Part 59

In reply to the resolution of your honorable body of the 5th instant, I herewith communicate a report of the Secretary of the Interior giving the information required.

MILLARD FILLMORE.

To the Senate of the United States:

In answer to the resolution of the Senate dated the 13th ultimo, requesting further information in regard to the imprisonment of the United States consul and of other American citizens in the castle at Acapulco, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State and the documents by which it is accompanied.

MILLARD FILLMORE.

JANUARY 17, 1853.

WASHINGTON, January 17, 1853.

To the Senate and House of Representatives:

I transmit herewith a communication lately received at the Department of State from the minister of Her Most Catholic Majesty, accompanied by a letter of instructions from the Spanish Government relative to the case of the Amistad. In Mr. Calderon's communication reference is had to former letters addressed by him to the Department of State on the same subject, copies of which are herewith transmitted, and an earnest wish is expressed that a final settlement of this long-pending claim should be made. The tone of the letter of instructions from Mr. Manuel Bertran de Lis is somewhat more peremptory than could be wished, but this circumstance will not, probably, prevent Congress from giving his suggestions the attention to which they may be entitled.

The claim of the Spanish Government on behalf of its subjects interested in the Amistad was the subject of discussion during the Administration of President Tyler between the Spanish minister and Mr. Webster, then Secretary of State. In an elaborate letter of the latter, addressed to the Chevalier d'Argais on the 1st of September, 1841, the opinion is confidently maintained that the claim is unfounded. The Administration of President Polk took a different view of the matter. The justice of the claim was recognized in a letter from the Department of State to the Spanish minister of the 19th of March, 1847, and in his annual message of the same year the President recommended its payment.

Under these circumstances the attention of Congress is again invited to the subject. Respect to the Spanish Government demands that its urgent representation should be candidly and impartially weighed. If Congress should be of opinion that the claim is just, every consideration points to the propriety of its prompt recognition and payment, and if the two Houses should come to the opposite conclusion it is equally desirable that the result should be announced without unnecessary delay.

MILLARD FILLMORE.

WASHINGTON, January 18, 1853.

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States:

I have the honor herewith to transmit a report from the Secretary of the Interior, from which it appears that the efforts of that Department to induce the Indians remaining in Florida to migrate to the country assigned to their tribe west of the Mississippi have been entirely unsuccessful. The only alternative that now remains is either to compel them by force to comply with the treaty made with the tribe in May, 1832, by which they agreed to migrate within three years from that date, or allow the arrangement made with them in 1842, referred to in the Secretary's report, by which they were permitted to remain in the temporary occupancy of a portion of the peninsula until the Government should see fit to remove them, to continue.

It can not be denied that the withholding so large a portion of her territory from settlement is a source of injury to the State of Florida; and although, ever since the arrangement above referred to, the Indians have manifested a desire to remain at peace with the whites, the presence of a people who may at any time and upon any real or fancied provocation be driven to acts of hostility is a source of constant anxiety and alarm to the inhabitants on that border.

There can be no doubt, also, that the welfare of the Indians would be promoted by their removal from a territory where frequent collisions between them and their more powerful neighbors are daily becoming more inevitable.

On the other hand, there is every reason to believe that any manifestation of a design to remove them by force or to take possession of the territory allotted to them would be immediately retaliated by acts of cruelty on the defenseless inhabitants.

The number of Indians now remaining in the State is, it is true, very inconsiderable (not exceeding, it is believed, 500), but owing to the extent of the country occupied by them and its adaptation to their peculiar mode of warfare, a force very disproportioned to their numbers would be necessary to capture them, or even to protect the white settlements from their incursions. The military force now stationed in that State would be inadequate to these objects, and if it should be determined to enforce their removal or to survey the territory allotted to them some addition to it would be necessary, as the Government has but a small force available for that service. Additional appropriations for the support of the Army would also, in that event, be necessary.

For these reasons I have deemed it proper to submit the whole matter to Congress, for such action as they may deem best.

MILLARD FILLMORE.

WASHINGTON, January 19, 1853.

To the House of Representatives:

In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of the 27th ultimo, requesting information relative to the claims on Spain in the cases of the bark Georgiana and the brig Susan Loud, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State, to whom the resolution was referred.

MILLARD FILLMORE.

WASHINGTON, January 21, 1853.

To the Senate of the United States:

In compliance with the resolution of the Senate of the 10th instant, requesting certain correspondence relative to Central America, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State and the documents by which it was accompanied.