it from further violation; to persuade my countrymen, so far
as I may, that it is not in a splendid government supported by powerful
monopolies and aristocratical establishments that they will find
happiness or their liberties protection, but in a plain system, void
of pomp, protecting all and granting favors to none, dispensing its
blessings, like the dews of Heaven, unseen and unfelt save in the
freshness and beauty they contribute to produce. It is such a government
that the genius of our people requires; such an one only under which our
States may remain for ages to come united, prosperous, and free. If
the Almighty Being who has hitherto sustained and protected me will
but vouchsafe to make my feeble powers instrumental to such a result,
I shall anticipate with pleasure the place to be assigned me in the
history of my country, and die contented with the belief that I have
contributed in some small degree to increase the value and prolong the
duration of American liberty.

To the end that the resolution of the Senate may not be hereafter
drawn into precedent with the authority of silent acquiescence on the
part of the executive department, and to the end also that my motives
and views in the Executive proceedings denounced in that resolution may
be known to my fellow-citizens, to the world, and to all posterity, I
respectfully request that this message and protest may be entered at
length on the journals of the Senate.

ANDREW JACKSON.

APRIL 21, 1834.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

Having reason to believe that certain passages contained in my message
and protest transmitted to the Senate on the 17th [15th] instant may be
misunderstood, I think it proper to state that it was not my intention
to deny in the said message the power and right of the legislative
department to provide by law for the custody, safe-keeping, and
disposition of the public money and property of the United States.

Although I am well satisfied that such a construction is not warranted
by anything contained in that message, yet aware from experience that
detached passages of an argumentative document, when disconnected from
their context and considered without reference to previous limitations
and the particular positions they were intended to refute or to
establish, may be made to bear a construction varying altogether from
the sentiments really entertained and intended to be expressed, and
deeply solicitous that my views o