n act to exempt the vessels of Portugal from the
payment of duties of tonnage," it was enacted as follows: "No duties
upon tonnage shall be hereafter levied or collected of the vessels of
the Kingdom of Portugal: _Provided, always_, That whenever the President
of the United States shall be satisfied that the vessels of the United
States are subjected in the ports of the Kingdom of Portugal to payment
of any duties of tonnage, he shall by proclamation declare the fact, and
the duties now payable by vessels of that Kingdom shall be levied and
paid as if this act had not been passed;" and

Whereas satisfactory evidence has been received by me not only that
the vessels of the United States are subjected in the ports of the
said Kingdom of Portugal to payment of duties of tonnage, but that a
discrimination exists in respect to those duties against the vessels
of the United States:

Now, therefore, I, Martin Van Buren, President of the United States
of America, do hereby declare that fact and proclaim that the duties
payable by vessels of the said Kingdom of Portugal on the 25th day of
May, 1832, shall henceforth be levied and paid as if the said act of
the 25th of May, 1832, had not been passed.

Given under my hand, at the city of Washington, the 11th day of October,
1837, and of the Independence of the United States the sixty-second.

M. VAN BUREN.

By the President:
JOHN FORSYTH,
_Secretary of State_.

FIRST ANNUAL MESSAGE.

WASHINGTON, _December 5, 1837_.

_Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives_:

We have reason to renew the expression of our devout gratitude to the
Giver of All Good for His benign protection. Our country presents on
every side the evidences of that continued favor under whose auspices
it has gradually risen from a few feeble and dependent colonies to a
prosperous and powerful confederacy. We are blessed with domestic
tranquillity and all the elements of national prosperity. The pestilence
which, invading for a time some flourishing portions of the Union,
interrupted the general prevalence of unusual health has happily been
limited in extent and arrested in its fatal career. The industry and
prudence of our citizens are gradually relieving them from the pecuniary
embarrassments under which portions of them have labored; judicious
legislation and the natural and boundless resources of the country have
afforded wise and timely aid to private enterprise, and th