eamers, the power and capacity of which
recommended them, as the best means of inter-communication by
mail, and of transportation for lighter and more profitable
freights, and American interests were becoming every day more and
more tributary to British ascendency on the ocean.

"Under the circumstances above stated, it was impossible for
Congress to hesitate for a moment which course to pursue, and it
was determined to adopt a policy which, while it would be in
strict accordance with the spirit of our free institutions, should
place the country in its proper attitude, and render its commerce
and postal arrangements independent of all foreign or rival
agencies.

"Of the correctness of this determination, experience has
furnished the most ample evidences in the results which thus far
have attended the prosecution of the system. The line between
New-York and Chagres _via_ New-Orleans and its auxiliaries, have,
by their superiority in point of swiftness and accommodation,
already superseded the British steamers which had previously plied
along our Southern maritime frontier, and the United States mails
for Mexico, South-America, and our possessions on the Pacific are
no longer in the hands of foreign carriers, but are transported in
American steamers of the first class, convertible, at a very small
expense, into war steamers, should occasion require, which have
commanded the admiration of the world by their fleetness and the
elegance of their accommodations for the travelling public. Our
Southern ports are, consequently, no longer frequented by British
steamers, commanded by officers of the British crown, whose
legitimate business it is to collect intelligence respecting the
approaches to and defenses of the harbors which they visit, to be
made available for their own purposes, in the event of the
existence of hostile relations.

"A similar result has, to a certain extent, attended the
establishment of the American, or Collins line, between New-York
and Liverpool. Previously to the commencement of this line, the
transportation of the United States mail matter, as well as the
finer and more destructible descriptions of merchandise, requiring
rapidity of transmission to and from Europe, had been monopolized
by the British Cunard line; and the British Government had, within