Fellow-Citizens: Being about to retire finally from public life, I beg leave to offer you my grateful thanks for the many proofs of kindness and confidence which I have received at your hands. It has been my fortune in the discharge of public duties, civil and military, frequently to have found myself in difficult and…

Fellow-Citizens: THE will of the American people, expressed through their unsolicited suffrages, calls me before you to pass through the solemnities preparatory to taking upon myself the duties of President of the United States for another term. For their approbation of my public conduct through a period which has not been without its difficulties, and…

Gentlemen of the Senate and House of Representatives: In my annual message at the commencement of your present session I adverted to the opposition to the revenue laws in a particular quarter of the United States, which threatened not merely to thwart their execution, but to endanger the integrity of the Union; and although I…

The bill » to modify and continue » the act entitled «An act to incorporate the subscribers to the Bank of the United States » was presented to me on the 4th July instant. Having considered it with that solemn regard to the principles of the Constitution which the day was calculated to inspire, and…

Fellow Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives: It affords me pleasure to tender my friendly greetings to you on the occasion of your assembling at the seat of Government to enter upon the important duties to which you have been called by the voice of our country-men. The task devolves on…

Fellow-Citizens: ABOUT to undertake the arduous duties that I have been appointed to perform by the choice of a free people, I avail myself of this customary and solemn occasion to express the gratitude which their confidence inspires and to acknowledge the accountability which my situation enjoins. While the magnitude of their interests convinces me…

My fellow Americans, the upcoming national elections present a very important choice. We can forge a “true” representative democracy for the first time in history, and be led by our directly elected leaders. Or we can continue to live in an aristocratic republic run by over-educated elitists who are not beholden to the will of…