I have deemed it my duty to thus bring to the knowledge of my
countrymen, as well as to the attention of their representatives charged
with the responsibility of legislative relief, the gravity of our
financial situation. The failure of the Congress heretofore to provide
against the dangers which it was quite evident the very nature of the
difficulty must necessarily produce caused a condition of financial
distress and apprehension since your last adjournment which taxed to the
utmost all the authority and expedients within executive control; and
these appear now to be exhausted. If disaster results from the continued
inaction of Congress, the responsibility must rest where it belongs.
Though the situation thus far considered is fraught with danger which
should be fully realized, and though it presents features of wrong to
the people as well as peril to the country, it is but a result growing
out of a perfectly palpable and apparent cause, constantly reproducing
the same alarming circumstances--a congested National Treasury and a
depleted monetary condition in the business of the country. It need
hardly be stated that while the present situation demands a remedy, we
can only be saved from a like predicament in the future by the removal
of its cause.
Our scheme of taxation, by means of which this needless surplus is
taken from the people and put into the public Treasury, consists of a
tariff or duty levied upon importations from abroad and internal-revenue
taxes levied upon the consumption of tobacco and spirituous and malt
liquors.
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