I now transmit to you that opinion for your consideration, that you may determine whether you will advise submission to the opinion delivered by the sovereign arbiter and consent to its execution.

That you may the better be enabled to judge of the obligation as well as the expediency of submitting to or rejecting the decision of the arbiter, I herewith transmit—­

1.  A protest made by the minister plenipotentiary of the United States after receiving the opinion of the King of the Netherlands, on which paper it may be necessary to remark that I had always determined, whatever might have been the result of the examination by the sovereign arbiter, to have submitted the same to the Senate for their advice before I executed or rejected it.  Therefore no instructions were given to the ministers to do any act that should commit the Government as to the course it might deem proper to pursue on a full consideration of all the circumstances of the case.

2.  The dispatches from our minister at The Hague accompanying the protest, as well as those previous and subsequent thereto, in relation to the subject of the submission.

3.  Communications between the Department of State and the governor of the State of Maine in relation to this subject.

4.  Correspondence between the charge d’affaires of His Britannic Majesty and the Department of State in relation to the arrest of certain persons at Madawasca under the authority of the British Government at New Brunswick.

It is proper to add that in addition to the evidence derived from Mr. Treble’s dispatches of the inclination of the British Government to abide by the award, assurances to the same effect have been uniformly made to our minister at London, and that an official communication on that subject may very soon be expected.

ANDREW JACKSON.

Washington City, December 7, 1831.
To the Congress of the United States: 

I transmit herewith, for the information of Congress, two letters from the Secretary of State, accompanied by statements from that Department showing the progress which has been made in taking the Fifth Census of the inhabitants of the United States, and also by a printed copy of the revision of the statements heretofore transmitted to Congress of all former enumerations of the population of the United States and their Territories.

ANDREW JACKSON.

Washington, December 13, 1831.
To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States: 

The accompanying papers show the situation of extreme peril from which more than sixty of our fellow-citizens have been rescued by the courage and humanity of the master and crew of a Spanish brig.  As no property was saved, there were no means of making pecuniary satisfaction for the risk and loss incurred in performing this humane and meritorious service.  Believing, therefore, that the obligation devolved upon the nation, but having no funds at my disposal which I could think constitutionally applicable to the case, I have thought honor as well as justice required that the facts should be submitted to the consideration of Congress, in order that they might provide not only a just indemnity for the losses incurred, but some compensation adequate to the merits of the service.