To Delaware Bay and River, 15.

To New York, the Sound, and waters as far as Cape Cod, 50.

To Boston and the harbors north of Cape Cod, 50.

The flotillas assigned to these several stations might each be under the care of a particular commandant, and the vessels composing them would in ordinary be distributed among the harbors within the station in proportion to their importance.

Of these boats a proper proportion would be of the larger size, such as those heretofore built, capable of navigating any seas and of reenforcing occasionally the strength of even the most distant ports when menaced with danger.  The residue would be confined to their own or the neighboring harbors, would be smaller, less furnished for accommodation, and consequently less costly.  Of the number supposed necessary, 73 are built or building, and the 127 still to be provided would cost from $500,000 to $600,000.  Having regard to the convenience of the Treasury as well as to the resources for building, it has been thought that the one-half of these might be built in the present year and the other half the next.  With the Legislature, however, it will rest to stop where we are, or at any further point, when they shall be of opinion that the number provided shall be sufficient for the object.

At times when Europe as well as the United States shall be at peace it would not be proposed that more than six or eight of these vessels should be kept afloat.  When Europe is in war, treble that number might be necessary, to be distributed among those particular harbors which foreign vessels of war are in the habit of frequenting for the purpose of preserving order therein.  But they would be manned in ordinary, with only their complement for navigation, relying on the seamen and militia of the port if called into action on any sudden emergency.  It would be only when the United States should themselves be at war that the whole number would be brought into active service, and would be ready in the first moments of the war to cooperate with the other means for covering at once the line of our seaports.  At all times those unemployed would be withdrawn into places not exposed to sudden enterprise, hauled up under sheds from the sun and weather, and kept in preservation with little expense for repairs or maintenance.

It must be superfluous to observe that this species of naval armament is proposed merely for defensive operation; that it can have but little effect toward protecting our commerce in the open seas, even on our own coast; and still less can it become an excitement to engage in offensive maritime war, toward which it would furnish no means.

TH.  JEFFERSON.

FEBRUARY 11, 1807.

To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States: 

I now lay before Congress a statement of the militia of the United States according to the latest returns received by the Department of War.  From two of the States no returns have ever been received.