strong fortification in some eligible position on the confines of that portion of our territory to which an adverse claim is set up by Great Britain.  In the opinion of your committee, the subject has lost none of its interest since that period, but, on the contrary, the events to which we have alluded give to it vastly augmented importance; and to our view, irrespective of any conditions growing out of the present controversy, a strong fortification upon the northeastern boundary of the United States, situated far in the interior and upon the confines of a foreign country, and surrounded by millions of acres of fertile land, destined soon to be peopled with a numerous population of hardy yeomanry, is of high importance.

Our isolated situation, being the northeastern boundary of the nation, with an interior frontier upward of 600 miles upon a foreign country and a large proportion of our territory lying between two Provinces of Great Britain and so situated as to render it greatly to the advantage of that nation to possess it; the inflexible determination which she manifests to pursue the course which interest dictates should not be forgotten; the extent of our seacoast; the exposed situation of our seaport towns, lying within a few hours’ sail of the British naval depot in the neighborhood of Maine; the disastrous consequences of our defenseless situation during the last war; the great and increasing maritime interests which we have at stake without one single point where a ship, if dependent upon the United States fortifications, would be safe from the attacks of a frigate—­these and the consideration that little, comparatively, has yet been done for Maine seem to our view to constitute irresistible reasons why Maine should no longer be forgotten or neglected in the common defense of the country.

Through all the long-protracted struggles, difficulties, and embarrassments of our infant Republic this portion of our Union has never been urgent or importunate in pressing its claims, but has submitted patiently to the force of circumstances which rendered it necessary to defer them.

But in the present altered condition of the country—­the national debt paid off at a season of universal peace and unexampled prosperity, with an overburthened Treasury, and when it is deemed necessary to dispose of it to resort to measures which many eminent statesmen consider unwarranted by the Constitution and which a great portion of the people of the Union consider of doubtful policy—­at such a period and under such circumstances it is difficult to perceive the justice of longer withholding suitable appropriations for the defense of Maine, and to our view it can only be withheld by doing violence to the principles of equal rights and by neglecting a plain constitutional duty.

Your committee therefore submit the following resolutions.

STEPHEN C. FOSTER,

Chairman.

STATE OF MAINE.