was in the country nearest to the Seminoles, Creeks, and Cherokees, and in like manner near the force designated for the western frontier, except a fraction of about 430 men to be hereafter selected when it should be ascertained where it would be most needed.  It is therefore unaccountable to me why General Wool would receive and muster into the service a greater number than has been called for and placed under his command, particularly as he knew that Tennessee had already been called upon for more volunteers than her proportion in the general apportionment.  He knows that the President can only execute the law, and he ought to have recollected that if the officers charged with the military operations contemplated by the law were to use their own discretion in fixing the number of men to be received and mustered into the service there could be no certainty in the amount of force which would be brought into the field.  His guide was the requisition upon Tennessee for 2,500, and he should never have departed from it.

The brave men whose patriotism brought them into the field ought to be paid, but I seriously doubt whether any of the money now appropriated can be used for this purpose, as all the volunteers authorized by the act of Congress have been apportioned, and the appropriations should be first applicable to their payment if they should be ordered into the field.  All that we can do is to bring the subject before the next Congress, which I trust will pass an act authorizing the payment.  Those men obeyed the summons of their country, and ought not to suffer for the indiscretion of those who caused more of them to turn out than could be received into the service.  The excess would have been avoided had the governor of Tennessee apportioned his requisition to each county or regiment, so as to make the proper number.  This, however, can now only be regretted.  I can not approve the mustering or reception into the service of the excess further than it may have been done to secure them hereafter the justice which it will be in the power of Congress to extend to them.  They ought to be paid for their travel and expense to, at, and from the place of rendezvous, and Congress will doubtless pass the necessary law.  Their promptness in tendering their services and equipping themselves for the field is a high evidence of patriotism, and the thanks of their country.

I shall inclose a copy of this letter to General Wool, and write to the governors of Kentucky, Mississippi, and Louisiana to withhold for the present the quota called for under General Gaines’s requisition, and if they are concentrated to muster and discharge them and wait for further orders.

I am, yours, respectfully,

ANDREW JACKSON.

EIGHTH ANNUAL MESSAGE.

WASHINGTON, December 5, 1836.

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives: