GEORGE WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, April 16, 1794.

Gentlemen of the Senate: 

The communications which I have made to you during your present session from the dispatches of our minister in London contain a serious aspect of our affairs with Great Britain.  But as peace ought to be pursued with unremitted zeal before the last resource, which has so often been the scourge of nations, and can not fail to check the advanced prosperity of the United States, is contemplated, I have thought proper to nominate, and do hereby nominate, John Jay as envoy extraordinary of the United States to His Britannic Majesty.

My confidence in our minister plenipotentiary in London continues undiminished.  But a mission like this, while it corresponds with the solemnity of the occasion, will announce to the world a solicitude for a friendly adjustment of our complaints and a reluctance to hostility.  Going immediately from the United States, such an envoy will carry with him a full knowledge of the existing temper and sensibility of our country, and will thus be taught to vindicate our rights with firmness and to cultivate peace with sincerity.

GEORGE WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, May 12, 1794.

Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives: 

As the letter which I forwarded to Congress on the 15th day of April last, from the minister plenipotentiary of His Britannic Majesty to the Secretary of State, in answer to a memorial of our minister in London, related to a very interesting subject, I thought it proper not to delay its communication.  But since that time the memorial itself has been received in a letter from our minister, and a reply has been made to that answer by the Secretary of State.  Copies of them are therefore now transmitted.

I also send the copy of a letter from the governor of Rhode Island, inclosing an act of the legislature of that State empowering the United States to hold lands within the same for the purpose of erecting fortifications, and certain papers concerning patents for the donation lands to the ancient settlers of Vincennes upon the Wabash.

GEORGE WASHINGTON.

UNITED STATES, May 20, 1794.

Gentlemen of the Senate and of the House of Representatives: 

In the communications which I have made to Congress during the present session relative to foreign nations I have omitted no opportunity of testifying my anxiety to preserve the United States in peace.  It is peculiarly, therefore, my duty at this time to lay before you the present state of certain hostile threats against the territories of Spain in our neighborhood.

The documents which accompany this message develop the measures which I have taken to suppress them, and the intelligence which has been lately received.

It will be seen from thence that the subject has not been neglected; that every power vested in the Executive on such occasions has been exerted, and that there was reason to believe that the enterprise projected against the Spanish dominions was relinquished.