Third.  Declare church and state forever separate and distinct, but each free within their proper spheres; and that all church property shall bear its own proportion of taxation.

Fourth.  Drive out licensed immorality, such as polygamy and the importation of women for illegitimate purposes.  To recur again to the centennial year, it would seem as though now, as we are about to begin the second century of our national existence, would be a most fitting time for these reforms.

Fifth.  Enact such laws as will insure a speedy return to a sound currency, such as will command the respect of the world.

Believing that these views will commend themselves to the great majority of the right-thinking and patriotic citizens of the United States, I submit the rest to Congress.

U. S. GRANT

***

State of the Union Address
Ulysses S. Grant
December 5, 1876

To the Senate and House of Representatives: 

In submitting my eighth and last annual message to Congress it seems proper that I should refer to and in some degree recapitulate the events and official acts of the past eight years.

It was my fortune, or misfortune, to be called to the office of Chief Executive without any previous political training.  From the age of 17 I had never even witnessed the excitement attending a Presidential campaign but twice antecedent to my own candidacy, and at but one of them was I eligible as a voter.

Under such circumstances it is but reasonable to suppose that errors of judgment must have occurred.  Even had they not, differences of opinion between the Executive, bound by an oath to the strict performance of his duties, and writers and debaters must have arisen.  It is not necessarily evidence of blunder on the part of the Executive because there are these differences of views.  Mistakes have been made, as all can see and I admit, but it seems to me oftener in the selections made of the assistants appointed to aid in carrying out the various duties of administering the Government—­in nearly every case selected without a personal acquaintance with the appointee, but upon recommendations of the representatives chosen directly by the people.  It is impossible, where so many trusts are to be allotted, that the right parties should be chosen in every instance.  History shows that no Administration from the time of Washington to the present has been free from these mistakes.  But I leave comparisons to history, claiming only that I have acted in every instance from a conscientious desire to do what was right, constitutional, within the law, and for the very best interests of the whole people.  Failures have been errors of judgment, not of intent.