that the military should be held subordinate to the civil power. The
gradual increase of our Navy, whose flag has displayed in distant climes
our skill in navigation and our fame in arms; the preservation of our
forts, arsenals, and dockyards, and the introduction of progressive
improvements in the discipline and science of both branches of our
military service are so plainly prescribed by prudence that I should be
excused for omitting their mention sooner than for enlarging on their
importance. But the bulwark of our defense is the national militia,
which in the present state of our intelligence and population must
render us invincible. As long as our Government is administered for the
good of the people, and is regulated by their will; as long as it
secures to us the rights of person and of property, liberty of
conscience and of the press, it will be worth defending; and so long as
it is worth defending a patriotic militia will cover it with an
impenetrable aegis. Partial injuries and occasional mortifications we
may be subjected to, but a million of armed freemen, possessed of the
means of war, can never be conquered by a foreign foe. To any just
system, therefore, calculated to strengthen this natural safeguard of
the country I shall cheerfully lend all the aid in my power.

It will be my sincere and constant desire to observe toward the Indian
tribes within our limits a just and liberal policy, and to give that
humane and considerate attention to their rights and their wants which
is consistent with the habits of our Government and the feelings of our
people.

The recent demonstration of public sentiment inscribes on the list of
Executive duties, in characters too legible to be overlooked, the task
of _reform_, which will require particularly the correction of those
abuses that have brought the patronage of the Federal Government into