hardship, and it remains for Congress to decide whether any, and what,
relief ought to be granted to them. Our minister to Mexico has been
instructed to ascertain the facts of the case from the Mexican
Government in an authentic and official form and report the result with
as little delay as possible.

My attention was early directed to the negotiation which on the 4th
of March last I found pending at Washington between the United States
and Great Britain on the subject of the Oregon Territory. Three several
attempts had been previously made to settle the questions in dispute
between the two countries by negotiation upon the principle of compromise,
but each had proved unsuccessful. These negotiations took place
at London in the years 1818, 1824, and 1826--the two first under the
Administration of Mr. Monroe and the last under that of Mr. Adams.

The negotiation of 1818, having failed to accomplish its object,
resulted in the convention of the 20th of October of that year. By the
third article of that convention it was--

Agreed that any country that may be claimed by either party on the
northwest coast of America westward of the Stony Mountains shall,
together with its harbors, bays, and creeks, and the navigation of all
rivers within the same, be free and open for the term of ten years from
the date of the signature of the present convention to the vessels,
citizens, and subjects of the two powers; it being well understood that
this agreement is not to be construed to the prejudice of any claim
which either of the two high contracting parties may have to any part of
the said country, nor shall it be taken to affect the claims of any
other power or state to any part of the said country, the only object of
the high contracting parties in that respect being to prevent disputes