The principles of our
Government leading us to the employment of such moderate garrisons in
time of peace as may merely take care of the post, and to a reliance on
the neighboring militia for its support in the first moments of war,
I have thought it would be important to obtain from the Indians such a
cession in the neighborhood of these posts as might maintain a militia
proportioned to this object; and I have particularly contemplated, with
this view, the acquisition of the eastern moiety of the peninsula
between lakes Michigan and Huron, comprehending the waters of the latter
and of Detroit River, so soon as it could be effected with the perfect
good will of the natives. Governor Hull was therefore appointed a
commissioner to treat with them on this subject, but was instructed to
confine his propositions for the present to so much of the tract before
described as lay south of Saguina Bay and round to the Connecticut
Reserve, so as to consolidate the new with the present settled country.
The result has been an acquisition of so much only of what would have
been acceptable as extends from the neighborhood of Saguina Bay to the
Miami of the Lakes, with a prospect of soon obtaining a breadth of 2
miles for a communication from the Miami to the Connecticut Reserve.
The treaty for this purpose entered into with the Ottoways, Chippeways,
Wyandots, and Pottawattamies at Detroit on the 17th of November last is
now transmitted to the Senate, and I ask their advice and consent as to
its ratification.
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