Notes

Gentlemen, I have maturely considered the bill proposing to authorize a "subscription of stock in the Maysville...Road Company," and now return the same to the House of Representatives, in which it originated, with my objections to its passage...
Such grants [of money by the federal government] have always been [passed] under the control of the general principle that the works which might be thus aided should be "of a general, not local, national, not State," character. A disregard of this distinction would of necessity lead to the subversion of the federal system.... I am not able to view [the Maysville Road Bill] in any other light than as a measure of purely local character.... It has no connection with any established system of improvements; [and] is exclusively within the limits of a State [Kentucky]....
...As great as this object [goal of internal improvements] undoubtedly is, it is not the only one which demands the fostering care of the government. The preservation and success of the republican principle rest with us…. Through the favor of an overruling and indulgent Providence our country is blessed with a general prosperity and our citizens exempted from the pressure of taxation, which other less favored portions of the human family are obliged to bear; yet it is true that many of the taxes collected from our citizens… have for a considerable period been onerous. In many particulars these taxes have borne severely upon the laboring and less prosperous classes of the community