Under existing circumstances the President deems it proper to wait for the definitive answer of the British Government to the last proposition offered by the United States. When received, a further communication to your excellency may be found proper, and if so will be made without unnecessary delay.
It can not be necessary to assure your excellency that the omission to reply to your communication forwarding to this Department the resolutions of the legislature of Maine did not in any degree arise either from a want of respect for their wishes or for the wishes of your excellency, or from indifference to the interests of the State. When these resolutions were received, there was every reason at no distant day to expect what is now daily looked for—a definitive answer to the proposition just alluded to, to which the attention of the British Government had been again forcibly invited about the time those resolutions were on their passage. Under this expectation a reply to the application from Maine was temporarily delayed; the more readily as about the time of its reception the Representatives of Maine, acting in reference to one of those resolutions, had a full and free conversation with the President. The most recent proceedings relative to the question of boundary were shown to them in this Department by his directions, and the occasion thus afforded was cheerfully embraced of offering frank and unreserved explanations of the President's views.
Of the recent events which have called the attention of the State of Maine to the question of the northeastern boundary, and which have been brought by it to the notice of the President, one—the arrest and imprisonment of Mr. Greely—has already been made the subject of communication with your excellency. All that it was competent for the Federal Executive to do has been done. Redress has been demanded, will be insisted upon, and is expected from that authority from whom alone redress can properly be sought. The President has followed the same course that was pursued by one of his predecessors and which was understood to be satisfactory to the State of Maine under circumstances of a somewhat similar character. In respect to the other—the projected construction of a railroad between St. Andrews and Quebec—a representation has been addressed to the British Government stating that the proposed measure is inconsistent with the understanding between the two Governments to preserve the status quo in the disputed territory until the question of boundary be satisfactorily adjusted, remonstrating against the project as contrary to the American claim and demanding a suspension of all further movements in execution of it. No answer has yet been received to this communication. From an informal conversation between the British minister at Washington and myself at the Department of State, the President is, however, firm in the conviction that the attempt to make the road in question will not be further prosecuted.
I am, in conclusion, directed to inform you that however unbounded may be the confidence of the legislature and people of Maine in the justice of their claim to the boundary contended for by the United States, the President's is not less so; and your excellency may rest assured that no exertions have been or shall be spared on his part to bring to a favorable and speedy termination a question involving interests so highly important to Maine and to the Union.
I have the honor to be, with high consideration, your excellency's obedient servant,
JOHN FORSYTH.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE,
Washington, August 25, 1837.
His Excellency ROBERT P. DUNLAP,
Governor of Maine.
SIR: I have the honor to transmit to your excellency, by direction of the President, the copy of a note from the British minister at Washington, dated yesterday, stating that the Government of Her Britannic Majesty has been pleased to direct the immediate discontinuance by the colonial authorities of Lower Canada and New Brunswick, respectively, of all operations connected with the projected railroad between the cities of Quebec and St. Andrews.
Mr. Fox took occasion on Wednesday last to inform me that Mr. Greely had been discharged from imprisonment at Frederickton, a fact of which doubtlessly your excellency has been some time since apprised.