Note 226 — Chapter III · The Power of Congress to Establish Postroads

Richardson, vol. ii, p. 142. Monroe’s veto was not unexpected. He had sounded a warning in his annual message of 1822 when he said that a power to execute a system of internal improvements, “confined to great national purposes and with proper limitations, would be productive of eminent advantage to our Union,” and thus “thought it advisable that an amendment of the Constitution to that effect should be recommended to the several states.” Ibid., vol. ii, p. 191.