Hon. JOHN MILLEDGE,
_President pro tempore of the Senate_.
SIR: I beg leave through you to inform the honorable the Senate of the
United States that I propose to take the oath which the Constitution
prescribes to the President of the United States before he enters on the
execution of his office on Saturday, the 4th instant, at 12 o'clock, in
the Chamber of the House of Representatives.
I have the honor to be, with the greatest respect, sir, your most
obedient and most humble servant,
JAMES MADISON.
FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS.
Unwilling to depart from examples of the most revered authority, I avail
myself of the occasion now presented to express the profound impression
made on me by the call of my country to the station to the duties of
which I am about to pledge myself by the most solemn of sanctions. So
distinguished a mark of confidence, proceeding from the deliberate and
tranquil suffrage of a free and virtuous nation, would under any
circumstances have commanded my gratitude and devotion, as well as
filled me with an awful sense of the trust to be assumed. Under the
various circumstances which give peculiar solemnity to the existing
period, I feel that both the honor and the responsibility allotted to me
are inexpressibly enhanced.
The present situation of the world is indeed without a parallel, and
that of our own country full of difficulties.
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