On the 26th May, 1824, an act was passed making
appropriations for "deepening the channel leading into the harbor of
Presque Isle, in the State of Pennsylvania," and to "repair Plymouth
Beach, in the State of Massachusetts, and thereby prevent the harbor
at that place from being destroyed."
President Monroe yielded his approval to these measures, though he
entertained, and had, in a message to the House of Representatives on
the 4th of May, 1822, expressed, the opinion that the Constitution had
not conferred upon Congress the power to "adopt and execute a system of
internal improvements." He placed his approval upon the ground, not that
Congress possessed the power to "adopt and execute" such a system by
virtue of any or all of the enumerated grants of power in the
Constitution, but upon the assumption that the power to make
appropriations of the public money was limited and restrained only by
the discretion of Congress. In coming to this conclusion he avowed that
"in the more early stage of the Government" he had entertained a
different opinion.
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