Joint congressional committee announces to President that Congress is ready to receive communications. Senate Journal, 6.

President communicates Second Annual Message to Congress: Foreign relations are more satisfactory than might be expected. Treaty with Great Britain for suppression of slave trade is in operation with prospect of success. Negro colonies from U.S. may soon migrate to Liberia and Haiti. Commercial relations with leading nations are undisturbed. System of banking associations will circulate notes of uniform appearance and security. Treasury receipts amounted to $583 million, expenditures to $570 million. Public lands are no longer source of revenue. System for Indian affairs may need remodeling. Progress has been made on construction of Pacific railroad. Department of Agriculture has been organized. President recommends that Congress propose three amendments to Constitution: 1. Every State that abolishes slavery before January 1, 1900, shall receive compensation from the U.S. 2. All slaves who shall have enjoyed actual freedom by chances of war shall be forever free. 3. Congress may appropriate money, and otherwise provide for colonizing free colored persons with their own consent, at any place or places outside U.S. Annual Message to Congress, 1 December 1862, CW, 5:518-37.

President writes Judge Adv. Gen. Joseph Holt: "Three hundred Indians have been sentenced to death in Minnesota by a Military Commission, and execution only awaits my action. I wish your legal opinion whether if I should conclude to execute only a part of them, I must myself designate which." Abraham Lincoln to Joseph Holt, 1 December 1862, CW, 5:537-38.

In afternoon Lincoln repeats to Sen. Browning (Ill.) at White House, "McClellan is too slow." Browning, Diary.

Informs Sec. Stanton of order that officers of military forces organized by Gov. Gamble (Mo.) may be removed and resignations accepted by Gov. Gamble, whose action will be confirmed by War Dept. Abraham Lincoln to Edwin M. Stanton, 2 December 1862, CW, 5:538.

Sen. Sumner (Mass.) interviews President in interest of Gen. Butler. Benjamin F. Butler, Autobiography and Personal Reminiscences . . . Butler's Book (Boston: A. M. Thayer, 1892), 552.

President receives Senate resolution requesting "all information in his possession touching the late Indian barbarities in the State of Minnesota." Abraham Lincoln to Caleb B. Smith, 5 December 1862, CW, 5:540-41.

Receives November salary warrant for $2,022.34. Pratt, Personal Finances, 182.

[Irwin deposits $75 in Springfield Marine Bank, interest on Cline note. Pratt, Personal Finances, 165.]

5 P.M. Sunday dinner party at White House includes Sen. Browning (Ill.), Sen. Harris (N.Y.), and members of President's staff. Nicolay to Bates, 7 December 1862, John G. Nicolay Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, DC; Browning, Diary.

Cabinet meets. Principal topic for attention is new state of West Virginia. Welles, Diary.

President and Atty. Gen. Bates confer with Rev. Samuel B. McPheeters, pastor of Pine Street Presbyterian Church, St. Louis, who was ordered by Provost Marshal Franklin A. Dick on December 19, 1862 to leave state within 10 days because of sympathy with rebellion. Abraham Lincoln to Samuel R. Curtis, 2 January 1863, CW, 6:33.

Lincoln directs Gen. Curtis: "Let the order in regard to Dr. McPheeters and family be suspended until you hear from me again." Abraham Lincoln to Samuel R. Curtis, 27 December 1862, CW, 6:20.

In evening Sen. Sumner (Mass.) reads aloud to President memorial from clergymen regarding Emancipation Proclamation. Gen. Burnside also at White House in evening. John M. Forbes, Letters and Recollections of John Murray Forbes, 2 vols. (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1899), 1:352-53.

Special cabinet meeting at 10 A.M. to make final revision of Emancipation Proclamation. Welles, Diary; Daily National Republican (Washington, DC), 1 January 1863, 2:2.

General Ambrose E. Burnside, in Washington to testify before court martial of General Fitz John Porter, confers with President and Secretary of War on military matters. Burnside to Lincoln, 30 December 1862, Abraham Lincoln Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, DC; Thomas Harry Williams, Lincoln and the Radicals (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1941), 223; Daily National Republican (Washington, DC), 1 January 1863, 2:2.

President signs agreement with Bernard Kock, promoter and self-styled "Governor of A'Vache Island," for colony of freedmen on Ile à Vache, dependency of Haiti. Monaghan, Diplomat, 272.

Interviews "old lady of genteel appearance" who has been ordered by government to vacate building where she lives and keeps boarders. Abraham Lincoln to Edwin M. Stanton, 1 January 1863, CW, 6:33.

Approves act admitting state of West Virginia into Union, and for other purposes. Stat. L., XII, 633; Abraham Lincoln to Members of the Cabinet, 23 December 1862, CW, 6:17.

[Irwin deposits $1,195.83 in Springfield Marine Bank, principal and interest on Smith, Edwards & Co. note. Pratt, Personal Finances, 165.]