of reelecting only once the same President, leads to a thousand corrupt cabals between the members of Congress and heads of departments, who are thus made, almost necessarily, rival pretenders to the succession. The only possible chance for a head of a department to attain the Presidency is by ingratiating himself with the members of Congress; and as many of them have objects of their own to obtain, the temptation is immense to corrupt coalitions, and tends to make all the public offices objects of bargain and sale." The treaty with Spain, by which the United States acquired the Floridas, was signed by Onis and Adams on the 22d of December, 1819. To effect this treaty, so full of difficulty and responsibility, Mr. Adams had labored ever since he had become Secretary of State. His success was to him a subject of intense gratification; especially the acknowledgment of the right of the United States to a definite line of boundary to the South Sea. This right was not among our claims by the treaty of peace with Great Britain, nor among our pretensions under the purchase of Louisiana, for that gave the United States only the range of the Mississippi and its waters. Mr. Adams regarded the attainment of it as his own; as he had first proposed it on his own responsibility, and introduced it in his discussions with Onis and De Neuville. Its final attainment, under such circumstances, was a just subject of exultation, which was increased by the change of relations which the treaty produced with Spain, from the highest state of exasperation and imminent war, to a fair prospect of tranquillity and secure peace. The treaty was ratified by the President, with the unanimous advice of the Senate.