Gentlemen of the House of Representatives:
I now transmit a report from the Secretary of State with the information requested in your resolution of the 17th instant.
In making this communication I deem it proper to observe that I was led by the regard due to the rights and interests of the United States and to the just sensibility of the portion of our fellow-citizens more immediately affected by the irregular proceeding at New Orleans to lose not a moment in causing every step to be taken which the occasion claimed from me, being equally aware of the obligation to maintain in all cases the rights of the nation and to employ for that purpose those just and honorable means which belong to the character of the United States.
TH: JEFFERSON.
Thomas Jefferson, Special Message Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/203520