NEW HAMPSHIRE PATRIOT, Concord, Dec. 16, 1817

• President James Monroe - SOTUA
• "Era of Good Feelings" - post War of 1812

Most of the front page is taken up with the "MESSAGE" of the President to Congress concluding on page 2, where it is signed in type by the President: James Monroe.
This is the President's annual state-of-the-union address to the nation. Page 2 also has editorial commentary on the President's address.
Four pages never-trimmed margins, light dirtiness to the top quadrant of the front page, good condition.

Background: The 1817 State of the Union Address—delivered by James Monroe on December 2 as his First Annual Message to Congress—stands as a rare historical snapshot of nearly total national consensus, capturing the United States at the vibrant onset of the "Era of Good Feelings" following the War of 1812. Most notably, Monroe officially announced the landmark Rush-Bagot Agreement, a historic diplomatic achievement that secured demilitarization along the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain, laying the permanent foundation for the unfortified U.S.–Canadian border. Uniquely balanced between domestic expansion and foreign policy, the address documented an booming federal Treasury driven by post-war trade and land sales—allowing Monroe to propose rapid national debt reduction—while simultaneously outlining military operations to suppress illicit privateering and smuggling at Amelia Island and Galveston along the contested Spanish Florida border. Furthermore, Monroe struck a delicate international balance by proclaiming strict U.S. neutrality toward South American revolutions against Spain—establishing the foundational ideological framework that would evolve six years later into the Monroe Doctrine—while urging Congress to consider a constitutional amendment to fund national roads and canals, making this address a rare, comprehensive blueprint of early American peace, prosperity, and hemispheric ambition.