Obrázky stránek
PDF
ePub

let me receive a recommendation from you as quickly as possible. And in all cases, when an office becomes vacant in your State, as the distance would occasion a great delay were you to wait to be regularly consulted, I shall be much obliged to you to recommend the best characters. There is nothing I am so anxious about as making the best possible appointments, and no case in which the best men are more liable to mislead us, by yielding to the solicitations of applicants. For this reason your own spontaneous recommendation would be desirable. Now to answer your particulars, seriatim,

Levees are done away.

The first communication to the next Congress will be, like all subsequent ones, by message, to which no answer will be expected.

The diplomatic establishment in Europe will be reduced to three ministers.

The compensations to collectors depend on you, and not on me.

TO GEORGE CLINTON.

J. MSS.

WASHINGTON, May 17, 1801.

DEAR SIR,-To you I need not make the observation that of all the duties imposed on the executive head of a government, appointment to office is the most difficult & most irksome. You have had long experience of it, and are, I hope, by this time ascertained of being in the way of experiencing it again, on which accept my sincere congratulations. Dis

posed myself to make as few changes in office as possible, to endeavor to restore harmony by avoiding everything harsh, and to remove only for malconduct, I have nevertheless been persuaded that circumstances in your state, and still more in the neighboring states on both sides, require something more. It is represented that the Collector, Naval officer, & Supervisor ought all to be removed for the violence of their characters & conduct. The following arrangement was agreed on by Colo. Burr & some of your Senators & representatives. David Gelston, collector, Theodorus Bailey, Naval officer, & M. L. Davis, Supervisor. Yet all did not agree in all the particulars, & I have since received letters expressly stating that Mr. Bailey has not readiness & habit enough of business for the office of Naval officer, & some suggestions that Mr. Davis's standing in society, & other circumstances will render his not a respectable appointment to the important office of Supervisor. Unacquainted myself with these & the other characters in the state which might be proper for these offices, & forced to decide on the opinions of others, there is no one whose opinion would command with me greater respect than yours, if you would be so good as to advise me, which of these characters & what others would be fittest for these offices. Not only competent talents, but respectability in the public estimation are to be considered. You You may be assured that your information to me shall be confidential & used only to inform my own judgment. We also want a marshall for the Albany district. S. Southwick had been

thought of but he will not accept.

Will you

be so

good as to propose one? Hoping for your friendly aid in these appointments, I pray you to accept assurances of my perfect esteem & high consideration & respect.

TO WILLIAM DUANE.

J. MSS.

May 23, 1801.

DEAR SIR,—I have duly received your favor of the 10th & shall always be thankful for any information you will favor me with, interesting to our affairs, & particularly which may enable me to understand the differences of opinion and interest which seem to be springing up in Pensva. & to be subjects of uneasiness. If that state splits it will let us down into the abyss. I hope so much from the patriotism of all, that they will make all smaller interests give way to the greater importance of the general welfare.

I now write to Mr. Boudinot, forwarding the specimens of Mr. Reich's talents as an engraver, and recommending to him to consider whether he may not be usefully employed for the public. Will you be so good as to mention this to Reich & to desire him to present himself to Mr. Boudinot two or three days after you shall have received this.

As to your proposition on the subject of stationery I believe you may be assured of the favor of every department here. You have no doubt contemplated placing your supplies here. My custom is inconsiderable & will only shew my desire to be useful to you.

From a paragraph in your letter to Mr. Gallatin I

think you must have forgotten the particulars of what passed here on the subject of the prosecution against you. To recall it to your mind I will just recapitulate that I asked if you could give me an exact list of the prosecutions of a public nature against you, & over which I might have a controul; observing that whenever in the line of my functions I should be met by the Sedition law, I should treat it as a nullity. That therefore, even in the prosecution recommended by the Senate, if founded on that law I would order a nolle prosequi; but out of respect to that body should be obliged to refer to the attorney of the district to consider whether there was ground of prosecution in any court and under any law acknowledged of force. I thought you expressed some dislike to a change of judicature and you could not furnish then a correct statement of the prosecutions, but would do it after your return to this city. This at least was the impression left on my mind, and I ascribed your not having furnished so specific a list of the prosecutions as would enable me to interpose with due accuracy either to the distance of the trials or perhaps a willingness to meet the investigation before a jury summoned by an impartial officer. The trial on behalf of the Senate being postponed, you have time to explain your wishes to me, and if it be done on a consultation with Mr. Dallas, it may abridge the operations which shall be thought proper.1

1 On this case of Duane Jefferson wrote to R. R. Livingston as follows: "WASHINGTON, May 31, 1801. DEAR SIR,-Our attorney general being absent, and none of the other members of the administration being professional lawyers, I am obliged to decide

I accept with acknoledgment Mrs. Bache's compliments, & beg leave to tender her my sincere respect, & to yourself salutations & my best wishes.

for myself in a case of law, which, in whatever way I decide, will make a great deal of noise. In this situation I ask the favor of you as a friend, and as a lawyer still in the habit of law reading, which I have not been for 30. years, to tell me what you think on the following questions arising in the case of Duane, imprisoned for [faded] days for contempt of court in printing matters, not pretended to be untrue relating to a case depending in court, in which he was a party?

1. Have not the Whig lawyers of England always denied that the publication of truth could be either a contempt or a libel.

2. If the printing of truth may be a contempt in England, can it be in the U. S. the constitution of which inhibits any law abridging the freedom of the press. 3. If it may be a contempt even in the U. S, may it not be pardoned by the President under that authority to pardon all offences against the U. S. except cases of impeachment? If either of these questions be answered in the affirmative, Duane may be relieved by pardon. If they [faded] whether we consider this as [Rest illegible]."

Jefferson also prepared the following message, but I cannot find that it was ever transmitted to the Senate :

"GENT. OF THE SEN.-By a resolñ. of the Senate of the 14th of Mar. 1800. the President was requested to instruct the proper law officer to prosecute William Duane editor of the newspaper called the Aurora for certain publications in that newspaper of the 19th of Feb. 1800. Learning on my accession to the administration that the prosecution had been so instituted as to rest principally, if not solely, on the act called the Sedition Act, I caused it to be discontinued & another to be instituted under whatsoever other laws might be in existence against the offence alledged. If such other laws did exist the object would be obtained which was desired by the Senate, but if the State of the laws before the passage of that act had left the printer to make the publication complained of then the Sedition Act abridging that freedom was contrary to the very letter of the Constitution which declares that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of the press and consequently it was void. A new prosecution was accordingly instituted and brought forward with diligence, but the grand jury not finding the bill it remains without effect. In this procedure I have endeavored to do the duty of my station between the Senate and Citizen, to pursue for the former that legal vindication which was the object of their resolution; to cover the latter with whatsoever of protection the Constitution had guarded him & to secure to the press that degree of freedom in which it remained under the authority of the states, with whom alone the power is left of abridging that freedom, the general Government being expressly excluded from it.

« PředchozíPokračovat »