From John Adams to William McPherson, 4 July 1789
To William MacPherson
Richmond hill July 4, 1784 [1789]1
Sir
I have received your polite letter of the second of this month, and am obliged to you for this instance of respect and attention to me.2 The competition for employment under the national government, is, I preceive, in Philadelphia, very numerous, and the merits of various candidates are considerable The personal knowledge of the President, and the able and faithful characters within the reach of his enquiry, from that district, cannot leave him at a loss to determine whose pretensions ought to be prevalent.
As according to my construction of the constitution the Senate have only a negative on the nominations of the President, and as I have a voice only in case of division of the Senators, the case is not likely very soon to happen, that I shall venture to put a negative on a nomination of the President supported by the suffrages of half the Senate. I should be very likely to make presumtions in favor of a constitutional nomination.
The recommendation of your friend Colo: Smith in addition to all that I have seen or heard of your character, would dispose me to wish well to your pursuits as far as they may be found consistent with Justice and public policy.
I am & &
John Adams
LbC in CA’s hand (Adams Papers); internal address: “William McPherson Esqr / Philadelphia”; APM Reel 115.
1. An inadvertence.
2. William MacPherson (1756–1813), of Philadelphia, attended Princeton College. He enlisted in the British Army before the Revolutionary War but switched his affiliation to the American cause and served on the Marquis de Lafayette’s staff. Aware that Congress was on the verge of passing the 31 July Collection Act, which created the U.S. Customs Service, MacPherson joined a multitude of former soldiers and struggling merchants who petitioned JA for federal employment. MacPherson wrote to JA on 2 July, noting that he was “well aware . . . of the extreme impropriety of asking from a Gentleman in your exalted station, any thing like a promise—I mean not Sir to presume so far—I only beg leave to make known my wish” (Adams Papers).
George Washington immediately began drafting his list of nominees to stock nearly sixty ports with collectors, naval officers, and surveyors, which was printed on 8 August. Initially, MacPherson’s desired post went to Samuel Meredith, who resigned in September. MacPherson was appointed and served as surveyor of the Philadelphia port until 1793 (William Henry Egle, Some Pennsylvania Women During the War of the Revolution, Harrisburg, Penn., 1898, p. 120, 121; Michael N. Ingrisano Jr., The First Officers of the United States Customs Service: Appointed by President George Washington in 1789, Washington, D.C., 1987, p. 3, 5, 14).