To Thomas Jefferson from George Washington, 31 December 1792
From George Washington
Decr. 31st. 1792
Dear Sir
I do not recollect perfectly what your sentiments were respecting the application of Mr. De la Forest—and being to give an answer to the Secretary of the Treasury on this occasion I should be glad to receive them previously thereto.
The difficulty of the case you well know arises from the unauthorised request, and the hazard of advancing monies without it. I am Yours sincerely
Go: Washington
RC (DLC); at head of text: “Private”; endorsed by TJ as received 31 Dec. 1792. Dft (DNA: RG 59, MLR). FC (Lb in same, SDC). Recorded in SJPL.
Two days before this letter was written, Alexander Hamilton submitted to the President a translation of a 27 Dec. 1792 letter from the French Consul General, Antoine René Charles Mathurin de La Forest, requesting that the United States government apply part of its debt obligations to France to the payment of French consular salaries in America (, xiii, 386). La Forest’s letter has not been found, but its tenor is clear from TJ’s letter to Washington of 1 Jan. 1793, which recommended approval of the French official’s application.