To James Madison from Littleton Dennis Teackle, 4 February 1823
From Littleton Dennis Teackle
Chamber of the House of Delegates
Annapolis 4 Feby 1823
Sir,
As chairman of the Committee of Publick Instruction, I take the liberty of transmitting a bill reported for that purpose,1 and beg the favour of your views upon the System proposed, and that you will be pleased to note its defects, and to suggest Amendments.
Presuming upon a knowledge of your liberal and Philanthropick disposition, I venture to Essay this claim upon your time, and attention. I have the Honor to be with the highest respect & Consideration Your Ob’d Svt.
Littleton Dennis Teackle2
RC (DLC). Addressed by Teackle to JM. Docketed by JM “recd. Feby. 9.”
1. An Act to Provide for the Public Instruction of Youth throughout This State, and to Promote the Important Interests of Husbandry and Agriculture ([Annapolis, 1823]; Shoemaker 13225). JM’s copy is in the Madison Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress.
2. Littleton Dennis Teackle (ca. 1776–1848), a resident of Somerset County, Maryland, was a merchant and entrepreneur who served in the Maryland House of Delegates, 1824–36, as an advocate of public education. Teackle was president of the Bank of Somerset and projected a railroad for the Eastern Shore in the 1830s (Daily National Intelligencer, 20 Nov. 1848; Jason Rhodes, Somerset County, Maryland: A Brief History [Charleston, S.C., 2007], 39–40, 47, 61; Robert J. Brugger, Maryland, A Middle Temperament, 1634–1980 [Baltimore, 1988], 250–51).