From Alexander Hamilton to Sharp Delany, 8 September 1791
To Sharp Delany
Treasury Department
Sept. 8. 1791.
Sir
I have considered the case proposed to me in your letter of the 11th. July,1 and do not find myself authorised to instruct you to set off the drawback against the bond of the importer Mr. Telles.2 The legislature had not seen fit to make any provision of this nature in the first collection law,3 and in the existing act4 they have only extended it to the importer, and not to the purchasers from him which you state Messrs. Willing Morris & Swanwick5 to be. [And the outward entry at the Custom House is the only admissible evidence of who is the Importer.]6
I am, Sir, Your obedt. servant
A Hamilton
Sharp Delany Esq.
LS, Bureau of Customs, Philadelphia; two copies, RG 56, Letters to Collectors at Small Ports, “Set G,” National Archives.
1. Letter not found.
2. John Telles was a Philadelphia merchant.
3. “An Act to regulate the Collection of the Duties imposed by law on the tonnage of ships or vessels, and on goods, wares and merchandises imported into the United States” ( 29–49 [July 31, 1789]).
4. “An Act to provide more effectually for the collection of the duties imposed by law on goods, wares and merchandise imported into the United States, and on the tonnage of ships or vessels” ( 145–78 [August 4, 1790]). Section 61 of this act reads as follows: “And be it further enacted, That if any goods, the duties upon which shall have been secured by bond, shall be re-exported by the importer or importers thereof, and if the said bond shall become due before the expiration of the time herein before limited for payment of the drawback upon such goods, it shall be lawful for the collector of the district from which the said goods shall have been exported, to give farther credit for so much of the sum due upon such bond, as shall be equal to the amount of the said drawback, until the expiration of the said time limited for payment thereof” ( 174–75).
5. The partners in this firm were Thomas Willing, Robert Morris, and John Swanwick.
6. The bracketed sentence is in the handwriting of H.