183101Editorial Note (Jefferson Papers)
Following the meeting of the commissioners for the University of Virginia at Rockfish Gap , Jefferson traveled to Staunton and spent two nights at the home of his fellow commissioner Archibald Stuart . On 6 Aug. 1818 he began the nearly sixty-mile journey to Warm Springs on horseback, arriving there a day later and departing on 27 Aug. 1818. Although this was his first and only visit to Warm...
183102The American Commissioners to John Lamb, [ca. 11–19 September 1786] (Adams Papers)
We have received your two Letters, of the 15 & 18. July from Alicant and are sorry to learn that your indisposition discourages you from travelling by Land or sea We still think it most adviseable, both for your own interest & that of the United states, that you should return to Congress, for their further Instructions, as soon as possible, & we again propose to you, to embark from spain, by...
183103Editorial Note: Death of Franklin (Jefferson Papers)
News of the death of Benjamin Franklin arrived in New York City on 22 April 1790. That same day James Madison arose in the House of Representatives, voiced a brief, moving tribute, and proposed that the members wear badges of mourning for a month. This, he said, should be done in respect for “a citizen whose native genius was not more an ornament to human nature, than his various exertions of...
183104To Benjamin Franklin from Sir Alexander Dick, 28 October 1766 (Franklin Papers)
ALS : American Philosophical Society Your Letter of the 11th. gave me and all my Family the greatest pleasure it being so long since we heard from your self of your and your familys wellfare and particularly your Son the Governor. I return you and your Son my most hearty thanks for the very great friendship you have shown to me and my friend Mr. Swinton in taking so much effectual pains to be...
183105To James Madison from an Unidentified Correspondent, 2 November 1812 (Madison Papers)
I do not mean to dictate but only as a friend to your Administration and as one of the family of the Union to communicate my sentiments in a few particulars as briefly as I can conveniently. I have suggested to you a mode of raising an hundred thousand troops or militia by classing the Citizens of the United States in such a manner as that the amount of the State tax each class annually pays...
183106Circular to Massachusetts and New Hampshire, 4 July 1780 (Washington Papers)
On an examination of the quantity of powder in the hands of the public we find that the whole together with what we are to expect from the French fleet will not be more than one third of the quantity required for a decisive operation, and that unless we can derive very extensive aids from the respective States this deficiency alone must subvert our plans. I am therefore to request The...
183107Enclosure A: [Estimate of Allowances and Expenses], [21 January 1795] (Hamilton Papers)
An Estimate of the Allowances & Expenses for the collection of the revenues arising from Licences to retail foreign distilled Spirits & wines; & from sales at auction; commencing on the first day of September 1794. I. Commissions allowed to the Supervisors of the revenue, on licences to retail foreign distilled spirits & wines, estimated by the Committee of the House of Representatives at...
183108Introductory Note: To John F. Mercer, 26 September 1792 (Hamilton Papers)
This letter marks the beginning of a protracted dispute between Mercer and Hamilton. In 1792 Mercer was a candidate for reelection to the House of Representatives from Maryland’s Second District. He was opposed by John Thomas of Susquehanna. During the campaign Mercer made a series of speeches in which he criticized Hamilton’s administration of financial affairs. Mercer contended that the...
183109Retreat from Public Life: Editorial Note (Jay Papers)
In May 1801, John Jay stepped down from his office as governor. This occasion marked not only the end of six years in office as the state’s chief executive, but also nearly three decades of public service on behalf of both New York and the young United States. As early as September 1783, after successfully completing his duties as American peace commissioner in Paris, Jay expressed a longing...
183110From Benjamin Franklin to Baynton, Wharton & Morgan, [8 June 1766] (Franklin Papers)
Extract: reprinted from Clarence W. Alvord and Clarence E. Carter, eds., The New Régime 1765–1766 , in Collections of the Illinois Historical Library, xi (Springfield, Ill., 1916), 366. I approve much of the Preposal of a strong Colony at the Illinois. It is well listned to here; But all affairs, except what immediately relate to Great Britain are laid aside, until the Season of Publick...
183111Enclosure: Livingston’s Steam Engine, 26 January 1799 (Jefferson Papers)
MS ( PPAmP ); endorsed for the APS American Philosophical Society : “Livingston’s Steam Engine.”
183112Editorial Note (Adams Papers)
After the official adjournment of the Second Continental Congress on 1 August, another meeting was held on the morning of the next day. Adams may not have left Philadelphia, then, until 3 August ( JCC Worthington C. Ford and others, eds., Journals of the Continental Congress , 1774–1789, Washington, 1904–1937; 34 vols. , 2:239; Burnett, ed., Letters of Members Edmund C. Burnett, ed., Letters...
183113Master List of Subscribers to Central College, [after 7 May 1817], document 5 in a group of documents on The Founding of … (Jefferson Papers)
Subscriptions to the Central College from persons residing in the county of Albemarle and in other counties and places. Names. Sum subscribed. No. of installments. Albemarle county . Nathaniel Anderson , $100 00 4 installments. Benjamin Austin , 100 00 〃 Nelson Barksdale
183114To Benjamin Franklin from Thomas Hutchinson, 26 March 1766 (Franklin Papers)
ALS : American Philosophical Society; letterbook copy: Massachusetts Archives, Office of the Secretary of State My son being bound to London I give him a letter to you that he may have a better Pretence for waiting on you and Paying his own as well as my respects to you. I expected to have gone my self some of my friends advising to it; others thought it best for me to remain here and that I...
183115The Death of John Jay: Editorial Note (Jay Papers)
During Jay’s retirement, his health had generally been a mixture of his usual ailments and the progressive effects of aging. However, in May of 1825, he suffered a “paralytick attack,” perhaps a stroke, that precipitated the deterioration of his health. Jay appeared to make a recovery, albeit slowly, from his attack. In March of 1827, he suffered from a serious injury when a piece of fire wood...
183116Minutes of the Committee for Detecting Conspiracies, 22 February 1777 (Jay Papers)
Beverly Robinson Esq r : appeared before the Committee of ^ appointed by ^ the Convention ^ of the ^ State of New York for inquiring into Detecting and Defeating all conspiracies that may be formed against the Liberties of the Same and the Board of Commissioners appointed by the Convention for the Same purpose. Present John Jay Esq r . Chairman } Members of the Committee. Judge [Lewis] Graham Nath
183117From Benjamin Franklin to Deborah Franklin, 6 April 1766 (Franklin Papers)
ALS : American Philosophical Society As the Stamp Act is at length repeal’d, I am willing you should have a new Gown, which you may suppose I did not send sooner, as I knew you would not like to be finer than your Neighbours, unless in a Gown of your own Spinning. Had the Trade between the two Countries totally ceas’d, it was a Comfort to me to recollect that I had once been cloth’d from Head...
183118To James Madison from an Unidentified Correspondent, 12 July 1814 (Madison Papers)
The writer of this Communication deems it his duty as one of a suffering Community to state to the Executive of the United states that unless immediate measures are adopted to prevent the further drain of Specie from the middle & southern States that universal Bankrupcy must ensue. In gods name why not meet the Crisis firmly & utter at once fifty or one hundred millions of paper medium & make...
183119John Jay, Anti-Slavery, and the New-York Manumission Society: Editorial Note (Jay Papers)
New York of the 1780s had the highest slave population of any of the northern states. One of those slave owners was John Jay. Yet Jay also opposed the institution of slavery, desired its gradual abolishment, and worked toward that goal in his personal and professional lives. In 1785, he became a founding member and first president of the New-York Society for Promoting the Manumission of...
183120Introductory Note: To George Washington, [10 May 1796] (Hamilton Papers)
The opening paragraph of this letter contains the first reference in Hamilton’s extant correspondence to the preparation of Washington’s Farewell Address. Washington first conceived of the idea of a valedictory address in 1792, when he thought that he would retire at the end of his first term in March, 1793. In May, 1792, he asked James Madison to draft a farewell address, and Madison complied...
183121To Alexander Hamilton from ———, [October 1789] (Hamilton Papers)
Answers. 1st The construction upon which vessels are built in this State, admits of their carrying as many tons in weight as their tonage; and may be said to sail well. The vessels that trade here from the Netherlands, Russia, Denmark and Sweden are at present few or none. Those from Great Britain do not materially differ in their construction for carrying from those built in this State, and...
183122Enclosure VIII: Map of the Reserved Tract including Fort Chartres (Jefferson Papers)
MS ( DNA : RG 46, Senate Records, 1st. Cong., 3rd. sess.).
183123Editorial Note (Adams Papers)
Josiah Marshall had lived in Plympton from 1747 until 1753, and had then spent five years at Middleboro as master of the grammar school. In 1758 he returned to Plympton, but in either 1760 or 1762 moved again, to teach school at Pembroke. According to his own testimony, he remained in the latter town for two years and two months. His next stop cannot be determined with certainty, but at some...
183124Introductory Note: From Philip Schuyler, [17 July 1800] (Hamilton Papers)
This letter contains the first explicit reference to the Grange, Hamilton’s country home in upper Manhattan. Hamilton may have begun to plan this “retreat,” as he called it, as early as 1798, when he wrote to his wife Elizabeth of a “sweet prospect” which he had formed. The name he gave to his country estate was the same as that of his family’s ancestral home in Ayrshire, Scotland, and of his...
183125Madison and the Collapse of the Spanish-American Empire: The West Florida Crisis of 1810, 20 April 1810 (Editorial Note) (Madison Papers)
The letter of Samuel Fulton to JM, 20 April 1810 , introduces one of the more dramatic developments JM witnessed during his terms as secretary of state and president of the United States—the revolutions for independence in the Spanish-American colonies. At the beginning of 1808 Spain still ruled an American empire stretching from California to Cape Horn; twenty years later it retained only...
183126Meeting of the Commissioners of the Sinking Fund, 20 October 1792 (Hamilton Papers)
At a meeting of the trustees of the sinking fund, Present: The Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury, and the Attorney General of the United States It appeared to the Board, from the information of the Secretary of the Treasury, that there were certain moneys on hand, belonging to the fund, constituted by the 7th section of the act, entitled “An act supplementary to the act making...
183127Editorial Note (Jefferson Papers)
Following the chartering of Central College early in 1816, the purchase the next summer of land just west of Charlottesville , and an ongoing subscription campaign to raise funds for the educational institution, construction began in the summer of 1817. Rather than building one large edifice, Jefferson designed an “academical village” with two rows of pavilions and student dormitories flanking...
183128Editorial Note (Adams Papers)
On 25 July 1768 the legally qualified voters of Rowley’s West Parish met to determine how the parish would dispose of its old meetinghouse and erect a new one on a different plot. Following the procedure prescribed for town meetings, they first chose a moderator, Deacon Richard Thurston. Before the meeting could proceed further, however, someone questioned the qualifications for voting of one...
183129Petition for the Pennsylvania Hospital, 23 January 1751 (Franklin Papers)
DS : Pennsylvania Hospital January 23, 1751 The founding of the Pennsylvania Hospital is one of the best-known episodes in Franklin’s public career, for he related the history of it in his autobiography at length, if not accurately in all details, and he printed the relevant documents in Some Account of the Pennsylvania Hospital , 1754. Franklin’s friend Dr. Thomas Bond was one of the first to...
183130From George Washington to William Pearce (Washington Papers)
[This letter was misdated in the volume and will be included in Presidential Series 17 .]
183131To Benjamin Franklin from Baynton, Wharton & Morgan, 28 August 1766 (Franklin Papers)
LS : Library of Congress We are now to acknowledge the Receipt of your very kind Favors, of the 26th February, the 10th of May and the 8th of June; and at the same Time, to do Ourselves the pleasure of heartily thanking you, for your many and great Kindnesses to Us. It was with inexpressible Joy We received your Congratulations on the Repeal of the Stamp Act; and found the several agreable...
183132Editorial Note: Documents on the American Tobacco Trade (Jefferson Papers)
The documents in this group reveal what a powerful ally Jefferson had in Simon Bérard and the mercantile firm to which he belonged in the effort to make the farmers-general live up to the agreement reached at Berni in May 1786 and given the approval of the ministry in Calonne’s letter to Jefferson of 22 Oct. 1786. The blunt, forthright challenge here presented to the farmers-general to meet...
183133To Benjamin Franklin from George Read, [August? 1766] (Franklin Papers)
Draft: Library of Congress I now return you my most sincere thanks for the immediate Application you were so good as to make at the Treasury on my behalf, as I am informed by your Letter of the 12th. of June and shou’d the event be otherwise than successful to me it will not prove a matter of much disappointment. I am but little troubled with that Passion for Offices so generally prevalent....
183134Extract of a Letter from London, 5 June 1771 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , August 1, 1771 William Strahan had accused Franklin of inactivity, and Arthur Lee was accusing him of being Hillsborough’s agent. To balance the record, therefore, it is appropriate to publish a defense of him by an anonymous correspondent, which found its way into two Philadelphia newspapers. I saw Dr. Franklin To-day. He is just returned from a little...
183135Avoiding the Maelstrom of Saint-Domingue, 1 May–1 June 1801 (Editorial Note) (Madison Papers)
During the undeclared naval war with France, Congress had prohibited trade with Saint-Domingue and other French colonies. (In 1801 Saint-Domingue embraced the entire island now occupied by Haiti and the Dominican Republic.) The act of 9 February 1799 contained a clause allowing the president to open trade with any French island or port when the interests of the United States warranted such a...
183136The Preliminary Articles: Second Draft Editorial Note (Jay Papers)
The first draft of the preliminary treaty was based on purely American proposals and Oswald soon learned that it was unacceptable to the British ministry. On 17 October the cabinet directed Townshend to issue new instructions that disclosed how badly Oswald had misjudged the importance his government attached to several issues on which he had given way or had not raised with the Americans....
183137Provincial Maneuvers Editorial Note (Jay Papers)
In December 1775 the extralegal provincial congress was the only effective governing body in New York. The royal assembly had been prorogued in April, and Governor William Tryon had been forced to take refuge on a British vessel at anchor in New York harbor, where he met periodically with his council. But as the year drew to a close, New York Loyalists saw an opportunity to regain political...
183138General Orders, 25 March 1800 (Hamilton Papers)
The General Court Martial of which Capt. Read was president, having tried Lieut. Leyborn of 2d. Regt. Arts. & Engs. upon a charge preferred against him for disorderly and unofficerlike conduct, in beating and maltreating Robert Branton, a private in the same Corps, for evidence given by him before a Court of Inquiry, instituted to investigate a certain charge exhibited against Lieut. Leyborn,...
183139Enclosure: [Statements of the Revenue Arising from the Postage of Letters], [26 December 1794] (Hamilton Papers)
Statement of the Revenue Arising from the Postage of Letters, &c. from the 1st of October, 1789, to 30th june, 1791. Expenses Postmaster General, Gross amount of postage. For transportation of the mails. For compensation to the postmaster general, his assistants and clerks including incidental expenses For compensations to the deputy postmasters, including incidental expenses. For ship...
183140Editorial Note: Jefferson’s Policy Concerning Presents to Foreign Diplomats (Jefferson Papers)
Soon after taking office, Jefferson was obliged to address himself to the task of terminating relations, diplomatic and otherwise, that he had thought on leaving France to be only temporarily suspended. One unavoidable duty was that of making “the accustomary present … to the Introducteur des Ambassadeurs and to Sequeville their Secretary,” through whom notice usually came of the king’s...
183141To James Madison from an Unidentified Correspondent, 15 February 1810 (Madison Papers)
I have taken the liberty to call your attention to certain Strictures contained in the 2d & 3d columns of the second page in the inclosed news paper. To you Sir the Nation has a right to look for an honest upright man at the head of the Treasury department. The People of the United States have not only a right to expect Sir, that the high officer to whom you entrust the management of all the...
183142Role in the First Congress Editorial Note (Jay Papers)
Eventually the stalemate over New York’s choice of congressional delegates was broken, and on 27 July 1774 the mechanics endorsed the slate that had been proposed by the Fifty-one more than three weeks earlier. Polls held in the city the next day brought the unanimous election of John Jay, John Alsop, Philip Livingston, and James Duane—a resounding defeat for radical Whig John Morin Scott....
183143Observations on Mr. Parker’s State of the Account, [undated] (Franklin Papers)
AD : Haverford College Library This undated document is placed here for convenience because it relates so closely to Parker’s final report on the accounts between Franklin and Hall, Feb. 1, 1766 (above, pp. 87–99), and his letter of February 3 about that report (immediately above). Franklin could hardly have received the report and letter before the middle of March 1766, but they had reached...
183144From Benjamin Franklin to William Cullen, 20 December 1766 (Franklin Papers)
Draft: American Philosophical Society I beg Leave to recommend to your favourable Notice two young Gentlemen the Bearers of this Letter, Messrs. Rush and Potts Sons of my Friends in Philadelphia. They are at Edinburgh to improve themselves in the Study of Physic, and from the Character they bear of Ingenuity, Industry and good Morals, I am persuaded they will improve greatly under your learned...
183145Note on Marginalia in Benjamin Wilson, Observations upon Lightning, [after 21 March 1773 and before 30 March 1773?] (Franklin Papers)
Benjamin Wilson was a hardy controversialist. When he lost his case against Franklin in the Purfleet committee in the summer of 1772, he carried it first to the Surveyor General of the Ordnance, then to the Royal Society, and finally to the public by printing his Observations upon Lightning, and the Method of Securing Buildings from It’s Effects, in a Letter to Sir Charles Frederick, &c....
183146Editorial Note: Jefferson’s Proposed Revision of the Virginia Constitution (Jefferson Papers)
When Jefferson stopped off in Richmond in May on his way back to Monticello, his discussions with various political figures led him to the conclusion that a convention to revise the Virginia Constitution was imminent. No doubt remembering his experience in 1776 when his earlier draft of a fundamental law arrived almost too late, he lost no time in drafting a text for a new constitution. He...
183147Privy Council: Referral of Franklin’s Application for a Land Grant, 10 February 1766 (Franklin Papers)
MS Minutes: Public Record Office Franklin’s interest in Nova Scotia lands has been examined in the preceding volume, where documents were printed showing that, as a member of two land speculating syndicates headed by Alexander McNutt, he acquired in 1765 claims to thousands of acres in what is now the province of New Brunswick. See above, XII , 345–50. The petition summarized here differs from...
183148To James Madison from an Unidentified Correspondent, 21 April 1812 (Abstract) (Madison Papers)
21 April 1812, New York. Having just learned that the government intends to appoint an additional judge for the district of New York, recommends John Ferguson of this city. “He is a man of honor and probity, and sincerely attached to the present Administration of the General Government.” Believes that Governor Tompkins and Mr. Sanford would confirm this. “The appointment of Mr Ferguson would...
183149To Benjamin Franklin from John Tunnicliff, 21 December 1766 (Franklin Papers)
ALS : American Philosophical Society I Received your kind Letters for which I return you my Best Thanks. If I can get a good Plantation either in Pensylvania or the Jerseys provided the same, is in a good Neighbourhood and the House High and Ary Sittuation to render it Healthy and near the River Delaware or the River Schoolkill with sufficiant Meadow and Pasture of the White Honey-Suckle,...
183150Editorial Note: The Admission of Kentucky and Vermont to the Union (Jefferson Papers)
A piece of doggerel in Bache’s General Advertiser at the opening of Congress voiced the politics of equilibrium underlying this first of a series of compromises for achieving sectional balance within the nation: But Kentucky had not been given to the union. Six years of persistent effort on the part of her people and their leaders lay back of the Virginia-Kentucky compact of 1790 which awaited...