Alexander Hamilton Papers

From Alexander Hamilton to Tench Coxe, 9 May 1791

To Tench Coxe

Treasury Department
May 9th 1791

Sir

Being about to leave the City for a Fortnight1—I have requested the Bank of North America to advance to your order such sums as you may find necessary for the current service of the Government during my absence to the extent of Twenty thousand dollars. This provision is designed to enable you to answer such demands as may arise in relation to the civil list (including the contingencies of the several executive departments and of the two houses of Congress)2 to the Act making provision for the Debt of the United States,3 & to the several acts of the last session concerning the duties on distilled spirits and compensations for the officers of the Judicial Courts of the United States and for jurors and Witnesses.4 Your disbursements will of course be confined to objects, for which there have been appropriations by law, and you will in each case obtain some voucher of a nature to operate as a discharge of the warrants which must hereafter issue to cover the sums paid.

I remain with great consideration and esteem   Sir   Your obedient servant

Alex Hamilton
Secy of the Treasury

PS If the 400.000 Guilders for drawing which directions have been given5 shall have been sold or nearly sold in my absence you will direct the drawing for two hundred thousand more (say 200.000).

To Tench Coxe Esqr
Assistant Secretary

ALS, Papers of Tench Coxe in the Coxe Family Papers at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

1. See H to Jeremiah Wadsworth, April, 1791, note 3 (printed in this volume).

2. “An Act making appropriations for the support of Government during the year one thousand seven hundred and ninety-one, and for other purposes” (1 Stat. description begins The Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America, I (Boston, 1845). description ends 190 [February 11, 1791]).

3. “An Act making provision for the (payment of the) Debt of the United States” (1 Stat. description begins The Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America, I (Boston, 1845). description ends 138–44 [August 4, 1790]).

4. “An Act repealing, after the last day of June next, the duties heretofore laid upon Distilled Spirits imported from abroad, and laying others in their stead; and also upon Spirits distilled within the United States, and for appropriating the same” (1 Stat. description begins The Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America, I (Boston, 1845). description ends 199–214 [March 3, 1791]); “An Act providing compensations for the officers of the Judicial Courts of the United States, and for Jurors and Witnesses, and for other purposes” (1 Stat. description begins The Public Statutes at Large of the United States of America, I (Boston, 1845). description ends 216–17 [March 3, 1791]).

5. See H to William Seton, May 9, 1791 (PAH description begins Harold C. Syrett, ed., The Papers of Alexander Hamilton (New York and London, 1961– ). description ends , VIII, 334–35).

Index Entries

    You Are Looking At

    Source Project
    Hamilton Papers
    Title
    From Alexander Hamilton to Tench Coxe, 9 May 1791
    Author
    Hamilton, Alexander
    Recipient
    Coxe, Tench
    Date
    9 May 1791

    Reference

    Cite as
    “From Alexander Hamilton to Tench Coxe, 9 May 1791,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Hamilton/01-26-02-0002-0289. [Original source: The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, vol. 26, 1 May 1802 – 23 October 1804, Additional Documents 1774–1799, Addenda and Errata, ed. Harold C. Syrett. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979, pp. 611–612.]

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