RC (DNA: RG 59, LAR); addressed: “The President of the United States”; endorsed by TJ as received 11 Mch. and so recorded in SJL. Enclosures: (1) Certificate of Richard Peters, 7 Mch. 1801, describing Hall as “diligent & punctual” and conducting himself with “Impartiality, in all Things,” with no complaints of “Failure in his Duty, or of any improper Conduct” coming to his attention (MS in same; in Peters’s hand and signed by him; endorsed by Hall: “Certificate of Richard Peters Judge of the District”). (2) Certificate of William Rawle, Philadelphia, 7 Mch. 1801, stating that Hall executed his duties as marshal with “integrity, diligence, perspecuity, promptitude and firmness” and that few would be found better qualified than he to hold the office (MS in same; in Rawle’s hand and signed by him).

 

John Hall (1760–1826) of Harford County, Maryland, was the second son of Elihu Hall, a well-established landholder, and the son-in-law of John Ewing, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church at Philadelphia and provost of the University of Pennsylvania. In 1782 Hall married Sarah Ewing, a popular essayist who wrote for Joseph Dennie’s Port Folio. Hall was secretary of the Pennsylvania land office from 1796 until 1799, when John Adams nominated him to replace William Nicholls as marshal of the district of Pennsylvania. Hall unsuccessfully petitioned Congress on 4 Feb. 1801 for relief of a settlement of his accounts with Treasury officers. TJ included him on a 28 Mch. list of removals for misconduct and delinquency, namely for packing juries (Sarah Hall, Selections from the Writings of Mrs. Sarah Hall, Author of Conversations on the Bible, with a Memoir of Her Life [Philadelphia, 1833], ix, xiii, xiv, xv, xxx, xxxi; JEP description begins Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States… to the Termination of the Nineteenth Congress, Washington, D.C., 1828, 3 vols. description ends , 1:325, 403; JHR description begins Journal of the House of Representatives of the United States, Washington, D.C., 1826, 9 vols. description ends , 3:784–5, 841; PMHB description begins Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, 1877-Preston, Catalogue Daniel Preston, A Comprehensive Catalogue of the Correspondence and Papers of James Monroe, Westport, Conn., 2001, 2 vols. description ends , 84 [1960], 474n; Maryland Genealogies, 2 vols. [Baltimore, 1980], 2:34; Papenfuse, Maryland Legislature description begins Edward C. Papenfuse, Alan F. Day, David W. Jordan, Gregory A. Stiverson, eds., A Biographical Dictionary of the Maryland Legislature, 1635–1789, Baltimore, 1979–85, 2 vols. description ends , 1:383; Appendix I, Lists 2, 3, and 4).

Hall’s witnesses both received appointments during Washington’s administration. William Rawle, a prominent Federalist, served as U.S. district attorney from 1791 until 1800. Richard Peters served as a Pennsylvania district court judge from 1792 until his death in 1828 (Washington, Papers, Pres. Ser., 7:250–1, 9:426; JEP description begins Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States… to the Termination of the Nineteenth Congress, Washington, D.C., 1828, 3 vols. description ends , 1:86, 351).

In his letter to TJ on 8 Apr., Pierce Butler claimed that TJ had been “misinformed respecting the Marshal of Pennsylvania District. He is a Man of mild manners; and well qualified for the Office. I believe he has never been indellicate. I understand that the Family he Maried into indulge a latitude of unjustifiable expression; but I am persuaded that he disapproves of it. If I know You, it is not Your intention to remove good and qualified Men, if they even shoud not think exactly with Yourself on Publick good” (RC in DLC; endorsed by TJ as received 29 Apr. and so recorded in SJL).