To James Madison from George Mathews Jr., 20 September 1805 (Abstract)
From George Mathews Jr., 20 September 1805 (Abstract)
§ From George Mathews Jr. 20 September 1805, Oglethorpe County, Georgia. “I received a few days since, from the President of the United States, a Commission, bearing date on the first of July, by which it appears I am appointed a Judge of the Mississippi Territory;1 and this being the earliest opportunity, I take the liberty through you, of informing the President, that I accept said appointment & am making preparations for my journy to that Country, where I hope to arrive early in November & will enter on the duties of my Office.”
RC (DNA: RG 59, LAR, 1801-9, filed under “Mathews”). 1 p.; docketed by Wagner and Jefferson.
1. Because his was a recess appointment, Mathews’s name was not submitted to the Senate until 20 Dec. 1805. George Mathews Jr. (1774–1836) was born in Virginia and moved with his family to Georgia in 1785, returning to Virginia in 1792, where he studied at Liberty Hall (now Washington and Lee University) in Lexington from 1794 to 1795. He returned to Georgia, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1799. In 1806 Jefferson appointed him to the bench in Orleans Territory, and on Louisiana’s achieving statehood in 1812, he was elevated to the state supreme court. Shortly thereafter he became presiding judge, a position he held until his death (, 2:8–9; Charles Watts, “Discourse on the Life and Character of the Hon. George Mathews,” La. Historical Quarterly 4 [1921]: 190–91; 6:71 n. 5).