WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1860
180
reasons for still desiring Mr. Durham to attend to this business will be given you. Sam Houston.
1 Executive Records, 1859-1861, p. 244, Texas State Library.
To CLEMENT R. JoHNS 1 Executive Department, Austin, November 6, 1860.
Hon. Clement R. Johns, State Comptroller Sir : Your letter of November 5th declining to place the vouch- ers and papers showing the amount expended by Texas for Frontie'r Defence, prior to 1854, in the hands of Mr. George J. Durham for transmission to Washington is received. .No other meaning can be attached to the letter of the Secretary of the Treasury, cited by you, than that the money would be paid to any agent appointed by the Governor to receive the same. In your official capacity you are not known to the Secretary of the Treasury. Were the Executive-to appoint you the Agent of the State, you could settle the business, otherwise you could not. The Executive may appoint any person for this purpose, and this has been the uniform course pursued heretofore. On the first day of May, 1855, Governor Pease ~ppointed Mr. Swenson "Agent and attorney in fact," for the purpose of presenting, either in his own name, or in the name of the State, as may be necessary an account amounting to the sum of Twenty Thousand Nine Hundred and Sixty Nine Dollars and Forty-two cents ($20,969.42) to the proper accounting officers of the Treasury, and upon receiving the same to sign, seal, and deliver in the nam,e of the sai"d State, full receipts and acquittances for the same." Under this appointment, Mr. Swenson went on to Washington, settled the account and received the money. You will therefore see that the Executive is not only following the line of safe precedents; but that all your suppositions as to the necessity for the Comptroller's presence in order to effect the transaction, falls to the ground. Now, if the "Comptroller and the Treasurer of the State are the only officers authorized to perform this duty," as you state, how did Mr. Swenson get the • money? Again, when in April, 1856, Mr. James B. Shaw, who was then Comptroller of the State, went on to Washington to collect "all mo_neys that may be due and owin&: to this State, from the United
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