The Writings of Sam Houston, Volume VIII

WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1860

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tion of one year, I would have been happy. All send love to you. Thy Father Sam Houston [Rubric]. Sam Houston, Jr. 1Qriginal in New York Public Library. Photostat copy in University of Texas Library.

MAY, 1860 To CLEMENT R. JoHNS 1 Executive Department, Austin, May 1st, 1860.

To Hon!. C. R. Johns, Comptroller Sir: Your letter of March 22nd on the subject of Interest Warrants, owing to the great press of business in this Depart- ment has remained unanswered until the present moment: being aware at the same time that no great emergency existed for an immediate reply. Nor was I discomposed or irritated by your gratuitous taunts, but rather indisposed, after your masterly efforts, to disturb your self-complacency, for I thought to dem- onstrate that you are not infallible, as I think I now shall do, would be to inflict a cruel and hitherto unusual punishment on your self esteem. You complain of my making charges against your official con- duct, in my letter of March 12th, and conclude with the request that any serious charges against "Your official conduct" shall be made to "the proper tribunal." In this you seem to have for- gotten the fact that in lieu of charges, as you facetiously term them, I only recall you to facts, matters of official record, in which, setting aside your favorite doctrine of strict construction, you choose to violate the law governing svecific app'ropriations, by paying out a fund specifically appropriated and sacredly set aside, without authority, and in flagrant violation of the Constitu- tion and the law creating the same. It is only by construction, you say, that I "claim the existence of an appropriation in this case." In this your own fancies have led you astray. The appropriation exists by virtue of the Act which makes it positive and specific as the Bill_ providing for deficiencies, yet without any unappropriated funds in the Treas- ury. Your Specific construction doctrine did not prevent the pay- ing out of thousands of dollars to creditors whom you preferred,

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