WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1860
519
Whitneyville. After Eli W~itney's death, his son, Eli Whitney, Jr., became the president of ~he arms factory, and it is to him that this letter was written. See lntc,-,.wtional Encyclopedia of Biography, X, 155.
To CLEMENT R. JoHNs 1 Executive Department, Austin, March 12, 1860.
Hon. C. R. Johns, Comptroller Sir: In reference to the Act passed August 1, 1856, to en- courage the improvement of the Navigable Waters in Texas, convinces me that in the Governor and Treasurer alone is vested the power to act upon drafts drawn by the State Engineer upon the Treasurer, The intervention of the Comptroller in such cases is not contemplated. This fund is declared by the "Act" to be "set apart as a special fund," to be drawn in a specified manner, subject to certain checks existing in the Governor and Treasurer, without any responsibility on the Auditor and Comptroller. Sam Houston. 1 Compt?-ollers' Lette1·s (1860); also Executive Records, 1859-1861, p. 94, Texas State Library. John's reply is in Comptroller's Letters (1860).
To E. DuRHAM 1 Executive Department, Austin, March 12, 1860.
Mr. E. Durham, Sumpter, Trinity Co., Texas. Dear Sir: I have this morning received your petition. Re- plying would say that I do not feel authorized to interfere. The land having been sold and the execution in part satisfied, it is beyond the power of the Executive to refund the money. Sam Houston.
1 Executive Reco1·ds, 1859-1861, Texas State Library.
To JOHN B. FL0Yo 1 Executive Department, Austin, March 12, 1860.
To Hon. John B. Floyd, Secretary of War, Washington, D.C. Dear Sir: Realizing that it is my duty to address your De- partment that it may be laid before his Excellency the President, I thus devote myself to action for two purposes. First, to vindi- cate myself from misapprehension and next to obtain if possi- ble protection for our frontier inhabitants, whose suffering and losses I feel afraid are not felt or known by the Go\'ernment.
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