14,2
WRITINGS OF SA:M HOUSTON, 184,2
1·cfuses to take the responsibility of saving to the Nation a large amount of money simply because he can find no Law specially covering the case (altho informed of the customs of other nations, similarly situated, which laws and customs govern in this Republic when our laws are silent.) When he requires the Officer of a Department to produce Law for his assurance of the custom, calls for instances, and when those instances are reported, asserts that they were the result of Special Law without producing that Law; therefore assuming that the ipse dixit of him, the Chief Magistrate, is paramount to and conclusive against the experience and judgment of an Officer fully as capable of forming, expressing and substant.iating his opinion, if the resort could be had to records. When that Officer and the Executive are fully aware that no Law can be found for appointing an Acting Quarter Master, that no Law can be found for appointing an Acting Inspector General, and two Assistant Inspectors, that no Law can be fonnd by which the Executive is warranted in permitting or ordering the Militia of this Republic (done under order to General Somervell) across the Rio Grande, or into the enemy's terri- tory; that no law exists, authorizing the Executive to make overtures to any Mexican Commander or any other, either directly or indirectly. That no law exists for the act committed at the ve1·y time in which the argument of the u.bsence of Law for one purpose (& preventing the salvation of public property) could warrant the appointment of a " Captain of Scouts,'' a title or service as fo1;eign to the regulations of this Republic, as that of the assumption in the preceding Executive, in establishing brevet rank; so that a special law becomes necessary for all action consequent upon Naval affairs, but it is not imperative for that of the service of our Army. When we reflect that it is the swo,-,1, duty of all Officers of the Govern- ment, to cherish and preserve its interests and its property, and when an Officer in the discharge of his duty, by advising the course, in his estima- tion most conducive to the public good, is de1-ided in the presence of a stranger, (it may be, for aught he knows, an alien to the country) his opinions thrown over the shoulder and proofs required of him known by the Executive not to be.,vithin his reach (for that Officer had candor and honesty enough to give to the Chief Magistrate, all the information he possessed.) When reviewing these positions, the undersigned can deduce but two conclusions, that prejudice on the part of the Executive, totally incapaci- tates him from fostering this important Arm of a Nation, acknowledged by all to be such, and that it becomes his duty to say, that he cannot conscientio1'8ly lend his aid to its destruction, or submit to the indelicacy of deportment experienced in discharge of his Official duty, during his interview of yesterday. This letter, may upon its first reading, appear in its style somewhat disrespectful; it is not so meant to be, it is intended only as a plain and unvarnished statement of the reasons which required the undersigned, most respectfully to tender to you his resignation as Secretary of War & Marine, and request its early acceptance.
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