Pc\PERS OF MIRABEAU BuoNAPARTE LAMAR
make a reserve of the whole territory and put it under his own coutroll Had they have done this, he would have accepted, and signed their bill This was what he wanted and it was all he called them together for; with the exception of one small job, in which they were partially in- terested and in which they accommodated him. And that was to give him and his officers an opportunity to speculate on the revenue. They could not suit him however, in the main measure for which they and the Country supposed they had been convened He alledged that he had not the power even to defend the Country, much less to make offensive war They framed a bill giving him ample powers, rbut mexican-horse-like broke on but one side, allways taking haw-pulls and. left hand roads; but to tak G-pulls, right-hand-roads, or even go straight a head as a decent animal would requires the Mexican bit; and so he demurred into I will now pursue him to Washington where he seems to be encamped for the present At the regular session of the Congress of the last year you find him true to his own interest still hammering at his Cher- okee territory, still insisting on his old doctrine, and lays before that body what he deemed would be conclusive proof of his position; that was the opinion of his Attorney General. I am sorry that this gentle- man permitted himself to be so deluded. In following the dictum of his leader however, he permitted himself to be compromitted in an opinion as a jurist predicated on a false base, and of course arrived at wrong conclusions I have not the document before me but such is my recollection of it. Whether that Congress quieted his fears on that, to him important subject I am not advised ; but we all know they done much dirty work for him in secret cabal I would however, be very glad they had reserved it from individual interfearance; as it would be amply sufficient to discharge the public debt During the last ses- sion, while the Congress had it in contemplation to appoint a Mjr. Genl. his Excellency sent them a secret message in which he notified them that he had derived secret information which might be relied on that we would be invaded by forty thousand mexicans in the course of some forty days; and in as much as he was the hero of the Country that the power should be confered on him as no other person could rally the chivalry of the Country but himself The Congress seemed to think differently and confered the appointment on Genl. Rusk, and the result is known When the Congress had the matter under discus- sion whether they should respect their constitutional oaths or not, that is whether they should conform to the whims and caprices of a nom- inal vagrant President, or repair to the seat of Government, the only place, as things were then, where they could form anything but a self willed vagrant body, so far as constitutional legislation was concerned for which purpose they had been entrusted by the Country:- That is however, foreign from present purpose; and as before observed while this matter was in agitation before the body this crafty hero fearing they might determine to order him to the seat of government and to the constitutional discharge of his duty; he secretly dispatched a com- pany to rob the seat of Government of its lawful records, and take them through the indian Country, as a near cut to Washington With a view no doubt if the Congress ordered him to the constitutional dis- charge of his duty, that the archives would either be in transit at Washington, or deposited in the indian Country or perhaps destroyed
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