Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow TO J. McHENRY, SECRETARY OF WAR. - The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799)

Return to Title Page for The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799)

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

TO J. McHENRY, SECRETARY OF WAR. - John Adams, The Works of John Adams, vol. 8 (Letters and State Papers 1782-1799) [1853]

Edition used:

The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: with a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations, by his Grandson Charles Francis Adams (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1856). 10 volumes. Vol. 8.

Part of: The Works of John Adams, 10 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


TO J. McHENRY, SECRETARY OF WAR.

Quincy, 13 July, 1799.

I have received your letter of the 8th of this month, and have read the letter from Major-General Hamilton, and the proceedings of the court-martial in the case of Joseph Perkins. All circumstances considered, I think this instance the least capable of a pardon of any which has been laid before me. I have thought it my duty to sign the warrant for his execution, and return it inclosed with all the other papers. My own opinion is, that a commission is not the exclusive evidence of appointments to office; but as chicanery may start popular objections, if the heads of department have any serious doubt in the case of Richard Hunt, you may submit this to them also.1

[1 ]This question was submitted by Mr. McHenry in a long letter addressed to his colleagues.

Mr. Wolcott drew a distinction between civil and military commissions, and thought the members of this court were military officers, without commissions.

Mr. Pickering thought the appointment of an officer might be complete without a commission—this being only the best evidence of it.

Mr. Stoddert agreed with Mr. Pickering in his opinion, but objected to all the later proceedings in Hunt’s case on another account.

When the proceedings were first presented to Mr. McHenry, it did not appear on the face of them, that two thirds of the members present had concurred, as required, in a sentence of death, by the 8th article of the appendix to the rules of war. They were returned to General Hamilton, who caused the omission to be supplied by an interlineation in the sentence, and the President of the court, and the judge advocate, added their certificate that more than two thirds of the members did concur, and that the omission so to state it was accidental.

Mr. Stoddert thought that the President and judge advocate had no right by themselves to assume such an authority. But he thought that the original omission might not vitiate the proceeding, if it had not been the practice established in court-martials heretofore to insert the form.

The celebrated case of Marbury v. Madison, and the act of Mr. Jefferson in annulling the appointment of justices of the peace by withholding their commissions, will occur to the mind of every reader.