a cession of territory and ratification by the king was conclusive. Of this the cession of the same countries by the king to England, that of a degree of latitude of them to the US. and that of Louisiana to France are sufficient proofs.

It is with real reluctance that I feel or express any doubts adverse to the interests of Mr. Hackley. I do it to yourself only, and with a wish not to be quoted, as well to avoid injury to him, as the implication of myself in anything controversial. I am far from having strong confidence in doubts of what two such able jurists have decided; yet for Mr. Hackley's sake I anxiously wish that he should not be so far over-confident in the certainty of these opinions as to enter into any warranties of title in the portions he may dispose of. These vast grants of land are entirely against the policy of our government. They have ever set their faces most decidedly against such monopolies. In all their sales of land they have taken every measure they could devise to prevent speculations in them by purchases to sell again, & to provide that sales should be made to settlers alone. On this ground Mr. Hackley will have to contend against prejudices deeply rooted. These might perhaps be somewhat softened if, instead of taking adverse possession, which the President is bound to remove summarily by the military, he were to make to Congress a full and candid statement of the considerations he has paid, or the sacrifices made, of which these lands are the compensation. They might in that case make him such a grant as would amount to a liberal indemnification.

I shall ever studiously avoid expressing to any person any doubt which might injure Mr. Hackley's prospects from this source, and sincerely wish him the most can be made of them. I renew to yourself affectionate assurances of attachment and respect.

TO THOMAS RITCHIE

J. MSS.

MONTO. Jan. 7. 22.

DR. SIR,-I see with much concern in your paper of the 3d that they are endeavoring to compromit me on the subject of the next President. The informn said to come from a gent. from Columbia is totally unfounded, & you will observe that the Augusta Chronicle which cited me as giving an acct. of the same Caucus says not a word of any letter from me. For all of the gentlemen named as subjects of the future election I have the highest esteem and should much regret that they should suppose me to take any part in it. I entirely and decidedly withdraw myself from all intermeddling in matters of this nature. You will oblige me by inserting in your paper some such contribution as below in a form not importing to come directly from myself. It is the more necessary as you seem to have given credit to it. I salute I salute you with frdshp & resp.

I

I "In our paper of the 3d, under the head of the 'next President' we quoted from the Petersbg Intelligencer the information of a Gentleman from Columbia S. C. mentioning that in a Caucus of members assembled there for the nomin of a President a letter was read from Mr. Jefferson pointing to this object. We are authorized by a friend of Mr. J's much in his society & intimacy to declare that that Gent. never wrote such a letter, never put pen to paper on that subject, and studiously avoids all conversn on it."

TO JEDEDIAH MORSE

J. MSS.

MONTICELLO, March 6, 1822.

SIR,-I have duly received your letter of February the 16th, and have now to express my sense of the honorable station proposed to my ex-brethren and myself, in the constitution of the society for the civilization and improvement of the Indian tribes. The object too, expressed as that of the association, is one which I have ever had much at heart, and never omitted an occasion of promoting while I have been in situations to do it with effect, and nothing, even now, in the calm of age and retirement, would excite in me a more lively interest than an approvable plan of raising that respectable and unfortunate people from the state of physical and moral abjection, to which they have been reduced by circumstances foreign to them. That the plan now proposed is entitled to unmixed approbation, I am not prepared to say, after mature consideration, and with all the partialities which its professed object would rightfully claim from me.

I shall not undertake to draw the line of demarcation between private associations of laudable views and unimposing numbers, and those whose magnitude may rivalize and jeopardize the march of regular government. Yet such a line does exist. I have seen the days, they were those which preceded the revolution, when even this last and perilous engine became necessary; but they were days which no man would wish to see a second time. That was the case where the regular authorities of the government had combined against the

rights of the people, and no means of correction remained to them but to organize a collateral power, which, with their support, might rescue and secure their violated rights. But such is not the case with our government. We need hazard no collateral power, which, by a change of its original views, and assumption of others we know not how virtuous or how mischievous, would be ready organized and in force sufficient to shake the established foundations of society, and endanger its peace and the principles on which it is based. Is not the machine now proposed of this gigantic stature? It is to consist of the ex-Presidents of the United States, the Vice President, the Heads of all the Executive departments, the members of the supreme judiciary, the Governors of the several States and territories, all the members of both Houses of Congress, all the general officers of the army, the commissioners of the navy, all Presidents and Professors of colleges and theological seminaries, all the clergy of the United States, the Presidents and Secretaries of all associations having relation to Indians, all commanding officers within or near Indian territories, all Indian superintendents and agents; all these ex officio; and as many private individuals as will pay a certain price for membership. Observe, too, that the clergy will constitute ' nineteen twentieths of this association, and, by the law of the majority, may command the twentieth part, which, composed

I The clergy of the United States may probably be estimated at eight thousand. The residue of this society at four hundred; but if the former number be halved, the reasoning will be the same.-T. J.

of all the high authorities of the United States, civil and military, may be outvoted and wielded by the nineteen parts with uncontrollable power, both as to purpose and process. Can this formidable array be reviewed without dismay? It will be said, that in this association will be all the confidential officers of the government; the choice of the people themselves. No man on earth has more implicit confidence than myself in the integrity and discretion of this chosen band of servants. But is confidence or discretion, or is strict limit, the principle of our constitution? It will comprehend, indeed, all the functionaries of the government; but seceded from their constitutional stations as guardians of the nation, and acting not by the laws of their station, but by those of a voluntary society, having no limit to their purposes but the same will which constitutes their existence. It will be the authorities of the people and all influential characters from among them, arrayed on one side, and on the other the people themselves deserted by their leaders. It is a fearful array. It will be said that these are imaginary fears. I know they are so at present. I know it is as impossible for these agents of our choice and unbounded confidence, to harbor machinations against the adored principles of our constitution, as for gravity to change its direction, and gravid bodies to mount upwards. The fears are indeed imaginary, but the example is real. Under its authority, as a precedent, future associations will arise with objects at which we should shudder at this time. The society of Jacobins, in another