3. Nephew of Colonel Burr
CHAPTER XVI.
The correspondence in the last chapter between Mr. and Mrs. Burr has been selected and published that the world may judge him as husband and parent, so far as his letters afford a criterion. As literary productions they cannot fail to interest and amuse.
On the 8th day of March, 1790, the legislature passed an act appointing Gerard Bancker, treasurer, Peter Curtenius, auditor, and Aaron Burr, attorney-general, a board of commissioners to report on the subject of the various claims against the state for services rendered, or injuries sustained, during the war of the revolution. The task was one of great delicacy, and surrounded with difficulties. On Colonel Burr devolved the duty of making that report. It was performed in a masterly manner. When presented to the house, notwithstanding its magnitude, involving claims of every description to an immense amount, it met with no opposition from any quarter. On the 5th of April, 1792, the report was ordered to be entered at length on the journals of the assembly, and formed the basis of all future settlements with public creditors on account of the war. In it the various claimants are classified; legal and equitable principles are established, and applied to each particular class. The report occupies eighteen folio pages of the journals of the assembly. An extract from it is made, as justly meriting a place in this work.
The said report is in the words and figures following:——"The treasurer, the auditor, and the attorney-general, pursuant to the act entitled An act to receive and state accounts against this state, did forthwith, after the passing of the said act, give such notice of their appointment and duties, and of the times and places for the execution thereof, and of the period by the said act limited for receiving and auditing claims, as is directed by the said act. And do herewith transmit to the legislature their report upon the accounts and claims against the state, which have been thereupon exhibited.
"The anxiety of the commissioners to render the execution of this trust useful and acceptable has occasioned a delay of some weeks; if their success in this attempt has been in any degree proportioned to their attention to the subject, it will furnish their excuse; indeed, when the legislature shall have seen the number, the variety, and intricacy of the matters which have been submitted to the consideration of the commissioners, it is hoped that a further apology will be thought unnecessary.
"The commissioners have endeavoured to reduce these various demands into classes, in such manner as to present to the legislature, in one view, all which have appeared to depend on similar principles. Notwithstanding their utmost attention to this object, they have found it necessary to report on a considerable number of single cases. As the authority under which they have acted required of them a state of facts, together with their opinion thereupon, whenever there was a want of uniformity either in the facts submitted or in the principles to be applied in the determination, they have thought that strict justice could not be done to the merit of the claim without a separate discussion, though this has tended to lengthen the report beyond what could have been wished, and to a degree which perhaps may in some instances be thought prolix, yet the commissioners supposed it of moment that their investigation should be not only satisfactory to themselves, but that it should be apparent to the citizens upon whose claims they have pronounced, that each hath received a distinct attention, and that demands substantially different from each other have not been inconsiderately blended. If the perusal of the proceedings now submitted shall give an impression of this kind, it will, in the opinion of the commissioners, tend to produce a more cheerful acquiescence in the determination of the legislature, when that determination shall reject the demand, and prevent a revival of claims which shall now be extinguished. The commissioners have thought that these were desirable objects, and have therefore been cautious of generalizing, so as to destroy real distinctions, or suppress a fact even of the lightest importance.
"In order to preserve uniformity in their opinions, the commissioners have adopted certain principles, from which the hardship of any particular case hath not induced them to depart. The most general and important of these are,
"First. Where any species of claims is barred by an act of the legislature, they have considered the act as a bar to their investigation, farther than to ascertain it to be unquestionably within the meaning of the law. This principle will be found to extend to all claims for pay and rations alleged to be due for militia service; to most of the demands against forfeited estates; to all claims for property sequestered, when the sequestration was warranted by the resolutions of the convention and the authority of the commissioners; to all claims of payment of state agents' notes, and to some other particular cases, which will appear in the report. In support of this principle the commissioners have considered, that to sanction by their opinion the admission of claims against the spirit and letter of the statute would be an impeachment of the wisdom of those laws; would be arrogating an authority not exercised by, or permitted to, any court of law or equity, and would open a door to the importunate and perhaps least deserving class of citizens, while others, having similar demands, had withdrawn them from a spirit of submission to the laws, by which these demands were precluded. The commissioners have been confirmed in the propriety of their ideas by a reflection that, if it shall for any reasons seem expedient to the legislature to repeal or suspend the limitation of these or any of those statutes, the avenues to redress will at once be open through the ordinary officers of the state, without farther legislative interposition; and that the opportunities of recompense would then be notorious and equal; but that the redress, if any should be obtained through the medium of the commissioners, would be partial in its operation, and to the exclusion of those who with equal merits had acquiesced in the known laws.
"Second. In the cases of claims for services done and supplies furnished during the war, when the demand, though originating under the authority of this state, is properly against the United States, the opinion of the commissioners is against the allowance of any recompense, because those claims should more properly be preferred to Congress; and for that this state can have no credit with the United States for payment or assumptions after the 1st day of October, 1788.