And they had the “tax-dodger” with them also, as early as August, 1779—the good citizen who always wants his full share of attention and protection by the law, without paying his just proportion of the taxes to support the government; but he could not escape this court’s resourceful remedies for all exigencies. Here is given the disposition of the case:
Ordered that the Sheriff Collect from Wm. More four fold: his Taxable property being apraised by the Best Information that John Woods, Jacob Brown & Johnathan Tipton Assessors could get—to the sum of Eight thousand pounds.
Even the smart and rascally tax-dodger could not evade the law, with a court like that one to take hold of him.
At the May term, 1780, it was “Ord. that a fine of One Hundred pounds be imposed on John Chisholm Esqr for being Guilty of Striking and Beating Abram Denton in the Court Yard also Disturbing the peace and Decorum of the Court and that the Clerk issue an execution for the same.” This fine is here set out for the reason that John Chisholm was one of the first justices appointed for the county—he was at the time a member of the court that imposed this fine—and, as the records show, was wealthy and prominent in public affairs, being trusted with various appointments by the court; and yet he did not escape the hand of correction so often laid on offenders by the court in one or another way. The offence for which he was fined was committed, not in the presence of the court, but out in the court-yard. I very much doubt if an instance prior to this one can be found, where the limits within which it has been held that a contempt of court could be committed have been so extended as to include the court-yard.
At the November term, 1780, the court formulated and entered the following very remarkable order:
The Court appointed John Sevier, William Cobb, Thomas Houghton and Andrew Greer Commissioners for the County to be Judges of the Different kinds of paper Emissions in Circulation in this County or may be hereafter, in order to prevent frauds and Impositions that might be committed on said County, and for the purpose of Detecting and Suppressing Coins of this kind, who shall be the Judges & Viewers of all such Monies.
The record recites that these commissioners and judges “took the oath and entered into bond for the performance of sd Trust.”
At the time these four gentlemen were appointed as a high commission to be “judges and viewers” of the currency of the realm, and “detectors and suppressers” of spurious or counterfeit “coins” and “paper emissions in circulation,” all kinds of “such monies” seem to have gotten into “the new world west of the Alleghanies,” for, at the same term of the court making the order regulating the charges of tavern-keepers, referred to above, two rates or schedules were prescribed, one in “paper emissions,” the other in “coins.” The order of the county court creating this commission and investing it with power to “view” and “judge” of the genuineness of the circulating medium, and to detect and suppress such of it as should be adjudged fraudulent, does not point out the way, lay down any rules or provide any method for the guidance and direction of the commission in the exercise of the powers given or the discharge of the duties imposed. It says simply what they shall do, or rather what they have been appointed to do, and then leaves them to do it. That they found out an effective way to exercise their powers there is not a doubt. They did not need to be given “mandatory” power. “Counterfeiters” had been “dealt with,” before this domestic monetary commission was created, by some of the same men who constituted the commission.
One of the most delicate and difficult duties that devolved upon this commission, under the terms of the order creating it—particularly the words, “in order to prevent frauds and impositions that might be committed,” etc.—was in cases where a question was raised as to the genuineness of the money offered in payment by a citizen known to be upright and free from any suspicion of handling spurious money, to another equally honest, who refused it because he was doubtful as to its being “good money.” The “judges and viewers” were called in to take action, and had to decide in effect whether or not the money offered was a “legal tender.” Their decision was accepted; and henceforth that particular money circulated, if so ordered, without question, and performed all the functions of money, whether it was in fact genuine or spurious: if the decision was adverse, that money was thenceforth worthless.
As an incident of the power and authority vested in these “judges and viewers,” arose the question occasionally of guilt or innocence, when a charge of counterfeiting or of wilfully and knowingly passing spurious money was preferred. The person so charged was tried before the high currency commission, and its finding or judgment not only settled the question of the guilt or innocence of the accused, but made the particular currency involved either “sound money” or counterfeit in that entire country. John Sevier, according to tradition, was chairman of the commission; if his name was written on the “paper emission,” it passed current thereafter, and when offered in payment was a “legal tender.”