Mr. McCulloch, collector, to Mr. Jackson.
Collector’s Office, December 3, 1819.
Sir: It has been reported to me this morning that you have said, upon being asked about some gun carriages in your workshop, that they were partly old, and that the men who employed you to make them told you that they had the collector’s instructions to do them in such a way as would *just keep clear of the laws, intimating thereby that they had been instructed by me in the way to evade the law. This is such an impudent, bare-faced falsehood that, though I am persuaded this has never been said to you, I cannot but wonder that you should believe and repeat such things, who surely know me well enough to suppose that I would neither emulate nor deliver such disgraceful lessons. The whole is a declaration of false knaves, and the carriages must not be delivered to any foreign vessel of war with those who are in peace with the United States, under penalty of aiding and assisting in fitting them out contrary to law. [132]
I am, sir, with better hopes for your future observations on this subject and on me, yours,
- J. H. McCULLOCH.
- Mr. William Jackson.