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ed in establishing the freedom of kindred states, to whose person, they have still flattered themselves they retained some right, and have ever looked up, as their dernier resort in distress, would restore full confidence of salvation to our citizens, and would render them equal to whatever is not impossible. I cannot un- dertake to foresee and obviate the difficulties which lie in the way of such a resolution. ‘The whole subject is before you, of which I see only detached parts: and your judgment will be formed on a view of the whole. Should the danger of this state and its consequence to the Union, be such, as to render it best for the whole that you should repair to its assistance, the difficulty would then be, how to keep men out of the field. I have un- dertaken to hint this matter to your Excellency, not only on my own sense of its importance to us, but at the solicitations of many members of weight in our legislature, which has not yet assem- bled to speak their own desires.
A few days will bring to me that relief which the constitution has prepared for those oppressed with the labors of my office, and a long declared resolution of relinquishing it to abler hands, has prepared my way for retirement to a private station: still, as an individual, I should feel the comfortable effects of your presence, and have (what I thought could not have been) an additional mo- tive for that gratitude, esteem, and respect, with which I have the honor to be,
your Exxcellency’s most obedient humble servant, Tu: JEFFERSON.”
LETTER LVIII. TO HIS EXCELLENCY GENERAL WASHINGTON.
Annapolis, April 16, 1784. Dear Sir,
[ received your favor of April the 8th, by Colonel Harrison. The subject of it is teresting, and, so far as you have stood con- nected with it, has been matter of anxiety to me; because, what- ever may be the ultimate fate of the institution of the Cincinnati, as, in its course, it draws to it some degree of disapprobation, I have wished to see you standing on ground separated from it, and
[* An interval of near three years here occurs in the Author’s correspon- dence, during which he preserved only memoranda of the contents of the letters written by him.]
