Annapolis April 6th 1784
Dear Sir
I have the pleasure of informing you that the resolutions for allowing your Expences as stated, & the loss of Money by Major Peirce passd this day unanimously.
1 I hope you will attend the Indian Treaty, which I think will be of infinite importance to our Country.2
Genl. Clarke is gone to the western Country & I much doubt whether he can attend. It is probable that Congress will adjourn toward the end of May, leaving a Committee of the States. But if you are so fortunate as to finish the Treaty with the Indians soon, by which a determinate territory may be securd in our disposal, it will be but justice to our Creditors to apply the Lands therein as speedily as possible to the payment of their demands; which Congress alone can execute.
The very uncommon severity of the winter, has been extremely injurious to all manner of Stock, & greatly embarrassd the People in general in preparing for their crops. Commerce & trade have also sufferd much from the same cause. I am therefore apprehensive that the product of taxes will be very small. This will render a recourse to the western land more necessary, & I cannot but hope, that this fund will contribute largely to the abolition of our public debt.
I shall be exceedingly rejoic'd to hear from yourself, of your having engag'd in the indian negociation & likely to bring it to a speedy & happy conclusion.
I have the honor to be, with very great esteem, Dear Sir Yr. most Obed. Servt.
Arthur Lee3
Receiver's copy, Custis-Lee Collection, Library of Congress.
1 See JCC, 26:198 - 99. In a letter of November 3, 1783, Greene had sought a "special resolution of Congress" for settling the accounts of his expenses in the southern department. The accounts had been referred on November 4 to a committee consisting of Hugh Williamson, Thomas Jefferson, and Jacob Read who had conferred with treasury officials and had reported on January 13, 1784. See PCC, item 19, 2:511 - 12, item 155, 2:672 - 91, item 186, fol. 136.
2 See Thomas Mifflin to the Indian Commissioners, March 6 and 22, 1784.
3 Lee also wrote a letter this day to his nephew Thomas Lee Shippen, acquiescing in his decision to transfer the seat of his law studies from Williamsburg, Va., where he was among his Lee cousins and uncles, to Philadelphia where his immediate family resided. Notwithstanding, Lee was persuaded that "Williamsburg is more healthy than Philadelphia, & the difference with regard to the Law is that in Virginia there is some rule of practice, in Philadelphia there are none. And I do not imagine the elevation of that renown'd Lawyer Jacob Rush is likely to improve it." Shippen Family Papers, DLC; and Richard Henry Lee to Shippen, November 19, 1784. Benjamin Rush's brother, Jacob, had just been appointed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Rush, Letters (Butterfield), 1:315.