Beschreibung:

HAMILTON, Alexander (1755-1804), First Secretary of the Treasury . Letter signed ("A Hamilton") with autograph FREE FRANK ("A Hamilton") as Secretary of the Treasury, to Benjamin Bartlett, "Treasury Department," Washington, 14 April 1791. 1½ pages, 4to, integral address leaf, silked, with some browning and damp staining . MANAGING THE PAY ACCOUNTS OF THE TREASURY DEPARTMENT A circular letter which attests to Hamilton's careful management of the the multitude of agents and officers attached to the Treasury Department. As first Secretary of the Treasury, Hamilton found it "was crucial to keep this far-flung apparatus functioning smoothly for, on a day-to-day basis, the Treasury Department very nearly was the national government" (McDonald, Alexander Hamilton , p. 218). With over 500 employees, the Treasury Department was at this date the largest Federal bureau, and "Hamilton made it standard policy to handle the more vexing and delicate problems himself" (ibid.). Here, in a circular addressed to the Surveyor in Suffolk, Hamilton requests essential payroll data for the Department: "The House of Representatives having been pleased to direct me to examine and report upon the emoluments of the several officers of the Customs, I find it necessary to enable me to form a satisfactory judgment upon the subject that, I be furnished with an accurate account as much as possible in detail of all the monies received in the four quarters of the year 1790, by every Officer of the Customs who conceives himself to be insufficiently compensated. You will therefore if you think it proper to have your case taken into consideration transmit me such an account, and you will exhibit in detail likewise in the same paper the expences of every kind which you have actually paid during the same year." At the date of this letter, Hamilton had begun preparations for his revolutionary Report on Manufactures , delivered in December.