“ Pamphlet, prepared by you for the use of your Counsel, in the case of Edward Livingston against you. M ^r Ingersol of Philadelphia, two or three years ago sent me two large Pamphlets upon the same subject. Neddy is a naughty lad as well as a saucy one. I have not forgotten his lying villany in his fictitious fabricated Case of a Jonathan Robbins who never existed. His suit against you, I hope has convinced you of his Character. What has become of his defalcation and plunder of the Publick? I rejoice however that you have been plagued by this fellow; because it has stimulated you to a Research that cannot fail to be of great Use to your Country. You have brought up to the view of the young Generation of Lawyers in our Country Tracts and Regions of legal Information of which they never had dreamed: but which will become, every day more and more necessary for our Courts of Justice to investigate.

"Good God! Is a President of U.S. to be subject to a private action of every Individual? This will soon introduce the Axiom that a President can do no wrong; or another equally curious that a President can do no right.

"I have run over this Pamphlet with great pleasure but must read it with more Attention . . .”

Again, two days later, on May 3, Adams wrote: “I wrote you on the first of this month acknowledging the receipt of your “Proceedings” &c and now repeat my thanks for it. It is as masterly a pamphlet as ever I have read; and every way worthy of the Mind that composed and the pen which commited it to writing. There is witt and fancy and delicate touches of Satyr enough in it to make it entertaining while the profusion of learning, the close reasoning, and accurate Criticism must have required a Patience of Investigation that at your Age is very uncommon . . .”

Jefferson’s list included Charles Pinckney as above. A letter of thanks came from William Pinkney, dated from Baltimore on June 27: “I had the honour to receive a few weeks ago, the very acceptable Present of your Book on Livingston’s Claim, which I have read in part with great attention, & intend to finish in a Day or two.-- It has a Bearing upon a Cause in which I am concerned as Counsel in Maryland, and affords me Lights which certainly I had not before.

"As far as I have gone I find the Statements clear, and the Reasoning absolutely conclusive. You appear to have exhibited a complete View of the Subject as to Fact and Law--and the whole is evidently the Result of the most diligent Personal and careful Reflection.--I cannot help thinking that it ought to be so published as to go into full Circulation.--Not only Lawyers, but the public in general, would peruse such a work with Pleasure & Profit.--Be pleased, Sir, to accept my Thanks for this Pamphlet, and to be assured that I have received it with a lively Interest, connected, not with the Subject only, or with the masterly manner in which it is treated, but with the author personnally, for whom my unfeigned & respectful attachment is too well known to require to be mentioned . . .”

Less than a month after this, on July 10, Jefferson sent a copy to Thomas Cooper: “ . . . In return for the many richer favors recieved from you, I send you my little tract on the Batture of New Orleans, & Livingston’s claim to it. I was at a loss where to get it printed, & confided it to the editor of the Edinburg Review, reprinted at N. York. but he has not done it immaculately. altho’ there are typographical errors in your lecture, I wonder to see so difficult a work so well done at Carlisle . . . ”

And on January 8, 1813, he sent a copy to Archibald Thweatt: “ Yours of Dec. 3 came during an absence of between 5. & 6. weeks in Bedford, which is the cause of my being so late in answering it. I now inclose you the pamphlet you ask for. it is the only copy I have, & is kept for my own use, so I must ask the return of it when you are done with it. I had it printed principally to put a copy into the hands of every member of Congress, & if I had supposed you would have ”