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Sir:

Inclosed you will be pleased to receive the dispatches from the board of Treasury of the United States, which you laid before the General Assembly; you will also receive two resolutions of the General Assembly, the one appointing Egbert Haywood, James Porterfield, and Ethelred Phillips, Commissioners for purchasing Tobacco, the other relative to Mr. Richard Blackledge’s furnishing the Governor with a receipt for Constable Rucker & Co., for a Certain quantity of Tobacco within Ninety days from the date of the Resolution.

As it appears to be the intention of the General Assembly that the whole of Mr. Blackledge’s conduct, together with the report of the Committee relative to this subject should be published in the Gazette, on failure of Mr. Blackledge in Complying with the Resolution, the whole of the papers respecting the same, I have lodged with the Treasurer. My reason for so doing was this, It appeared to me from the Tenor of the Resolution that it was intended, the Treasurer should carry into effect the intentions of the General Assembly, which he would not be able to comply with in any instance, without your direction. Should Mr. Blackledge therefore fail complying with the expectations of the General Assembly, Your Excellency will be pleased to call on the Treasurer to direct a publication of this transaction.

The late Governor laid before the General Assembly, a number of orders from the Commissioners of the Board of Treasury, on the United States, on William Skinner, Esquire, Commissioner of the Continental Loan Office in this State, on which warrants have been

granted on the Treasury of this State, by which means they have been taken up—these orders appear to me to be of Consequence to this State and the General Assembly having failed to give me any directions with respect to the disposition to be made of them, I must request your Excellency’s directions thereon.

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