I have the honor to be, very respectfully, sir, your obedient servant,
JAMES MONROE.
_The Secretary of State to His Excellency D.B. Mitchell, the
governor of Georgia_.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE, _April 10, 1812_.
SIR: The President is desirous of availing the public of your services
in a concern of much delicacy and of high importance to the United
States. Circumstances with which you are in some degree acquainted, but
which will be fully explained by the inclosed papers, have made it
necessary to revoke the powers heretofore committed to General Matthews
and to commit them to you. The President is persuaded that you will not
hesitate to undertake a trust so important to the nation, and peculiarly
to the State of Georgia. He is the more confident in this belief from
the consideration that these new duties may be discharged without
interfering, as he presumes, with those of the station which you now
hold.
By the act of the 15th of January, 1811, you will observe that it was
not contemplated to take possession of East Florida or any part thereof,
unless it should be surrendered to the United States amicably by the
governor or other local authority of the Province, or against an attempt
to take possession of it by a foreign power, and you will also see that
General Matthews's instructions, of which a copy is likewise inclosed,
correspond fully with the law.
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