Enclosure To Alexander Hamilton, 27 July 1793
Enclosure To Alexander Hamilton
Philadelphia July 27. 1793.
Sir.
I have considered your application for liberty to borrow three millions of Florins in addition to the one million, now in train of being borrowed.1
It appears from the documents which you have laid before me that 284,901 Dollars 89 Cents have been applied to the purchase of the general debt;2 and that by the Act of 2d March 1793. 200,000 dollars, of the money for that use, have been employed discharging the installment due to the Bank of the United States.3 The sum then which may still be borrowed under the Act of the 12th of August 1790, being 1,515,098 Dollars 11 Cents—& it being very desirable to embrace the present season for purchasing, I am of opinion that a loan should be opened to that amount.4
In like manner, as the balance of foreign loans, now in the Treasury, which appears from the same documents to be 565,484 D. 28 Cts may be absorbed by the installments of the French Debt due in September & November next;5 & another installment of the Dutch loan will fall due in June 1794 & will require the sum of 1,000,000 florins, I am also of opinion that a Loan ought to be effected to that amount.6
Go: Washington
LB, DLC:GW.
1. For Hamilton’s arguments in favor of new U.S. loans, see Hamilton to GW, 3, 15, 24 June, 24 July 1793.
2. For payment of this debt, see Hamilton to GW, 24 June, and note 4.
3. According to “An Act providing for the payment of the First Instalment due on a Loan made of the Bank of the United States,” 2 Mar. 1793, the president was authorized “to apply two hundred thousand dollars, of the monies which may have been borrowed, in pursuance of the fourth section of the act, intituled ‘An Act making provision for the reduction of the public debt’” in order to make the first installment due on a loan from the Bank of the United States (., 338).
4. Section 4 of “An Act making Provision for the Reduction of the Public Debt,” 12 Aug. 1790, authorized the president to borrow $2 million for payment of the U.S. debt (ibid., 187).
5. On the French loans of 18 million and 10 million livres, see , 11–14. For previous payments on these loans, see the “Statement of Interest & Arrearages of Interest,” of 1 Sept. 1790, enclosed in Hamilton to William Short, 1 Sept. 1790, , 7:16–17. According to the report “On Obtaining New Foreign Loans” enclosed in Hamilton to GW, 15 June 1793, the two installments with interest totaled $605,302.50.
6. On the 1782 Dutch loan of 10 million livres (5 million florins), see , 15–17.