Report on New Hampshire Requisition, 25 March 1782
Report on New Hampshire Requisition
MS (NA: PCC, No. 20, I, 19–21). Written and docketed by JM: “Report of Committee on the Letter from President Weare of 23d. of Feby. 1782[.] 25th. March 1782. Monday next assigned[.]” Between “Feby. 1782” and “25th. March,” Charles Thomson, secretary of Congress, later inserted “Agreed to May 22d. 1782.”
March 25th. 1782
The Committee to whom was referred the letter of the 23d. of Feby last from the President of N. Hamshire1 submit the following report:
That so much of the said letter as relates to 5 Millions of Dollars of the old emission remaining in the Treasury of N. Hamshire, as a surplus of the quota allotted to that State for redemption, be referred to the Superintendt of Finance to report thereon.2
That in answer to the remaining part of the letter which represents that the State of N. Hamshire was overated in the requisition made by Congress on the 2d. of Novr. last, and contains a return of its inhabitants, amounting to 82,200 only the President of the said State be informed;3
That as a valuation of land throughout the U. States wch. the instrument of confederation prescribes as the rule for apportioning the public burdens on the several States,4 was under present circumstances manifestly unattainable, Congress were obliged to resort to some other rule in fixing the quotas in the requisition of Novr. last:
That the number of inhabitants in each State, having been a rule observed in previous requisitions of money naturally presented itself as the most eligible one;
That as no actual numeration of the inhabitants of each State hath yet been obtained by Congress, the computed number which formed the basis of the first requisition made on the States the 29th. of July 1775,5 was adhered to:
That although the particular numeration of the Inhabitants of N. Hamshire, as stated in the letter, should have been made with due accuracy, still a reduction of its quota in conformity thereto, might produce injustice to the other States; since the computation of July 1775 may as far exceed their real number as it has been found to exceed that of New Hamshire:
That if the justice of the application from N. Hamshire were less uncertain, it would at this season be impossible to superadd to the quotas of the other States, any deduction from that of N. Hamshire; and to make such deduction without superadding it to the quotas of the other States, would leave a deficiency in the revenue which has been found on calculation to be essential for the exigencies of the current year.
That the other facts stated by him in his letter,6 however well founded they may be, are not peculiar to N. Hamshire, and if admitted for the purpose to which they are applied, would authorize, and produce similar demands from other States:
That for these considerations, and more especially as, the apportionment in question, if hereafter found to be erroneous will be subject to correction, Congress cannot comply with the request made in behalf of N. Hamshire; and confide in the justice and public spirit of the sd. State for those exertions which may be necessary to prevent a deficiency in the public revenue.7
1. Meshech Weare’s letter, addressed to Samuel Livermore, the only New Hampshire delegate then in Congress, was read on 13 March and referred to JM, Abraham Clark, and Ezekiel Cornell (, XXII, 128, n. 2).
2. Weare pointed out that, subsequent to the ordinance of 18 March 1780 providing for the cancellation of the “old emission” of continental currency, notes of that emission had depreciated more slowly in New Hampshire than in most of the other states. Hence, late in the spring of 1781, when these bills suddenly became almost worthless along the middle Atlantic seaboard, they naturally flowed in large quantities to New Hampshire, which until 23 July continued to receive them for taxes at the legal exchange rate of $40.00 of the old for $1.00 of the new currency. As a result, his state had drawn over double its quota of these bills into its treasury but could not use them to pay domestic debts or the annual allotment of money to Congress. In view of this situation and the fact that some states had not retired their full quotas of the old emission, Weare asked that Congress direct these delinquent states to make up their shortages by purchases from the surplus held by New Hampshire, or that Congress agree to receive this continental currency “in part payment of our Taxes for the current year” (NA: PCC, No. 64, fols. 218–20). See also , XV, 1150; XVI, 262–66; , II, 49, n. 2; III, 108–9; 109–10, nn. As the present report recommended, Weare’s request was referred to Robert Morris on 22 May. Morris’ proposed solution was rejected by Congress on 26 November 1782. Thereafter the matter at issue was merged with the much larger problem of effecting financial settlements among the states and between each state and Congress (, XXIII, 854–56).
3. By the requisition of 2 November 1781, New Hampshire was asked to supply $373,598 or 4.67 per cent of the $8 million total. Lacking both a reliable population census for most of the colonies and similar tables of property values, Congress on 29 July 1775 had apportioned its first requisition in sums assumed to reflect the relative populations, “including negroes and mulattoes,” of the thirteen colonies (, II, 221–22; XXI, 1090). When requisitioning money thereafter, Congress adhered approximately to the ratio agreed upon in 1775. The cover of Weare’s letter contains docketing that notes the number of New Hampshire’s “Inhabitants taken on Oath in 1775” was 82,200. Only three other colonies had taken a similar census in that year; hence the total population at the outset of the Revolution can only be estimated. If the people in the thirteen colonies then numbered about 2,507,180, as one careful scholar has concluded, New Hampshire’s percentage of the total should have been 3.24 rather than 4.67 (Stella H. Sutherland, Population Distribution in Colonial America [New York, 1936], pp. xii, 271). Therefore it seems Weare had good reason to believe that New Hampshire was “overated.” Although he did not specify in his letter by how much the population of his state had been overestimated, an opinion on this point was at least implied by Livermore on 1 April 1782, when he succeeded merely in postponing the adoption of JM’s report by offering a substitute motion to lessen New Hampshire’s quota by $66,512 (, XXII, 158–61). If Congress had consented to this reduction, the state’s percentage of the $8 million would have dropped from 4.67 to about 3.84.
4. Article VIII of the Articles of Confederation ( XIX, 217). See JM to Pendleton, 7 February 1782, n. 5.
5. See n. 3, above.
6. Among these “other facts” stated by Weare were “little Trade,” many new, unproductive farms, no “hard Money,” and “the great difficulties and embarrassments we are under, on account of the disputes subsisting in the western Parts of this State” (NA: PCC, No. 64, fol. 220). For the Vermont or New Hampshire Grants disputes, see JM to Pendleton, 22 January, and nn. 3, 5, and 6; and 7 February 1782, and n. 4.
7. In a letter on 16 April to Weare, Livermore mentioned his “utmost efforts” to defeat the report and sarcastically characterized it as “wise,” according to “the wisdom of this world, and savours of the mammon of unrighteousness” (, VI, 328–29; see also ibid., VI, 317). Although unmentioned in the printed journal, Congress on 22 April referred the report to Joseph Montgomery, Thomas Bee, and Oliver Wolcott (Conn.) for review (NA: PCC, No. 186, fol. 22). In a letter written to Weare on that day, Livermore expressed the hope that the report “will be well considered and set right” by the new committee (, VI, 332). The hope was in vain. On 22 May 1782 Congress adopted JM’s original report without alteration (, XXII, 290).