Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/558

, in defiance of the penal statute, and showing- also the great estimation of the advantage of having these certificates put into a company stock, and "managed " by Judge Watrous and his confederates; for to secure this advantage one hundred and fifty thousand out of three hundred thousand acres is offered as a premium.

", February 24, 1847.

":— Colonel met here with an old acquaintance, Colonel, and, what is more to the purpose, a large landholder in the East. Through some former business connections with him,  was able to persuade him to an arrangement most advantageous to us.  holds about sixty of the rejected—ah! call them not fraudulent!—and thinks he can secure as many more. He is willing to give us half in order to have the others put into the company stock, and located and managed with the rest; most kindly offered to divide with us, so that this arrangement will secure us about thirty more leagues, or one hundred and fifty thousand acres contingently. has gone home now to obtain them. He speaks in the most disrespectful terms of Miner and his management.

"Miner is here, and going to San Antonio. I have, most strangely, received no letter yet from Judge Watrous, respecting the final settlement with the 'little fellow,' nor the survey and the engagement of Hay, but I expect one daily. Miner's presence will complicate matters, I am afraid.

"" The expression of this letter "ah! call them not fraudulent," is curious for its flippant irony. It reminds one of the same self-complacency with which, in a formerly-quoted letter, he opines his agent, Miner, to be "the cheater, not the seller."

To return to the history of the case which Mr. League had taken in hand. At the December term of the Supreme Court of the United States, judgment was rendered, affirming the judgment of the Supreme Court of Texas, declaring the certificate invalid and void.

It might have been supposed that after the judgment of the Supreme Court of Texas, the high Court of Appeals, and, finally, after the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, against the validity of the certificate, further efforts on the part of the company would have been hopeless. But what vitality, what ramifications, what resources, must they have possessed, when we find them daring, at the last, as I shall show, to anticipate exerting an influence on the United States Supreme Court itself? This, certainly, was a fitting climax to audacity and assertion of power. Thus we find this branch of the scheme of the conspirators expiring with an adventurous and desperate effort to retrieve their fortunes by improper influences with the courts; the last effort, still characteristic, and still significant of the comprehensive grasp and connections of this most extraordinary combination.

As exposing the honest proposition of exerting an influence on the Supreme Court of the United States, I will here read from a letter from Mr. Joseph L. Williams on this subject, to whom, it appears, was and is allotted the Washington branch of the company's operations: ", November 1, 1851. ":— Your suggestions as to the proper course for our