◆ SpookStack

mittee in its inquiries. The House based its right to investigate on ite control over the expenditure of public money. When the Committee asked the President for the papers relating to the campaign, President Washington called a meeting of his Cabinet. Present were Thomas Jefferson, Secre- tary of State, Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Knox, Secretary of War, and Edmond Rendolph, the Attorney General. The Presi- dent stated that he had called his Cabinet together because this was the first demand on the Executive for papers within his contro] and he desired that in so far as the action taken would constitute a precedent, it should be rightly conducted. President Washington readily admitted that he had no doubt of the propriety of what the House was doing, but he did conceive that there might be papers of so secret a nature that they ought not be given up. The President and his Cabinet came to an unanimous conclusion as follows: First, thet the House was an inquest, end therefore might institute inquiriss. Second, that it might call for papers generally. Third, that the Executive ought to communicate such pepers as the public good would per- mit, and cu + to refuse those, the disclosure of which would injure the public. The precedent there set by President Washington and his Cabinet wae followodin 1796 when he refused to comply with a resolution of the House of Representatives which requested him to lay before the House a copy of the instructions to the United States Minister who negotiated ae treaty with Great Britain, together with the correspondence and documents relating to that treaty. In declining to comply, President Weshington stated: "As it is essential to the due administration of the Government that the boundaries fixed by the Constitution between the various departments should be preserved, a just regard to the Constitution and to the duty of my office #* * * forbids @ compliance with your request.” ee en er es ee