other, and that from the
Apalachicola to the Perdido the third. To these districts the usual
number of revenue officers were appointed; and to secure the due
operation of these laws one judge and a district attorney were appointed
to reside at Pensacola, and likewise one judge and a district attorney
to reside at St. Augustine, with a specified boundary between them;
and one marshal for the whole, with authority to appoint a deputy. In
carrying this law into effect, and especially that part relating to the
powers of the existing government of those Provinces, it was thought
important, in consideration of the short term for which it was to
operate and the radical change which would be made at the approaching
session of Congress, to avoid expense, to make no appointment which
should not be absolutely necessary to give effect to those powers, to
withdraw none of our citizens from their pursuits, whereby to subject
the Government to claims which could not be gratified and the parties
to losses which it would be painful to witness.

It has been seen with much concern that in the performance of these
duties a collision arose between the governor of the Territory and the
judge appointed for the western district. It was presumed that the
law under which this transitory government was organized, and the
commissions which were granted to the officers who were appointed to
execute each branch of the system, and to which the commissions were
adapted, would have been understood in the same sense by them in which
they were understood by the Executive. Much allowance is due to officers
employed in each branch of this system, and the more so as there is good
cause to believe that each acted under the conviction that he possessed
the power which he undertook to exercise. Of the officer holding the
principal station, I think it proper to observe that he accepted it
with reluctance, in compliance with the invitation given him, and from
a high sense of duty to his country, being willing to contribute to the
consummation of an event which would insure complete protection to an
important part of our Union, which had suffered much from incursion and
invasion, and to the defense of which his very gallant and patriotic
services had been so signally and usefully devoted.

From the intrinsic difficulty of executing laws deriving their origin
from different sources, and so essentially different in many important
circumstances, the advantage, and