rality which has characterized the Executive Committee in
all their intercourse with their opponents, the suggestion made by Mr.
Elmore is cheerfully complied with. The following is a copy of the
letter alluded to.--J.G.B.]

"WASHINGTON, May 5, 1838.

To JAMES G. BIRNEY, Esq., Cor. Sec. A.A.S.S.

SIR,--I have to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 1st
instant, in which you again refer to the publication of the
Correspondence between us, in relation to the measures and designs
of the abolitionists. I would have certainly answered yours of the
2d ult., on the same subject, more fully before this, had it not
escaped my recollection, in consequence [of] having been more
engaged than usual in the business before the House. I hope the
delay has been productive of no inconvenience.

If I correctly understand your letters above referred to, the
control of these papers, and the decision as to their publication,
have passed into the 'Executive Committee of the American
Anti-Slavery Society;' and, from their tenor, I infer that their
determination is so far made, that nothing I could object would
prevent it, if I desired to do so. I was certainly not apprised,
when I entered into this Correspondence, that its disposition was to
depend on any other will than yours and mine,--but that matters
nothing now,--you had the power, and I am not disposed to question
the right or propriety of its exercise. I heard of you as a man of
intelligence, sincerity, and truth,--who, although laboring in a bad
cause, did it with ability, and from a mistaken conviction of its
justice. As one of the Representatives of a slave-holding
constituency, and one of a committee raised by the Representatives
of the slave-holding States, to ascertain the intentions and
progress of your associations, I availed myself of the opportunity
offered by your character and situation, to propose to you inquiries
_as to facts_, which would make those _developments so important to
be known by our people_. My inquiries were framed to draw out _full
and authentic details_ of the organization, numbers, resources, and
designs of the abolitionists, of the means they resorted to for the
accomplishment of their ends, and the progress made, and making, in
their dangerous work, that all such information might be laid before
the _four mi