A Rare and Important Original Act of Congress, Signed by Thomas Jefferson, Wherein Congress Funds the State Department As the U.S. Government Gets Underway

We are unaware of another signed copy of this act having reached the market

 

For generations in a private collection

The first three Executive branch departments under the Constitution were created in 1789 – the departments of Treasury, War, and State (Thomas Jefferson was confirmed by the Senate as the nation’s first Secretary of State, on September 26, 1789 (the day after Washington appointed him). At the time, Jefferson was just completing his four-year tenure as United States Minister Plenipotentiary to France, and was acutely aware of the need for official American representatives abroad who would have responsibilities beyond the mere facilitation of commerce. President Washington recognized this need as well – in his first Annual Address to Congress (on January 8, 1790) he remarked: “The interests of the United States require that our intercourse with other nations should be facilitated by such provisions as will enable me to fulfill my duty in that respect in the manner which circumstances may render most conducive to the public good, and to this end that the compensation to be made to the persons who may be employed should, according to the nature of their appointments, be defined by law, and a competent fund designated for defraying the expenses incident to the conduct of foreign affairs.”

Just months later, on July 1, 1790, Congress passed an act “providing the means of intercourse between the United States and foreign nations”. The act provided funding for the State Department, and in effect funded the United States Foreign Service. It effectively empowered the Department of State to represent American interests abroad. It enabled establishment of the first pay scale for U.S. diplomats. A Minister’s salary was $9,000; a Chargé d’Affaires earned $4,500. Overall expenses for “foreign intercourse” were set at $40,000. The act also gave the president the right to pay expenses associated with treaties and consulates. Washington then appointed the first United States consular officers: twelve consuls and five vice consuls.

But the funding was for a limited time, and as originally designed, required every Congress to renew the act. Also, Jefferson made a request for additional authority to facilitate payment of State Department expenses. The Second Congress in 1793 acted to renew it, and comply with Jefferson’s request, passing “An Act to continue in force for a limited time, and to amend the act intituled ‘An act providing the means of intercourse between the United States and foreign nations’”. It reads: “Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the act, intituled “An Act providing the means of intercourse between the United States and foreign nations which would expire at the end of the present session of Congress, be, and the same hereby is, together with this act, continued in force for the space of one year, from the passing of this act, and from thence until the end of the session of Congress then, or next thereafter holden, and no longer. Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That in all cases, where any sum or sums of money have issued, or shall hereafter issue, from the treasury, for the purposes of intercourse or treaty, with foreign nations, in pursuance of any law, The President shall be, and he hereby is authorized to cause the same to be duly settled annually with the accounting officers of the treasury, in manner following, that is to say; by causing the same to be accounted for, specifically, in all instances, wherein the expenditure thereof may, in his judgment, be made public; and by making a certificate or certificates, or causing the Secretary of State to make a certificate or certificates of the amount of such expenditures, as he may think it advisable not to specify; and every such certificate shall be deemed a sufficient voucher for the sum or sums therein expressed to have been expended.” That latter provision was designed, by giving authority to Washington, to respond to Jefferson’s request.

Back then, copies of federal laws were sent by the Secretary of State to the governors of the states to put them on notice. Document signed by Jefferson as Secretary of State, Washington, February 9, 1793, being that very law – “An Act to continue in force for a limited time, and to amend the act intituled ‘An act providing the means of intercourse between the United States and foreign nations.’” Section 1 extended the bill, and section 2 dealt with expenditures and gave the President certain authority over making incurring them. This copy was sent to Connecticut Governor and signer of the Declaration of Independence Samuel Huntington.

This is our first bill funding one of the original departments in the Washington Administration, and signed by Jefferson, that we have had in many years.