Mr. Latrobe now comes on as a witness against Burr. His presence here
is with great inconvenience dispensed with, as one hundred and fifty
workmen require his constant directions on various public works of
pressing importance. I hope you will permit him to come away as soon as
possible. How far his testimony will be important as to the prisoner, I
know not; but I am desirous that those meetings of Yrujo with Burr and
his principal accomplices should come fully out, and judicially, as they
will establish the just complaints we have against his nation.

I did not see till last night the opinion of the Judge on the _subpoena
duces tecum_ against the President. Considering the question there as
_coram non judice_, I did not read his argument with much attention.
Yet I saw readily enough, that, as is usual, where an opinion is to be
supported, right or wrong, he dwells much on smaller objections, and
passes over those which are solid. Laying down the position generally,
that all persons owe obedience to subpoenas, he admits no exception
unless it can be produced in his law books. But if the constitution
enjoins on a particular officer to be always engaged in a particular
set of duties imposed on him, does not this supersede the general law,
subjecting him to minor duties inconsistent with these? The constitution
enjoins his constant agency in the concerns of six millions of people.
Is the law paramount to this, which calls on him on behalf of a single
one? Let us apply the Judge's own doctrine to the case of himself and
his brethren. The sheriff of Henrico summons him from the bench, to
quell a riot somewhere in his county. The federal judge is, by the
general law, a part of the posse of the State sheriff. Would the Judge
abandon major duties to perform lesser ones? Again; the court of Orleans
or Maine commands, by subpoenas, the attendance of all the judges of
the Supreme Court. Would they abandon their posts as judges, and the