Favor. I hope you will excuse the Omission.

Some time in the Month of September last, a Gentleman in Connecticutt
requested me to give him my Opinion of a Subject, perhaps too much
altercated in that State as well as this, The Commutation of half Pay
granted by Congress to the Officers of the late Army for Life for full
Pay during the Term of five years. I did not hesitate to say in Return,
that in my Opinion Congress was, in the Nature of their Appointment,
the sole Judge of the necessary Means of supporting the late Army
raised for the Defence of our Common Rights against the Invasions of
Great Britain; and if, upon their own deliberate Councils & the
repeated Representations of the Commander in Chiefe of the Army, they
judgd that the Grant of half Pay for Life was a Measure absolutely
necessary for the Support of a disciplined Army for the Purpose before
mentiond, they had an undoubted Right to make it; and as it was made in
behalf of the United States by their Representative authorizd to do it,
each State was bound in Justice & Honor to comply with it, even tho it
should seem to any to have been an ill judgd Measure; because States &
Individual Persons are equally bound to fulfill their Obligations, and
it is given as Characteristick of an honest Man, that "though he
sweareth (or promiseth) to his own hurt he changeth not." I moreover
acquainted him, that although I was never pleasd with the Idea of half
Pay for Life, for Reasons which appeard satisfactory to myself, some of
which I freely explaind to him, yet I had always thought, that as the
Opportunities of the Officers of the Army of acquiring moderate
Fortunes or making such Provision for their Families as Men generally
wish to make, were not equal to those of their Fellow Citizens at home,
it would be but just & reasonable, that an adequate Compensation should
be made to them at, or as soon as conveniently might be after, the End
of the War; and that he might therefore conclude, that the Commutation,