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Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Volume 2. by Matthew L. (Matthew Livingston) Davis
page 80 of 568 (14%)
As a part of the history of this election, the following letter and
extracts from letters are here inserted.



THOMAS JEFFERSON TO AARON BURR.

Washington, December 15, 1800.

"DEAR SIR,

Although we have not official information of the votes for president
and vice-president, and cannot have until the first week in February,
yet the state of the votes is given on such evidence as satisfies both
parties that the two republican candidates stand highest. From South
Carolina we have not even heard of the actual vote, but we have
learned who were appointed electors, and with sufficient certainty how
they would vote. It is said they would withdraw from yourself one
vote. It has also been said that a General Smith, of Tennessee, had
declared that he would give his second vote to Mr. Gallatin, not from
any indisposition towards you, but extreme reverence to the character
of Mr. Gallatin. It is also surmised that the vote of Georgia will not
be entire. Yet nobody pretends to know these things of a certainty,
and we know enough to be certain that what it is surmised will be
withheld, will still leave you four or five votes at least above Mr.
Adams. However, it was badly managed not to have arranged with
certainty what seems to have been left to hazard. It was the more
material, because I understand several high-flying federalists have
expressed their hope that the two republican tickets may be equal, and
their determination in that case to prevent a choice by the House of
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