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service; and provide for carrying the mail. His salary is $8000.

§ 487. The Postmaster-General is aided in the discharge of his duties by three Assistant Postmasters-General, appointed by himself. He has the sole appointment of all postmasters throughout the United States, whose commissions are less than $1000 a year; those whose commissions yield more than that sum, are appointed by the President, with the advice and consent of the Senate. In case of the death, resignation, or absence of the Postmaster-General, all his powers and duties devolve on the first assistant.

§ 488. Once in three months, the Postmaster-General renders to the Secretary of the Treasury a quarterly account of all the receipts and expenditures in his department, to be adjusted and settled as other public accounts, and the revenue arising from his department is paid into the Treasury of the United States. For a long period the Postmaster-General was not regarded as a member of the President's Cabinet, but in the opening of Jackson's administration the Postmaster-General was called to the same duties as a cabinet counsellor of the President, which had previously been discharged by the secretaries of the other departments.

$489. The Postmaster-General, and all other persons employed in the general post-office, or in the care, custody, or conveyance of the mail, are required, previous to entering upon their duties, to take and subscribe an oath, faithfully to perform the duties required of them, and to abstain from every thing forbidden by the laws in relation to the establishment of post-offices and post-roads. The deputy postmasters in the various cities, towns, and villages. throughout the United States, are required to give bonds to secure the faithful discharge of their duties.

§ 490. The following is a list of the Postmasters-Gene ral:

SAMUEL OSGOOD, of Massachusetts. Appointed 26th September, 1789. Resigned.

TIMOTHY PICKERING, of Pennsylvania. Appointed 12th August, 1791, in the recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 7th November, 1791. Appointed Secretary of War 2d January, 1795. JOSEPH HABERSHAM, of Georgia. Appointed 25th February, 1795. Resigned.

GIDEON GRANGER, of Connecticut. Appointed 28th November, 1801, in recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 26th January, 1802.

RETURN JONATHAN Meigs, Jr., (Governor of Ohio.) Appointed 17th March, 1814. Resigned.

JOHN MCLEAN, of Ohio. Appointed 26th June, 1823, in recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 9th December, 1823. WILLIAM T. BARRY, of Kentucky. Appointed 9th March, 1829. AMOS KENDALL, of Kentucky. Appointed 1st May, 1835, in the recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 15th March, 1836.

JOHN M. NILES, of Connecticut. Appointed 18th May, 1840. FRANCIS GRANGER, of New York. Appointed 6th March, 1841. Resigned.

CHARLES A. WICKLIFFE, of Kentucky. Appointed 13th September, 1841. Resigned.

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CAVE JOHNSON, of Tennessee. Appointed 5th March, 1845. JACOB COLLAMER, of Vermont. Appointed 7th March, 1849. signed.

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NATHAN K. HALL, of New York. Appointed 20th July, 1850. Resigned.

SAMUEL D. HUBBARD, of Connecticut. Appointed 31st August, 1952.
JAMES CAMPBELL, of Pennsylvania. Appointed March 7th, 1853.

§ 491. By an act of Congress, approved March 3, 1849, a new department was created, called the Department of the Interior, to which were assigned certain matters which had previously appertained to the Department of State, of War, of Treasury, or of Navy.

§ 492. The Secretary of the Interior has supervision of

the patent office; the general land office; the accounts of officers of the courts of the United States; Indian affairs ; the pension office; the census office; mines; and the public buildings. Salary $8000.

§ 493. The bureaus connected with this department are the land office, the chief officer of which is termed the Commissioner of the General Land Office; the patent office, the chief officer of which is the Commissioner of Patents; the Indian office, the chief officer of which is the Commissioner of Indian Affairs; the pension office, the chief officer of which is the Commissioner of Pensions; and the census bureau, the chief officer of which is the Superintendent of Census.

§ 494. The care of the Capitol, the President's house and grounds, and the bridges and buildings of a public character erected by Congress in the District of Columbia, belongs to this department.

§ 495. List of Secretaries of the Interior since the organization of the department :

THOMAS EWING, of Ohio. Appointed 7th March, 1849. Resigned. THOMAS M. T. MCKENNAN, of Pennsylvania. Appointed 15th August, 1850. Resigned.

ALEXANDER H. H. STUART, of Virginia. Appointed 12th September,

1850.

ROBERT MCCLELLAND, of Michigan. Appointed March 7th, 1853

§ 496. An act of Congress of September 24, 1789, made provision for an Attorney-General; whose duty should be to prosecute and conduct all suits in the Supreme Court of the United States, in which the United States shall be concerned, and to give his advice and opinion upon questions of law, when required by the President, or when requested by the heads of any of the departments in matters which concern their departments. He also advises

with and directs the solicitor of the treasury as to suits in which the United States are concerned, pending in the inferior courts of the United States, and he directs and prosecutes appeals to the Supreme Court of the United States, in suits involving title to land in the new territories acquired by the United States.

§ 497. He also examines the title to all lands purchased by the United States for the purpose of erecting thereon armories, arsenals, forts, navy-yards, custom-houses, light. houses, or other public buildings; and without his certificate of the validity of the title, no public money can be expended in such purchases. It is not his duty to give official opinions to the Senate or House of Representatives. His salary is $8000.

§ 498. The act above referred to, does not declare what effect shall be attributed to the advice and opinion of the Attorney-General when given to the President, or the head of a department; but it is believed that the practice of the government has almost invariably been to follow it.

$499. The following is a list of the Attorneys-General of the United States:

EDMUND RANDOLPH, of Virginia. Appointed 26th September, 1789. Appointed Secretary of State 2d January, 1794.

WILLIAM BRADFORD, of Pennsylvania. Appointed 28th January, 1794.

CHARLES LEE, of Virginia. Appointed 10th December, 1795. LEVI LINCOLN, of Massachusetts. Appointed 5th March, 1801. signed in 1805.

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Appointed 23d December, 1805.
Appointed 20th January, 1807

ROBERT SMITH, of Maryland. Appointed 2d March, 1805.
JOHN BRECKENRIDGE, of Kentucky.
CESAR A. RODNEY, of Delaware.
Resigned.

WILLIAM PINKNEY, of Maryland.
RICHARD RUSH, of Pennsylvania.
WILLIAM WIRT, of Virginia.

Appointed 11th December, 1811. Appointed 10th February, 1814. Appointed 13th November, 1817, in

recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 15th December, 1817.

JOHN MACPHERSON BERRIEN, of Georgia. Appointed 9th March, 1829. Resigned.

ROGER B. TANEY, of Maryland. Appointed 20th July, 1831, in the recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 27th December, 1831.

BENJAMIN F. BUTLER, of New York. Appointed 15th November, 1833, in the recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 24th June, 1834. Resigned.

FELIX GRUNDY, of Tennessee. Appointed 7th July, 1838. Resigned. HENRY D. GILPIN, of Pennsylvania. Appointed 10th January, 1840. JOHN J. CRITTENDEN, of Kentucky. Appointed 5th March, 1841. Resigned.

HUGH S. LEGARE, of South Carolina. Appointed 13th September, 1841. JOHN NELSON, of Maryland. Appointed 1st July, 1843, in the recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 2d January, 1844. Resigned.

JOHN Y. MASON, of Virginia. Appointed 5th March, 1845. Resigned Appointed Secretary of the Navy 9th September, 1846.

NATHAN CLIFFORD, of Maine. Appointed 17th October, 1846, in the recess of the Senate. Nomination confirmed and appointed 23d De

cember, 1846.

ISAAC TOUCEY, of Connecticut. Appointed 21st June, 1848.
REVERDY JOHNSON, of Maryland.

Resigned.

JOHN J. CRITTENDEN, of Kentucky.
CALEB CUSHING, of Massachusetts.

Appointed 7th March, 1849.

Appointed 20th July, 1850.
Appointed March 7, 1853.

§ 500. These departments employ a large number of clerks. By an act of March 3, 1791, every clerk and other officer appointed in any of the departments, before entering on the duties of the appointment, must take an oath or affirmation before one of the justices of the Supreme Court, or one of the judges of a district court of the United States, to support the Constitution of the United States, and well and faithfully to execute the trust comImitted to him.

§ 501. By an act passed March 3, 1853, and its supple

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