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Title: Amos T. Akerman to Horace Maynard, 1 December 1871
Date: December 1, 1871
Whitman Archive ID: nar.03507
Source: National Archives and Records Administration. Transcribed from digital images or a microfilm reproduction of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Elizabeth Lorang, John Schwaninger, Anthony Dreesen, and Melanie Krupa
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Dec. 1, 1871.
Hon. Horace Maynard, M. C.
Washington, D. C.
Dear Sir:
Your letter of Tuesday, enclosing the copy of one from the Marshal of Georgia, has been received.
As far as I am advised, the view of the District Attorney as to the existing law, is right; but the facts reported by the Marshal show an urgent necessity for a change in the law.
Permit me to call your attention to some observations on the subject of U.S. Prisons on the 3d page of my annual report presented last winter, a copy of which I enclose. If those recommendations should not be adopted by Congress, I suggest at least, a law should be passed making it highly penal for the keepers of jails in States which allow the use of their prisons to the United States, to suffer prisoners to go at large.
Very respectfully,
A. T. Akerman,
Attorney General.
certain case
U.S. prisoners, &c.