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obligations to individuals - first branch - commission under the 17th article

there provided. And whenever such a commission is revived, it will become necessary, at any rate, to discover what claims have been disallowed and to know the reasons wherefore, that their rejections may be confirmed or set aside, - -for unless they failed through inability to fulfil some rule of evidence, a decision against them would prove so manifestly unjust, that it could never be sustained. Hence a review seems inevitable. And whenever such a review occurs, it is likely to induce? a reconsideration of many of the allowed claims, of the stoppages out of some among them for alleged debts which may be thought to have been improperly either exaggerated or cut down. But there appear serious difficulties in the way of such an examination, even independently of the high priveleges which are supposed to ?? the commission far beyond the reach of investigation. These difficulties proceed from the almost unintelligible state in which the commission has left its books and papers. I will describe what I have learned on this subject, and state, under each respective head, the source of such difficulty as seems to embarrass the investigation of each one of the various charges just enumerated