"Suppose the proposal attended to, the sum to be given comes next on the carpet This, on the part of America, will be estimated between the value of the Commerce, and the quantity of revenue that Louisiana will produce. "The french treasury is not only empty, but the Government has consumed by anticipation a great part of the next year's revenue. A monied proposal will, I believe, be attended to; if it should, the claims upon france can be stipulated as part of the payment, and that sum can be paid here to the claimants. "------I congratulate you on the _birthday of the New Sun_, now called christmas-day; and I make you a present of a thought on Louisiana." Jefferson next day told Paine, what was as yet a profound secret, that he was already contemplating the purchase of Louisiana.* * "The idea occurred to me," Paine afterwards wrote to the President, "without knowing it had occurred to any other person, and I mentioned it to Dr. Leib who lived in the same house (Lovell's); and, as he appeared pleased with it, I wrote the note and showed it to him before I sent it. The next morning you said to me that measures were already taken in that business. When Leib returned from Congress I told him of it. 'I knew that,' said he. 'Why then,' said I, 'did you not tell me so, because in that case I would not have sent the note.' 'That is the very reason,' said he; 'I would not tell you, because two opinions concurring on a case strengthen it.' I do not, however, like Dr. Leib's motion about Banks. Congress ought to be very cautious how it gives encouragement to this speculating project of banking, for it is now carried to an extreme. It is but another kind of striking paper money. Neither do I like the notion respecting the recession of the territory [District of Columbia.]." Dr. Michael Leib was a representative from Pennsylvania. {1803}