118 SMITHSONIAN BEQUEST. 



From Proceedings of the Board of Regents, January 28, 1867. 



On motion of Mr. Wallach, the following resolution was adopted: 

 Resolved, That a committee of three be appointed to present a 

 memorial to Congress in behalf of the Board of Regents, requesting 

 the passage of an act authorizing the Treasurer of the United States 

 to receive into the Treasury, on the same terms as the original bequest, 

 the residuary legacy of James Smithson, now in United States bonds 

 in the hands of said Treasurer, namely, $26,210.63, together with such 

 other sums as the Regents may from time to time see fit to deposit, not 

 exceeding, with the original bequest, the sum of $1,000,000; and that 

 the income which has accrued or which may accrue from said residuary 

 legacy be applied in the same manner as the interest on the original 

 bequest. 



The Chancellor appointed Mr. Garret Davis, Mr. J. W. Patterson, 

 and Mr. J. A. Garfield as the committee. 



From Proceedings of the Board of Regents, February 1, 1867. 



The Secretary presented the following memorial which had been 

 offered to Congress by the special committee: 



To the honorable the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress assembled: 



The Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution have directed the under- 

 signed to transmit to your honorable body the resolution herewith appended, and to 

 solicit the passage of an act in accordance therewith. 



It is known to your honorable body that the original sum received into the United 

 States Treasury from the bequest of James Smithson, of England, was $515,167, 

 which was considered a trust fund, the interest alone to be applied to carrying out 

 the purpose of the testator, viz, "The increase and diffusion of knowledge among 

 men." 



This, however, was not the whole of the Smithsonian bequest, the sum of 5,015 

 having been left by Hon. R. Rush, the agent of the United States, as the principal of 

 an annuity to the mother of the nephew of Smithson. 



The annuitant having died, the sum of $26,210.63 has been received from this 

 source, and is now in charge of the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, 

 and no provision having been made in the act of August 10, 1846, establishing the 

 Institution, for the disposition of this remainder of the legacy, your memorialists, in 

 behalf of the Board of Regents, now ask that it be added to the original bequest on 

 the same terms, and that the increase which has arisen from interest or otherwise on 

 the sum before mentioned, also in the hands of the Treasury Department of the 

 United States, be transferred to the Board of Regents for assisting to defray the 

 expense of the reconstruction of the building and for other objects of the Institution. 



And your memorialists would further ask that the Board of Regents be allowed to 

 place in the Treasury of the United States, on the same terms as the original bequest, 

 such sums of money as may accrue from savings of income and from other sources, 

 provided the whole amount thus received into the Treasury shall not exceed 

 $1,000,000. 



