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NARA 682

These hands, by easy labor can get the balance of the crops in in twenty days- As you have seen fit to break up my contract with my laborers, and thus deprive me of all authority and influence with them, I must demand that you exercise your authority, and require diligent labor until my crops are prepared for market, When this is done I shall be prepared to meet claims in law, or in equity. that may be brought against me.

If I shall fail to meet obligations that I have incurred in anticipation of these crops, the failure, I am prepared to establish, will be due to bad faith upon the part of my employees and unlawful interference in my affairs by the Agent of the Bureau.

I hold therefore that these laborers should not be held as prefered creditors, in equity; as they are not in law. They have been put in the position of prefered creditors by me to the extent of one half of their wages. And the Agent of the Bureau seems inclined to put them in that position under all circumstances. 

The law however gives the landholder the first claim upon the Lessee, and it seems but equitable that the law should be enforced to satisfy this obligation

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