2pp. (64 x 197 mm), accomplished in manuscript. Lincoln signs his name on the recto.

In full: "Received by the Auditor Warrant on the Treasurer of the State of Illinois, for twenty-five dollars, in full for my services as atty in behalf of the State on the Sureties of Camphor."

Following the end of his only term as representative for the 7th Illinois District in the United States House of Representatives in 1849, Abraham Lincoln resumed his law practice in Springfield full-time. By this time, the Eighth Judicial Circuit consisted of fourteen counties, with Lincoln being one of only a handful of lawyers who traveled its entirety with any degree of regularity.

The present receipt was signed by Lincoln as acknowledgment of payment from the State of Illinois for services rendered. Lincoln received this fee for his work as plaintiff attorney in a lawsuit between the State of Illinois and William Compher and his sureties. In 1849, Compher, the sheriff of Peoria County, Illinois, executed a bond with a $62,000 penalty that permitted him to collect taxes in the county. In August 1850, the state of Illinois retained Lincoln and sued Compher and his sureties in an action of debt on the bond in the Sangamon County Circuit Court to recover the 1849 state tax that Compher collected but failed to pay into the state treasury.