For eighteen months Mr. Gallatin had almost lost sight of the excise

agitation, and possibly had not been sorry to do so. Throughout his

political life he followed the sound rule of identifying himself with

his friends and of accepting the full responsibility, except in one or

two extreme cases, even for measures which were not of his own choice.

But under the moderation of his expressions in regard to the Pittsburg

resolutions of 1792 it seems possible to detect a certain amount of

personal annoyance at the load he was thus forced to carry, and a

determination to keep himself clear from such complications in future.

The year had been rather favorable than otherwise to the operation of

the excise law. To use his own language in his speech of January, 1795:

"It is even acknowledged that the law gained ground during the year

1793. With the events subsequent to that meeting [at Pittsburg] I am but

imperfectly acquainted. I came to Philadelphia a short time after it,

and continued absent from the western country upon public business for

eighteen months. Neither during that period of absence, nor after my

return to the western country in June last, until the riots had begun,

had I the slightest conversation that I can recollect, much less any

deliberate conference or correspondence, either directly or indirectly,

with any of its inhabitants on the subject of the excise law. I became

first acquainted with almost every act of violence committed either

before or since the meeting at Pittsburg upon reading the report of the

Secretary of the Treasury."

Occasional acts of violence were committed from time to time by unknown

or irresponsible persons with intent to obstruct the collection of the

tax, but no opposition of any consequence had as yet been offered to the

ordinary processes of the courts; not only the rioters, wherever known,

but also the delinquent distillers, were prosecuted in all the regular

forms of law, both in the State and the Federal courts. The great

popular grievance had been that the distillers were obliged to enter

appearance at Philadelphia, which was in itself equivalent to a serious

pecuniary fine, owing to the distance and difficulty of communication.

In modern times it would probably be a much smaller hardship to require

that similar offenders in California and Texas should stand their trial

at Washington. This grievance had, however, been remedied by an Act of

Congress approved June 5, 1794, by which concurrent jurisdiction in

excise cases was given to the State courts. Unluckily, this law was held

not to apply to distillers who had previously to its enactment incurred

a penalty, and early in July the marshal set out to the western country

to serve a quantity of writs issued on May 31 and returnable before the

Federal court in Philadelphia. All those in Fayette County were served

without trouble, and the distillers subsequently held a meeting at

Uniontown about the 20th July, after the riots had begun elsewhere and

the news had spread to Fayette; a meeting which Mr. Gallatin attended,

and at which it was unanimously agreed to obey the law, and either

abandon their stills or enter them. In fact, there never was any

resistance or trouble in Fayette County except in a part the most remote

from Mr. Gallatin's residence.

But the marshal was not so fortunate elsewhere. He went on to serve his

writs in Alleghany County, and after serving the last he was followed by

some men and a gun was fired. General Neville, the inspector, was with

him, and the next day, July 16, General Neville's house was

approached by a body of men, who demanded that he should surrender his

commission. They were fired upon and driven away, with six of their

number wounded and one killed. Then the smouldering flame burst out. The

whole discontented portion of the country rose in armed rebellion, and

the well-disposed, although probably a majority, were taken completely

by surprise and were for the moment helpless. The next day Neville's

house was again attacked and burned, though held by Major Kirkpatrick

and a few soldiers from the Pittsburg garrison. The leader of the

attacking party was killed.

[Illustration: map of Mongolia]

The whole duration of the famous whiskey rebellion was precisely six

weeks, from the outbreak on the 15th July to the substantial submission

at Redstone Old Fort on the 29th August. This is in itself evidence

enough of the rapidity with which the various actors moved. From the

first, two parties were apparent, those in favor of violence and those

against it. The violent party had the advantage in the very suddenness

of their movement. The moderates were obliged to organize their force at

first in the districts where their strength lay, before it became

possible to act in combination against the disturbers of the peace. Of

course an armed collision was of all things to be avoided by the

moderates, at least until the national government could have time to

act; in such a collision the more peaceable part of the community was

certain to be worsted.

Mr. Gallatin, far away from the scene of disturbance, did not at first

understand the full meaning of what had happened. He and his friend

Smilie attended the meeting of distillers at Uniontown, and, although

news of the riots had been received there, they found no difficulty in

persuading the distillers to submit. He therefore felt no occasion for

further personal interference until subsequent events showed him that

there was a general combination to expel the government officers.[14]

But events moved fast. On the 21st July, the leaders in the attack on

Neville's house called a meeting at Mingo Creek meeting-house for the

23d, which was attended by a number of leading men, among whom were

Judge Brackenridge and David Bradford.

Judge Brackenridge, then a prominent lawyer of Pittsburg, was a humorist

and a scholar, constitutionally nervous and timid, as he himself

explains,[15] the last man to meet an emergency such as was now before

him, and furthermore greatly inclined to run away, if he could, and

leave the rebels to their own devices; he did nevertheless make a fairly

courageous stand at the Mingo Creek meeting, and disconcerted the

movements of the insurgents for the time. Had others done their duty as

well as he, the organization of the insurgents would have ended then and

there, but Brackenridge was deserted by the two men who should have

supported him. James Marshall and David Bradford had gone over to the

insurgents, and by their accession the violent party was enabled to

carry on its operations. The Mingo Creek meeting ended in a formal

though unsigned invitation to the townships of the four western counties

of Pennsylvania and the adjoining counties of Virginia to send

representatives on the 14th August to a meeting at Parkinson's Ferry on

the Monongahela.

Had this measure been left to itself it is probable that it would have

answered sufficiently well the purposes of the peace party, since it

allowed them time for consultation and organization, which was all they

really required. Bradford and his friends knew this, and were bent on

forcing the country into their own support; Bradford therefore conceived

the ingenious idea of stopping the mail and seizing the letters which

might have been written from Pittsburg and Washington to Philadelphia.

This was done on the 26th by a cousin of Bradford, who stopped the post

near Greensburg, about thirty miles east of Pittsburg, and took out the

two packages. In the Pittsburg package were found several letters from

Pittsburg people, the publication of which roused great offence against

them, and, what was of more consequence, carried consternation among the

timid. It was the beginning of a system of terror.

Certainly Bradford showed energy and ability in conducting his campaign,

at least as considered from Brackenridge's point of view. His stroke at

the peace party through the mail-robbery was instantly followed up by

another, much more serious and thoroughly effective. On the 28th July he

with six others, among whom was James Marshall, issued a circular

letter, in which, after announcing that the intercepted letters

contained secrets hostile to their interest, they declared that things

had now "come to that crisis that every citizen must express his

sentiments, not by his words but by his actions." This letter, directed

to the officers of the militia, was in the form of an order to march on

the 1st August, with as many of their command as possible, fully armed

and equipped, with four days' provision, to the usual rendezvous of the

militia at Braddock's Field.

This was levying war on a complete scale, but it was well understood

that the chief object was to overawe opposition, more especially in

Pittsburg, although the Federal garrison and stores in that city were

also aimed at. The order met with strong resistance, and under the

earnest remonstrances of James Ross and other prominent men, in a

meeting at Washington, even Marshall was compelled to retract and assent

to a countermand. But, notwithstanding their opposition, the popular

vehemence in Washington County was such that it was decided to go

forward, and, after a moment's wavering, Bradford became again the

loudest of the insurgent leaders.

On the 1st August, accordingly, several thousand people assembled at

Braddock's Field, about eight miles from Pittsburg. Of these some

fifteen hundred or two thousand were armed militia, all from the

counties of Washington, Alleghany, and Westmoreland; there were not more

than a dozen men present from Fayette. Brackenridge has given a lively

description of this meeting, which he attended as a delegate from

Pittsburg, in the hope of saving the town, if possible, from the

expected sack. Undoubtedly a portion of the armed militia might easily

have been induced to attack the garrison, which would have led to the

plundering of the town, but either Bradford wanted the courage to fight

or he found opposition among his own followers. He abandoned the idea of

assailing the garrison, and this formidable assemblage of armed men,

after much vague discussion, ended by insisting only upon marching

through the town, which was done on the 2d of August, without other

violence than the burning of Major Kirkpatrick's barn. A lively sense

of the meaning of excise to the western people is conveyed by the casual

statement that this march cost Judge Brackenridge alone four barrels of

his old whiskey, gratuitously distributed to appease the thirst of the

crowd; how much whiskey the western gentleman usually kept in his house

nowhere appears, but it is not surprising under such circumstances that

the march should have thoroughly terrified the citizens of Pittsburg and

quenched all thirst for opposition in that quarter.

Mr. Gallatin did not attend the meeting at Braddock's Field; it was not

till after that meeting that the serious nature of the disturbances

first became evident to him. What had been riot was now become

rebellion. He rapidly woke to the gravity of the occasion when disorder

spread on every side and even Fayette was invaded by riotous parties of

armed men. A liberty-pole was raised, and when he asked its meaning he

was told it was to show they were for liberty; he replied by expressing

the wish that they would not behave like a mob, and was met by the

pointed inquiry whether he had heard of the resolves in Westmoreland

that if any one called the people a mob he should be tarred and

feathered.[16] Unlike many of the friends of order, he felt no doubts in

regard to the propriety of sending delegates to the coming assembly at

Parkinson's Ferry, and, feeling that Fayette would inevitably be drawn

into the general flame unless measures were promptly taken to prevent

it, he offered to serve as a delegate himself, and was elected. All the

friends of order did not act with the same decision. The meeting at

Braddock's Field was intended to control the elections to the meeting at

Parkinson's Ferry, and to a considerable extent it really had this

effect. The peace party was overawed by it. The rioters extended their

operations; chose delegates from all townships where they were a

majority, and from a number where they were not, and made an appearance

of election in some places where no election was held. The peace party

hesitated to the last whether to send delegates at all.

When the 14th of August came, all the principal actors were on the

spot,--Bradford, Marshall, Brackenridge, Findley, and Gallatin,--226

delegates in all, of whom 93 from Washington, 43 from Alleghany, 49 from

Westmoreland, and 33 from Fayette, 2 from Bedford, 5 from Ohio County in

Virginia, and about the same number of spectators. They were assembled

in a grove overlooking the Monongahela. Marshall came to Gallatin before

the meeting was organized, and showed him the resolutions which he

intended to move, intimating at the same time that he wished Mr.

Gallatin to act as secretary. Mr. Gallatin told him that he highly

disapproved the resolutions, and had come to oppose both him and

Bradford, therefore did not wish to serve. Marshall seemed to waver; but

soon the people met, and Edward Cook, who had presided at Braddock's

Field, was chosen chairman, with Gallatin for secretary.

Bradford opened the debate by a speech in which, beginning with a

history of the movement, he read the original intercepted letters, and

stated the object of the present meeting as being to deliberate on the

mode in which the common cause was to be effectuated; he closed by

pronouncing the terms of his own policy, which were to purchase or

procure arms and ammunition, to subscribe money, to raise volunteers or

draft militia, and to appoint committees to have the superintendence of

those departments. Marshall supported Bradford, and moved his

resolutions, which were at once taken into consideration. The first

denounced the practice of taking citizens to great distances for trial,

and this resolution was put to vote and carried without opposition. The

second appointed a committee of public safety "to call forth the

resources of the western country to repel any hostile attempt that may

be made against the rights of the citizens or of the body of the

people." It was dexterously drawn. It did not call for a direct approval

of the previous acts of rebellion, but, by assuming their legality and

organizing resistance to the government on that assumption, it committed

the meeting to an act of treason.[17]

Mr. Gallatin immediately rose, and, throwing aside all tactical

manoeuvres, met the issue flatly in face. "What reason," said he,

"have we to suppose that hostile attempts will be made against our

rights? and why, therefore, prepare to resist them? Riots have taken

place which may be the subject of judicial cognizance, but we are not to

suppose hostility on the part of the general government; the exertions

of government on the citizens in support of the laws are coercion and

not hostility; it is not understood that a regular army is coming, and

militia of the United States cannot be supposed hostile to the western

country."[18] He closed by moving that the resolutions should be

referred to a committee, and that nothing should be done before it was

known what the government would do.

Mr. Gallatin's speech met the assumption that resistance to the excise

was legal by a contrary assumption, without argument, that it was

illegal, and thus threatened to force a discussion of the point of which

both sides were afraid. Mr. Gallatin himself believed that the

resolutions would then have been adopted if put to a vote; the majority,

even if disposed to peace, had not the courage to act. Now was the time

for Brackenridge to have thrown off his elaborate web of double-dealing

and with his utmost strength to have supported Gallatin's lead; but

Brackenridge's nerves failed him. "I respected the courage of the

secretary in meeting the resolution," he says,[19] "but I was alarmed at

the idea of any discussion of the principle." "I affected to oppose the

secretary, and thought it might not be amiss to have the resolution,

though softened in terms." Nevertheless, the essential point was

carried; Marshall withdrew the resolution, and a compromise was made by

referring everything to a committee of sixty, with power to call a new

meeting of the people.

The third and fourth resolutions required no special opposition. The

fifth pledged the people to the support of the laws, except the excise

law and the taking citizens out of their counties for trial. Gallatin

attacked this exception, and succeeded in having it expunged. A debate

then followed on the adoption of the amended resolution, which was

supported by both Brackenridge and Gallatin, and an incident said to

have occurred in the course of the latter's speech is thus related by

Mr. Brackenridge:[20]

"Mr. Gallatin supported the necessity of the resolution, with a view to

the establishment of the laws and the conservation of the peace. Though

he did not venture to touch on the resistance to the marshal or the

expulsion of the proscribed, yet he strongly arraigned the destruction

of property; the burning of the barn of Kirkpatrick, for instance.

'What!' said a fiery fellow in the committee, 'do you blame that?' The

secretary found himself embarrassed; he paused for a moment. 'If you had

burned him in it,' said he, 'it might have been something; but the barn

had done no harm.' 'Ay, ay,' said the man, 'that is right enough.' I

admired the presence of mind of Gallatin, and give the incident as a

proof of the delicacy necessary to manage the people on that occasion."

Opposite this passage on the margin of the page, in Mr. Gallatin's copy

of this book, is written in pencil the following note, in his hand:

"Totally false. It is what B. would have said in my place. The fellow

said, 'It was well done.' I replied instantly, 'No; it was not well

done,' and I continued to deprecate in the most forcible terms every act

of violence. For I had quoted the burning of this house as one of the

worst."

The result of the first day's deliberation was therefore a substantial

success for the peace party, not so much from what they succeeded in

effecting as from the fact that they had obtained energetic leadership

and the efficiency which comes from confidence in themselves. The

resolutions were finally referred to a committee of four,--Gallatin,

Bradford, Herman Husbands, and Brackenridge; a curious party in which

Brackenridge must have had a chance to lay up much material for future

humor, Bradford being an utterly hollow demagogue, Husbands a religious

lunatic, and Brackenridge himself a professional jester.[21]

This committee, or rather Gallatin and Bradford, the next morning

remodelled the resolutions. The only point on which Bradford insisted

was that the standing committee to which all business was now to be

committed should have power, "in case of any sudden emergency, to take

such temporary measures as they may think necessary."

The next point with Gallatin was to get the meeting dissolved. The Peace

commissioners were expected soon to arrive on the opposite bank of the

river, and President Washington's proclamation calling out the militia

to suppress the insurrection had already been received. In the general

tendency of things the army could hardly fail to decide the contest in

favor of the peace party by the mere moral effect of its advance; but at

the moment the news excited and exasperated the violent, who were a very

large proportion, if not a majority, of the meeting. The committee of

sixty was chosen, one from each township, from whom another committee of

twelve was selected to confer with the Federal and State commissioners.

The final struggle came upon the question whether the meeting should be

now dissolved, or should wait for a report from their committee of

twelve after a conference with the commissioners of the government.

Both Gallatin and Brackenridge exerted themselves very much in carrying

this point, and after great difficulty succeeded in getting a

dissolution.[22]

The result of the Parkinson's Ferry meeting was practically to break the

power of the insurrectionary party. Bradford and his friends, instead of

carrying the whole country with them, were checked, outmanoeuvred, and

lost their prestige at the moment when the calling out of a Federal army

made their cause quite desperate; nevertheless, owing to the fact that

the committee of sixty was chosen by the meeting, and therefore was of

doubtful complexion, much remained to be done in order to bring about

complete submission; above all, time was needed, and the government

could not allow time, owing to the military necessity of immediate

action.

On the 20th August the committee of twelve held their conference with

the government commissioners at Pittsburg. All except Bradford favored

submission and acceptance of the very liberal terms offered by the

government. The committee of sixty was called together at Redstone Old

Fort (Brownsville) on the 28th. It was a nervous moment. The committee

itself was in doubt, and the desperate party was encouraged by the

accidental presence of sixty or seventy riflemen, whose threatening

attitude very nearly put Brackenridge's nerves to a fatal test; the

simple candor with which he relates how Gallatin held him up and carried

him through the trial is very honorable to his character.[23] The

committee met; Bradford attempted to drive it into an immediate decision

and rejection of the terms, and it was with difficulty that a

postponement till the next day was obtained. Such was the alarm among

the twelve conferees that Gallatin's determination to make the effort,

cost what it might, seems to have been the final reason which decided

them to support their own report;[24] even then they only ventured to

propose half of it; they made their struggle on the question of

accepting the government proposals, not on that of submission. The next

morning Gallatin took the lead; no one else had the courage. "The

committee having convened, with a formidable gallery, as the day before,

Gallatin addressed the chair in a speech of some hours. It was a piece

of perfect eloquence, and was heard with attention and without

disturbance."[25] This is all that is known of what was, perhaps, Mr.

Gallatin's greatest effort. Brackenridge followed, and this time spoke

with decision, notwithstanding his alarm. Then Bradford rose and

vehemently challenged the full force of the alternative which Gallatin

and Brackenridge had described; he advocated the creation of an

independent government and war on the United States. James Edgar

followed, with a strong appeal in favor of the report. William Findley,

who should have been a good judge, says, "I had never heard speeches

that I more ardently desired to see in print than those delivered on

this occasion. They would not only be valuable on account of the oratory

and information displayed in all the three, and especially in

Gallatin's, who opened the way, but they would also have been the best

history of the spirit and the mistakes which then actuated men's minds.

But copies of them could not be procured. They were delivered without

any previous preparation other than a complete knowledge of the actual

state of things and of human nature when in similar circumstances. This

knowledge, and the importance of the occasion on which it was exhibited,

produced such ingenuity of reasoning and energy of expression as never

perhaps had been exhibited by the same orators before."

Bradford's power was not yet quite broken; even on the frontiers human

nature is timid, and a generation which was shuddering at the atrocities

of Robespierre might not unreasonably shrink from the possibilities of

David Bradford. Gallatin pressed a vote, but could not induce the

committee to take it; the twelve conferees alone supported him. He then

proposed an informal vote, and still the sixty hesitated. At last a

member suggested that Mr. Gallatin, as secretary, should write the words

"yea" and "nay" on sixty scraps of paper, and, after distributing them

among the members, should collect the votes in a hat. This expedient

was, of course, highly satisfactory to Gallatin, and Bradford could not

openly oppose. It was adopted, and, with these precautions, the vote was

taken, each man, of his own accord, carefully concealing his ballot and

destroying that part of the paper on which was the yea or nay not voted.

The tickets were taken out of the hat and counted; there were 34 yeas

and 23 nays; Gallatin had won the battle. The galleries grumbled; the

minority were enraged; Bradford's face fell and his courage sank.

Outwardly the public expressed dissatisfaction at the result.

Brackenridge's terrors became more acute than ever, and not without

reason, for had Bradford chosen now to appeal to force, he might have

cost the majority their lives; men enough were at the meeting ready to

follow him blindly, but either his nerves failed him or he had sense to

see the folly of the act; he allowed the meeting to adjourn, and he

himself went home, leaving his party without a head and dissolved into

mere individual grumblers.

Throughout this meeting, Mr. Gallatin was in personal danger and knew

it. Any irresponsible, drunken frontiersman held the lives of his

opponents in his hands; a word from Bradford, the old, personal enemy of

Gallatin, would have sent scores of bullets at his rival. Doubtless Mr.

Gallatin believed David Bradford to be "an empty drum," deficient in

courage as in understanding, and on that belief he risked his whole

venture; but it was a critical experiment, not so much for the western

country, which had now little to fear from violence, but for the

obnoxious leader, who, by common consent, was held by friends and

enemies responsible for the submission of the people to the law.

From the time of this meeting, and the vote of 34 to 23 at Redstone Old

Fort, the situation entirely changed and a new class of difficulties and

dangers arose; it was no longer the insurgents who were alarming, but

the government. As Bradford on one side was formally giving in his

submission, and, on finding that his speech at Redstone had put him

outside the amnesty, made a rapid and narrow escape down the Ohio to

Louisiana, on the other side an army of fifteen thousand men was

approaching, and the conditions of proffered amnesty could not be

fulfilled for lack of time. Before the terms were fixed between the

committee of twelve and the government commissioners, three days had

passed; to print and prepare the forms of submission to be signed by the

people took two days more. The 4th September arrived before these

preliminaries were completed; the 11th September was the day on which

the people were to sign. No extension of time was possible. In

consequence there was only a partial adhesion to the amnesty, and among

those excluded were large numbers of persons who refused or neglected to

sign on the ground that they had been in no way concerned in the

insurrection and needed no pardon.

Gallatin was active in procuring the adhesion of the citizens of

Fayette, and the address he then drafted for a meeting on September 10

of the township committees of that county is to be found in his printed

works.[26] There, indeed, the danger was slight, because of all the

western counties Fayette had been the least disturbed; yet there, too,

numbers were technically at the mercy of the army and the law. Mr.

Gallatin was, therefore, of opinion that as the rebellion was completely

broken, and the submissions made on the 11th September, if not

universal, were so general and had been followed by such prostration

among the violent party as to preclude the chance of resistance, a

further advance of the army was inadvisable. He drafted a letter on the

part of the Fayette townships committee to the governor, on the 17th

September, representing this view of the case.[27] The President,

however, acting on the report of the government commissioners, decided

otherwise, and the order for marching was issued on the 25th September.

The news of the riots and disturbances of July had caused prompt action

on the part of the general government for the restoration of order, and

on the 7th August, President Washington had issued a proclamation

calling out the militia of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, and

Virginia. The 1st September was the time fixed for the insurgents to

disperse, and active preparations were made for moving the militia when

ordered. Naturally the feeling predominant in the army was one of

violent irritation, and, as strict discipline was hardly to be expected

in a hastily-raised militia force, there was reason to fear that the

western country would suffer more severely from the army than from the

rebels. The arrival of the President and of Secretary Hamilton, however,

and their persistent efforts to repress this feeling and to maintain

strict discipline among the troops, greatly diminished the danger, and

the army ultimately completed its march, occupied Pittsburg, and

effected a number of arrests without seriously harassing the

inhabitants. Nevertheless there was, perhaps inevitably, more or less

injustice done to individuals, and, as is usual in such cases, the

feeling of the army ran highest against the least offending parties. Mr.

Gallatin was one of the most obnoxious, on the ground that he had been a

prominent leader of opposition to the excise law and responsible for the

violence resulting from that opposition. In this there was nothing

surprising; Gallatin was unknown to the great mass of the troops, and

the victorious party in politics cannot be expected to do entire justice

to its opponents. So far as the President was concerned, no one has ever

found the smallest matter to blame in his bearing; the only prominent

person connected with the government whose conduct roused any bitterness

of feeling was the Secretary of the Treasury. It was asserted, and may

be believed, that Mr. Hamilton, who in Pittsburg and other places

conducted the examination into the conduct of individuals, showed a

marked desire to find evidence incriminating Gallatin. In what official

character Mr. Hamilton assumed the duty of examiner, which seems to have

properly belonged to the judicial authorities, does not appear; Findley,

however, asserts that certain gentlemen, whose names he gives, were

strictly examined as witnesses against Gallatin, urged to testify that

Gallatin had expressed himself in a treasonable manner at Parkinson's

Ferry, and when they denied having heard such expressions, the

Secretary asserted that he had sufficient proofs of them already.[28] It

is not impossible that Mr. Hamilton really suspected Mr. Gallatin of

tampering with the insurgents, and really said that "he was a foreigner,

and therefore not to be trusted;"[29] it is not impossible that he

thought himself in any case called upon to probe the matter to the

bottom; and finally, it is not impossible that he foresaw the advantages

his party would gain by overthrowing Mr. Gallatin's popularity. However

this may be, the Secretary gave no public expression to his suspicions

or his thoughts, and Gallatin was in no way molested or annoyed.

The regular autumnal election took place in Pennsylvania on the 14th

October. The army had not then arrived, but there was no longer any idea

of resistance or any sign of organization against the enforcement of all

the laws. More than a month had passed since order had been restored;

even Bradford had submitted, and he and the other most deeply implicated

insurgents were now flying for their lives. On the 2d October another

meeting of the committee had been held at Parkinson's Ferry, and

unanimously agreed to resolutions affirming the general submission and

explaining why the signatures of submission had not been universal; on

the day of election itself written assurances of submission were

universally signed throughout the country; but the most remarkable proof

of the complete triumph of the peace party was found in the elections

themselves.

Members of Congress were to be chosen, as well as members of the State

Legislature. Mr. Gallatin was, as a matter of course, sent back to his

old seat in the Assembly from his own county of Fayette. In the

neighboring Congressional district, comprising the counties of

Washington and Alleghany and the whole country from Lake Erie to the

Virginia line, there was some difficulty and perhaps some

misunderstanding in regard to the selection of a candidate. Very

suddenly, and without previous consultation, indeed without even his own

knowledge, and only about three days before election, Mr. Gallatin's

name was introduced. The result was that he was chosen over Judge

Brackenridge, who stood second on the poll, while the candidate of the

insurgents, who had received Bradford's support, was lowest among four.

By a curious reverse of fortune Mr. Gallatin suddenly became the

representative not of his own county of Fayette, but of that very county

of Washington whose citizens, only a few weeks before, had been to all

appearance violently hostile to him and to his whole course of action.

This spontaneous popular choice was owing to the fact that Mr. Gallatin

was considered by friend and foe as the embodiment of the principle of

law and order, and, rightly or wrongly, it was believed that to his

courage and character the preservation of peace was due. It was one more

evidence that the true majority had at last found its tongue.

This restoration of Mr. Gallatin to Congress was by no means pleasing to

Mr. Hamilton, who, as already mentioned, on his arrival soon afterwards

at Pittsburg expressed himself in strong terms in regard to the choice.

From the party point of view it was, in fact, a very undesirable result

of the insurrection, but there is no reason to suppose that the people

in making it cast away a single thought on the question of party. They

chose Mr. Gallatin because he represented order.

The 1st November, 1794, had already arrived before the military

movements were quite completed. The army had then reached Fayette, and

Mr. Gallatin, after having done all in his power to convince the

government that the advance was unnecessary, set off with his wife to

New York, and, leaving her with her family, returned to take his seat in

the Assembly at Philadelphia. Here again he had to meet a contested

election. A petition from citizens of Washington County was presented,

averring that they had deemed it impossible to vote, and had not voted,

at the late election, owing to the state of the country, and praying

that the county be declared to have been in insurrection at the time,

and the election void. The debate on this subject lasted till January 9,

1795, when a resolution was adopted to the desired effect. In the course

of this debate Mr. Gallatin made the first speech he had yet printed,

which will be found in his collected works.[30] Like all his writings,

it is a plain, concise, clear statement of facts and argument,

extremely well done, but not remarkable for rhetorical show, and

effective merely because, or so far as, it convinces. He rarely used

hard language under any provocation, and this speech, like all his other

speeches, is quite free from invective and personality; but, although

his method was one of persuasion rather than of compulsion, he always

spoke with boldness, and some of the passages in this argument grated

harshly on Federalist ears.

The decision of the Pennsylvania Legislature, "that the elections held

during the late insurrection ... were unconstitutional, and are hereby

declared void," was always regarded by him as itself in clear violation

of the constitution, but for his personal interests a most fortunate

circumstance. His opponents were, in fact, by these tactics giving him a

prodigious hold upon his party; he had the unusual good fortune of being

twice made the martyr of a mere political persecution. This second

attempt obviously foreshadowed a third, for if the election to the State

Legislature was unconstitutional, that to Congress was equally so, and

there was no object in breaking one without breaking the other; but the

action of the western country rendered the folly of such a decision too

obvious for imitation. All the ejected members except one, who declined,

were re-elected, and Mr. Gallatin took his seat a second time on the

14th February, 1795, not to be again disturbed. During this second part

of the session he seems to have been chiefly occupied with his bill in

regard to the school system; but he closed his service in the State

Legislature on the 12th of March, when other matters pressed on his

attention.

GALLATIN TO HIS WIFE.

PHILADELPHIA, 8d December, 1794.

... I arrived here without any accident and have already seen several of

my friends. The Assembly met yesterday, but my colleague having

neglected to take down the return of our election we must wait as

spectators till it comes, which will not be before a fortnight, I

believe.... I saw Dallas yesterday. Poor fellow had a most disagreeable

campaign of it. He says the spirits, I call it the madness, of the

Philadelphia Gentlemen Corps was beyond conception before the arrival

of the President. He saw a list (handed about through the army by

officers, nay, by a general officer) of the names of those persons who

were to be destroyed at all events, and you may easily guess my own was

one of the most conspicuous. Being one day at table with sundry

officers, and having expressed his opinion that the army were going only

to support the civil authority and not to do any military execution, one

of them (Dallas did not tell me his name, but I am told it was one Ross,

of Lancaster, aide-de-camp to Mifflin) half drew a dagger he wore

instead of a sword, and swore any man who uttered such sentiments ought

to be dagged. The President, however, on his arrival, and afterwards

Hamilton, took uncommon pains to change the sentiments, and at last it

became fashionable to adopt, or at least to express, sentiments similar

to those inculcated by them....

7th December, 1794.

... You want me to leave politics, but I guess I need not take much

pains to attain that object, for politics seem disposed to leave me. A

very serious attempt is made to deprive me of my seat in next Congress.

The intention is to try to induce the Legislature of this State either

to vacate the seats of the members for the counties of Alleghany and

Washington, or to pass a law to declare the whole election both for

Congress and Assembly in that district to be null and void, and to

appoint another day for holding the same. If they fail in that they will

pursue the thing before Congress. A petition was accordingly presented

to the Legislature last Friday, signed by thirty-four persons, calling

themselves peaceable inhabitants of Washington County, and requesting

the Assembly to declare the district to have been in a state of

insurrection at the time of the election, and to vacate the same. John

Hoge, who, however, has not signed it, is the ostensible character who

has offered it to be signed, but he did not draw it, and I know the

business originated in the army. It is couched in the most indecent

language against all the members elect from that district. Did those

poor people know how little they torment me by tormenting themselves, I

guess they would not be so anxious to raise a second persecution against

me.

GALLATIN TO BADOLLET, GREENSBURG, WASHINGTON CO.

PHILADELPHIA, 10th January, 1795.

... Savary writes you on the fate of our elections. One thing only I

wish and I must insist upon. If the same members are not re-elected, the

people here will undoubtedly say that our last elections were not fair

and that the people were in a state of insurrection. The only danger I

can foresee arises from your district. You have been ill-treated; you

have no member now, and every engine will now be set at work to mislead

you by your very opponents. Fall not in the snare; take up nobody from

your own district; re-elect unanimously the same members, whether they

be your favorites or not. It is necessary for the sake of our general

character....

* * * * *

Meanwhile, a new scheme was brought to Mr. Gallatin's attention. The

French revolution produced a convulsion in Geneva. Large numbers of the

Genevese emigrated or thought of emigration. Mr. Gallatin was consulted

and made a plan for a joint-stock company, to form a settlement by

immigration from Geneva. The expected immigration never came, but this

scheme ended in an unforeseen way; Mr. Gallatin joined one or two of the

originators of the plan in creating another joint-stock company, and his

mind was long busied with its affairs.

GALLATIN TO BADOLLET.

PHILADELPHIA, 29th December, 1794.

[Sidenote: 1795.]

Mon bon ami, si je t'écris cette lettre en français ce n'est pas qu'elle

contienne des secrets d'état, car je n'en ai point à te dire, mais c'est

qu'elle renferme plusieurs choses particulières et qui jusqu'à nouvel

ordre doivent rester entre toi et moi absolument.... Le retour de mon

élection est ou perdu ou n'a jamais été envoyé, en sorte que je n'ai pas

encore pu prendre siège dans l'Assemblée, et demain l'on va décider si

l'élection de nos quatre comtés sera cassée ou non, sans que je puisse

prendre part aux débats.... Ci-inclus tu trouveras un abrégé de la

dernière révolution de Genève, écrit par D'Yvernois qui est à Londres.

Genève est dans la situation la plus triste. Affamé également par les

Français et par les Suisses, déchiré par des convulsions sanguinaires

auxquelles l'esprit national paraissait si opposé, une grande partie de

ses habitants cherchent, et beaucoup sont obligés de quitter ses murs.

Plusieurs tournent leurs yeux vers l'Amérique et quelques-uns sont déjà

arrivés. D'Yvernois avait formé le plan de transplanter toute

l'université de Genève ici, et il m'a écrit sur cet objet ainsi qu'à Mr.

Jefferson et à Mr. Adams; mais il supposait qu'on pourrait obtenir des

États-Unis pour cet objet 15,000 dollars de revenu, ce qui est

impraticable; et il comptait associer à ce projet une compagnie de

terres par actions avec un capital de 3 a 400,000 piastres. D'un autre

côté les Genevois arrivés ici cherchaient tant pour eux que pour ceux

qui devaient les suivre quelque manière de s'établir, de devenir

fermiers, &c. Ils se sont adressés à moi, et d'après les lettres de

D'Yvernois et les conversations que les nouveaux arrivés et moi avons

eues ensemble, nous avons formé un plan d'établissement et une société

dans laquelle je t'ai réservé une part. En voici les fondements.... Tu

sais bien que je n'ai jamais encouragé personne excepté toi à venir en

Amérique de peur qu'ils n'y trouvassent des regrets, mais les temps out

changé. Il faut que beaucoup de Genevois émigrent et un grand nombre

vont venir en Amérique. J'ai trouvé autant de plaisir que c'était de mon

devoir de tâcher de leur offrir le plan qui m'a paru devoir leur

convenir le mieux en arrivant. En 1er lieu j'ai cru qu'il serait

essentiel qu'ils fussent réunis, non-seulement pour pouvoir

s'entr'aider, mais aussi afin d'être à même de retrouver leurs moeurs,

leurs habitudes et même leurs amusements de Genève. 2e, que, comme il y

aurait parmi les émigrants bien des artisans, hommes de lettres, &c., et

qu'il était bon d'ailleurs d'avoir plus d'une ressource, il conviendrait

de former une ville ou village dans le centre d'un corps de terres qu'on

achèterait pour cela, en sorte qu'on pût exercer une industrie de ville

ou de campagne suivant les goûts et les talents. Ci-inclus tu trouveras

deux papiers que je viens de retrouver et qui renferment une esquisse

des premières idées que j'avais jetées sur les papiers sur ce sujet, et

le brouillon de notre plan d'association qui consiste de 150 actions de

800 piastres chacune, dont nous Genevois ici, savoir Odier, Fazzi, deux

Cazenove, Cheriot, Bourdillon, Duby, Couronne, toi et moi avons pris

25; nous en offrons 25 autres ici à des Américains et je les ai déjà

presque toutes distribuées; je crois même que je pourrais distribuer

cent de plus ici sur-le-champ si je voulais; et nous avons envoyé les

cent autres à Genève, en Suisse, et à D'Yvernois pour les Genevois qui

voudront y prendre part.... En attendant une réponse de Genève nous

comptons examiner les terres et peut-être même en acheter, si nous le

croyons nécessaire. Il est entendu que c'est à toi et à moi à faire cet

examen, car c'est surtout à nous que s'en rapportent tant les émigrés

que ceux qui doivent les suivre. J'ai jeté les yeux en général sur la

partie nord-est de la Pennsilvanie ou sur la partie de New York qui la

joint. Jette les yeux sur la carte et trouve Stockport sur la Delaware

et Harmony tout près de là sur la Susquehannah joignant presque l'état

de New York. Des gens qui veulent s'intéresser à la chose m'offrent le

corps de terres compris entre le Big Bend de la Susquehannah joignant

Harmony et la ligne de New York; mais il faut d'abord examiner. Si on

casse nos élections, j'emploierai à ce travail cet hiver; sinon, c'est

sur toi que nous comptons, bien entendu que quoique ce ne fût pas aussi

nécessaire, il me serait bien plus agréable que tu pusses aller avec moi

si j'allais moi-même....

* * * * *

In April, 1795, he made an expedition through New York to examine lands

with a view to purchase for the projected Geneva settlement. This

expedition brought him at last to Philadelphia, where he was detained

till August by the trials of the insurgents and by the business of his

various joint-stock schemes.

GALLATIN TO HIS WIFE.

CATSKILL LANDING, 22d April, 1795.

... The more I see of this State the better I like Pennsylvania. It may

be prejudice, or habit, or whatever you please, but there are some

things in the western country which contribute to my happiness, and

which I do not find here. Amongst other things which displease me here I

may mention, in the first place, _family influence_. In Pennsylvania not

only we have neither Livingstones nor Rensselaers, but from the suburbs

of Philadelphia to the banks of the Ohio I do not know a single family

that has any extensive influence. An equal distribution of property has

rendered every individual independent, and there is amongst us true and

real equality. In the next place, the lands on the western side of the

river are far inferior in quality to those of Pennsylvania, and in the

third place, provisions bear the same price as they do in New York,

whence arises a real disadvantage for persons wishing to buy land; for

the farmers will sell the land in proportion to the price they can get

for their produce, and that price being at present quite extravagant and

above the average and common one, the consequence is that the supposed

value of land is also much greater. In a word, as I am lazy I like a

country where living is cheap, and as I am poor I like a country where

no person is very rich....

PHILADELPHIA, May 6, 1795.

... I arrived here yesterday, pretty much jolted by the wagon, and went

to bed in the afternoon, so that I saw nobody till this morning....

Hardly had I walked ten minutes in the streets this morning before I was

summoned as a witness before the grand jury on the part of government,

and must appear there in a few minutes....

8th May, 1795.

... I wrote you that I was summoned on behalf of government. I am

obliged to attend every day at court, but have not yet been called upon.

I am told the bill upon which I am to be examined is not yet filled. I

guess it is against Colonel Gaddis; but I have, so far as I can

recollect, nothing to say which in my opinion can hurt him. You remember

that Gaddis is the man who gave an affidavit to Lee against me. He came

yesterday to me to inform me that he meant to have me summoned in his

favor, as he thought my testimony must get him discharged. I did not

speak to him about his affidavit, nor he to me, but he had a guilty

look. I guess the man was frightened, and now feels disappointed in his

hope that his accusing me would discharge him. The petty jury consists

of twelve from each of the counties of Fayette, Washington, and

Alleghany, and twelve from Northumberland, but none from Westmoreland.

Your friend Sproat is one of them, Hoge another. All from Fayette

supposed to have been always friendly to the excise, but I think in

general good characters. All those of any note known to have been in

general of different politics with us....

12th May, 1795.

... The two bills for treason against Mr. Corbly and Mr. Gaddis have

been returned _ignoramus_ by the grand jury; but there are two bills

found against them for misdemeanor,--against the first for some

expressions, against the last for having been concerned in raising the

liberty-pole in Union town. I am a witness in both cases,--in the case

of Mr. Corbly altogether in his favor; in the other case my evidence

will about balance itself.... The grand jury have not yet finished their

inquiry, but will conclude it this morning. They have found twenty-two

bills for treason. Some of those against whom bills were found are not

here; but I believe fourteen are in jail and will be tried. I do not

know one of them. John Hamilton, Sedgwick, and Crawford, whom Judge

Peters would not admit to bail, and who were released little before we

left town, after having been dragged three hundred miles and being in

jail three months, are altogether cleared, the grand jury not having

even found bills for misdemeanor against them. After the strictest

inquiry the attorney-general could send to the grand jury bills only

against two inhabitants of Fayette, to wit, Gaddis and one Mounts; he

sent two against each of them, one for treason and one for misdemeanor.

In the case of Mounts, who has been in jail more than five months, and

who was not admitted to give bail, although the best security was

offered, not a shadow of proof appeared, although the county was

ransacked for witnesses, and both bills were found _ignoramus_. And it

is proper to observe that the grand jury, who are respectable, were,

however, all taken from Philadelphia and its neighborhood, and, with

only one or two exceptions, out of one party, so that they cannot be

suspected of partiality. In the case of Gaddis the bill for treason was

returned _ignoramus_; the bill for misdemeanor was found. So that the

whole insurrection of Fayette County amounts to one man accused of

misdemeanor for raising a pole. I can form no guess as to the fate of

the prisoners who are to be tried for treason, and whether, in case any

are found guilty, government mean to put any to death. There is not a

single man of influence or consequence amongst them, which makes me hope

they may be pardoned. There is one, however, who is said to be Tom the

Tinker; he is a New England man, who was concerned in Shay's

insurrection, but it is asserted that he signed the amnesty. I have had

nothing but that business in my head since I have been here, and can

write about nothing else....

26th May, 1795.

I believe, my dear little wife, that I will not be able to see thee till

next week, for the trials go on but very slowly; there has been but one

since my last letter, and there are nine more for high treason, besides

misdemeanors. I am sorry to add that the man who was tried was found

guilty of high treason. He had a very good and favorable jury, six of

them from Fayette; for, although he is from Westmoreland County, the

fact was committed in Fayette.... There is no doubt of the man [Philip

Vigel] being guilty in a legal sense of levying war against the United

States, which was the crime charged to him. But he is certainly an

object of pity more than of punishment, at least when we consider that

death is the punishment, for he is a rough, ignorant German, who knew

very well he was committing a riot, and he ought to have been punished

for it, but who had certainly no idea that it amounted to levying war

and high treason....

1st June, 1795.

... Those trials go still very slowly, only two since I wrote to you;

the men called Curtis and Barnet, both indicted for the attack upon and

burning Nevil's house, and both acquitted; the first without much

hesitation, as there was at least a strong presumption that he went

there either to prevent mischief or at most only as a spectator. The

second was as guilty as Mitchell, who has been condemned, but there were

not sufficient legal proofs against either. The difference in the

verdict arises from the difference of counsel employed in their

respective defences, and chiefly from a different choice of jury.

Mitchell was very poorly defended by Thomas, the member of Senate, who

is young, unexperienced, impudent, and self-conceited. He challenged

(that is to say, rejected, for, you know, the accused person has a right

to reject thirty-five of the jury without assigning any reason) every

inhabitant of Alleghany, and left the case to twelve Quakers (many of

them probably old Tories), on the supposition that Quakers would condemn

no person to death; but he was utterly mistaken. Lewis defended Barnet,

made a very good defence, and got a jury of a different complexion; the

consequence of which was that, although the evidence, pleadings, and

charge took up from eleven o'clock in the forenoon till three o'clock

the next morning, the jury were but fifteen minutes out before they

brought in a verdict of not guilty. Brackenridge says that he would

always choose a jury of Quakers, or at least Episcopalians, in all

common cases, such as murder, rape, etc., but in every possible case of

insurrection, rebellion, and treason, give him Presbyterians on the jury

by all means. I believe there is at least as much truth as wit in the

saying.... I have drawn, at the request of the jury who convicted Philip

Vigel, a petition to the President recommending him as a proper object

of mercy; they have all signed it, but what effect it will have I do not

know, and indeed nobody can form any conjecture whether the persons

convicted will be pardoned or not. It rests solely with the

President....

GALLATIN TO BADOLLET.

PHILADELPHIA, 20th May, 1795.

I am sorry, my dear friend, that I cannot go and meet you, agreeable to

our appointment; but I am detained here as an evidence in the case of

Corbly, and of two more in behalf of the United States, although I know

nothing about any of them except Corbly. I lend my horse to Cazenove,

who goes in my room, and who will tell you what little has passed since

I saw you on the subject of our plan. Upon the whole, I conceive that

further emigrations from Geneva will not take place at present, and that

our plan will not be accepted in Europe. We must therefore depend merely

on our own present number and strength, and this you should keep in

view in the course of the examination you are now making. Our own

convenience and the interest of those few Genevans who now are here must

alone be consulted, and it may be a question whether under those

circumstances it will be worth while for you and me to abandon our

present situation, and for them to encounter the hardships and hazards

of a new settlement in the rough country you are now exploring; whether,

on the contrary, it would not be more advantageous for them to fix

either in the more populous parts of the State, or even in our own

neighborhood, where they might perhaps find resources sufficient for a

few and enjoy all the advantages resulting from our neighborhood,

experience, and influence.

GALLATIN TO HIS WIFE.

PHILADELPHIA, 29th June, 1795.

... You will see in this day's Philadelphia paper an abstract of the

treaty; it is pretty accurate, for I read the treaty itself yesterday. I

believe it will be printed at large within a day or two. It exceeds

everything I expected.... As to the form of ratification I have not seen

it, but from the best information I could collect it is different from

what has been printed in some papers. It is, I think, nearly as

followeth: The Senate consent to and advise the President to ratify the

treaty upon condition that an additional article be added to the same

suspending the operation of, or explaining (I do not know which), the

12th Article, so far as relates to the intercourse with the West India

Islands. If that information is accurate, it follows that the treaty is

not ratified, because the intended additional article, if adopted by

Great Britain, is not valid until ratified by the Senate, and unless

that further ratification takes place the whole treaty falls through.

You know the vote, and that Gunn is the man who has joined the ratifying

party. I am told that Burr made a most excellent speech.... I think

fortitude is a quality which depends very much upon ourselves, and which

we lose more and more for want of exercising it. Indeed, I want it now

myself more than you. I have just received a letter from one of my

uncles, under date 23d January, which informs me that Miss Pictet is

dangerously ill and very little hope of her recovering. She had not yet

received my and your letter. I hope she may, for I know how much

consolation it would give her; but I have not behaved well....

* * * * *

Gallatin remained in Philadelphia till July 31, to form a new company,

dissolving the old one, and joining with Bourdillon, Cazenove, Badollet,

and his brother-in-law, James W. Nicholson, in a concern with nine or

ten thousand dollars capital, the business being "to purchase lots at

the mouth of George's Creek," "a mill or two" in the neighborhood,

keeping a retail store and perhaps two (the main business), and land

speculations on their own account and on commission. After settling the

partnership he remained to buy supplies and to get money from Morris,

who at last paid him eight hundred dollars cash and gave a note at

ninety days for a thousand. On July 31 he started for Fayette.

GALLATIN TO HIS WIFE.

PHILADELPHIA, 31st July, 1795.

... After being detained here two days by the rain, we finally go this

moment.... I have settled with Mr. Morris.... I have balanced all my

accounts, and find that we are just worth 7000 dollars.... In addition

to that, we have our plantation, Mr. Morris's note for 3500 dollars, due

next May, and about 25,000 acres waste lands....

FAYETTE COUNTY, September 6, 1795.

... Upon a further examination of Wilson's estate I have purchased it at

£3000, which is a high price, but then we have the town seat (which is

the nearest portage from the western waters to the Potowmack and the

Federal city, and as near as any to Philadelphia and Baltimore) and

three mill seats, one built, another building, and the third, which is

the most valuable, will be on the river-bank, so that we will be able to

load boats for New Orleans from the mill-door, and they stand upon one

of the best, if not the very best, stream of the whole country. The

boat-yards fall also within our purchase, so that, with a good store,

we will, in a great degree, command the trade of this part of the

country. I have also purchased, for about £300, all the lots that

remained unsold in the little village of Greensburgh, on the other side

of the river, opposite to our large purchase, and 20 acres of the

bottom-land adjoining it. It will become necessary, of course, for us to

increase our capital.... As to politics, I have thought but little about

them since I have been here. I wish the ratification of the treaty may

not involve us in a more serious situation than we have yet been in. May

I be mistaken in my fears and everything be for the best! I would not

heretofore write to you on the subject of the dispute between your

father and Hamilton, as I knew you were not acquainted with it. I feel

indeed exceedingly happy that it has terminated so, but I beg of you not

to express your sentiments of the treatment I have received with as much

warmth as you usually do, for it may tend to inflame the passions of

your friends and lead to consequences you would forever regret. It has

indeed required all my coolness and temper, and I might perhaps add, all

my love for you, not to involve myself in some quarrel with that

gentleman or some other of that description; but, however sure you may

be that I will not myself, others may, so that I trust that my good girl

will be more cautious hereafter....

PHILADELPHIA, 29th September, 1795.

... I arrived here pretty late last night.... Since I wrote to you I

received the account which I expected, that of the death of my second

mother. I trust, I hope at least, the comfort she must have experienced

from hearing she had not been altogether disappointed in the hopes she

had formed of me, and in the cares she had bestowed on my youth, will in

some degree have made amends for my unpardonable neglect in writing so

seldom to her.... I expect to set off to-morrow.

* * * * *

The dispute between Commodore Nicholson and Mr. Hamilton, to which

allusion is made above, was a private one, which, of course, had its

source in politics. For a time the commodore expected a duel, and it may

well be imagined that to a gentleman of his fighting temperament a duel

was not altogether without its charm. Mr. Hamilton, however, had too

much good sense to seek this species of distinction. The dispute was

amicably settled, and probably no one was better pleased at the

settlement than Mr. Gallatin, although he had nothing to do with the

quarrel.

Mr. Gallatin's career as a member of Congress now began, and lasted till

1801, when he became Secretary of the Treasury. In some respects it was

without a parallel in our history. That a young foreigner, speaking with

a foreign accent, laboring under all the odium of the western

insurrection, surrounded by friendly rivals like Madison, John Nicholas,

W. B. Giles, John Randolph, and Edward Livingston; confronted by

opponents like Fisher Ames, Judge Sewall, Harrison Gray Otis, Roger

Griswold, James A. Bayard, R. G. Harper, W. L. Smith, of South Carolina,

Samuel Dana, of Connecticut, and even John Marshall,--that such a man

under such circumstances should have at once seized the leadership of

his party, and retained it with firmer and firmer grasp down to the last

moment of his service; that he should have done this by the sheer force

of ability and character, without ostentation and without the tricks of

popularity; that he should have had his leadership admitted without a

dispute, and should have held it without a contest, made a curious

combination of triumphs. Many of the great parliamentary leaders in

America, John Randolph, Henry Clay, Thaddeus Stevens, have maintained

their supremacy by their dogmatic and overbearing temper and their

powers of sarcasm or invective. Mr. Gallatin seldom indulged in

personalities. His temper was under almost perfect control. His power

lay in courage, honesty of purpose, and thoroughness of study.

Undoubtedly his mind was one of rare power, perhaps for this especial

purpose the most apt that America has ever seen; a mind for which no

principle was too broad and no detail too delicate; but it was

essentially a scientific and not a political mind. Mr. Gallatin always

tended to think with an entire disregard of the emotions; he could only

with an effort refrain from balancing the opposing sides of a political

question. His good fortune threw him into public life at a time when

both parties believed that principles were at stake, and when the

struggle between those who would bar the progress of democracy and those

who led that progress allowed little latitude for doubt on either side

in regard to the necessity of their acts. While this condition of things

lasted, and it lasted throughout Mr. Gallatin's stormy Congressional

career, he was an ideal party leader, uniting boldness with caution,

good temper with earnestness, exact modes of thought with laborious

investigation, to a degree that has no parallel in American experience.

Perhaps the only famous leader of the House of Representatives who could

stand comparison with Mr. Gallatin for the combination of capacities,

each carried to uniform excellence, was Mr. Madison; and it was

precisely Mr. Madison whom Gallatin supplanted.

On the subject of his Congressional service Mr. Gallatin left two

fragmentary memoranda, which may best find place here:

"As both that body [Congress] and the State Legislature sat in

Philadelphia, owing also to my short attendance in the United States

Senate and my defence of my seat, I was as well known to the members of

Congress as their own colleagues, and at once took my stand in that

Assembly. The first great debate in which we were engaged was that on

the British treaty; and my speech, or rather two speeches, on the

constitutional powers of the House, miserably reported and curtailed by

B. F. Bache, were, whether I was right or wrong, universally considered

as the best on either side. I think that of Mr. Madison superior and

more comprehensive, but for this very reason (comprehensiveness) less

impressive than mine. Griswold's reply was thought the best; in my

opinion it was that of Goodrich, though this was deficient in

perspicuity. Both, however, were second-rate. The most brilliant and

eloquent speech was undoubtedly that of Mr. Ames; but it was delivered

in reference to the expediency of making the appropriations, and treated

but incidentally of the constitutional question. I may here say that

though there were, during my six years of Congressional service, many

clever men in the Federal party in the House (Griswold, Bayard, Harper,

Otis, Smith of South Carolina, Dana, Tracy, Hillhouse, Sitgreaves, &c.),

I met with but two superior men, Ames, who sat only during the session

of 1795-1796, and John Marshall, who sat only in the session of

1799-1800, and who took an active part in the debates only two or three

times, but always with great effect. On our side we were much stronger

in the Congress of 1795-1797. But Mr. Madison and Giles (an able

commonplace debater) having withdrawn, and Richard Brent become

hypochondriac, we were reduced during the important Congress of

1797-1799 to Ed. Livingston, John Nicholas, and myself, whilst the

Federalists received the accession of Bayard and Otis. John Marshall

came in addition for the Congress of 1799-1801, and we were recruited by

John Randolph and Joseph Nicholson."

"The ground which I occupied in that body [Congress] is well known, and

I need not dwell on the share I took in all the important debates and on

the great questions which during that period (1795-1801) agitated the

public mind, in 1796 the British treaty, in 1798-1800 the hostilities

with France and the various unnecessary and obnoxious measures by which

the Federal party destroyed itself. It is certainly a subject of

self-gratulation that I should have been allowed to take the lead with

such coadjutors as Madison, Giles, Livingston, and Nicholas, and that

when deprived of the powerful assistance of the two first, who had both

withdrawn in 1798, I was able to contend on equal terms with the host of

talents collected in the Federal party,--Griswold, Bayard, Harper,

Goodrich, Otis, Smith, Sitgreaves, Dana, and even J. Marshall. Yet I was

destitute of eloquence, and had to surmount the great obstacle of

speaking in a foreign language, with a very bad pronunciation. My

advantages consisted in laborious investigation, habits of analysis,

thorough knowledge of the subjects under discussion, and more extensive

general information, due to an excellent early education, to which I

think I may add quickness of apprehension and a sound judgment.

"A member of the opposition during the whole period, it could not have

been expected that many important measures should have been successfully

introduced by me. Yet an impulse was given in some respects which had a

powerful influence on the spirit and leading principles of subsequent

Administrations. The principal questions in which I was engaged related

to constitutional construction or to the finances. Though not quite so

orthodox on the first subject as my Virginia friends (witness the United

States Bank and internal improvements), I was opposed to any usurpation

of powers by the general government. But I was specially jealous of

Executive encroachments, and to keep that branch within the strict

limits of Constitution and of law, allowing no more discretion than what

appeared strictly necessary, was my constant effort.

"The financial department in the House was quite vacant, so far at least

as the opposition was concerned; and having made myself complete master

of the subject and occupied that field almost exclusively, it is not

astonishing that my views should have been adopted by the Republican

party and been acted upon when they came into power. My first step was

to have a standing committee of ways and means appointed. That this

should not have been sooner done proves the existing bias in favor of

increasing as far as possible the power of the Executive branch. The

next thing was to demonstrate that the expenditure had till then

exceeded the income: the remedy proposed was economy. Economy means

order and skill; and after having determined the proper and necessary

objects of expense, the Legislature cannot enforce true economy

otherwise than by making _specific_ appropriations. Even these must be

made with due knowledge of the subject, since, if carried too far by too

many subdivisions, they become injurious, if not impracticable. This

subject has ever been a bone of contention between the legislative and

executive branches in every representative government, and it is in

reality the only proper and efficient legislative check on executive

prodigality.

"Respecting the objects of expenditure, there was not, apart from that

connected with the French hostilities, any other subject of division but

that of the navy. And the true question was whether the creation of an

efficient navy should be postponed to the payment of the public debt."

...

[Sidenote: 1796.]

During Mr. Gallatin's maiden session of Congress, the exciting winter of

1795-96, when the first of our great party contests took place, not even

a private letter seems to have been written by him that throws light on

his acts or thoughts. His wife was with him in Philadelphia. If he wrote

confidentially to any other person, his letters are now lost. The only

material for his biography is in the Annals of Congress and in his

speeches, with the replies they provoked; a material long since worn

threadbare by biographers and historians.

Of all portions of our national history none has been more often or more

carefully described and discussed than the struggle over Mr. Jay's

treaty. No candid man can deny that there was at the time ample room for

honest difference of opinion in regard to the national policy. That Mr.

Jay's treaty was a bad one few persons even then ventured to dispute; no

one would venture on its merits to defend it now. There has been no

moment since 1810 when the United States would have hesitated to prefer

war rather than peace on such terms. No excuse in the temporary

advantages which the treaty gained can wholly palliate the concessions

of principle which it yielded, and no considerations of a possible war

with England averted or postponed can blind history to the fact that

this blessing of peace was obtained by the sacrifice of national

consistency and by the violation of neutrality towards France. The

treaty recognized the right of Great Britain to capture French property

in American vessels, whilst British property in the same situation was

protected from capture by our previous treaty with France; and, what was

yet worse, the acknowledgment that provisions might be treated as

contraband not only contradicted all our principles, but subjected the

United States government to the charge of a mean connivance in the

British effort to famish France, while securing America from pecuniary

loss.

Nevertheless, for good and solid reasons, the Senate at the time

approved, and President Washington, after long deliberation, signed, the

treaty. The fear of a war with Great Britain, the desire to gain

possession of the Western posts, and the commercial interests involved

in a neutral trade daily becoming more lucrative, were the chief motives

to this course. So far as Mr. Gallatin's private opinions were

concerned, it is probable that no one felt much more aversion to the

treaty than he did; but before he took his seat in Congress the Senate

had approved and the President had signed it; a strong feeling in its

favor existed among his own constituents, always in dread of Indian

difficulties; the treaty, in short, was law, and the House had only to

consider the legislation necessary to carry it into effect.

Bad as the treaty was, both in its omissions and in its admissions, as a

matter of foreign relations, these defects were almost trifles when

compared with its mischievous results at home. It thrust a sword into

the body politic. So far as it went, and it went no small distance, it

tended to overturn the established balance of our neutrality and to

throw the country into the arms of England. Nothing could have so

effectually arrayed the two great domestic parties in sharply defined

opposition to each other, and nothing could have aroused more bitterness

of personal feeling. In recent times there has been a general

disposition to explain away and to soften down the opinions and passions

of that day; to throw a veil over their violence; to imagine a possible

middle ground, from which the acts and motives of all parties will

appear patriotic and wise, and their extravagance a mere

misunderstanding. Such treatment of history makes both parties

ridiculous. The two brilliant men who led the two great divisions of

national thought were not mere declaimers; they never for a moment

misunderstood each other; they were in deadly earnest, and no compromise

between them ever was or ever will be possible. Mr. Jefferson meant that

the American system should be a democracy, and he would rather have let

the world perish than that this principle, which to him represented all

that man was worth, should fail. Mr. Hamilton considered democracy a

fatal curse, and meant to stop its progress. The partial truce which the

first Administration of Washington had imposed on both parties, although

really closed by the retirement of Mr. Jefferson from the Cabinet, was

finally broken only by the arrival of Mr. Jay's treaty. From that moment

repose was impossible until one party or the other had triumphed beyond

hope of resistance; and it was easy to see which of the two parties must

triumph in the end.

One of the immediate and most dangerous results of the British treaty

was to put the new Constitution to a very serious test. The theory which

divides our government into departments, executive, legislative, and

judicial, and which makes each department supreme in its own sphere,

could not be worked out with even theoretical perfection; the framers

of the Constitution were themselves obliged to admit exceptions in this

arrangement of powers, and one of the most serious exceptions related to

treaties. The Constitution begins by saying, "_All_ legislative powers

herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which

shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives," and proceeds to

give Congress the express power "to make _all_ laws which shall be

necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers,

and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of

the United States or in any department or officer thereof." But on the

other hand the Constitution also says that the President "shall have

power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make

treaties," and finally it declares that "this Constitution, and the laws

of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, and _all_

treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United

States shall be the supreme law of the land," State laws or

constitutions to the contrary notwithstanding.

Here was an obvious conflict of powers, resulting from an equally

obvious divergence of theory. Congress possessed _all_ legislative

powers. The President and Senate possessed the power to make treaties,

which were, like the Constitution and the laws of Congress, the supreme

law of the land. Congress, then, did not possess _all_ legislative

powers. The President alone, with two-thirds of the Senate, could

legislate.

The British treaty contained provisions which could only be carried into

execution by act of Congress; it was, therefore, within the power of the

House of Representatives to refuse legislation and thus practically

break the treaty. The House was so evenly divided that no one could

foresee the result, when Edward Livingston began this famous debate by

moving to call on the President for papers, in order that the House

might deliberate with official knowledge of the conditions under which

the treaty was negotiated.

The Federalists met this motion by asserting that under the Constitution

the House had no right to the papers, no right to deliberate on the

merits of the treaty, no right to refuse legislation. In Mr. Griswold's

words, "The House of Representatives have nothing to do with the treaty

but provide for its execution." Untenable as this ground obviously was,

and one which no respectable legislative body could possibly accept, it

was boldly taken by the Federalists, who plunged into the contest with

their characteristic audacity and indomitable courage, traits that

compel respect even for their blunders.

The debate began on March 7, 1796, and on the 10th Mr. Gallatin spoke,

attacking the constitutional doctrine of the Federalists and laying down

his own. He claimed for the House, not a power to make treaties, but a

check upon the treaty-making power when clashing with the special powers

expressly vested in Congress by the Constitution; he showed the

existence of this check in the British constitution, and he showed its

necessity in our own, for, "if the treaty-making power is not limited by

existing laws, or if it repeals the laws that clash with it, or if the

Legislature is obliged to repeal the laws so clashing, then the

legislative power in fact resides in the President and Senate, and they

can, by employing an Indian tribe, pass any law under the color of

treaty."

The argument was irresistible; it was never answered; and indeed the

mere statement is enough to leave only a sense of surprise that the

Federalists should have hazarded themselves on such preposterous ground.

Some seventy years later, when the purchase of Alaska brought this

subject again before the House on the question of appropriating the

purchase-money stipulated by the treaty, the Administration abandoned

the old Federalist position; the right of the House to call for papers,

to deliberate on the merits of the treaty, even to refuse appropriations

if the treaty was inconsistent with the Constitution or with the

established policy of the country, was fully conceded. The

Administration only made the reasonable claim that if, upon just

consideration, a treaty was found to be clearly within the

constitutional powers of the government, and consistent with the

national policy, then it was the duty of each co-ordinate branch of the

government to shape its action accordingly.[31] This claim was

recognized; the House voted the money, and the controversy may be

considered at an end. In 1796, on the contrary, Mr. Griswold, whose

reply to Mr. Gallatin's argument was considered the most effective, and

who never shrank from a logical conclusion however extreme, admitted and

asserted that the legislative power did reside in the President and

Senate to the exclusion of the House, and added, "Allowing this to be

the case, what follows?--that the people have clothed the President and

Senate with a very important power."

On this theme the debate was continued for several weeks; but the

Federalists were in a false position, and were consequently overmatched

in argument. Madison, W. C. Nicholas, Edward Livingston, and many other

members of the opposition, in speeches of marked ability, supported the

claim of their House. The speakers on the other side were obliged to

take the attitude of betraying the rights of their own body in order to

exaggerate the powers of the Executive, and as this practice was

entirely in accordance with the aristocratic theory of government, they

subjected themselves to the suspicion at least of acting with ulterior

motives.

On the 23d March, Mr. Gallatin closed the debate for his side of the

House by a second speech, in which he took more advanced ground. He had

before devoted his strength to overthrowing the constitutional theory of

his opponents; he now undertook the far more difficult task of

establishing one of his own. The Federalist side of the House was not

the temperate side in this debate, and Mr. Gallatin had more than one

personal attack to complain of, but he paid no attention to

personalities, and went on to complete his argument. Inasmuch as the

Federalists characterized their opponents on this question as

disorganizers, disunionists, and traitors, and even to this day numbers

of intelligent persons still labor under strong prejudice against the

Republican opposition to Washington's Administration, a few sentences

from Mr. Gallatin's second speech shall be inserted here to show

precisely how far he and his party did in fact go:

"The power claimed by the House is not that of negotiating and proposing

treaties; it is not an active and operative power of making and

repealing treaties; it is not a power which absorbs and destroys the

constitutional right of the President and Senate to make treaties; it is

only a negative, a restraining power on those subjects over which

Congress has the right to legislate. On the contrary, the power claimed

for the President and Senate is that, under color of making treaties, of

proposing and originating laws; it is an active and operative power of

making laws and of repealing laws; it is a power which supersedes and

annihilates the constitutional powers vested in Congress.

"If it is asked, in what situation a treaty is which has been made by

the President and Senate, but which contains stipulations on legislative

objects, until Congress has carried them into effect? whether it is the

law of the land and binding upon the two nations? I might answer that

such a treaty is precisely in the same situation with a similar one

concluded by Great Britain before Parliament has carried it into effect.

"But if a direct answer is insisted on, I would say that it is in some

respects an inchoate act. It is the law of the land and binding upon the

American nation in all its parts, except so far as relates to those

stipulations. Its final fate, in case of refusal on the part of Congress

to carry those stipulations into effect, would depend on the will of the

other nation."

The Federalists had in this debate failed to hold well together; the

ground assumed by Mr. Griswold was too extreme for some even among the

leaders, and concessions were made on that side which fatally shook

their position; but among the Republicans there was concurrence almost,

if not quite, universal in the statements of the argument by Mr. Madison

and Mr. Gallatin, and this closing authoritative position of Mr.

Gallatin was on the same day adopted by the House on a vote of 62 to 37,

only five members not voting.

The Administration might perhaps have contented itself with refusing the

papers called for by the House, and left the matter as it stood, seeing

that the resolution calling for the papers said not a word about the

treaty-making power, and the journals of the House contained no allusion

to the subject; or the President might have contented himself with

simply asserting his own powers and the rights of his own Department;

but, as has been already seen, there was at this time an absence of

fixed precedent which occasionally led executive officers to take

liberties with the Legislature such as would never afterwards have been

tolerated. The President sent a message to the House which was far from

calculated to soothe angry feeling. Two passages were especially

invidious. In one the President adverted to the debates held in the

House. In the other he assumed a position in curious contrast to his

generally cautious tone: "Having been a member of the general

convention, and knowing the principles on which the Constitution was

formed, I have, &c., &c." For the President of the United States on such

an occasion to appeal to his personal knowledge of the intentions of a

body of men who gave him no authority for that purpose, and whose

intentions were not a matter of paramount importance, seeing that by

universal consent it was not their intentions which interpreted the

Constitution, but the intentions of the people who adopted it; and for

him to use this language to a body of which Mr. Madison was leader, and

which had adopted Mr. Madison's views, was a step not likely to diminish

the perils of the situation. Had the President been any other than

Washington, or perhaps had the House been led by another than Madison,

the opportunity for a ferocious retort would probably have been

irresistible. As it was, the House acted with great forbearance; it left

unnoticed this very vulnerable part of the message, and in reply to the

implication that the House claimed to make its assent "necessary to the

validity of a treaty," it contented itself with passing a resolution

defining its own precise claim. On this resolution Mr. Madison spoke at

some length and with perfect temper in reply to what could only be

considered as the personal challenge contained in the message, while Mr.

Gallatin did not speak at all. The resolutions were adopted by 57 to 35,

and the House then turned to the merits of the treaty.

On this subject Mr. Gallatin spoke at considerable length on the 26th

April, a few days before the close of the debate. The situation was

extremely difficult. In the country at large opinion was as closely

divided as it was in the House itself. Even at the present moment it is

not easy to decide in favor of either party. Nothing but the personal

authority of General Washington carried the hesitating assent of great

masses of Federalists. Nothing but fear of war made approval even

remotely possible. Whether the danger of war was really so great as the

friends of the treaty averred may be doubted. No Federalist

Administration would have made war on England, for it was a cardinal

principle with the Hamiltonian wing of the party that only through peace

with England could their ascendency be preserved, while war with England

avowedly meant a dissolution of the Union by their own act.[32] The

Republicans wanted no war with England, as they afterwards proved by

enduring insults that would in our day rouse to madness every

intelligent human being within the national borders. Nevertheless war

appeared or was represented as inevitable in 1796; the eloquent speech

of Fisher Ames contained no other argument of any weight; it was abject

fear to which he appealed: "You are a father: the blood of your sons

shall fatten your corn-field. You are a mother: the war-whoop shall wake

the sleep of the cradle."

It was the truth of this reproach on the weakness of the argument for

the treaty that made the sting of Mr. Gallatin's closing remarks:

"I cannot help considering the cry of war, the threats of a dissolution

of government, and the present alarm, as designed for the same purpose,

that of making an impression on the fears of this House. It was through

the fear of being involved in a war that the negotiation with Great

Britain originated; under the impression of fear the treaty has been

negotiated and signed; a fear of the same danger, that of war, promoted

its ratification: and now every imaginary mischief which can alarm our

fears is conjured up, in order to deprive us of that discretion which

this House thinks it has a right to exercise, and in order to force us

to carry the treaty into effect."

Nevertheless Mr. Gallatin carefully abstained from advocating a refusal

to carry the treaty into effect. With his usual caution he held his

party back from any violent step; he even went so far as to avow his

wish that the treaty might not now be defeated:

"The further detention of our posts, the national stain that would

result from receiving no reparation for the spoliations on our trade,

and the uncertainty of a final adjustment of our differences with Great

Britain, are the three evils which strike me as resulting from a

rejection of the treaty; and when to these considerations I add that of

the present situation of the country, of the agitation of the public

mind, and of the advantages that would arise from a union of sentiments;

however injurious and unequal I conceive the treaty to be, however

repugnant it may be to my feelings and, perhaps, to my prejudices, I

feel induced to vote for it, and will not give my assent to any

proposition which would imply its rejection."

He also carefully avoided taking the ground which was undoubtedly first

in his anxieties, that of the bearing which the treaty would have on our

relations with France. This was a subject which his semi-Gallican origin

debarred him from dwelling upon. The position he took was a new one, and

for his party perfectly safe and proper; it was that, in view of the

conduct of Great Britain since the treaty was signed, her impressment of

our seamen, her uninterrupted spoliations on our trade, especially in

the seizure of provision vessels, "a proceeding which they might perhaps

justify by one of the articles of the treaty," a postponement of action

was advisable until assurances were received from Great Britain that she

meant in future to conduct herself as a friend.

This was the ground on which the party recorded their vote against the

resolution declaring it expedient to make appropriations for carrying

the treaty into effect. In committee the division was 49 to

49,--Muhlenberg, the chairman, throwing his vote in favor of the

resolution, and thus carrying it to the House. There the appropriation

was voted by 51 to 48.

Perhaps the only individual in any branch of the government who was

immediately and greatly benefited by the British treaty was Mr.

Gallatin; he had by common consent distinguished himself in debate and

in counsel; bolder and more active than Mr. Madison, he was followed by

his party with instinctive confidence; henceforth his leadership was

recognized by the entire country.

Absorbing as the treaty debate was, it did not prevent other and very

weighty legislation. One Act, adopted in the midst of the excitement of

the treaty, was peculiarly important, and, although the idea itself was

not new, Mr. Gallatin was the first to embody it in law, so far as any

single individual can lay claim to that distinction. This Act created

the land-system of the United States government; it applied only to

lands north-west of the Ohio River, in which the Indian titles had been

extinguished, and it provided for laying these out in townships, six

miles square, and for selling the land in sections, under certain

reservations. This land-system, always a subject of special interest to

Mr. Gallatin, and owing its existence primarily to his efforts while a

legislator, took afterwards an immense development in his hands while he

was Secretary of the Treasury, and, had he been allowed to carry out his

schemes, would probably have been made by him the foundation of a

magnificent system of internal improvement. Circumstances prevented him

from realizing his plan; only the land-system itself and the Cumberland

Road remained to testify the breadth and accuracy of his views; but even

these were achievements of the highest national importance.

Deeply as these two subjects interested him, his permanent and peculiar

task was a different one. To Mr. Gallatin finance was an instinct. He

knew well, as Mr. Hamilton had equally clearly understood before him,

that the heart of the government was the Treasury; like many another man

of high financial reputation, he had little talent for money-making, and

never was, or cared to be, rich; but he had one great advantage over

most Americans of his time, even over Mr. Hamilton and Mr. Jefferson; he

was an economist as well as a statesman; he was exact not merely in the

details but in the morality of affairs; he held debt in horror;

punctilious exactness in avoiding debt was his final axiom in finance;

the discharge of debt was his first principle in statesmanship;

searching and rigid economy was his invariable demand whether in or out

of office, and he made this demand imperative upon himself as upon

others.

Mr. Hamilton, to whom the organization of the financial system was due,

and who left public life just as Gallatin began his Congressional

career, had belonged to a different school and had acted on different

principles. Adhering more or less closely to the English financial and

economical theories then in vogue, he had intentionally constructed a

somewhat elaborate fabric, of which a considerable national debt was the

foundation. Had Mr. Hamilton foreseen in 1790 the course public affairs

would take during the next ten years, he would perhaps have modified his

plan and would have guarded more carefully against overloading the

Treasury; but at that moment it was not unreasonable to suppose that

what the country wanted was centralization, and that a national debt was

one means of consolidating divergent local interests. Mr. Hamilton,

therefore, accepted as much debt as he thought the country could

reasonably bear, and allowed the rest to be expunged. In forming this

debt he had at least in one respect permitted an unnecessary and very

mischievous addition to be made to the acknowledged and existing

national burden. In order to settle the accounts between the States, he

had permitted Congress--perhaps forced Congress--to assume a large

proportion of the State debts. The balance to be adjusted by payment of

the debtor to the creditor States was ultimately ascertained to be a

little more than $8,000,000. To settle this account as nearly as it was

settled in fact, required an assumption of State debts to the amount of

$11,609,000; but, instead of waiting for a settlement of accounts,

Congress had, in 1790, voted to assume a certain amount of State debts

at once and to charge each State in the ultimate settlement with the

amount assumed on her account. A sum of over $18,000,000 was thus

funded, and so much debt transferred from the States to the national

government. In addition to this sum a further amount of about $3,500,000

was funded in order to get rid of the balances in favor of the creditor

States. Altogether, including back interest from 1790 to 1795, a debt of

$22,500,000 was imposed on the new government, where half that sum would

have answered the purpose, and of this about $2,000,000 was actually new

debt, created for the occasion.

The entire amount of the national debt when fairly funded was about

$78,000,000. Had no political complications in its foreign relations

embarrassed the government, this burden might have been easily carried

in spite of Indian wars and even in spite of the whiskey rebellion,

though these troubles steadily tended to increase the sum. The annual

charge was in 1796 nearly $4,000,000, but after the year 1800 an

additional charge of $1,100,000 on deferred stock was to be provided for

by taxation, and this future addition to the annual charge hung over the

government during all these years as a perpetual anxiety. The population

of the country in 1791 was not quite 4,000,000 souls, of whom 700,000

were slaves. The expenditures, including the charge on the debt,

amounted in 1796 to about $7,000,000 a year, and the receipts nearly

balanced the expenditures. Considering the poverty of the country,

taxation was high; so high as to make any increase dangerous. Thus the

new government was not in a condition to hazard experiments, and needed

five or ten years of careful management in order to give the country

time for expansion.

In the middle of this state of affairs, while the Treasury was wrestling

with the problems of Indian wars and domestic revolt, came the ominous

signs of foreign aggression. War was thought to be imminent, either with

France or England, from 1795 to 1800, and the government was in great

straits to provide for it. The time now came when the Federalists would

probably have been delighted to recover the ten millions which had been

unnecessarily assumed, and the theory of a national debt must have taken

a different aspect in their eyes. Mr. Hamilton had not calculated on

this emergency; his system had rested on the assumption that the old

situation was to be permanent. The question was forced upon the country

whether it should increase its debt or neglect its defences.

Here was the point where the theories of Mr. Hamilton and of Mr.

Gallatin sharply diverged. The Federalists in a body demanded an army

and navy, with an indefinite increase of debt. Mr. Gallatin and his

party demanded that both army and navy should be postponed until they

could be created without increase of debt. The question as a matter of

statesmanship was extremely difficult. In a country like America any

really efficient defence, either by land or sea, was out of the question

except at an appalling cost, yet to be quite defenceless was to tempt

aggression. Deeper feelings, too, were involved in the dispute. An army

and a navy might be used for domestic as well as foreign purposes; to

use the words of Fisher Ames in private consultation with the Secretary

of the Treasury in 1800, when the situation was most critical: "a few

thousand, or even a few hundred, regular troops, well officered, would

give the first advantages to government in every contest;"[33] and this

idea was always foremost in the minds of the extreme Federalists as it

was among the extreme Republicans. To crush democracy by force was the

ultimate resource of Hamilton. To crush that force was the determined

intention of Jefferson.

Mr. Gallatin's policy was early, openly, and vigorously avowed and

persistently maintained. In this session of 1795-96, when appropriations

for finishing three frigates were demanded, he said in a few words what

he continued to say to the end of his service: "I am sensible that an

opinion of our strength will operate to a certain degree on other

nations; but I think a real addition of strength will go farther in

defending us than mere opinion. If the sums to be expended to build and

maintain the frigates were applied to paying a part of our national

debt, the payment would make us more respectable in the eyes of foreign

nations than all the frigates we can build. To spend money unnecessarily

at present will diminish our future resources, and instead of enabling

us will perhaps render it more difficult for us to build a navy some

years hence." "Perhaps I may be asked if we are then to be left without

protection. I think there are means of protection which arise from our

peculiar situation, and that we ought not to borrow institutions from

other nations, for which we are not fit. If our commerce has increased,

notwithstanding its want of protection; if we have a greater number of

seamen than any other nation except England, this, I think, points out

the way in which commerce ought to be protected. The fact is, that our

only mode of warfare against European nations at sea is by putting our

seamen on board privateers and covering the sea with them; these would

annoy their trade and distress them more than any other mode of defence

we can adopt."[34]

Yet government has to deal with beings ruled not only by reason but by

feeling, and its success depends on the degree to which it can satisfy

or at least compromise between the double standard of criticism. Mr.

Gallatin habitually made too little allowance for the force and

complexity of human passions and instincts. Self-contained and

self-reliant himself, and, like most close reasoners, distrustful of

everything that had a mere feeling for its justification, he held

government down to an exact observance of rules that made no allowance

for national pride. The three frigates whose construction he so

pertinaciously resisted were the Constitution, the Constellation, and

the United States. The time came, after Mr. Gallatin and his party had

for nearly twelve years carried out their own theories with almost

absolute power, when the American people, bankrupt and disgraced on

land, turned with a frenzy of enthusiasm towards the three flags which

these frigates were carrying on the ocean, and, with little regard to

party differences, would have seen the national debt and no small part

of the national life expunged rather than have parted with the glories

of these ships; when the broadsides of the Constitution and United

States, to use the words of George Canning in the British Parliament,

"produced a sensation in England scarcely to be equalled by the most

violent convulsion of nature;" and when Mr. Gallatin himself, exhausting

every resource of diplomacy in half the courts of Europe, found that his

country had no national dignity abroad except what these frigates had

conquered.

Notwithstanding all this, and with every motive to recognize in the

fullest extent the honors won by the American navy, the cool and candid

decision of history should be that Mr. Gallatin was essentially in the

right. A few years of care and economy were alone necessary in order to

secure the certainty of national power, and that power would be so safe

in its isolation as to be able to dispense with great armies and navies.

The real injury suffered by Great Britain in the war of 1812 was not in

the loss of half a dozen vessels of war out of her eight hundred in

commission, but in the ravages of our privateers on her commercial

marine. As a matter of fact the United States have continued to act on

Mr. Gallatin's theory; government has never pretended to protect the

national commerce by a powerful navy; no navy, not even that of Great

Britain, could protect it in case of war. That commerce has continued to

flourish without such protection. Every one concedes that it would be

the wildest folly even now, with forty millions of people and a

continent to protect, for America to establish a proportionate navy.

Every smatterer in finance knows that, inefficient as the existing navy

is, hundreds of millions have been uselessly expended upon it. There

could be no more instructive thesis proposed to future Secretaries of

the Treasury than to ask themselves on entering into office, "What would

Mr. Gallatin wish to do with the navy were he now in my place?"

But opposition to a navy was only a detail in Mr. Gallatin's theory of

American finance, and his plans extended over a far wider range than

could be comprehended within the limits of one or many speeches. The

debate on the British treaty had, no doubt, won him a large share of

attention, but the essentials of power in a deliberative body are only

to be secured by labor and activity and by mastery of the business in

hand. Mr. Gallatin knew perfectly well what was to be done, and lost no

time in acting. Before the House had been ten days in session, on the

17th December, 1795, he brought forward a resolution for the appointment

of "a committee to superintend the general operations of finance. No

subject," said he, "more requires a system, and great advantages will be

derived from it." This is the origin of the standing Committee of Ways

and Means, the want of which hitherto he ascribed, it seems, to Mr.

Hamilton's jealousy of legislative supervision. On the 21st December the

resolution was adopted and a committee of fourteen appointed, Mr.

William Smith, of South Carolina, being chairman, supported by Theodore

Sedgwick, Madison, Gallatin, and other important members of the House.

The British treaty consumed most of this session, and until that

question was settled the regular business was much neglected; but Mr.

Gallatin did not wait till then in order to begin his attack. As early

as April 12, 1796, a somewhat warm debate arose in the House on the

subject of the debt, and he undertook, with an elaborate comparison of

receipts and expenditures, to analyze the financial situation and to

show that the revenue was steadily running behindhand. The true

situation of the government was a point not altogether easy to

ascertain. One of several English ideas adopted by Mr. Hamilton from Mr.

Pitt was a sinking fund apparatus. Even at that time of Mr. Pitt's

supreme authority it can hardly be conceived that any one really

believed a sinking fund to be effective so long as the government's

expenditure exceeded its income; it was, however, certainly the fashion

to affect a belief in its efficacy at all times, and although, if Mr.

Pitt and Mr. Hamilton had been pressed on the subject, they might

perhaps have agreed that a sinking fund was always expensive and never

efficient except when there was a surplus, they would in the end have

fallen back on the theory that it inspired confidence in ultimate

payment of the debt. Their opponents would not unnaturally consider it

to be a mere fraud designed to cover and conceal the true situation.

Apart, however, from every question of the operation of the sinking

fund, there were intrinsic difficulties in ascertaining the facts. The

question was, as in such cases it is apt to be, in a great degree one of

accounts. The immediate matter in dispute was a sum of $3,800,000

advanced by the bank in anticipation of revenue. Mr. Sedgwick and the

Administration wished to fund it, and made considerable effort to prove

that the debt would not only be unaffected thereby, but that, as a

matter of fact, the debt had been diminished. Mr. Gallatin opposed the

funding, and insisted that provision should be made for its payment, and

he undertook to prove by a comparison of receipts and expenditures that

the debt had been increased $2,800,000 down to the 1st January, 1796. It

was felt to be a crucial point, and Mr. Gallatin was not allowed to go

unanswered. On the last day of the session Mr. William Smith replied to

him, elaborately proving that so far from there being a total increase

of $5,000,000 in the debt, as he had undertaken to show, there was an

actual excess of over $2,000,000 in favor of the government. To this Mr.

Gallatin made an immediate reply, Mr. Smith rejoined, and the session

ended.