IV. Concerning the infallible teaching of the Roman Pontiff: (part 11 of 15)

IV. Concerning the infallible teaching of the Roman Pontiff: (part 11 of 15)

"To the people of the United States. Friends and Fellow-Citizens: The period for a new election of a citizen, to administer the executive government of the United States, being not far distant, and the time actually arrived, when your thoughts must be employed in designating the person, who is to be clothed with that important trust, it appears to me proper, especially as it may conduce to a more distinct expression of the public voice, that I should now apprize you of the resolution I have formed, to decline being considered among the number of those, out of whom a choice is to be made. I beg you, at the same time, to do me the justice to be assured, that this resolution has not been taken without a strict regard to an the considerations appertaining to the relation, which binds a dutiful citizen to his country; and that, in withdrawing the tender of service, which silence in my situation might imply, I am influenced by no diminution of zeal for your future interest; no deficiency of grateful respect for your past kindness; but am supported by a full conviction that the step is compatible with both. The acceptance of, and continuance hitherto in, the office to which your suffrages have twice called me, have been a uniform sacrifice of inclination to the opinion of duty, and to a deference for what appeared to be your desire. I constantly hoped, that it would have been much earlier in my power, consistently with motives, which I was not at liberty to disregard, to return to that retirement, from which I had been reluctantly drawn. The strength of my inclination to do this, previous to the last election, had even led to the preparation of an address to declare it to you; but mature reflection on the then perplexed and critical posture of our affairs with foreign nations, and the unanimous advice of persons entitled to my confidence, impelled me to abandon the idea. I rejoice, that the state of your concerns, external as well as internal, no longer renders the pursuit of inclination incompatible with the sentiment of duty, or propriety; and am persuaded, whatever partiality may be retained for my services, that, in the present circumstances of our country, you will not disapprove my determination to retire. The impressions, with which I first undertook the arduous trust, were explained on the proper occasion. In the discharge of this trust, I will only say, that I have, with good intentions, contributed towards the organization and administration of the government the best exertions of which a very fallible judgment was capable. Not unconscious, in the outset, of the inferiority of my qualifications, experience in my own eyes, perhaps still more in the eyes of others, has strengthened the motives to diffidence of myself; and every day the increasing weight of years admonishes me more and more, that the shade of retirement is as necessary to me as it will be welcome. Satisfied, that, if any circumstances have given peculiar value to my services, they were temporary, I have the consolation to believe, that, while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it. In looking forward to the moment, which is intended to terminate the career of my public life, my feelings do not permit me to suspend the deep acknowledgment of that debt of gratitude, which I owe to my beloved country for the many honors it has conferred upon me; still more for the steadfast confidence with which it has supported me; and for the opportunities I have thence enjoyed of manifesting my inviolable attachment, by services faithful and persevering, though in usefulness unequal to my zeal. If benefits have resulted to our country from these services, let it always be remembered to your praise, and as an instructive example in our annals, that under circumstances in which the passions, agitated in every direction, were liable to mislead, amidst appearances sometimes dubious, vicissitudes of fortune often discouraging, in situations in which not unfrequently want of success has countenanced the spirit of criticism, the constancy of your support was the essential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected. {3310} Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I shall carry it with me to my grave, as a strong incitement to unceasing vows that Heaven may continue to you the choicest tokens of its beneficence; that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free constitution, which is the work of your hands, may be sacredly maintained; that its administration in every department may be stamped with wisdom and virtue; that, in fine, the happiness of the people of these States, under the auspices of liberty, may be made complete, by so careful a preservation and so prudent a use of this blessing, as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applause, the affection, and adoption of every nation, which is yet a stranger to it. Here, perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare, which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger, natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn contemplation, and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments, which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a People. These will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my sentiments on a former and not dissimilar occasion. Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attachment. The unity of Government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so: for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very Liberty, which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that, from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment, that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the Palladium of your political safety and prosperity; watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion, that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the first dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link together the various parts. For this you have every inducement of sympathy and interest. Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the Independence and Liberty you possess are the work of joint counsels, and joint efforts, of common dangers, sufferings, and successes. But these considerations, however powerfully they address themselves to your sensibility, are greatly outweighed by those, which apply more immediately to your interest. Here every portion of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preserving the Union of the whole. The North, in an unrestrained intercourse with the South, protected by the equal laws of a common government, finds, in the productions of the latter, great additional resources of maritime and commercial enterprise and precious materials of manufacturing industry. The South, in the same intercourse, benefiting by the agency of the North, sees its agriculture grow and its commerce expand. Turning partly into its own channels the seamen of the North, it finds its particular navigation invigorated; and, while it contributes, in different ways, to nourish and increase the general mass of the national navigation, it looks forward to the protection of a maritime strength, to which itself is unequally adapted. The East, in a like intercourse with the West, already finds, and in the progressive improvement of interior communications by land and water, will more and more find, a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad, or manufactures at home. The West derives from the East supplies requisite to its growth and comfort, and, what is perhaps of still greater consequence, it must of necessity owe the secure enjoyment of indispensable outlets for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the future maritime strength of the Atlantic side of the Union, directed by an indissoluble community of interest as one nation. Any other tenure by which the West can hold this essential advantage, whether derived from its own separate strength, or from an apostate and unnatural connexion with any foreign power, must be intrinsically precarious. While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particular interest in Union, all the parts combined cannot fail to find in the united mass of means and efforts greater strength, greater resource, proportionably greater security from external danger, a less frequent interruption of their peace by foreign nations; and, what is of inestimable value, they must derive from Union an exemption from those broils and wars between themselves, which so frequently afflict neighbouring countries not tied together by the same governments, which their own rivalships alone would be sufficient to produce, but which opposite foreign alliances, attachments, and intrigues would stimulate and embitter. Hence, likewise, they will avoid the necessity of those overgrown military establishments, which, under any form of government, are inauspicious to liberty and which are to be regarded as particularly hostile to Republican Liberty. In this sense it is, that your Union ought to be considered as a main prop of your liberty, and that the love of the one ought to endear to you the preservation of the other. {3311} These considerations speak a persuasive language to every reflecting and virtuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the Union as a primary object of Patriotic desire. Is there a doubt, whether a common government can embrace so large a sphere? Let experience solve it. To listen to mere speculation in such a case were criminal. We are authorized to hope, that a proper organization of the whole, with the auxiliary agency of governments for the respective subdivisions, will afford a happy issue to the experiment. It is well worth a fair and full experiment. With such powerful and obvious motives to Union, affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those, who in any quarter may endeavour to weaken its bands. In contemplating the causes, which may disturb our Union, it occurs as matter of serious concern, that any ground should have been furnished for characterizing parties by Geographical discriminations, Northern and Southern, Atlantic and Western; whence designing men may endeavour to excite a belief, that there is a real difference of local interests and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence, within particular districts, is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districts. You cannot shield yourselves too much against the jealousies and heart-burnings, which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those, who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our western country have lately had a useful lesson on this head; they have seen, in the negotiation by the Executive, and in the unanimous ratification by the Senate, of the treaty with Spain, and in the universal satisfaction at that event, throughout the United States, a decisive proof how unfounded were the suspicious propagated among them of a policy in the General Government and in the Atlantic States unfriendly to their interests in regard to the Mississippi; they have been witnesses to the formation of two treaties, that with Great Britain, and that with Spain, which secure to them every thing they could desire, in respect to our foreign relations, towards confirming their prosperity. Will it not be their wisdom to rely for the preservation of these advantages on the Union by which they were procured? Will they not henceforth be deaf to those advisers, if such there are, who would sever them from their brethren, and connect them with aliens? To the efficacy and permanency of your Union, a Government for the whole is indispensable. No alliances, however strict, between the parts can be an adequate substitute; they must inevitably experience the infractions and interruptions, which all alliances in all times have experienced. Sensible of this momentous truth, you have improved upon your first essay, by the adoption of a Constitution of Government better calculated than your former for an intimate Union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. This Government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, in the distribution of its powers, uniting security with energy, and containing within itself a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim to your confidence and your support. Respect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquiescence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true Liberty. The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their Constitutions of Government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, till changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish Government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established Government. All obstructions to the execution of the Laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels, and modified by mutual interests. However combinations or associations of the above descriptions may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people, and to usurp for themselves the reins of government; destroying afterwards the very engines, which have lifted them to unjust dominion. Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect, in the forms of the constitution, alterations, which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited, remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true character of governments, as of other human institutions; that experience is the surest standard, by which to test the real tendency of the existing constitution of a country; that facility in changes, upon the credit of mere hypothesis and opinion, exposes to perpetual change, from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion; and remember, especially, that, for the efficient management of your common interests, in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprise of faction, to confine each member of the society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property. {3312} I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party, generally. This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stilled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy. The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty. Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind, (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight,) the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it. It serves always to distract the Public Councils, and enfeeble the Public Administration. It agitates the Community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms; kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another. There is an opinion, that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the Government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of Liberty. This within certain limits is probably true; and in Governments of a Monarchical cast, Patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the popular character, in Governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And, there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume. It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution, in those intrusted with its administration, to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories, and constituting each the Guardian of the Public Weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern; some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way, which the constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for, though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit, which the use can at any time yield. Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. The mere Politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connexions with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who, that is a sincere friend to it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric? Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion should be enlightened. As a very important source of strength and security, cherish public credit. One method of preserving it is, to use it as sparingly as possible; avoiding occasions of expense by cultivating peace, but remembering also that timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it; avoiding likewise the accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasions of expense, but by vigorous exertions in time of peace to discharge the debts, which unavoidable wars may have occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the burthen, which we ourselves ought to bear. The execution of these maxims belongs to your representatives, but it is necessary that public opinion should cooperate. {3313} To facilitate to them the performance of their duty, it is essential that you should practically bear in mind, that towards the payment of debts there must be Revenue; that to have Revenue there must be taxes; that no taxes can be devised, which are not more or less inconvenient and unpleasant, that the intrinsic embarrassment, inseparable from the selection of the proper objects (which is always a choice of difficulties), ought to be a decisive motive for a candid construction of the conduct of the government in making it, and for a spirit of acquiescence in the measures for obtaining revenue, which the public exigencies may at any time dictate. Observe good faith and justice towards all Nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and Morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, enlightened, and, at no distant period, a great Nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt, that, in the course of time and things, the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages, which might be lost by a steady adherence to it? Can it be, that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its Virtue? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices? In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential, than that permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular Nations, and passionate attachments for others, should be excluded; and that, in place of them, just and amicable feelings towards all should be cultivated. The Nation, which indulges towards another an habitual hatred, or an habitual fondness, is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. Antipathy in one nation against another disposes each more readily to offer insult and injury, to lay hold of slight causes of umbrage, and to be haughty and intractable, when accidental or trifling occasions of dispute occur. Hence frequent collisions, obstinate, envenomed, and bloody contests. The Nation, prompted by ill-will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the Government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The Government sometimes participates in the national propensity, and adopts through passion what reason would reject; at other times, it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty, of Nations has been the victim. So likewise, a passionate attachment of one Nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite Nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest, in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter, without adequate inducement or justification. It leads also to concessions to the favorite Nation of privileges denied to others, which is apt doubly to injure the Nation making the concessions; by unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained; and by exciting jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or deluded citizens, (who devote themselves to the favorite nation,) facility to betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium, sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous sense of obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a laudable zeal for public good, the base of foolish compliances of ambition, corruption, or infatuation. As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent Patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practise the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the Public Councils! Such an attachment of a small or weak, towards a great and powerful nation, dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter. Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens,) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove, that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of Republican Government. But that jealousy, to be useful, must be impartial; else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of a defence against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation, and excessive dislike of another, cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other. Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests. The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connexion as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop. Europe has a set of primary interests, which to us have none, or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves, by artificial ties, in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities. Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people, under an efficient government, the period is not far off, when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality, we may at any time resolve upon, to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel. Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice? It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy. {3314} I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would be unwise to extend them. Taking care always to keep ourselves, by suitable establishments, on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies. Harmony, liberal intercourse with all nations, are recommended by policy, humanity, and interest. But even our commercial policy should hold an equal and impartial hand; neither seeking nor granting exclusive favors or preferences; consulting the natural course of things; diffusing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of commerce, but forcing nothing; establishing, with powers so disposed, in order to give trade a stable course, to define the rights of our merchants, and to enable the government to support them, conventional rules of intercourse, the best that present circumstances and mutual opinion will permit, but temporary, and liable to be from time to time abandoned or varied, as experience and circumstances shall dictate; constantly keeping in view, that it is folly in one nation to look for disinterested favors from another; that it must pay with a portion of its independence for whatever it may accept under that character; that, by such acceptance, it may place itself in the condition of having given equivalents for nominal favors, and yet of being reproached with ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no greater error than to expect or calculate upon real favors from nation to nation. It is an illusion, which experience must cure, which a just pride ought to discard. In offering to you, my countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting impression I could wish; that they will control the usual current of the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course, which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations. But, if I may even flatter myself, that they may be productive of some partial benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur to moderate the fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs of foreign intrigue, to guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism; this hope will be a full recompense for the solicitude for your welfare, by which they have been dictated. How far in the discharge of my official duties, I have been guided by the principles which have been delineated, the public records and other evidences of my conduct must witness to you and to the world. To myself, the assurance of my own conscience is, that I have at least believed myself to be guided by them. In relating to the still subsisting war in Europe, my Proclamation of the 22d of April, 1793, is the index to my Plan. Sanctioned by your approving voice, and by that of your Representatives in both Houses of Congress, the spirit of that measure has continually governed me, uninfluenced by any attempts to deter or divert me from it. After deliberate examination, with the aid of the best lights I could obtain, I was well satisfied that our country, under all the circumstances of the case, had a right to take, and was bound in duty and interest to take, a neutral position. Having taken it, I determined, as far as should depend upon me, to maintain it, with moderation, perseverance, and firmness. The considerations, which respect the right to hold this conduct, it is not necessary on this occasion to detail. I will only observe, that, according to my understanding of the matter, that right, so far from being denied by any of the Belligerent Powers, has been virtually admitted by all. The duty of holding a neutral conduct may be inferred, without anything more, from the obligation which justice and humanity impose on every nation, in cases in which it is free to act, to maintain inviolate the relations of peace and amity towards other nations. The inducements of interest for observing that conduct will best be referred to your own reflections and experience. With me, a predominant motive has been to endeavour to gain time to our country to settle and mature its yet recent institutions, and to progress without interruption to that degree of strength and consistency, which is necessary to give it, humanly speaking, the command of its own fortunes. Though, in reviewing the incidents of my administration, I am unconscious of intentional error, I am nevertheless too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope, that my Country will never cease to view them with indulgence; and that, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest. Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love towards it, which is so natural to a man, who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations; I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever favorite object of my heart, and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers. GEORGE WASHINGTON."

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1796. Third Presidential Election. Washington succeeded by John Adams.

After the appearance of Washington's Farewell Address, the result of the Presidential election became exceedingly doubtful. "There was no second man to whom the whole of the nation could be won over. The Federalists … could not bring forward a single candidate who could calculate on the unanimous and cheerful support of the entire party. There still prevailed at the time a feeling among the people that the vice-president had a sort of claim to the succession to the presidency. But even apart from this, Adams would have been one of the most prominent candidates of the Federalists. The great majority of them soon gave him a decided preference over all other possible candidates. On the other hand, some of the most distinguished and influential of the Federalists feared serious consequences to the party and the country from the vanity and violence as well as from the egotism and irresolution with which he was charged. But to put him aside entirely was not possible, nor was it their wish. They thought, however, to secure a greater number of electoral votes for Thomas Pinckney, the Federal candidate for the vice-presidency, which, as the constitution then stood, would have made him president and Adams vice-president. {3315} Although this plan was anxiously concealed from the people, it caused the campaign to be conducted by the party with less energy than if the leaders had been entirely unanimous. France was naturally desirous of Jefferson's success. … Wolcott asserted that Adet had publicly declared that France's future policy towards the United States would depend on the result of the election. Some did not hesitate to say that, on this account, Jefferson should have the preference, but on the more thoughtful Federalists it exerted the very opposite influence. There is no reason for the assumption that the issue of the election would have been different, had Adet behaved more discreetly. But his indiscretion certainly contributed to make the small majority expected for Adams completely certain, while Hamilton's flank movement in favor of Pinckney helped Jefferson to the vice-presidency. … The result of the election, however, left the country in a very serious condition. Washington's withdrawal removed the last restraint from party passion."

H. von Holst, The Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, chapter 3.

Adams received 71 votes in the Electoral College and Jefferson 68. As the constitution then provided, the majority of votes elected the President and the next greatest number of votes elected the Vice President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1797-1799. Troubles with the French Republic. The X, Y, Z correspondence. On the brink of war.

"Mr. Adams took his cabinet from his predecessor; it was not a strong one, and it was devoted to Hamilton, between whom and the new President there was soon a divergence, Hamilton being fond of power, and Adams having a laudable purpose to command his own ship. The figure of speech is appropriate, for he plunged into a sea of troubles, mainly created by the unreasonable demands of the French government. The French 'Directory,' enraged especially by Jay's treaty with England, got rid of one American minister by remonstrance, and drove out another [Pinckney] with contempt. When Mr. Adams sent three special envoys [Gerry, Marshall, and Pinckney], they were expected to undertake the most delicate negotiations with certain semi-official persons designated in their correspondence only by the letters X, Y, Z. The plan of this covert intercourse came through the private secretary of M. de Talleyrand, then French Minister for Foreign Affairs; and the impudence of these three letters of the alphabet went so far as to propose a bribe of 1,200,000 francs (some $220,000) to be paid over to this minister. 'You must pay money, a great deal of money,' remarked Monsieur Y ('Il faut de l'argent, beaucoup de l'argent'). The secret of these names was kept, but the diplomatic correspondence was made public, and created much wrath in Europe as well as in America. Moreover, American vessels were constantly attacked by France, and yet Congress refused to arm its own ships. At last the insults passed beyond bearing, and it was at this time that 'Millions for defence, not one cent for tribute,' first became a proverbial phrase, having been originally used by Charles C. Pinckney. … Then, with tardy decision, the Republicans yielded to the necessity of action, and the Federal party took the lead. War was not formally proclaimed, but treaties with France were declared to be no longer binding. An army was ordered to be created, with Washington as Lieutenant-general and Hamilton as second in command; and the President was authorized to appoint a Secretary of the Navy and to build twelve new ships-of-war. Before these were ready, naval hostilities had actually begun; and Commodore Truxtun, in the United States frigate Constellation, captured a French frigate in West Indian waters (February 9. 1799), and afterwards silenced another, which however escaped. Great was the excitement over these early naval successes of the young nation. Merchant-ships were authorized to arm themselves, and some 300 acted upon this authority. … The result of it all was that France yielded. Talleyrand, the very minister who had dictated the insults, now disavowed them, and pledged his government to receive any minister the United States might send. The President, in the most eminently courageous act of his life, took the responsibility of again sending ambassadors; and did this without even consulting his cabinet, which would, as he well knew, oppose it. They were at once received, and all danger of war with France was at an end. This bold stroke separated the President permanently from at least half of his own party, since the Federalists did not wish for peace with France. His course would have given him a corresponding increase of favor from the other side, but for the great mistake the Federalists had made in passing certain laws, called the 'Alien' law and the 'Sedition' law."

T. W. Higginson, Larger History of the United States, chapter 14.

ALSO IN: J. T. Austin, Life of Elbridge Gerry, volume 2, chapters 5-8.

John Quincy and Charles Francis Adams, Life of John Adams, chapter 10 (volume 2).

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1797-1800. Early attitude of the Slavocracy in Congress. Treatment of Free Blacks.

"Many people will not allow the least blame to be cast on this period [the later years of the 18th century], because it does not harmonize with their admiration of the 'fathers,' and because they have adopted, without any proof, the common view that the deeper shadows of slavery and slavocracy first appeared comparatively late. … In reading through the debates [in Congress], single striking instances of injustice do not make the deepest impression. It is the omnipresent unwillingness to practice justice towards colored persons,—yes, even to recognize them as actual beings. When the defense of their rights is demanded, then congress has always a deaf ear. … Swanwick of Pennsylvania laid before the house of representatives, January 30, 1797, a petition from four North Carolina negroes who had been freed by their masters. Since a state law condemned them to be sold again, they had fled to Philadelphia. There they had been seized under the fugitive slave law … and now prayed congress for its intervention. Blount of North Carolina declared that only when it was 'proved' that these men were free, could congress consider the petition. Sitgreaves of Pennsylvania asked, in reply to this, what sort of proof was offered that the four negroes were not free. This question received no answer. Smith of South Carolina and Christie of Maryland simply expressed their amazement that any member whatever could have presented a petition of 'such an unheard-of nature.' {3316} Swanwick and some other representatives affirmed that the petition must be submitted to a committee for investigation and consideration, because the petitioners complained of violation of their rights under a law of the Union. No reply could be made to this and no reply was attempted. This decisive point was simply set aside, and it was voted by fifty ayes to thirty-three noes not to receive the petition. … In order to reach this result, Smith had produced the customary impression by the declaration that the refusal of the demand made by the representatives from the southern states would drive a 'wedge' into the Union. When, three years later, the same question was brought before congress again by a petition of the free negroes of Philadelphia, Rutledge of South Carolina declared in even plainer terms that the south would be forced to the sad necessity of going its own way. … The whites who troubled themselves about slaves or free colored persons had no better reception. Year after year the Quakers came indefatigably with new petitions, and each time had to undergo the same scornful treatment. … In all the cases mentioned, the tactics of the representatives of the slaveholding interest were the same and they maintained them unchanged up to the last. If congress was urged to act in any way which did not please them, then slavery was always a 'purely municipal affair.'"

H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, chapter 8.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1798. The Alien and Sedition Laws and the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions.

"The outrages which we suffered from the injustice of England and France gave additional bitterness to the strife between parties at home. The anti-federal press was immoderate in its assaults upon the administration. It so happened that several of the anti-federal papers were conducted by foreigners. Indeed, there were many foreigners in the country whose sympathies were with the French, and their hostility to the administration was open and passionate. The federal leaders determined to crush out by the strong arm of the law these publishers of slanders and fomenters of discontent. Hence the famous 'alien and sedition laws' were passed. The remedy devised was far worse than the disease. It hastened the federal party to its tomb, and was the occasion of the formulation of that unfortunate creed of constitutional construction and of state sovereignty known as the 'Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions' of 1798-99."

J. S. Landon, Constitutional History and Government of the United States, lecture 6.

The series of strong measures carried by the Federalists comprised the Naturalization Act of June 18, the Alien Act of June 25, the second Alien Act, of July 6, and the Sedition Act of July 14, 1798.

The text of the Naturalization Act is as follows:

June 18, 1798. Acts of the Fifth Congress, Statute II., Chapter liv.:

"An Act supplementary to, and to amend the act, intituled 'An act to establish an uniform rule of naturalization; and to repeal the act heretofore passed on that subject.'

Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That no alien shall be admitted to become a citizen of the United States, or of any state, unless in the manner prescribed by the act, intituled 'An act to establish an uniform rule of naturalization; and to repeal the act heretofore passed on that subject,' he shall have declared his intention to become a citizen of the United States, five years, at least, before his admission, and shall, at the time of his application to be admitted, declare and prove, to the satisfaction of the court having jurisdiction in the case, that he has resided within the United States fourteen years, at least, and within the state or territory where, or for which such court is at the time held, five years, at least, besides conforming to the other declarations, renunciations and proofs, by the said act required, anything therein to the contrary hereof notwithstanding: Provided, that any alien, who was residing within the limits, and under the jurisdiction of the United States, before the twenty-ninth day of January, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-five, may, within one year after the passing of this act—and any alien who shall have made the declaration of his intention to become a citizen of the United States, in conformity to the provisions of the act, intituled 'An act to establish an uniform rule of naturalization; and to repeal the act heretofore passed on that subject,' may, within four years after having made the declaration aforesaid, be admitted to become a citizen, in the manner prescribed by the said act, upon his making proof that he has resided five years, at least, within the limits, and under the jurisdiction of the United States: And provided also, that no alien, who shall be a native, citizen, denizen or subject of any nation or state with whom the United States shall be at war, at the time of his application, shall be then admitted to become a citizen of the United States."

Statutes at Large of the United States, edition 1850. volume 1, pages 566-567.

The following is the text of the two Alien Acts:

June 25, 1798. Statute II., Chapter lviii. "An Act Concerning Aliens.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That it shall be lawful for the President of the United States at any time during the continuance of this act, to order all such aliens as he shall judge dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States, or shall have reasonable grounds to suspect are concerned in any treasonable or secret machinations against the government thereof, to depart out of the territory of the United States, within such time as shall be expressed in such order, which order shall be served on such alien by de·livering him a copy thereof, or leaving the same at his usual abode, and returned to the office of the Secretary of State, by the marshal or other person to whom the same shall be directed. And in case any alien, so ordered to depart, shall be found at large within the United States after the time limited in such order for his departure, and not having obtained a license from the President to reside therein, or having obtained such license shall not have conformed thereto, every such alien shall, on conviction thereof, be imprisoned for a term not exceeding three years, and shall never after be admitted to become a citizen of the United States. {3317} Provided always and be it further enacted, that if any alien so ordered to depart shall prove to the satisfaction of the President, by evidence to be taken before such person or persons as the President shall direct, who are for that purpose hereby authorized to administer oaths, that no injury or danger to the United States will arise from suffering such alien to reside therein, the President may grant a license to such alien to remain within the United States for such time as he shall judge proper, and at such place as he may designate. And the President may also require of such alien to enter into a bond to the United States, in such penal sum as he may direct, with one or more sufficient sureties to the satisfaction of the person authorized by the President to take the same, conditioned for the good behavior of such alien during his residence in the United States, and not violating his license, which license the President may revoke whenever he shall think proper.

Section 2. And be it further enacted, That it shall be lawful for the President of the United States, whenever he may deem it necessary for the public safety, to order to be removed out of the territory thereof, any alien who may or shall be in prison in pursuance of this act; and to cause to be arrested and sent out of the United States such of those aliens as shall have been ordered to depart therefrom and shall not have obtained a license as aforesaid, in all cases where, in the opinion of the President, the public safety requires a speedy removal. And if any alien so removed or sent out of the United States by the President shall voluntarily return thereto, unless by permission of the President of the United States, such alien on conviction thereof, shall be imprisoned so long as, in the opinion of the President, the public safety may require.

Section 3. And be it further enacted, That every master or commander of any ship or vessel which shall come into any port of the United States after the first day of July next, shall immediately on his arrival make report in writing to the collector, or other chief officer of the customs of such port, of all aliens, if any, on board his vessel, specifying their names, age, the place of nativity, the country from which they shall have come, the nation to which they belong and owe allegiance, their occupation and a description of their persons, as far as he shall be informed thereof, and on failure, every such master and commander shall forfeit and pay three hundred dollars, for the payment whereof on default of such master or commander, such vessel shall also be holden, and may by such collector or other officer of the customs be detained. And it shall be the duty of such collector, or other officer of the customs, forthwith to transmit to the officer of the department of state true copies of all such returns.

Section 4. And be it further enacted, That the circuit and district courts of the United States, shall respectively have cognizance of all crimes and offences against this act. And all marshals and other officers of the United States are required to execute all precepts and orders of the President of the United States issued in pursuance or by virtue of this act.

Section 5. And be it further enacted, That it shall be lawful for any alien who may be ordered to be removed from the United States, by virtue of this act, to take with him such part of his goods, chattels, or other property, as he may find convenient; and all property left in the United States by any alien, who may be removed, as aforesaid, shall be, and remain subject to his order and disposal, in the same manner as if this act had not been passed.

Section 6. And be it further enacted, That this act shall continue and be in force for and during the term of two years from the passing thereof.

Approved, June 25, 1798."

Statutes at Large of the United States, edition 1850, Volume I., pages 570-572.

July 6, 1798. Statute II., Chapter lxvi. "An Act respecting Alien Enemies.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That whenever there shall be a declared war between the United States and any foreign nation or government, or any invasion or predatory incursion shall be perpetrated, attempted, or threatened against the territory of the United States, by any foreign nation or government, and the President of the United States shall make public proclamation of the event, all natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of the hostile nation or government, being males of the age of fourteen years and upwards, who shall be within the United States, and not actually naturalized, shall be liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured and removed, as alien enemies. And the President of the United States shall be, and he is hereby authorized, in any event, as aforesaid, by his proclamation thereof or other public act, to direct the conduct to be observed, on the part of the United States, towards the aliens who shall become liable as aforesaid; the manner and degree of the restraint to which they shall be subject, and in what cases, and upon what security their residence shall be permitted, and to provide for the removal of those, who, not being permitted to reside within the United States, shall refuse or neglect to depart therefrom; and to establish any other regulations which shall be found necessary in the premises and for the public safety; Provided, that aliens resident within the United States, who shall become liable as enemies, in the manner aforesaid, and who shall not be chargeable with actual hostility, or other crime against the public safety, shall be allowed for the recovery, disposal, and removal of their goods and effects, and for their departure, the full time which is, or shall be stipulated by any treaty, where any shall have been between the United States and the hostile nation or government, of which they shall be natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects: and when no such treaty shall have existed, the President of the United States may ascertain and declare such reasonable time as may be consistent with the public safety, and according to the dictates of humanity and national hospitality.

Section 2. And be it further enacted, That after any proclamation shall be made as aforesaid, it shall be the duty of the several courts of the United States, and of each state, having criminal jurisdiction, and of the several judges and justices of the courts of the United States, and they shall be, and are hereby respectively, authorized upon complaint, against any alien or alien enemies, as aforesaid, who shall be resident and at large within such jurisdiction or district, to the danger of the public peace or safety, and contrary to the tenor or intent of such proclamation, or other regulations which the President of the United States shall and may establish in the premises, to cause such alien or aliens to be duly apprehended and convened before such court, judge or Justice; and after a full examination and hearing on such complaint, and sufficient cause therefor appearing, shall and may order such alien or aliens to be removed out of the territory of the United States, or to give such sureties for their good behaviour, or to be otherwise restrained, conformably to the proclamation or regulations which shall or may be established as aforesaid, and may imprison, or otherwise secure such alien or aliens, until the order which shall and may be made, as aforesaid, shall be performed.

{3318}

Section 3. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of the marshal of the district in which any alien enemy shall be apprehended, who by the President of the United States, or by the order of any court, judge or justice, as aforesaid, shall be required to depart, and to be removed, as aforesaid, to provide therefor, and to execute such order, by himself or his deputy, or other discreet person or persons to be employed by him, by causing a removal of such alien out of the territory of the United States; and for such removal the marshal shall have the warrant of the President of the United States, or of the court, judge or justice ordering the same, as the case may be.

Approved, July 6, 1798."

Statutes at Large of the United States, edition of 1850, Volume I, page 577.

The text of the Sedition Act is as follows:

JULY 14, 1798. Chapter lxxiv.

"An Act in addition to the act, entitled 'An Act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States.'

Section 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That if any persons shall unlawfully combine or conspire together, with intent to oppose any measure or measures of the government of the United States, which are or shall be directed by proper authority, or to impede the operation of any law of the United States, or to intimidate or prevent any person holding a place or office in or under the government of the United States, from undertaking, performing or executing, his trust or duty; and if any person or persons, with intent as aforesaid, shall counsel, advise or attempt to procure any insurrection, riot, unlawful assembly, or combination, whether such conspiracy, threatening, counsel, advice, or attempt shall have the proposed effect or not, he or they shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and on conviction before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding five thousand dollars and by imprisonment during a term not less than six months nor exceeding five years; and further at the discretion of the court may be holden to find sureties for his good behavior in such sum, and for such time, as the said court may direct.

Section 2. And be it further enacted, That if any person shall write, print, utter, or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either, or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, and one in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against the United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.

Section 3. And be it further enacted and declared, That if any person shall be prosecuted under this act, for the writing or publishing any libel aforesaid, it shall be lawful for the defendant, upon the trial of the cause, to give in evidence in his defence, the truth of the matter contained in the publication charged as a libel. And the jury who shall try the cause, shall have a right to determine the law and the fact, under the direction of the court, as in other cases.

Section 4. And be it further enacted, That this act shall continue and be in force until the third day of March, one thousand eight hundred and one, and no longer: Provided that the expiration of the act shall not prevent or defeat a prosecution and punishment of any offence against the law, during the time it shall be in force. Approved July 14, 1798."

"There has been a general effort on the part of biographers to clear their respective heroes from all responsibility for these ill-fated measures. The truth is, that they had the full support of the congressmen and senators who passed, them, of the President who signed them, and of all the leaders in the States, who almost all believed in them; and they also met with very general acceptance by the party in the North. Hamilton went as far in the direction of sustaining the principle of these laws as any one. He had too acute a mind to believe with many of the staunch Federalist divines of New England, that Jefferson and Madison were Marats and Robespierres, and that their followers were Jacobins who, when they came to power, were ready for the overthrow of religion and society, and were prepared to set up a guillotine and pour out blood in the waste places of the federal city. But he did believe, and so wrote to Washington, after the appearance of the X. Y. Z. letters that there was a party in the country ready to 'new model' the constitution on French principles, to form an offensive and defensive alliance with France, and make the United States a French province. He felt, in short, that there was a party in America ready for confiscation and social confusion. A year later, in 1799, he wrote to Dayton, the speaker of the national House of Representatives, a long letter in which he set forth very clearly the policy which he felt ought to be pursued. {3319} He wished to give strength to the government, and increase centralization by every means, by an extension of the national judiciary, a liberal system of internal improvements, an increased and abundant revenue, an enlargement of the army and navy, permanence in the laws for the volunteer army, extension of the powers of the general government, subdivision of the States as soon as practicable, and finally a strong sedition law, and the power to banish aliens. This was what was termed at that day a 'strong and spirited' policy; it would now be called repressive, but by whatever name it is designated, it was the policy of Hamilton, and is characteristic of both his talents and temperament. Except as to the subdivision of States, it was carried out pretty thoroughly in all its main features by the Federalists. The alien and sedition laws, although resisted in Congress, did not much affect public opinion at the elections which immediately ensued, and the Federalists came into the next Congress with a large majority."

Henry Cabot Lodge, Alexander Hamilton, chapter 9.

"The different portions of the country were affected according to the dominant political opinion. Where the Federalists were strong political feeling bore them headlong into prosecutions under the new powers. In the Republican States a sense of injury and danger went hand in hand, and the question of the hour was how to repel the threatening destruction. Mr. Jefferson did not fail to see that the great opportunity for his party had come. His keen political sagacity detected in an instant the fatal mistake the administration had made, and he began at once to look about him for the best means to turn his opponents' mistake to his own advantage. Naturally he felt some delicacy in appearing too forward in assailing a government of which he himself was the second in office. Nevertheless he lent himself willingly to the task of organizing, in a quiet way, a systematic assault upon these laws of Congress, and at once opened a correspondence calculated to elicit the best judgment of his coadjutors and gradually drew out a programme of action. Virginia was by no means unanimous in reprobating these laws. She had a large and influential body of Federalists. … But the influence of Jefferson was paramount and the result of Jeffersonian principles soon appeared on every hand. Meetings were held in many of the counties upon their county court days at which were adopted addresses or series of resolutions condemning or praying for the repeal of these laws. … New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania sent petitions of appeal to Congress. … But it was in Kentucky that the greatest resistance was evoked. The feeling in that State was, indeed, little short of frenzy, and a singular unanimity was displayed even in the most extreme acts and sentiments. This grew out of no passing passion. It was based upon the most vigorous elements in her character as a people. Kentucky was at this time somewhat apart from the rest of the Union. … Her complaints, just and unjust, had been many, but hitherto she had not gained the nation's ear. But the time was now ripe for her to assert herself."

E. D. Warfield, The Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, chapter 1.

The famous Kentucky Resolutions, substantially drafted by Jefferson, as he acknowledged fifteen years afterwards, but introduced in the Legislature of Kentucky by John Breckenridge, on the 8th of November, 1798, were adopted by that body, in the lower branch on the 10th and in the upper on the 13th. Approved by the Governor on the 16th, they were immediately printed and copies officially sent to every other state and to members of Congress. They were as follows:

"I. Resolved, that the several states composing the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their General Government; but that by compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Government for special purposes, delegated to that Government certain definite powers, reserving each state to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self Government; and that whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and are of no force: That to this compact each state acceded as a state, and is an integral party, its co-states forming as to itself, the other party: That the Government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the constitution, the measure of its powers; but that as in all other cases of compact among parties having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress.

II. Resolved, that the Constitution of the United States having delegated to Congress a power to punish treason, counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States, piracies and felonies committed on the High Seas, and offences against the laws of nations, and no other crimes whatever, and it being true as a general principle, and one of the amendments to the Constitution having also declared, 'that the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people,' therefore also the same act of Congress passed on the 14th day of July, 1798, and entitled 'An act in addition to the act entitled an act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States;' as also the act passed by them on the 27th of June, 1798, entitled 'An act to punish frauds committed on the Bank of the United States' (and all other their acts which assume to create, define, or punish crimes other than those enumerated in the constitution) are altogether void and of no force, and that the power to create, define, and punish such other crimes is reserved, and of right appertains solely and exclusively to the respective states, each within its own Territory.

{3320}

III. Resolved, that it is true as a general principle, and is also expressly declared by one of the amendments to the Constitution that 'the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively or to the people;' and that no power over the freedom of religion, freedom of speech, or freedom of the press being delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, all lawful powers respecting the same did of right remain, and were reserved to the states, or to the people: That thus was manifested their determination to retain to themselves the right of judging how far the licentiousness of speech and of the press may be abridged without lessening their useful freedom, and how far those abuses which cannot be separated from their use, should be tolerated, rather than the use be destroyed; and thus also they guarded against all abridgment by the United States of the freedom of religious opinions and exercises, and retained to themselves the right of protecting the same, as this state by a Law passed on the general demand of its Citizens, had already protected them from all human restraint or interference; and that in addition to this general principle and express declaration, another and more special provision has been made by one of the amendments to the Constitution which expressly declares that 'Congress shall make no law respecting an Establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press,' thereby guarding in the same sentence, and under the same words, the freedom of religion, of speech, and of the press, insomuch, that whatever violates either, throws down the sanctuary which covers the others, and that libels, falsehoods, and defamation, equally with heresy and false religion, are withheld from the cognizance of federal tribunals. That therefore the act of the Congress of the United States passed on the 14th day of July, 1798, entitled 'An act in addition to the act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States,' which does abridge the freedom of the press, is not law, but is altogether void and of no effect.

IV. Resolved, that alien friends are under the jurisdiction and protection of the laws of the state wherein they are; that no power over them has been delegated to the United States, nor prohibited to the individual states distinct from their power over citizens; and it being true as a general principle, and one of the amendments to the Constitution having also declared, that 'the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the states are reserved to the states respectively or to the people,' the act of the Congress of the United States passed on the 22d day of June, 1798, entitled 'An act concerning aliens,' which assumes power over alien friends not delegated by the Constitution, is not law, but is altogether void and of no force.

V. Resolved, that in addition to the general principle as well as the express declaration, that powers not delegated are reserved, another and more special provision inserted in the Constitution from abundant caution has declared, 'that the migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year 1808.' That this Commonwealth does admit the migration of alien friends described as the subject of the said act concerning aliens; that a provision against prohibiting their migration, is a provision against all acts equivalent thereto, or it would be nugatory; that to remove them when migrated is equivalent to a prohibition of their migration, and is therefore contrary to the said provision of the Constitution, and void.

VI. Resolved, that the imprisonment of a person under the protection of the Laws of this Commonwealth on his failure to obey the simple order of the President to depart out of the United States, as is undertaken by the said act entitled 'An act concerning aliens,' is contrary to the Constitution, one amendment to which has provided, that 'no person shall be deprived of liberty without due process of law,' and that another having provided 'that in all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the right to a public trial by an impartial jury, to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation, to be confronted with the witnesses against him, to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favour, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defence,' the same act undertaking to authorize the President to remove a person out of the United States who is under the protection of the Law, on his own suspicion, without accusation, without jury, without public trial, without confrontation of the witnesses against him, without having witnesses in his favour, without defence, without counsel, is contrary to these provisions also of the Constitution, is therefore not law but utterly void and of no force. That transferring the power of judging any person who is under the protection of the laws, from the Courts to the President of the United States, as is undertaken by the same act concerning Aliens, is against the article of the Constitution which provides, that 'the judicial power of the United States shall be vested in Courts, the Judges of which shall hold their offices during good behaviour,' and that the said act is void for that reason also; and it is further to be noted, that this transfer of Judiciary powers is to that magistrate of the General Government who already possesses all the Executive, and a qualified negative in all the Legislative power.

VII. Resolved, that the construction applied by the General Government (as is evinced by sundry of their proceedings) to those parts of the Constitution of the United States which delegate to Congress a power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises; to pay the debts, and provide for the common defence, and general welfare of the United States, and to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the powers vested by the Constitution in the Government of the United States, or any department thereof, goes to the destruction of all the limits prescribed to their power by the Constitution—That words meant by that instrument to be subsidiary only to the execution of the limited powers, ought not to be so construed as themselves to give unlimited powers, nor a part so to be taken, as to destroy the whole residue of the instrument: That the proceedings of the General Government under colour of these articles, will be a fit and necessary subject for revisal and correction at a time of greater tranquility, while those specified in the preceding resolutions call for immediate redress.

VIII. Resolved, that the preceding Resolutions be transmitted to the Senators and Representatives in Congress from this Commonwealth, who are hereby enjoined to present the same to their respective Houses, and to use the best endeavours to procure at the next session of Congress, a repeal of the aforesaid unconstitutional and obnoxious acts.

{3321}

IX. Resolved lastly, that the Governor of this Commonwealth be, and is hereby authorised and requested to communicate the preceding Resolutions to the Legislatures of the several States, to assure them that this Commonwealth considers Union for specified National purposes, and particularly for those specified in their late Federal compact, to be friendly to the peace, happiness, and prosperity of all the states: that faithful to that compact, according to the plain intent and meaning in which it was understood and acceded to by the several parties, it is sincerely anxious for its preservation: that it does also believe, that to take from the states all the powers of self government, and transfer them to a general and consolidated Government, without regard to the special delegations and reservations solemnly agreed to in that compact, is not for the peace, happiness, or prosperity of these states: And that therefore, this Commonwealth is determined, as it doubts not its Co-states are, tamely to submit to undelegated and consequently unlimited powers in no man or body of men on earth: that if the acts before specified should stand, these conclusions would flow from them; that the General Government may place any act they think proper on the list of crimes and punish it themselves, whether enumerated or not enumerated by the Constitution as cognizable by them: that they may transfer its cognizance to the President or any other person, who may himself be the accuser, counsel, judge, and jury, whose suspicions may be the evidence, his order the sentence, his officer the executioner, and his breast the sole record of the transaction: that a very numerous and valuable description of the inhabitants of these states, being by this precedent reduced as outlaws to the absolute dominion of one man and the barrier of the Constitution thus swept away from us all, no rampart now remains against the passions and the power of a majority of Congress, to protect from a like exportation or other more grievous punishment the minority of the same body, the Legislatures, Judges, Governors, and Counsellors of the states, nor their other peaceable inhabitants who may venture to reclaim the constitutional rights and liberties of the states and people, or who for other causes, good or bad, may be obnoxious to the views or marked by the suspicions of the President, or be thought dangerous to his or their elections or other interests public or personal: that the friendless alien has indeed been selected as the safest subject of a first experiment: but the citizen will soon follow, or rather has already followed; for already has a Sedition Act marked him as its prey: that these and successive acts of the same character, unless arrested on the threshold, may tend to drive these states into revolution and blood, and will furnish new calumnies against Republican Governments, and new pretexts for those who wish it to be believed that man cannot be governed but by a rod of iron: that it would be a dangerous delusion were a confidence in the men of our choice to silence our fears for the safety of our rights: that confidence is everywhere the parent of despotism: free government is founded in jealousy and not in confidence; it is jealousy and not confidence which prescribes limited Constitutions to bind down those whom we are obliged to trust with power: that our Constitution has accordingly fixed the limits to which and no further our confidence may go; and let the honest advocate of confidence read the Alien and Sedition Acts, and say if the Constitution has not been wise in fixing limits to the Government it created, and whether we should be wise in destroying those limits? Let him say what the Government is if it be not a tyranny, which the men of our choice have conferred on the President, and the President of our choice has assented to and accepted over the friendly strangers, to whom the mild spirit of our Country and its laws had pledged hospitality and protection: that the men of our choice have more respected the bare suspicions of the President than the solid rights of innocence, the claims of justification, the sacred force of truth, and the forms and subsistence of law and justice. In questions of power then let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution. That this Commonwealth does therefore call on its Co-states for an expression of their sentiments on the acts concerning Aliens, and for the punishment of certain crimes hereinbefore specified, plainly declaring whether these acts are or are not authorized by the Federal Compact? And it doubts not that their sense will be so announced as to prove their attachment unaltered to limited Government, whether general or particular, and that the rights and liberties of their Co-states will be exposed to no dangers by remaining embarked on a common bottom with their own: That they will concur with this Commonwealth, in considering the said acts so palpably against the Constitution as to amount to an undisguised declaration, that the compact is not meant to be the measure of the powers of the General Government, but that it will proceed in the exercise over these states of all powers whatsoever: That they will view this as seizing the rights of the states and consolidating them in the hands of the General Government with a power assumed to bind the states (not merely in cases made federal) but in all cases whatsoever, by laws made, not with their consent, but by others against their consent: That this would be to surrender the form of Government we have chosen, and to live under one deriving its powers from its own will, and not from our authority; and that the Co-states recurring to their natural right in cases not made federal, will concur in declaring these acts void and of no force, and will each unite with this Commonwealth in requesting their repeal at the next session of Congress."

In the month following this declaration from Kentucky, on the 21st of December, Virginia affirmed substantially the same threatening doctrine, more temperately and cautiously set forth in resolutions drawn by Madison as follows:

"Resolved, that the General Assembly of Virginia doth unequivocally express a firm resolution to maintain and defend the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of this state against every aggression, either foreign or domestic, and that they will support the government of the United States in all measures warranted by the former.

That this Assembly most solemnly declares a warm attachment to the union of the states, to maintain which, it pledges all its powers; and that for this end it is their duty to watch over and oppose every infraction of those principles which constitute the only basis of that union, because a faithful observance of them can alone secure its existence, and the public happiness.

{3322}

That this Assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare that it views the powers of the Federal Government, as resulting from the compact, to which the states are parties; as limited by the plain sense and intention of the instrument constituting that compact; as no farther valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact, and that in case of a deliberate, palpable and dangerous exercise of other powers not granted by the said compact, the states who are parties thereto have the right, and are in duty bound to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits, the authorities, rights and liberties appertaining to them.

That the General Assembly doth also express its deep regret that a spirit has in sundry instances, been manifested by the Federal Government, to enlarge its powers by forced constructions of the constitutional charter which defines them; and that indications have appeared of a design to expound certain general phrases (which having been copied from the very limited grant of powers in the former articles of confederation were the less liable to be misconstrued), so as to destroy the meaning and effect of the particular enumeration, which necessarily explains and limits the general phrases; and so as to consolidate the states by degrees into one sovereignty, the obvious tendency and inevitable consequence of which would be to transform the present republican system of the United States into an absolute, or at best a mixed monarchy. That the General Assembly doth particularly protest against the palpable and alarming infractions of the Constitution, in the two late cases of the 'Alien and Sedition Acts,' passed at the last session of Congress, the first of which exercises a power nowhere delegated to the Federal Government; and which by uniting legislative and judicial powers to those of executive, subverts the general principles of free government, as well as the particular organization and positive provisions of the federal constitution: and the other of which acts, exercises in like manner a power not delegated by the constitution, but on the contrary expressly and positively forbidden by one of the amendments thereto; a power which more than any other ought to produce universal alarm, because it is levelled against the right of freely examining public characters and measures, and of free communication among the people thereon, which has ever been justly deemed the only effectual guardian of every other right.

That this state having by its convention which ratified the federal constitution, expressly declared, 'that among other essential rights, the liberty of conscience and of the press cannot be cancelled, abridged, restrained or modified by any authority of the United States,' and from its extreme anxiety to guard these rights from every possible attack of sophistry or ambition, having with other states recommended an amendment for that purpose, which amendment was in due time annexed to the constitution, it would mark a reproachful inconsistency and criminal degeneracy, if an indifference were now shown to the most palpable violation of one of the rights thus declared and secured, and to the establishment of a precedent which may be fatal to the other.

That the good people of this commonwealth having ever felt and continuing to feel the most sincere affection to their brethren of the other states, the truest anxiety for establishing and perpetuating the union of all, and the most scrupulous fidelity to that constitution which is the pledge of mutual friendship, and the instrument of mutual happiness: The General Assembly doth solemnly appeal to the like dispositions of the other states, in confidence that they will concur with this commonwealth in declaring, as it does hereby declare, that the acts aforesaid are unconstitutional, and that the necessary and proper measures will be taken by each for cooperating with this state, in maintaining unimpaired the authorities, rights, and liberties, reserved to the states respectively, or to the people. That the Governor be desired to transmit a copy of the foregoing resolutions to the executive authority of each of the other states, with a request, that the same may be communicated to the legislature thereof.

And that a copy be furnished to each of the Senators and Representatives, representing this state in the Congress of the United States."

In later years, after Calhoun and his school had pushed these doctrines to their logical conclusion, Madison shrank from the result, and endeavored to disown the apparent meaning of what Jefferson had written and he had seemed to endorse in 1798. He denounced Nullification and Secession as "twin heresies," and denied that they were contained or implied in the resolutions of 1798—either those adopted in Kentucky or the responsive ones written by himself for the legislature of Virginia. The Kentucky Resolutions of 1798 were followed in 1799 by another series, in which the right of a sovereign State to nullify obnoxious laws of the Federal Government was no longer asserted by implication, but was put into plain terms—as follows: "That the principle and construction, contended for by sundry of the state legislatures, that the general government is the exclusive judge of the extent of the powers delegated to it, stop not short of despotism,—since the discretion of those who administer the government, and not the Constitution, would be the measure of their powers: That the several states who formed that instrument, being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of the infraction; and, That a nullification, by those sovereignties, of all unauthorized acts done under color of that instrument, is the rightful remedy." It was Mr. Madison's desire to cast on these resolutions of 1799, with which Jefferson had nothing to do, the odium of the nullification doctrine, and to remove the stigma from the resolutions of 1798, in which the word "nullification" makes no appearance; "neither that," pleaded Madison, "nor any equivalent term." But, when Madison made this plea, in 1830, "it was not then generally known, whether Mr. Madison knew it or not, that one of the resolutions and part of another which Jefferson wrote to be offered in the Kentucky legislature in 1798 were omitted by Mr. Nicholas [to whom Mr. Jefferson had entrusted them], and that therein was the assertion … 'where powers are assumed which have not been delegated, a nullification of the act is the rightful remedy.' {3323} The next year, when additional resolutions were offered by Mr. Breckenridge, this idea in similar, though not in precisely the same language, was presented [as quoted above]. … In 1832, this fact, on the authority of Jefferson's grandson and executor, was made public; and further, that another declaration of Mr. Jefferson's in the resolution not used was an exhortation to the co-States, 'that each will take measures of its own for providing that neither these acts nor any others of the general government, not plainly and intentionally authorized by the Constitution, shall be exercised within their respective territories.'"

S. H. Gay, James Madison, chapter 15.

"The publication of the Kentucky resolutions … was instantly followed by a new crop of remonstrances and petitions from the people. … Memorials by scores came in from each State, and the signatures appended to some were as many as sixteen hundred. Those from Pennsylvania alone bore over eighteen thousand names. … Such memorials as reached the House were sent to a committee, who, late in February, reported. … The report closed with three resolutions, and these were: that it was not in the interest of the public good to repeal either the Alien Law, or the Sedition Law, or any of the laws respecting the army, the navy, or the revenue of the United States. On the twenty-fifth of February, the House being in Committee of the Whole, the three resolutions were taken up one by one. Gallatin spoke long and well against the first; but it was carried. Mr. Nicholas spoke at greater length against agree·ing to the second. But the Federalists had made up their minds to accept the report, and, as Nicholas went on, treated him with great disrespect. They assembled in groups about the House, laughed, coughed, and talked at the top of their voices; nor would the Speaker command order in the room. When Nicholas finished, shouts of 'Question! Question!' rose from all sides. A member from North Carolina hoped the question would not be taken. The hour was late. Other members had something to say. An hour or two on the morrow might well be spent in discussion. He moved the committee should rise. … The motion to rise was lost, the question on the second resolution was carried, the question on the third resolution was carried, then the committee rose. The House then agreed to the action of the committee on each of the three resolutions. The Federal party was now at the height of its prosperity and power. It controlled the Senate. It controlled the House. Outwardly it was great and powerful, but within that dispute had begun which, in a few short months, drove Pickering and M'Henry from the Cabinet, split the party in twain, and gave to the country the strange spectacle of staunch and earnest Federalists wrangling and contending and overwhelming each other with abuse."

J. B. McMaster, A History of the United States, chapter 11 (volume 2).

ALSO IN: H. S. Randall, Life of Jefferson, volume 2, chapter 8.

J. Madison, Works, volume 4, pages 95-110, and 506-555.

T. Jefferson, Works, volume 7, page 229; and volume 9, pages 464-471.

H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, page 148.

J. T. Morse, Life of Hamilton, volume 2, chapter 6.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1800. The convention with France and the French Spoliation Claims incident to it.

"In the instructions to the American envoys in France they had been directed to secure a claims commission, the abrogation of the former treaties, and the abolition of the guarantee of 1778, as it was called, contained in Article XI. of the Treaty of Alliance of that year, and covering 'the present possessions of the Crown of France in America, as well as those which it may acquire by the future treaty of peace.' Upon none of these points were the envoys able to carry out their instructions. In reference to claims, a distinction, which was finally embodied in the treaty, was drawn by the French government between two classes of claims: first, debts due from the French government to American citizens for supplies furnished, or prizes whose restoration had been decreed by the courts; and secondly, indemnities for prizes alleged to have been wrongfully condemned. The treaty provided that the first class, known as debts, should be paid, but excluded the second, or indemnity class. In reference to the indemnity claims, and to the questions involved in the old treaties, including, of course, the guarantee of 1778, as the envoys were not able to come to an agreement, the treaty declared that the negotiation was postponed. The Senate of the United States expunged this latter article, inserting in its place a clause providing for the duration of the present convention; and this amendment was accepted by the French government, with the proviso that both governments should renounce the pretensions which were the object of the original article. To this the Senate also agreed, and upon this basis the convention was finally ratified. It thus appears that the United States surrendered the claims of its citizens against France for wrongful seizures, in return for the surrender by France of whatever claim it might have had against the United States for the latter's failure to fulfil the obligations assumed in the earlier treaties [especially the guaranty of the possessions of France in America, which was undertaken in the treaty of 1778]. The United States, therefore, having received a consideration for its refusal to prosecute the claims of its citizens, thereby took the place, with respect to the claimants, of the French government, and virtually assumed the obligations of the latter. … The claims for indemnity thus devolving upon the United States, known as the French Spoliation Claims, have been from that day to this the subject of frequent report and discussion in Congress, but with no result until the passage of the act of January 20, 1885, referring them to the Court of Claims. At the present time (1888) they are undergoing judicial examination before that tribunal."

J. R. Soley, The Wars of the United States, 1789-1850 (Narrative and Critical History of America, volume 7, chapter 6; and editor's foot-note).

ALSO IN: F. Wharton, Digest of the International Law of the United States, section 248 (volume 2, pages 714-728).

D. Webster, Works, volume 4, pages 152-178.

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 1, chapters 117-120.

W. H. Seward, Works, volume 1, pages 132-155.

_Report of Secretary of State (United States Senate, Ex. Doc. no. 74 and 102, 49th Congress 1st session)._

Spoliations committed by the French in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars subsequently to the year 1800, were indemnified under the provisions of the treaty for the Louisiana purchase (see LOUISIANA: A. D. 1798-1803); under the treaty with Spain in 1819, and under a later treaty with France which was negotiated in Andrew Jackson's most imperative manner in 1831. These do not enter into what have become historically specialized as the French Spoliation Claims.

{3324}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1800. The Second Census.

Total population, 5,305,937, (an increase of slightly more than 35 per cent. since 1790), classed and distributed as follows:

North.

White. Free black. Slave. Connecticut. 244,721 5,330 951 Indiana. 4,577 163 135 Maine. 150,901 818 0 Massachusetts. 416,793 6,452 0 New Hampshire. 182,898 856 8 New Jersey. 195,125 4,402 12,422 New York. 556,039 10,374 20,343 Ohio. 45,028 337 0 Pennsylvania. 586,094 14,561 1,706 Rhode Island. 65,437 3,304 381 Vermont. 153,908 557 0 --- --- --- Total 2,601,521 47,154 35,946

South.

White. Free black. Slave. Delaware. 49,852 8,268 6,153 District of Columbia. 10,066 783 3,244 Georgia. 101,678 1,019 59,404 Kentucky. 179,871 741 40,343 Maryland. 216,326 19,587 105,635 Mississippi. 5,179 182 3,489 North Carolina. 337,764 7,043 133,296 South Carolina. 196,255 3,185 146,151 Tennessee. 91,709 309 13,584 Virginia. 514,280 20,124 345,796 --- --- --- Total 1,702,980 61,241 857,095

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1800-1801. The Fourth Presidential Election Inauguration of Jefferson.

"Adams, whom Dr. Franklin aptly described as 'always an honest man, often a wise one, but sometimes and in some things absolutely out of his senses,' was approaching the end of his term as President, and public attention was absorbed in the task of choosing a successor. … At the time of Adams's election, a sectional feeling, destined in the future to work so much evil, had already been developed; and he in consequence received from States south of the Potomac but two electoral votes. New York had given him her twelve, yet the entire majority over his competitor was but three in all the colleges. The national parties were not unequally matched in the State; and it was evident that, could its vote be diverted to Jefferson in the next contest, his victory would be assured. Hence, strenuous efforts were made to accomplish this end, and for months society was like a seething caldron. The trouble with France had, for the moment, swelled the numbers of the Federalists, and closed up their ranks; but the capricious course of the President, and the violent disruption of the cabinet, rent them asunder, never to be re-united. … During the French excitement, it seemed almost certain that, after the local election, they would have a majority in the new Legislature, and thus retain for their candidate the electoral vote of New York. This pleasing prospect was soon obscured. When its people found Mr. Adams sternly enforcing the Sedition Law, and exercising the power it conferred in an unfeeling manner upon one of their most esteemed citizens [Judge Peck], they turned with disgust from a party which they held responsible for its enactment, as well as for this violent procedure. The permanent ascendency which the Republicans seemed to have acquired in the metropolis had been wrested from them, in the spring of 1799, by the unpopularity of a scheme of Burr's, already conspicuous in the State as an unscrupulous political tactician. He had been a member of the assembly the preceding year, and, under the pretence of supplying pure and wholesome water, obtained a charter which enabled the corporators to engage in banking. In consequence of the feeling this aroused, he did not dare present himself again as a candidate, but, with great tact and unwearied efforts, succeeded in healing divisions in his party, and nominating a delegation for the assembly, which embraced the Republicans most eminent for wealth, station, or family influence. Governor Clinton headed the list. … The result followed which Burr had anticipated. The Federal majority of the last year was overcome, and New York City secured by the Republicans, giving them control of the State. Adams subsequently received but four electoral votes south of Maryland, and Jefferson became his successor. Burr, to whose untiring exertions this great victory was due, was thereby inducted into the office of Vice-President. At that time, the Legislature appointed the electors for the State; and the Republicans, then anticipating a defeat, had at a previous session advocated that, for the future, these should be chosen directly by the people in separate districts, hoping thus to secure a sufficient number to elect their Presidential candidate. The Federalists, thinking their supremacy in the assembly assured, refused to support the plan. Now, however, when it became known that their adversaries had gained a majority in the Legislature on which would devolve the duty of choosing the electors, Hamilton addressed a letter to Governor Jay, suggesting that the present body, whose term would not expire before July, should be again convened, in order to pass a measure which, when before proposed by the Republicans, had been denounced as unconstitutional. Jay had too much regard for principle to entertain the idea. After his death, the letter was found among his papers, endorsed, 'Proposing a measure for party purposes which I think it would not become me to adopt.' It is related that a noted French duellist, when required to forgive his enemies before receiving absolution, exclaimed, My enemies? I have none. I have killed them all! Mr. Jefferson might have responded in the same manner, the morrow after the Presidential election. To the one party, the result seemed like the breaking up of an ice gorge—the harbinger of spring. To the other it appeared as an avalanche of French principles, destructive alike of religion and established government. Both were at fault. President Jefferson was quite as unable to destroy the work of his predecessors as he was to depart from their policy of neutrality. The Sedition and Alien Laws soon expired by limitation; but the great measures of the former administrations were too wise, and had struck their roots too deep into the national sentiment, to be suddenly overturned."

W. Whitelock, Life and Times of John Jay, chapter 22.

{3325}

In the Electoral College, Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr, both Democratic Republicans, received an equal number of votes (73), and the election was carried into the House of Representatives, where Jefferson was chosen President and Burr Vice President. "Adams, stung to the heart by the election of Jefferson, refused to witness the hateful spectacle of his successor's inauguration. He spent his last hours in filling up vacancies to place patronage out of Jefferson's reach; then he departed, the old order in his person giving place with a frown and a shudder to the new. Adams did not hate monarchy, he thought that for England it was good. In the eyes of Jefferson monarchy was the incarnate spirit of evil and to rid mankind of it by example was the mission of the American Republic. Every vestige of the half monarchical state which Washington had retained was now banished from the President's mansion and life. No more coaches-and-six, no more court dress, no more levees. Although Jefferson did not, as legend says, ride to his inauguration and tie his horse to the fence, he was inaugurated with as little ceremony as possible. He received an ambassador in slippers down at the heel, and in the arrangement of his dinner parties was so defiant of the rules of etiquette as to breed trouble in the diplomatic circle. Yet with all his outward simplicity the Virginian magnate and man of letters, though he might be a Republican, could not in himself be a true embodiment of democracy. He was the friend of the people, but not one of them. … The desired day had come when the philosopher was to govern. The words of the address which Jefferson, unlike the demagogic sons of thunder in the present day, read in a very low voice, are the expression by its great master and archetype of the republican idea which has hitherto reigned supreme in the mind of the American people. These words are monumental, 'Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies, the preservation of the general government in its whole constitutional vigour, as the sheet-anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the People; a mild and safe correction of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which there is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first movements in war, till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labour may be lightly burdened; the honest payment of our debts, and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid, the diffusion of information, and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of public reason; freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the "habeas corpus," and trial by jurors impartially selected;—these principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation.' Jefferson's wand was the pen. Yet he is strangely apt to fall into mixed metaphors and even into platitudes. This address has not escaped criticism."

Goldwin Smith, The United States, chapter 3.

"Jefferson had reached the presidential chair at a most fortunate moment. … The prospect of a speedy peace in Europe promised effectual and permanent relief from those serious embarrassments to which, during war on the ocean, American commerce was ever exposed from the aggressions of one or of all the belligerents. The treasury was fuller, the revenue more abundant than at any previous period. Commerce was flourishing, and the pecuniary prosperity of the country very great. All the responsibility of framing institutions, laying taxes, find providing for debts, had fallen on the ousted administration. Succeeding to the powers and the means of the Federal government without sharing any of the unpopularity at the expense of which they had been attained, and ambitious not so much of a splendid as of a quiet and popular administration, the new president seemed to have before him a very plain and easy path. … To the offices of Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, and Attorney General, left vacant by the resignation of the late incumbents, Jefferson nominated James Madison, Henry Dearborn, and Levi Lincoln, the latter an early leader of the opposition in Massachusetts. … As the Senate stood at present, still containing, as it did, of the members present a majority of Federalists, Jefferson did not think proper to make any further nominations; but, soon after the adjournment, he appointed as Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin, all along the financial member of the opposition. … The Navy Department, after being refused by Chancellor Livingston, was given to Robert Smith, brother of the Baltimore member of Congress. Livingston, however, having reached the age of sixty, and being obliged, under a Constitutional provision, to vacate the chancellorship of New York, consented to accept the embassy to France. … Habersham was continued as post-master-general for some six months, … but he presently gave way to Gideon Granger, a leader of the Connecticut Republicans."

R. Hildreth, History of the United States, 2d series, chapter 16 (volume 2, or volume 5 of whole work).

"The first act of the new Cabinet was to reach a general understanding in regard to the objects of the Administration. These appear to have been two only in number: reduction of debt and reduction of taxes, and the relation to be preserved between them."

H. Adams, Life of Albert Gallatin, page 276.

"Under President Jefferson, the heads of the great departments of the government were changed, nor was there any just reason to complain of this measure; as they formed a part of his political council; and, as the chief executive officer of government, he had a perfect right to select his confidential friends and advisers. But when afterwards, and within a few months, he removed able and upright men from offices of a subordinate grade, his conduct was considered improper and arbitrary, and as partaking somewhat of the 'right of prerogative,' usually claimed and exercised by royal princes. … In his inaugural address, Mr. Jefferson said, 'We have gained little, if we encourage a political intolerance as wicked as impolitic. We are all brethren of the same principles; we are all republicans, and all federalists.' {3326} Yet in less than fifty days he removed fourteen federal officers; without any allegation of unfaithfulness or inefficiency: on the plea, indeed, that his predecessor had removed two public officers on account of their political opinions; and had appointed none to office in the government but such as were of the same sentiments and views as the administration. 'Few died, and none resigned,' he said; and therefore, to equalize public offices between the two great political parties, it was necessary, in his opinion, to remove a part of those then employed, and to appoint others more friendly to the new administration. For a very few of the removals there might have been sufficient or justifiable reasons offered; but in most instances the changes were made merely for political opinions."

A. Bradford, History of the Federal Government, 1789-1839, chapter 6.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1801. Appointment of John Marshall to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. His Constitutional decisions.

On the 31st of January, 1801, near the close of the term of President Adams, the latter appointed John Marshall, who had been Secretary of State in his cabinet since the previous May, to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. It was a memorable appointment,—the most memorable, perhaps, that has ever been made by official and not popular selection, in America, since Washington was appointed to the command of the continental army. Its result was to place the new, uninterpreted, plastic Constitution of the Federal Republic under the hands of a master, during thirty-four years of the period in which it hardened into practical, determined law. It decided the character of the Constitution, and by that decision the great instrument was made a bond of nationality, firm, strenuous and enduring. "The abilities of the new Chief Justice were recognized by the profession and the public at the time of his appointment, but the attractive qualities of his heart and his kindly manners soon caused respect and reverence to ripen into affection. Perhaps no American citizen except Washington ever conciliated so large a measure of popularity and public esteem. … In surveying the results of the labors of thirty-four years recorded in thirty-two volumes of reports, it is obvious that it was in the decision of cases involving international and constitutional law that the force and clearness of the Chief Justice's intellect shone most conspicuous. Such was the ready assent of his colleagues on the bench to his supremacy in the exposition of constitutional law, that in such causes a dissenting opinion was almost unknown. Having had occasion to discuss and thoroughly study the Constitution, both in the Virginia convention which adopted it and afterward in the legislature, he had preconceived opinions concerning it, as well as perfect familiarity with it. But in the hot contest waging between the friends of a strict and those of a liberal construction of its language, he wished to take no part. He stated that there should be neither a liberal nor a strict construction, but that the simple, natural, and usual meaning of its words and phrases should govern their interpretation. In the case of Gibbons v. Ogden, in which he is called upon to define the true rule of construction of the United States Constitution regarding the rights of the States and the rights and powers of the general government, he studiously avoids each extreme, steering safely in the middle course. He lays down his own rule thus clearly and definitely:—'This instrument contains an enumeration of powers expressly granted by the people to their government. It has been said that these powers ought to be construed strictly; but why ought they to be so construed? Is there one sentence in the Constitution which gives countenance to this rule? In the last of the enumerated powers, that which grants expressly the means for carrying all others into execution, Congress is authorized to make all laws that shall be necessary and proper for the purpose. But this limitation on the means which may be used is not extended to the powers which are conferred, nor is there one sentence in the Constitution which has been pointed out by the gentlemen of the bar, or which we have been able to discern, that prescribes this rule. We do not therefore think ourselves justified in adopting it. If they contend only against that enlarged construction which would extend words beyond their natural and obvious import, we might question the application of the term but should not controvert the principle. If they contend for that narrow construction which, in support of some theory not to be found in the Constitution, would deny to the government those powers which the words of the grant, as usually understood, import, and which are consistent with the general views and objects of the instrument; for that narrow construction which would cripple the government, and render it unequal to the objects for which it is declared to be instituted, and to which the powers given, as fairly understood, render it competent; then we cannot perceive the propriety of this strict construction, nor adopt it as a rule by which the Constitution is to be expounded.' … Marshall's dictum that there must be neither a strict nor a liberal construction of the Constitution, but that the natural meaning of the words must govern, was undoubtedly sound and wise. The broad proposition was above criticism; it meant only that the language of the instrument should not be stretched or wrenched in any direction; and however politicians or even statesmen might feel, there was no other possible ground for a judge to take. Jefferson might regard it as a duty to make the Constitution as narrow and restricted as possible; Hamilton might feel that there was an actual obligation upon him to make it as broad and comprehensive as its words would admit. But Jefferson and Hamilton, in a different department of public life from Marshall, had duties and obligations correspondingly different from his. They might properly try to make the Constitution mean what it seemed to them for the public welfare that it should mean. Marshall could not consider any such matter; he had only to find and declare what it did mean, what its words actually and properly declared, not what they might possibly or desirably be supposed or construed to declare. This was the real force and the only real force of his foregoing assertion. As an abstract statement of his function it was impregnable. But, as with most broad principles, the difficulty lay in the application of it to particular cases. The constitutional questions which came before Marshall chiefly took the form of whether or not the Constitution conferred some power or authority upon Congress, or upon the Executive. Then the Federalist lawyers tried to show how much the language could mean, and the anti-Federalist counsel sought to show how little it could mean, and each urged that public policy was upon his side. {3327} The decision must be yes or no; the authority did or did not rest in the government. It was easy to talk about the natural and proper meaning of the words; but after all it was the question at issue; did they (not could they) say yes, or did they (not could they) say no, to the special authority sought to be exercised. Now it is one thing to be impartial and another to be colorless in mind. Judge Marshall was impartial and strongly possessed of the judicial instinct or faculty. But he was by no means colorless. He could no more eliminate from his mind an interest in public affairs, and opinions as to the preferable forms of government and methods of administration, than he could cut out and cast away his mind itself. Believing that the Constitution intended to create and did create a national government, and having decided notions as to what such a government must be able to do, he was subject to a powerful though insensible influence to find the existence of the required abilities in the government. … The great majority of his decisions were in accordance with Federalist principles of construction and of policy. The Republicans all denounced him as a Federalist, even of an extreme type."

A. B. Magruder, John Marshall, chapter 10.

ALSO IN: H. Flanders, Lives and Times of the Chief Justices of the Supreme Court, volume 2.

_J. Story, John Marshall (North American Review, volume 26)._

[Image: The United States in 1860.]

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1801. First American naval demonstration against the Barbary Pirates.

See BARBARY STATES: A. D. 1785-1801.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1802. Admission of Ohio to the Union.

See NORTHWEST TERRITORY: A. D. 1788-1802.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1802-1804. Land cessions of Georgia annexed to Mississippi Territory.

See MISSISSIPPI: A. D. 1798-1804.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803. The Louisiana Purchase. Its constitutional and political aspects.

"The Mississippi question, which had played so important a part in the times of the confederation, had arisen again and demanded a solution, as Spain had, on the 1st of October, 1800, ceded the whole of Louisiana to France. The United States had had experience enough already of how dangerous and how great an obstacle in the way of the commercial development of the country it might become, if the mouth of the Mississippi were in the possession of a foreign power, even if it were no stronger than Spain. Jefferson had not shared in this experience in vain. This was one of the instances in which he gave evidence of a really statesmanlike insight. He wrote on the 18th of April, 1802, to his embassador Livingston in Paris: This cession 'completely reverses all the political relations of the United States, and will form a new epoch in our political course. … There is on the globe one single spot, the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy.' Livingston was instructed to enter into negotiations immediately for the cession of New Orleans and the Floridas, in case France should consider the possession of Louisiana indispensably necessary. As Bonaparte at this very time entertained the idea of resuming the old French colonial policy, the negotiations remained long without result. The uprising of the negroes in San Domingo and the warlike turn which the affairs of Europe began again to assume, disposed him more favorably towards the American offer. On the 30th of April, 1803, the treaty, ceding the whole of Louisiana to the United States for $15,000,000, was concluded in Paris.

See LOUISIANA: A. D. 1798-1803.

Hamilton shared Jefferson's view, that the purchase of Louisiana was a question of the greatest, and even of vital, importance for the Union. His opposition on other occasions to the policy of the administration, and his personal enmity to the president, did not prevent his lending him a helping hand in this matter when an opportunity offered. The great majority of the Federalists opposed this increase of the territory of the Union with as much decision as Hamilton advocated it. They showed in their attitude towards this question a short-sightedness which would have been astonishing even among the doctrinarians of the opposite party."

H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, pages 183-185.

"Mr. Jefferson belonged to the school of strict construction, and was in fact its leader and apostle. … Under a construction of the Constitution as strict as he had been insisting upon, it was plain that the government would have no power to acquire foreign territory by purchase, and that any attempt in that direction would be usurpation. … To give the necessary authority an amendment of the Constitution would be essential, and amendment would be a slow process which might not be accomplished in time to meet the emergency. The case would be complicated by the fact that if the territory was acquired a considerable population would be brought into the Union and thus made citizens by a process of naturalization not contemplated by the Constitution. Mr. Madison, the Secretary of State, agreed with the President in his views. To use Mr. Jefferson's words, "The Constitution has made no provision for our holding foreign territory; still less for incorporating foreign nations into our Union.' But under circumstances so imperative he thought the political departments of the government should meet the emergency by consummating the purchase, and 'then appeal to the nation for an additional article in the Constitution approving and confirming an act which the nation had not previously authorized.' He did not conceal from himself, however, that in so doing ground would be occupied which it would be difficult to defend, and he proceeds to say: 'The less that is said about any constitutional difficulty the better. Congress should do what is necessary in silence. I find but one opinion as to the necessity of shutting up the Constitution for some time.' Mr. John Quincy Adams held similar views. … But it is difficult to conceive of any doctrine more dangerous or more distinctly antagonistic to the fundamental ideas of the American Union than the doctrine that the Constitution may be 'shut up' for a time in order that the government may accomplish something not warranted by it. The political immorality was obvious and glaring; more so in the case of the apostle of strict construction than it could have been if advanced by any other statesman of the day. … But Mr. Jefferson's political mistake was scarcely greater than that committed by his opponents: and, indeed, from a party standpoint it was no mistake whatsoever, but a bold measure of wise policy.

{3328}

… The purchase, according to the Federal view of the Constitution, was perfectly legitimate. … But the Federalists in general took narrow and partisan views, and in order to embarrass the administration resorted to quibbles which were altogether unworthy the party which had boasted of Washington as its chief and Hamilton as the exponent of its doctrines. … The Federal leaders did not stop at cavils; they insisted that the unconstitutional extension of territory was in effect a dissolution of the Union, so that they were at liberty to contemplate and plan for a final disruption."

_Judge T. M. Cooley, The Acquisition of Louisiana (Indiana Historical Society Pamphlets, number 3)._

The result of the debates on the Louisiana treaty, in the Senate and the House, "decided only one point. Every speaker, without distinction of party, agreed that the United States government had the power to acquire new territory either by conquest or by treaty; the only difference of opinion regarded the disposition of this territory after it was acquired. Did Louisiana belong to the central government at Washington, or to the States? … Whether the government at Washington could possess Louisiana as a colony or admit it as a State, was a difference of no great matter if the cession were to hold good; the essential point was that for the first time in the national history all parties agreed in admitting that the government could govern. … Even in 1804 the political consequences of the act were already too striking to be overlooked. Within three years of his inauguration Jefferson bought a foreign colony without its consent and against its will, annexed it to the United States by an act which he said made blank paper of the Constitution; and then he who had found his predecessors too monarchical, and the Constitution too liberal in powers,—he who had nearly dissolved the bonds of society rather than allow his predecessor to order a dangerous alien out of the country in a time of threatened war,—made himself monarch of the new territory, and wielded over it, against its protests, the powers of its old kings. Such an experience was final; no century of slow and half-understood experience could be needed to prove that the hopes of humanity lay thenceforward, not in attempting to restrain the government from doing whatever the majority should think necessary, but in raising the people themselves till they should think nothing necessary but what was good."

H. Adams, History of the United States of America during the first Administration of Jefferson, volume 2, chapters 4-6.

ALSO IN: _Treaties and Conventions between the United States and other Powers (edition of 1889), pages 331-342. _

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803. Report on the British impressment of seamen from American ships.

"In consequence of a resolution of the Senate, calling upon the President for information respecting the violation of the national flag, and the impressment of American seamen, he communicated to that body a letter from the Secretary of State, specifying all the cases of impressment which had come to the knowledge of that Department. The Secretary had no information of the violation of the national flag, except in the recent aggression of Morocco. It appeared, by this report, that 43 citizens of the United States had been impressed by the British, of whom 12 had protections. Ten were natives of the British dominions, and 17 of other countries, none of whom were stated to have been naturalized. Thus a practice which, even within the British dominions, violates the dearest rights of personal liberty, and which their courts have never ventured to justify, and which is excused and acquiesced in on the plea of necessity, was unhesitatingly exercised by British navy officers on board of American vessels."

G. Tucker, History of the United States, chapter 12 (volume 2).

"When the captain of a British frigate overhauled an American merchant-vessel for enemy's property or contraband of war, he sent an officer on board who mustered the crew, and took out any seamen whom he believed to be British. The measure, as the British navy regarded it, was one of self-protection. If the American government could not or would not discourage desertion, the naval commander would recover his men in the only way he could. Thus a circle of grievances was established on each side. … The growth of American shipping stimulated desertions from the British service to the extent of injuring its efficiency; and these desertions in their turn led to a rigorous exercise of the right of impressment. To find some point at which this vicious circle could be broken was a matter of serious consequence to both countries, but most so to the one which avowed that it did not mean to protect its interest by force. Great Britain could have broken the circle by increasing the pay and improving the condition of her seamen; but she was excessively conservative, and the burdens already imposed on her commerce were so great that she could afford to risk nothing. … Conscious of her own power, she thought that the United States should be first to give way. Had the American government been willing to perform its neutral obligations strictly, the circle might have been broken without much trouble; but the United States wished to retain their advantage, and preferred to risk whatever England might do rather than discourage desertion, or enact and enforce a strict naturalization law, or punish fraud, The national government was too weak to compel the States to respect neutral obligations, even if it had been disposed to make the attempt. The practice of impressment brought the two governments to a deadlock on an issue of law. No one denied that every government had the right to command the services of its native subjects, and as yet no one ventured to maintain that a merchant-ship on the high seas could lawfully resist the exercise of this right; but the law had done nothing to define the rights of naturalized subjects or citizens. The British government might, no doubt, impress its own subjects; but almost every British sailor in the American service carried papers of American citizenship, and although some of these were fraudulent, many were genuine. The law of England, as declared from time out of mind by every generation of her judges, held that the allegiance of a subject was indefeasible, and therefore that naturalization was worthless. The law of the United States, as declared by Chief-Justice Ellsworth in 1799, was in effect the same."

H. Adams, History of the United States of America, during the first Administration of Thomas Jefferson, volume 2, chapter 14.

{3329}

"Great Britain was clearly in the wrong. She ought to have kept her seamen by increasing their pay and putting an end to the grievances which produced the mutiny of the Nore. In heartlessly neglecting to render the service just to the common sailor, and at the same time making a brutal use of impressment, aristocratic government showed its dark side. It is true that impressment was conscription in a coarse form, and that the extreme notion of indefeasible allegiance still prevailed. But the practice, however lawful, was intolerable, and its offensiveness was sure to be aggravated by the conduct of British commanders full of the naval pride of their nation and perhaps irritated by the loss of their crews; for it is not denied that many British seamen were seduced from the service and that the American marine, both mercantile and national, was largely manned in this way."

Goldwin Smith, The United States, chapter 3.

See, also, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1809.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803-1804. Federalist Secession movement.

"In the winter … of 1803-4, immediately after, and as a consequence of, the acquisition of Louisiana, certain leaders of the Federal party conceived the project of the dissolution of the Union, and the establishment of a Northern Confederacy. The justifying causes to those who entertained it were, that the annexation of Louisiana to the Union transcended the constitutional powers of the government of the United States; that it created, in fact, a new confederacy, to which the States, united by the former compact, were not bound to adhere; that it was oppressive to the interests and destructive to the influence of the Northern section of the Confederacy, whose right and duty it therefore was to secede from the new body politic, and to constitute one of their own. It was lamented that one inevitable consequence of the annexation of Louisiana to the Union would be to diminish the relative weight and influence of the Northern section; that it would aggravate the evil of the slave representation; and endanger the Union itself, by the expansion of its bulk, and the enfeebling extension of its line of de·fence against foreign invasion. A Northern Confederacy was thought to be the only probable counterpoise to the manufacture of new States in the South. This project was quietly and extensively discussed at the time, by the members of Congress from Massachusetts and Connecticut especially. General Hamilton, indeed, was chosen as the person to be placed, at the proper time, at the head of the military movement which, it was foreseen, would be necessary for carrying the plan into execution. He was consulted on the subject; and although it is quite certain that he was opposed to it, he consented to attend a meeting of Federalists in Boston in the autumn of 1804, but his untimely death, in the summer of that year, prevented the meeting. To whatever proportions, however, the project might otherwise have gone, it was checked by the advantage which was evident to all of the securing of so large a domain, by the great desirableness of preventing France from holding the mouth of our great river, and by the settlement of the question of our national boundaries. These considerations gave a quietus for a time to the suggestions of sectional jealousy."

C. F. Robertson, The Louisiana Purchase in its Influence upon the American System (Papers of the American Historical Association, volume 1), pages 262-263.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804. Fifth Presidential Election.

Thomas Jefferson, Democratic Republican, reelected by the vote of 162 Electors in the College, against 14 voting for Charles C. Pinckney, Federalist. George Clinton was chosen Vice President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1805. Impeachment and trial of Judge Chase.

In the closing hours of the session of Congress which expired March 4, 1803, proceedings of impeachment were begun for the removal from the bench of Judge Pickering, United States District Judge of New Hampshire, who had become mentally incapable of discharging the duties of his office. "By the federalists, the attack on Judge Pickering was taken as the first of a series of impeachments, intended to revolutionize the political character of the courts, but there is nothing to prove that this was then the intent of the majority. The most obnoxious justice on the supreme bench was Samuel Chase of Maryland, whose violence as a political partisan had certainly exposed him to the danger of impeachment; but two years had now passed without producing any sign of an intention to disturb him, and it might be supposed that the administration thus condoned his offences. Unluckily, Judge Chase had not the good taste or the judgment to be quiet. He irritated his enemies by new indiscretions, and on May 13, 1803, nearly three months after Pickering's impeachment, Mr. Jefferson, in a letter to Joseph H. Nicholson, suggested that it would be well to take him in hand:—'You must have heard of the extraordinary charge of Chase to the grand jury at Baltimore. Ought this seditious and official attack on the principles of our Constitution and on the proceedings of a State to go unpunished? And to whom so pointedly as yourself will the public look for the necessary measures? I ask these questions for your consideration. As for myself, it is better that I should not interfere.' … Nicholson seems to have passed on to Randolph the charge he had received from the President. … On January 5, 1804, Randolph rose to move for an inquiry into the conduct of Judge Chase. … After a long debate, the inquiry was ordered, and Randolph, with his friend Nicholson, was put at the head of the committee. On March 26, 1804, they reported seven articles of impeachment. … With this the session ended, and the trial went over to the next year. … The impeachment of Justice Chase is a landmark in American history, because it was here that the Jeffersonian republicans fought their last aggressive battle, and, wavering under the shock of defeat, broke into factions which slowly abandoned the field and forgot their discipline. That such a battle must one day be fought for the control of the Judiciary was from the beginning believed by most republicans who understood their own principles. Without controlling the Judiciary, the people could never govern themselves in their own way; and although they might, over and over again, in every form of law and resolution, both state and national, enact and proclaim that theirs was not a despotic but a restricted government, which had no right to exercise powers not delegated to it, and over which they, as States, had absolute control, it was none the less certain that Chief Justice Marshall and his associates would disregard their will, and would impose upon them his own. The people were at the mercy of their creatures. The Constitutions of England, of Massachusetts, of Pennsylvania, authorized the removal of an obnoxious judge on a mere address of the legislature, but the Constitution of the United States had so fenced and fortified the Supreme Court that the legislature, the Executive, the people themselves, could exercise no control over it. {3330} A judge might make any decision, violate any duty, trample on any right, and if he took care to commit no indictable offence he was safe in office for life. On this license the Constitution imposed only one check: it said that all civil officers should be removed from office 'on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.' This right of impeachment was as yet undefined, and if stretched a little beyond strict construction it might easily be converted into something for which it had not been intended. … Judge Chase's offences were serious. The immediate cause of impeachment, his address to the grand jury at Baltimore on the 2d May, 1803, proved that he was not a proper person to be trusted with the interpretation of the laws. In this address he said that those laws were rapidly destroying all protection to property and all security to personal liberty. 'The late alteration of the federal Judiciary,' said he, 'by the abolition of the office of the sixteen circuit judges, and the recent change in our state Constitution by the establishing of universal suffrage, and the further alteration that is contemplated in our state Judiciary, if adopted, will, in my judgment, take away all security for property and personal liberty. The independence of the national Judiciary is already shaken to its foundations, and the virtue of the people alone can restore it.' That by this reference to the virtue of the people he meant to draw a contrast with the want of virtue in their government was made clear by a pointed insult to Mr. Jefferson: 'The modern doctrines by our late reformers, that all men in a state of society are entitled to enjoy equal liberty and equal rights, have brought this mighty mischief upon us, and I fear that it will rapidly progress until peace and order, freedom and property, shall be destroyed.' … There was gross absurdity in the idea that the people who, by an immense majority, had decided to carry on their government in one way should be forced by one of their own servants to turn about and go in the opposite direction; and the indecorum was greater than the absurdity, for if Judge Chase or any other official held such doctrines, even though he were right, he was bound not to insult officially the people who employed him. On these grounds Mr. Jefferson privately advised the impeachment, and perhaps Randolph might have acted more wisely had he followed Mr. Jefferson's hint to rely on this article alone, which in the end came nearer than any other to securing conviction. … The articles of impeachment which Randolph presented to the House on March 26, 1804, and which were, he claimed, drawn up with his own hand, rested wholly on the theory of Chase's criminality; they contained no suggestion that impeachment was a mere inquest of office. But when Congress met again, and, on December 3, the subject came again before the House, it was noticed that two new articles, the fifth and sixth, had been quietly interpolated, which roused suspicion of a change in Randolph's plan. … No one could doubt that Randolph and his friends, seeing how little their ultimate object would be advanced by a conviction on the old charges, inserted these new articles in order to correct their mistake and to make a foundation for the freer use of impeachment as a political weapon. The behavior of Giles and his friends in the Senate strengthened this suspicion. He made no concealment of his theories, and labored earnestly to prevent the Senate from calling itself a court, or from exercising any functions that belonged to a court of law."

H. Adams, John Randolph, chapters 4-6.

The doctrine of impeachment which Giles (Senator from Virginia) and John Randolph maintained, in connection with the trial of Judge Chase, and which seems to have been acquiesced in by the majority of their party, is reported by John Quincy Adams from a conversation to which he was a listener. In Mr. Adams' Memoirs, under date of December 21, 1804, the incident is related as follows: "There was little business to do [in the Senate], and the adjournment took place early. Sitting by the fireside afterwards, I witnessed a conversation between Mr. Giles and Mr. Israel Smith, on the subject of impeachments; during which Mr. John Randolph came in and took part in the discussion. Giles labored with excessive earnestness to convince Smith of certain principles, upon which not only Mr. Chase, but all the other Judges of the Supreme Court, excepting the one last appointed, must be impeached and removed. He treated with the utmost contempt the idea of an 'independent' judiciary—said there was not a word about such an independence in the Constitution, and that their pretensions to it were nothing more nor less than an attempt to establish an aristocratic despotism in themselves. The power of impeachment was given without limitation to the House of Representatives; the power of trying impeachments was given equally without limitation to the Senate; and if the Judges of the Supreme Court should dare, as they had done, to declare an act of Congress unconstitutional, or to send a mandamus to the Secretary of State, as they had done, it was the undoubted right of the House of Representatives to impeach them, and of the Senate to remove them, for giving such opinions, however honest and sincere they may have been in entertaining them. Impeachment was not a criminal prosecution; it was no prosecution at all. The Senate sitting for the trial of impeachments was not a court, and ought to discard and reject all process of analogy to a court of justice. A trial and removal of a judge upon impeachment need not imply any criminality or corruption in him. Congress had no power over the person, but only over the office. And a removal by impeachment was nothing more than a declaration by Congress to this effect: You hold dangerous opinions, and if you are suffered to carry them into effect you will work the destruction of the nation. We want your offices, for the purpose of giving them to men who will fill them better. In answer to all this, Mr. Smith only contended that honest error of opinion could not, as he conceived, be a subject of impeachment. And in pursuit of this principle he proved clearly enough the persecution and tyranny to which those of Giles and Randolph inevitably lead. It would, he said, establish 'a tyranny over opinions,' and he traced all the arguments of Giles to their only possible issue of rank absurdity. In all this conversation I opened my lips but once, in which I told Giles that I could not assent to his definition of the term impeachment."

J. Q. Adams, Memoirs, edited by C. F. Adams, volume 1, pages 322-323.

{3331}

The trial of Judge Chase was opened on the 9th of February, 1805, and ended on the 23d. By votes ranging from 15 to 34 (the total number of Senators being 34), he was acquitted on each of the charges—a result attributed considerably to the offensive and incapable manner in which the prosecution had been conducted by John Randolph.

J. Schouler, History of the United States, volume 2, page 77.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1805. Expedition of Lewis and Clark across the continent. The first exploration of the Missouri and beyond.

Captain Meriwether Lewis and Captain William Clark "were the first men to cross the continent in our zone, the truly golden zone. A dozen years before them, Mackenzie had crossed in British dominions far north, but settlements are even now sparse in that parallel. Still earlier had Mexicans traversed the narrowing continent from the Gulf to the Pacific, but seemed to find little worth discovery. It was otherwise in the zone penetrated by Lewis and Clark. There development began at once and is now nowhere surpassed. Along their route ten States, with a census in 1890 of eight and a half millions, have arisen in the wilderness. … The credit of our Great Western discovery is due to Jefferson, though he never crossed the Alleghanies. When Columbus saw the Orinoco rushing into the ocean with irrepressible power and volume, he knew that he had anchored at the mouth of a continental river. So Jefferson, ascertaining that the Missouri, though called a branch, at once changed the color and character of the Mississippi, felt sure that whoever followed it would reach the innermost recesses of our America. Learning afterward that Captain Gray had pushed into the mouth of the Columbia only after nine days' breasting its outward current, he deemed that river a worthy counterpart of the Missouri, and was convinced that their headwaters could not be far apart in longitude. Inaugurated in 1801, before his first Presidential term was half over he had obtained, as a sort of secret-service fund, the small sum which sufficed to fit out the expedition. He had also selected Lewis, his private secretary, for its head, and put him in a course of special training. But the actual voyage up the Missouri, purchased April 30, 1803, was not begun till the middle of May, 1804. Forty-five persons in three boats composed the party. … After 171 days the year's advance ended with October, for the river was ready to freeze. The distance up stream they reckoned at 1,600 miles, or little more than 9 miles a day, a journey now made by railroad in forty-four hours. … Winter quarters were thirty miles above the Bismarck of our day. Here they were frozen in about five months. The huts they built and abundant fuel kept them warm. Thanks to their hunters and Indian traffic, food was seldom scarce. Officials of the Hudson's Bay Company (who had a post within a week's journey) and many inquisitive natives paid them visits. From all these it was their tireless endeavor to learn everything possible concerning the great unknown of the river beyond. Scarcely one could tell about distant places from personal observation, but some second-hand reports were afterward proved strangely accurate, even as to the Great Falls, which turned out to be a thousand miles away. It was not long, however, before they learned that the wife of Chaboneau, whom they had taken as a local interpreter, was a captive whose birth had been in the Rocky Mountains. She, named the Bird-woman, was the only person discoverable after a winter's search who could by possibility serve them as interpreter and guide among the unknown tongues and labyrinthine fastnesses which they must encounter. Early in April, 1805, the explorers, now numbering thirty-two, again began to urge their boats up the river, for their last year's labors had brought them no more than half-way to their first objective, its source. No more Indian purveyors or pilots: their own rifles were the sole reliance for food. Many a wigwam, but no Indian, was espied for four months and four days after they left their winter camp. It was through the great Lone Land that they groped their dark and perilous way. In twenty days after the spring start they arrived at the Yellowstone, and in thirty more they first sighted the Rocky Mountains. Making the portage at the Great Falls cost them a month of vexatious delay. Rowing on another month brought them on August 12 to a point where one of the men stood with one foot each side of the rivulet, and 'thanked God that he had lived to bestride the Missouri, heretofore deemed endless.' They dragged their canoes, however, up the rivulet for five days longer. It was 460 days since they had left the mouth of the river, and their mileage on its waters had been 3,096 miles. A mile further they stood on the great divide, and drank of springs which sent their water to the Pacific. But meantime they had been ready to starve in the mountains. Their hunters were of the best, but they found no game: buffaloes had gone down into the lowlands, the birds of heaven had fled, and edible roots were mostly unknown to them. For more than four months they had looked, and lo! there was no man. It was not till August 13 that, surprising a squaw so encumbered with pappooses that she could not escape, and winning her heart by the gift of a looking-glass and painting her cheeks, they formed friendship with her nation, one of whose chiefs proved to be a brother of their Bird-woman. Horses were about all they could obtain of these natives, streams were too full of rapids to be navigable, or no timber fit for canoes was within reach. So the party, subsisting on horse-flesh, and afterwards on dog-meat, toiled on along one of the worst possible routes. Nor was it till the 7th of October that they were able to embark in logs they had burned hollow, upon a branch of the Columbia, which, after manifold portages and perils, bore them to its mouth and the goal of their pilgrimage, late in November. Its distance from the starting-point, according to their estimate, was 4,134 miles. … Many an episode in this eventful transcontinental march and countermarch will hereafter glorify with romantic associations islands, rivers, rocks, cañons, and mountains all along its track. Among these none can be more touching than the story of the Bird-woman, her divination of routes, her courage when men quailed, her reunion with a long-lost brother, her spreading as good a table with bones as others could with meat, her morsel of bread for an invalid benefactor, her presence with her infant attesting to savages that the expedition could not be hostile. But when bounties in land and money were granted to others, she was unthought of. Statues of her, however, must yet be reared by grateful dwellers in lands she laid open for their happy homes. Western poets will liken her to Ariadne and Beatrice."

The Nation, October 26, 1893 (Reviewing Dr. Coues' edition of "History of the Expedition under the Command of Lewis and Clark").

{3332}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1805, Jefferson's Plans of National defense. His Gunboat fleet.

Mr. Jefferson's views as to the measures required for national defense, in the disturbed foreign relations of the country, were indicated in his message to Congress, when it assembled in November, 1804, but were afterwards communicated more fully to Mr. Nicholson, of Maryland, chairman of the committee to which the subject was referred. "Concerning fortifications, he remarks that the plans and estimates of those required for our principal harbours, made fifty millions of dollars necessary for their completion. It would require 2,000 men to garrison them in peace, and 50,000 in war. When thus completed and manned, they would avail but little, as all military men agree that when vessels might pass a fort without tacking, though it may annoy, it cannot prevent them. Two modes of effecting the same object might be 'adopted in aid of each other.' 1. Heavy cannon on travelling carriages, with militia trained to the management of them. 2. Floating batteries or gunboats. There were, he estimated, fifteen harbours in the United States needing and deserving defence. They would require 250 gunboats. The cost of these had been estimated at 2,000 dollars each, but he puts it down at 4,000, amounting in all to 1,000,000 dollars. Such of them as were kept under a shelter, ready to be launched, when wanted, would cost nothing more than an inclosure, or sentinel; those that were afloat, with men enough to take care of them, about 2,000 dollars a year each; and those fully manned for action about 8,000 dollars a year. He thought twenty-five of the second description enough, when France and England were at war. When at war ourselves, some of the third description would be required, the precise number depending on circumstances. There were ten then built and building, and fifteen more it was thought would be sufficient to put every harbour into a respectable state of defence. Congress, neither fulfilling the wishes of the President, nor altogether resisting them, gave the President the means of partially trying his favourite scheme, by the appropriation of 60,000 dollars. The sufficiency of this species of naval defence occasioned a good deal of discussion about this time between the opponents and the supporters of the administration. … The scheme was vehemently assailed by his adversaries in every form of argument and ridicule, and was triumphantly adduced as a further proof that he was not a practical statesman. The officers of the navy were believed to be, with scarcely an exception, opposed to the system of gunboats, especially those who were assigned to this service, partly because it was found to be personally very uncomfortable, and yet more, perhaps, because the power they wielded was so inferior, and their command so insignificant, compared with that to which they had been familiarized. It was like compelling a proud man to give up a fine richly caparisoned charger for a pair of panniers and a donkey. To stem the current of public opinion, which so far as it was manifested, set so strong against these gunboats, and to turn it in their favour, Mr. Jefferson prevailed on Paine, who had since his return been addressing the people of the United States on various topics, through the newspapers, to become their advocate. He set about it with his wonted self-confidence and real talent in enforcing his views, and proceeded to show that a gun from a gunboat would do the same execution as from a seventy-four, and cost no more, perhaps less; but a ship carrying seventy-four guns, could bring only one half to bear on an enemy at once, whereas if they were distributed among seventy-four boats, they could all be equally effective at once. In spite of this logic, the public, pinning its faith on experienced men, remained incredulous; and when, soon afterwards, many of the new marine were driven ashore in a tempest, or were otherwise destroyed, no one seemed to regard their loss as a misfortune, and the officers of the navy did not affect to conceal their satisfaction: nor has any attempt been since made to replace them. … The error of Mr. Jefferson was not, as his enemies charged, in adopting a visionary scheme of defence, but in limiting his views from a motive of economy, to the protection of the harbours, and in leaving his country's commerce and seamen, on the ocean, defenceless."

G. Tucker, The Life of Thomas Jefferson, volume 2, chapter 8.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1809. Difficulties with Great Britain. Neutral rights. The Right of Search. Impressment. Blockade by Orders in Council and the Berlin and Milan Decrees. Embargo and Non-intercourse.

For a time, after 1803, almost the whole carrying trade of Europe was in American hands. "The merchant flag of every belligerent, save England, disappeared from the sea. France and Holland absolutely ceased to trade under their flags. Spain for a while continued to transport her specie and her bullion in her own ships protected by her men-of-war. But this, too, she soon gave up, and by 1806 the dollars of Mexico and the ingots of Peru were brought to her shores in American bottoms. It was under our flag that the gum trade was carried on with Senegal; that the sugar trade was carried on with Cuba; that coffee was exported from Caracas; and hides and indigo from South America. From Vera Cruz, from Carthagena, from La Plata, from the French colonies in the Antilles, from Cayenne, from Dutch Guiana, from the Isles of France and Reunion, from Batavia and Manilla, great fleets of American merchantmen sailed for the United States, there to neutralize the voyage and then go on to Europe. They filled the warehouses at Cadiz and Antwerp to overflowing. They glutted the markets of Embden and Lisbon, Hamburg and Copenhagen with the produce of the West Indies and the fabrics of the East, and, bringing back the products of the looms and forges of Germany to the New World, drove out the manufactures of Yorkshire, Manchester, and Birmingham. But this splendid trade was already marked for destruction. That Great Britain should long treat it with indifference was impossible. … She determined … to destroy it, and to destroy it in two ways: by paper blockades and by admiralty decisions. In January, 1804, accordingly, Great Britain blockaded the ports of Guadeloupe and Martinique. In April her commander at Jamaica blockaded Curaçoa. In August she extended the blockade to the Straits of Dover and the English Channel."

J. B. McMaster, History of the People of the United States, volume 3, pages 225-226.

{3333}

"It had not yet come to be the acknowledged law of nations that free ships make free goods. But nearly the same purpose was answered, if the property of belligerents could be safely carried in neutral ships under the pretense of being owned by neutrals. The products of the French colonies, for example, could be loaded on board of American vessels, taken to the United States and reshipped there for France as American property. England looked upon this as an evasion of the recognized public law that property of belligerents was good prize. … It was denied that neutrals could take advantage of a state of war to enter upon a trade which had not existed in time of peace; and American ships were seized on the high seas, taken into port, and condemned in the Admiralty Courts for carrying enemy's goods in such a trade. The exercise of that right, if it were one by the recognized law of nations, would be of great injury to American commerce, unless it could be successfully resisted. … A war with England must be a naval war; and the United States not only had no navy of any consequence, but it was a part of Mr. Jefferson's policy, in contrast with the policy of the preceding administrations, that there should be none, except … gunboats kept on wheels and under cover in readiness to repel an invasion. But there was no fear of invasion, for by that England could gain nothing. 'She is renewing,' Madison wrote in the autumn of 1805, 'her depredations on our commerce in the most ruinous shapes, and has kindled a more general indignation among our merchants than was ever before expressed.' These depredations were not confined to the seizing and confiscating American ships under the pretense that their cargoes were contraband. Seamen were taken out of them on the charge of being British subjects and deserters, not only on the high seas in larger numbers than ever before, but within the waters of the United States. No doubt these seamen were often British subjects and their seizure was justifiable, provided England could rightfully extend to all parts of the globe and to the ships of all nations the merciless system of impressment to which her own people were compelled to submit at home. … But even if it could be granted that English naval officers might seize such men without recourse to law, wherever they should be found and without respect for the flag of another nation, it was a national insult and outrage, calling for resentment and resistance, to impress American citizens under the pretense that they were British subjects. But what was the remedy? As a last resort in such cases, nations have but one. Diplomacy and legislation may be first tried, but if these fail, war must be the final ordeal. For this the Administration made no preparation, and the more evident the unreadiness the less was the chance of redress in any other way. … The first measure adopted to meet the aggressions of the English was an act prohibiting the importation of certain British products. This had always been a favorite policy with Madison. … The President and Secretary were in perfect accord; for Jefferson preferred anything to war, and Madison was persuaded that England would be brought to terms by the loss of the best market for her manufactures. … But the Administration did not rely upon legislation alone in this emergency. The President followed up the act prohibiting the introduction of British goods by sending William Pinkney to England in the spring of 1806, to join Monroe, the resident minister, in an attempt at negotiation. These commissioners soon wrote that there was good reason for hoping that a treaty would be concluded, and thereupon the non-importation act was for a time suspended. In December came the news that a treaty was agreed upon, and soon after it was received by the President. … Monroe and Pinkney were enjoined, in tho instructions written by the Secretary of State, to make the abandonment of impressment the first condition of a treaty. A treaty, nevertheless, was agreed upon, without this provision. … Without consulting the Senate, though Congress was in session when the treaty was received, and although the Senate had been previously informed that one had been agreed upon, the President rejected it. … As England's need of seamen increased, the captains of her cruisers, encouraged by the failure of negotiation, grew bolder in overhauling American ships. … In the summer of 1807 an outrage was perpetrated on the frigate Chesapeake, as if to emphasize the contempt with which a nation must be looked upon which only screamed like a woman at wrongs which it wanted the courage and strength to resent, or the wisdom to compound for. The Chesapeake was followed out of the harbor of Norfolk by the British man-of-war Leopard, and when a few miles at sea, the Chesapeake being brought to under the pretense that the English captain wished to put some dispatches on board for Europe, a demand was made for certain deserters supposed to be on the American frigate. Commodore Barron replied that he knew of no deserters on his ship, and that he could permit no search to be made, even if there were. After some further altercation the Englishman fired a broadside, killing and wounding a number of the Chesapeake's crew. Commodore Barron could do nothing else but surrender, for he had only a single gun in readiness for use, and that was fired only once and then with a coal from the cook's galley. The ship was then boarded, the crew mustered, and four men arrested as deserters. Three of them were negroes,—two natives of the United States, the other of South America. The fourth man, probably, was an Englishman. … For this direct national insult, explanation, apology, and reparation were demanded, and at the same time the President put forth a proclamation forbidding all British ships of war to remain in American waters. … Some preparation was made for war, but it was only to call upon the militia to be in readiness, and to order Mr. Jefferson's gunboats to the most exposed ports. Great Britain was not alarmed. The captain of the Leopard, indeed, was removed from his command, as having exceeded his duty; but a proclamation on that side was also issued, requiring all ships of war to seize British seamen on board foreign merchantmen, to demand them from foreign ships of war, and if the demand was refused to report the fact to the admiral of the fleet. … New perils all the while were besetting American commerce. {3334} In November, 1806, Napoleon's Berlin decree was promulgated, forbidding the introduction into France of the products of Great Britain and her colonies, whether in her own ships or those of other nations. … The decree, it was declared, was a rightful retaliation of a British order in council of six months before, which had established a partial blockade of a portion of the French coast. … In the autumn of 1807 [the President] called a special session of Congress. … He sent a special message to the Senate, recommending an embargo. An act was almost immediately passed, which, if anything more was needed to complete the ruin of American commerce, supplied that deficiency. A month before this time the English ministry had issued a new order in council—the news of which reached Jefferson as he was about to send in his message—proclaiming a blockade of pretty much all Europe, and forbidding any trade in neutral vessels, unless they had first gone into some British port and paid duties on their cargoes; and within 24 hours of the President's message, recommending the embargo, Napoleon proclaimed a new decree from Milan, by which it was declared that any ship was lawful prize that had anything whatever to do with Great Britain. … Within four months of its enactment, Josiah Quincy of Massachusetts declared, in a debate in Congress, that 'an experiment, such as is now making, was never before—I will not say tried—it never before entered into the human imagination. There is nothing like it in the narrations of history or in the tales of fiction.' … The prosperity and tranquillity which marked the earlier years of Jefferson's administration disappeared in its last year. … The mischievous results of the embargo policy were evident enough to a sufficient number of Republicans to secure, in February, 1809, the repeal [by the Non-intercourse Bill] of that measure, to take effect the next month as to all countries except England and France."

S. H. Gay, James Madison, chapter 17.

The Non-intercourse Bill which repealed the general provisions of the Embargo Act "excluded all public and private vessels of France and England from American waters; forbade under severe penalties the importation of British or French goods; … and gave the President authority to reopen by proclamation the trade with France or England in case either of these countries should cease to violate neutral rights. … Such a non-intercourse merely sanctioned smuggling."

H. Adams, History of the United States: Second Administration of Jefferson, volume 2, page 445.

ALSO IN: H. S. Randall, Life of Jefferson, volume 3, chapters 3-7.

E. Schuyler, American Diplomacy, chapters 5 and 7.

A. T. Mahan, Influence of Sea Power on the French Revolution, chapters 17-18 (volume 2).

F. Wharton, Digest of the International Law of the United States, chapters 7, 16, and 21 (volume 2-3).

See, also, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803; UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812, and FRANCE: A. D. 1806-1810.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1806-1807. Aaron Burr's filibustering scheme. His arrest and trial.

Aaron Burr had been chosen vice-president in 1800. But he had lost all his friends in both parties in the election. In the course of a bitter political quarrel in New York, in 1804, he challenged Hamilton to a duel. Hamilton was mad enough to accept the challenge and was killed. Burr, "after his duel with General Hamilton, and after the term of his office as vice-president had expired, … seemed to be left alone, and abandoned by all political parties. The state of public feeling in New York was such, after the death of Hamilton, that his presence in that city could not be endured. In New Jersey he had been indicted by a grand jury for murder. Thus situated, his ambitious, active and restless spirit rendered his condition intolerable to himself. On the 22nd March, but a few days after he left forever the presidency of the United States senate, he wrote to his son-in-law, Mr. Joseph Alston, that he 'was under ostracism. In New York,' said he, 'I am to be disfranchised, and in New Jersey to be hanged. Having substantial objections to both, I shall not, for the present, hazard either, but shall seek another country.' Accordingly, early in May, he left Philadelphia for the western country, and arrived at Lexington, in Kentucky, on the 20th of that month. After travelling with great rapidity through that state, he directed his course to Nashville, in Tennessee, and from thence he journied through the woods to Natchez. From Natchez he went by land to New Orleans, where he arrived on the 25th June, 1805. At that time, General Wilkinson was in that city, or in its neighborhood, and commanded the United States troops stationed there. It does not appear that he remained long in New Orleans, but soon again returned to Lexington, in Kentucky, by the way of Nashville. He was at Cincinnati, and at several places in Ohio, but in a very short time made his appearance at St. Louis, in Missouri, and from thence he travelled to Washington, at which place he arrived on the 29th day of November. These immense journies he performed in a little more than six months; before the great western rivers were rendered navigable by steam, and when the roads were badly constructed; and through a considerable part of the country traversed by him there were no roads at all. His movements were veiled in mystery, and all men wondered what could be the motive which induced these extraordinary journies. From January, 1806, to the month of August following, he spent his time principally in Washington and Philadelphia; but, in the month of August, he again set his face towards the west, and was soon afterwards found in Kentucky. About this time boats were provided, provisions and munitions of war were collected, and men were gathering at different points on the Ohio and Cumberland rivers. Government now began to be alarmed. Mr. Tiffin, governor of Ohio, under the advice of the president (Jefferson), seized the boats and their cargo, and Burr was arrested in Kentucky; but no sufficient proof appearing against him he was discharged. On the 23d January, 1807, Mr. Jefferson sent a message to congress, accompanied by several affidavits, in which he gave the history of Burr's transactions, so far as they had come to the knowledge of the administration. The message stated that, on the 21st of October, General Wilkinson wrote to the president that, from a letter he had received from Burr, he had ascertained that his objects were, a severance of the union on the line of the Allegany mountains, an attack upon Mexico, and the establishment of an independent government in Mexico, of which Burr was to be the head. That to cover his movements, he had purchased, or pretended to have purchased, of one Lynch, a tract of country claimed by Baron Bastiop, lying near Natchitoches, on which he proposed to make a settlement. {3335} That he had found, by the proceedings of the governor and people of Ohio and Kentucky, that the western people were not prepared to join him; but notwithstanding, there was reason to believe that he intended, with what force he could collect, to attack New Orleans, get the control of the funds of the bank, seize upon the military and naval stores which might be found there, and then proceed against Mexico. The president assured congress that there was no reason to apprehend that any foreign power would aid Colonel Burr. A considerable part of the evidence going to show that Burr entertained criminal designs, depended on the affidavit of Wilkinson. It is not my intention to examine into the proofs of the guilt or innocence of Burr, further than to remark, that from the character of the vain, vaporing and unprincipled Wilkinson, as before and since developed, no dependence can safely be placed upon his statements, unless supported by strong circumstances, or other evidence; and I believe it will not at this day be doubted, that if Burr plotted treason, Wilkinson, in the first instance, agreed to be his accomplice; that, as their operations progressed, he began seriously to doubt of success, and then communicated his knowledge of the affair to the government, in order to save himself, and perhaps obtain a reward. … That Burr himself was deceived by Wilkinson, there can be no doubt. … But there was other evidence besides that of Wilkinson, against Burr, which has never been explained. … If his object was merely an attack upon Mexico, why did he not openly avow it, when charged and indicted for treason against his country? … Again, unless Colonel William Eaton, the man who had then recently so gallantly distinguished himself on the Barbary coasts, has perjured himself, Burr did form a treasonable plot against his country. Colonel Eaton, on the 26th January, deposed, in open court, held before Judge Cranch and others, at Washington, that during the preceding winter (1806), Burr called upon him, and, in the first instance, represented that he was employed by the government to raise a military force to attack the Spanish Provinces in North America, and invited Eaton to take a command in the expedition; that Eaton, being a restless, enterprising man, readily acceded to the proposal; that Burr made frequent calls upon him, and in his subsequent interviews complained of the inefficiency and timidity of the government, and, eventually, fully developed his project; which was to separate the western states from the union, and establish himself as sovereign of the country. … Burr did not succeed in collecting and organizing a force on the western waters; but, on the 1st day of March, he was discovered wandering alone in the Tombigbee country, near the line of Florida. … The trial of the indictment against Burr, for treason, occupied many weeks, but he was finally acquitted by the jury, without swearing any witness in his defence. The acquittal seems to have been on technical grounds. … After his acquittal, Colonel Burr appears still to have persevered in the project of making an effort to detach Mexico from the Spanish government. On the 7th of June, 1808, he sailed from New York for Europe, it would seem in the hope of engaging the British government to fit out an expedition against Mexico, in which he would take a part. In this he was entirely unsuccessful. His application to the French government was equally vain and useless. He spent four years wandering about in Europe."

J. D. Hammond, History of Political Parties in the State of New York, chapter 12 (volume 1).

ALSO IN: W. H. Safford, The Blennerhassett Papers, chapters 6-15.

M. L. Davis, Memoirs of Burr, volume 2, chapters 17-20.

J. Parton, Life of Burr, chapters 21-26 (volume 2).

H. Adams, History of the United States: Second Administration of Jefferson, volume 1, chapters 10-14 and 19.

_D. Robertson, Report of Trials of Burr._

See BLENNERHASSETT'S ISLAND.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1806-1812. The Cumberland Road. The first National work of "Internal Improvement."

"In 1806 the United States began the Cumberland Road, its first work of the kind; but it was intended to open up the public lands in Ohio and the country west, and was nominally paid for out of the proceeds of those public lands. Just as the embargo policy was taking effect, Gallatin, encouraged by the accumulation of a surplus in the Treasury, brought in a report, April 4, 1808, suggesting the construction of a great system of internal improvements: it was to include coastwise canals across the isthmuses of Cape Cod, New Jersey, upper Delaware and eastern North Carolina; roads were to be constructed from Maine to Georgia, and thence to New Orleans, and from Washington westward to Detroit and St. Louis. He estimated the cost at twenty millions, to be provided in ten annual instalments. Jefferson himself was so carried away with this prospect of public improvement that he recommended a constitutional amendment to authorize such expenditures. The whole scheme disappeared when the surplus vanished; but from year to year small appropriations were made for the Cumberland Road, so that up to 1812 more than $200,000 had been expended upon it."

A. B. Hart, Formation of the Union (Epochs of American History), section 121.

"The Cumberland Road was always a pet enterprise with Mr. Clay. … Its eastern terminus was Cumberland on the Potomac, from which it takes its name. Thence it was projected to Wheeling on the Ohio, crossing the Alleganies; from Wheeling to Columbus, Ohio; and thence westward through Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri, to Jefferson, the capital of the latter State. … After Mr. Clay went to Congress in 1806, and while he was there, this great national work required and realized his constant attention and zealous advocacy. It was owing to his exertions chiefly that it ever reached Wheeling, and passed on so far into the State of Ohio. The last appropriations made for this road were in 1834 and 1835, with a view of repairing it, and giving it over to the States through which it passed, if they would accept it, and keep it in repair."

C. Colton, Life, Correspondence, and Speeches of Henry Clay, volume 6, page 7.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1807. Practical beginning of steam-boat navigation.

See STEAM NAVIGATION.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1807. Abolition of the Slave-Trade. The measure in Congress. Significance of Southern action.

By the terms of the Constitution, Congress was deprived of power to interfere with the importation of slaves before the year 1808, but no longer. The time now approached when that restraint would cease, and the President in his annual message brought the subject to notice. {3336} "It was referred to a committee of which Mr. Early of Georgia was the chairman. There was no difference of opinion as to the prohibition of the traffic, or at least no expression of any; but the practical details of the law, the penalties by which it was to be enforced, and, above all, the disposition to be made of such negroes as might be brought into the country in violation of it, gave rise to violent and excited debates. The committee reported a law prohibiting the slave-trade after the 31st of December, 1807, imposing certain penalties for its breach, and providing that all negroes imported after that date should be forfeited. The object of this provision undoubtedly was to obtain directly what the Constitution only gave indirectly and by implication,—the sanction of the government of the United States to the principle of slave-holding, by making it hold and sell men as property. The astuteness of the slave-holding mind on all points touching slavery was shown in this proposition, and all the tactics of bullying and bluster with which later Congressional campaigns have made us familiar, were employed in the debate to which it gave rise. It having been moved that the words 'shall be entitled to his or her freedom' should be inserted after the word 'forfeited,' a furious fight ensued over this amendment. The Southern members resisted it, on the ground that the emancipation of the imported Africans would increase the number of free negroes, who, as Mr. Early affirmed, 'were considered in the States where they are found in considerable numbers as instruments of murder, theft, and conflagration.' And so craftily was this proposition of forfeiture to the government qualified, that its drift was not at first discerned by the Northern members. For, strong as was their disapprobation of slavery in the abstract, they felt no disposition to expose their Southern brethren to all the horrors of insurrection which it was assumed would follow the multiplication of free negroes. Indeed, Mr. Early candidly said, that, if these negroes were left free in the Southern States, not one of them would be alive in a year. And although the Federalists as a party, and Mr. Quincy eminently among them, regarded the political element of slavery as full of dangers to the future of the nation, these opinions had worked no personal and social alienation between Northern and Southern men, such as has since taken place. … There was, therefore, quite disposition enough to arrange this matter in the way the most satisfactory to the masters, without so rigid a regard to the rights of the negroes as, it is to be hoped, would have been had in later times. Mr. Quincy at first opposed striking out the forfeiture clause, on the ground that this was the only way in which the United States could get the control of the Africans, so as to dispose of them in the manner most for their own interest. … These views influenced a majority of the Northern members until the question of the final passage of the bill approached. At last they came to a sense of the disgrace which the forfeiture of the negroes to the government, and the permission to it to sell them as slaves if it so pleased, would bring upon the nation, and the whole matter was recommitted to a committee of one from each State. … This committee reported a bill providing that such imported negroes should be sent to such States as had abolished slavery, there to be bound out as apprentices for a term of years, at the expiration of which they should be free. This bill produced a scene of great and violent excitement on the part of the slaveholders. Mr. Early declared that the people of the South would resist this provision with their lives! This resistance to a measure which proposed doing all the slaveholders had demanded for their own safety, to wit, removing the imported negroes from the slaveholding domain and providing for them in the Free States, showed that their purpose was, at least in part, to have the negroes sold as slaves to themselves. This object they did virtually gain at last, as the final settlement was by a bill originating in the Senate, providing that, though neither importer nor purchaser should have a title to such negroes, still the negroes should be subject to any regulation for their disposal that should be made by the States into which they might be brought. The design of the slaveholding party to make the United States recognize the rightfulness of property in man was thus avoided, but it was at the cost of leaving the imported Africans to the tender mercies of the Slave States. The fact that the slaveholders were greatly incensed at the result, and regarded it as an injury and an affront, does not make this disposition of these unfortunates any the less discreditable to Congress or the nation."

E. Quincy, Life of Josiah Quincy, chapter 5.

See, also, SLAVERY, NEGRO: A. D. 1792-1807.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1808. The effects of the Embargo.

"The dread of war, radical in the Republican theory, sprang not so much from the supposed waste of life or resources as from the retroactive effects which war must exert upon the form of government; but the experience of a few months showed that the embargo as a system was rapidly leading to the same effects. … Personal liberties and rights of property were more directly curtailed in the United States by embargo than in Great Britain by centuries of almost continuous foreign war. … While the constitutional cost of the two systems was not altogether unlike, the economical cost was a point not easily settled. No one could say what might be the financial expense of embargo as compared with war. Yet Jefferson himself in the end admitted that the embargo had no claim to respect as an economical measure. … As the order was carried along the seacoast, every artisan dropped his tools, every merchant closed his doors, every ship was dismantled. American produce—wheat, timber, cotton, tobacco, rice—dropped in value or became unsalable; every imported article rose in price; wages stopped; swarms of debtors became bankrupt; thousands of sailors hung idle round the wharves trying to find employment on coasters, and escape to the West Indies or Nova Scotia. A reign of idleness began; and the men who were not already ruined felt that their ruin was only a matter of time. The British traveller, Lambert, who visited New York in 1808, described it as resembling a place ravaged by pestilence:—'The port indeed was full of shipping, but they were dismantled and laid up; their decks were cleared, their hatches fastened down, and scarcely a sailor was to be found on board. Not a box, bale, cask, barrel, or package was to be seen upon the wharves.' … In New England, where the struggle of existence was keenest, the embargo struck like a thunderbolt, and society for a moment thought itself at an end. {3337} Foreign commerce and shipping were the life of the people, —the ocean, as Pickering said, was their farm. The outcry of suffering interests became every day more violent, as the public learned that this paralysis was not a matter of weeks, but of months or years. … The belief that Jefferson, sold to France, wished to destroy American commerce and to strike a deadly blow at New and Old England at once, maddened the sensitive temper of the people. Immense losses, sweeping away their savings and spreading bankruptcy through every village, gave ample cause for their complaints. Yet in truth, New England was better able to defy the embargo than she was willing to suppose. She lost nothing except profits which the belligerents had in any case confiscated; her timber would not harm for keeping, and her fish were safe in the ocean. The embargo gave her almost a monopoly of the American market for domestic manufactures; no part of the country was so well situated or so well equipped for smuggling. … The growers of wheat and live stock in the Middle States were more hardly treated. Their wheat, reduced in value from two dollars to seventy-five cents a bushel, became practically unsalable. … The manufacturers of Pennsylvania could not but feel the stimulus of the new demand; so violent a system of protection was never applied to them before or since. Probably for that reason the embargo was not so unpopular in Pennsylvania as elsewhere, and Jefferson had nothing to fear from political revolution in this calm and plodding community. The true burden of the embargo fell on the Southern States, but most severely upon the great State of Virginia. Slowly decaying, but still half patriarchal, Virginia society could neither economize nor liquidate. Tobacco was worthless; but 400,000 negro slaves must be clothed and fed, great establishments must be kept up, the social scale of living could not be reduced, and even could not clear a large landed estate without creating new encumbrances in a country bankruptcy where land and negroes were the only forms of property on which money could be raised. Stay-laws were tried, but served only to prolong the agony. With astonishing rapidity Virginia succumbed to ruin, while continuing to support the system that was draining her strength."

H. Adams, History of the United States: Second Administration of Jefferson, volume 2, chapter 12.

"'Our passion,' said Jefferson, 'is peace.' He not only recoiled as a philanthropist from bloodshed, but as a politician he with reason dreaded military propensities and sabre sway. Such preparations for war as he could be induced to make were scrupulously defensive, and his fleet of gun-boats for the protection of the coast to be launched when the invader should appear excited a smile. Alone among all statesmen he tried to make war without bloodshed by means of an embargo on trade. … It is not the highest of his titles to fame in the eyes of his countrymen, but it may be not the lowest in the court of humanity, that he sacrificed his popularity in the attempt to find a bloodless substitute for war. His memory recovered from the shock and his reign over American opinion endured."

Goldwin Smith, The United States: An outline of Political History, 1492-1871, chapter 3.

ALSO IN: _H. A. Hill, Trade and Commerce of Boston, 1780-1880 (Memorial History of Boston, volume 4, part 2, chapter 8)._

E. Quincy, Life of Josiah Quincy, chapters 6-7.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1808. Sixth Presidential Election. Jefferson succeeded by Madison.

"In anticipation of Jefferson's retirement there had been … no little dispute and lively canvassing as to the next incumbency of the presidential chair. … Upon Madison, it was generally considered that Jefferson had fixed his personal preference. … But Madison had many political enemies in the Republican ranks among Virginians themselves. … Monroe was the growing favorite. Republicans in Congress, who, from one cause or another, had become disaffected to the Secretary of State, made their new choice manifest. The Quids [see QUIDS], having courted Monroe by letter when he was abroad, crowded about him when he passed through Washington on his way home, just as the Embargo became a law. … Monroe hesitated, unwilling to make a breach; and rather than hazard the Republican cause, or the future prospects of their favorite, his more temperate friends took him off the list of candidates, so that at the usual Congressional caucus, held at the capital, Madison was nominated almost unanimously for President, and George Clinton for Vice-President. But out of 139 Republican Senators and Representatives only 89 were present at this caucus, some being sick or absent from the city, and others keeping away because dissatisfied. Clinton had been a disappointed candidate, as well as Monroe, for the highest honors. … His ambition was pursued beyond the caucus, notwithstanding his renomination as Vice-President, until the friends of Madison, who had profited by the diversion among competitors, threatened to drop Clinton from the regular ticket unless he relinquished his pretensions to a higher place than that already assigned him. Meantime the schismatic Republicans had united in protesting to the country against Congressional dictation, at the same time pronouncing that the caucus which had nominated Madison was irregularly held. This open letter was signed by 17 Republican members of Congress. … Unfortunately for their influence in the canvass, however, they could not agree as to whether Monroe or Clinton should head the ticket. Objectionable, moreover, as the Congressional caucus might be, many more Presidential terms elapsed before other nominating machinery superseded it. National delegates, the national congress or convention of a party, was an idea too huge as yet for American politics to grasp in these days of plain frugality. … Harassed with foes within and without, with dissensions among the friends of rival candidates for the succession, with an odious and profitless measure to execute, against which citizens employed both cunning and force, it seemed, at one time, as if the administration party would go down in the fall elections. But Jefferson's wonderful popularity and the buoyancy of Republican principles carried the day. The regular Presidential ticket prevailed, not without a diminished majority."

J. Schouler, History of the United States, chapter 6, section 2 (volume 2).

James Madison, Democratic Republican, was elected, receiving 122 votes in the Electoral College; George Clinton, of the same party, receiving 6, and Charles C. Pinckney, Federalist, 47. George Clinton was chosen Vice President.

{3338}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1808-1810. Substitution of Non-intercourse for Embargo. Delusive conduct of Napoleon.

"All through the year 1808 and the first two months of 1809, the heavy hand of the embargo was laid on American commerce. The close of Jefferson's administration was signalized by an important change in the policy of the American Government. Almost the last act which Jefferson performed as President was to sign the new law which repealed the embargo, and substituted non-intercourse—a law which instead of universal prohibition of trade, merely prohibited commerce with Great Britain and with the countries under French control. The statute further authorized the President to suspend this prohibition as to either Great Britain or France as soon as one or the other should desist from violating neutral rights. An excuse for renewing commercial relations was not long delayed. On April 21, 1809, immediately upon the rather unexpected conclusion of a liberal and satisfactory diplomatic arrangement with Erskine, the British minister in Washington, the non-intercourse act was suspended as to Great Britain; and foreign trade, long dormant, suddenly sprang into excessive activity. This happy truce was short-lived. Erskine had effected his arrangement by a deliberate and almost defiant disregard of Canning's instructions; and his acts were promptly disavowed by his government. His recall was followed by a renewal of non-intercourse under a presidential proclamation of August 9, 1809. But notwithstanding the disavowal of Erskine, the British Government had made an apparent concession to the United States by the adoption of new orders in council which revoked the stringent prohibitions of the orders of 1807, and substituted a paper blockade of all ports and places under the government of France—a distinction which, on the whole, was perhaps without any important difference. France, on the other hand, entered upon a course of further aggressions. Louis Bonaparte was driven from his kingdom of Holland because he refused to attack neutral commerce, and all American ships found lying at Amsterdam were seized. Finally, by the decree of Rambouillet, every American ship found in any French port was confiscated and ordered sold. England and the United States thus seemed for the moment to be slowly drawing together in the presence of a common enemy, when suddenly the whole situation of affairs was changed by the formal announcement on August 5, 1810, of the Emperor's intended revocation of the decrees of Berlin and Milan, such revocation to take place on the first day of the following November, provided the British Government revoked their orders in council, or (and this was the important provision) the United States caused their rights to be respected. This promise, as Napoleon had privately pointed out a few days before, committed him to nothing; but it was accepted with all seriousness on the part of the United States. In reliance upon the imperial word, commercial intercourse with Great Britain—which had been once more resumed in May, 1810—was for the third time suspended. This, it was thought, was 'causing American rights to be respected'; and although the condemnation of American ships went on without a pause in every continental port, the Government of the United States clung with the strongest pertinacity to the belief that Napoleon's declarations were sincere. The practical effect of all this was to bar the door against any possible settlement with Great Britain. Commerce was now permanently suspended; there was a long list of grievances to be redressed, and negotiation was exhausted."

G. L. Rives, editor, Selections from the Correspondence of Thomas Barclay, chapter 6.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1810. The Third Census.

Total population, 7,215,791 (being an increase of nearly 36½ per cent. over the population shown in 1800), classed and distributed as follows:

North.

White. Free black. Slave. Connecticut. 255,279 6,453 310 Illinois. 11,501 613 168 Indiana. 23,890 393 237 Maine. 227,736 969 0 Massachusetts. 465,303 6,737 0 Michigan. 4,618 120 24 New Hampshire. 213,390 970 0 New Jersey. 226,861 7,843 10,851 New York. 918,699 25,333 15,017 Ohio. 228,861 1,899 0 Pennsylvania. 786,804 22,492 795 Rhode Island. 73,314 3,609 108 Vermont. 216,963 750 0 ------- ------ ------ Total 3,653,219 78,181 27,510

South.

White. Free black. Slave. Delaware. 55,361 13,136 4,177 District of Columbia. 16,079 2,549 5,395 Georgia. 145,414 1,801 105,218 Kentucky. 324,237 1,713 80,561 Louisiana. 34,311 7,585 34,660 Maryland. 235,117 33,927 111,502 Mississippi. 23,024 240 17,088 Missouri. 17,227 607 3,011 North Carolina. 376,410 10,266 168,824 South Carolina. 214,196 4,554 196,365 Tennessee. 215,875 1,317 44,535 Virginia. 551,534 30,570 392,518 ------- ------- ------- 2,208,785 108,265 1,163,854

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1810-1812. Continued provocation from England and France. The "War of 1812" against Great Britain declared.

"Congress, on May 1, 1810, passed an act providing that commercial non-intercourse with the belligerent powers should cease with the end of the session, only armed ships being excluded from American ports; and further, that, in case either of them should recall its obnoxious orders or decrees, the President should announce the fact by proclamation, and if the other did not do the same within three months, the non-intercourse act should be revived against that one,—a measure adopted only because Congress, in its helplessness, did not know what else to do. The conduct of France had meanwhile been no less offensive than that of Great Britain. On all sorts of pretexts American ships were seized in the harbors and waters controlled by French power. A spirited remonstrance on the part of Armstrong, the American Minister, was answered by the issue of the Rambouillet Decree in May, 1810, ordering the sale of American vessels and cargoes seized, and directing like confiscation of all American vessels entering any ports under the control of France. {3339} This decree was designed to stop the surreptitious trade that was still being carried on between England and the continent in American bottoms. When it failed in accomplishing that end, Napoleon instructed his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Champagny, to inform the American Minister that the Berlin and Milan Decrees were revoked, and would cease to have effect on November 1, 1810, if the English would revoke their Orders in Council, and recall their new principles of blockade, or if the United States would 'cause their rights to be respected by the English,'—in the first place restore the non-intercourse act as to Great Britain. … The British government, being notified of this by the American Minister, declared on September 29 that Great Britain would recall the Orders in Council when the revocation of the French decrees should have actually taken effect, and the commerce of neutrals should have been restored. … Madison, … leaning toward France, as was traditional with the Republican party, and glad to grasp even at the semblance of an advantage, chose to regard the withdrawal of the Berlin and Milan Decrees as actual and done in good faith, and announced it as a matter of fact on November 1, 1810. French armed ships were no longer excluded from American ports. On February 2, 1811, the non-importation act was revived as to Great Britain. In May the British Court of Admiralty delivered an opinion that no evidence existed of the withdrawal of the Berlin and Milan Decrees, which resulted in the condemnation of a number of American vessels and their cargoes. Additional irritation was caused by the capture, off Sandy Hook, of an American vessel bound to France, by some fresh cases of search and impressment, and by an encounter between the American frigate President and the British sloop Little Belt, which fired into one another, the British vessel suffering most. But was American commerce safe in French ports? By no means. … Outrages on American ships by French men-of-war and privateers went on as before, … The pretended French concession was, therefore, a mere farce. Truly, there were American grievances enough. Over 900 American ships had been seized by the British, and more than 550 by the French. … By both belligerents the United States had been kicked and cuffed like a mere interloper among the nations of the earth, who had no rights entitled to respectful consideration. Their insolence seemed to have been increased by the irresolution of the American government, the distraction of counsel in Congress, and the division of sentiment among the people. … But … young Republican leaders came to the front to interpret the 'national spirit and expectation.' They totally eclipsed the old chiefs by their dash and brilliancy. Foremost among them stood Henry Clay; then John C. Calhoun, William Lowndes, Felix Grundy, Langdon Cheves, and others. They believed that, if the American Republic was to maintain anything like the dignity of an independent power, and to preserve, or rather, regain, the respect of mankind in any degree,—ay, its self-respect,—it must cease to submit to humiliation and contemptuous treatment; it must fight,—fight somebody who had wronged or insulted it. The Republicans having always a tender side for France, and the fiction of French concessions being accepted, the theory of the war party was that, of the two belligerents, England had more insolently maltreated the United States. Rumors were spread that an Indian war then going on, and resulting in the battle of Tippecanoe on November 7, 1811, was owing to English intrigues. Adding this to the old Revolutionary reminiscences of British oppression, it was not unnatural that the national wrath should generally turn against Great Britain. … Not only the regular army was increased, but the President was authorized to accept and employ 50,000 volunteers. Then a bill was introduced providing for the building of ten new frigates. … The war spirit in the country gradually rose, and manifested itself noisily in public meetings, passing resolutions, and memorializing Congress. It was increased in intensity by a sensational 'exposure,' a batch of papers laid before Congress by the President in March, 1812. They had been sold to the government by John Henry, an Irish adventurer, and disclosed a confidential mission to New England, undertaken by Henry in 1809 at the request of Sir James Craig, the governor of Canada, to encourage a disunion movement in the Eastern States. This was the story. Whatever its foundation, it was believed, and greatly increased popular excitement." On the 4th of April the President signed a bill laying an embargo on commerce with Great Britain for ninety days. "All over the country the embargo was understood as meaning an immediate preparation for war. … In May, 1812, President Madison was nominated for reelection by the congressional caucus. It has been said that he was dragooned into the war policy by Clay and his followers with the threat that, unless he yielded to their views, another candidate for the presidency would be chosen. This Clay denied, and there was no evidence to discredit his denial. Madison was simply swept into the current by the impetuosity of Young America. … On June 1 the President's war message came. On June 18 a bill in accordance with it, which had passed both Houses, was signed by the President, who proclaimed hostilities the next day. Thus Young America, led by Henry Clay, carried their point. But there was something disquieting in their victory. The majority they commanded in Congress was not so large as a majority for a declaration of war should be. In the House, Pennsylvania and the states south and west of it gave 62 votes for the war, and 32 against it; the states north and east of Pennsylvania gave 17 yeas and 32 nays,—in all 79 for and 49 against war. This showed a difference of sentiment according to geographical divisions. Not even all the Republicans were in favor of war. … Nor were the United States in any sense well prepared for a war with a first-class power."

C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, volume 1, chapter 5.

ALSO IN: S. Perkins, History of the Late War, chapters 1-2.

C. J. Ingersoll, Historical Sketch of the Second War between the United States and Great Britain, volume 1, chapter 1.

E. Quincy, Life of Josiah Quincy, chapters 9-12.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1811. Refusal to re-charter the Bank of the United States.

See MONEY AND BANKING: A. D. 1791-1816.

{3340}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1811. General Harrison's campaign against Tecumseh and his league. The Battle of Tippecanoe.

"During the interval between the Tripolitan war and the war of 1812, one noticeable campaign was made against the Indians. The operation took place in 1811, under General William H. Harrison, governor of Indiana Territory, and was directed against the Shawnees and other tribes which adhered to Tecumseh. This chief, with his brother, known as 'the Prophet,' had been engaged since 1806 in planning a species of crusade against the whites, and had acquired great influence among the northwestern Indians. For the previous two years Harrison's suspicions had been aroused by reports of Tecumseh's intrigues, and attempts had been made from time to time to negotiate with him, but without satisfactory results. In the summer of 1811 it was decided to strike a decisive blow at the Indians, and in the autumn Harrison, with a regiment of regulars under Colonel Boyd, and a force of militia, marched upon Tecumseh's town, situated on the Tippecanoe River. On the 7th of November the Indians, in Tecumseh's absence, attempted to surprise Harrison's camp, but in the battle which followed they were driven off, and presently abandoned their town, which Harrison burned. The invading force then retired. The importance of the expedition was largely due to the military reputation which Harrison acquired by it."

J. R. Soley, The Wars of the United States (Narrative and Critical History of the United States, volume 7, chapter 6).

ALSO IN: American State Papers: Indian Affairs, volume 1, page 776.

E. Eggleston and L. E. Seelye, Tecumseh, chapters 12-23.

H. Adams, History of the United States: First Administration of Madison, volume 2, chapters 4-5.

J. B. Dillon, History of Indiana, chapters 35-38.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812 (April). Admission of Louisiana into the Union.

See LOUISIANA: A. D. 1812.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812 (June-October). Rioting at Baltimore. The opening of the war and the unreadiness of the nation for it. Hull's disastrous campaign and surrender, at Detroit.

"It was perhaps characteristic of the conduct of the war, that the first blood spilled should be American blood, shed by Americans. … In the night of June 22d, three days after the proclamation of war, a mob in Baltimore sacked the office of the 'Federal Republican,' edited by Alexander Hanson, because he had opposed the war policy. The mob also attacked the residences of several prominent Federalists, and burned one of them. Vessels in the harbor, too, were visited and plundered. About a month later Hanson resumed the publication of his paper, and in the night of July 26th the mob gathered again." This time they were resisted and one was killed; whereupon the authorities seized Hanson and his friends and lodged them in jail. "The rioters, thus encouraged by those whose business it was to punish them, attacked the jail the next night, murdered General Lingan [one of Hanson's defenders], injured General [Henry] Lee so that he was a cripple for the rest of his life, and beat several of the other victims and subjected them to torture. The leaders of the mob were brought to trial, but were acquitted! In this state of affairs, the war party in the country being but little stronger than the peace party, the youngest and almost the weakest of civilized nations went to war with one of the oldest and most powerful. The regular army of the United States numbered only 6,000 men; but Congress had passed an act authorizing its increase to 25,000, and in addition to this the President was empowered to call for 50,000 volunteers, and to use the militia to the extent of 100,000. Henry Dearborn, of Massachusetts, was made a major-general and appointed to command the land forces. Against the thousand vessels and 144,000 sailors of the British navy, the Americans had 20 war-ships and a few gunboats, the whole carrying about 300 guns. But these figures, taken alone, are deceptive; since a very large part of the British force was engaged in the European wars, and the practical question was, what force the United States could bring against so much as England could spare for operations on the high seas and on this side of the Atlantic. In that comparison, the discrepancy was not so great, and the United States had an enormous element of strength in her fine merchant marine. Her commerce being temporarily suspended to a large degree, there was an abundance both of ships and sailors, from which to build up a navy and fit out a fleet of privateers. Indeed, privateering was the business that now offered the largest prizes to mariners and ship-owners. … War with Great Britain being determined upon, the plan of campaign that first and most strongly presented itself to the Administration was the conquest of the British provinces on our northern border. … In planning for the invasion of Canada, the Administration counted largely upon a supposed readiness of the Canadians to throw off their allegiance to Great Britain and join with the United States. Such expectations have almost never been realized, and in this instance they were completely disappointed. In the preceding February, William Hull, Governor of the Territory of Michigan, who had rendered distinguished service in the Revolution, had been made a brigadier-general and placed in command of the forces in Ohio, with orders to march them to Detroit, to protect the Territory against the Indians, who were becoming troublesome. In June he was in command of about 2,000 men, in northern Ohio, moving slowly through the wilderness. On the day when war was declared, June 18th, the Secretary of War wrote him two letters. The first, in which the declaration was not mentioned, was despatched by a special messenger, and reached General Hull on the 24th. The other informed him of the declaration of war, but was sent by mail to Cleveland, there to take its chance of reaching the General by whatever conveyance might be found. The consequence was, that he did not receive it till the 2d of July. But every British commander in Canada learned the news several days earlier. Hull arrived at Detroit on the 5th of July and set about organizing his forces. On the 9th he received from the War Department orders to begin the invasion of Canada by taking possession of Malden, 15 miles below Detroit, on the other side of the river, if he thought he could do so with safety to his own posts. He crossed on the 12th, and issued a proclamation to the Canadians." He found the enemy too strongly fortified at Malden to be prudently assaulted with raw troops and without artillery. "So it was decided to defer the attack, and in a few days came the news that, on the declaration of war, a force of over 600—British and Indians—had promptly moved against the American post at Michilimackinac—on the rocky little island of Mackinaw, commanding the strait between Lake Huron and Lake Michigan—and the garrison of 61 officers and men capitulated on the 16th of July. {3341} This disaster to the Americans roused the Indians to renewed hostility against them, while it proportionately disheartened Hull, and seems to have been the first step in the breaking down of his courage. After a few skirmishes, he recrossed to Detroit on the 7th of August. Meanwhile the British Colonel Proctor had arrived at Malden with reënforcements, and on Hull's withdrawal to Detroit he threw a force across the river to intercept his supplies. This force consisted of a small number of British regulars and a considerable number of Indians commanded by the famous Tecumseh." Two considerable engagements occurred between this force and detachments sent out to meet an expected supply train. In the first, the Americans were badly beaten; in the second, they drove the enemy to their boats with heavy loss; but the supply train was not secured. "During this gloomy state of things at Detroit, a bloody affair took place on ground that is now within the city of Chicago. Fort Dearborn stood at the mouth of Chicago River, and was occupied by a garrison of about 50 soldiers, with several families. Captain Nathan Heald, commanding the post, had been ordered by General Hull to abandon it and remove his force to Detroit. "To conciliate the neighboring Indians who professed friendliness, he promised to give them all the property in the fort which he could not carry; but before making the delivery to them he foolishly destroyed all the arms, the gunpowder and the liquors. Enraged by this proceeding, which they considered a trick, the savages pursued Captain Heald's small party, waylaid them among the Sand-hills on the lake shore, and massacred the greater part, twelve children included. The scalps which they took were sold to Colonel Proctor, "who had offered a premium for American scalps." The same day on which this occurred, August 15th, "the British General Isaac Brock, who had arrived at Malden a few days before and assumed command there, formally demanded the surrender of Detroit. This demand included a plain threat of massacre in case of refusal. Said Brock in his letter: 'It is far from my intention to join in a war of extermination; but you must be aware that the numerous bodies of Indians who have attached themselves to my troops will be beyond my control the moment the contest commences.' … Brock's force, according to his own testimony, numbered 1,330 men, including 600 Indians, and he had also two ships of war. Hull had present for duty about 1,000 men. Brock sent a large body of Indians across the river that night, at a point five miles below the fort, and early in the morning crossed with the remainder of his troops, and at once marched on the place." On the approach of the attacking force Hull offered to surrender. "The articles of capitulation were drawn up, and the American general surrendered, not merely the fort and its garrison, but the whole Territory of Michigan, of which he was Governor. … Hull's officers were incensed at his action, and he was subsequently court-martialled, convicted of cowardice, and condemned to death; but the President pardoned him, in consideration of his age and his services in the Revolution. … Subsequent investigations, if they do not exonerate General Hull, have at least greatly modified the blame attached to him."

R. Johnson, History of the War of 1812-15, chapter 2.

ALSO IN: _J. F. Clarke, History of the Campaign of 1812 and Surrender of the Post at Detroit._

_B. J. Lossing, Hull's Surrender (Potter's American Monthly, August, 1875)._

F. S. Drake, Memorials of the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati, pages 341-354.

_S. C. Clark, Hull's Surrender at Detroit (Magazine of American History, volume 27)._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812. The opposition of the Federalists to the war.

"Unfortunately for the Federalists, while they were wholly right in many of their criticisms on the manner in which the war came about, they put themselves in the wrong as to its main feature. We can now see that in their just wrath against Napoleon they would have let the nation remain in a position of perpetual childhood and subordination before England. No doubt there were various points at issue in the impending contest, but the most important one, and the only one that remained in dispute all through the war, was that of the right of search and impressment. … It must be understood that this was not a question of reclaiming deserters from the British navy, for the seamen in question had very rarely belonged to it. There existed in England at that time an outrage on civilization, now abandoned, called impressment, by which any sailor and many who were not sailors could be seized and compelled to serve in the navy. The horrors of the 'press-gang,' as exhibited in the sea-side towns of England, have formed the theme of many novels. It was bad enough at home, but when applied on board the vessels of a nation with which England was at peace, it became one of those outrages which only proceed from the strong to the weak, and are never reciprocated. Lord Collingwood said well, in one of his letters, that England would not submit to such an aggression for an hour. Merely to yield to visitation for such a purpose was a confession of national weakness; but the actual case was far worse than this. … We have … Cobbett's statement of the consequences. 'Great numbers of Americans have been impressed,' he adds, 'and are now in our navy. … That many of these men have died on board our ships, that many have been worn out in the service, there is no doubt.' … In 1806 the merchants of Boston had called upon the general government to 'assert our rights and support the dignity of the United States.' … Yet it shows the height of party feeling that when, in 1812, Mr. Madison's government finally went to war for these very rights, the measure met with the bitterest opposition from the whole Federalist party, and from the commercial States generally. A good type of the Federalist opposition on this particular point is to be found in the pamphlets of John Lowell. John Lowell was the son of the eminent Massachusetts judge of that name; he was a well-educated lawyer, who was president of the Massachusetts Agricultural Society, and wrote under the name of 'A New England Farmer.' In spite of the protests offered half a dozen years before by his own neighbors, he declared the whole outcry against impressment to be a device of Mr. Madison's party. … He argued unflinchingly for the English right of search, called it a 'consecrated' right, maintained that the allegiance of British subjects was perpetual, and that no residence in a foreign country could absolve them. … {3342} While such a man, with a large party behind him, took this position, it must simply be said that the American republic had not yet asserted itself to be a nation. Soon after the Revolution, when some one spoke of that contest to Franklin as the war for independence, he said, 'Say rather the war of the Revolution; the war for independence is yet to be fought.' The war of 1812 was just the contest he described. To this excitement directed against the war, the pulpit very largely contributed, the chief lever applied by the Federalist clergy being found in the atrocities of Napoleon. … The Federalist leaders took distinctly the ground that they should refuse to obey a conscription law to raise troops for the conquest of Canada; and when that very questionable measure failed by one vote in the Senate, the nation may have escaped a serious outbreak. … It might, indeed, have been far more dangerous than the Hartford Convention of 1814 [see UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814 (DECEMBER)], which was, after all, only a peaceable meeting of some two dozen men, with George Cabot at their head—men of whom very few had even a covert purpose of dissolving the Union, but who were driven to something very near desperation by the prostration of their commerce and the defencelessness of their coast."

T. W. Higginson, Larger History of the United States, chapter 15.

ALSO IN: H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, chapter 6.

H. C. Lodge, Life and Letters of George Cabot, chapters 11-12.

E. Quincy, Life of Josiah Quincy, chapters 11-14.

See, also, BLUE-LIGHT FEDERALISTS.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812 (September-November). The opening of the war on the New York frontier. The Battle of Queenstown Heights.

"To put Dearborn [who commanded in the northern department] in a condition to act with effect, Governor Tompkins [of the state of New York] made the greatest efforts to get out the New York quota of militia. The Democratic Legislature of Vermont voted to add to the pay of their militia in service as much as was paid by the United States. At the same time they passed a stringent drafting law, and offered $30 bounty to volunteers. By the co-operating exertions of these states and of the war department, some 3,000 regulars and 2,000 militia were presently assembled on Lake Champlain, under Dearborn's immediate command. Another force of 2,000 militia was stationed at different points along the south bank of the St. Lawrence, their left resting on Sackett's Harbor. A third army was collected along the Niagara River, from Fort Niagara to Buffalo, then a village of a thousand or two inhabitants, in the midst of a newly-settled district. This latter force of nearly 6,000 men, half regulars and volunteers and half militia, was under the immediate command of Major-general Van Rensselaer, a Federalist. … The first skirmishes on the New York frontier grew out of attempts, not unsuccessful, made principally from Ogdensburg, a new but much the largest village on the American side of the St. Lawrence, to intercept the British supplies proceeding upward in boats. The militia officer in command at Ogdensburg was General Jacob Brown. A Pennsylvanian by birth, a Quaker by education, while employed as a teacher in the city of New York, some newspaper essays of his had attracted the attention of Alexander Hamilton, to whom, during the quasi war of '98, he became military secretary. Removing afterward to the new settlements of Northwestern New York, his enterprise had founded the flourishing village of Brownsville, not far from Sackett's Harbor. … His success in repulsing a British force of 700 men, which attempted to cross from Prescott to attack Ogdensburg, laid the foundation of a military reputation which soon placed him at the head of the American army. There had been built on Lake Ontario, out of the gun-boat appropriations, but by a fortunate improvement upon Jefferson's model, a sloop of war of light draft, mounting 16 guns. This vessel, called the Oneida, just before the breaking out of the war had been furnished with a regular-bred commander and crew. She was attacked shortly after at Sackett's Harbor by five British vessels, three of them larger than herself, but manned only by lake watermen. By landing part of her guns, and establishing a battery on shore, she succeeded, however, in beating them off. Hull's failure having shown how important was the control of the lakes, a judicious selection was made of Captain Chauncey, hitherto at the head of the New York Navy Yard, to take command on those waters. Along with Henry Eckford as naval constructor, and soon followed by ship-carpenters, naval stores, guns, and presently by parties of seamen, he was sent to Sackett's Harbor [September, 1812], then held by a garrison of 200 regulars. That newly-settled region could supply nothing but timber; every thing else had to be transported from Albany at vast expense. … A 24-gun ship was at once commenced; for immediate use, Chauncey purchased six of the small schooners employed in the then infant commerce of the lake, which, though very ill adapted for war, he armed with four guns each. With these and the Oneida he put out on the lake, and soon [November 8] drove the British ships into Kingston. … While thus employed, Chauncey had sent Lieutenant Elliot to Buffalo, with a party of seamen, to make arrangements for a force on the upper lakes. Elliot, soon after his arrival, succeeded in cutting out [October 9] from under the guns of Fort Erie, nearly Opposite Buffalo, two British vessels just arrived from Detroit. One, the late Adams, which the British had armed and equipped, grounded, and it became necessary to destroy her. The other, the Caledonia, of two guns, was brought off, and became the nucleus of the naval force of Lake Erie. Elliot also purchased several small schooners lying in the Niagara River; but they, as well as the Caledonia, lay blockaded at Black Rock [now a part of the city of Buffalo], the passage into the lake being commanded by the guns of Fort Erie. The troops along the Niagara frontier, highly excited by Elliot's exploit, demanded to be led against the enemy; and, under the idea that the British village of Queenstown, at the foot of the falls [a few miles below] might furnish comfortable winter quarters for a part of his troops, Van Rensselaer resolved to attack it."

_R. Hildreth, History of the United States, 2d series, chapter 25 (volume 3)._

{3343}

The Niagara River, 35 miles long, which conducts the waters of the upper lakes through Erie into Ontario, constituted an important military frontier in such a war; its banks sparsely settled, and the crossing a narrow one. Below the roaring cataracts had assembled another little army, supplied in great measure by regiments of the New York quota, Major-General Van Rensselaer, of the militia of that State, a prominent Federalist, being in command. Hull's sudden surrender left Brock free to confront this second adversary with a moderate force from the Canada side, not without feeling uncertain as to where the American blow would be struck. By October Van Rensselaer had 6,000 men, half of them regulars; and, yielding to the impatience of his volunteers and the public press, he gave orders to cross the river from Lewiston to Queenston. High bluffs arose on either side. There were not boats enough provided to carry more than half the advance party at a time. Too much reliance was placed upon militia, while regulars won the laurels. Wool, a young captain, and Lieutenant-Colonel Scott did gallant work on Queenston Heights; and General Brock, the conqueror of Detroit, fell mortally wounded; but reinforcements crossed too slowly, and with the green militia dreading death, many of the reserve pleading legal exemption from service in an enemy's country, their deserted comrades on the Canada side, unable to return, were forced to surrender. Van Rensselaer, whose advance had been premature, resigned in disgust, leaving a less capable but more pretentious officer, of Virginia birth, General Alexander Smyth, to succeed him. Smyth had a gift of windy composition, which fortunately, imposed upon the inhabitants of Western New York just long enough to check despondency and restore a glow to the recruiting service. 'Come on, my heroes,' was his cry, 'and when you attack the enemy's batteries, let your rallying word be: "The cannon lost at Detroit, or death!". All this inkshed promised an exploit for invading Canada from the upper end of the Niagara, between Fort Erie and Chippewa. By the 27th of November Smyth had concentrated at Black Rock, near Buffalo, a fair army, 4,500 troops, comprising, in addition to the regulars, volunteer regiments from Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New York; the last under the command of General Porter, the representative in Congress, whose report, twelve months before, had given the first loud note of war. The big moment approached; but, notwithstanding the sonorous promise of 'memorable to-morrows,' and an embarkation to the music of 'Yankee Doodle,' one or two shivering attempts were made to land on the opposite shore, and then the volunteers were dismissed to their homes, and regulars ordered into winter-quarters. Disorderly scenes ensued. Our insubordinate and mortified soldiers discharged their muskets in all directions. Porter having openly charged Smyth with cowardice, the two crossed to Grand Island to fight a duel, and then shook hands. … But the country could not be reconciled to such generalship, and Smyth was presently cashiered."

J. Schouler, History of the United States, volume 2, chapter 8, section 2.

ALSO IN: _S. Van Rensselaer, Narrative of the Affair of Queenstown._

_J. Symons, The Battle of Queenstown Heights._

General W. Scott, Memoirs, by himself, volume 1, chapter 6.

_W. H. Merritt, Journal during the War of 1812._

H. Adams, History of the United States: First Administration of Madison, volume 2, chapter 16.

F. B. Tupper, Life and Correspondence of Major-General Sir Isaac Brock, chapters 13-14.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812. Seventh Presidential Election.

James Madison was re-elected, receiving in the electoral college 128 votes, against 89 cast for DeWitt Clinton, Federalist. Elbridge Gerry was elected Vice President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812-1813. Possession of West Florida taken from the Spaniards.

See FLORIDA: A. D. 1810-1813.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812-1813. Indifference to the Navy at the beginning of the war. Its Efficiency and its Early Successes.

"The young leaders of the war party in congress looked to successes on land and territorial conquest, and had an indifference to the field which the ocean afforded. And yet the triumphs of our young fleet in the Revolution, the alarm which John Paul Jones excited in English homes, and, later, the brilliant achievements in the Mediterranean, the heroes of which were still in the prime of their service, might have inspired better counsel. Madison's cabinet were said to have without exception opposed the increase and use of our navy; indeed, somewhat after Jefferson's idea in imposing the embargo—to save our vessels by laying them up. The advice of Captains Charles Stewart and William Bainbridge, who happened to be in Washington at the time of the declaration of war, determined Madison to bring the navy into active service. One of the chief causes of the war being the impressment of our seamen, it seems to-day surprising that their ardor in defense of 'Free Trade and Sailors' Rights,'—the cry under which our greatest triumphs were won—should have been either passed by or deprecated."

_J. A. Stevens, Second War with Great Britain (Magazine of American History, May-June, 1893)._

"Although [the American navy] had never been regarded by the government with favor, it happened that the three most essential measures had been adopted to secure its efficiency,— the ships built for it were the best of their class in the world, the officers had been carefully selected (200 out of a total of 500 having been retained under the Peace Establishment Act), and they had received—at least a large number of them—in Preble's squadron at Tripoli a training such as had fallen to the lot of few navies, either before or since. To these three causes the successes of 1812 were directly due; and although Commodore Preble died in 1807, the credit of the later war belongs more to him than to any other one man. It was not only that he formed many of the individual officers who won the victories of 1812-15,—for Hull, Decatur, Bainbridge, Macdonough, Porter, Lawrence, Biddle, Chauncey, Warrington, Charles Morris, and Stewart were all in his squadron,—but he created in the navy the professional spirit or idea, which was the main quality that distinguished it from the army in the war with Great Britain. At the outbreak of the war there were 18 vessels in the navy, ranging from 44-gun frigates to 12-gun brigs. There were also 176 gunboats, on which a large sum of money had been expended, but which were of no use whatever. … Immediately after the declaration of war, the frigates in commission in the home ports, together with two of the sloops, put to sea as a squadron under Commodore John Rodgers. They fell in with the English frigate 'Belvidera,' but she got away from them; and after an ineffectual cruise across the Atlantic, they returned home, without meeting anything of consequence.

{3344}

Three weeks later, the 'Constitution,' under Captain Hull, sailed from Annapolis. Soon after leaving the Chesapeake she came upon a British squadron of one sixty-four and four frigates, and then ensued the famous three days' chase, in the course of which, by a marvel of good seamanship and good discipline, the American frigate escaped. After a short respite in Boston, Hull set out again, and on the 19th of August he fought and captured the 'Guerrière,' Captain Dacres, in an engagement lasting about an hour. The 'Constitution,' being armed with 24-pounders instead of 18's, threw at a broadside a weight of shot half as large again as that of the 'Guerrière,' and her crew was numerically superior in a still greater degree. Nevertheless, the immensely greater disproportion in the casualties which the 'Constitution' inflicted and received, and the short time which she took to do the work, cannot be explained by the difference in force alone; for the 'Guerrière' had five times as many killed and wounded as her opponent, and at the close of the engagement she was a dismasted wreck, while the 'Constitution' had suffered no injury of importance. The essential point of difference lay in the practical training and skill of the crews in gunnery. … In the next action, in October, the sloop 'Wasp,' Captain Jacob Jones, captured the English brig 'Frolic,' of approximately the same force. The relative loss of English and Americans was again five to one. Both vessels were soon after taken by a seventy-four. Later in the same month, another frigate action took place, the 'United States,' under Decatur, capturing the 'Macedonian.' The advantage of the Americans in men was about the same as in the first action, while in guns it was greater. The American casualties were 13, the English 104. This difference was not due to the fact that the American guns were 24's and 42's, instead of 18's and 32's, or that the Americans had three more of them in a broadside; it was really due to the way in which the guns on both sides were handled. Shortly after this capture, a cruise in the Pacific was projected for a squadron to be composed of the 'Constitution,' 'Essex,' and 'Hornet.' The 'Essex' failed to meet the other vessels at the rendezvous off the coast of Brazil, and went on the Pacific cruise alone [having great success]. The 'Constitution,' now commanded by Bainbridge, met the frigate 'Java,' near Brazil, on the 29th of December. The antagonists were more nearly matched than in the previous frigate actions, but the fight, lasting a little over an hour, resulted in the total defeat and surrender of the 'Java,' with a loss of 124 to the Americans' 34. The 'Java' was a wreck, and could not be taken into port, and Bainbridge returned home. Two months later, February 24, 1813, the 'Hornet,' commanded by Lawrence, met the 'Peacock' off the Demerara, and reduced her in fifteen minutes to a sinking condition, while the 'Hornet's' hull was hardly scratched. The English sloop sank so quickly that she carried down part of her own crew and three of the 'Hornet's' who were trying to save them. The casualties, apart from those drowned, were 5 in the 'Hornet' and 38 in the 'Peacock.' … The moral effect in England of these defeats was very great. … In March, 1813, Admiral Sir John Warren assumed the command of the British squadron on the American coast. Although rather past his prime, his defects were more than compensated by the activity of his second in command, Rear-Admiral Cockburn, who during this summer and the next kept the coasts of Chesapeake Bay in a continuous state of alarm by successful raids, in which much valuable property was destroyed. Among the more important of the actions of 1813 were the capture and destruction (in part) of Havre de Grace, Md., early in May, and an attack on the village of Hampton, Va., on the 25th of June. 'Acts of rapine and violence' on the part of the invading forces characterized the latter attack, which excited intense indignation throughout the country. … In the summer of 1813 occurred the first serious reverse of the navy during the war. On the 1st of June the frigate 'Chesapeake,' Captain James Lawrence, sailed from Boston to engage the 'Shannon,' which was lying outside, waiting for the battle. The two ships were nearly matched in guns and men, what slight difference there was being in favor of the 'Chesapeake'; but the crew of the latter had been recently shipped and was partly composed of disaffected men, and Lawrence had had no time to discipline them. The engagement was short and decisive. Ranging up alongside of the 'Shannon,' whose crew had been brought to the highest state of efficiency by Captain Broke their commander, the 'Chesapeake' at the first fire received a severe injury in the loss of several of her officers. Falling foul of the 'Shannon' she was effectually raked, and presently a boarding party, led by Captain Broke, got possession of her deck. The great mortality among the officers [including Captain Lawrence, who had received a mortal wound just before his ship was boarded, and whose dying appeal, 'Don't give up the ship,' became the battle cry of the American navy during the remainder of the war], and the want of discipline in the crew, resulted in a victory for the boarders. The battle lasted fifteen minutes only, and the 'Chesapeake' was carried as a prize to Halifax. During this summer the naval war on the ocean continued with varying fortunes, two important actions being fought. The brig 'Argus,' Captain Allen, after a successful voyage in the Irish Sea, in which many prizes were taken and destroyed, was captured by the English brig 'Pelican,' on the 14th of August. Early in September the brig 'Enterprise,' commanded by Lieutenant Burrows, captured the English brig 'Boxer,' near Portland, Me."

J. R. Soley, The Wars of the United States (Narrative and Critical History of the United States, volume 7, chapter 6).

ALSO IN: T. Roosevelt, The Naval War of 1812, chapters 2-5.

J. F. Cooper, History of the Navy of the United States, volume 2, chapters 9-22.

A. S. Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, chapters 10-12.

_D. D. Porter, Memoirs of Commander David Porter._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812-1813. Harrison's northwestern campaign. Winchester's defeat. Perry's naval victory on Lake Erie. The Battle of the Thames and death of Tecumseh. Recovery of Detroit and Michigan.

"Great was the indignation of the West, great the mortification of our whole people, on learning that, instead of capturing Upper Canada at the first blow, we had lost our whole Michigan Territory. The task now was to retake Detroit under a competent commander. Ohio and Kentucky went on filling rapidly their quotas, while urging the administration to march them under Harrison. {3345} The President hesitated, doubtful whether Harrison was a man of sufficient military experience. He proposed that Monroe should go to the scene, as a volunteer, if not to command; but Monroe restrained his first military ardor, as was prudent, and Winchester, of Tennessee, another of the recent brigadiers, and a revolutionary veteran, was selected. The selection, however, gave umbrage to the Kentuckians, whose State government had already made Harrison a brevet major-general of militia. The hero of Tippecanoe was finally assigned to the chief command of the Western army, Madison countermanding his first orders. Harrison's route for Detroit was by way of Fort Wayne and Fort Defiance to the falls of the Maumee. But it was late in the fall [October 1812] before the new military arrangements could be completed; and through a swampy wilderness, infested as it was with hostile Indians, the progress of the column was toilsome and discouraging; and, except for the destruction of a few Indian villages on the way, the deeds of prowess were reserved for a winter campaign. … The winter expedition of the Northwest army … [was] retarded by a disaster which overtook Winchester's command near the Maumee Rapids, at a little village on the River Raisin. By Harrison's orders Winchester had started for these Rapids, whence, having first concentrated troops as if for winter quarters, the design was that he should advance 50 miles farther, when weather permitted, cross the frozen Detroit, and fall suddenly upon Malden. Winchester not only pushed on incautiously to his first destination, but, with a design more humane than prudent, undertook to protect against a British and Indian raid the alarmed inhabitants of Frenchtown [now Monroe, Michigan], a place 30 miles nearer Malden. Here [January 22, 1813] he was overpowered by the enemy, which fell upon the American force suddenly at daybreak, with yells and a shower of bomb-shells and canister. Winchester having been taken prisoner, Colonel Proctor, the British commander, extorted from him the unconditional surrender of all his troops, some 700 in number, as the only means of saving them from the tomahawk and scalping-knife. … Our sick and wounded … the British commander shamefully abandoned to their fate. … Officers and men, many of them the flower of Kentucky, perished victims to barbarities … abhorrent to civilized warfare, of which the British Colonel Proctor and Captain Elliott were not innocent. Besides the American loss in prisoners at the sad affair of the Raisin, nearly 200 were killed and missing. Hearing at the Upper Sandusky of Winchester's intended movement, Harrison had pressed to his relief with reinforcements, but fugitives from Frenchtown brought the melancholy tidings of disaster; and Harrison fell back to the Rapids, there to strengthen the post known as Fort Meigs, and go into winter quarters. The terms of many of his troops having now expired, the Northwestern army was for many months too feeble to begin a forward movement. But Harrison possessed the unabated confidence of the West, and, promoted to be one of the new major-generals, he received, through the zealous co-operation of Ohio and Kentucky, whose people were inflamed to take vengeance, enough volunteer reinforcements [May] to relieve Fort Meigs [which was twice besieged in 1813 by British and Indians] from Proctor's investment in the spring, and at length the quota requisite for resuming the offensive; other frontier plans of the War Department having long deranged his own in this quarter. The splendid co-operation of an American flotilla on Lake Erie opened the way to Detroit and victory. For that memorable service Commodore Chauncey had detailed an aspiring young naval officer, Captain Oliver H. Perry, of Rhode Island. Our little Lake squadron was tediously constructed at Presqu' Isle (now Erie). When all at last was ready [in August, 1813], Perry, who had long chafed in spirit while the British fleet hovered in sight like a hawk, sailed forth to dispute the supremacy of the broad inland waters. His heavier vessels were floated over the bar not without difficulty. After conferring at Sandusky upon the combined plan of operations with General Harrison, from whom he received a small detail of soldiers to act as marines and supply vacancies in his crews, he offered battle to Barclay, the British commander,—the latter a veteran in naval experience, who had served under Nelson at Trafalgar. Barclay had lain idly for several weeks at Malden, in hopes of procuring additional sailors, purposely avoiding an action meanwhile. But Proctor's army having now run short of provisions, longer delay was inexpedient. At sunrise on September 10th Perry descried the approaching British fleet from his look-out, a group of islands off Sandusky. Ten miles to the north of this locality, which was known as Put-in-bay, the two squadrons at noon engaged one another,—Perry approaching at an acute angle, and keeping the weather-gage, while Barclay's vessels hove to in close order. In officers and men the fleets were about equally matched; there were 6 British vessels to the American 9, but the former carried more guns, and were greatly superior for action from a distance. With 30 long guns to Perry's 15, Barclay had the decided advantage at first, and our flag-ship, the Lawrence, exposed to the heaviest of the British cannonade, became terribly battered, her decks wet with carnage, her guns dismounted. Undismayed by this catastrophe, Perry dropped into a little boat with his broad pennant and banner, and crossed to his next largest vessel, the Niagara, the target for 15 minutes of a furious fire while being rowed over. Climbing the Niagara's deck, and hoisting once more the emblems of commander, our brave captain now pierced the enemy's line with his new flag-ship, followed by his smaller vessels, and, gaining at last that advantage of a close engagement which for nearly three hours had eluded him, he won the fight in eight minutes. The colors of the Detroit, Barclay's flag-ship, struck first, three others followed the example, and two of the British squadron attempting to escape were overtaken and brought back triumphantly. 'We have met the enemy and they are ours,' was Perry's laconic dispatch to Harrison, written in pencil on the back of an old letter, with his navy-cap for a rest; 'two ships, two brigs, one schooner, and one sloop.' … Barclay lay dangerously wounded, and his next in command died that evening. … To Harrison's expectant army, augmented by 3,500 mounted Kentuckians, whom Governor Shelby led in person, the word of advance was now given. … {3346} Perry's flotilla, aided by the captured vessels, presently landed the American troops on the Canada side. Proctor had already begun the retreat, having first dismantled the fort at Malden and burned the barracks. Harrison pursued him beyond Sandwich, covered by the flotilla, until near a Moravian town, up the river Thames [some 30 miles east of Lake St. Clair], the enemy was overtaken, with Tecumseh's braves. Here, upon well-chosen ground, the British made a final stand [October 5], but at the first impetuous charge of our cavalry their line broke, and only the Indians remained to engage in a desperate hand-to-hand fight. Among the slain was the famous Tecumseh, dispatched, as tradition asserts, by the pistol of Colonel Johnson, a Kentucky officer prominent in the battle. Proctor himself escaped in a carriage with a few followers, incurring afterwards the royal reprimand. … The baleful British and Indian alliance was broken up by these victories, while Detroit, Michigan, and all that Hull had lost, and a fair portion of Upper Canada besides, passed into American control. Among American generals in this war Harrison enjoyed the rare felicity of having fully accomplished his undertaking."

J. Schouler, History of the United States, chapter 8, section 2 and chapter 9, section 1 (volume 2).

"The victory of Lake Erie was most important, both in its material results and in its moral effect. It gave us complete command of all the upper lakes, prevented any fears of invasion from that quarter, increased our prestige with the foe and our confidence in ourselves, and ensured the conquest of Upper Canada; in all these respects its importance has not been overrated. But the 'glory' acquired by it most certainly has been estimated at more than its worth. … The simple truth is, that, where on both sides the officers and men were equally brave and skilful, the side which possessed the superiority in force, in the proportion of three to two, could not well help winning. … Though we had nine guns less, yet, at a broadside, they threw half as much metal again as those of our antagonist."

T. Roosevelt, The Naval War of 1812, chapter 6.

ALSO IN: C. D. Yonge, History of the British Navy, chapter 36 (volume 3).

E. Eggleston and L. E. Seelye, Tecumseh, chapters 26-34.

I. R. Jackson, Life of W. H. Harrison, chapters 7-9.

B. J. Lossing, Field Book of the War of 1812, chapters 16-17, and 23-26.

_G. Bancroft, History of the Battle of Lake Erie._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1813 (April-July). The burning of Toronto. The capture of Fort George.

"The American fleet on Lake Ontario had been increased, and in 1813 controlled the lake. General Sheaffe had succeeded Brock as Governor as well as commander of the forces. Some 600 troops were in York [now Toronto], the capital. York had about 1,000 inhabitants, and was not regarded as of strategic importance. The Americans, however, set sail from Sackett's Harbour with 16 sail and 2,500 men to attack it. The enemy landed [April 27] to the west of the town, and General Sheaffe evacuated the works, and retired down the Kingston Road. The Americans invested the town, and though skirmishing took place, had an easy victory. The land force was under General Pike, an officer well known as having, when a lieutenant, explored the sources of the Mississippi. Just as the Americans had well filled the fort, the powder-magazine exploded with violence, killing and wounding about 250. General Pike, struck in the breast by a flying stone, died soon after. The Americans, contrary to the articles of surrender, shamefully burnt the town, and retired from York on the 2nd of May, 1813. While the squadron was absent, Sackett's Harbour was attacked by a strong force. The garrison seemed to be on the point of surrendering the fort, when Sir George Prevost, to the surprise of all, ordered a retreat. Little York taken, Commodore Chauncey then crossed the lake to Fort George at the mouth of the Niagara River. General Vincent commanded the fort. Twenty-four of Hull's guns frowned from its bastions. Its defender had 1,340 men. The American army on the Niagara frontier numbered 6,000. Chauncey had eleven war-vessels and 900 seamen. On the 27th of May the expected day came. Vincent drew his men out about a mile from the fort and awaited the attack. He was overpowered and retired, having lost nearly 450 soldiers. The Canadian force retired to a strong position, 'Beaver Dams,' twelve miles from Niagara on the heights, having given up Fort Erie and Chippewa and blown up Fort George. Vincent had now 1,600 men, and with these he retired to Burlington Heights, near the present city of Hamilton. An American army of 2,500 men followed General Vincent to Stoney Creek. On the night of the 8th of June, Colonel Harvey of the British force, with upwards of 750 men, fell stealthily on the sleeping American army, scattered the troops, killed many, captured the American generals Chandler and Winder, and about 100 men, along with guns and stores. The adventurers then retired to their camp. The scattered American soldiers reassembled in the morning and retired in a disorderly manner down the country to Fort George. Vincent now followed the retreating army and reoccupied Beaver Dams. One of his outposts was held by Lieutenant Fitzgibbon and 30 men. Smarting with defeat, the American general sought to surprise this station as a basis for future attacks. He secretly despatched Colonel Boerstler with nearly 700 men to capture it. A wounded militiaman, living within the lines at Queenston, heard by chance of the expedition. … The alarm was given [by the militiaman's wife, who travelled 20 miles through the forest, at night] and that night the men lay on their arms. Early next morning the American party came, but an ambuscade had been prepared for them, and after severe fighting 542 men surrendered into the hands of some 260. General Dearborn soon after retired from the command of the American army, to be succeeded by General Boyd. British parties captured Fort Schlosser and Black Rock on the Niagara River at this time, though at the latter place with the loss of Colonel Bishopp, the idol of his men. Colonel Scott, in command of troops on board Commodore Chauncey's fleet, again scoured Lake Ontario. Landing at Burlington Heights on the 31st of July, they did nothing more than reconnoitre the works and depart. Afterwards the second attack on York was made and the barracks burnt. After this a trial of strength took place between Sir James Yeo's fleet, now sent forth from Kingston Harbour, and Chauncey's squadron. The Americans lost two vessels in a squall, and two were captured by the British, but the result between the two fleets was indecisive."

G. Bryce, Short History of the Canadian People, chapter 8, section 5.

ALSO IN: R. Johnson, History of the War of 1812-1815, chapter 7.

{3347}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1813 (October-November). The abortive expedition against Montreal.

"While Perry and Harrison were … reclaiming our lost ground on Lake Erie and in the northwest, Armstrong was preparing to carry out his favorite plan of a descent on Kingston and Montreal. When he accepted the post of Secretary of War, he transferred his department from Washington to Sackett's Harbor, so that he might superintend in person the progress of the campaign. … Although Wilkinson had superseded Dearborn, as commander-in-chief of this district in July, he did not issue his first orders to the army till the 23d of August. … General Wade Hampton, who had been recalled from the fifth military district to the northern frontier, encamped with his army, 4,000 strong, at Plattsburg, on Lake Champlain. The plan finally adopted by the Secretary was, to have Wilkinson drop down the St. Lawrence, and without stopping to attack the English posts on the river, form a junction with General Hampton, when the two armies should march at once on Montreal. These two Generals were both Revolutionary officers, and consequently too advanced in years to carry such an expedition through with vigor and activity. Besides, a hostile feeling separated them, rendering each jealous of the other's command. … Chauncey, In the mean time, after an action with Yeo, in which both parties claimed the victory, forced his adversary to take refuge in Burlington Bay. He then wrote to Wilkinson that the lake was clear of the enemy, and reported himself ready to transport the troops down the St. Lawrence. The greatest expectations were formed of this expedition. The people knew nothing of the quarrel between Wilkinson and Hampton, and thought only of the strength of their united force. … While Wilkinson was preparing to fulfill his part of the campaign, Hampton made a bold push into Canada on his own responsibility. Advancing from Plattsburg, he marched directly for St. John, but finding water scarce for his draft cattle, owing to a severe drought, he moved to the left, and next day arrived at Chateaugay Four Corners, a few miles from the Canada line. Here he was overtaken by an order from Armstrong, commanding him to remain where he was, until the arrival of Wilkinson. But jealous of his rival, and wishing to achieve a victory in which the honor would not be divided, he resolved to take upon himself the responsibility of advancing alone. Several detachments of militia had augmented his force of 4,000, and he deemed himself sufficiently strong to attack Prevost, who he was told had only about 2,000 ill assorted troops under him. He therefore gave orders to march, and cutting a road for 24 miles through the wilderness, after five days great toil, reached the British position. Ignorant of its weakness, he dispatched Colonel Purdy at night by a circuitous route to gain the enemy's flank and rear and assail his works, while he attacked them in front. Bewildered by the darkness, and led astray by his guide, Colonel Purdy wandered through the forest, entirely ignorant of the whereabouts of the enemy or of his own. General Hampton, however, supposing that he had succeeded in his attempt, ordered General Izard to advance with the main body of the army, and as soon as firing was heard in the rear to commence the attack in front. Izard marched up his men and a skirmish ensued, when Colonel De Salaberry, the British commander, who had but a handful of regulars under him, ordered the bugles, which had been placed at some distance apart on purpose to represent a large force, to sound the charge. The ruse succeeded admirably, and a halt was ordered. The bugles brought up the lost detachment of Purdy, but suddenly assailed by a concealed body of militia, his command was thrown into disorder and broke and fled. Disconcerted by the defeat of Purdy, Hampton ordered a retreat, without making any attempt to carry the British intrenchments. … Hampton, defeated by the blasts of a few bugles, took up his position again at the Four Corners, to wait further news from Wilkinson's division. The latter having concentrated his troops at Grenadier Island, embarked them again the same day that Hampton advanced, against orders, towards Montreal. Three hundred boats, covering the river for miles, carried the infantry and artillery, while the cavalry, 500 strong, marched along the bank. … They were two weeks in reaching the river. Wilkinson, who had been recalled from New Orleans, to take charge of this expedition, was prostrated by the lake fever, which, added to the infirmities of age, rendered him wholly unfit for the position he occupied. General Lewis, his second in command, was also sick. The season was already far advanced—the autumnal storms had set in earlier than usual—everything conspired to ensure defeat; and around this wreck of a commander, tossed an army, dispirited, disgusted, and doomed to disgrace. General Brown led the advance of this army of invasion, as it started for Montreal, 180 miles distant. … When it reached the head of the long rapids at Hamilton, 20 miles below Ogdensburg, Wilkinson ordered General Brown to advance by land and cover the passage of the boats through the narrow defiles, where the enemy had established block houses. In the mean time the cavalry had crossed over to the Canadian side and, with 1,500 men under General Boyd, been despatched against the enemy, which was constantly harassing his rear. General Boyd, accompanied by Generals Swartwout and Covington as volunteers, moved forward in three columns. Colonel Ripley advancing with the 21st Regiment, drove the enemy's sharp shooters from the woods, and emerged on an open space, called Chrystler's Field, and directly in front of two English regiments. Notwithstanding the disparity of numbers this gallant officer ordered a charge, which was executed with such firmness that the two regiments retired. Rallying and making a stand, they were again charged and driven back. … At length the British retired to their camp and the Americans maintained their position on the shore, so that the flotilla passed the Saut in safety. This action [called the battle of Chrystler's Farm, or Williamsburg] has never received the praise it deserves—the disgraceful failure of the campaign having cast a shadow upon it. The British, though inferior in numbers, had greatly the advantage in having possession of a stone house in the midst of the field. … {3348} Nearly one-fifth of the entire force engaged were killed or wounded. … The army, however, still held its course for Montreal. Young Scott, who had joined the expedition at Ogdensburg, was 15 miles ahead, clearing, with a detachment of less than 800 men, the river banks as he went. Montreal was known to be feebly garrisoned, and Wilkinson had no doubt it would fall an easy conquest. He therefore sent forward to Hampton to join him at St. Regis, with provisions. Hampton, in reply, said, that his men could bring no more provisions than they wanted for their own use, and informed him, in short, that he should not co-operate with him at all, but make the best of his way back to Lake Champlain. On receiving this astounding news, Wilkinson called a council of war, which reprobated in strong terms the conduct of Hampton, and decided that in consideration of his failure, and the lateness of the season, the march should be suspended, and the army retire to winter quarters. This was carried into effect, and Wilkinson repaired to French Mills, on Salmon river, for the winter, and Hampton to Plattsburg."

J. T. Headley, The Second War with England, volume 1, chapter. 13.

ALSO IN: W. C. Bryant and S. H. Gay, Popular History of the United States, volume 4, chapter 8.

S. Perkins, History of the Late War, chapter 12.

J. Armstrong, Notices of the War of 1812, volume 2, chapter 1.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1813 (December). Retaliatory devastation of the Niagara frontier. Fort Niagara surprised. The burning of Buffalo.

"The withdrawal of troops from the Niagara frontier to take part in Wilkinson's expedition left the defence of that line almost entirely to militia, and the term for which the militia had been called out expired on the 9th of December. The next day General George McClure, who had been left in command at Fort George, found himself at the head of but 60 effective men, while the British General Drummond had brought up to the peninsula 400 troops and 70 Indians—released by the failure of Wilkinson's expedition—and was preparing to attack him. McClure thereupon determined to evacuate the fort, as the only alternative from capture or destruction, and remove his men and stores across the river to Fort Niagara. He also determined to burn the village of Newark, that the enemy might find no shelter. The laudable part of this plan was but imperfectly carried out; he failed to destroy the barracks, and left unharmed tents for 1,500 men, several pieces of artillery, and a large quantity of ammunition, all of which fell into the hands of Drummond's men. But the inexcusable part—the burning of a village in midwinter, inhabited by noncombatants who had been guilty of no special offence—was only too faithfully executed. The inhabitants were given twelve hours in which to remove their goods, and then the torch was applied, and not a house was left standing. This needless cruelty produced its natural result; Drummond determined upon swift and ample retaliation. In the night of December 18th, just one week after the burning of Newark, he threw across the Niagara a force of 550 men. They landed at Five Mile Meadows, three miles above Fort Niagara, and marched upon it at once, arriving there at four o'clock in the morning. McClure, who had received an intimation of the enemy's intention to devastate the American frontier, had gone to Buffalo to raise a force to oppose him. The garrison of the fort consisted of about 450 men, a large number of whom were in the hospital. The command had been left to a Captain Leonard, who at this time was three miles away, sleeping at a farm-house. The most elaborate preparations had been made for the capture of the fort, including scaling-ladders for mounting the bastions. But the Americans seemed to have studied to make the task as easy as possible. The sentries were seized and silenced before they could give any alarm, and the main gate was found standing wide open, so that the British had only to walk straight in and begin at once the stabbing which had been determined upon. The guard in the south-east block-house tired one volley, by which the British commander, Colonel Murray, was wounded, and a portion of the invalids made what resistance they could. A British lieutenant and five men were killed, and a surgeon and three men wounded. Sixty-five Americans, two-thirds of whom were invalids, were bayoneted in their beds; 15 others, who had taken refuge in the cellars, were despatched in the same manner, and 14 were wounded; 20 escaped, and all the others, about 340, were made prisoners. … On the same morning, General Riall, with a detachment of British troops and 500 Indians, crossed from Queenstown." Lewiston, Youngstown, Tuscarora and Manchester (now Niagara Falls) were plundered and burned, and the houses and barns of farmers along the river, within a belt of several miles, were destroyed. "The bridge over Tonawanda Creek had been destroyed by the Americans, and at this point the enemy turned back, and soon recrossed the Niagara to the Canada side. The alarm at Buffalo brought General Hall, of the New York militia, to that village, where he arrived the day after Christmas. He found collected there a body of 1,700 men, whom it would have been gross flattery to call a 'force.' They were poorly supplied with arms and cartridges, and had no discipline and almost no organization. Another regiment of 300 soon joined them, but without adding much to their efficiency. On the 28th of December, Drummond reconnoitred the American camp, and determined to attack it; for which purpose he sent over General Riall on the evening of the 29th with 1,450 men, largely regulars, and a body of Indians. One detachment landed two miles below Black Rock, crossed Canajokaties [or Scajaquada] Creek in the face of a slight resistance, and took possession of a battery. The remainder landed at a point between Buffalo and Black Rock [two villages then, now united in one city], under cover of a battery on the Canadian shore. Poor as Hall's troops were, they stood long enough to fire upon the invaders and inflict considerable loss. … Both sides had artillery, with which the action was opened. As it progressed, however, the American line was broken in the centre, and Hall was compelled to fall back. His subsequent attempts to rally his men were of no avail, and he himself seems to have lost heart, as Lieutenant Riddle, who had about 80 regulars, offered to place them in front for the encouragement of the militia to new exertion, but Hall declined. … Both Buffalo and Black Rock were sacked and burned, and no mercy was shown. With but two or three exceptions, those of the inhabitants who were not able to run away were massacred. … {3349} It is related that in Buffalo a widow named St. John 'had the address to appease the ferocity of the enemy so far as to remain in her house uninjured.' Her house and the stone jail were the only buildings not laid in ashes. In Black Rock every building was either burned or blown up, except one log house, in which a few women and children had taken refuge. … Five vessels lying at the wharves were also burned. In this expedition the British lost 108 men, killed, wounded or missing. More than 50 of the Americans were found dead on the field. Truly, an abundant revenge had been taken for the burning of Newark. … On New Year's day of 1814 the settlers along the whole length of the Niagara—those of them who survived—were shivering beside the smouldering embers of their homes."

R. Johnson, History of the War of 1812-1815, chapter 9.

ALSO IN: C. Johnson, Centennial History of Erie County, New York, chapters 24-25.

W. Ketchum, History of Buffalo, volume 2, chapter 15.

O. Turner, Pioneer History of the Holland Purchase, pages 589-606.

_W. Dorsheimer, Buffalo during the war of 1812 (Buffalo Historical Society Publication, volume 1)._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1813-1814. British blockade of the Atlantic coast.

"The blockade of the Atlantic coast was enforced by British vessels from the beginning of the year 1813. At first they were inclined to spare the coast of New England, which they supposed to be friendly to Great Britain, but this policy was soon abandoned, and the whole coast was treated alike. Groups of war-vessels were stationed before each of the principal sea-ports, and others were continually in motion along the coast, from Halifax on the north to the West Indies. Early in 1813, they took possession of the mouth of Chesapeake Bay as a naval station, and the American Government ordered all the lights to be put out in the neighboring light-houses. The Atlantic coast was thus kept in a state of almost constant alarm, for the British vessels were continually landing men at exposed points to burn, plunder, and destroy. … In 1813, the defenceless towns of Lewes, Havre de Grace, and Hampton (near Fortress Monroe) were bombarded, and Stonington, Conn., in 1814; and a number of smaller towns were burned or plundered. Attacks on New York and other larger cities were prevented only by fear of torpedoes, by means of which the Americans had nearly blown up one or two British ships which ventured too near New York. … Maine, as far as the Penobscot River, was seized by the British in 1814, and was held until the end of the war."

A. Johnston, History of the United States for Schools, sections 384-386.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1813-1814 (August-April). The Creek War. General Jackson's first campaign.

The great Indian chief Tecumseh had been trying for years to unite all the red men against the whites. There would have been an Indian war if there had been no war with England, but the latter war seemed to be Tecumseh's opportunity. Among the southwestern Indians he found acceptance only with the Creeks, who were already on the verge of civil war, because some wanted to adopt civilized life, and others refused. The latter became the war party, under Weatherford [Red Eagle], a very able half-breed chief. The first outbreak in the Southwest, although there had been some earlier hostilities, was the massacre of the garrison and refugees at Fort Mims, at the junction of the Alabama and Tombigbee rivers, August 30, 1813. There were 553 persons in the fort, of whom only 5 or 6 escaped. … The result of the massacre at Fort Mims was that Alabama was almost abandoned by whites. Terror and desire for revenge took possession of Georgia and Tennessee. September 25th the Tennessee Legislature voted to raise men and money to aid the people of Mississippi territory against the Creeks." Andrew Jackson, one of the two major-generals of the Tennessee militia, was then confined to his bed by a wound received in a recent fight with Thomas H. Benton and Benton's brother. "As soon as he possibly could, Jackson took the field. Georgia had a force in the field under General Floyd. General Claiborne was acting at the head of troops from Louisiana and Mississippi. This Indian war had a local character and was outside the federal operations, although in the end it had a great effect upon them. … The Creek war was remarkable for three things: (1) the quarrels between the generals, and the want of concert of action; (2) lack of provisions; (3) insubordination in the ranks. … On three occasions Jackson had to use one part of his army to prevent another part from marching home, he and they differing on the construction of the terms of enlistment. He showed very strong qualities under these trying circumstances. … In the conduct of the movements against the enemy his energy was very remarkable. So long as there was an enemy unsubdued Jackson could not rest, and could not give heed to anything else. … At the end of March [1814] Jackson destroyed a body of the Creeks at Tohopeka, or Horse-Shoe Bend, in the northeast corner of the present Tallapoosa County, Alabama. With the least possible delay he pushed on to the last refuge of the Creeks, the Hickory Ground, at the confluence of the Coosa and Tallapoosa, and the Holy Ground a few miles distant. The medicine men, appealing to the superstition of the Indians, had taught them to believe that no white man could tread the latter ground and live. In April the remnant of the Creeks surrendered or fled to Florida, overcome as much by the impetuous and relentless character of the campaign against them as by actual blows. Fort Jackson was built on the Hickory Ground. The march down through Alabama was a great achievement, considering the circumstances of the country at the time. … The Creek campaign lasted only seven months. In itself considered, it was by no means an important Indian war, but in its connection with other military movements it was very important. Tecumseh had been killed at the battle of the Thames, in Canada, October 5, 1813. His scheme of a race war died with him. The Creek campaign put an end to any danger of hostilities from the southwestern Indians, in alliance either with other Indians or with the English. … This campaign … was the beginning of Jackson's fame and popularity, and from it dates his career. He was 47 years old. On the 31st of May he was appointed a major-general in the army of the United States, and was given command of the department of the South. He established his headquarters at Mobile in August, 1814."

W. G. Sumner, Andrew Jackson as a Public Man, chapter 2.

{3350}

ALSO IN: _G. C. Eggleston, Red Eagle._

J. W. Monette, Discovery and Settlement of the Valley of the Mississippi, book 5, chapter 14 (volume 2).

B. J. Lossing, Field Book of the War of 1812, chapters 33-34.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814 (July-September). On the Niagara Frontier. Chippewa. Lundy's Lane. Fort Erie.

"After the desolation of the Niagara frontier in 1813, there appeared to be nothing for the parties to contend for in that quarter. No object could be obtained by a victory on either side, but the temporary occupation of a vacant territory; yet both parties seemed to have selected this as the principal theatre on which to display their military prowess in the year 1814. Lieutenant General Drummond, governor of Upper Canada, concentrated the forces of that province at Fort George, and retained the possession of Niagara. The American Generals Smyth, Hampton, Dearborn, and Wilkinson, under whose auspices the campaigns of 1812 and 1813, on the Canada border, were conducted, had retired from that field; and General Brown was appointed major general, and, with the assistance of Brigadiers Scott and Ripley, designated to the command of the Niagara frontier. He left Sackett's Harbour in May, with a large portion of the American troops. … On his arrival at Buffalo, calculating upon the co-operation of the Ontario fleet, he determined on an attempt to expel the British from the Niagara peninsula. With this view he crossed the river on the 3d of July. … On the same day he invested Fort Erie, and summoned it to surrender, allowing the commandant two hours to answer the summons. At five in the afternoon the fort surrendered, and the prisoners, amounting to 137, were removed to Buffalo. On the morning of the fourth General Scott advanced with his brigade and corps of artillery, and took a position on the Chippewa plain, half a mile in front of the village, his right resting on the river, and his front protected by a ravine. The British were encamped in force at the village. In the evening General Brown joined him with the reserve under General Ripley, and the artillery commanded by Major Hindman. General Porter arrived the next morning, with the New York and Pennsylvania volunteers, and a number of Indians of the six nations. … At four in the afternoon, General Porter advanced, taking the woods in order to conceal his approach, and … met the whole British force approaching in order of battle. General Scott, with his brigade and Towser's artillery, met them on the plain, in front of the American encampment, and was directly engaged in close action with the main body. General Porter's command gave way. … The reserve were now ordered up, and General Ripley passed to the woods in left of the line to gain the rear of the enemy; but before this was effected, General Scott had compelled the British to retire. Their whole line now fell back, and were eagerly pursued. … The British left 200 dead on the ground. … The American loss was 60 killed, and 268 wounded and missing. After the battle of Chippewa, the British retired to Fort George; and General Brown took post at Queenston, where he remained some time, expecting reinforcements. … On the 20th, General Brown advanced with his army towards Fort George, drove in the outposts, and encamped near the fort, in the expectation that the British would come out and give him battle. On the 22d, he returned to his former position at Queenston; here he received a letter from General Gaines, informing him that the heavy guns, and the rifle regiment, which he had ordered from Sackett's harbour, together with the whole fleet, were blockaded in that port, and no assistance was to be expected from them. On the 24th, he fell back to Chippewa, and on the 25th received intelligence that the enemy, having received large reinforcements from Kingston, were advancing upon him. The first brigade under General Scott, Towser's artillery, all the dragoons and mounted men, were immediately put in motion on the Queenston road. On his arrival at the Niagara cataract, General Scott learned that the British were in force directly in his front, separated only by a narrow piece of wood. Having despatched this intelligence to General Brown, he advanced upon the enemy, and the action commenced at six o'clock in the afternoon. … The British artillery had taken post on a commanding eminence, at the head of Lundy's lane, supported by a line of infantry, out of the reach of the American batteries. This was the key of the whole position; from hence they poured a most deadly fire on the American ranks. It became necessary either to leave the ground, or to carry this post and seize the height. The latter desperate task was assigned to Colonel Miller. On receiving the order from General Brown, he calmly surveyed the position, and answered 'I will try, sir,' which expression was afterwards the motto of his regiment. … Colonel Miller advanced coolly and steadily to his object, amid a tremendous fire, and at the point of the bayonet, carried the artillery and the height. The guns were immediately turned upon the enemy; General Ripley now brought up the 23d regiment, to the support of Colonel Miller; the first regiment was rallied and brought into line, and the British were driven from the hill. … The British rallied under the hill, and made a desperate attempt to regain their artillery, and drive the Americans from their position, but without success; a second and third attempt was made with the like result. General Scott was engaged in repelling these attacks, and though with his shoulder fractured, and a severe wound in the side, continued at the head of his column, endeavouring to turn the enemy's right flank. The volunteers under General Porter, during the last charge of the British, precipitated themselves upon their lines, broke them, and took a large number of prisoners. General Brown … received a severe wound on the thigh, and in the side, and … consigned the command to General Ripley. At twelve o'clock, both parties retired from the field to their respective encampments, fatigued and satiated with slaughter. … The battle [called Lundy's Lane, or Bridgewater, or Niagara] was fought to the west of, and within half a mile of the Niagara cataract. … Considering the numbers engaged, few contests have ever been more sanguinary. … General Brown states his loss to be, killed, 171; wounded, 572; missing, 117; [total] 860. General Drummond acknowledges a loss of, killed, 84; wounded, 559; missing and prisoners, 235; [total] 878. … General Ripley, on the 26th, fell back to Fort Erie. General Brown retired to Buffalo, and General Scott to Batavia, to recover from their wounds."

S. Perkins, History of the Late War, chapter 17.

{3351}

"Fort Erie was a small work with two demi-bastions; one upon the north and the other upon the south front. It was built of stone, but was not of sufficient strength to resist ordnance heavier than the field artillery of that day. Ripley at once commenced to strengthen the position. Fortunately, General Drummond delayed his advance for two days, giving the Americans an opportunity of which they industriously availed themselves. … Fort Erie was changed into an entrenched camp, with its rear open toward the river. General Drummond appeared before the fort, on the 3d of August, with a force of 5,350 men. He established his camp two miles distant, back of Waterloo, and commenced a double line of entrenchments within 400 yards of the main work. The same morning he threw a force of about 1,000 men across the river, and landed them below Squaw Island, with the intention of seizing Buffalo, destroying the stores gathered there, and interrupting the communications of the American army. This soldierly plan was happily frustrated by Major Morgan with a battalion of the First Rifles, 250 strong. … During the following fortnight several skirmishes occurred in front of Fort Erie, in one of which the gallant Colonel Morgan was killed. General Drummond, having been still further reinforced, determined not to wait for the slow results of a siege, but to carry the place by assault. At two o'clock in the morning of the 3d of August, the British army moved to the attack in three columns. One was ordered to carry the Douglass battery, upon the extreme right of our position; another column was to engage the fort itself; but the main attack was directed against the Towson battery upon Snake Hill. Brigadier-General Gaines, who had lately arrived, was now in command of the American forces. … The evening before, a shell had exploded a small magazine in Fort Erie, and General Gaines was apprehensive that the enemy would take advantage of this disaster and attack him,—one-third of the troops were therefore kept at their post through the night, which was dark and rainy. His precautions were well taken. At half-past two the tramp of a heavy column was heard approaching Towson's redoubt. Instantly a sheet of fire flashed from our lines, lighting up the night, and revealing the enemy 1,500 strong. They had been ordered to attack with the bayonet; and, to insure obedience, the flints had been removed from their muskets. With complete courage they approached to within reach of the light abattis, between Snake Hill and the lake. But after a desperate struggle they fell back. Again they advanced, and this time succeeded in planting scaling ladders in the ditch in front of the redoubt. But their ladders were too short, and the assailants were driven off with severe loss. Meanwhile a detachment endeavored to turn our position by wading out into the river, and passing round our left. Ripley met them promptly. Numbers were killed or wounded, and were carried off by the current, and the remainder of the detachment were captured: Five times the obstinate English returned to the assault, but each time without success. … The other British columns waited until the engagement on the left was at its height. On our right the enemy advanced to within 50 yards of the Douglass battery, but were then driven back. At the fort the contest was more severe. The assailants, led by Colonel Drummond, an officer of singular determination, advanced through a ravine north of the fort, and attacking simultaneously all the salient points, they swarmed over the parapet into the north bastion. … The garrison of the fort rallied, and after a severe contest succeeded in regaining possession of the bastion. A second and third time Drummond returned to the assault with no better success. But with invincible tenacity he clung to his purpose. Moving his troops, under cover of the night and the dense cloud of battle which hung along the ramparts, silently round the ditch, he suddenly repeated the charge. The English ran up their ladders so quickly that they gained the top of the glacis before the defenders could rally to resist them. … The garrison of the fort made repeated unsuccessful efforts to retake the bastion; but at day-break it was still in the enemy's possession. Powerful detachments were then brought up from the left and center, and a combined attempt was made from several different directions to drive the British from their position; but, after a desperate struggle, this likewise failed. The guns of the Douglass battery, and those under Captain Fanning, were turned upon the bastion, and Captain Biddle was placing a piece of artillery to enfilade it, while several hundred of the American reserve stood ready to rush upon it. At this moment a loud explosion shook the earth, and the whole bastion leaped into the air, carrying with it both its assailants and defenders. The cause of this explosion has never been accurately ascertained. It is generally supposed to have been accidental. … The shattered columns of the foe now retired to their encampment. The British report stated their loss at 905 killed, wounded and missing; of whom 222 were killed, including 14 officers; 174 wounded; and 186 prisoners remained in our hands. Our loss, including 11 prisoners, was 84 men. In the bombardment of the day before we had 45 killed and wounded; swelling our total loss to 129. A few days after this, Drummond was reinforced by two regiments, and reopened fire along his own line. The bombardment continued through the remainder of the month of August. On the 28th, General Gaines was wounded by a shell, which fell into his quarters, and General Ripley again assumed the command, but was soon superseded by General Brown, who had recovered from the wound received at Lundy's Lane. General Porter, by dint of superhuman efforts, gathered a considerable body of militia at Buffalo, to reinforce the fort. … Notwithstanding the victory I have just described, and the reinforcements brought by Porter, the American army at Fort Erie was in a very dangerous situation. Their foe was daily increasing in number, and three new batteries were thrown up, whose fire was rapidly making the position untenable. … Under the pressure of this great necessity, General Porter planned a sortie, which was submitted to General Brown; who approved it, and ordered it to be carried out. … By this enterprise, altogether the most brilliant military event which occurred on this frontier during the war, all of the enemy's guns in position were made useless, and their entrenchments destroyed. We took 385 prisoners, including 11 commissioned officers, and killed or wounded 600 men. Our own loss was 510. … Four days after this, General Drummond raised the siege, and fell back to Fort George."

_W. Dorsheimer, Buffalo during the War of 1812 (Buffalo Historical Society Publications, volume 1)._

ALSO IN: _E. Cruikshank, The Battle of Lundy's Lane (Lundy's Lane Historical Society)._

General W. Scott, Memoirs by himself, chapters 9-11 (volume 1).

C. Johnson, Centennial History of Erie County, New York, chapter 26.

B. J. Lossing, Field Book of the War of 1812, chapters 35-36.

_The Attack on Fort Erie (Portfolio, February, 1816)._

{3352}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814 (August-September). Capture and destruction of the national Capital. Attempt against Baltimore.

Early in the "summer of 1814, rumors spread through the capital of a great British armament preparing at Bermuda, some said for an attack on New York, others on Baltimore and Annapolis, while others asserted quite as vehemently that the national capital was the chosen object of British vengeance. How easy it would be, they argued, for Admiral Sir George Cockburn, who had been a year with his fleet in Chesapeake Bay, when reinforced by the Bermuda armament to disembark a strong column at any point on the western shore of the Chesapeake—but forty miles distant—and by a forced march capture the city. But by some strange fatuity, the President and his cabinet treated these possibilities as unworthy of credence. 'The British come here!' a Cabinet officer is reported to have said, in answer to the representations of citizens. "What should they come here for?' Sure enough: a provincial village of 6,000 inhabitants. But then there were the state papers and public buildings, the moral effect of capturing an enemy's capital, and the satisfaction of chastising the city where a British minister had been obliged to ask for his recall on the ground of ill-treatment. … Colonel James Monroe, a gallant soldier of the Revolution, was now Secretary of State; another Revolutionary soldier, General Armstrong, was Secretary of War, and acting on their advice, President Madison did substantially nothing for the defence of his capital. Fort Washington, commanding the Potomac, which Major L'Enfant had planned early in the war, was hurried forward to completion; but no defences on the landward side were erected, and no army was called out to defend it. What was done was this: The District of Columbia, Maryland, and that part of Virginia north of the Rappahannock, were created a tenth military district under command of General W. H. Winder, a brave officer, who had seen service in the Northwest, and who had recently returned from long detention in Canada as prisoner of war. General Winder on taking command (June 26, 1814) found for the defence of Washington detachments of the 36th and 38th regulars, amounting to a few hundred men, but nothing more—no forts, no guns, no army. A force of 13 regiments of Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania militia had been drafted, but were not to be called into active service until the enemy should appear—an arrangement against which General Winder protested in vain. … While these weak and ineffectual preparations are being made, the enemy has been marshalling his forces. Early in August Rear-Admiral Cockburn's blockading squadron had been joined in the Potomac by the fleet of Vice-Admiral Cochrane, who as ranking officer at once took command." A few days later the expected Bermuda expedition arrived bringing 4,000 troops—veterans from Wellington's army—under General Ross. A little flotilla of gunboats on the Chesapeake, commanded by Commodore Barney, was driven into Patuxent River and there abandoned and burned. Then the enemy landed in force at Benedict and marched on Washington, while the Secretary or War still insisted that Baltimore must be, in the nature of things, the place they would strike, At Bladensburg they were met (August 24th) by General Winder with some 5,000 hastily collected militia and volunteers and less than 1,000 regular troops, sailors, and marines—poor materials for an army with which to face 4,000 hardened veterans of the Peninsular War. The battle ended in the utter routing of the American forces and the abandonment of Washington to the British invaders.

C. B. Todd, The Story of Washington, chapter 8.

"This battle, by which the fate of the American capital was decided, began about one o'clock in the afternoon, and lasted till four. The loss on the part of the English was severe, since, out of two-thirds of the army, which were engaged, upwards of 500 men were killed and wounded; and what rendered it doubly severe was, that among these were numbered several officers of rank and distinction. … On the side of the Americans the slaughter was not so great. Being in possession of a strong position, they were of course less exposed in defending than the others in storming it; and had they conducted themselves with coolness and resolution, it is not conceivable how the battle could have been won. But the fact is that, with the exception of a party of sailors from the gun boats, under the command of Commodore Barney, no troops could behave worse than they did."

G. R. Gleig, Campaign of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans, chapter 9.

When Winder's troops abandoned Washington "fire was put at the navy yard to a new frigate on the stocks, to a new sloop-of-war lately launched, and to several magazines of stores and provisions, for the destruction of which ample preparations had been made. By the light of this fire, made lurid by a sudden thunder-gust, Ross, toward evening, advanced into Washington, at that time a straggling village of some 8,000 people, but, for the moment, almost deserted by the male part of the white inhabitants. From Gallatin's late residence, one of the first considerable houses which the column reached, a shot was fired which killed Ross's horse, and which was instantly revenged by putting fire to the house. After three or four volleys at the Capitol, the two detached wings were set on fire. The massive walls defied the flames, but all the interior was destroyed, with many valuable papers, and the library of Congress—a piece of Vandalism alleged to be in revenge for the burning of the Parliament House at York. [Chaplain Gleig, who was with the British forces under Ross, states in the narrative quoted from above that the party fired upon from Gallatin's house bore a flag of truce, and that Ross's destructive proceedings in Washington were consequent on that fact.] … The president's house, and the offices of the Treasury and State Departments near by, were set on fire. … The next morning the War Office was burned. … {3353} Several private houses were burned, and some private warehouses broken open and plundered; but, in general, private property was respected." On the night of the 20th the British withdrew, returning as they came; but on the 29th their frigates, ascending the Potomac, arrived at Alexandria and plundered that city heavily. "Within less than a fortnight after the re-embarkation of Ross's army, the British fleet, spreading vast alarm as it ascended the Chesapeake, appeared off the Patapsco [September 12]. … A landing was effected the next day at North Point, on the northern shore of that estuary, some eight miles up which was Fort M'Henry, an open work only two miles from Baltimore, commanding the entrance into the harbor, which found, however, its most effectual protection in the shallowness of the water. The defense of the city rested with some 10,000 militia. … A corps 3,000 strong had been thrown forward toward North Point. As Ross and Cockburn, at the head of a reconnoitering party, approached the outposts of this advanced division, a skirmish ensued, in which Ross was killed. … The fleet, meanwhile, opened a tremendous cannonade on Fort M'Henry; but … at such a distance as to render their fire ineffectual. It was under the excitement of this cannonade that the popular song of the 'Star Spangled Banner' was composed, the author [Francis Scott Key] being then on board the British fleet, whither he had gone to solicit the release of certain prisoners, and where he was detained pending the attack. An attempt to land in boats also failed; and that same night, the bombardment being still kept up, the British army, covered by rain and darkness, retired silently to their ships and re-embarked."

R. Hildreth, History of the United States, volume 6, pages 510-520.

ALSO IN: _J. S. Williams, Invasion and Capture of Washington._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814 (September). Prevost's invasion of New York. Macdonough's naval victory on Lake Champlain.

Lake Champlain, "which had hitherto played but an inconspicuous part, was now to become the scene of the greatest naval battle of the war. A British army of 11,000 men under Sir George Prevost undertook the invasion of New York by advancing up the western bank of Lake Champlain. This advance was impracticable unless there was a sufficiently strong British naval force to drive back the American squadron at the same time. Accordingly, the British began to construct a frigate, the Confiance, to be added to their already existing force, which consisted of a brig, two sloops, and 12 or 14 gun-boats. The Americans already possessed a heavy corvette, a schooner, a small sloop, and 10 gun-boats or row-galleys; they now began to build a large brig, the Eagle, which was launched about the 16th of August. Nine days later, on the 25th, the Confiance was launched. The two squadrons were equally deficient in stores, etc.; the Confiance having locks to her guns, some of which could not be used, while the American schooner Ticonderoga had to fire her guns by means of pistols flashed at the touchholes (like Barclay on Lake Erie). Macdonough and Downie were hurried into action before they had time to prepare themselves thoroughly; but it was a disadvantage common to both, and arose from the nature of the case, which called for immediate action. The British army advanced slowly toward Plattsburg, which was held by General Macomb with less than 2,000 effective American troops. Captain Thomas Macdonough, the American commodore, took the lake a day or two before his antagonist, and came to anchor in Plattsburg harbor. The British fleet, under Captain George Downie, moved from Isle-aux-Noix on September 8th, and on the morning of the 11th sailed into Plattsburg harbor." The American force consisted of the ship Saratoga, Captain Macdonough, the brig Eagle, the schooner Ticonderoga, the sloop Preble, and ten row-galleys, or gunboats mounting one or two guns each—"in all, 14 vessels of 2,244 tons and 882 men, with 86 guns throwing at a broadside 1,194 lbs. of shot, 480 from long, and 714 from short guns. The force of the British squadron in guns and ships is known accurately, as most of it was captured." It consisted of the frigate Confiance, the brig Linnet, the sloops Chubb and Finch, and twelve gunboats—"in all, 16 vessels, of about 2,402 tons, with 937 men, and a total of 92 guns, throwing at a broadside 1,192 lbs., 660 from long and 532 from short pieces. … Young Macdonough (then but 28 years of age) calculated all … chances very coolly and decided to await the attack at anchor in Plattsburg Bay, with the head of his line so far to the north that it could hardly be turned. … The morning of September 11th opened with a light breeze from the northeast. Downie's fleet weighed anchor at daylight, and came down the lake with the wind nearly aft, the booms of the two sloops swinging out to starboard. At half-past seven, the people in the ships could see their adversaries' upper sails across the narrow strip of land ending in Cumberland Head, before the British doubled the latter. … As the English squadron stood bravely in, young Macdonough, who feared his foes not at all, but his God a great deal, knelt for a moment, with his officers, on the quarter-deck; and then ensued a few minutes of perfect quiet." The fierce battle which followed lasted about two hours and a half, with terribly destructive effects on both sides. The British commander, Downie, was killed early in the action. "On both sides the ships had been cut up in the most extraordinary manner; the Saratoga had 55 shot-holes in her hull, and the Confiance 105 in hers, and the Eagle and Linnet had suffered in proportion. The number of killed and wounded can not be exactly stated; it was probably about 200 on the American side, and over 300 on the British. … The effects of the victory were immediate and of the highest importance. Sir George Prevost and his army [which had arrived before Plattsburg on the 6th, and which, simultaneously with the naval advance, had made an unsuccessful attack on the American defensive works, at the mouth of the Saranac, held by General Alexander Macomb] at once fled in great haste and confusion back to Canada, leaving our northern frontier clear for the remainder of the war; while the victory had a very great effect on the negotiations for peace. In this battle the crews on both sides behaved with equal bravery, and left nothing to be desired in this respect; but from their rawness they of course showed far less skill than the crews of most of the American and some of the British ocean cruisers. … Macdonough in this battle won a higher fame than any other commander of the war, British or American. {3354} He had a decidedly superior force to contend against, the officers and men of the two sides being about on a par in every respect; and it was solely owing to his foresight and resource that we won the victory. He forced the British to engage at a disadvantage by his excellent choice of position, and he prepared beforehand for every possible contingency. … Down to the time of the Civil War he is the greatest figure in our naval history."

T. Roosevelt, The Naval War of 1812, chapter 8.

ALSO IN: R. Johnson, History of the War of 1812-1815, chapter 15.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814 (December). The Hartford Convention.

"The commercial distress in New England, the possession by the enemy of a large part of the District of Maine, the fear of their advance along the coast, and the apparent neglect of the Federal Government to provide any adequate means of resistance, had led the Legislature of Massachusetts, in October, to invite the other New England States to send delegates to Hartford, Connecticut, 'to confer upon the subject of their public grievances.' Delegates [26 in number] from Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut, and from parts of Vermont and New Hampshire, met at Hartford in December and remained in session for three weeks. In their report to their State Legislatures they reviewed the state of the country, the origin and management of the war, and the strong measures lately proposed in Congress, and recommended several Amendments to the Constitution, chiefly with intent to restrict the powers of Congress over commerce, and to prevent naturalized citizens from holding office. In default of the adoption of these Amendments, another convention was advised, 'in order to decide on the course which a crisis so momentous might seem to demand.' This was the famous Hartford Convention. The peace which closely followed its adjournment removed all necessity or even desire for another session of it. Its objects seem to have been legitimate. But the unfortunate secrecy of its proceedings, and its somewhat ambiguous language, roused a popular suspicion, sufficient for the political ruin of its members, that a dissolution of the Union had been proposed, perhaps resolved upon, in its meetings. Some years afterward those concerned in it were compelled in self-defense to publish its journal, in order to show that no treasonable design was officially proposed. It was then, however, too late, for the popular opinion had become fixed. Neither the Federal party which originated, nor the Federalist politicians who composed, the assembly, were ever freed from the stigma left by the mysterious Hartford Convention."

A. Johnston, History of American Politics, 2d ed., chapter 8.

The language of the report of the Hartford Convention "was so skillfully selected that it cannot be said with certainty whether the convention deduced from the nature of the Union a positive right in the individual states to withdraw from the Union, or whether it claimed only a moral justification for revolution. It was prudent enough in the declaration of its position on the constitutional question not to venture beyond vague, double-meaning expressions, except so far as it could appeal to its opponents. But it went just far enough to repeat almost verbatim the declaration of faith laid down in the Kentucky resolutions of 1798. If the members of the convention, and those in sympathy with them, were 'Maratists,' they could claim that they had become so in the school of Madison and Jefferson."

H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, page 268.

ALSO IN: _T. Dwight, History of the Hartford Convention._

H. C. Lodge, Life and Letters of George Cabot, chapters 11-13.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814 (December). The Treaty of Peace concluded at Ghent.

"In September, 1812, Count Romanzoff suggested to Mr. [John Quincy] Adams the readiness of the Emperor [of Russia] to act as mediator in bringing about peace between the United States and England. The suggestion was promptly acted upon, but with no directly fortunate results. The American government acceded at once to the proposition, and, at the risk of an impolitic display of readiness, dispatched Messrs. Gallatin and Bayard to act as Commissioners jointly with Mr. Adams in the negotiations. These gentlemen, however, arrived in St. Petersburg only to find themselves in a very awkward position," since the offered mediation of the Czar was declined by England. The latter power preferred to negotiate directly with the United States, and presently made proposals to that effect, intimating her readiness "to send Commissioners to Gottingen, for which place Ghent was afterwards substituted, to meet American Commissioners and settle terms of pacification. The United States renewed the powers of Messrs. Adams, Bayard, and Gallatin, … and added Jonathan Russell, then Minister to Sweden, and Henry Clay. England deputed Lord Gambier, an Admiral, Dr. Adams, a publicist, and Mr. Goulbourn, a member of Parliament and Under Secretary of State. These eight gentlemen accordingly met in Ghent on August 7, 1814. It was upwards of four months before an agreement was reached. … The eight were certainly an odd assemblage of peacemakers. The ill-blood and wranglings between the opposing Commissions were bad enough, yet hardly equalled the intestine dissensions between the American Commissioners themselves. … The British first presented their demands, as follows: 1. That the United States should conclude a peace with the Indian allies of Great Britain, and that a species of neutral belt of Indian territory should be established between the dominions of the United States and Great Britain, so that these dominions should be nowhere conterminous, upon which belt or barrier neither power should be permitted to encroach even by purchase, and the boundaries of which should be settled in this treaty. 2. That the United States should keep no naval force upon the Great Lakes, and should neither maintain their existing forts nor build new ones upon their northern frontier; it was even required that the boundary line should run along the southern shore of the lakes; while no corresponding restriction was imposed upon Great Britain, because she was stated to have no projects of conquest as against her neighbor. 3. That a piece of the province of Maine should be ceded, in order to give the English a road from Halifax to Quebec. 4. That the stipulations of the treaty of 1783, conferring on English subjects the right of navigating the Mississippi, should be now formally renewed. The Americans were astounded; it seemed to them hardly worth while to have come so far to listen to such propositions." {3355} But, after long and apparently hopeless wrangling, events in Europe rather than in America brought about a change of disposition on the part of the British government; instructions to the commissioners were modified on both sides, and, quite to their own surprise, they arrived at agreements which were formulated in a Treaty and signed, December 24, 1814. "Of the many subjects mooted between the negotiators scarcely any had survived the fierce contests which had been waged concerning them. The whole matter of the navigation of the Mississippi, access to that river, and a road through American territory, had been dropped by the British; while the Americans had been well content to say nothing of the Northeastern fisheries, which they regarded as still their own.

See FISHERIES, NORTH AMERICAN: A. D. 1814-1818.

The disarmament on the lakes and along the Canadian border, and the neutralization of a strip of Indian territory, were yielded by the English. The Americans were content to have nothing said about impressment; nor was anyone of the many illegal rights exercised by England formally abandoned. The Americans satisfied themselves with the reflection that circumstances had rendered these points now only matters of abstract principle, since the pacification of Europe had removed all opportunities and temptations for England to persist in her previous objectionable courses. For the future it was hardly to be feared that she would again undertake to pursue a policy against which it was evident that the United States were willing to conduct a serious war. There was, however, no provision for indemnification. Upon a fair consideration, it must be admitted that, though the treaty was silent upon all the points which the United States had made war for the purpose of enforcing, yet the country had every reason to be gratified with the result of the negotiation."

J. T. Morse, John Quincy Adams, pages 75-96.

"Instead of wearing themselves out over impracticable, perhaps impossible, questions, the commissioners turned their attention to the northern boundary between the two countries, and it was by them forever settled, and in such manner as to give the United States the foundation for its future greatness. … The victory of the American diplomats at Ghent was two-fold: first, they secured the benefits desired without enumerating them—even to a greater extent than if the benefits had been enumerated; and second, if they had insisted upon an enumeration of the benefits obtained, it is apparent they would have periled the entire treaty and lost all."

_T. Wilson, The Treaty of Ghent (Magazine of American History, November, 1888)._

ALSO IN: C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, chapter 6 (volume l).

J. Q. Adams, Memoirs (Diary) chapter 9 (volumes 2-3).

Following is the text of the treaty:

Article I. There shall be a firm and universal peace between His Britannic Majesty and the United States, and between their respective countries, territories, cities, towns, and people, of every degree, without exception of places or persons. All hostilities, both by sea and land, shall cease as soon as this treaty shall have been ratified by both parties, as hereinafter mentioned. All territory, places, and possessions whatsoever, taken by either party from the other during the war, or which may be taken after the signing of this treaty, excepting only the islands hereinafter mentioned, shall be restored without delay, and without causing any destruction or carrying away any of the artillery or other public property originally captured in the said forts or places, and which shall remain therein upon the exchange of the ratifications of this treaty, or any slaves or other private property. And all archives, records, deeds, and papers, either of a public nature or belonging to private persons, which, in the course of the war, may have fallen into the hands of the officers of either party, shall be, as far as may be practicable, forthwith restored and delivered to the proper authorities and persons to whom they respectively belong. Such of the islands in the Bay of Passamaquoddy as are claimed by both parties, shall remain in the possession of the party in whose occupation they may be at the time of the exchange of the ratifications of this treaty, until the decision respecting the title to the said islands shall have been made in conformity with the fourth article of this treaty. No disposition made by this treaty as to such possession of the islands and territories claimed by both parties shall, in any manner whatever, be construed to affect the right of either.

Article II. Immediately after the ratification of this treaty by both parties, as hereinafter mentioned, orders shall be sent to the armies, squadrons, officers, subjects and citizens of the two Powers to cease from all hostilities. And to prevent all causes of complaint which might arise on account of the prizes which may be taken at sea after the said ratifications of this treaty, it is reciprocally agreed that all vessels and effects which may be taken after the space of twelve days from the said ratifications, upon all parts of the coast of North America, from the latitude of twenty-three degrees north to the latitude of fifty degrees north, and as far eastward in the Atlantic Ocean as the thirty-sixth degree of west longitude from the meridian of Greenwich, shall be restored on each side: that the time shall be thirty days in all other parts of the Atlantic Ocean north of the equinoctial line or equator, and the same time for the British and Irish Channels, for the Gulf of Mexico, and all parts of the West Indies; forty days for the North Seas, for the Baltic, and for all parts of the Mediterranean; sixty days for the Atlantic Ocean south of the equator, as far as the latitude of the Cape of Good Hope; ninety days for every other part of the world south of the equator; and one hundred and twenty days for all other parts of the world, without exception.

Article III. All prisoners of war taken on either side, as well by land as by sea, shall be restored as soon as practicable after the ratifications of this treaty, as hereinafter mentioned, on their paying the debts which they may have contracted during their captivity. The two contracting parties respectively engage to discharge, in specie, the advances which may have been made by the other for the sustenance and maintenance of such prisoners.

{3356}

Article IV. Whereas it was stipulated by the second article in the treaty of peace of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three, between His Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, that the boundary of the United States should comprehend all islands within twenty leagues of any part of the shores of the United States, and lying between lines to be drawn due east from the points where the aforesaid boundaries, between Nova Scotia on the one part, and East Florida on the other, shall respectively touch the Bay of Fundy and the Atlantic Ocean, excepting such islands as now are, or heretofore have been, within the limits of Nova Scotia; and whereas the several islands in the Bay of Passamaquoddy, which is part of the Bay of Fundy, and the Island of Grand Menan, in the said Bay of Fundy, are claimed by the United States as being comprehended within their aforesaid boundaries, which said islands are claimed as belonging to His Britannic Majesty, as having been, at the time of and previous to the aforesaid treaty of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three, within the limits of the Province of Nova Scotia: In order, therefore, finally to decide upon these claims, it is agreed that they shall be referred to two Commissioners to be appointed in the following manner, viz: One Commissioner shall be appointed by His Britannic Majesty, and one by the President of the United States, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate thereof; and the said two Commissioners so appointed shall be sworn impartially to examine and decide upon the said claims according to such evidence as shall be laid before them on the part of His Britannic Majesty and of the United States respectively. The said Commissioners shall meet at St. Andrews, in the Province of New Brunswick, and shall have power to adjourn to such other place or places as they shall think fit. The said Commissioners shall, by a declaration or report under their hands and seals, decide to which of the two contracting parties the several islands aforesaid do respectively belong, in conformity with the true intent of the said treaty of peace of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three. And if the said Commissioners shall agree in their decision, both parties shall consider such decision as final and conclusive. It is further agreed that, in event of the two Commissioners differing upon all or any of the matters so referred to them, or in the event of both or either of the said Commissioners refusing, or declining, or wilfully omitting to act as such, they shall make, jointly or separately, a report or reports, as well to the Government of His Britannic Majesty as to that of the United States, stating in detail the points on which they differ, and the grounds upon which their respective opinions have been formed, or the grounds upon which they, or either of them, have so refused, declined, or omitted to act. And His Britannic Majesty and the Government of the United States hereby agree to refer the report or reports of the said Commissioners to some friendly sovereign or State, to be then named for that purpose, and who shall be requested to decide on the differences which may be stated in the said report or reports, or upon the report of one Commissioner, together with the grounds upon which the other Commissioner shall have refused, declined or omitted to act, as the case may be. And if the Commissioner so refusing, declining or omitting to act, shall also wilfully omit to state the grounds upon which he has so done, in such manner that the said statement may be referred to such friendly sovereign or State, together with the report of such other Commissioner, then such sovereign or State shall decide ex parte upon the said report alone. And His Britannic Majesty and the Government of the United States engage to consider the decision of such friendly sovereign or State to be final and conclusive on all the matters so referred.

Article V. Whereas neither that point of the highlands lying due north from the source of the river St. Croix, and designated in the former treaty of peace between the two Powers as the northwest angle of Nova Scotia, nor the north-westernmost head of Connecticut River, has yet been ascertained; and whereas that part of the boundary line between the dominions of the two Powers which extends from the source of the river St. Croix directly north to the above mentioned northwest angle of Nova Scotia, thence along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the river St. Lawrence from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean to the northwestern most head of Connecticut River, thence down along the middle of that river to the forty-fifth degree of north latitude; thence by a line due west on said latitude until it strikes the river Iroquois or Cataraquy, has not yet been surveyed: it is agreed that for these several purposes two Commissioners shall be appointed, sworn, and authorized to act exactly in the manner directed with respect to those mentioned in the next preceding article, unless otherwise specified in the present article. The said Commissioners shall meet at St. Andrews, in the Province of New Brunswick, and shall have power to adjourn to such other place or places as they shall think fit. The said Commissioners shall have power to ascertain and determine the points above mentioned, in conformity with the provisions of the said treaty of peace of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three, and shall cause the boundary aforesaid, from the source of the river St. Croix to the river Iroquois or Cataraquy, to be surveyed and marked according to the said provisions. The said Commissioners shall make a map of the said boundary, and annex to it a declaration under their hands and seals, certifying it to be the true map of the said boundary, and particularizing the latitude and longitude of the northwest angle of Nova Scotia, of the northwesternmost head of Connecticut River, and of such other points of the said boundary as they may deem proper. And both parties agree to consider such map and declaration as finally and conclusively fixing the said boundary. And in the event of the said two Commissioners differing, or both or either of them refusing, declining, or wilfully omitting to act, such reports, declarations, or statements shall be made by them, or either of them, and such reference to a friendly sovereign or State shall be made in all respects as in the latter part of the fourth article is contained, and in as full a manner as if the same was herein repeated.

{3357}

Article VI. Whereas by the former treaty of peace that portion of the boundary of the United States from the point where the forty-fifth degree of north latitude strikes the river Iroquois or Cataraquy to the Lake Superior, was declared to be "along the middle of said river into Lake Ontario, through the middle of said lake, until it strikes the communication by water between that lake and Lake Erie, thence along the middle of said communication into Lake Erie, through the middle of said lake until it arrives at the water communication into the Lake Huron, thence through the middle of said lake to the water communication between that lake and Lake Superior;" and whereas doubts have arisen what was the middle of the said river, lakes, and water communications, and whether certain islands lying in the same were within the dominions of His Britannic Majesty or of the United States: In order, therefore, finally to decide these doubts, they shall be referred to two Commissioners, to be appointed, sworn, and authorized to act exactly in the manner directed with respect to those mentioned in the next preceding article, unless otherwise specified in this present article. The said Commissioners shall meet, in the first instance, at Albany, in the State of New York, and shall have power to adjourn to such other place or places as they shall think fit. The said Commissioners shall, by a report or declaration, under their hands and seals, designate the boundary through the said river, lakes and water communications, and decide to which of the two contracting parties the several islands lying within the said rivers, lakes, and water communications, do respectively belong, in conformity with the true intent of the said treaty of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three. And both parties agree to consider such designation and decision as final and conclusive. And in the event of the said two Commissioners differing, or both or either of them refusing, declining, or wilfully omitting to act, such reports, declarations, or statements shall be made by them, or either of them, and such reference to a friendly sovereign or State shall be made in all respects as in the latter part of the fourth article is contained, and in as full a manner as if the same was herein repeated.

Article VII. It is further agreed that the said two last-mentioned Commissioners, after they shall have executed the duties assigned to them in the preceding article, shall be, and they are hereby, authorized upon their oaths impartially to fix and determine, according to the true intent of the said treaty of peace of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three, that part of the boundary between the dominions of the two Powers which extends from the water communication between Lake Huron and Lake Superior, to the most northwestern point of the Lake of the Woods, to decide to which of the two parties the several islands lying in the lakes, water communications, and rivers, forming the said boundary, do respectively belong, in conformity with the true intent of the said treaty of peace of one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three; and to cause such parts of the said boundary as require it to be surveyed and marked. The said Commissioners shall, by a report or declaration under their hands and seals, designate the boundary aforesaid, state their decision on the points thus referred to them, and particularize the latitude and longitude of the most northwestern point of the Lake of the Woods, and of such other parts of the said boundary as they may deem proper. And both parties agree to consider such designation and decision as final and conclusive. And in the event of the said two Commissioners differing, or both or either of them refusing, declining, or wilfully omitting to act, such reports, declarations, or statements shall be made by them, or either of them, and such reference to a friendly sovereign or State shall be made in all respects as in the latter part of the fourth article is contained, and in as full a manner as if the same was herein repeated.

Article VIII. The several boards of two Commissioners mentioned in the four preceding articles shall respectively have power to appoint a Secretary, and to employ such surveyors or other persons as they shall judge necessary. Duplicates of all their respective reports, declarations, statements and decisions and of their accounts, and of the journal of their proceedings, shall be delivered by them to the agents of His Britannic Majesty and to the agents of the United States, who may be respectively appointed and authorized to manage the business on behalf of their respective Governments. The said Commissioners shall be respectively paid in such manner as shall be agreed between the two contracting parties, such agreement being to be settled at the time of the exchange of the ratifications of this treaty. And all other expenses attending the said Commissions shall be defrayed equally by the two parties. And in the case of death, sickness, resignation or necessary absence, the place of every such Commissioner, respectively, shall be supplied in the same manner as such Commissioner was first appointed, and the new Commissioner shall take the same oath or affirmation, and do the same duties. It is further agreed between the two contracting parties, that in case any of the islands mentioned in any of the preceding articles, which were in the possession of one of the parties prior to the commencement of the present war between the two countries, should, by the decision of any of the Boards of Commissioners aforesaid, or of the sovereign or State so referred to, as in the four next preceding articles contained, fall within the dominions of the other party, all grants of land made previous to the commencement of the war, by the party having had such possession, shall be as valid as if such island or islands had, by such decision or decisions, been adjudged to be within the dominions of the party having had such possession.

Article IX. The United States of America engage to put an end, immediately after the ratification of the present treaty, to hostilities with all the tribes or nations of Indians with whom they may be at war at the time of such ratification; and forthwith to restore to such tribes or nations, respectively, all the possessions, rights and privileges which they may have enjoyed or been entitled to in one thousand eight hundred and eleven, previous to such hostilities: Provided always that such tribes or nations shall agree to desist from all hostilities against the United States of America, their citizens and subjects, upon the ratification of the present treaty being notified to such tribes or nations, and shall so desist accordingly. And His Britannic Majesty engages, on his part, to put an end immediately after the ratification of the present treaty, to hostilities with all the tribes or nations of Indians with whom he may be at war at the time of such ratification, and forthwith to restore to such tribes or nations respectively all the possessions, rights and privileges which they may have enjoyed or been entitled to in one thousand eight hundred and eleven, previous to such hostilities: Provided always that such tribes or nations shall agree to desist from all hostilities against His Britannic Majesty, and his subjects, upon the ratification of the present treaty being notified to such tribes or nations, and shall so desist accordingly.

{3358}

Article X. Whereas the traffic in slaves is irreconcilable with the principles of humanity and justice, and whereas both His Majesty and the United States are desirous of continuing their efforts to promote its entire abolition, it is hereby agreed that both the contracting parties shall use their best endeavors to accomplish so desirable an object.

Article XI. This treaty, when the same shall have been ratified on both sides, without alteration by either of the contracting parties, and the ratifications mutually exchanged, shall be binding on both parties and the ratifications shall be exchanged at Washington, in the space of four months from this day, or sooner if practicable. In faith whereof we, the respective Plenipotentiaries, have signed this treaty, and have thereunto affixed our seals. Done, in triplicate, at Ghent, the twenty-fourth day of December, one thousand eight hundred and fourteen.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1814. The last fighting at Sea. The exploits of "Old Ironsides."

"During the latter part of the war, as might have been foreseen, there was little opportunity for American frigates to show that they could keep up the fame they had so gloriously won. The British were determined that none of them that ventured out to sea should escape; and by stationing a squadron, which their great resources enabled them to do, before each port where a frigate lay, they succeeded in keeping it cooped up and inactive. … The 'Adams,' which had been a 28-gun frigate, but which was now a corvette, managed to slip out from Washington in January, 1814, under the command of Charles Morris. … Six months were passed in cruising, part of the time off the Irish coast, but with no great success." Returning home, the "Adams" went ashore at the mouth of the Penobscot, but was got off, much injured, and was taken up the river for repairs. An English expeditionary force pursued the crippled vessel, and her commander was forced to set her on fire. "At this time the 'Constitution' [Old Ironsides, as she was popularly called] was … lying at Boston, watched by a squadron of the enemy. She had proved a lucky ship, … and her present captain, Charles Stewart, who had been one of Preble's lieutenants at Tripoli, was certainly a man well fitted to make the most of any chance he had. The frigate had been in port since April, at first repairing, and later unable to get out owing to the presence of the enemy's squadron." In December, however, the " Constitution" contrived to give the blockaders the slip and made her way across the Atlantic to the neighborhood of Madeira, where she fought and captured, at one time, two British war vessels—the corvette "Cyana" of 22 guns, and the sloop "Levant," of 20 guns. A few days afterwards, as the "Constitution," with her two prizes, was lying at anchor in Port Praya, Cape de Verde Islands, Captain Stewart sighted, outside, no less than three ships of the very blockading squadron which he had slipped away from at Boston, and which had pursued him across the ocean. He made his escape from the port, with both his prizes, in time to avoid being hemmed in, and speedily outsailed his pursuers. The latter, giving up hope of the "Constitution," turned their attention to one of the prizes and succeeded in recovering her. "The only other frigate that left port in the last year of the war was less fortunate than the 'Constitution.' This was the 'President,' now under Commodore Decatur. She was at New York, and for some time had lain at anchor off Staten Island watching for an opportunity to pass the blockading squadron." On a stormy night in January, 1815 (after the treaty of peace had been actually signed at Ghent, but before news of it had reached America), he made the attempt, but was discovered and chased by four of the blockading ships. After a race which lasted from dawn until nearly midnight, and a running fight of two hours, Decatur found escape to be impossible and surrendered his ship.

J. R. Soley, The Boys of 1812, chapter 17.

ALSO IN: T. Roosevelt, The Naval War of 1812, chapters 7-9.

B. J. Lossing, Field Book of the War of 1812, chapter 41.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1815 (January). Jackson's victory at New Orleans.

In October of the last year "dispatches from the American envoys abroad announced that 12,000 to 15,000 British troops would leave Ireland early in September for New Orleans and Mobile. Intelligence reached Washington, December 9th, by way of Cuba, that the British Chesapeake force, under Admiral Cochrane, had united at Jamaica with these other troops, and all were ready to sail for the mouths of the Mississippi. 'Hasten your militia to New Orleans,' now urged Monroe upon the Executives of Tennessee, Kentucky, and Georgia; 'do not wait for this government to arm them; put all the arms you can find into their hands; let every man bring his rifle or musket with him; we shall see you paid.' … Great results had been expected by Great Britain from the secret expedition fitted out against Louisiana. … Fifty British vessels, large and small, bore 7,000 British land troops—comprising the invading force from the Chesapeake and a veteran reinforcement from England—across the Gulf of Mexico from Jamaica to the ship channel near the entrance of Lake Borgne, thus approaching New Orleans midway between the Mississippi River and Mobile Bay. Here the fleet anchored; and, after dispersing a meagre flotilla of American gunboats, which opposed their progress in vain, the invaders took full possession of Lake Borgne, and, by means of lighter transports, landed troops upon a lonely island at the mouth of the Pearl River, which served as the military rendezvous. Crossing thence to the northwestern end of Lake Borgne, a sparsely-settled region, with plantations and sugar-works, half of this invading army, by the 23d [December], struck the Mississippi at a point within nine miles of New Orleans. Not a gun had been fired since the trifling engagement with the American flotilla. The British believed their near approach unknown, and even unsuspected, in the city; they meant to capture it by an assault both brilliant and sudden. … But Jackson had received his instructions in good season, and from the 2d of December New Orleans had been, under his vigilant direction, a camp in lively motion." Martial law was proclaimed; "free men of color were enrolled; convicts were released to become soldiers; the civic force was increased to its utmost. {3359} Jackson inspected and strengthened the defences in the vicinity, erect·ing new batteries. … With his newly arrived volunteers from neighboring States, quite expert, many of them, in the use of the rifle and eager for fight, Jackson found himself presently at the head of 5,000 effective men, less than 1,000 of whom were regulars." With a portion of these, supported by one of the two armed vessels on the river, he boldly attacked the enemy, on the evening of the 23d, but accomplished little more than to demonstrate the energy of the defence he was prepared to make. On the 28th the English (having previously destroyed one of the troublesome vessels in the river, the Carolina, with hot shot) returned the attack, but did not break the American lines. Then General Pakenham, the English commander, brought up heavy guns from the fleet, and soon convinced General Jackson that cotton bales, which the latter had piled up before his men, were too light and too combustible for breastworks against artillery; but the lesson proved more useful than otherwise, and the British batteries were answered with fully equal effect by an American cannonade. "Pakenham's last and boldest experiment was to carry Jackson's lines by storm on both sides of the river; and this enterprise, fatal, indeed, to those who conceived it, gives immortal date to the 8th of January,—the day on which the battle of New Orleans was fought. Four days before this momentous battle, over 2,000 Kentucky militia, under General Adair, arrived at New Orleans, ready soldiers, but miserably equipped. Of their number 700 were marched to the front. Pakenham's army, swelled by a body of reinforcements, commanded by General Lambert, another of Wellington's officers, now consisted in all of 10,000 troops, the flower of Brit·ish veterans. On the day of the battle Jackson had only half as many soldiers on the New Orleans side of the river, and of these the greater part were new recruits under inexperienced officers. On the opposite bank General Morgan, with about 1,500 men, among them detachments of Kentuckians and Louisiana militia, had intrenched himself in expectation of an assault. Jackson had penetrated the enemy's design, which was to make the main attack upon his lines, while a lesser force crossed the Mississippi to drive Morgan up the bank. Jackson's grand defences, extending for a mile and a half from the Mississippi, along his ditch or canal, to an impassable cypress swamp, consisted of earthworks, a redoubt next the river to enfilade the ditch, and eight batteries, all well mounted. The schooner Louisiana and Commander Patterson's marine battery across the river protected this line. Another intrenchment had been thrown up a mile and a half in the rear, as a rallying-point in case of need. There was a third line just below the city. … The morn·ing fog rolled away on the 8th of January. Pakenham, under the fire of a battery he had erected during the night, advanced with the main body of British troops to storm Jackson's position." The Americans, behind their breastworks, withheld their fire until the storming columns were 200 yards away, and then poured volley on volley into the approaching mass of men. "This, with the steady fire from the American batteries all along the line, as the foe advanced over a large bare plain, made hideous gaps in the British ranks, throwing them into utter confusion. It was a fearful slaughter. Dead bodies choked the ditch and strewed the plain. Gallant Highlanders flung themselves forward to scale the ramparts only to fall back lifeless. Soldiers who had served under Wellington in Spain broke, scattered, and ran. Of the four British generals commanding, Pakenham was killed, Gibbs mortally wounded, Keane disabled by a shot in the neck; only Lambert remained. Thornton, across the river, had driven Morgan from his lines meantime, and silenced Patterson's battery; but this enterprise might have cost him dearly, had he not in season received orders from Lambert to return instantly. In this battle the British lost not less than 2,600, all but 500 of whom were killed or wounded; while only 8 were killed and 13 wounded on the American side. Having buried his dead presently under a flag of truce, Lambert, whom this calamity had placed in command, retreated hastily under cover of the night, abandoning the expedition. Re-embarking at Lake Borgne, and rejoining the fleet, he next proceeded to invest Fort Bowyer, at the entrance of Mobile Bay, only to learn, after its little garrison had surrendered, that a treaty of peace [signed December 24, 1814, two weeks before the battle of New Orleans was fought] annulled the conquest. … Rude and illiterate as he was, Jackson showed at New Orleans the five prime attributes of military genius: decision, energy, forethought, dispatch, skill in employing resources."

J. Schouler, History of the United States of America, chapter 9, section 1 (volume 2).

ALSO IN: _A. Walker, Jackson and New Orleans._

J. Parton, Life of Andrew Jackson, volume 2, chapters 1-23.

G. R. Gleig, Campaigns of the British Army at Washington and New Orleans, chapters 18-23.

M. Thompson, The Story of Louisiana, chapter 9.

G. W. Cable, The Creoles of Louisiana, chapters 26-27.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1815. Final war with the Algerines and suppression of their piracies.

See BARBARY STATES: A. D. 1815.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816. Incorporation of the second Bank of the United States.

See MONEY AND BANKING: A. D. 1791-1816; and 1817-1833.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816. Admission of Indiana into the Union.

See INDIANA: A. D. 1800-1818.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816. The increased Tariff.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES): A. D. 1816-1824.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816. Organization of the American Colonization Society.

See SLAVERY, NEGRO: A. D. 1816-1849.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816. Eighth Presidential Election.

James Monroe, Democratic Republican, was elected over Rufus King, Federalist, receiving 183 out of 217 votes cast in the electoral college. Daniel D. Tompkins was chosen Vice President. "Opposition to the War of 1812 proved fatal to the Federal party, which ceased to exist as a national party with the close of Mr. Madison's administration. Not only did the odium of opposing the war tend to annihilate that party, but the questions upon which the two parties differed were, in a great measure, settled or disposed of by the war; others, relating to the general interests of the country, such as a tariff, internal improvements, the chartering of a national bank, erecting fortifications, etc., taking their place, and finding advocates and opponents in both the old parties. Candidates for President and Vice-President were then selected by the respective parties by what was termed a Congressional caucus. {3360} Mr. Monroe was placed in nomination for President by a caucus of the Republican members of Congress, Daniel D. Tompkins, of New York, being nominated by the same caucus for Vice-President. Mr. Crawford, of Georgia, was Mr. Monroe's competitor, and fell but few votes behind him in the caucus. Rufus King was the candidate of the Federal party, or what there was left of it, against Mr. Monroe. The latter received 183 electoral votes, the former 34. No President ever encountered less opposition during his four or eight years' service than Mr. Monroe. Parties and the country seemed to be tired of contention, and desirous to enjoy repose. A most able cabinet was selected, consisting of Mr. J. Q. Adams as Secretary of State; William H. Crawford, Secretary of the Treasury; John C. Calhoun, Secretary of War; Smith Thompson, Secretary of the Navy; and William Wirt, Attorney-General."

N. Sargent, Public Men and Events, 1817-1853, volume 1, chapter 1.

"Remembering only the almost unopposed election and second election of Mr. Monroe, we are apt to think of him as the natural and easy choice of the people. As a matter of fact he was not a great favorite with Republican politicians. He was first nominated by a narrow majority. … Numerous meetings were held in various parts of the country to protest against the caucus system, the most noteworthy of which, perhaps, was held in Baltimore, in which meeting Roger B. Taney, afterward Chief Justice, took a most prominent part. The nomination being made, the presidential election was practically decided. There was no canvass, worthy of the name."

E. Stanwood, History of Presidential Elections, chapter 9.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816-1817. The opening of the question of "Internal Improvements."

"The passage of the bank bill in 1816 was to give the United States a million and a half of dollars. Calhoun, therefore, came forward, December 23, 1816, with a bill proposing that this sum be employed as a fund 'for constructing roads and canals and improving the navigation of watercourses.' 'We are,' said he, 'a rapidly—I was about to say a fearfully—growing country. … This is our pride and danger, our weakness and our strength.' The constitutional question he settled with a phrase: 'If we are restricted in the use of our money to the enumerated powers, on what principle can the purchase of Louisiana be justified?' The bill passed the House by 86 to 84; it was strongly supported by New York members, because it was expected that the general government would begin the construction of a canal from Albany to the Lakes; it had also large support in the South, especially in South Carolina. In the last hours of his administration Madison vetoed it. His message shows that he had selected this occasion to leave to the people a political testament; he was at last alarmed by the progress of his own party, and, like Jefferson, he insisted that internal improvements were desirable, but needed a constitutional amendment. The immediate effect of the veto was that New York, seeing no prospect of federal aid, at once herself began the construction of the Erie Canal, which was opened eight years later."

A. B. Hart, Formation of the Union (Epochs of American History), section 121.

"Mr. Monroe came out, in his first message to Congress, coinciding, on this point, with Mr. Madison's veto. It is due to both of them, however, to say that they were the advocates of internal improvement, and recommended an amendment of the constitution with that view. Nevertheless, Mr. Madison, by his veto, had dashed the cup from the lips to the ground, as he went out of office; and Mr. Monroe coming in, at least for four years, probably for eight—it proved to be eight—broke the cup in advance, so that it could not be used during his term of office, without an amendment of the constitution. … Three presidents successively, Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Madison, and Mr. Monroe, had officially expressed their opinion adverse to a power vested in Congress by the constitution for projects of internal improvement, as contemplated by the measures proposed. Not satisfied with these decisions, Mr. Clay and his friends were instrumental in having a resolution brought forward, in the fifteenth Congress, declaring that Congress had power, under the constitution, to make appropriations for the construction of military roads, post-roads, and canals. … The resolution declaring the power to be vested in Congress by the constitution, to make appropriations for the construction of military roads, post-roads, and canals, was adopted by a vote of 90 to 75; and the principle involved has been practically applied by acts of Congress, from that time to the present."

C. Colton, Life, Correspondence, and Speeches of Henry Clay, volume 1, chapter 19.

ALSO IN: _H. G. Wheeler, History of Congress, comprising a History of Internal Improvements, volume 2, page 109, and after._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1816-1818. The First Seminole War. Jackson's arbitrary conquest of Florida.

See FLORIDA: A. D. 1816-1818.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1817. Admission of Mississippi into the Union.

See MISSISSIPPI: A. D. 1817.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1818. Treaty with Great Britain relating to Fisheries.

See FISHERIES: A. D. 1814-1818.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1818. Admission of Illinois into the Union.

See INDIANA: A. D. 1800-1818.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1818-1819. The Dartmouth College Case.

See SUPPLEMENT: DARTMOUTH COLLEGE CASE.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1818-1821. The first bitter Conflict concerning Slavery. The Missouri Compromise, on the admission of Missouri to the Union.

"On March 6, 1818, a petition was presented in the House of Representatives praying that Missouri be admitted as a state. A bill authorizing the people of Missouri to form a state government was taken up in the House on February 13, 1819, and Tallmadge of New York moved, as an amendment, that the further introduction of slavery should be prohibited, and that all children born within the said state should be free at the age of twenty-five years. Thus began the struggle on the slavery question in connection with the admission of Missouri, which lasted, intermittently, until March, 1821. No sooner had the debate on Tallmadge's proposition begun than it became clear that the philosophical anti-slavery sentiment of the revolutionary period had entirely ceased to have any influence upon current thought in the South.

See SLAVERY, NEGRO: A. D. 1776-1808.

The abolition of the foreign slave-trade had not, as had been hoped, prepared the way for the abolition of slavery or weakened the slave interest in any sense. On the contrary, slavery had been immensely strengthened by an economic development making it more profitable than it ever had been before. The invention of the cotton-gin by Eli Whitney, in 1793, had made the culture of cotton a very productive source of wealth.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1793.

{3361}

In 1800 the exportation of cotton from the United States was 19,000,000 pounds, valued at $5,700,000. In 1820 the value of the cotton export was nearly $20,000,000, almost all of it the product of slave labor. The value of slaves may be said to have at least trebled in twenty years. The breeding of slaves became a profitable industry. Under such circumstances the slave-holders arrived at the conclusion that slavery was by no means so wicked and hurtful an institution as their revolutionary fathers had thought it to be. … On the other hand, in the Northern States there was no such change of feeling. Slavery was still, in the nature of things, believed to be a wrong and a sore. … The amendment to the Missouri bill, providing for a restriction with regard to slavery, came therefore in a perfectly natural way from that Northern sentiment which remained still faithful to the traditions of the revolutionary period. And it was a great surprise to most Northern people that so natural a proposition should be so fiercely resisted on the part of the South. It was the sudden revelation of a change of feeling in the South which the North had not observed in its progress. 'The discussion of this Missouri question has betrayed the secret of their souls,' wrote John Quincy Adams. The slave-holders watched with apprehension the steady growth of the Free States in population, wealth, and power. In 1790 the population of the two sections had been nearly even. In 1820 there was a difference of over 600,000 in favor of the North in a total of less than ten millions. In 1790 the representation of the two sections in Congress had been about evenly balanced. In 1820 the census promised to give the North a preponderance of more than 30 votes in the House of Representatives. As the slave-holders had no longer the ultimate extinction, but now the perpetuation, of slavery in view, the question of sectional power became one of first importance to them, and with it the necessity of having more Slave States for the purpose of maintaining the political equilibrium at least in the Senate. A struggle for more Slave States was to them a struggle for life. This was the true significance of the Missouri question. The debate was the prototype of all the slavery debates which followed in the forty years to the breaking out of the civil war. … The dissolution of the Union, civil war, and streams of blood were freely threatened by Southern men, while some anti-slavery men declared themselves ready to accept all these calamities rather than the spread of slavery over the territories yet free from it. … On February 16, 1819, the House of Representatives adopted the amendment restricting slavery, and thus passed the Missouri bill. But the Senate, eleven days afterwards, struck out the anti-slavery provision and sent the bill back to the House. A bill was then passed organizing the Territory of Arkansas, an amendment moved by Taylor of New York prohibiting the further introduction of slavery there having been voted down. … Thus slavery was virtually fastened on Arkansas. But the Missouri bill failed in the fifteenth Congress. The popular excitement steadily increased. The sixteenth Congress met in December, 1819. In the Senate the admission of Missouri with slavery was coupled with the admission of Maine, on the balance-of-power principle that one free state and one slave state should always be admitted at the same time. An amendment was moved absolutely prohibiting slavery in Missouri, but it was voted down. Then Mr. Thomas, a Senator from Illinois, on January 18, 1820, proposed that no restriction as to slavery be imposed upon Missouri in framing a state constitution, but that in all the rest of the country ceded by France to the United States north of 30° 30', this being the southern boundary line of Missouri, there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude. This was the essence of the famous Missouri Compromise, and, after long and acrimonious debates and several more votes in the House for restriction and in the Senate against it, this compromise was adopted. By it the slave power obtained the present tangible object it contended for; free labor won a contingent advantage in the future. … Clay has been widely credited with being the 'father' of the Missouri Compromise. As to the main features of the measure this credit he did not deserve. So far he had taken a prominent but not an originating part in the transaction." But, at the next session of Congress, when the Missouri question was unexpectedly reopened, and as threateningly as ever, Clay assumed a more important part in connection with the final settlement of it. "The bill passed at the last session had authorized the people of Missouri to make a state constitution without any restriction as to slavery. The formal admission of the state was now to follow. But the Constitution with which Missouri presented herself to Congress not only recognized slavery as existing there; it provided also that it should be the duty of the legislature to pass such laws as would be necessary to prevent free negroes or mulattoes from coming into or settling in the state." This provoked a new revolt on the part of the Northern opponents of slavery, and it was only through Clay's exertions as a pacificator that Missouri was conditionally admitted to the Union at length [March 3, 1820], the condition being that "the said state shall never pass any law preventing any description of persons from coming to or settling in the said state who now are, or hereafter may become, citizens of any of the states of this Union." The legislature of Missouri gave its assent, as required, to this "fundamental condition," and the "compromise" became complete. "The public mind turned at once to things of more hopeful interest, and the Union seemed safer than ever. The American people have since become painfully aware that this was a delusion."

C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, chapter 8 (volume 1).

"The immediate contest was not over the question of the prohibition of slavery in the Territories. The great struggle lasted for nearly three years, but the final proposition which closed the controversy and which prohibited slavery in almost all the then Federal territory was probably not debated more than three hours. It was accepted without discussion by the great bulk of the advocates of Missouri's free admission. Very few slavery extensionists questioned the right and power of Congress to prevent the spread of slavery to the Territories. {3362} That question, in the minds of those who opposed restriction in Missouri, was incidental to the question of the right of Congress to impose conditions upon a State. Incidentally the question of slavery in the Territories came up in the case of Arkansas, a country south of Missouri, in which slavery was already a fact. The restrictionists themselves recognized the fact that the plain, simple issue 'of limiting the area of human slavery would be strengthened by bringing it before the country unincumbered with the question of imposing conditions on a State, though most of them never wavered in their belief that conditions might be imposed. On the one hand it was only Southern zealots who denied to Congress the power to prohibit slavery in the Territories; on the other hand many in the North who opposed slavery believed that Congress might not impose conditions upon a State. In the cabinet of Monroe, in which sat Wirt, Crawford, and Calhoun, it was unanimously agreed that Congress had power to prohibit slavery in the Territories. But John Quincy Adams, also a member of that cabinet, who hated slavery with all the strength of his soul, thought it was unconstitutional to bind a State by conditions. … The struggle indicated a notable change in the southern mind on the slavery question, and that a slave power was forming which would attempt to control all legislation of the federal Union affecting slavery. … The struggle and the compromise afford the first clear demarcation between the sections. From this time the equilibrium of political power was a matter of first concern to a section of States and to a powerful political interest. Mason and Dixon's line is extended toward the west, and now marks a political division. The slave States were now, and for the first time, clearly separated from the free. A geographical line dividing the sections was established."

J. A. Woodburn, Historical Significance of the Missouri Compromise (Report of American Historical Association, 1893), pages 289-294.

ALSO IN: H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 2, chapter 9.

J. Quincy, Life of John Quincy Adams, chapter 5.

H. Greeley, The American Conflict, volume 1, chapter 7.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1819. Admission of Alabama into the Union.

See ALABAMA: A. D. 1817-1819.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1819-1821. Acquisition of Florida from Spain. Definition of the boundary of the Louisiana Purchase.

See FLORIDA: A. D. 1819-1821.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1820. Admission of Maine into the Union as a State.

See MAINE: A. D. 1820; also, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1818-1821.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1820. Ninth Presidential Election.

"Monroe like Washington was re-chosen President by a vote practically unanimous. One, however, of the 232 electoral votes cast was wanting to consummate this exceptional honor; for a New Hampshire elector, with a boldness of discretion which, in our days and especially upon a close canvass, would have condemned him to infamy, threw away upon John Quincy Adams the vote which belonged like those of his colleagues to Monroe, determined, so it is said, that no later mortal should stand in Washington's shoes. Of America's Presidents elected by virtual acclamation history furnishes but these two examples; and as between the men honored by so unapproachable a tribute of confidence, Monroe entered upon his second term of office with less of real political opposition than Washington."

J. Schouler, History of the United States, chapter 10, section. 2 (volume 3).

Daniel D. Tompkins was re-elected Vice President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1820. The Fourth Census.

Total population, 9,638,191 (an increase exceeding 33 per cent. over the enumeration of 1810), classed and distributed as follows:

North.

White. Free black. Slave. Connecticut. 267,161 7,844 97 Illinois. 53,788 457 917 Indiana. 145,758 1,230 190 Maine. 297,340 929 0 Massachusetts. 516,419 6,740 0 Michigan. 8,591 174 0 New Hampshire. 243,236 786 0 New Jersey. 257,409 12,460 7,557 New York. 1,332,744 29,279 10,088 Ohio. 576,572 4,723 0 Pennsylvania. 1,017,094 30,202 211 Rhode Island. 79,413 3,554 48 Vermont. 234,846 903 0 --- --- --- Total 5,030,371 99,281 19,108

South.

White. Free black. Slave. Alabama. 85,451 571 41,879 Arkansas 12,579 59 1,617 Delaware. 55,282 12,958 4,509 District of Columbia. 22,614 4,048 6,377 Georgia. 189,566 1,763 149,654 Kentucky. 434,644 2,759 126,732 Louisiana. 73,383 10,476 69,064 Maryland. 260,223 39,730 107,397 Mississippi. 42,176 458 32,814 Missouri. 55,988 347 10,222 North Carolina. 419,200 14,612 205,017 South Carolina. 237,440 6,826 258,475 Tennessee. 339,927 2,727 80,107 Virginia. 603,087 36,889 425,153 --- --- --- Total 2,831,560 134,223 1,519,017

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1821. Beginning of emigration to Texas.

See TEXAS: A. D. 1819-1835.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1821-1824. The Era of Good Feeling.

With the closing of the war of 1812-14, and the disappearance of the party of the Federalists, there came a period of remarkable quietude in the political world. "Then followed the second administration of Monroe, to which was given, perhaps by the President himself, a name which has secured for the whole period a kind of peaceful eminence. It was probably fixed and made permanent by two lines in Halleck's once famous poem of 'Alnwick Castle,' evidently written during the poet's residence in England in 1822-23. Speaking of the change from the feudal to the commercial spirit, he says: "'Tis what our President Monroe, Has called "the era of good feeling."' … It would seem from this verse that Monroe himself was credited with the authorship of the phrase; but I have been unable to find it in his published speeches or messages, and it is possible that it may be of newspaper origin, and that Halleck, writing in England, may have fathered it on the President himself."

T. W. Higginson, Larger History of the United States, page 394.

{3363}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1823. The enunciation of the Monroe Doctrine.

One lasting mark of distinction was given to the administration of President Monroe by the importance which came to be attached to his enunciation of the principle of policy since known as the "Monroe Doctrine." This was simply a formal and official statement of the national demand that foreign nations shall not interfere with the affairs of the two American continents. "There has been a good deal of dispute as to the real authorship of this announcement, Charles Francis Adams claiming it for his father, and Charles Sumner for the English statesman Canning. Mr. Gilman, however, in his late memoir of President Monroe, has shown with exhaustive research that this doctrine had grown up gradually into a national tradition before Monroe's time, and that he merely formulated it, and made it a matter of distinct record. The whole statement is contained in a few detached passages of his message of December 2, 1823. In this he announces that 'the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are not to be considered as subjects for colonization by European powers.' Further on he points out that the people of the United States have kept aloof from European dissensions, and ask only in return that North and South America should be equally let alone. 'We should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety;' and while no objection is made to any existing colony or dependency of theirs, yet any further intrusion or interference would be regarded as 'the manifestation of an unfriendly spirit towards the United States.' This in brief, is the 'Monroe doctrine' as originally stated; and it will always remain a singular fact that this President—the least original or commanding of those who early held that office—should yet be the only one whose name is identified with what amounts to a wholly new axiom of international law."

T. W. Higginson, Larger History of the United States, chapter 16.

"At a cabinet meeting May 13, 1818, President Monroe propounded several questions on the subject of foreign affairs, of which the fifth, as recorded by J. Q. Adams, was this: 'Whether the ministers of the United States in Europe shall be instructed that the United States will not join in any project of interposition between Spain and the South Americans, which should not be to promote the complete independence of those provinces; and whether measures shall be taken to ascertain if this be the policy of the British government, and if so to establish a concert with them for the support of this policy.' He adds that all these points were discussed, without much difference of opinion. On July 31, 1818, Rush had an important interview with Castelreagh in respect to a proposed mediation of Great Britain between Spain and her colonies. The coöperation of the United States was desired. Mr. Rush informed the British minister that 'the United States would decline taking part, if they took part at all, in any plan of pacification, except on the basis of the independence of the colonies.' 'This,' he added, 'was the determination to which his government had come on much deliberation.' … Gallatin writes to J. Q. Adams, June 24, 1823, that before leaving Paris he had said to M. Chateaubriand on May 13, 'The United States would undoubtedly preserve their neutrality provided it were respected, and avoid every interference with the politics of Europe. … On the other hand, they would not suffer others to interfere against the emancipation of America.' … After Canning had proposed to Rush (September 19, 1823) that the United States should coöperate with England in preventing European interference with the Spanish-American colonies, Monroe consulted Jefferson as well as the cabinet, on the course which it was advisable to take, and with their approbation prepared his message. … Enough has been quoted to show that Mr. Sumner is not justified in saying that the 'Monroe doctrine proceeded from Canning,' and that he was 'its inventor, promoter, and champion, at least so far as it bears against European intervention in American affairs.' Nevertheless, Canning is entitled to high praise for the part which he took in the recognition of the Spanish republics, a part which almost justified his proud utterance, 'I called the New World into existence to redress the balance of the Old.'"

D. C. Gilman, James Monroe, chapter 7.

ALSO IN: C. Sumner, Prophetic Voices concerning America, page 157.

_G. F. Tucker, The Monroe Doctrine._

F. Wharton, Digest of the International Law of the United States, section 57 (volume 1).

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1824. The Protective Tariff.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES): A. D. 1816-1824.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1824. Tenth Presidential Election. No choice by the People. Election of John Quincy Adams by the House of Representatives.

"In 1823, as the Presidential election approached, the influences to control and secure the interests predominating in the different sections of the country became more active. Crawford of Georgia, Calhoun of South Carolina, Adams of Massachusetts, and Clay of Kentucky, were the most prominent candidates. In December, Barbour of Virginia was superseded, as Speaker of the House of Representatives, by Clay of Kentucky; an event ominous to the hopes of Crawford, and to that resistance to the tariff and to internal improvements which was regarded as dependent on his success. The question whether a Congressional caucus, by the instrumentality of which Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe had obtained the Presidency, should be again held to nominate a candidate for that office, was the next cause of political excitement. The Southern party, whose hopes rested on the success of Crawford, were clamorous for a caucus. The friends of the other candidates were either lukewarm or hostile to that expedient. Pennsylvania, whose general policy favored a protective tariff and public improvements, hesitated. … But the Democracy of that state … held meetings at Philadelphia, and elsewhere, recommending a Congressional caucus. This motion would have been probably adopted, had not the Legislature of Alabama, about this time, nominated Andrew Jackson for the Presidency, and accompanied their resolutions in his favor with a recommendation to their representatives to use their best exertions to prevent a Congressional nomination of a President. The popularity of Jackson, and the obvious importance to his success of the policy recommended by Alabama, fixed the wavering counsels of Pennsylvania, so that only three representatives from that state attended the Congressional caucus, which was soon after called, and which consisted of only 60 members, out of 261, the whole number of the House of Representatives; of which Virginia and New York, under the lead of Mr. Van Buren, constituted nearly one half. {3364} Notwithstanding this meagre assemblage, Mr. Crawford was nominated for the Presidency. … But the days of Congressional caucuses were now numbered. The people took the nomination of President into their own hands [and John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay were brought into the field]. … The result of this electioneering conflict was that, by the returns of the electoral colleges of the several states, it appeared that none of the candidates had the requisite constitutional majority; the whole number of votes being 261—of which Andrew Jackson had 99, John Quincy Adams 84, William H. Crawford 41, and Henry Clay 37. [The popular vote cast as nearly as can be determined, was: Jackson, 153,544; Adams, 108,740; Crawford, 46,618; Clay, 47,136.] For the office of Vice-President, John C. Calhoun had 180 votes, and was elected. … Of the 84 votes cast for Mr. Adams, not one was given by either of the three great Southern slaveholding states. Seventy-seven were given to him by New England and New York. The other seven were cast by the Middle or recently admitted states. The selection of President from the candidates now devolved on the House of Representatives, under the provisions of the constitution. But, again, Mr. Adams had the support of none of those slaveholding states, with the exception of Kentucky, and her delegates were equally divided between him and General Jackson. The decisive vote was, in effect, in the hands of Mr. Clay, then Speaker of the House, who cast it for Mr. Adams; a responsibility he did not hesitate to assume, notwithstanding the equal division of the Kentucky delegation, and in defiance of a resolution passed by the Legislature of that state, declaring their preference for General Jackson. On the final vote Andrew Jackson had 7 votes, William H. Crawford 4, and John Quincy Adams 13; who was, therefore, forthwith declared President of the United States for four years ensuing the 4th of March, 1825. … Immediately after his inauguration, Mr. Adams appointed Henry Clay, of Kentucky, Secretary of State. … General Jackson was deeply mortified and irritated by Mr. Clay's preference of Mr. Adams. … He immediately put into circulation among his friends and partisans an unqualified statement to the effect that Mr. Adams had obtained the Presidency by means of a corrupt bargain with Henry Clay, on the condition that he should be elevated to the office of Secretary of State. To this calumny Jackson gave his name and authority, asserting that he possessed evidence of its truth; and, although Mr. Clay and his friends publicly denied the charge, and challenged proof of it, two years elapsed before they could compel him to produce his evidence. This, when adduced, proved utterly groundless, and the charge false; the whole being but the creation of an irritated and disappointed mind. Though detected and exposed, the calumny had the effect for which it was calculated. Jackson's numerous partisans and friends made it the source of an uninterrupted stream of abuse upon Mr. Adams, through his whole administration."

J. Quincy, Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams, chapters 6-7.

The new administration "stood upon the same political basis as that of Mr. Monroe. It was but a continuance of the same party ascendency. It looked to no change of measures, and to no other change of men than became inevitably necessary to supply the vacancies which the accidents of political life had created. Mr. Clay was called to the State Department [and was maliciously accused of having bargained for it when he threw his influence at last in Mr. Adams' favor]. … The country … indulged the hope of a prosperous career in the track which had been opened by Mr. Madison, and so successfully pursued by Mr. Monroe. Less confidently, however, it indulged the hope of a continuance of that immunity from party contention and exasperation which had characterized the last eight years. The rising of an opposition was seen, at the very commencement of this administration, like a dark cloud upon the horizon, which gradually spread towards the zenith, not without much rumbling of distant thunder and angry flashes of fire. It was quite obvious to shrewd observers that the late election had disappointed many eager spirits, whose discontent was likely to make head against the predominant party, and, by uniting the scattered fragments of an opposition which had heretofore only slept, whilst the country had supposed it extinct, would present a very formidable antagonist to the new administration. The extraordinary popularity of General Jackson, the defeat of his friends by the vote of the House of Representatives, the neutrality of his political position, his avowed toleration towards political opponents, and what was thought to be his liberal views in regard to prominent political measures—for as yet nothing was developed in his opinions to set him in direct opposition to the policy or principles which governed the administration either of Madison or Monroe—all these considerations gave great strength to the position which he now occupied, and, in the same degree, emboldened the hopes of those who looked to him as the proper person to dispute the next election against the present incumbent. Many of those who had hoped to see the reign of good feeling and of abstinence from party strife prolonged, will remember with what surprise they saw this gathering of hostile elements, and heard it proclaimed by an authoritative political leader [Colonel Richard M. Johnson], in the first days of the new administration, that it should be and ought to be opposed, 'even if it were as pure as the angels at the right hand of the throne of God.' Such a declaration was not less ominous of what was to come than it was startling for its boldness and its novelty in the history of the government. … The opposition … took an organized form—became compact, eager, intolerant and even vindictive."

J. P. Kennedy, Memoirs of the Life of William Wirt, volume 2, chapter 10.

"Monroe was the last President of the Virginian line, John Quincy Adams the last from New England. The centre of power was passing from the east to the west. Adams was a genuine New Englander of the Puritan stock, austerely moral, from his boyhood laboriously self-trained, not only staid but solemn in his teens, intensely self-conscious, ever engaged in self-examination, the punctual keeper of a voluminous diary, an invariably early riser, a daily reader of the Bible even in the White House, scrupulously methodical and strictly upright in all his ways; but testy, unconciliatory, unsympathetic, absolutely destitute of all the arts by which popularity is won. {3365} His election does the highest credit to the respect of the electors for public virtue unadorned. The peculiar features of his father's character were so intensified in him that he may be deemed the typical figure rather than his father. In opinions he was a Federalist who having broken with his party on the question of foreign relations and the embargo had been put out of its pale but had retained its general mould. As he was about the last President chosen for merit not for availability, so he was about the last whose only rule was not party but the public service. So strictly did he observe the principle of permanency and purity in the Civil Service, that he refused to dismiss from office a Postmaster-General whom he knew to be intriguing against him. The demagogic era had come but he would not recognize its coming. He absolutely refused to go on the stump, to conciliate the press, to do anything for the purpose of courting popularity and making himself a party. His obstinacy was fatal to his ambition but is not dishonourable to his memory."

Goldwin Smith, The United States, chapter 4.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1824-1825. The visit of Lafayette.

One of the most deeply interesting events of the year 1824 was the arrival in the country of the honored Lafayette, companion of Washington and friend of the American Republic in its struggle for independence. He came on the invitation of the national Government and was entertained as its guest. "He arrived at Staten Island on Sunday, 15th of August, 1824, accompanied by his son, George Washington Lafayette, and his son-in-]aw, M. Le Vasseur. Here he remained until Monday, and was then met and welcomed by a distinguished committee from New York, who escorted him to that city. … The arrival of Lafayette was an event which stirred the whole country; everybody was anxious to see him, and every State and city in the Union extended an invitation to him to visit such State or city; and he did so, being everywhere received with the most enthusiastic manifestations of love and respect. … He spent a little over a year in the United States, traveling most of the time. … Having visited every portion of the United States and received the affectionate homage of the people, General Lafayette returned to Washington, where he became in fact 'the Nation's Guest' at the Presidential mansion. Soon after the meeting of Congress, in December, 1824, a bill was reported by a joint committee of the two Houses granting to him a township of land and the sum of $200,000, which became a law."

N. Sargent, Public Men and Events, 1817-1853, volume 1, page 89-91.

ALSO IN: _A. Levasseur, Lafayette in America, in 1824-1825._

B. Tuckerman, Life of General Lafayette, volume 2, chapter 7.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1824-1836. Schemes of the Slave Power for acquiring Texas.

See TEXAS: A. D. 1824-1836.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1825-1828. Opposition to the Administration. The question of Internal Improvements. Reconstruction of Parties. Democrats and National Republicans.

The inaugural address of President Adams "furnished a topic" against him, and "went to the reconstruction of parties on the old line of strict, or latitudinous, construction of the constitution. It was the topic of internal national improvement by the federal government. The address extolled the value of such works, considered the constitutional objections as yielding to the force of argument, expressed the hope that every speculative (constitutional) scruple would be solved in a practical blessing; and declared the belief that, in the execution of such works, posterity would derive a fervent gratitude to the founders of our Union and most deeply feel and acknowledge the beneficent action of our government. The declaration of principles which would give so much power to the government … alarmed the old republicans, and gave a new ground of opposition to Mr. Adams's administration, in addition to the strong one growing out of the election in the House of Representatives. … This new ground of opposition was greatly strengthened at the delivery of the first annual message, in which the topic of internal improvement was again largely enforced, other subjects recommended which would require a liberal use of constructive powers, and Congress informed that the President had accepted an invitation from the American States of Spanish origin, to send ministers to their proposed Congress on the Isthmus of Panama.

See COLOMBIAN STATES: A. D. 1826.

It was, therefore, clear from the beginning that the new administration was to have a settled and strong opposition. … There was opposition in the Senate to the confirmation of Mr. Clay's nomination to the State department, growing out of his support of Mr. Adams in the election of the House of Representatives, and acceptance of office from him; but overruled by a majority of two to one."

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 1, chapter 21.

"From the very beginning of this Administration both factions of the Strict Constructionists united in an opposition to the President which became stronger through his whole term of office, until it overcame him. His ill-advised nomination of Clay to a post in his Cabinet gave color to the charge of a corrupt bargain between him and Clay, by which Adams was to receive the Clay vote in the House, and Clay was to be rewarded by the position of Secretary of State, which was then usually considered a stepping stone to the Presidency. Clay angrily denied any such bargain, and the renewal of charges and denials, each with its appropriate arguments, gave abundant material for debate. The Clay and Adams factions soon united and took the distinctive party name of National Republicans. Some years afterward this name was changed to that of Whigs. They maintained the loose constructionist principles of the Federalists, and, in addition, desired a Protective Tariff and a system of public improvements at national expense. … In October, 1825, the Tennessee Legislature nominated Jackson for the Presidency in 1828, and Jackson accepted the nomination. Crawford's continued ill-health compelled his adherents to look elsewhere for a candidate, and they gradually united upon Jackson. At first the resulting coalition was known as 'Jackson Men,' but, as they began to take the character of a national party, they assumed the name of Democrats, by which they have since been known. They maintained the strict constructionist principles of the Republican party, though the Crawford faction in the South went further, and held the extreme ground of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1799."

A. Johnston, History of American Politics, 2d edition, chapter 11.

ALSO IN: C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, volume 1, chapters 10-12.

{3366}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1828. The Tariff "Bill of Abominations." Change of front in New England.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES: A. D. 1828).

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1828. Eleventh Presidential Election. Triumph of Jackson and the new Democracy.

Andrew Jackson was again put in nomination for the Presidency, while President Adams was supported for re-election by the National Republicans. "The campaign was conducted, on both sides, on very ruthless methods. Niles said it was worse than the campaign of 1798. Campaign extras of the 'Telegraph' were issued weekly, containing partisan material, refutations of charges against Jackson, and slanders on Adams and Clay. The Adams party also published a monthly of a similar character. The country was deluged with pamphlets on both sides. These pamphlets were very poor stuff, and contain nothing important on any of the issues. They all appeal to low tastes and motives, prejudices and jealousies. … In September, 1827, the Tammany General Committee and the Albany 'Argus' came out for Jackson, as it had been determined, in the programme, that they should do. A law was passed for casting the vote of New York in 1828 by districts. The days of voting throughout the country ranged from October 31st to November 19th. The votes were cast by the Legislature in Delaware and South Carolina; by districts in Maine, New York, Maryland, Tennessee; elsewhere, by general ticket. Jackson got 178 votes to 83 for Adams. The popular vote was 648,273 for Jackson; 508,064 for Adams. Jackson got only one vote in New England. … For Vice-President, Richard Rush got all the Adams votes; Calhoun [who was elected] got all the Jackson votes except 7 of Georgia, which were given to William Smith, of South Carolina. General Jackson was therefore triumphantly elected President of the United States, in the name of reform, and as the standard-bearer of the people, rising in their might to overthrow an extravagant, corrupt, aristocratic, federalist administration, which had encroached on the liberties of the people, and had aimed to corrupt elections by an abuse of federal patronage. Many people believed this picture of Adams's administration to be true. Andrew Jackson no doubt believed it. Many people believe it yet. Perhaps no administration, except that of the elder Adams, is under such odium. There is not, however, in our history any administration which, upon a severe and impartial scrutiny, appears more worthy of respectful and honorable memory. Its chief fault was that it was too good for the wicked world in which it found itself. In 1836 Adams said, in the House, that he had never removed one person from office for political causes, and that he thought that was one of the principal reasons why he was not reëlected."

W. G. Sumner, Andrew Jackson as a Public Man, chapter 5.

"In this election there was a circumstance to be known and remembered. Mr. Adams and Mr. Rush were both from the non-slaveholding, General Jackson and Mr. Calhoun from the slaveholding States, and both large slave owners themselves, and both received a large vote (73 each) in the free States—and of which at least 40 were indispensable to their election. There was no jealousy, or hostile or aggressive spirit in the North at that time against the South!"

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 1, chapter 38.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1828-1833. The Nullification doctrine and ordinance of South Carolina. The Hayne and Webster debate. President Jackson's proclamation. The Compromise Tariff.

"In May, 1828, a meeting of the South Carolina delegation in Congress was held in Washington, at the rooms of General Hayne, one of the Senators of that State, to concert measures against the tariff and the protective policy which it embodied. From the history of the times, and the disclosures subsequently made, it is apparent that some violent things were said at this meeting, but it broke up without any definite plan. In the course of the following summer, there were many popular meetings in South Carolina, largely attended, at which the tariff of 1824 was treated as an act of despotism and usurpation, which ought to be openly resisted. … They occasioned anxiety and regret among the friends of the Union throughout the country, though nothing more. But, in the autumn, the Legislature of South Carolina adopted an 'Exposition and Protest,' which gave form and substance to the doctrines which thenceforward became known as 'Nullification.' In order to understand them, however, as a theory of the Federal Constitution, it is necessary to state the theory to which they are opposed, and to overthrow which they were brought forward. The Government of the United States, under the Constitution, had hitherto been administered upon the principle that the extent of its powers is to be finally determined by its supreme judicial tribunal, not only when there is any conflict of authority between its several departments, but also when the authority of the whole Government is denied by one or more of the States. … Aside from the authority of [the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 1798]—an authority that was doubtful, because their interpretation was not clear—there had been no important assertion of the principle that a State can determine for its citizens whether they are to obey an act of Congress, by asserting its unconstitutional character, and that the right to do this is implied as a right inherent in a State, under the Constitution, and results from the nature of the Government. This, however, was what the advocates of nullification now undertook to establish. The remedy which they sought, against acts which they regarded as usurpations, was not revolution, and not the breaking up the Union, as they claimed; but it was a remedy which they held to exist within the Union, and to have been contemplated by the people of the States when they established the Constitution. How far they considered such a theory compatible with the continued existence of the Union, I am not aware that they undertook to explain. … Although the Legislature of South Carolina had thus propounded a theory of resistance, and held that there was then a case in the tariff which would justify a resort to it, no steps were yet taken toward the immediate exercise of the asserted power." In the great debate between General Hayne of South Carolina and Daniel Webster, which occurred in the Senate, in January, 1830, the doctrine of nullification received for the first time a discussion which sank deep into the mind of the nation. {3367} The original subject-matter of the debate was a resolution relating to Western land sales; but Hayne in his first speech made an attack on New England which drew out Webster in vindication, and then, when the South Carolinian replied, he boldly and broadly set forth the nullifying theory which his State had accepted from the sophistical brain of John C. Calhoun. It received its refutation then and there, in Webster's final speech. "The effect of this speech upon the country, that immediately followed its delivery, it is not easy for us at the present day to measure. … Vast numbers of Mr. Webster's speech were … published and circulated in pamphlet editions, after all the principal newspapers of the country had given it entire to their readers. The popular verdict, throughout the Northern and Western and many of the Southern States was decisive. A great majority of the people of the United States, of all parties, understood, appreciated, and accepted the view maintained by Mr. Webster of the nature of the Constitution, and the character of the government which it establishes."

G. T. Curtis, Life of Daniel Webster, chapter 16 (volume 1).

If Webster's speech had solidified the majority opinion of the country in resistance to nullification, it had not paralyzed the nullifying movement. In the summer of 1831, and again in August, 1832, Calhoun published addresses to the people of South Carolina, elaborating his doctrine, and "urging an immediate issue on account of the oppressive tariff legislation under which the South was then suffering. The Legislature of South Carolina was convened by the governor to meet on October 22, for the purpose of calling a convention 'to consider the character and extent of the usurpations of the general government.' The convention met on November 19, and adopted without delay an 'ordinance' declaring that the tariff act of 1828, and the amendments thereto passed in 1832, were null and void; that it should be held unlawful to enforce the payment of duties thereunder within the State of South Carolina; that it should be the duty of the legislature to make laws giving effect to the ordinance; … and that, if the general government should attempt to use force to maintain the authority of the federal law, the State of South Carolina would secede from the Union,—the ordinance to go into full effect on February 1, 1833. The legislature, which met again on November 19, passed the 'appropriate' laws. But these enactments were not very fierce; as Webster said, they 'limped far behind the ordinance.' Some preparation, although little, was made for a conflict of arms;" nor was there any certain show of readiness in other Southern States to stand by South Carolina in the position she had taken. "President Jackson's annual message, which went to Congress on December 4, 1832, was remarkably quiet in tone," and neither alarmed the nullifiers nor gave confidence to the friends of the Union; but "six days later, on December 10, came out Jackson's famous proclamation against the nullifiers, which spoke thus: 'The Constitution of the United States forms a government, not a league. … Our Constitution does not contain the absurdity of giving power to make laws, and another power to resist them. To say that any state may at pleasure secede from the Union is to say that the United States are not a nation.' He appealed to the people of South Carolina, in the tone of a father, to desist from their ruinous enterprise; but he gave them also clearly to understand that, if they resisted by force, the whole power of the Union would be exerted to maintain its authority. All over the North, even where Jackson had been least popular, the proclamation was hailed with unbounded enthusiasm. … The nullifiers in South Carolina received the presidential manifesto apparently with defiance. The governor of the state issued a counter-proclamation. Calhoun resigned the vice-presidency, and was immediately sent to the Senate to fight the battle for nullification there." The president, now thoroughly roused, called on Congress for extraordinary powers to meet the emergency, and a bill embodying his wishes—called the "Force Bill"—was introduced. But, at the same time, while they showed this bold front to the nullifiers, Congress and the executive began to prepare a retreat from the ground they had held on the tariff. Henry Clay took the field again, in the exercise of his peculiar talents for compromise, and the result was the nearly simultaneous passage (February 26 and 27, 1833) through Congress of the "Force bill" and of a compromise tariff bill, which latter provided for a graduated reduction of the duties year by year, until 1842, when they should stand at 20 per cent., as a horizontal rate, with a large free-list. "The first object of the measure was attained: South Carolina repealed her nullification ordinance. … But before long it became clear that beyond the repeal of the nullification ordinance, the compromise had settled nothing. The nullifiers strenuously denied that they had in any sense given up their peculiar doctrine."

C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, chapter 14 (volume 2).

"The theory of nullification, as set forth by Calhoun, even now, after it has received the benefit of careful study and able expounding by historians, is not clear. He always avowed a loyalty to the Union, but the arguments by which he sought to demonstrate that nullification was compatible with the existence of the Union, and indeed a guarantee of its perpetuity, did not occasion much solicitude to the majority of his party. But no one at the North understood the fallacy of his reasoning or the real end and aim of his party more clearly than did the Union men of his state. They reasoned simply. Said the Camden, S. C. 'Gazette': 'We know of only two ways, under our government, to get rid of obnoxious legislation. We must convince a majority of the nation that a given enactment is wrong and have it repealed in the form prescribed by the constitution, or resist it extra-constitutionally by the sword. … But this everlasting cant of devotion to the Union, accompanied by a recommendation to do those acts that must necessarily destroy it, is beyond patient endurance from a people not absolutely confined in their own mad-houses.' … A fact … that historians have failed to lay any stress upon, and that nevertheless deserves some notice, is the holding of a state convention of the Union party of South Carolina immediately after the nullification convention had completed its work. It was the last important action of that party in the state. {3368} Randell Hunt, who presented the first resolutions, epitomized the views of the convention and the question it should consider in three sentences: 'That the Union party acknowledges no allegiance to any government except that of the United States. That in referring this resolution to the general committee they be instructed to inquire whether it is not expedient to give a military organization to the Union party throughout the state. Whether it will not be necessary to call in the assistance of the general government for maintaining the laws of the United States against the arbitrary violence which is threatened by the late convention.' The resolutions which were adopted declared that the ordinance of nullification violated the constitution of the United States and had virtually destroyed the Union, since by preventing the general government from enforcing its laws within the boundaries of the state, it made the state a sovereignty paramount to the United States. They denounced the provisions of the ordinance as tyrannical and oppressive, and the test oath as especially incompatible with civil liberty, in that it disfranchised nearly half the citizens of the state. They pointed scornfully to the project of a standing army in the state. … They concluded by declaring the continued opposition of the signers to the tariff, and their determination to protect themselves against intolerable oppression. The resolutions were signed by all the members of the convention, about 180 in number. In point of fact, the Unionists were not disposed to favor any compromise measures, and looked rather with disfavor upon Mr. Clay's bill, as a measure which was being forced upon the country. Congress, they thought, ought not to modify the tariff until the nullification ordinance had been repealed. But the greater force was with the nullifiers, and the number of their opponents was dwindling. Caught by the enthusiasm and fighting spirit of their neighbors, some of the Unionists joined the nullification military companies that were being organized, and others, seeing the hopelessness of the struggle against a superior force, in sorrow and disgust shook the dust of South Carolina from their feet, preferring to begin life over again in other parts of the South, less charged with sentiments that they believed to be treasonable. … The Unionist party, crushed and helpless, was only too anxious to bury all feuds. It never was an active force in the state again, but the bold spirit which had actuated its members was manifested later, when the struggle for state sovereignty was more widespread; and some of the most intrepid Union men of the South in the civil war were those who had fled from South Carolina years before, when the nullification party had triumphed."

_G. Hunt, South Carolina during the Nullification Struggle (Political Science Quarterly, June, 1891)._

ALSO IN: W. G. Sumner, Andrew Jackson as a Public Man, chapters 10 and 13.

H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 1, chapter 12.

J. Parton, Life of Andrew Jackson, volume 3, chapters 32-34.

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 1, chapters 78-89.

J. C. Calhoun, Works, volume 6 (Reports and Public Letters).

O. L. Elliott, The Tariff Controversy in the United States, chapter 5.

The following is the text of the "Ordinance to nullify certain acts of the Congress of the United States, purporting to be laws laying duties and imposts on the importation of foreign commodities," adopted by the State Convention of South Carolina on the 24th of November, 1832:

"Whereas the Congress of the United States by various acts, purporting to be acts laying duties and imposts on foreign imports, but in reality intended for the protection of domestic manufactures, and the giving of bounties to classes and individuals engaged in particular employments, at the expense and to the injury and oppression of other classes and individuals, and by wholly exempting from taxation certain foreign commodities, such as are not produced or manufactured in the United States, to afford a pretext for imposing higher and excessive duties on articles similar to those intended to be protected, hath exceeded its just powers under the constitution, which confers on it no authority to afford such protection, and hath violated the true meaning and intent of the constitution, which provides for equality in imposing the burdens of taxation upon the several States and portions of the confederacy: And whereas the said Congress, exceeding its just power to impose taxes and collect revenue for the purpose of effecting and accomplishing the specific objects and purposes which the constitution of the United States authorizes it to effect and accomplish, hath raised and collected unnecessary revenue for objects unauthorized by the constitution. We, therefore, the people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained, that the several acts and parts of acts of the Congress of the United States, purporting to be laws for the imposing of duties and imposts on the importation of foreign commodities, and now having actual operation and effect within the United States, and, more especially, an act entitled 'An act in alteration of the several acts imposing duties on imports,' approved on the nineteenth day of May, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-eight, and also an act entitled 'An act to alter and amend the several acts imposing duties on imports,' approved on the fourteenth day of July, one thousand eight hundred and thirty-two, are unauthorized by the constitution of the United States, and violate the true meaning and intent thereof and are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State, its officers or citizens; and all promises, contracts, and obligations, made or entered into, or to be made or entered into, with purpose to secure the duties imposed by said acts, and all judicial proceedings which shall be hereafter had in affirmance thereof, are and shall be held utterly null and void. And it is further ordained, that it shall not be lawful for any of the constituted authorities, whether of this State or of the United States, to enforce the payment of duties imposed by the said acts within the limits of this State; but it shall be the duty of the legislature to adopt such measures and pass such acts as may be necessary to give full effect to this ordinance, and to prevent the enforcement and arrest the operation of the said acts and parts of acts of the Congress of the United States within the limits of this State, from and after the 1st day of February next, and the duty of all other constituted authorities, and of all persons residing or being within the limits of this State, and they are hereby required and enjoined to obey and give effect to this ordinance, and such acts and measures of the legislature as may be passed or adopted in obedience thereto. {3369} And it is further ordained, that in no case of law or equity, decided in the courts of this State, wherein shall be drawn in question the authority of this ordinance, or the validity of such act or acts of the legislature as may be passed for the purpose of giving effect thereto, or the validity of the aforesaid acts of Congress, imposing duties, shall any appeal be taken or allowed to the Supreme Court of the United States, nor shall any copy of the record be permitted or allowed for that purpose; and if any such appeal shall be attempted to be taken, the courts of this State shall proceed to execute and enforce their judgments according to the laws and usages of the State, without reference to such attempted appeal, and the person or persons attempting to take such appeal may be dealt with as for a contempt of the court. And it is further ordained, that all persons now holding any office of honor, profit, or trust, civil or military, under this State (members of the legislature excepted), shall, within such time, and in such manner as the legislature shall prescribe, take an oath well and truly to obey, execute, and enforce this ordinance, and such act or acts of the legislature as may be passed in pursuance thereof, according to the true intent and meaning of the same; and on the neglect or omission of any such person or persons so to do, his or their office or offices shall be forthwith vacated, and shall be filled up as if such person or persons were dead or had resigned; and no person hereafter elected to any office of honor, profit, or trust, civil or military (members of the legislature excepted), shall, until the legislature shall otherwise provide and direct, enter on the execution of his office, or be in any respect competent to discharge the duties thereof until he shall, in like manner, have taken a similar oath; and no juror shall be empanelled in any of the courts of this State, in any cause in which shall be in question this ordinance, or any act of the legislature passed in pursuance thereof, unless he shall first, in addition to the usual oath, have taken an oath that he will well and truly obey, execute, and enforce this ordinance, and such act or acts of the legislature as may be passed to carry the same into operation and effect, according to the true intent and meaning thereof. And we, the people of South Carolina, to the end that it may be fully understood by the government of the United States, and the people of the co-States, that we are determined to maintain this our ordinance and declaration, at every hazard, do further declare that we will not submit to the application of force on the part of the federal government, to reduce this State to obedience; but that we will consider the passage, by Congress, of any act authorizing the employment of a military or naval force against the State of South Carolina, her constitutional authorities or citizens; or any act abolishing or closing the ports of this State, or any of them, or otherwise obstructing the free ingress and egress of vessels to and from the said ports, or any other act on the part of the federal government, to coerce the State, shut up her ports, destroy or harass her commerce, or to enforce the acts hereby declared to be null and void, otherwise than through the civil tribunals of the country, as inconsistent with the longer continuance of South Carolina in the Union; and that the people of this State will henceforth hold themselves absolved from all further obligation to maintain or preserve their political connection with the people of the other States; and will forthwith proceed to organize a separate government, and do all other acts and things which sovereign and independent States may of right do. Done in convention at Columbia, the twenty-fourth day of November, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty-two, and in the fifty-seventh year of the declaration of the independence of the United States of America."

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1829. Introduction of the "Spoils System."

See CIVIL-SERVICE REFORM IN THE UNITED STATES.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1829. The Kitchen Cabinet of President Jackson.

Major Lewis, one of the Tennessee friends of General Jackson, who accompanied him to Washington and was persuaded to remain, with his residence at the White House; General Duff Green, editor of the "United States Telegraph"; Isaac Hill, editor of the "New Hampshire Patriot," and Amos Kendall, late the editor of a Jackson paper in Kentucky, but a native of Massachusetts:—"these were the gentlemen … who, at the beginning of the new administration, were supposed to have most of the President's ear and confidence, and were stigmatized by the opposition as the Kitchen Cabinet."

J. Parton, Life of Andrew Jackson, volume 3, chapter 16.

After the breach between Jackson and Calhoun, Duff Green adhered to the latter. The "Globe" newspaper was then founded, to be the organ of the administration, and Francis P. Blair, called from Kentucky to undertake the editorship, acquired at the same time Duff Green's vacated seat in the Kitchen Cabinet.

J. Schouler, History of the United States, volume 3, page 501.

"The establishment of the 'Globe,' the rupture with Calhoun, and the breaking up of the first cabinet had inaugurated a bitter war between the two rival papers, though really between the President and Mr. Calhoun, in consequence of which there were rich revelations made to the public."

N. Sargent, Public Men and Events, 1817-1853, volume 1, page 186.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1829-1832. Rise of the Abolitionists.

"Between the years 1829 and 1832 took place a remarkable series of debates in Virginia on the subject of slavery, brought about by dissatisfaction with the State constitution and by the Nat Turner massacre, in which a number of slaves had risen against their masters. In these debates the evils of slavery were exposed as clearly as they were afterwards by the Abolitionists, and with an outspoken freedom which, when indulged in by Northern men, was soon to be denounced as treasonable and incendiary. These Southern speakers were silenced by the Slave Power. But there were men in the North who thought the same and who would not be silenced. Chief among these was William Lloyd Garrison. He had begun his memorable career by circulating petitions in Vermont in 1828 in favor of emancipation in the District of Columbia. Having joined Lundy in Baltimore in editing the 'Genius of Universal Emancipation,' he had suffered ignominy in the cause, in a Southern jail; drawing from persecution and hardship only new inspiration, he began the publication of the 'Liberator', at Boston in January, 1831. {3370} In the following year, under his leadership, was formed the New England Anti-Slavery Society, which placed itself on the new ground that immediate, unconditional emancipation, without expatriation, was the right of every slave and could not be withheld by his master an hour without sin. In March, 1833, the 'Weekly Emancipator' was established in New York, with the assistance of Arthur and Lewis Tappan, and under the editorship of William Goodell. In the same year appeared at Haverhill, Massachusetts, a vigorous pamphlet by John G. Whittier, entitled 'Justice and Expediency, or Slavery considered with a View to its Rightful and Effectual Remedy, Abolition.' Nearly simultaneously were published Mrs. Lydia Maria Child's 'Appeal in Behalf of that Class of Americans called Africans,' and a pamphlet by Elizur Wright, Jr., a professor in the Western Reserve College, on 'The Sin of Slavery and its Remedy.' These publications and the doctrines of the 'Liberator' produced great excitement throughout the country."

B. Tuckerman, William Jay and the Constitutional Movement for the Abolition of Slavery, chapter 3.

The "Liberator" "was a weekly journal, bearing the names of William Lloyd Garrison and Isaac Knapp as publishers. Its motto was, 'Our Country is the World, Our Countrymen are Mankind,' a direct challenge to those whose motto was the Jingo cry of those days, 'Our Country, right or wrong!' It was a modest folio, with a page of four columns, measuring fourteen inches by nine and a quarter. … The paper had not a dollar of capital. It was printed at first with borrowed type. Garrison and Knapp did all the work of every kind between them, Garrison of course doing the editorials. That he wrote them can hardly be said: his habit was often to set up without manuscript. … The publishers announced in their first issue their determination to go on as long as they had bread and water to live on. In fact, they lived on bread and milk, with a little fruit and a few cakes, which they bought in small shops below. Garrison apologizes for the meagreness of the editorials, which, he says, he has but six hours, and those at midnight, to compose, all the rest of his time and the whole of that of his companion being taken up by the mechanical work. … It was against nothing less than the world, or at least the world in which he lived, that this youth of twenty-six, with his humble partner, took up arms. Slavery was at the height of its power. … The salutatory of the 'Liberator' avowed that its editor meant to speak out without restraint. 'I will be as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject I do not wish to think or speak or write with moderation. No! No! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen—but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in earnest—I will not equivocate—I will not excuse—I will not retreat a single inch—and I will be heard.' This promise was amply kept. … In private and in his family he was all gentleness and affection. Let it be said, too, that he set a noble example to controversial editors in his fair treatment of his opponents. Not only did he always give insertion to their replies, but he copied their criticisms from other journals into his own. Fighting for freedom of discussion, he was ever loyal to his own principle. What is certain is that the 'Liberator,' in spite of the smallness of its circulation, which was hardly enough to keep it alive, soon told. The South was moved to its centre. The editorials probably would not have caused much alarm, as the slaves could not read. What was likely to cause more alarm was the frontispiece, which spoke plainly enough to the slave's eye. It represented an auction at which 'slaves, horses and other cattle' were being offered for sale, and a whipping-post at which a slave was being flogged. In the background was the Capitol at Washington, with a flag inscribed 'Liberty' floating over the dome. … On seeing the 'Liberator' the realm of slavery bestirred itself. A Vigilance Association took the matter in hand. First came fiery and bloodthirsty editorials; then anonymous threats; then attempts by legal enactment to prevent the circulation of the 'Liberator' at the South. The Grand Jury of North Carolina found a true bill against Garrison for the circulation of a paper of seditious tendency, the penalty for which was whipping and imprisonment for the first offence, and death without benefit of clergy for the second. The General Assembly of Georgia offered a reward of five thousand dollars to anyone who, under the laws of that State, should arrest the editor of the 'Liberator', bring him to trial, and prosecute him to conviction. The South reproached Boston with allowing a battery to be planted on her soil against the ramparts of Southern institutions. Boston felt the reproach, and showed that she would gladly have suppressed the incendiary print and perhaps have delivered up its editor; but the law was against her, and the mass of the people, though wavering in their allegiance to morality on the question of slavery, were still loyal to freedom of opinion. … It was just at this time that the South and its clientage at the North were thrown into a paroxysm of excitement by the Bloody Monday, as Nat Turner's rising at Southampton was called. The rising was easily suppressed, and Virginia saw, as Jamaica has since seen, how cruel is the panic of a dominant race. Not the slightest connection of the outbreak with Northern abolitionism was traced. That Garrison or anyone connected with him ever incited the slaves to revolt, or said a word intentionally which could lead to servile war, seems to be utterly untrue. His preaching to the slaves, on the contrary, was always patience, submission, abstinence from violence, while in his own moral code he carried non-resistance to an extreme. Moreover, his championship held out hope, and what goads to insurrection is despair."

Goldwin Smith, William Lloyd Garrison, pages 60-65.

"Mr. Emerson once said, 'Eloquence is dog-cheap in anti-slavery meetings.' … On the platform you would always see Garrison; with him was … Sam May. Stephen S. Foster was always there. … Parker Pilsbury, James Buffum, Arnold Buffum, Elizur Wright, Henry C. Wright, Abigail Kelley, Lucy Stone, Theo. D. Weld, the sisters Grimké, from South Carolina; John T. Sargent, Mrs. Chapman, Mrs. Lydia M. Child, Fred Douglas, Wm. W. Brown and Francis Jackson. The last was a stern Puritan, conscientious, upright, clear-minded, universally respected. Edmund Quincy also was there, and he never spoke without saying something that had a touch of wit as well as of logic. Oliver Johnson … was one of the very first members of the Society. Theodore Parker, Samuel J. May, John Pierpont, Charles L. Stearns, Charles L. Redwood, George Thompson (another wonderfully eloquent man), and, above all, Wendell Phillips."

J. F. Clarke, Anti-Slavery Days, chapter 3.

See, also, SLAVERY, NEGRO: A. D. 1828-1832.

{3371}

A. D. 1830. The Fifth Census.

Total population, 12,866,020 (being about 33½ per cent. more than in 1820), classed and distributed as follows:

North.

White. Free black. Slave. Connecticut. 289,603 8,047 25 Illinois. 155,061 1,637 747 Indiana. 339,399 3,629 3 Maine 398,263 1,190 2 Massachusetts. 603,359 7,048 1 Michigan. 31,346 261 32 New Hampshire. 268,721 604 3 New Jersey. 300,266 18,303 2,254 New york. 1,873,663 44,870 75 Ohio. 928,329 9,568 6 Pennsylvania. 1,309,900 37,930 403 Rhode Island. 93,621 3,561 17 Vermont. 279,771 881 0

Total 6,871,302 137,529 3,568

South. White. Free black. Slave. Alabama. 190,406 1,572 117,549 Arkansas. 25,671 141 4,576 Delaware. 57,601 15,855 3,292 District of Columbia. 27,563 6,152 6,119 Florida. 18,385 844 15,501 Georgia. 296,806 2,486 217,531 Kentucky. 517,787 4,917 165,213 Louisiana. 89,441 16,710 109,588 Maryland. 291,108 52,938 102,994 Mississippi 70,443 519 65,659 Missouri. 114,795 569 25,091 North Carolina. 472,843 19,543 245,601 South Carolina. 257,863 7,921 315,401 Tennessee. 535,746 4,555 141,603 Virginia. 694,300 47,348 469,757

Total 3,660,758 182,070 2,005,475

In the decade between 1820 and 1830 the immigrant arrivals in the United States, as officially recorded, numbered 143,439, of which 75,803 were from the British Islands. Prior to 1821, there is no official record of immigration.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1830-1831. The first railroads.

See STEAM LOCOMOTION ON LAND.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1832. The Black Hawk War.

See ILLINOIS: A. D. 1832.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1832. The prospective surplus and necessary tariff reduction. Clay's delusive measure.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES): A. D. 1832.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1832. Twelfth Presidential Election. Re-election of General Jackson.

General Jackson, renominated by his party almost without question, was re-elected over three competitors, the popular vote being as follows: Andrew Jackson, Democrat, 687,502; Henry Clay, National Republican, 530,189; William Wirt, Anti-Masonic, 33,108; John Floyd (voted for only in South Carolina, where electors were chosen by the legislature). The vote in the electoral college stood: Jackson 219, Clay 49, Floyd 11, Wirt 7. Martin Van Buren was elected Vice President.

"This election is notable for several reasons. It marks the beginning of the system of national nominating conventions; it gave Jackson a second term of office, in which he was to display his peculiar qualities more conspicuously than ever; it compacted and gave distinct character to the new Democratic party; and it practically settled directly the fate of the Bank of the United States, and indirectly the question of nullification. Jackson was easily re-elected, for he had established a great popularity, and the opposition was divided. A new party came into the field, and marked its advent by originating the national nominating convention. This was the Anti-Masonic party".

See NEW YORK: A. D.1826-1832.

Both the Democratic and the National Republican parties adopted the invention of the Anti-Masons, and made their nominations for the first time by the agency of great national conventions.

W. Wilson, Division and Reunion, 1829-1889, page 62.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1833-1836. President Jackson's overthrow of the United States Bank. The removal of the Deposits.

"The torrents of paper-money issued during the revolutionary war, which sunk in value to nothing, converted the old prejudice against paper promises-to-pay into an aversion that had the force of an instinct. To this instinctive aversion, as much as to the constitutional objections urged by Mr. Jefferson and his disciples, was owing the difficulty experienced by Alexander Hamilton in getting his first United States bank chartered. Hence, also, the refusal of Congress to recharter that bank in 1811. Hence the unwillingness of Mr. Madison to sanction the charter of the second bank of the United States in 1816. But the bank was chartered in 1816, and went into existence with the approval of all the great republican leaders, opposed only by the extreme Jeffersonians and by the few federalists who were in public life. … But, long before General Jackson came into power, the bank appeared to have lived down all opposition. In the presidential campaign of 1824 it was not so much as mentioned, nor was it mentioned in that of 1828. … At the beginning of the administration of General Jackson, the Bank of the United States was a truly imposing institution. Its capital was thirty-five millions. The public money deposited in its vaults averaged six or seven millions; its private deposits, six millions more; its circulation, twelve millions; its discounts, more than forty millions a year; its annual profits, more than three millions. Besides the parent bank at Philadelphia, with its marble palace and hundred clerks, there were 25 branches in the towns and cities of the Union. … Its bank-notes were as good as gold in every part of the country. … The bank and its branches received and disbursed the entire revenue of the nation. … There is a tradition in Washington to this day, that General Jackson came up from Tennessee to Washington, in 1829, resolved on the destruction of the Bank of the United States, and that he was only dissuaded from aiming a paragraph at it in his inaugural address by the prudence of Mr. Van Buren. … General Jackson had no thought of the bank until he had been President two months. He came to Washington expecting to serve but a single term, during which the question of re-chartering the bank was not expected to come up. {3372} The bank was chartered in 1816 for twenty years, which would not expire until 1836." But, in 1829, the influence of Isaac Hill, one of the so-called "Kitchen Cabinet" at Washington, involved the irascible President in an endeavor to bring about the removal of Jeremiah Mason, a political opponent, who had been appointed to the presidency of the branch of the United States Bank at Portsmouth, New Hampshire. "The correspondence began in June and ended in October. I believe myself warranted in the positive assertion, that this correspondence relating to the desired removal of Jeremiah Mason was the direct and real cause of the destruction of the bank."

J. Parton, Life of Andrew Jackson, volume 3, chapter 20.

"As soon as the issue between him and the Bank of the United States was declared, Jackson resolved that the bank must be utterly destroyed. The method was suggested by Kendall and Blair, of the Kitchen Cabinet. It was to cripple the available means of the bank by withdrawing from it and its branches the deposits of public funds. In the message of December, 1832, Jackson had expressed his doubt as to the safety of the government deposits in the bank, and recommended an investigation. The House, after inquiry, resolved on March 2, by 109 to 46 votes, that the deposits were safe. The bank was at that period undoubtedly solvent, and there seemed to be no reason to fear for the safety of the public money in its custody. But Jackson had made up his mind that the bank was financially rotten; that it had been employing its means to defeat his reëlection; that it was using the public funds in buying up members of Congress for the purposes of securing a renewal of its charter, and of breaking down the administration; and that thus it had become a dangerous agency of corruption and a public enemy. Therefore the public funds must be withdrawn, without regard to consequences. But the law provided that the public funds should be deposited in the Bank of the United States or its branches, unless the Secretary of the Treasury should otherwise 'order and direct,' and in that case the Secretary should report his reasons for such direction to Congress. A willing Secretary of the Treasury was therefore needed. In May, 1833, Jackson reconstructed his Cabinet for the second time. … For the Treasury Department Jackson selected William J. Duane of Philadelphia, who was known as an opponent of the bank. Jackson, no doubt, expected him to be ready for any measure necessary to destroy it. In this he was mistaken. Duane earnestly disapproved of the removal of the deposits as unnecessary, and highly dangerous to the business interests of the country. … A majority of the members of the Cabinet thought the removal of the deposits unwise. … In the business community there seemed to be but one voice about it. The mere rumor that the removal of the deposits was in contemplation greatly disturbed the money market. But all this failed to stagger Jackson's resolution. … The Cabinet, with the exception of the Secretary of the Treasury, bowed to Jackson's will. But Duane would not shelter himself behind the President's assumed responsibility to do an act which, under the law, was to be his act. He also refused to resign. If he had to obey or go, he insisted upon being removed. Jackson then formally dismissed him, and transferred Roger B. Taney from the attorney generalship to the treasury. Benjamin F. Butler of New York, a friend of Van Buren, was made Attorney General. Taney forthwith ordered the removal of the deposits from the Bank of the United States; that is to say, the public funds then in the bank were to be drawn out as the government required them, and no new deposits to be made in that institution. The new deposits were to be distributed among a certain number of selected state banks, which became known as the 'pet banks.' … The money market became stringent. Many failures occurred. The general feeling in business circles approached a panic." But the very disturbance was charged upon the Bank, itself; the people rallied to the support of their favorite, "Old Hickory," and when the national charter of the Bank expired, in March, 1836, there was no hope of its renewal. It obtained a charter from the State of Pennsylvania, and continued business as a State institution until it went to pieces in the general commercial shipwreck of 1837-41.

C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, chapter 15 (volume 2).

ALSO IN: W. G. Sumner, Andrew Jackson as a Public Man, chapters 11-14.

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 1, chapters 49, 56, 64-67, 77, and 92-111.

_M. St. C. Clarke and D. A. Hall, History of the Bank of the United States._

See, also, MONEY AND BANKING: A. D. 1817-1833.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1834. Organization of the Whig Party.

The largest section of the opposition to the Jacksonian Democracy "was organized in 1834 as the Whig party. According to the 'Whig Almanac' for 1838, the party as then constituted comprised: '(1) Most of those who, under the name of National Republicans, had previously been known as supporters of Adams and Clay, and advocates of the American system [of tariff-protection]; (2) Most of those who, acting in defence of what they deemed the assailed or threatened rights of the States, had been stigmatized as Nullifiers, or the less virulent State Rights' men, who were thrown into a position of armed neutrality towards the administration by the doctrines of the proclamation of 1832 against South Carolina; (3) A majority of those before known as Anti-Masons; (4) Many who had up to that time been known as Jackson men, but who united in condemning the high-handed conduct of the Executive, the immolation of Duane, and the subserviency of Taney; (5) Numbers who had not before taken any part in politics, but who were now awakened from their apathy by the palpable usurpations of the Executive and the imminent peril of our whole fabric of constitutional liberty and national prosperity.' It was not to be expected that a party composed of such various elements would be able to unite on one candidate with heartiness; and, as the event proved, it was necessary that some time should elapse before anything like homogeneity could be given to the organization. Nullification was not popular among the Whigs of the North, nor did the State Rights' people of South Carolina and other States care about the war on the bank and the removal of the deposits."

E. Stanwood, History of Presidential Elections, chapter 14.

{3373}

"It was now felt instinctively that, in the existing struggle between the parties actually arrayed against each other, and in the principles and doctrines of those who were in power, there was a peculiar fitness in the revival of a term which, on both sides of the Atlantic, had been historically associated with the side of liberty against the side of power. The revival of the name of Whigs was sudden, and it was a spontaneous popular movement. In progress of time, it enabled the public men who were leading the opposition to the party of the Administration to consolidate an organization of distinct political principles, and to strengthen it by accessions from those who had found reason to be dissatisfied with the opinions prevailing among the friends of the President."

G. T. Curtis, Life of Daniel Webster, volume 1, page 499.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1835. First Petitions for the Abolition of Slavery in the District of Columbia. Exclusion of Antislavery literature from the Mails.

"It was during the Twenty-third Congress, 1835, that the abolition of slavery, especially in the District of Columbia, may be said to have begun to move the public mind at the North. The first petitions presented to Congress for the abolition of slavery, at least the first to attract attention, were presented by Mr. Dickson, from the Canandaigua district, New York, who addressed the House in support of the prayer of the petitioners. Perhaps his speech, more than the petition he presented, served to stir up a feeling on the part of Southern men, and to cause other and numerous similar petitions to be gotten up at the North and sent to Congress. … The labors of the enemies of slavery, or 'Abolitionists,' had commenced, and by indefatigable men who believed they were serving God and the cause of humanity, and consequently it was with them a labor of conscience and duty, with which nothing should be allowed to interfere. Instead of petitions to Congress, they now sent large boxes of tracts, pamphlets, and various publications which the Southern people denominated 'incendiary,' to the post-office at Charleston, South Carolina, and other cities, to be distributed, as directed, to various persons. This increased the complaints and inflammatory articles in the Southern papers. The publications thus sent were stopped in the post-office, and the postmasters addressed the head of the department, Amos Kendall, on the subject, who replied that though the law authorized the transmission of newspapers and pamphlets through the mail, yet the law was intended to promote the general good of the public, and not to injure any section; and intimated that, such being the effect of these publications at the South, postmasters would be justified in withholding them."

N. Sargent, Public Men and Events, 1817-1853, volume 1, page 294-295.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1835-1837. The inflation of credits, and Speculation. The great collapse.

"When the United States Bank lost the government deposits, late in 1833, they amounted to a little less than $10,000,000. On January 1, 1835, more than a year after the state banks took the deposits, they had increased to a little more than $10,000,000. But the public debt being then paid and the outgo of money thus checked, the deposits had by January 1, 1836, reached $25,000,000, and by June 1, 1836, $41,500,000. This enormous advance represented the sudden increase in the sales of public lands, which were paid for in bank paper, which in turn formed the bulk of the government deposits. … The increase in the sales of public lands was the result of all the organic causes and of all the long train of events which had seated the fever of speculation so profoundly in the American character of the day. … The increase of government deposits was only fuel added to the flames. The craze for banks and credits was unbounded before the removal of the deposits had taken place, and before their great increase could have had serious effect. … The insanity of speculation was in ample though unobserved control of the country while Nicholas Biddle [President of the United States Bank] still controlled the deposits, and was certain to reach a climax whether they stayed with him or went elsewhere. … The distribution of the surplus among the states by the law of 1836 was the last and in some respects the worst of the measures which aided and exaggerated the tendency to speculation. By this bill, all the money above $5,000.000 in the treasury on January 1, 1837, was to be 'deposited' with the states in four quarterly installments commencing on that day. … From the passage of the deposit bill in June, 1836, until the crash in 1837, this superb donation of thirty-seven millions was before the enraptured and deluded vision of the country. Over nine millions and a quarter to be poured into 'improvements' or loaned to the needy,—what a luscious prospect! The lesson is striking and wholesome, and ought not to be forgotten, that, when the land was in the very midst of these largesses, the universal bankruptcy set in. During 1835 and 1836 there were omens of the coming storm. Some perceived the rabid character of the speculative fever. William L. Marcy, governor of New York, in his message of January, 1836, answering the dipsomaniac cry for more banks, declared that an unregulated spirit of speculation had taken capital out of the state; but that the amount so transferred bore no comparison to the enormous speculations in stocks and in real property within the state. … The warning was treated contemptuously; but before the year was out the federal administration also became anxious, and the increase in land sales no longer signified to Jackson an increasing prosperity. … So Jackson proceeded with his sound defense of the famous specie circular, long and even still denounced as the 'causa cansans' of the crisis of 1837. By this circular, issued on July 11, 1836, the secretary of the treasury had required payment for public lands to be made in specie, with an exception until December 15, 1836, in favor of actual settlers and actual residents of the state in which the lands were sold. … Jackson's specie circular toppled over the house of cards, which at best could have stood but little longer. … An insignificant, part of the sales had been lately made to settlers. They were chiefly made to speculators. … Of the real money necessary to make good the paper bubble promises of the speculators not one tenth part really existed. Banks could neither make their debtors pay in gold and silver, nor pay their own notes in gold and silver. So they suspended. The great and long concealed devastation of physical wealth and of the accumulation of legitimate labor by premature improvements and costly personal living, became now quickly apparent. Fancied wealth sank out of sight."

E. M. Shepard, Martin Van Buren, chapter 8.

ALSO IN: W. G. Sumner, History of American Currency, pages 102-161.

F. A. Walker, Money, chapter 21.

C. Juglar, Brief History of Panics, page 58.

{3374}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1835-1843. The Second Seminole War.

See FLORIDA: A. D. 1835-1843.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1836. The Atherton Gag.

"At this time [1835-36], the Northern abolitionists sent petitions to Congress for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. They contended that as this territory was under the control of the United States' Government, the United States was responsible for slavery there; and that the Free States were bound to do what they could to have slavery brought to an end in that District. But the Slave States were not willing to have anything said on the subject, so they passed what was called a 'gag' law in the House of Representatives, and ruled that all petitions which had any relation to slavery should be laid on the table without being debated, printed or referred. John Quincy Adams opposed this rule resolutely, maintaining that it was wrong and unconstitutional. … He continued to present petitions, as before, for the abolition of slavery in the District. When the day came for petitions he was one of the first to be called upon; and he would sometimes occupy nearly the whole hour in presenting them, though each one was immediately laid on the table. One day he presented 511."

J. F. Clarke, Anti-Slavery Days, page 45.

The gag-law has sometimes taken the name of the Atherton gag from its New Hampshire author.

W. C. Bryant and S. H. Gay, Popular History of the United States, volume 4, page 338.

ALSO IN: J. H. Gidding, History of the Rebellion, pages 104-124.

J. T. Morse, Jr., John Quincy Adams, pp. 246-280.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1836. Admission of Arkansas into the Union.

See ARKANSAS: A. D. 1819-1836.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1836. Jackson's administration reviewed.

"What of the administration as a whole? Parton's view is as follows: 'I must avow explicitly the belief that, notwithstanding the good done by General Jackson during his presidency, his elevation to power was a mistake on the part of the people of the United States. The good which he effected has not continued, while the evil which he began remains.' Sumner, in commenting on 'Jackson's modes of action in his second term,' says: 'We must say of Jackson that he stumbled along through a magnificent career, now and then taking up a chance without really appreciating it; leaving behind him disturbed and discordant elements of good and ill just fit to produce turmoil and dis·aster in the future.' Later he adds: 'Representative institutions are degraded on the Jacksonian theory just as they are on the divine-right theory, or on the theory of the democratic empire. There is not a worse perversion of the American system of government conceivable than to regard the President as the tribune of the people.' The view of von Holst may be inferred from the following passages: 'In spite of the frightful influence, in the real sense of the expression, which he exercised during the eight years of his presidency, he neither pointed out nor opened new ways to his people by the superiority of his mind, but only dragged them more rapidly onward on the road they had long been travelling, by the demoniacal power of his will.' The meaning of the bank struggle is thus defined: 'Its significance lay in the elements which made Jackson able actually and successfully to assert his claims, in conflict both with the constitution and with the idea of republicanism, to a position between Congress and the people as patriarchal ruler of the republic.' Elsewhere he tells us that the 'curse of Jackson's administration' is that it weakened respect for law; that 'the first clear symptom' of 'the decline of a healthy political spirit' was the election and re-election of Jackson to the presidency; that his administration paved a 'broad path for the demoralizing transformation of the American democracy'; and that 'his "reign" receives the stamp which characterizes it precisely from the fact that the politicians knew how to make his character, with its texture of brass, the battering-ram with which to break down the last ramparts which opposed their will.' According to Parton, Sumner, and von Holst, as I understand them, the net result of Jackson's influence upon the American people was to hasten their progress toward political ruin. I think this conclusion erroneous. The gravest accusation against Jackson is, that his influence undermined respect for law. It is plausibly argued that, since he himself was impatient of authority, his example must have stimulated lawlessness in his followers. It may be urged, in reply, that the history of the country does not support the charge. The worst exhibitions of general lawlessness which have disgraced the United States were the anti-abolitionist mobs of Jackson's own day—for which he was not responsible. Since then, the American people, in spite of the demoralizations of the war and reconstruction periods, have steadily grown in obedience to law. … It is a curious circumstance that the relation of Jackson to sectionalism has received very little attention; and yet the growth of sectionalism, i. e., the tendency to divide the Union into two portions, politically separate and independent, is the fact which, from the Missouri Compromise of 1820 to the ordinances of secession in 1860, gives our political history its distinctive character. The one important question concerning Jackson, as indeed concerning every public man during the forty years which precede the Civil War, is: What did he do towards saving the Union from sectionalism? … Jackson came before the country as a disciple of Jefferson, and therefore as a believer in state rights. There was, it is true, much in his temper and situation which favored centralization; nevertheless, he was an honest, though moderate and somewhat inconsistent Jeffersonian, and he won and retained the confidence of the state-rights element in the democratic party. Moreover, he identified himself with the newly enfranchised and poorer citizens just rising to political self-consciousness. In these ways, his following came to include a large majority of his fellow-citizens, and, what was of the utmost importance, by far the larger proportion of those whose political character and opinions were as yet plastic. … Jackson became, to a degree never realized by any other man in our history, the trusted leader and teacher of the masses. … This intimate relation to the people, and this unparalleled power over the people, Jackson used to impress upon them his own love of the Union and his own hatred of sectionalism. … His character was altogether national. It is easy to think of Calhoun as a southerner and a South Carolinian; but it would not be easy to think of Jackson as belonging to Tennessee or to the border states. {3375} The distribution of his support in the election of 1832 is instructive. New Hampshire, New York and Pennsylvania, as well as Tennessee, Georgia, Missouri, were Jackson's states. He was not looked upon as the representative of any particular section. His policy as President showed no trace of sectionalism. Its aim was the welfare of the masses irrespective of section. To him state lines had little meaning; sectional lines, absolutely none. There is another way in which he rendered great though unconscious service to the cause of national unity: he made the government, hitherto an unmeaning abstraction, intelligible and attractive to the people. … The chief value, then, of Jackson's political career, was its educational effect. His strong conviction of the national character of the Union, his brave words and acts in behalf of the rights of the Union, sank deep into the hearts of followers and opponents."

_A. D. Morse, Political Influence of Andrew Jackson (Political Science Quarterly, June, 1886)._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1836. Thirteenth Presidential Election. Martin Van Buren chosen.

"As Vice-president, Van Buren was at the side of Jackson during his second term as President. It was the period of the first experiment in producing panics; of reckless expansions of the currency; of extravagant speculation; of an accumulating surplus revenue; of the last struggles of the Bank of the United States for the continuance of its powers. There was not a difficult question on which Jackson did not open his mind to the Vice-president with complete and affectionate confidence. He has often been heard to narrate incidents illustrating the prompt decision and bold judgment of his younger friend; and in those days of vehement conflicts between the power of the people and interests embodied against that power, the daring energy of the one was well united with the more tranquil intrepidity of the other. How fully this was recognized by the people appears from the action of the Democratic party of the Union. In May, 1835, it assembled in convention at Baltimore, and by a unanimous vote placed Van Buren in nomination as their candidate for the Presidency. … The Democracy of the Union supported Van Buren with entire unanimity. Out of two hundred and eighty-six electoral votes he received one hundred and seventy; and, for the first time, the Democracy of the North saw itself represented in the Presidential chair. Electoral votes were given for Van Buren without regard to geographical divisions: New York and Alabama, Missouri and Maine, Virginia and Connecticut, were found standing together. His election seemed friendly to the harmony and the perpetuity of the Union."

G. Bancroft, Martin Van Buren. chapter 5.

Mr. Van Buren received a clear majority of the popular vote cast at the election, namely, 762,678, against 735,651 cast in opposition, but divided between four Whig candidates, namely, William H. Harrison, who received 73 electoral votes, Hugh L. White, who received 26, Daniel Webster who received 14, and Willie P. Mangum, who received 11. Richard M. Johnson was chosen Vice President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1837. Admission of Michigan into the Union.

See MICHIGAN: A. D. 1837.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1837. The introduction of the Sub-treasury system.

"When the banks went down, they had the government deposits: this was in May, 1837. Van Buren's administration was only two months old. The President was a warm admirer of Jackson, and had formally announced that he would continue his predecessor's policy with respect to the management of the deposits. But the 'experiment' had suddenly culminated. The government deposits were not in its control, and could not be regained; their transfer from one part of the country to another had ceased. … Once more, therefore, the government was confronted with a grave question touching its deposits and the circulating medium. It now essayed a brand-new experiment. This was nothing less than keeping the deposits itself, and transferring and paying them as occasion required; while the people were left to regulate the currency themselves. This was a very wide departure from any former policy. The mode proposed of keeping the public deposits may be briefly described. The treasury building at Washington was to constitute the treasury of the United States, and the public money was to be kept within its vaults. The mint at Philadelphia, the branch at New Orleans, the new custom-houses in New York and Boston, were also to contain branch treasury vaults. Places were also to be prepared at Charleston, St. Louis, and elsewhere. The treasurer of the United States at Washington, and the treasurers of the mints at Philadelphia and New Orleans, were to be 'receivers-general,' to keep the public money. … At the extra session of Congress in 1837, the Executive recommended the sub-treasury experiment. Congress refused to try it, although a majority in both Houses belonged to the same political party as the President. Nevertheless, the system was continued, without legislative sanction, until 1840, when Congress finally passed a bill legalizing the measure. At the presidential election in 1840 a party revolution occurred, and the sub-treasury system, which had formed a prominent issue in the campaign, was unqualifiedly condemned by the people. Congress repealed the law, and passed a bill creating another national bank," which President Tyler vetoed.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1841.

"Thus the keeping of the public money remained in the hands of the government officials, without legislative regulation, until the passage of the sub-treasury bill, in 1846. The system established at that time has been maintained ever since."

A. S. Bolles, Financial History of the United States, 1789-1860, book 3, chapter 2.

ALSO IN: T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 2, chapters 29, 41, 64-65.

_D. Kinley, The Independent Treasury of the United States._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1837-1838. Antislavery Petitions in the Senate. Calhoun's Resolutions, forcing the issue.

"The movements for and against slavery in the session of 1837-1838 deserve to be noted, as of disturbing effect at the time; and as having acquired new importance from subsequent events. Early in the session a memorial was presented in the Senate from the General Assembly of Vermont, remonstrating against the annexation of Texas to the United States, and praying for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia—followed by many petitions from citizens and societies in the Northern States to the same effect; and, further, for the abolition of slavery in the Territories—for the abolition of the slave trade between the States—and for the exclusion of future slave States from the Union. … {3376} The question which occupied the Senate was as to the most judicious mode of treating these memorials, with a view to prevent their evil effects: and that was entirely a question of policy, on which senators disagreed who concurred in the main object. Some deemed it most advisable to receive and consider the petitions—to refer them to a committee—and subject them to the adverse report which they would be sure to receive; as had been done with the Quakers' petitions at the beginning of the government. Others deemed it preferable to refuse to receive them. The objection raised to this latter course was, that it would mix up a new question with the slavery agitation which would enlist the sympathies of many who did not co-operate with the Abolitionists—the question of the right of petition. … Mr. Clay, and many others were of this opinion; Mr. Calhoun and his friends thought otherwise; and the result was, so far as it concerned the petitions of individuals and societies, what it had previously been—a half-way measure between reception and rejection—a motion to lay the question of reception on the table. This motion, precluding all discussion, got rid of the petitions quietly, and kept debate out of the Senate. In the case of the memorial from the State of Vermont, the proceeding was slightly different in form, but the same in substance. As the act of a State, the memorial was received; but after reception was laid on the table. Thus all the memorials and petitions were disposed of by the Senate in a way to accomplish the two-fold object, first, of avoiding discussion; and, next, condemning the object of the petitioners. It was accomplishing all that the South asked; and if the subject had rested at that point, there would have been nothing in the history of this session, on the slavery agitation, to distinguish it from other sessions about that period: but the subject was revived; and in a way to force discussion, and to constitute a point for the retrospect of history. Every memorial and petition had been disposed of according to the wishes of the senators from the slaveholding States; but Mr. Calhoun deemed it due to those States to go further, and to obtain from the Senate declarations which should cover all the questions of federal power over the institution of slavery: although he had just said that paper reports would do no good. For that purpose, he submitted a series of resolves—six in number—which derive their importance from their comparison, or rather contrast, with others on the same subject presented by him in the Senate ten years later; and which have given birth to doctrines and proceedings which have greatly disturbed the harmony of the Union, and palpably endangered its stability. The six resolutions of this period (1837-1838) undertook to define the whole extent of the power delegated by the States to the federal government on the subject of slavery; to specify the acts which would exceed that power; and to show the consequences of doing anything not authorized to be done— always ending in a dissolution of the Union. The first four of these related to the States; about which, there being no dispute, there was no debate. The sixth, without naming Texas, was prospective, and looked forward to a case which might include her annexation; and was laid upon the table to make way for an express resolution from Mr. Preston on the same subject. The fifth related to the territories, and to the District of Columbia, and was the only one which excited attention, or has left a surviving interest. It was in these words: 'Resolved that the intermeddling of any State, or States, or their citizens, to abolish slavery in this District, or any of the territories, on the ground or under the pretext that it is immoral or sinful, or the passage of any act or measure of Congress with that view, would be a direct and dangerous attack on the institutions of all the slaveholding States.' The dogma of 'no power in Congress to legislate upon the existence of slavery in territories' had not been invented at that time; and, of course, was not asserted in this resolve, intended by its author to define the extent of the federal legislative power on the subject. The resolve went upon the existence of the power, and deprecated its abuse." Mr. Clay offered an amendment, in the nature of a substitute, consisting of two resolutions, the first of which was in these words: "'That the interference by the citizens of any of the States, with the view to the abolition of slavery in this District, is endangering the rights and security of the people of the District; and that any act or measure of Congress, designed to abolish slavery in this District, would be a violation of the faith implied in the cessions by the States of Virginia and Maryland—a just cause of alarm to the people of the slaveholding States—and have a direct and inevitable tendency to disturb and endanger the Union.' The vote on the final adoption of the resolution was: (Yeas 37, Nays 8]. … The second resolution of Mr. Clay applied to slavery in a territory where it existed, and deprecated any attempt to abolish it in such territory, as alarming to the slave States, and as violation of faith towards its inhabitants, unless they asked it; and in derogation of its right to decide the question of slavery for itself when erected into a State. This resolution was intended to cover the case of Florida, and ran thus: 'Resolved that any attempt of Congress to abolish slavery in any territory of the United States in which it exists would create serious alarm and just apprehension in the States sustaining that domestic institution, and would be a violation of good faith towards the inhabitants of any such territory who have been permitted to settle with, and hold, slaves therein; because the people of any such territory have not asked for the abolition of slavery therein; and because, when any such territory shall be admitted into the Union as a State, the people thereof shall be entitled to decide that question exclusively for themselves.' And the vote upon it was—[Yeas 35, Nays 9]. … The general feeling of the Senate was that of entire repugnance to the whole movement—that of the petitions and memorials on the one hand, and Mr. Calhoun's resolutions on the other. The former were quietly got rid of, and in a way to rebuke, as well as to condemn their presentation; that is to say, by motions (sustained by the body) to lay them on the table. The resolutions could not so easily be disposed of, especially as their mover earnestly demanded discussion, spoke at large, and often himself; and 'desired to make the question, on their rejection or adoption, a test question.'"

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 2, chapter 33.

{3377}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1840. The Sixth Census.

Total population, 17,069,453 (exceeding that of 1830 by nearly 33 per cent.), classed and distributed as follows:

North.

White. Free black. Slave. Connecticut. 301,856 8,105 17 Illinois. 472,254 3,598 331 Indiana. 678,698 7,165 3 Iowa. 42,924 172 16 Maine. 500,438 1,355 0 Massachusetts. 729,030 8,669 0 Michigan. 211,560 707 0 New Hampshire. 284,036 537 1 New Jersey. 351,588 21,044 674 New York. 2,378,890 50,027 4 Ohio. 1,502,122 17,342 3 Pennsylvania. 1,676,115 47,854 64 Rhode Island. 105,587 3,238 5 Vermont. 291,218 730 0 Wisconsin. 30,749 185 11

Total 9,557,065 170,728 1,129

South.

White. Free black. Slave. Alabama. 335,185 2,039 253,532 Arkansas. 77,174 465 19,935 Delaware. 58,561 16,919 2,605 District of Columbia. 30,657 8,361 4,694 Florida. 27,943 817 25,717 Georgia. 407,695 2,753 280,944 Kentucky. 590,253 7,817 182,258 Louisiana. 158,457 25,502 168,452 Maryland. 318,204 62,078 89,737 Mississippi. 179,074 1,366 195,211 Missouri. 323,888 1,574 58,240 North Carolina. 484,870 22,732 245,817 South Carolina. 259,084 8,276 327,038 Tennessee. 640,627 5,524 183,059 Virginia. 740,858 49,852 449,087

Total 4,632,530 215,575 2,486,326

The number of immigrants arriving in the United States between 1830 and 1840, according to official reports, was 599,125, of whom 283,191 were from the British Islands, and 212,497 from other parts of Europe.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1840. Fourteenth Presidential Election. The Log-cabin and Hard-cider campaign.

William Henry Harrison, Whig, was elected President, over Martin Van Buren, Democrat, and James G. Birney, candidate of the "Liberty Party." The popular vote cast was: Harrison 1,275,016, Van Buren 1,129,102, Birney 7,069. The electoral vote stood: Harrison 234, Van Buren 60, Birney none. John Tyler was elected Vice President. In the early part of the campaign, a Baltimore newspaper, making a foolish attempt to cast ridicule on General Harrison, said that a pension of a few hundred dollars and a barrel of hard cider would content him in his log cabin for life. This fatuous remark gave the Whigs a popular cry which they used with immense effect, and "the log-cabin and hard-cider campaign," as it is known in American history, was memorable for its song-singing enthusiasm.—"If one could imagine a whole nation declaring a holiday or season of rollicking for a period of six or eight months, and giving themselves up during the whole time to the wildest freaks of fun and frolic, caring nothing for business, singing, dancing, and carousing night and day, he might have some faint notion of the extraordinary scenes of 1840. It would be difficult, if not impossible, otherwise to form even a faint idea of the universal excitement, enthusiasm, activity, turmoil, and restlessness which pervaded the country during the spring, summer, and fall of that memorable year. Log cabins large enough to hold crowds of people were built in many places. Small ones, decorated with 'coon-skins, were mounted on wheels and used in processions. The use of the 'coon-skins soon led to the adoption of the 'coon (raccoon) itself as an emblem and adjunct of the log cabin, and its 'counterfeit presentment' was hoisted in all the Whig papers. Meetings were everywhere, and every day, held in neighborhoods, school-houses, villages, towns, counties, cities, States, varying in number from ten to one hundred thousand; and wherever there was a gathering there were also speaking and singing. Ladies attended these meetings, or conventions, in great numbers, and joined in the singing. Farmers, with big teams and wagons, would leave their fields and travel ten, twenty, or thirty miles, accompanied by their families and neighbors, to attend a convention or a barbecue and listen to distinguished orators. Crowds on the road, multitudes in big wagons drawn by four, six, or eight horses, made the welkin ring with their log-cabin songs. Nobody slept, nobody worked, nobody rested; at least so it seemed, for all were on the 'qui vive' and in motion. The entire population seemed to be absorbed in the great duty of electing General Harrison and thus changing the government. …

What has caused this great commotion, motion, motion, Our country through? It is the ball a rolling on For Tippecanoe and Tyler too, For Tippecanoe and Tyler too.'

The original or special friends of General Harrison very naturally claimed that it was his popularity which produced such an unprecedented 'commotion' 'our country through.' But in this they were mistaken. The popularity of no one man could have produced such a universal outpouring of the people from day to day for weeks and months unceasingly, abandoning everything else, and giving time and money unstintedly to carry the election. General Harrison was but the figure-head,—the representative of the Whig party for the time being. Few had ever heard of him. The people knew from history and the campaign papers that he had been a general in the then late war with England; that he had won a victory at the battle of Tippecanoe over the British and Indians, and also at the battle of the Thames, in Canada, where Tecumseh, the noted Indian warrior, was killed. This was enough to make a hero of him by those who had a purpose to serve in doing so. As to his fitness for the Presidency, the people knew nothing and cared nothing. A change in the government was what they desired and were determined to have."

N. Sargent, Public Men and Events, volume 2, pages 107-110.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1840-1841. The McLeod case.

See CANADA: A. D. 1840-1841.

{3378}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1841. The Death of President Harrison. Breach between President Tyler and the Whig Party which elected him.

President Harrison died suddenly on the 4th of April, 1841, and Vice President John Tyler became President. Tyler was a Calhoun Democrat in politics, although nominated and elected by the Whigs, and the financial measures favored by the latter were especially obnoxious to him. "Congress met May 31st, 1841. … A bill to abolish the Sub-Treasury of the previous Administration was passed by both Houses and signed by the President. A bill to incorporate 'The Fiscal Bank of the United States' was passed by both Houses. It was weeded of many of the objectionable features of the old United States Bank, but was hardly less odious to the Democrats. It was vetoed by the President. … An effort to pass the bill over the veto did not receive a two-thirds majority. The Whig leaders, anxious to prevent a party disaster, asked from the President an outline of a bill which he would sign. After consultation with the Cabinet, it was given, and passed by both Houses. September 9th the President vetoed this bill also, and an attempt to pass it over the veto did not receive a two-thirds majority. The action of the President, in vetoing a bill drawn according to his own suggestions, and thus apparently provoking a contest with the party which had elected him, roused the unconcealed indignation of the Whigs. The Cabinet, with one exception [Daniel Webster, Secretary of State, who remained in President Tyler's cabinet until May, 1843], at once resigned. The Whig members of Congress issued Addresses to the People, in which they detailed the reforms designed by the Whigs and impeded by the President, and declared that 'all political connection between them and John Tyler was at an end from that day forth.' … The President filled the vacancies in the Cabinet by appointing Whigs and Conservatives. His position was one of much difficulty. His strict constructionist opinions, which had prevented him from supporting Van Buren, would not allow him to approve a National Bank, and yet he had accepted the Vice-Presidency from a party pledged to establish one. The over hasty declaration of war by the Whigs put a stop to his vacillations, and compelled him to rely upon support from the Democrats. But only a few members of Congress, commonly known as 'the corporal's guard,' recognized Tyler as a leader."

A. Johnston, History of American Politics, 2d ed., chapter 15, sections 2-4.

ALSO IN: L. G. Tyler, Letters and Times of the Tylers, volume 2, chapters 1-4.

C. Colton, Life and Times of Henry Clay, chapters 14-15.

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 2, chapters 80-85.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1842. Victory of John Quincy Adams in defending the Right of Petition.

"January 21, 1842, Mr. Adams presented a petition from 45 citizens of Haverhill, Massachusetts, praying for the dissolution of the Union, and moved it be referred to a select committee, with instructions to report why the petition should not be granted. There was at once great excitement and members called out, 'Expel him,' 'Censure him.' After a good deal of fruitless endeavor to accomplish something, the House adjourned, and forty or fifty slaveholders met to decide what kind of resolutions should be presented to meet the case. Thomas F. Marshall of Kentucky was selected by this caucus from Congress to propose the resolutions, which were to the effect that for presenting such a petition to a body each of whom had taken an oath to maintain the Constitution, Mr. Adams was virtually inviting them to perjure themselves, and that therefore he deserved the severest censure. Marshall supported this with a very violent speech. Mr. Wise followed in another. Then Mr. Adams arose and asked the clerk to read the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, being the one which recognizes the right of every people to alter or abolish their form of Government when it ceases to accomplish its ends. He said that those who believed that the present Government was oppressive had the right (according to the Declaration of Independence, on which the whole of our national unity reposes), to petition Congress to do what they believed was desirable; and all that Congress could properly do would be to explain to them why such an act could not be performed. He replied with great severity to Mr. Wise and said that Mr. Wise had come into that Hall a few years before with his hands dripping with the blood of one of his fellow beings. In this he alluded to the part which Mr. Wise had taken in the duel between Mr. Graves of Kentucky, and Cilley of Maine, in which the latter had been killed. As for Mr. Marshall, who had accused him of treason, he spoke of him with great scorn. 'I thank God!' said he 'that the Constitution of my country has defined treason, and has not left it to the puny intellect of this young man from Kentucky to say what it is. If I were the father of this gentleman from Kentucky, I should take him from this House and put him to school where he might study his profession for some years until he became a little better qualified to appear in this place.' Mr. Adams had on his desk a great many books and references prepared for his use by some anti-slavery gentlemen then in Washington; after he had gone on for some time with his speech he was asked how much more time he would probably occupy. He replied 'I believe Mr. Burke took three months for his speech on Warren Hastings' indictment. I think I may probably get through in ninety days, perhaps in less time.' Thereupon they thought it just as well to have the whole thing come to an end and it was moved that the matter should be laid on the table. Mr. Adams consented, and it was done."

J. F. Clarke, Anti-Slavery Days, pages 57-59.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1842. The tariff act.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES): A. D. 1842.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1842. The Ashburton Treaty with England. Settlement of Northeastern boundary questions.

"It was arranged in December by the Peel ministry that Lord Ashburton should be sent to Washington as a special minister from Great Britain, with full powers to settle the boundary, and all other pending disputes with the United States. … Ashburton, formerly Alexander Baring, of the eminent banking firm of Baring Brothers, and a son of its original founder, was now an old man, who had retired on a princely fortune, and being indifferent to fame, aspired only to bring these two countries to more friendly terms. Like his father before him, he had tact and plain good sense, and understood well the American character, having married here during his youth. Lord Ashburton arrived early the next April, and on the 13th of June entered upon the duties of his mission. {3379} Maine and Massachusetts, the States most interested in the disputed boundary, sent commissioners of their own to yield an assent in this branch of the business. The whole business as conducted at our capital had an easy and informal character. Webster and Lord Ashburton represented alone their respective governments; no protocols were used, nor formal records; and the correspondence and official interviews went on after a friendly fashion in the heat of summer, and while Congress was holding its long regular session. … This Washington or Ashburton treaty, as it is called to this day, bore date of the day [August 9] when it was formally signed. It passed by the Oregon or north-western boundary, a point on which harmony was impossible, and this was the most pregnant omission of all; it passed by the 'Caroline' affair; it ignored, too, the 'Creole' case, for Great Britain would not consent to recognize the American claim of property in human beings. Nor, on the other side, were the debts of delinquent States assumed by the United States, as many British creditors had desired. Mutual extradition in crimes under the law of nations, and the delivery of fugitives from justice, were stipulated. But the two chief features of this treaty were: a settlement of the boundary between Great Britain and the United States on the north-east, extending westward beyond the great lakes, and a cruising convention for the mutual suppression of the slave-trade. As to the northeast territory in dispute, which embraced some 12,000 square miles, seven-twelfths, or about as much as the King of the Netherlands had awarded, were set off to the United States; Great Britain taking the residue and securing the highlands she desired which frown upon the Canadian Gibraltar, and a clear though circuitous route between Quebec and Halifax. Our government was permitted to carry timber down the St. John's River, and though becoming bound to pay Maine and Massachusetts $300,000 for the strip of territory relinquished to Great Britain, gained in return Rouse's Point, on Lake Champlain, of which an exact survey would have deprived us. By the cruising convention clause, which the President himself bore a conspicuous part in arranging, the delicate point of 'right of search' was avoided; for instead of trusting Great Britain as the police of other nations for suppressing the African slave-trade, each nation bound itself to do its full duty by keeping up a sufficient squadron on the African coast. It so happened that Great Britain, by softening the old phrase 'right of search' into 'right of visitation,' had been inducing other nations to guarantee this police inspection of suspected slave vessels. In December, 1841, ambassadors of the five great European powers arranged in London a quintuple league of this character. But France, hesitating to confirm such an arrangement, rejected that league when the Ashburton treaty was promulgated, and hastened to negotiate in its place a cruising convention similar to ours on the slave-trade suppression; nor was the right of search, against which America had fought in the war of 1812, ever again invoked, even as a mutual principle, until by 1862 the United States had grown as sincere as Great Britain herself in wishing to crush out the last remnant of the African traffic. This cruising convention, however, left the abstract question of search untouched, and in that light Sir Robert Peel defended himself in Parliament. The Ashburton treaty was honorable, on the whole, for each side; what it arranged was arranged fairly, and what it omitted was deferred without prejudice. … So satisfactory, in fine, was the treaty, despite all criticism, that the Senate ratified it by more than a three-fourths vote, and at a time, too, when the Whig Congress was strongly incensed against the administration, and Webster had made bitter enemies."

J. Schouler, History of the United States, volume 4, chapter 17, pages 400-403.

ALSO IN: _D. Webster, Diplomatic and Official Papers._

G. T. Curtis, Life of Webster, chapters 28-29 (volume 2).

Treaties and Conventions between the United States and other countries (edition of 1889), pages 432-438.

_I. Washburn, Jr., The Northeastern Boundary (Maine Historical Society Collections, volume 8)._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1844. Fifteenth Presidential Election. Choice of James K. Polk.

The Texas treaty of annexation had been held in committee in the Senate "till the national conventions of the two parties should declare themselves. Both conventions met in Baltimore, in May, to name candidates and avow policies. The Whigs were unanimous as to who should be their candidate: it could be no one but Henry Clay. Among the Democrats there was a very strong feeling in favor of the renomination of Van Buren. But both Clay and Van Buren had been asked their opinion about the annexation of Texas, both had declared themselves opposed to any immediate step in that direction, and Van Buren's declaration cost him the Democratic nomination. He could have commanded a very considerable majority in the Democratic convention, but he did not command the two-third's majority required by its rules, and James K. Polk of Tennessee became the nominee of his party." Polk had been Speaker of the House of Representatives, and was honorably though slightly known to the country. The only new issue presented in the party "platforms" was offered by the Democrats in their resolution demanding "'the reoccupation of Oregon and the reannexation of Texas, at the earliest practicable period'; and this proved the makeweight in the campaign. … The 'Liberty Party,' the political organization of the Abolitionists, commanded now, as it turned out, more than 60,000 votes. … Had the 'Liberty' men in New York voted for Clay, he would have been elected."

W. Wilson, Division and Reunion, 1829-1889, section 73 (chapter 6).

Polk received of the popular votes, 1,337,243, against 1,299,062 cast for Henry Clay, Whig, and 62,300 cast for James G. Birney, candidate of the Liberty Party. Electoral vote: Polk, 170; Clay, 105; Birney, none. George M. Dallas was elected Vice President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1844-1845, The annexation of Texas and the agitation preceding it.

See TEXAS: A. D. 1836-1845.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1844-1846. The Oregon boundary question and its settlement.

See OREGON: A. D. 1844-1846.

{3380}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1845. Preserving the equilibrium between Free and Slave States. Admission of Iowa and Florida.

"The slave-masters … had long pretended that the equilibrium between the free and slave States must be preserved at all hazards, and twice had they resorted to the violent device of arbitrarily linking two measures that had nothing in common for that purpose,—in 1820 combining the bills for the admission of Missouri and Maine, and in 1836 those for the admission of Michigan and Arkansas. In pursuance of the same purpose and line of policy, they were now unwilling to receive without a consideration the free State of Iowa, which had framed a constitution in the autumn of 1844, and was asking for admission. Some makeweight must be found before this application could be complied with. This they managed to discover in an old constitution, framed by the Territory of Florida five years before. Though Florida was greatly deficient in numbers, and her constitution was very objectionable in some of its features, they seized this occasion to press its claims, and to make its admission a condition precedent to their consent that Iowa should be received. The House Committee on Territories reported in favor of the admission of the two in a single measure. In the closing hours of the XXVIIIth Congress the bill came up for consideration. … The constitution of Florida not only expressly denied to the legislature the power to emancipate slaves, but gave it the authority to prevent free colored persons from immigrating into the State, or from being discharged from vessels in her ports." All attempts to require an amendment of the Florida constitution in these particulars before recognizing that ill-populated territory as a State, were defeated, and the bill admitting Florida and Iowa became a law on the 3d of March, 1845.

H. Wilson, History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America, volume 2, chapter 1.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1845-1846. The Slavery question in the Democratic Party. Hunkers and Barnburners. The Wilmot Proviso.

"With Polk's accession and the Mexican war, the schism in the Democratic ranks over the extension of American slave territory became plainer. Even during the canvass of 1844 a circular had been issued by William Cullen Bryant, David Dudley Field, John W. Edmonds, and other Van Buren men, supporting Polk, but urging the choice of congressmen opposed to annexation. Early in the new administration the division of New York Democrats into 'Barnburners' and 'Old Hunkers' appeared. The former were the strong pro-Van Buren, anti-Texas men, or 'radical Democrats,' who were likened to the farmer who burned his barn to clear it of rats. The latter were the 'northern men with southern principles,' the supporters of annexation, and the respectable, dull men of easy consciences, who were said to hanker after the offices. The Barnburners were led by men of really eminent ability and exalted character: Silas Wright, then governor, Benjamin F. Butler, John A. Dix, chosen in 1845 to the United States senate, Azariah C. Flagg, the famous comptroller, and John Van Buren, the ex-president's son. … Daniel S. Dickinson and William L. Marcy were the chief figures in the Hunker ranks. Polk seemed inclined, at the beginning, to favor, or at least to placate, the Barnburners. … Jackson's death in June, 1845, deprived the Van Buren men of the tremendous moral weight which his name carried, and which might have daunted Polk. It perhaps also helped to loosen the weight of party ties on the Van Buren men. After this the schism rapidly grew. In the fall election of 1845 the Barnburners pretty thoroughly controlled the Democratic party of the state [of New York] in hostility to the Mexican war, which the annexation of Texas had now brought. Samuel J. Tilden of Columbia county, and a profound admirer of Van Buren, became one of their younger leaders. Now arose the strife over the 'Wilmot proviso,' in which was embodied the opposition to the extension of slavery into new territories. Upon this proviso the modern Republican party was formed eight years later; upon it, fourteen years later, Abraham Lincoln was chosen president; and upon it began the war for the Union, out of whose throes came the vastly grander and unsought beneficence of complete emancipation. David Wilmot was a Democratic member of Congress from Pennsylvania; in New York he would have been a Barnburner. In 1846 a bill was pending to appropriate $3,000,000 for use by the president in a purchase of territory from Mexico as part of a peace. Wilmot proposed an amendment that slavery should be excluded from any territory so acquired. All the Democratic members, as well as the Whigs from New York, and most strongly the Van Buren or Wright men, supported the proviso. The Democratic legislature [of New York] approved it by the votes of the Whigs with the Barnburners and the Soft Hunkers, the latter being Hunkers less friendly to slavery. It passed the house at Washington, but was rejected by the senate."

E. M. Shepard, Martin Van Buren, chapter 11.

In the slang nomenclature which New York politics have always produced with great fertility Hard-Shell and Soft-Shell were terms often used instead of Hunker and Barnburner.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1846. The Walker Tariff.

See TARIFF LEGISLATION (UNITED STATES): A. D. 1846-1861.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1846-1847. War with Mexico. Conquest of California and New Mexico.

See MEXICO: A. D. 1846; 1846-1847; and 1847; also, CALIFORNIA: A. D. 1846-1847; and NEW MEXICO: A. D. 1846.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1847. Calhoun's aggressive policy of agitation, forcing the Slavery issue upon the North. His program of disunion.

"On Friday, the 19th of February [1847], Mr. Calhoun introduced into the Semite his new slavery resolutions, prefaced by an elaborate speech, and requiring an immediate vote upon them. They were in these words: 'Resolved, That the territories of the United States belong to the several States composing this Union, and are held by them as their joint and common property. Resolved, That Congress, as the joint agent and representative of the States of this Union, has no right to make any law, or do any act whatever, that shall directly, or by its effects, make any discrimination between the States of this Union, by which any of them shall be deprived of its full and equal right in any territory of the United States acquired or to be acquired. Resolved, That the enactment of any law which should directly, or by its effects, deprive the citizens of any of the States of this Union from emigrating, with their property, into any of the territories of the United States, will make such discrimination, and would, therefore, be a violation of the constitution, and the rights of the States from which such citizens emigrated, and in derogation of that perfect equality which belongs to them as members of this Union, and would tend directly to subvert the Union itself. {3381} Resolved, That it is a fundamental principle in our political creed, that a people, in forming a constitution, have the unconditional right to form and adopt the government which they may think best calculated to secure their liberty, prosperity, and happiness; and that, in conformity thereto, no other condition is imposed by the federal constitution on a State, in order to be admitted into this Union, except that its constitution shall be republican; and that the imposition of any other by Congress would not only be in violation of the constitution, but in direct conflict with the principle on which our political system rests.' These resolutions, although the sense is involved in circumlocutory phrases, are intelligible to the point, that Congress has no power to prohibit slavery in a territory, and that the exercise of such a power would be a breach of the constitution, and leading to the subversion of the Union. … Mr. Calhoun demanded the prompt consideration of his resolutions, giving notice that he would call them up the next day and press them to a speedy and final vote. He did call them up, but never called for the vote, nor was any ever had. … In the course of this year, and some months after the submission of his resolutions in the Senate denying the right of Congress to abolish slavery in a territory, Mr. Calhoun wrote a letter to a member of the Alabama Legislature, which furnishes the key to unlock his whole system of policy in relation to the slavery agitation, and its designs, from his first taking up the business in Congress in the year 1835, down to the date of the letter; and thereafter. The letter was in reply to one asking his opinion 'as to the steps which should be taken' to guard the rights of the South. … It opens with this paragraph: 'I am much gratified with the tone and views of your letter, and concur entirely in the opinion you express, that instead of shunning, we ought to court the issue with the North on the slavery question. I would even go one step further, and add that it is our duty—due to ourselves, to the Union, and our political institutions, to force the issue on the North. We are now stronger relatively than we shall be hereafter, politically and morally. Unless we bring on the issue, delay to us will be dangerous indeed. It is the true policy of those enemies who seek our destruction. Its effects are, and have been, and will be to weaken us politically and morally, and to strengthen them. Such has been my opinion from the first. Had the South, or even my own State backed me, I would have forced the issue on the North in 1835, when the spirit of abolitionism first developed itself to any considerable extent. It is a true maxim, to meet danger on the frontier, in politics as well as war. Thus thinking, I am of the impression, that if the South act as it ought, the Wilmot Proviso, instead of proving to be the means of successfully assailing us and our peculiar institution, may be made the occasion of successfully asserting our equality and rights, by enabling us to force the issue on the North. Something of the kind was indispensable to rouse and unite the South. On the contrary, if we should not meet it as we ought, I fear, greatly fear, our doom will be fixed. It would prove that we either have not the sense or spirit to defend ourselves and our institutions.' The phrase 'forcing the issue' is here used too often, and for a purpose too obvious, to need remark. The reference to his movement in 1835 confirms all that was said of that movement at the time by senators from both sections of the Union. … At that time Mr. Calhoun characterized his movement as defensive—as done in a spirit of self-defence: it was then characterized by senators as aggressive and offensive: and it is now declared in this letter to have been so. He was then openly told that he was playing into the hands of the abolitionists, and giving them a champion to contend with, and the elevated theatre of the American Senate for the dissemination of their doctrines, and the production of agitation and sectional division. All that is now admitted, with a lamentation that the South, and not even his own State, would stand by him then in forcing the issue. So that chance was lost. Another was now presented. The Wilmot Proviso, so much deprecated in public, is privately saluted as a fortunate event, giving another chance for forcing the issue. The letter proceeds: 'But in making up the issue, we must look far beyond the proviso. It is but one of many acts of aggression, and, in my opinion, by no means the most dangerous or degrading, though more striking and palpable.' … So that, while this proviso was, publicly, the Pandora's box which filled the Union with evil, and while it was to Mr. Calhoun and his friends the theme of endless deprecation, it was secretly cherished as a means of keeping up discord, and forcing the issue between the North and the South. Mr. Calhoun then proceeds to the serious question of disunion, and of the manner in which the issue could be forced. 'This brings up the question, how can it be so met, without resorting to the dissolution of the Union? … There is, in my opinion, but one way in which it can be met; and that is … by retaliation.' … Then follows an argument to justify retaliation. … Retaliation by closing the ports of the State against the commerce of the offending State: and this called a constitutional remedy, and a remedy short of disunion. … The letter proceeds with further instructions upon the manner of executing the retaliation: 'My impression is, that it should be restricted to sea-going vessels, which would leave open the trade of the valley of the Mississippi to New Orleans by river, and to the other Southern cities by railroad; and tend thereby to detach the North-western from the North-eastern States.' … This confidential letter from Mr. Calhoun to a member of the Alabama legislature of 1847, has come to light, to furnish the key which unlocks his whole system of slavery agitation which he commenced in the year 1835. That system was to force issues upon the North under the pretext of self-defence, and to sectionalize the South, preparatory to disunion, through the instrumentality of sectional conventions, composed wholly of delegates from the slaveholding States."

T. H. Benton, Thirty Years' View, volume 2, chapters 167-168.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1848. Peace with Mexico. The Treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo. The acquisition of Territory.

See MEXICO: A. D. 1848.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1848. Admission of Wisconsin into the Union.

See WISCONSIN: A. D. 1805-1848.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1848. Increased reservation of public lands for School support.

See EDUCATION, MODERN: AMERICA: A. D. 1785-1880.

{3382}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1848. The Free Soil Convention at Buffalo and its nominations.

The "Barnburner" Democrats of New York, or Free Soilers as they began to be called, met in convention at Utica, February 16, 1848, and chose delegates to the approaching national Democratic Convention at Baltimore. In April the Barnburner members of the Legislature issued an elaborate address, setting forth the Free Soil principles of the Democratic fathers. The authors of the address were afterwards known to be Samuel J. Tilden and Martin and John Van Buren. The national Democratic Convention assembled in May, 1848. "It offered to admit the Barnburner and Hunker delegations together to cast the vote of the State. The Barnburners rejected the compromise as a simple nullification of the vote of the State, and then withdrew. Lewis Cass was nominated for president, the Wilmot proviso being thus emphatically condemned. For Cass had declared in favor of letting the new territories themselves decide upon slavery. The Barnburners, returning to a great meeting in the City Hall Park at New York, cried 'The lash has resounded through the halls of the Capitol!' and condemned the cowardice of northern senators who had voted with the South. … The delegates issued an address written by Tilden, fearlessly calling Democrats to independent action. In June a Barnburner convention met at Utica," which named Van Buren for the Presidency and called a national convention of all Free Soilers to meet at Buffalo, August 9, 1848. "Charles Francis Adams, the son of John Quincy Adams, presided at the Buffalo convention; and in it Joshua R. Giddings, the famous abolitionist, and Salmon P. Chase, were conspicuous. To the unspeakable horror of every Hunker there participated in the deliberations a negro, the Rev. Mr. Ward. Butler [Benjamin F., of New York], reported the resolutions in words whose inspiration is still fresh and ringing. … At the close were the stirring and memorable words: 'We inscribe on our banner, Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men; and under it we will fight on and fight ever, until a triumphant victory shall reward our exertions.' Joshua Leavitt of Massachusetts, one of the 'blackest' of abolitionists, reported to the convention the name of Martin Van Buren for president." The nomination was acclaimed with enthusiasm, and Charles Francis Adams was nominated for vice-president. "In September, John A. Dix, then a Democratic senator, accepted the Free-soil nomination for governor of New York. The Democratic party was aghast. The schismatics had suddenly gained great dignity and importance. … The Whigs had in June nominated Taylor, one of the two heroes of the Mexican war. … The anti-slavery Whigs hesitated for a time: but Seward of New York and Horace Greeley in the New York Tribune finally led most of them to Taylor, rather than, as Seward said, engage in 'guerrilla warfare' under Van Buren. … This launching of the modern Republican party was, strangely enough, to include in New York few besides Democrats."

E. M. Shepard, Martin Van Buren, chapter 11.

"The Buffalo Convention was one of the more important upheavals in the process of political disintegration which went steadily on between the years 1844, when the 'Birneyites' deprived Henry Clay of the electoral vote of New York, and 1856, when the Whig party disappeared, and the pro-slavery Democracy found itself confronted by the anti-slavery Republican organization of the North. In 1848, though the Whig party was already doomed, its time had not yet come. The Free Soil movement of 1848 was, therefore, premature; and moreover, as the result afterwards showed, there was something almost ludicrous in a combination of 'Conscience Whigs' of Massachusetts, in revolt over the nomination of the slave-owning General Taylor, with the 'Barnburning' Democrats of New York, intent only upon avenging on Cass the defeat of Van Buren. None the less the Free Soil movement of 1848 clearly foreshadowed the Republican uprising of 1856, and of the men who took part in the Buffalo convention an unusually large proportion afterwards became prominent as political leaders."

C. F. Adams, Richard Henry Dana, volume 1, chapter 7.

ALSO IN: H. Wilson, History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America, volume 2, chapter 13.

J. W. Schuckers, Life of Salmon P. Chase, chapter 11.

R. B. Warden, Life of Salmon P. Chase, chapter 21.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1848-1849. Sixteenth Presidential Election. Inauguration and death of General Taylor.

In the Presidential election of 1848, the Democratic party put forward as its candidate Lewis Cass; the Whigs named General Zachary Taylor; and the Free Soil Party placed Martin Van Buren in nomination. That the Whig Party should again have set aside its distinguished leader, Henry Clay, caused great grief among his devoted followers and friends. "But there were those in it who had grown gray in waiting for office under the banner of Mr. Clay, and whose memories were refreshed with what was effected by the éclat of military glory under General Jackson. It was hard, and might seem ungrateful, to abandon a great and long-tried leader. But the military feather waved before their eyes, and they were tempted. … It needed a leader, or a few leaders to give the signal of defection; and they were not wanting. One after another of the great names of the party fell off from Mr. Clay and inclined to General Taylor; and when the national Whig Convention met at Philadelphia, in June, 1848, to nominate a candidate for the Presidency, the first ballot showed that seven out of twelve of the Kentucky delegation, against the expectations and wishes of their constituency, had deserted Mr. Clay, and gone over to General Taylor. The influence of this fact was great—perhaps decisive. For if Mr. Clay's own State was against him, what could be expected of the other States? On the fourth ballot General Taylor had 52 majority, and was declared the nominee. … In November following, General Taylor was elected President of the United States, and Millard Fillmore Vice-President. As in the case of General Harrison, who died in thirty days after his inauguration, so in the case of General Taylor … he, too, died in sixteen months after he had entered on the duties of his office."

C. Colton, Life, Correspondence and Speeches of Henry Clay, volume 3, chapter 4.

The popular vote cast at the election was, for Taylor, 1,360,099; Cass, 1,220,544; for Van Buren, 291,263. The electoral vote was, for Taylor, 163; for Cass, 127; for Van Buren, none. Millard Fillmore, elected Vice President, succeeded to the Presidency on the death of General Taylor, July 9, 1850.

O. O. Howard, General Taylor, chapters 21-24.

{3383}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1850. The Seventh Census.

Total population, 23,191,876, nearly 36 per cent. greater than in 1840. The remnant of slavery in the northern States which appears in this census, still lingering in New Jersey, was not quite extinguished in the succeeding decade. The classification and distribution of population was as follows:

North.

White. Free black. Slave. California. 91,635 962 0 Connecticut. 363,099 7,693 0 Illinois. 846,034 5,436 0 Indiana. 977,154 11,262 0 Iowa. 191,881 333 0 Maine. 581,813 1,356 0 Massachusetts. 985,450 9,064 0 Michigan. 395,071 2,583 0 Minnesota. 6,038 39 0 New Hampshire. 317,456 520 0 New Jersey. 465,509 23,810 236 New York. 3,048,325 49,069 0 Ohio. 1,955,050 25,279 0 Oregon. 13,087 207 0 Pennsylvania. 2,258,160 53,626 0 Rhode Island. 143,875 3,670 0 Utah. 11,354 0 26 Vermont. 313,402 718 0 Wisconsin. 304,756 635 0

13,269,149 196,262 262

South.

White. Free black. Slave. Alabama. 426,514 2,265 342,844 Arkansas. 162,189 608 47,100 Delaware. 71,169 18,073 2,290 District of Columbia. 37,941 10,059 3,687 Florida. 47,203 932 39,310 Georgia. 521,572 2,931 381,682 Kentucky. 761,413 10,011 210,981 Louisiana. 255,491 17,462 244,809 Maryland. 417,943 74,723 90,368 Mississippi. 295,718 930 309,878 Missouri. 592,004 2,618 87,422 New Mexico. 61,547 0 0 North Carolina. 553,028 27,463 288,548 South Carolina. 274,563 8,960 384,984 Tennessee. 756,836 6,422 239,459 Texas. 154,034 397 58,161 Virginia. 894,800 54,333 472,528

Total 6,283,965 238,187 3,204,051

The immigration in the decade preceding this census had risen to 1,713,251 in number of persons, 1,047,763 coming from the British Islands (mostly from Ireland), and 549,739 from other parts of Europe.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1850. Henry Clay's last "Compromise." Free California, and the Fugitive Slave Law. Webster's Seventh of March Speech and Seward's Declaration of the "Higher Law."

"In 1848 gold was discovered in California. The tide of adventurers poured in. They had no slaves to take with them and no desire to acquire any. In less than a year the newly gathered people outnumbered the population of some of the smaller states. They organized a state government with an antislavery constitution, and demanded admission into the Union. True, the greater part of the proposed state lies north of 36° 30' [the dividing line of the Missouri Compromise], but its climate, tempered by the Pacific Ocean, is of rare mildness. If any part of the newly acquired territory should be opened to slavery, it seemed that California was the part best suited for it. If California repelled slavery, there was small hope that the remainder of the new territory would embrace it. Congress debated for ten months over the admission of California. The threatened inequality in numbers of the free and slave states was the central subject of contention, and the Union seemed again in danger of disruption."

J. S. Landon, Constitutional History and Government of the United States, lecture 8.

"One day toward the close of January [January 29, 1850], Henry Clay rose from his chair in the Senate Chamber, and waving a roll of papers, with dramatic eloquence and deep feeling, announced to a hushed auditory that he held in his hand a series of resolutions proposing an amicable arrangement of all questions growing out of the subject of slavery. Read and explained by its author this plan of compromise was to admit California, and to establish territorial governments in New Mexico, and the other portions of the regions acquired from Mexico, without any provisions for or against slavery—to pay the debt of Texas and fix her western boundary—to declare that it was 'inexpedient' to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, but 'expedient' to put some restrictions on the slave trade there, to pass a new and more stringent fugitive slave law, and to formally deny that Congress had any power to obstruct the slave trade between the States. Upon this plan of compromise and the modifications afterward made in it, began that long debate, since become historic, which engrossed the attention of Congress and the country for eight weary months. At the outset, many of those who had threatened 'Disunion,' opposed 'Clay's Compromise,' because it did not go far enough, while the 'Wilmot Proviso' men were equally resolute in opposing it, because it went too far. Seward with many other Northern Whigs, adhered to the 'President's Plan' [which simply favored the admission of California and New Mexico under constitutions which he had invited their people to frame], as being a much more just and speedy way of solving the problem. Avowing himself unterrified by the threats of 'Disunion,' he insisted that neither 'Compromise' nor the 'Fugitive Slave Law' was necessary, and that it was both the right and the duty of Congress to admit the Territories as free States, to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, and the slave trade between the States. Southern feeling was predominant in the Senate Chamber, as it had been for many years. Neither of the two great parties was opposed to slavery, and the recognized leaders of both were men of Southern birth. … Mr. Clay's resolutions, unsatisfactory as they were, to anti-slavery men, at first met with objections from Southern members. One 'deeply regretted the admission that slavery did not exist in the territories.' Several would 'never assent to the doctrine that slaveholders could not go there, taking their property with them.' Some questioned the validity of the Mexican decree, abolishing slavery in New Spain, and doubted the constitutionality of any attempt on the part of Congress to exclude it. Prognostications and threats of 'disunion' were freely made. {3384} On the other hand, there began to be signs of a growing disposition, on the part of many Northern men, to give up the 'Proviso' for the sake of peace; and to follow the lead of Mr. Clay. Conservative Southern Whigs were quite ready to meet these half way. Seward's position was regarded as 'ultra' by both classes; and it not unfrequently happened that, on questions in the Senate relating to slavery, only three Senators, Seward, Chase, and Hale, would be found voting together, on one side, while all the other Senators present were arrayed against them, on the other. Newspapers, received from all parts of the country, showed that elsewhere, as well as at the capital, the proposed compromise was an engrossing topic. Great meetings were held at the North in support of it. State Legislatures took ground, for and against it. Fresh fuel was added to the heated discussion by a new 'Fugitive Slave Law,' introduced by Senator Mason of Virginia, and by the talk of Southern Conventions, and 'Secret Southern Caucuses.' … March was an eventful month. Time enough had elapsed for each Senator to receive, from the press and people of his State, their response, in regard to Clay's proposed compromise. Resolutions pro and con had come from different Legislatures. … Each of the leaders in senatorial debate felt that the hour had come for him to declare whether he was for or against it. … Mr. Calhoun, though in failing health, obtained the floor for a speech. Everybody awaited it with great interest, regarding him as the acknowledged exponent of Southern opinion. … An expectant throng filled the Senate Chamber. His gaunt figure and attenuated features attested that he had risen from a sick bed; but his fiery eyes and unshaken voice showed he had no intention of abandoning the contest. In a few words he explained that his health would not permit him to deliver the speech he had prepared, but that 'his friend the Senator behind him (Mason) would read it for him.' Beginning by saying that he had 'believed from the first that the agitation of the subject of slavery would, if not prevented by some timely and effective measure, end in "disunion,"' the speech opposed Clay's plan of adjustment; attacked the President's plan; adverted to the growing feeling that the South could not remain in Union 'with safety and honor'; pointed out the gradual snapping, one after another, of the links which held the Union together, and expressed the most gloomy forebodings for the future. Three days later a similar, or greater, throng gathered to listen to Webster's great '7th of March speech,' which has ever since been recorded as marking an era in his life. He rose from his seat near the middle of the chamber, wearing his customary blue coat with metal buttons, and with one hand thrust into the buff vest, stood during his opening remarks, as impassive as a statue; but growing slightly more animated as he proceeded. Calm, clear, and powerful, his sonorous utterances, while they disappointed thousands of his friends at the North, lent new vigor to the 'Compromisers,' with whom, it was seen, he would henceforth act."

F. W. Seward, Seward at Washington, 1846-1861, chapter 16.

The first and longer part of Mr. Webster's speech was an historical review of the slavery question, and an argument maintaining the proposition, as he afterwards stated it in a few words, that there is "not a square rod of territory belonging to the United States the character of which, for slavery, or no slavery is not already fixed by some irrepealable law." The concluding part of his speech contained the passages which caused most grief among and gave most offense to his friends and admirers at the North. They are substantially comprised in the quotations following,—together with his eloquent declamation against the thought of secession: Mr. President, in the excited times in which we live, there is found to exist a state of crimination and recrimination between the North and South. There are lists of grievances produced by each; and those grievances, real or supposed, alienate the minds of one portion of the country from the other, exasperate the feelings, and subdue the sense of fraternal affection, patriotic love, and mutual regard. I shall bestow a little attention, Sir, upon these various grievances existing on the one side and on the other. I begin with complaints of the South. I will not answer, further than I have, the general statements of the honor·able Senator from South Carolina, that the North has prospered at the expense of the South in consequence of the manner of administering this government, in the collecting of its revenues, and so forth. These are disputed topics, and I have no inclination to enter into them. But I will allude to other complaints of the South, and especially to one which has in my opinion just foundation; and that is, that there has been found at the North, among individuals and among legislators, a disinclination to perform fully their constitutional duties in regard to the return of persons bound to service who have escaped into the free States. In that respect, the South, in my judgment, is right, and the North is wrong. Every member of every Northern legislature is bound by oath, like every other officer in the country, to support the Constitution of the United States; and the article of the Constitution which says to these States that they shall deliver up fugitives from service is as binding in honor and conscience as any other article. No man fulfils his duty in any legislature who sets himself to find excuses, evasions, escapes from this constitutional obligation. I have always thought that the Constitution addressed itself to the legislatures of the States or to the States themselves. It says that those persons escaping to other States 'shall be delivered up,' and I confess I have always been of the opinion that it was an injunction upon the States themselves. When it is said that a person escaping into another State, and coming therefore within the jurisdiction of that State, shall be delivered up, it seems to me the import of the clause is, that the State itself, in obedience to the Constitution, shall cause him to be delivered up. That is my judgment. I have always entertained that opinion, and I entertain it now. But when the subject, some years ago, was before the Supreme Court of the United States, the majority of the judges held that the power to cause fugitives from service to be delivered up was a power to be exercised under the authority of this government. I do not know, on the whole, that it may not have been a fortunate decision. My habit is to respect the result of judicial deliberations and the solemnity of judicial decisions. {3385} As it now stands, the business of seeing that these fugitives are delivered up resides in the power of Congress and the national judicature, and my friend at the head of the Judiciary Committee has a bill on the subject now before the Senate, which with some amendments to it, I propose to support, with all its provisions, to the fullest extent. And I desire to call the attention of all sober-minded men at the North, of all conscientious men, of all men who are not carried away by some fanatical idea or some false impression, to their constitutional obligations. I put it to all the sober and sound minds at the North as a question of morals and a question of conscience. What right have they, in their legislative capacity or any other capacity, to endeavor to get round this Constitution, or to embarrass the free exercise of the rights secured by the Constitution to the persons whose slaves escape from them? None at all; none at all. Neither in the forum of conscience, nor before the face of the Constitution, are they, in my opinion, justified in such an attempt. … I repeat, therefore, Sir, that here is a well-founded ground of complaint against the North, which ought to be removed, which it is now in the power of the different departments of this government to remove; which calls for the enactment of proper laws authorizing the judicature of this government, in the several States, to do all that is necessary for the recapture of fugitive slaves and for their restoration to those who claim them. … Complaint has been made against certain resolutions that emanate from legislatures at the North, and are sent here to us, not only on the subject of slavery in this District, but sometimes recommending Congress to consider the means of abolishing slavery in the States. I should be sorry to be called upon to present any resolutions here which could not be referable to any committee or any power in Congress; and therefore I should be unwilling to receive from the legislature of Massachusetts any instructions to present resolutions expressive of any opinion whatever on the subject of slavery, as it exists at the present moment in the States, for two reasons: first, be·cause I do not consider that the legislature of Massachusetts has anything to do with it; and next, because I do not consider that I, as her representative here, have anything to do with it. It has become, in my opinion, quite too common; and if the legislatures of the States do not like that opinion, they have a great deal more power to put it down than I have to uphold it; It has become in my opinion quite too common a practice for the State legislatures to present resolutions here on all subjects and to instruct us on all subjects. There is no public man that requires instruction more than I do, or who requires information more than I do, or desires it more heartily; but I do not like to have it in too imperative a shape. … Then Sir, there are the Abolition societies, of which I am unwilling to speak, but in regard to which I have very clear notions and opinions. I do not think them useful. I think their operations for the last twenty years have produced nothing good or valuable. At the same time, I believe thousands of their members to be honest and good men, perfectly well-meaning men. They have excited feelings; they think they must do something for the cause of liberty; and, in their sphere of action, they do not see what else they can do than to contribute to an Abolition press, or an Abolition society, or to pay an Abolition lecturer. I do not mean to impute gross motives even to the leaders of these societies, but I am not blind to the consequences of their proceedings. I cannot but see what mischiefs their interference with the South has produced. And is it not plain to every man? Let any gentleman who entertains doubts on this point recur to the debates in the Virginia House of Delegates in 1832, and he will see with what freedom a proposition made by Mr. Jefferson Randolph for the gradual abolition of slavery was discussed in that body. Everyone spoke of slavery as he thought; very ignominious and disparaging names and epithets were applied to it. The debates in the House of Delegates on that occasion, I believe, were all published. They were read by every colored man who could read, and to those who could not read, those debates were read by others. At that time Virginia was not unwilling or afraid to discuss this question, and to let that part of her population know as much of the discussion as they could learn. That was in 1832. As has been said by the honorable member from South Carolina, these Abolition societies commenced their course of action in 1835. It is said, I do not know how true it may be, that they sent incendiary publications into the slave States; at any rate, they attempted to arouse, and did arouse, a very strong feeling; in other words they created great agitation in the North against Southern slavery. Well, what was the result? The bonds of the slaves were bound more firmly than before, their rivets were more strongly fastened. Public opinion, which in Virginia had begun to be exhibited against slavery, and was opening out for the discussion of the question, drew back and shut itself up in its castle. I wish to know whether any body in Virginia can now talk openly as Mr. Randolph, Governor McDowell, and others talked in 1832, and sent their remarks to the press? We all know the fact, and we all know the cause; and everything that these agitating people have done has been, not to enlarge, but to restrain, not to set free, but to bind faster, the slave population of the South. Again, Sir, the violence of the Northern press is complained of. The press violent! Why, Sir, the press is violent everywhere. There are outrageous reproaches in the North against the South, and there are reproaches as vehement in the South against the North. Sir, the extremists of both parts of this country are violent; they mistake loud and violent talk, for eloquence and for reason. They think that he who talks loudest reasons best. And this we must expect, when the press is free, as it is here, and I trust always will be. … Well, in all this I see no solid grievance, no grievance presented by the South, within the redress of the government, but the single one to which I have referred; and that is, the want of a proper regard to the injunction of the Constitution for the delivery of fugitive slaves. There are also complaints of the North against the South. I need not go over them particularly. The first and gravest is, that the North adopted the Constitution, recognizing the existence of slavery in the States, and recognizing the right, to a certain extent, of the representation of slaves in Congress, under a state of sentiment and expectation which does not now exist; and that, by events, by circumstances, by the eagerness of the South to acquire territory and extend her slave population, the North finds itself, in regard to the relative influence of the South and the North, of the free States and the slave States, where it never did expect to find itself when they agreed to the compact of the Constitution. {3386} They complain, therefore, that, instead of slavery being regarded as an evil, as it was then, an evil which all hoped would be extinguished gradually, it is now regarded by the South as an institution to be cherished, and preserved, and extended; an institution which the South has already extended to the utmost of her power by the acquisition of new territory. Well, then, passing from that, every body in the North reads; and every body reads whatsoever the newspapers contain; and the newspapers, some of them, especially those presses to which I have alluded, are careful to spread about among the people every reproachful sentiment uttered by any Southern man bearing at all against the North; every thing that is calculated to exasperate and to alienate; and there are many such things, as every body will admit, from the South, or some portion of it, which are disseminated among the reading people; and they do exasperate, and alienate, and produce a most mischievous effect upon the public mind at the North. Sir, I would not notice things of this sort appearing in obscure quarters; but one thing has occurred in this debate which struck me very forcibly. An honorable member from Louisiana addressed us the other day on this subject. I suppose there is not a more amiable and worthy gentleman in this chamber, nor a gentleman who would be more slow to give offence to any body, and he did not mean in his remarks to give offence. But what did he say? Why, Sir, he took pains to run a contrast between the slaves of the South and the laboring people of the North, giving the preference, in all points of condition, and comfort, and happiness, to the slaves of the South. The honorable member, doubtless, did not suppose that he gave any offence, or did any injustice. He was merely expressing his opinion. But does he know how remarks of that sort will be received by the laboring people of the North? Why, who are the laboring people of the North? They are the whole North. They are the people who till their own farms with their own hands; freeholders, educated men, independent men. Let me say, Sir, that five sixths of the whole property of the North is in the hands of the laborers of the North; they cultivate their farms, they educate their children, they provide the means of independence. … There is a more tangible and irritating cause of grievance at the North. Free blacks are constantly employed in the vessels of the North, generally as cooks or stewards. When the vessel arrives at a Southern port, these free colored men are taken on shore, by the police or municipal authority, imprisoned, and kept in prison till the vessel is again ready to sail. This is not only irritating, but exceedingly unjustifiable and oppressive. Mr. Hoar's mission, some time ago, to South Carolina, was a well-intended effort to remove this cause of complaint. The North thinks such imprisonments illegal and unconstitutional; and as the cases occur constantly and frequently, they regard it as a great grievance. Now, Sir, so far as any of these grievances have their foundation in matters of law, they can be redressed, and ought to be redressed; and so far as they have their foundation in matters of opinion, in sentiment, in mutual crimination and recrimination, all that we can do is to endeavor to allay the agitation, and cultivate a better feeling and more fraternal sentiments between the South and the North. Mr. President, I should much prefer to have heard from every member on this floor declarations of opinion that this Union could never be dissolved, than the declaration of opinion by any body, that, in any case, under the pressure of any circumstances, such a dissolution was possible. I hear with distress and anguish the word 'secession,' especially when it falls from the lips of those who are patriotic, and known to the country, and known all over the world, for their political services. Secession! Peaceable secession! Sir, your eyes and mine are never destined to see that miracle. The dismemberment of this vast country without convulsion! The breaking up of the fountains of the great deep without ruffling the surface! Who is so foolish, I beg every body's pardon, as to expect to see any such thing? Sir, he who sees these States, now revolving in harmony around a common centre, and expects to see them quit their places and fly off without convulsion, may look the next hour to see the heavenly bodies rush from their spheres, and jostle against each other in the realms of space, without causing the wreck of the universe. There can be no such thing as a peaceable secession. Peaceable secession is an utter impossibility. Is the great Constitution under which we live, covering this whole country, is it to be thawed and melted away by secession, as the snows on the mountain melt under the influence of a vernal sun, disappear almost unobserved, and run off? No, Sir! No, Sir! I will not state what might produce the disruption of the Union; but, Sir, I see as plainly as I see the sun in heaven what that disruption itself must produce; I see that it must produce war, and such a war as I will not describe, in its two-fold character. Peaceable secession! Peaceable secession! The concurrent agreement of all the members of this great republic to separate! A voluntary separation, with alimony on one side and on the other. Why, what would be the result? Where is the line to be drawn? What States are to secede? What is to remain American? What am I to be? An American no longer? Am I to become a sectional man, a local man, a separatist, with no country in common with the gentlemen who sit around me here, or who fill the other house of Congress? Heaven forbid! Where is the flag of the republic to remain? Where is the eagle still to tower? or is he to cower, and shrink, and fall to the ground? Why, Sir, our ancestors, our fathers, and our grandfathers, those of them that are yet living amongst us with prolonged lives, would rebuke and reproach us; and our children and our grandchildren would cry out shame upon us, if we of this generation should dishonor these ensign of the power of the government and the harmony of that Union which is every day felt among us with so much joy and gratitude. … Sir, nobody can look over the face of this country at the present moment, nobody can see where its population is the most dense and growing, without being ready to admit, and compelled to admit, that ere long the strength of America will be in the Valley of the Mississippi. {3387} Well, now, Sir, I beg to inquire what the wildest enthusiast has to say on the possibility of cutting that river in two, and leaving free States at its source and on it branches, and slave States down near its mouth, each forming a separate government? … To break up this great government! to dismember this glorious country! To astonish Europe with an act of folly such as Europe for two centuries has never beheld in any government or any people! No, Sir! no, Sir! There will be no secession! Gentlemen are not serious when they talk of secession."

Daniel Webster, Works, volume 5, page 324.

"The speech, if exactly defined, is, in reality, a powerful effort, not for compromise or for the Fugitive Slave Law, or any other one thing, but to arrest the whole anti-slavery movement, and in that way put an end to the dangers which threatened the Union and restore lasting harmony between the jarring sections. It was a mad project. Mr. Webster might as well have attempted to stay the incoming tide at Marshfield with a rampart of sand as to seek to check the anti-slavery movement by a speech. Nevertheless, he produced a great effect. … The blow fell with terrible force, and here … we come to the real mischief which was wrought. The 7th of March speech demoralized New England and the whole North. The abolitionists showed by bitter anger the pain, disappointment, and dismay which this speech brought. The Free-Soil party quivered and sank for the moment beneath the shock. The whole anti-slavery movement recoiled. The conservative reaction which Mr. Webster endeavored to produce came and triumphed. Chiefly by his exertions the compromise policy was accepted and sustained by the country. The conservative elements everywhere rallied to his support, and by his ability and eloquence it seemed as if he had prevailed and brought the people over to his opinions. It was a wonderful tribute to his power and influence, but the triumph was hollow and short-lived. He had attempted to compass an impossibility. Nothing could kill the principles of human liberty, not even a speech by Daniel Webster, backed by all his intellect and knowledge, his eloquence and his renown. The anti-slavery movement was checked for the time, and pro-slavery democracy, the only other positive political force, reigned supreme. But amid the falling ruins of the Whig party, and the evanescent success of the Native Americans, the party of human rights revived; and when it rose again, taught by the trials and misfortunes of 1850, it rose with a strength which Mr. Webster had never dreamed of."

H. C. Lodge, Daniel Webster, chapter 9.

"A public meeting in Faneuil Hall condemned the action of Webster. Theodore Parker, who was one of the principal speakers, said: 'I know no deed in American history done by a son of New England to which I can compare this but the act of Benedict Arnold. … The only reasonable way in which we can estimate this speech is as a bid for the presidency.' In the main, the Northern Whig press condemned the salient points of the speech. … Whittier, in a song of plaintive vehemence called 'Ichabod,' mourned for the 'fallen' statesman whose faith was lost, and whose honor was dead. … This was the instant outburst of opinion; but friends for Webster and his cause came with more deliberate reflections. … When the first excitement had subsided, the friends of Webster bestirred themselves, and soon testimonials poured in, approving the position which he had taken. The most significant of them was the one from eight hundred solid men of Boston, who thanked him for 'recalling us to our duties under the Constitution,' and for his 'broad national and patriotic views.' The tone of many of the Whig papers changed, some to positive support, others to more qualified censure. The whole political literature of the time is full of the discussion of this speech and its relation to the compromise. It is frequently said that a speech in Congress does not alter opinions; that the minds of men are determined by set political bias or sectional considerations. This was certainly not the case in 1850. Webster's influence was of the greatest weight in the passage of the compromise measures, and he is as closely associated with them as is their author. Clay's adroit parliamentary management was necessary to carry them through the various and tedious steps of legislation. But it was Webster who raised up for them a powerful and much-needed support from Northern public sentiment. At the South the speech was cordially received; the larger portion of the press commended it with undisguised admiration. … On the 11th of March, Seward spoke. … When Seward came to the territorial question, his words created a sensation, 'We hold,' he said, 'no arbitrary authority over anything, whether acquired lawfully or seized by usurpation. The Constitution regulates our stewardship; the Constitution devotes the domain (i. e. the territories not formed into States) to union, to justice, to defence, to welfare, and to liberty. But there is a higher law than the Constitution, which regulates our authority over the domain, and devotes it to the same noble purposes. The territory is a part, no inconsiderable part, of the common heritage of mankind, bestowed upon them by the Creator of the Universe. We are his stewards, and must so discharge our trust as to secure in the highest attainable degree their happiness.' This remark about 'a higher law,' while far inferior in rhetorical force to Webster's 'I would not take pains uselessly to reaffirm an ordinance of Nature, nor to re-enact the will of God,' was destined to have transcendent moral influence. A speech which can be condensed into an aphorism is sure to shape convictions. These, then, are the two maxims of this debate; the application of them shows the essential points of the controversy."

J. F. Rhodes, History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850. volume 1, chapter 2.

In the political controversies which accompanied and followed the introduction of the Compromise measures, the Whigs who supported the Compromise were called "Silver-Grays," or "Snuff-Takers," and those who opposed it were called "Woolly-Heads," or "Seward-Whigs."

{3388}

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1850. Mr. Clay's last compromise. The Omnibus Bill. The Fugitive Slave Law as passed.

On the 17th of April, "a select committee of the Senate, headed by Mr. Clay, reported a bill consisting of 39 sections, embodying most of the resolutions which had been discussed. From its all-comprehensive nature it was called the Omnibus Bill. The points comprehended in the omnibus bill were as follows:

1st. When new states formed out of Texas present themselves, it shall be the duty of Congress to admit them;

2d. The immediate admission of California, with the boundaries which she has proposed;

3d. The establishment of territorial governments for Utah and New Mexico, without the Wilmot proviso;

4th. The combination of points 2 and 3 in one bill;

5th. The excission from Texas of all New Mexico, rendering therefor a pecuniary equivalent;

6th. The enactment of a law for the effectual rendition of fugitive slaves escaping into the free states;

7th. No interference with slavery in the District of Columbia, but the slave trade therein should be abolished, under heavy penalties.

This bill was discussed until the last of July, and then passed by the Senate, but it had been so pruned by successive amendments that it contained only a provision for the organization of a territorial government for Utah. In this condition it was sent to the House. There, as a whole, the bill was rejected, but its main heads were passed in August as separate bills, and were designated the compromise measures of 1850, and, in their accepted shape, required:

(1) Utah and New Mexico to be organized into territories, without reference to slavery;

(2) California to be admitted as a free state;

(3) $10,000,000 to be paid to Texas for her claim to New Mexico;

(4) fugitive slaves to be returned to their masters; and

(5) the slave trade to be abolished in the District of Columbia.

The compromises were received by the leaders of the two great parties as a final settlement of the vexed questions which had so long troubled Congress and agitated the country, but the storm was only temporarily allayed. In accordance with these measures California became a state of the Union September 9, 1850. The most important feature of this bill, in its bearing upon future struggles and conflicts, was the fugitive slave law. … In the midst of the discussion of these topics occurred the death of the President, July 9, 1850, one year and four months after his inauguration. … Mr. Fillmore was inaugurated on the 10th of July, 1850. He departed from the policy of his predecessor, organized a new cabinet, used his influence in favor of the compromise measures," and gave his signature to the Fugitive Slave Law.

W. R. Houghton, History of American Politics, chapter 15.

"It was apparent to everyone who knew anything of the sentiments of the North that this law could not be executed to any extent. Seward had truly said that if the South wished their runaway negroes returned they must alleviate, not increase, the rigors of the law of 1793; and to give the alleged fugitive a jury trial, as Webster proposed, was the only possible way to effect the desired purpose. If we look below the surface we shall find a strong impelling motive of the Southern clamor for this harsh enactment other than the natural desire to recover lost property. Early in the session it took air that a part of the game of the disunionists was to press a stringent fugitive slave law, for which no Northern man could vote; and when it was defeated, the North would be charged with refusing to carry out a stipulation of the Constitution. Douglas stated in the Senate that while there was some ground for complaint on the subject of surrender of fugitives from service, it had been greatly exaggerated. The excitement and virulence were not along the line bordering on the free and slave States, but between Vermont and South Carolina, New Hampshire and Alabama, Connecticut and Louisiana. Clay gave vent to his astonishment that Arkansas, Louisiana, Georgia, and South Carolina, States which very rarely lost a slave, demanded a stricter law than Kentucky, which lost many. After the act was passed Senator Butler, of South Carolina, said: 'I would just as soon have the law of 1793 as the present law, for any purpose, so far as regards the reclamation of fugitive slaves;' and another Southern ultra never thought it would be productive of much good to his section. Six months after the passage of the law, Seward expresses the matured opinion 'that political ends—merely political ends—and not real evils, resulting from the escape of slaves, constituted the prevailing motives to the enactment.'"

J. F. Rhodes, History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850, chapter 2 (volume 1).

"The fugitive-slave law was to make the citizens of the Free States do for the slave-holders what not a few of the slave-holders were too proud to do for themselves. Such a law could not but fail. But then it would increase the exasperation of the slave-holders by its failure, while exasperating the people of the Free States by the attempts at enforcement. Thus the compromise of 1850, instead of securing peace and harmony, contained in the most important of its provisions the seeds of new and greater conflicts. One effect it produced which Calhoun had clearly predicted when he warned the slave-holding states against compromises as an invention of the enemy: it adjourned the decisive conflict until the superiority of the North over the South in population and material resources was overwhelming."

C. Schurz, Life of Henry Clay, chapter 26 (volume 2).

ALSO IN: H. von Holst, Constitutional and Political History of the United States, volume 3, chapters 15-16.

H. Clay, Life, Correspondence, and Speeches; edited by Colton, volume 6.

W. H. Seward, Works, volume 1, pages 51-131. and volume 4.

J. S. Pike, First Blows of the Civil War, pages 1-98.

H.Wilson, History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power, volume 2, chapters 18-28.

J. F. Rhodes, History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850, chapter. 2 (volume 1).

See, also, HIGHER LAW DOCTRINE.

The following is the complete text of the Fugitive Slave Law: "An act to amend, and supplementary to, the Act entitled 'An Act respecting Fugitives from Justice, and Persons escaping from the Service of their Masters,' approved February twelfth, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-three.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the persons who have been, or may hereafter be, appointed commissioners, in virtue of any act of Congress, by the Circuit Courts of the United States, and who, in consequence of such appointment, are authorized to exercise the powers that any justice of the peace, or other magistrate of any of the United States, may exercise in respect to offenders for any crime or offence against the United States, by arresting, imprisoning, or bailing the same under and by virtue of the thirty-third section of the act of the twenty-fourth of September seventeen hundred and eighty-nine, entitled 'An Act to establish the judicial courts of the United States,' shall be, and are hereby, authorized and required to exercise and discharge all the powers and duties conferred by this act.

{3389}

SECTION 2. And be it further enacted, That the Superior Court of each organized Territory of the United States shall have the same power to appoint commissioners to take acknowledgments of bail and affidavits, and to take depositions of witnesses in civil causes, which is now possessed by the Circuit Court of the United States; and all commissioners who shall hereafter be appointed for such purposes by the Superior Court of any organized Territory of the United States, shall possess all the powers, and exercise all the duties, conferred by law upon the commissioners appointed by the Circuit Courts of the United States for similar purposes, and shall moreover exercise and discharge all the powers and duties conferred by this act.

SECTION 3. And be it further enacted, That the Circuit Courts of the United States, and the Superior Courts of each organized Territory of the United States, shall from time to time enlarge the number of commissioners, with a view to afford reasonable facilities to reclaim fugitives from labor, and to the prompt discharge of the duties imposed by this act.

SECTION 4. And be it further enacted, That the commissioners above named shall have concurrent jurisdiction with the judges of the Circuit and District Courts of the United States, in their respective circuits and districts within the several States, and the judges of the Superior Courts of the Territories, severally and collectively, in term-time and vacation; and shall grant certificates to such claimants, upon satisfactory proof being made, with authority to take and remove such fugitives from service or labor, under the restrictions herein contained, to the State or Territory from which such persons may have escaped or fled.

SECTION 5. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of all marshals and deputy marshals to obey and execute all warrants and precepts issued under the provisions of this act, when to them directed; and should any marshal or deputy marshal refuse to receive such warrant, or other process, when tendered, or to use all proper means diligently to execute the same, he shall, on conviction thereof, be fined in the sum of one thousand dollars, to the use of such claimant, on the motion of such claimant by the Circuit or District Court for the district of such marshal; and after arrest of such fugitive, by such marshal or his deputy, or whilst at any time in his custody under the provisions of this act, should such fugitive escape, whether with or without the assent of such marshal or his deputy, such marshal shall be liable, on his official bond, to be prosecuted for the benefit of such claimant, for the full value of the service or labor of said fugitive in the State, Territory, or District whence he escaped: and the better to enable the said commissioners, when thus appointed, to execute their duties faithfully and efficiently, in conformity with the requirements of the Constitution of the United States and of this act, they are hereby authorized and empowered, within their counties respectively, to appoint, in writing under their hands, any one or more suitable persons, from time to time, to execute all such warrants and other process as may be issued by them in the lawful performance of their respective duties; with authority to such commissioners, or the persons to be appointed by them, to execute process as aforesaid, to summon and call to their aid the bystanders, or posse comitatus of the proper county, when necessary to insure a faithful observance of the clause of the Constitution referred to, in conformity with the provisions of this act; and all good citizens are hereby commanded to aid and assist in the prompt and efficient execution of this law, whenever their services may be required, as aforesaid, for that purpose; and said warrants shall run, and be executed by said officers, anywhere in the State within which they are issued.

SECTION 6. And be it further enacted, That when a person held to service or labor in any State or Territory of the United States, has heretofore or shall hereafter escape into another State or Territory of the United States, the person or persons to whom such service or labor may be due, or his, her, or their agent or attorney, duly authorized, by power of attorney, in writing, acknowledged and certified under the seal of some legal officer or court of the State or Territory in which the same may be executed, may pursue and reclaim such fugitive person, either by procuring a warrant from some one of the courts, judges, or commissioners aforesaid, of the proper circuit, district, or county, for the apprehension of such fugitive from service or labor, or by seizing and arresting such fugitive, where the same can be done without process, and by taking, or causing such person to be taken, forthwith before such court, judge, or commissioner, whose duty it shall be to hear and determine the case of such claimant in a summary manner; and upon satisfactory proof being made, by deposition or affidavit, in writing, to be taken and certified by such court, judge, or commissioner, or by other satisfactory testimony, duly taken and certified by some court, magistrate, justice of the peace, or other legal officer authorized to administer an oath and take depositions under the laws of the State or Territory from which such person owing service or labor may have escaped, with a certificate of such magistracy or other authority, as aforesaid, with the seal of the proper court or officer thereto attached, which seal shall be sufficient to establish the competency of the proof, and with proof, also by affidavit, of the identity of the person whose service or labor is claimed to be due as aforesaid, that the person so arrested does in fact owe service or labor to the person or persons claiming him or her, in the State or Territory from which such fugitive may have escaped as aforesaid, and that said person escaped, to make out and deliver to such claimant, his or her agent or attorney, a certificate setting forth the substantial facts as to the service or labor due from such fugitive to the claimant, and of his or her escape from the State or Territory in which such service or labor was due, to the State or Territory in which he or she was arrested, with authority to such claimant, or his or her agent or attorney, to use such reasonable force and restraint as may be necessary, under the circumstances of the case, to take and remove such fugitive person back to the State or Territory whence he or she may have escaped as aforesaid. In no trial or hearing under this act shall the testimony of such alleged fugitive be admitted in evidence; and the certificates in this and the first [fourth] section mentioned, shall be conclusive of the right of the person or persons in whose favor granted, to remove such fugitive to the State or Territory from which he escaped, and shall prevent all molestation of such person or persons by any process issued by any court, judge, magistrate, or other person whomsoever.

{3390}

SECTION 7. And be it further enacted, That any person who shall knowingly and willingly obstruct, hinder, or prevent such claimant, his agent or attorney, or any person or persons lawfully assisting him, her, or them, from arresting such a fugitive from service or labor, either with or without process as aforesaid, or shall rescue, or attempt to rescue, such fugitive from service or labor, from the custody of such claimant, his or her agent or attorney, or other person or persons lawfully assisting as aforesaid, when so arrested, pursuant to the authority herein given and declared; or shall aid, abet, or assist such person so owing service or labor as aforesaid, directly or indirectly, to escape from such claimant, his agent or attorney, or other person or persons legally authorized as aforesaid; or shall harbor or conceal such fugitive, so as to prevent the discovery and arrest of such person, after notice or knowledge of the fact that such person was a fugitive from service or labor as aforesaid, shall, for either of said offences, be subject to a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars, and imprisonment not exceeding six months, by indictment and conviction before the District Court of the United States for the district in which such offence may have been committed, or before the proper court of criminal jurisdiction, if committed within any one of the organized Territories of the United States; and shall moreover forfeit and pay, by way of civil damages to the party injured by such illegal conduct, the sum of one thousand dollars, for each fugitive so lost as aforesaid, to be recovered by action of debt, in any of the District or Territorial Courts aforesaid, within whose jurisdiction the said offence may have been committed.

SECTION 8. And be it further enacted, That the marshals, their deputies, and the clerks of the said District and Territorial Courts, shall be paid, for their services, the like fees as may be allowed to them for similar services in other cases; and where such services are rendered exclusively in the arrest, custody, and delivery of the fugitive to the claimant, his or her agent or attorney, or where such supposed fugitive may be discharged out of custody for the want of sufficient proof as aforesaid, then such fees are to be paid in the whole by such claimant, his agent or attorney; and in all cases where the proceedings are before a commissioner, he shall be entitled to a fee of ten dollars in full for his services in each case, upon the delivery of the said certificate to the claimant, his or her agent or attorney; or a fee of five dollars in cases where the proof shall not, in the opinion of such commissioner, warrant such certificate and delivery, inclusive of all services incident to such arrest and examination, to be paid, in either case, by the claimant, his or her agent or attorney. The person or persons authorized to execute the process to be issued by such commissioners for the arrest and detention of fugitives from service or labor as aforesaid, shall also be entitled to a fee of five dollars each for each person he or they may arrest and take before any such commissioner as aforesaid, at the instance and request of such claimant, with such other fees as may be deemed reasonable by such commissioner for such other additional services as may be necessarily performed by him or them; such as attending at the examination, keeping the fugitive in custody, and providing him with food and lodging during his detention, and until the final determination of such commissioner; and, in general, for performing such other duties as may be required by such claimant, his or her attorney or agent, or commissioner in the premises, such fees to be made up in conformity with the fees usually charged by the officers of the courts of justice within the proper district or county, as near as may be practicable, and paid by such claimants, their agents or attorneys, whether such supposed fugitives from service or labor be ordered to be delivered to such claimants by the final determination of such commissioners or not.

SECTION 9. And be it further enacted, That, upon affidavit made by the claimant of such fugitive, his agent or attorney, after such certificate has been issued, that he has reason to apprehend that such fugitive will be rescued by force from his or their possession before he can be taken beyond the limits of the State in which the arrest is made, it shall be the duty of the officer making the arrest to retain such fugitive in his custody, and to remove him to the State whence he fled, and there to deliver him to said claimant, his agent, or attorney. And to this end, the officer aforesaid is hereby authorized and required to employ so many persons as he may deem necessary to overcome such force, and to retain them in his service so long as circumstances may require. The said officer and his assistants, while so employed, to receive the same compensation, and to be allowed the same expenses, as are now allowed by law for transportation of criminals, to be certified by the judge of the district within which the arrest is made, and paid out of the treasury of the United States.

SECTION 10. And be it further enacted, That when any person held to service or labor in any State or Territory, or in the District of Columbia, shall escape therefrom, the party to whom such service or labor shall be due, his, her, or their agent or attorney, may apply to any court of record therein, or judge thereof in vacation, and make satisfactory proof to such court, or judge in vacation, of the escape aforesaid, and that the person escaping owed service or labor to such party. Whereupon the court shall cause a record to be made of the matters so proved, and also a general description of the person so escaping, with such convenient certainty as may be; and a transcript of such record, authenticated by the attestation of the clerk and of the seal of the said court, being produced in any other State, Territory, or district in which the person so escaping may be found, and being exhibited to any judge, commissioner, or other officer authorized by the law of the United States to cause persons escaping from service or labor to be delivered up, shall be held and taken to be full and conclusive evidence of the fact of escape, and that the service or labor of the person escaping is due to the party in such record mentioned. And upon the production by the said party of other and further evidence if necessary, either oral or by affidavit, in addition to what is contained in the said record of the identity of the person escaping, he or she shall be delivered up to the claimant. {3391} And the said court, commissioner, judge, or other person authorized by this act to grant certificates to claimants of fugitives, shall, upon the production of the record and other evidences aforesaid, grant to such claimant a certificate of his right to take any such person identified and proved to be owing service or labor as aforesaid, which certificate shall authorize such claimant to seize or arrest and transport such person to the State or Territory from which he escaped: Provided, That nothing herein contained shall be construed as requiring the production of a transcript of such record as evidence as aforesaid. But in its absence the claim shall be heard and determined upon other satisfactory proofs, competent in law. Approved, September 18, 1850."

Statutes at Large, ix. 462-465.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1850. The Clayton-Bulwer Treaty with Great Britain.

See NICARAGUA: A. D. 1850.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1850-1851. The Hülsemann Letter. Kossuth in America.

In July, 1850, Daniel Webster became Secretary of State in the cabinet of President Fillmore and retained that post until his death, in October, 1852. "The best-known incident of this period was that which gave rise to the famous 'Hülsemann letter.' President Taylor had sent an agent to Hungary to report upon the condition of the revolutionary government, with the intention of recognizing it if there were sufficient grounds for doing so. When the agent arrived, the revolution was crushed, and he reported to the President against recognition. These papers were transmitted to the Senate in March, 1850. Mr. Hülsemann, the Austrian Charge, thereupon complained of the action of our administration, and Mr. Clayton, then Secretary of State, replied that the mission of the agent had been simply to gather information. On receiving further instructions from his government, Mr. Hülsemann rejoined to Mr. Clayton, and it fell to Mr. Webster to reply, which he did on December 21, 1850. The note of the Austrian Chargé was in a hectoring and highly offensive tone, and Mr. Webster felt the necessity of administering a sharp rebuke. 'The Hülsemann letter,' as it was called, was, accordingly dispatched. It set forth strongly the right of the United States and their intention to recognize any de facto revolutionary government, and to seek information in all proper ways in order to guide their action. … Mr. Webster had two objects. One was to awaken the people of Europe to a sense of the greatness of this country, the other to touch the national pride at home. He did both. … The affair did not, however, end here. Mr. Hülsemann became very mild, but he soon lost his temper again. Kossuth and the refugees in Turkey were brought to this country in a United States frigate. The Hungarian hero was received with a burst of enthusiasm that induced him to hope for substantial aid, which was, of course, wholly visionary. The popular excitement made it difficult for Mr. Webster to steer a proper course, but he succeeded, by great tact, in showing his own sympathy, and, so far as possible, that of the government, for the cause of Hungarian independence and for its leader, without going too far. … Mr. Webster's course, … although carefully guarded, aroused the ire of Mr. Hülsemann, who left the country, after writing a letter of indignant farewell to the Secretary of State."

H. C. Lodge, Daniel Webster, chapter 10.

ALSO IN: D. Webster, Works, volume 6, pages 488-504.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1851. The Lopez Filibustering expedition to Cuba.

See CUBA: A. D. 1845-1860.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1852. Appearance of the Know Nothing or American Party.

"A new party had by this time risen to active importance in American politics. It appeared in 1852, in the form of a secret, oath-bound organization, of whose name, nature, and objects nothing was told even to its members until they had reached its higher degrees. Their consequent declaration that they knew nothing about it gave the society its popular name of Know Nothings. It accepted the name of the American Party. Its design was to oppose the easy naturalization of foreigners, and to aid the election of native-born citizens to office. Its nominations were made by secret conventions of delegates from the various lodges, and were voted for by all members under penalty of expulsion in case of refusal. At first, by endorsing the nominations of one or other of the two great parties, it decided many elections. After the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, the Know Nothing organization was adopted by many Southern Whigs who were unwilling to unite with the Democracy, and became, for a time, a national party. It carried nine of the State elections in 1855, and in 1856 nominated Presidential candidates. After that time its Southern members gradually united with the Democracy, and the Know Nothing party disappeared from politics."

A. Johnston, History of American Politics, 2d edition, chapter 18, section 4.

The ritual, rules, etc., of the American, or Know Nothing party are given in the following work.

T. V. Cooper, American Politics, pages 56-68.

ALSO IN: A. Holmes, Parties and their Principles, pages 287-295.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1852. Seventeenth Presidential Election. Franklin Pierce.

"The question of slavery, in its comprehensive bearings, formed the turning point in the presidential canvass of 1852. … The national democratic convention which nominated Mr. Pierce, unanimously adopted a platform approving the compromise of 1850 as the final decision of the slavery question. The Whig party were widely divided on the question of acquiescence in the compromise measures, and still more at variance in regard to the claims of rival candidates for the presidency. Mr. Seward's friends in the free states united in the support of General Scott, who had, to a considerable extent, stood aloof from the agitations of the last few years. On the other hand, the exclusive supporters of the compromise, as a condition of party allegiance, were divided between Millard Fillmore, at that time acting president, and Daniel Webster, secretary of state. The Whig convention met in Baltimore on the 17th of June, 1852, two weeks after the democratic convention, and nominated General Scott as their candidate for president. A large majority of the delegates from New York, and a considerable number from other states, maintained their opposition to the test resolutions which were proposed by the other branch of the party. These resolutions, however, were adopted, and a platform was thus established resembling, in its main features, that of the democrats. … Supported by several advocates of this new platform on the ground of his personal popularity, General Scott received the nomination. {3392} He was, however, regarded with great suspicion by a large number of whigs in the slaveholding states. … Many ardent friends of the compromise … refused to rally around General Scott, distrusting his fidelity to the compromise platform; while a large number of the Whigs of the free states, through aversion to the platform, assumed a neutral position or gave their support to a third candidate. Another portion of the Whig party nominated Mr. Webster, who died [October 24, 1852], not only refusing to decline the nomination, but openly avowing his disgust with the action of the party."

_G. E. Baker, Memoir of William. H. Seward (Seward's Works, volume 4)._

"The Democratic convention was held, first, on June 1, 1852, at Baltimore. It was a protracted convention, for it did not adjourn until the 6th of the month, but it was not very interesting. … After a short contest, the two-thirds rule was adopted by an overwhelming majority. The struggle over the nomination was protracted. On the first ballot, General Cass had 116; James Buchanan, 93; William L. Marcy, 27; Stephen A. Douglas, 20; Joseph Lane, 13; Samuel Houston, 8; and there were 4 scattering. The number necessary to a choice was 188. … On the twenty-ninth trial, the votes were: for Cass, 27; for Buchanan, 93; for Douglas, 91; and no other candidate had more than 26. At this point Cass began to recover his strength, and reached his largest number on the thirty-fifth trial, namely, 131. On that same ballot, Virginia gave 15 votes to Franklin Pierce. Mr. Pierce gained 15 more votes on the thirty-sixth trial; but at that point his increase ceased, and was then slowly resumed, as the weary repetition of balloting without effect went on. The forty-eighth trial resulted as follows: for Cass, 73; for Buchanan, 28; for Douglas, 33; for Marcy, 90; for Pierce, 55; for all others, 8. The forty-ninth trial was the last. There was a 'stampede' for Pierce, and he received 282 votes to 6 for all others. Ten candidates were voted for as a candidate for the vice-presidency.—On the second ballot, William R. King of Alabama was unanimously nominated. … The anti-slavery organization, the Free Soil Democrats, though a much less important political factor than they had been four years earlier, held their convention in Pittsburg on August 11. Henry Wilson of Massachusetts presided. John P. Hale of New Hampshire was nominated for President, and George W. Julian of Indiana for Vice-President. … The canvass was not a very spirited one. All the early autumn elections were favorable to the Democrats, and the result in November was a crushing defeat of the Whigs in the popular vote and one still more decisive in the electoral vote. … The popular and electoral votes were as follows." Popular vote: Franklin Pierce, 1,601,274; Winfield Scott, 1,386,580; John P. Hale, 155,825. Electoral vote: Pierce, 254; Scott, 42.

E. Stanwood, History of Presidential Elections, chapter 18.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1852. The appearance of Uncle Tom's Cabin, and its effect.

"Of the literary forces that aided in bringing about the immense revolution in public sentiment between 1852 and 1860, we may affirm with confidence that by far the most weighty was the influence spread by this book. This story, when published [1851-1852] as a serial in the 'National Era,' an anti-slavery newspaper at Washington, attracted little attention, but after it was given to the world in book form in March, 1852, it proved the most successful novel ever written. The author felt deeply that the Fugitive Slave law was unjust, and that there was cruelty in its execution; this inspired her to pour out her soul in a protest against slavery. She thought that if she could only make the world see slavery as she saw it, her object would be accomplished; she would then have induced people to think right on the subject. The book was composed under the most disheartening circumstances. Worn out with the care of many young children; overstrained by the domestic trials of a large household, worried because her husband's small income did not meet their frugal needs; eking out the poor professor's salary by her literary work in a house too small to afford a study for the author—under such conditions there came the inspiration of her life. … The effect produced by the book was immense. Whittier offered up 'thanks for the Fugitive Slave law; for it gave occasion for Uncle Tom's Cabin.' Longfellow thought it was one of the greatest triumphs in literary history, but its moral effect was a higher triumph still. Lowell described the impression which the book made as a 'whirl of excitement.' Choate is reported to have said: 'That book will make two millions of abolitionists.' Garrison wrote the author: 'All the defenders of slavery have let me alone and are abusing you.'"

J. F. Rhodes, History of the United States from 1850, volume 1, pages 278-280.

Writing only nine months after the publication of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," C. F. Briggs, in Putnam's Monthly Magazine, said: "Never since books were first printed has the success of Uncle Tom been equalled; the history of literature contains nothing parallel to it, nor approaching it; it is, in fact, the first real success in bookmaking, for all other successes in literature were failures when compared with the success of Uncle Tom. … There have been a good many books which were considered popular on their first appearance, which were widely read and more widely talked about. But what were they all, compared with Uncle Tom, whose honest countenance now overshadows the reading world, like the dark cloud with a silver lining. Don Quixote was a popular book on its first coming out, and so was Gil Blas, and Richardson's Pamela, and Fielding's Tom Jones, and Hannah More's Cœlebs, and Gibbon's Decline and Fall; and so were the Vicar of Wakefield, and Rasselas, and the Tale of a Tub, and Evelina, the Lady of the Lake, Waverley, the Sorrows of Werter, Childe Harold, the Spy, Pelham, Vivian Grey, Pickwick, the Mysteries of Paris, and Macaulay's History. These are among the most famous books that rose suddenly in popular esteem on their first appearance, but the united sale of the whole of them, within the first nine months of their publication, would not equal the sale of Uncle Tom in the same time. … It is but nine months since this Iliad of the blacks, as an English reviewer calls Uncle Tom, made its appearance among books, and already its sale has exceeded a million of copies; author and publisher have made fortunes out of it, and Mrs. Stowe, who was before unknown, is as familiar a name in all parts of the civilized world as that of Homer or Shakspeare. Nearly 200,000 copies of the first edition of the work have been sold in the United States, and the publishers say they are unable to meet the growing demand. {3393} The book was published on the 20th of last March, and on the 1st of December there had been sold 120,000 sets of the edition in two volumes. 50,000 copies of the cheaper edition in one, and 3,000 copies of the costly illustrated edition. … They [the publishers] have paid to the author $20,300 as her share of the profits on the actual cash sales of the first nine months. But it is in England where Uncle Tom has made his deepest mark. Such has been the sensation produced by the book there, and so numerous have been the editions published, that it is extremely difficult to collect the statistics of its circulation with a tolerable degree of exactness. But we know of twenty rival editions in England and Scotland, and that millions of copies have been produced. … We have seen it stated that there were thirty different editions published in London, within six months of the publication of the work here, and one firm keeps 400 men employed in printing and binding it. … Uncle Tom was not long in making his way across the British Channel, and four rival editions are claiming the attention of the Parisians, one under the title of 'le Père Tom,' and another of 'la Case de l'Oncle Tom.'"

_Uncle Tomitudes (Putnam's Monthly Magazine, January, 1853)._

"In May, 1852. Whittier wrote to Garrison: 'What a glorious work Harriet Beecher Stowe has wrought. Thanks for the Fugitive Slave Law. Better for slavery that that law had never been enacted, for it gave occasion for Uncle Tom's Cabin.' … Macaulay wrote, thanking her for the volume, assuring her of his high respect for the talents and for the benevolence of the writer. Four years later, the same illustrious author, essayist, and historian wrote to Mrs. Stowe: 'I have just returned from Italy, where your fame seems to throw that of all other writers into the shade. There is no place where Uncle Tom, transformed into Il Zio Tom, is not to be found.' From Lord Carlisle she received a long and earnest epistle, in which he says he felt that slavery was by far the 'topping' question of the world and age, and that he returned his 'deep and solemn thanks to Almighty God, who has led and enabled you to write such a book.' The Rev. Charles Kingsley, in the midst of illness and anxiety, sent his thanks, saying: 'Your book will do more to take away the reproach from your great and growing nation than many platform agitations and speechifyings.' Said Lord Palmerston, 'I have not read a novel for thirty years; but I have read that book three times, not only for the story, but for the statesmanship of it.' Lord Cockburn declared: 'She has done more for humanity than was ever before accomplished by any single book of fiction.' Within a year Uncle Tom's Cabin was scattered all over the world. Translations were made into all the principal languages, and into several obscure dialects, in number variously estimated from twenty to forty. The librarian of the British Museum, with an interest and enterprise which might well put our own countrymen to blush, has made a collection which is unique and very remarkable in the history of books. American visitors may see there thirty-five editions (Uncle Tom's Cabin) of the original English, and the complete text, and eight of abridgments and adaptations. Of translations into different languages there are nineteen, viz.: Armenian, one; Bohemian, one; Danish, two distinct versions; Dutch, one; Flemish, one; French, eight distinct versions, and two dramas; German, five distinct versions, and four abridgments; Hungarian, one complete version, one for children, and one versified abridgment; Illyrian, two distinct versions; Italian, one; Polish, two distinct versions; Portuguese, one; Roman, or modern Greek, one; Russian, two distinct versions; Spanish, six distinct versions; Swedish, one; Wallachian, two distinct versions; Welsh, three distinct versions."

_Mrs. F. T. McCray, Uncle Tom's Cabin (Magazine of American History, January, 1890)._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1852-1854. The Perry Expedition. Opening of intercourse with Japan.

See JAPAN: A. D. 1852-1888.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1853. The Gadsden Purchase of Arizona.

See ARIZONA: A. D. 1853.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1854. The Kansas-Nebraska Bill. Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. The doctrine of "Squatter Sovereignty."

"The slavery agitation apparently had died away both in congress and throughout the country. This calm, however, was doomed to a sudden interruption. The prospect of … beneficent legislation was destroyed by the introduction of a measure which at once supplanted all other subjects in congress and in the political interests of the people. This was the novel and astounding proposal of Mr. Douglas [Senator Stephen A. Douglas, of Illinois], in relation to the Kansas and Nebraska territories. … The measure … alluded to … was a provision in the bill for the organization of a territory in Nebraska, declaring that the states which might at any future time be formed in the new territory should leave the question of slavery to be decided by the inhabitants thereof on the adoption of their constitution,—[this being in accordance with the doctrine which its advocates styled 'Popular Sovereignty,' but which took the commoner name of 'Squatter Sovereignty' from its opponents]. This provision was, as explained by the bill itself, the application of the compromise policy of 1850 to Nebraska, and, as was evident, virtually repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which guarantied that slavery should be forever excluded from the territory in question. But, in order to bring the supporters of the bill and its opponents to a more decided test, an amendment was moved expressly annulling that portion of the Missouri Compromise which related to the subject. Mr. Douglas, after some deliberation, accepted the amendment, and modified his plan so far as to introduce a new bill for the organization of Nebraska and Kansas within the same limits, instead of the territory of Nebraska alone, according to the original programme. The administration lost no time in adopting this policy as their own. It was at first proposed to hasten the passage of the bill through both houses so rapidly as to prevent any remonstrance on the part of the people. But the opponents of the measure, including Mr. Seward, Mr. Chase, Mr. Sumner, Mr. Truman Smith, Mr. Wade, Mr. Everett, Mr. Bell, Mr. Houston, and Mr. Fessenden, combined against it such an earnest and effective resistance that the attention of the country was aroused, and an indignant protest called forth from the people of the free states. The bill, however, passed the senate on the 4th day of March, 1854, after a discussion which had occupied nearly every day of the session since the 23d of January. … {3394} On the 21st of March, Mr. Richardson of Illinois, in the house, moved to refer the bill, as it came from the senate, to the committee on territories, of which he was the chairman. Mr. Francis B. Cutting, of New York, moved that it be sent to the committee of the whole, where it could be freely discussed. His motion was carried, after a severe struggle, by a vote of 110 to 95. This was regarded as a triumph of the enemies of the bill and inspired hopes of its ultimate defeat in the house. On the 22d of May, after a most exciting contest, lasting nearly two months, in committee of the whole, Mr. Alex. H. Stephens of Georgia, by an extraordinary stratagem in parliamentary tactics, succeeded in closing the debate and bringing the bill to a vote in the house, where it finally passed, before adjournment, by a vote of 113 to 100." Returned to the senate, on account of amendments which had been made to it, it passed that body again "by vote of 35 to 13; and amid the firing of cannon and the shouting of its friends, it was sent to the president for his signature, at three o'clock in the morning of May 26, 1854. President Pierce promptly gave it his approval, and the odious measure became the law of the land. Thus was abrogated the Missouri Compromise—a law enacted thirty years before with all the solemnity of a compact between the free and the slave states—and a territory as large as the thirteen original states opened to slavery. The act was consummated by the cooperation of the north. Originating with a senator from a free state, it was passed by a congress containing in each branch a majority of members from the free states, and was sanctioned by the approval of a free state president. The friends of this legislation attempted to defend it on the pretence that it was not an original act, but only declaratory of the true intent and significance of the compromise measures of 1850."

G. E. Baker, Memoir of William H. Seward (volume 4 of Seward's Works), pages 24-27.

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us