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Title: Albert Gallatin
American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII
Author: John Austin Stevens
Release Date: March 22, 2007 [EBook #20873]
Language: English
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Standard Library Edition
AMERICAN STATESMEN
EDITED BY
JOHN T. MORSE, JR.
IN THIRTY-TWO VOLUMES VOL. XIII.
THE JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY
ALBERT GALLATIN
[Illustration: Albert Gallatin]
American Statesmen
STANDARD LIBRARY EDITION
[Illustration: The Home of Albert Gallatin]
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
American Statesmen
ALBERT GALLATIN
BY
JOHN AUSTIN STEVENS
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
Copyright, 1883 and 1898,
BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
_All rights reserved._
PREFACE
Every generation demands that history shall be rewritten. This is not
alone because it requires that the work should be adapted to its own
point of view, but because it is instinctively seeking those lines which
connect the problems and lessons of the past with its own questions and
circumstances. If it were not for the existence of lines of this kind,
history might be entertaining, but would have little real value. The
more numerous they are between the present and any earlier period, the
more valuable is, for us, the history of that period. Such
considerations establish an especial interest just at present in the
life of Gallatin.
The Monroe Doctrine has recently been the pivot of American
statesmanship. With that doctrine Mr. Gallatin had much to do, both as
minister to France and envoy to Great Britain. Indeed, in 1818, some
years before the declaration of that doctrine, when the Spanish colonies
of South America were in revolt, he declared that the United States
would not even aid France in a mediation. Later, in May, 1823, six
months before the famous message of President Monroe, Mr. Gallatin had
already uttered its idea; when about leaving Paris, on his return from
the French mission, he said to Chateaubriand, the French minister of
foreign affairs (May 13, 1823): "The United States would undoubtedly
preserve their neutrality, provided it were respected, and avoid any
interference with the politics of Europe.... On the other hand, they
would not suffer others to interfere against the emancipation of
America." With characteristic vanity Canning said that it was he himself
who "called the new world into existence to redress the balance of the
old." Yet precisely this had already for a long while been a cardinal
point of the policy of the United States. So early as 1808, Jefferson,
alluding to the disturbed condition of the Spanish colonies, said: "We
consider their interest and ours as the same, and that the object of
both must be to exclude all European influence in this hemisphere."
Matters of equal interest are involved in the study of Mr. Gallatin's
actions and opinions in matters of finance. Every one knows that he
ranks among the distinguished financiers of the world, and problems
which he had to consider are still agitating the present generation. He
was opposed alike to a national debt and to paper money. Had the
metallic basis of the United States been adequate, he would have
accepted no other circulating medium, and would have consented to the
use of paper money only for purposes of exchange and remittance. In 1830
he urged the restriction of paper money to notes of one hundred dollars
each, which were to be issued by the government. Obviously these must be
used chiefly for transmitting funds, and would be of little use for the
daily transactions of the people. Yet even this concession was due to
the fact that the United States was then a debtor country, and so late
as 1839, as Mr. Gallatin said, "specie was a foreign product." For
subsidiary money he favored silver coins at eighty-five per cent. of the
dollar value, a sufficient alloy to hold them in the country. Silver was
then the circulating medium of the world, the people's pocket money, and
gold was the basis and the solvent of foreign exchanges.
Great interest attaches to the application of some other of Gallatin's
financial principles to more modern problems; and a careful study of his
papers may fairly enable us to form a few conclusions. It may be safely
said that he would not have favored a national bank currency based on
government bonds. This, however, would not have been because of any
objection to the currency itself, but because the scheme would insure
the continuance of a national debt. He was too practical, also, not to
see that the ultimate security is the faith of the government, and that
no filtering of that responsibility through private banks could do
otherwise than injure it. Further, it is reasonably safe to say that he
would favor the withdrawal both of national bank notes and of United
States notes, the greenbacks so-called; and that he would consent to the
use of paper only in the form of certificates directly representing the
precious metals, gold and silver; also that he would limit the use of
silver to its actual handling by the people in daily transactions. He
would feel safe to disregard the fluctuations of the intrinsic value of
silver, when used in this limited way as a subordinate currency, on the
ground that the stamp of the United States was sufficient for conferring
the needed value, when the obligation was only to maintain the parity,
not of the silver, but of the coin, with gold. He understood that, in
the case of a currency which is merely subordinate, parity arises from
the guaranty of the government, and not from the quality of the coin;
and that only such excess of any subordinate currency as is not needed
for use in daily affairs can be presented for redemption. This
principle, well understood by him, is recognized in European systems,
wherein the minimum of circulation is recognized as a maximum limit of
uncovered issues of paper. The circulation of silver, or of
certificates based upon it, comes within the same rule.
At the time of the publication of this volume objection was taken to the
author's statement that, until the publication of Gallatin's writings,
his fame as a statesman and political leader was a mere tradition. Yet
in point of fact, not only is his name hardly mentioned by the early
biographers of Jefferson, Madison, and J. Q. Adams, but even by the
later writers in this very Series, his work, varied and important as it
was, has been given but scant notice. The historians of the United
States, and those who have made a specialty of the study of political
parties, have been alike indifferent or derelict in their investigations
to such a degree that it required months of original research in the
annals of Congress to ascertain Gallatin's actual relations towards the
Federalist party which he helped to overthrow, and towards the
Republican party which he did so much to found, and of which he became
the ablest champion, in Congress by debate, and in the cabinet by
administration.
Invited by the publishers of the Statesmen Series to bring this study
"up to date," the author has found no important changes to make in his
work as he first prepared it. In the original investigation every source
of information was carefully explored, and no new sources have since
then been discovered. Mr. Gallatin's writings, carefully preserved in
originals and copies, and well arranged, supplied the details; while the
family traditions, with which the author was familiar, indicated the
objects to be obtained. But so wide was the general field of Mr.
Gallatin's career, so varied were his interests in all that pertained to
humanity, philanthropy, and science, and so extensive were his relations
with the leaders of European and American thought and action, that the
subject could only be treated on the broadest basis. With this apology
this study of one of the most interesting characters of American life is
again commended to the indulgence of the American people.
NEWPORT, April, 1898.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. EARLY LIFE 1
II. PENNSYLVANIA Legislature 32
III. UNITED STATES SENATE 56
IV. THE WHISKEY INSURRECTION 67
V. MEMBER OF CONGRESS 97
VI. SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY 170
VII. IN THE CABINET 279
VIII. IN DIPLOMACY 301
IX. CANDIDATE FOR THE VICE-PRESIDENCY 355
X. SOCIETY--LITERATURE--SCIENCE 361
INDEX 391
ILLUSTRATIONS
ALBERT GALLATIN _Frontispiece_
From the original painting by Gilbert Stuart, in the
possession of Frederic W. Stevens, Esq., New York, N. Y.
Autograph from the Chamberlain collection, Boston
Public Library.
The vignette of "Friendship Hill," Mr. Gallatin's
home at New Geneva, Pa., is from a photograph.
Page
ROBERT GOODLOE HARPER _facing_ 98
From a painting by St. Mémin, in the possession of
Harper's granddaughter, Mrs. William C. Pennington,
Baltimore, Md.
Autograph from a MS. in the New York Public
Library, Lenox Building.
ALEXANDER J. DALLAS _facing_ 236
From the original painting by Gilbert Stuart, in the
possession of Mrs. W. H. Emory, Washington, D. C.
Autograph from the Chamberlain collection, Boston
Public Library.
JAMES A. BAYARD _facing_ 312
From a painting by Wertmüller, owned by the late
Thomas F. Bayard, Wilmington, Del.
Autograph from the Chamberlain collection, Boston
Public Library.
ALBERT GALLATIN
CHAPTER I
EARLY LIFE
Of all European-born citizens who have risen to fame in the political
service of the United States, Albert Gallatin is the most distinguished.
His merit in legislation, administration, and diplomacy is generally
recognized, and he is venerated by men of science on both continents.
Not, however, until the publication of his writings was the extent of
his influence upon the political life and growth of the country other
than a vague tradition. Independence and nationality were achieved by
the Revolution, in which he bore a slight and unimportant part; his
place in history is not, therefore, among the founders of the Republic,
but foremost in the rank of those early American statesmen, to whom it
fell to interpret and administer the organic laws which the founders
declared and the people ratified in the Constitution of the United
States. A study of his life shows that, from the time of the peace until
his death, his influence, either by direct action or indirect counsel,
may be traced through the history of the country.
The son of Jean Gallatin and his wife, Sophie Albertine Rollaz, he was
born in the city of Geneva on January 29, 1761, and was baptized by the
name of Abraham Alfonse Albert Gallatin. The name Abraham he received
from his grandfather, but it was early dropped, and he was always known
by his matronymic Albert. The Gallatin family held great influence in
the Swiss Republic, and from the organization of the State contributed
numerous members to its magistracy; others adopted the military
profession, and served after the manner of their country in the Swiss
contingents of foreign armies. The immediate relatives of Albert
Gallatin were concerned in trade. Abraham, his grandfather, and Jean,
his father, were partners. The latter dying in 1765, his widow assumed
his share in the business. She died in March, 1770, leaving two
children,--Albert, then nine years of age, and an invalid daughter who
died a few years later. The loss to the orphan boy was lessened, if not
compensated, by the care of a maiden lady--Mademoiselle Pictet--who had
taken him into her charge at his father's death. This lady, whose
affection never failed him, was the intimate friend of his mother as
well as a distant relative of his father. Young Gallatin remained in
this kind care until January, 1773, when he was sent to a
boarding-school, and in August, 1775, to the academy of Geneva, from
which he was graduated in May, 1779. The expenses of his education were
in great part met by the trustees of the Bourse Gallatin,--a sum left in
1699 by a member of the family, of which the income was to be applied to
its necessities. The course of study at the academy was confined to
Latin and Greek. These were taught, to use the words of Mr. Gallatin,
"Latin thoroughly, Greek much neglected." Fortunately his preliminary
home training had been careful, and he left the academy the first in his
class in mathematics, natural philosophy, and Latin translation. French,
a language in general use at Geneva, was of course familiar to him.
English he also studied. He is not credited with special proficiency in
history, but his teacher in this branch was Muller, the distinguished
historian, and the groundwork of his information was solid. No American
statesman has shown more accurate knowledge of the facts of history, or
a more profound insight into its philosophy, than Mr. Gallatin.
Education, however, is not confined to instruction, nor is the influence
of an academy to be measured by the extent of its curriculum, or the
proficiency of its students, but rather by its general tone, moral and
intellectual. The Calvinism of Geneva, narrow in its religious sense,
was friendly to the spread of knowledge; and had this not been the case,
the side influences of Roman Catholicism on the one hand, and the
liberal spirit of the age on the other, would have tempered its
exclusive tendency.
While the academy seems to have sent out few men of extraordinary
eminence, its influence upon society was happy. Geneva was the resort of
distinguished foreigners. Princes and nobles from Germany and the north
of Europe, lords and gentlemen from England, and numerous Americans went
thither to finish their education. Of these Mr. Gallatin has left
mention of Francis Kinloch and William Smith, who later represented
South Carolina in the Congress of the United States; Smith was
afterwards minister to Portugal; Colonel Laurens, son of the president
of Congress, and special envoy to France during the war of the American
Revolution; the two Penns, proprietors of Pennsylvania; Franklin Bache,
grandson of Dr. Franklin; and young Johannot, grandson of Dr. Cooper of
Boston. Yet no one of these followed the academic course. To use again
the words of Mr. Gallatin, "It was the Geneva society which they
cultivated, aided by private teachers in every branch, with whom Geneva
was abundantly supplied." "By that influence," he says, he was himself
"surrounded, and derived more benefit from that source than from
attendance on academical lectures." Considered in its broader sense,
education is quite as much a matter of association as of scholarly
acquirement. The influence of the companion is as strong and enduring as
that of the master. Of this truth the career of young Gallatin is a
notable example. During his academic course he formed ties of intimate
friendship with three of his associates. These were Henri Serre, Jean
Badollet, and Etienne Dumont. This attachment was maintained unimpaired
throughout their lives, notwithstanding the widely different stations
which they subsequently filled. Serre and Badollet are only remembered
from their connection with Gallatin. Dumont was of different mould. He
was the friend of Mirabeau, the disciple and translator of Bentham,--a
man of elegant acquirement, but, in the judgment of Gallatin, "without
original genius." De Lolme was in the class above Gallatin. He had such
facility in the acquisition of languages that he was able to write his
famous work on the English Constitution after the residence of a single
year in England. Pictet, Gallatin's relative, afterwards celebrated as a
naturalist, excelled all his fellows in physical science.
During his last year at the academy Gallatin was engaged in the tuition
of a nephew of Mademoiselle Pictet, but the time soon arrived when he
felt called upon to choose a career. His state was one of comparative
dependence, and the small patrimony which he inherited would not pass to
his control until he should reach his twenty-fifth year,--the period
assigned for his majority. It would be hardly just to say that he was
ambitious. Personal distinction was never an active motor in his life.
Even his later honors, thick and fast though they fell, were rather
thrust upon than sought by him. But his nature was proud and sensitive,
and he chafed under personal control. The age was restless. The spirit
of philosophic inquiry, no longer confined within scholastic limits, was
spreading far and wide. From the banks of the Neva to the shores of the
Mediterranean, the people of Europe were uneasy and expectant. Men
everywhere felt that the social system was threatened with a cataclysm.
What would emerge from the general deluge none could foresee. Certainly,
the last remains of the old feudality would be engulfed forever. Nowhere
was this more thoroughly believed than at the home of Rousseau. Under
the shadow of the Alps, every breeze from which was free, the Genevese
philosopher had written his "Contrat social," and invited the rulers and
the ruled to a reorganization of their relations to each other and to
the world. But nowhere, also, was the conservative opposition to the new
theories more intense than here.
The mind of young Gallatin was essentially philosophic. The studies in
which he excelled in early life were in this direction, and at no time
in his career did he display any emotional enthusiasm on subjects of
general concern. But, on the other hand, he was unflinching in his
adherence to abstract principle. Though not carried away by the
extravagance of Rousseau, he was thoroughly discontented with the
political state of Geneva. He was by early conviction a Democrat in the
broadest sense of the term. Indeed, it would be difficult to find a more
perfect example of what it was then the fashion to call a _citoyen du
monde_. His family seem, on the contrary, to have been always
conservative, and attached to the aristocratic and oligarchic system to
which they had, for centuries, owed their position and advancement.
Abraham Gallatin, his grandfather, lived at Pregny on the northern shore
of the lake, in close neighborhood to Ferney, the retreat of Voltaire.
Susanne Vaudenet Gallatin, his grandmother, was a woman of the world, a
lady of strong character, and the period was one when the influence of
women was paramount in the affairs of men; among her friends she counted
Voltaire, with whom her husband and herself were on intimate relations,
and Frederick, Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, with whom she corresponded. So
sincere was this latter attachment that the sovereign sent his portrait
to her in 1776, an honor which, at her instance, Voltaire acknowledged
in a verse characteristic of himself and of the time:--
"J'ai baisé ce portrait charmant,
Je vous l'avoûrai sans mystère,
Mes filles en out fait autant,
Mais c'est un secret qu'il faut taire.
Vous trouverez bon qu'une mère
Vous parle un peu plus hardiment,
Et vous verrez qu'également,
En tous les temps vous savez plaire."
At Pregny young Gallatin was the constant guest of his nearest relatives
on his father's side, and he was a frequent visitor at Ferney. Those
whose fortune it has been to sit at the feet of Mr. Gallatin himself,
in the serene atmosphere of his study, after his retirement from active
participation in public concerns, may well imagine the influence which
the rays of the prismatic character of Voltaire must have had upon the
philosophic and receptive mind of the young student.
There was and still is a solidarity in European families which can
scarcely be said to have ever had a counterpart in those of England, and
of which hardly a vestige remains in American social life. The fate of
each member was a matter of interest to all, and the honor of the name
was of common concern. Among the Gallatins, the grandmother, Madame
Gallatin-Vaudenet, as she was called, appears to have been the
controlling spirit. To her the profession of the youthful scion of the
stock was a matter of family consequence, and she had already marked out
his future course. The Gallatins, as has been already stated, had
acquired honor in the military service of foreign princes. Her friend,
the Landgrave of Hesse, was engaged in supporting the uncertain fortunes
of the British army in America with a large military contingent, and she
had only to ask to obtain for her grandson the high commission of
lieutenant-colonel of one of the regiments of Hessian mercenaries. To
the offer made to young Gallatin, and urged with due authority, he
replied, that "he would never serve a tyrant;" a want of respect which
was answered by a cuff on the ear. This incident determined his career.
Whether it crystallized long-cherished fancies into sudden action, or
whether it was of itself the initial cause of his resolve, is now mere
matter of conjecture; probably the former. The three friends, Gallatin,
Badollet, and Serre seem to have amused their leisure in planning an
ideal existence in some wilderness. America offered a boundless field
for the realization of such dreams, and the spice of adventure could be
had for the seeking. Here was the forest primeval in its original
grandeur. Here the Indian roamed undisputed master; not the tutored
Huron of Voltaire's tale, but the savage of torch and tomahawk. The
continent was as yet unexplored. In uncertainty as to motives for man's
action the French magistrate always searches for the woman,--"cherchez
la femme!" One single allusion in a letter written to Badollet, in 1783,
shows that there was a woman in Gallatin's horoscope. Who she was, what
her relation to him, or what influence she had upon his actions, nowhere
appears. He only says that besides Mademoiselle Pictet there was one
friend, "une amie," at Geneva, from whom a permanent separation would be
hard.
Confiding his purpose to his friend Serre, Gallatin easily persuaded
this ardent youth to join him in his venturesome journey, and on April
1, 1780, the two secretly left Geneva. It certainly was no burning
desire to aid the Americans in their struggle for independence, such as
had stirred the generous soul of Lafayette, that prompted this act. In
later life he repeatedly disclaimed any such motive. It was rather a
longing for personal independence, for freedom from the trammels of a
society in which he had little faith or interest. Nor were his political
opinions at this time matured. He had a just pride in the Swiss Republic
as a free State (Etat libre), and his personal bias was towards the
"Négatif" party, as those were called who maintained the authority of
the Upper Council (Petit Conseil) to reject the demands of the people.
To this oligarchic party his family belonged. In a letter written three
years later, he confesses that he was "Négatif" when he abandoned his
home, and conveys the idea that his emigration was an experiment, a
search for a system of government in accordance with his abstract
notions of natural justice and political right. To use his own words, he
came to America to "drink in a love for independence in the freest
country of the universe." But there was some method in this madness. The
rash scheme of emigration had a practical side; land speculation and
commerce were to be the foundation and support of the settlement in the
wilderness where they would realize their political Utopia.
From Geneva the young adventurers hurried to Nantes, on the coast of
France, where Gallatin soon received letters from his family, who seem
to have neglected nothing that could contribute to their comfort or
advantage. Monsieur P. M. Gallatin, the guardian of Albert, a distant
relative in an elder branch of the family, addressed him a letter
which, in its moderation, dignity, and kindness, is a model of
well-tempered severity and reproach. It expressed the pain Mademoiselle
Pictet had felt at his unceremonious departure, and his own affliction
at the ingratitude of one to whom he had never refused a request.
Finally, as the trustee of his estate till his majority, the guardian
assures the errant youth that he will aid him with pecuniary resources
as far as possible, without infringing upon the capital, and within the
sworn obligation of his trust. Letters of recommendation to
distinguished Americans were also forwarded, and in these it is found,
to the high credit of the family, that no distinction was made between
the two young men, although Serre seems to have been considered as the
originator of the bold move. The intervention of the Duke de la
Rochefoucauld d'Enville was solicited, and a letter was obtained by him
from Benjamin Franklin--then American minister at the Court of
Versailles--to his son-in-law, Richard Bache. Lady Juliana Penn wrote in
their behalf to John Penn at Philadelphia, and Mademoiselle Pictet to
Colonel Kinloch, member of the Continental Congress from South Carolina.
Thus supported in their undertaking the youthful travelers sailed from
L'Orient on May 27, in an American vessel, the Kattie, Captain Loring.
Of the sum which Gallatin, who supplied the capital for the expedition,
brought from Geneva, one half had been expended in their land journey
and the payment of the passages to Boston; one half, eighty louis
d'or--the equivalent of four hundred silver dollars--remained, part of
which they invested in tea. Reaching the American coast in a fog, or bad
weather, they were landed at Cape Ann on July 14. From Gloucester they
rode the next day to Boston on horseback, a distance of thirty miles.
Here they put up at a French café, "The Sign of the Alliance," in Fore
Street, kept by one Tahon, and began to consider what step they should
next take in the new world.
The prospects were not encouraging; the military fortunes of the
struggling nation were never at a lower ebb than during the summer which
intervened between the disaster of Camden and the discovery of Arnold's
treason. Washington's army lay at New Windsor in enforced inactivity;
enlistments were few, and the currency was almost worthless. Such was
the stagnation in trade, that the young strangers found it extremely
difficult to dispose of their little venture in tea. Two months were
passed at the café, in waiting for an opportunity to go to Philadelphia,
where Congress was in session, and where they expected to find the
influential persons to whom they were accredited; also letters from
Geneva. But this journey was no easy matter. The usual routes of travel
were interrupted. New York was the fortified headquarters of the British
army, and the Middle States were only to be reached by a détour through
the American lines above the Highlands and behind the Jersey Hills.
The homesick youths found little to amuse or interest them in Boston,
and grew very weary of its monotonous life and Puritanic tone. They
missed the public amusements to which they were accustomed in their own
country, and complained of the superstitious observance of Sunday, when
"singing, fiddling, card-playing and bowling were forbidden." Foreigners
were not welcome guests in this town of prejudice. The sailors of the
French fleet had already been the cause of one riot. Gallatin's letters
show that this aversion was fully reciprocated by him.
The neighboring country had some points of interest. No Swiss ever saw a
hill without an intense desire to get to its top. They soon felt the
magnetic attraction of the Blue Hills of Milton, and, descrying from
their summit the distant mountains north of Worcester, made a pedestrian
excursion thither the following day. Mr. Gallatin was wont to relate
with glee an incident of this trip, which Mr. John Russell Bartlett
repeats in his "Reminiscences."
"The tavern at which he stopped on his journey was kept by a man
who partook in a considerable degree of the curiosity even
now-a-days manifested by some landlords in the back parts of New
England to know the whole history of their guests. Noticing Mr.
Gallatin's French accent he said, 'Just from France, eh! You are a
Frenchman, I suppose.' 'No!' said Mr. Gallatin, 'I am not from
France.' 'You can't be from England, I am sure?' 'No!' was the
reply. 'From Spain?' 'No!' 'From Germany?' 'No!' 'Well, where on
earth are you from then, or what are you?' eagerly asked the
inquisitive landlord. 'I am a Swiss,' replied Mr. Gallatin. 'Swiss,
Swiss, Swiss!' exclaimed the landlord, in astonishment. 'Which of
the ten tribes are the Swiss?'"
Nor was this an unnatural remark. At this time Mr. Gallatin did not
speak English with facility, and indeed was never free from a foreign
accent.
At the little café they met a Swiss woman, the wife of a Genevan, one De
Lesdernier, who had been for thirty years established in Nova Scotia,
but, becoming compromised in the attempt to revolutionize the colony,
was compelled to fly to New England, and had settled at Machias, on the
northeastern extremity of the Maine frontier. Tempted by her account of
this region, and perhaps making a virtue of necessity, Gallatin and
Serre bartered their tea for rum, sugar, and tobacco, and, investing the
remainder of their petty capital in similar merchandise, they embarked
October 1, 1780, upon a small coasting vessel, which, after a long and
somewhat perilous passage, reached the mouth of the Machias River on the
15th of the same month. Machias was then a little settlement five miles
from the mouth of the stream of the same name. It consisted of about
twenty houses and a small fortification, mounting seven guns and
garrisoned by fifteen or twenty men. The young travelers were warmly
received by the son of Lesdernier, and made their home under his roof.
This seems to have been one of the four or five log houses in a large
clearing near the fort. Gallatin attempted to settle a lot of land, and
the meadow where he cut the hay with his own hands is still pointed out.
This is Frost's meadow in Perry, not far from the site of the Indian
village. A single cow was the beginning of a farm, but the main
occupation of the young men was woodcutting. No record remains of the
result of the merchandise venture. The trade of Machias was wholly in
fish, lumber, and furs, which, there being no money, the settlers were
ready enough to barter for West India goods. But the outlet for the
product of the country was, in its unsettled condition, uncertain and
precarious, and the young traders were no better off than before. One
transaction only is remembered, the advance by Gallatin to the garrison
of supplies to the value of four hundred dollars; for this he took a
draft on the state treasury of Massachusetts, which, there being no
funds for its payment, he sold at one fourth of its face value.
The life, rude as it was, was not without its charms. Serre seems to
have abandoned himself to its fascination without a regret. His
descriptive letters to Badollet read like the "Idylls of a Faun." Those
of Gallatin, though more tempered in tone, reveal quiet content with the
simple life and a thorough enjoyment of nature in its original wildness.
In the summer they followed the tracks of the moose and deer through the
primitive forests, and explored the streams and lakes in the light
birch canoe, with a woodsman or savage for their guide. In the winter
they made long journeys over land and water on snowshoes or on skates,
occasionally visiting the villages of the Indians, with whom the
Lesderniers were on the best of terms, studying their habits and
witnessing their feasts. Occasional expeditions of a different nature
gave zest and excitement to this rustic life. These occurred when alarms
of English invasion reached the settlement, and volunteers marched to
the defence of the frontier. Twice Gallatin accompanied such parties to
Passamaquoddy, and once, in November, 1780, was left for a time in
command of a small earthwork and a temporary garrison of whites and
Indians at that place. At Machias Gallatin made one acquaintance which
greatly interested him, that of La Pérouse, the famous navigator. He was
then in command of the Amazone frigate, one of the French squadron on
the American coast, and had in convoy a fleet of fishing vessels on
their way to the Newfoundland banks. Gallatin had an intense fondness
for geography, and was delighted with La Pérouse's narrative of his
visit to Hudson's Bay, and of his discovery there (at Fort Albany, which
he captured) of the manuscript journal of Samuel Hearne, who some years
before had made a voyage to the Arctic regions in search of a northwest
passage. Gallatin and La Pérouse met subsequently in Boston.
The winter of 1780-81 was passed in the cabin of the Lesderniers. The
excessive cold does not seem to have chilled Serre's enthusiasm. Like
the faun of Hawthorne's mythical tale, he loved Nature in all her moods;
but Gallatin appears to have wearied of the confinement and of his
uncongenial companions. The trading experiment was abandoned in the
autumn, and with some experience, but a reduced purse, the friends
returned in October to Boston, where Gallatin set to work to support
himself by giving lessons in the French language. What success he met
with at first is not known, though the visits of the French fleet and
the presence of its officers may have awakened some interest in their
language. However this may be, in December Gallatin wrote to his good
friend, Mademoiselle Pictet, a frank account of his embarrassments.
Before it reached her, she had already, with her wonted forethought,
anticipated his difficulties by providing for a payment of money to him
wherever he might be, and had also secured for him the interest of Dr.
Samuel Cooper, whose grandson, young Johannot, was then at school in
Geneva. Dr. Cooper was one of the most distinguished of the patriots in
Boston, and no better influence could have been invoked than his. In
July, 1782, by a formal vote of the President and Fellows of Harvard
College, Mr. Gallatin was permitted to teach the French language. About
seventy of the students availed themselves of the privilege. Mr.
Gallatin received about three hundred dollars in compensation. In this
occupation he remained at Cambridge for about a year, at the expiration
of which he took advantage of the close of the academic course to
withdraw from his charge, receiving at his departure a certificate from
the Faculty that he had acquitted himself in his department with great
reputation.
The war was over, the army of the United States was disbanded, and the
country was preparing for the new order which the peace would introduce
into the habits and occupations of the people. The long-sought
opportunity at last presented itself, and Mr. Gallatin at once embraced
it. He left Boston without regret. He had done his duty faithfully, and
secured the approbation and esteem of all with whom he had come in
contact, but there is no evidence that he cared for or sought social
relations either in the city or at the college. Journeying southward he
passed through Providence, where he took sail for New York. Stopping for
an hour at Newport for dinner, he reached New York on July 21, 1783. The
same day the frigate Mercury arrived from England with news of the
signature of the definitive treaty of peace. He was delighted with the
beauty of the country-seats above the city, the vast port with its
abundant shipping, and with the prospect of a theatrical entertainment.
The British soldiers and sailors, who were still in possession, he found
rude and insolent, but the returning refugees civil and honest people.
At Boston Gallatin made the acquaintance of a French gentleman, one
Savary de Valcoulon, who had crossed the Atlantic to prosecute in person
certain claims against the State of Virginia for advances made by his
house in Lyons during the war. He accompanied Gallatin to New York, and
together they traveled to Philadelphia; Savary, who spoke no English,
gladly attaching to himself as his companion a young man of the ability
and character of Gallatin.
At Philadelphia Gallatin was soon after joined by Serre, who had
remained behind, engaged also in giving instruction. The meeting at
Philadelphia seems to have been the occasion for the dissolution of a
partnership in which Gallatin had placed his money, and Serre his
enthusiasm and personal charm. A settlement was made; Serre giving his
note to Gallatin for the sum of six hundred dollars,--one half of their
joint expenses for three years,--an obligation which was repaid more
than half a century later by his sister. Serre then joined a
fellow-countryman and went to Jamaica, where he died in 1784. At
Philadelphia Gallatin and Savary lodged in a house kept by one Mary
Lynn. Pelatiah Webster, the political economist, who owned the house,
was also a boarder. Later he said of his fellow-lodgers that "they were
well-bred gentlemen who passed their time conversing in French."
Gallatin, at the end of his resources, gladly acceded to Savary's
request to accompany him to Richmond.
Whatever hesitation Gallatin may have entertained as to his definitive
expatriation was entirely set at rest by the news of strife between the
rival factions in Geneva and the interposition of armed force by the
neighboring governments. This interference turned the scale against the
liberal party. Mademoiselle Pictet was the only link which bound him to
his family. For his ingratitude to her he constantly reproached himself.
He still styled himself a citizen of Geneva, but this was only as a
matter of convenience and security to his correspondence. His
determination to make America his home was now fixed. The lands on the
banks of the Ohio were then considered the most fertile in America,--the
best for farming purposes, the cultivation of grain, and the raising of
cattle. The first settlement in this region was made by the Ohio
Company, an association formed in Virginia and London, about the middle
of the century, by Thomas Lee, together with Lawrence and Augustine,
brothers of George Washington. The lands lay on the south side of the
Ohio, between the Monongahela and Kanawha rivers. These lands were known
as "Washington's bottom lands." In this neighborhood Gallatin determined
to purchase two or three thousand acres, and prepare for that ideal
country home which had been the dream of his college days. Land here was
worth from thirty cents to four dollars an acre. His first purchase was
about one thousand acres, for which he paid one hundred pounds,
Virginia currency. Land speculation was the fever of the time. Savary
was early affected by it, and before the new friends left Philadelphia
for Richmond he bought warrants for one hundred and twenty thousand
acres in Virginia, in Monongalia County, between the Great and Little
Kanawha rivers, and interested Gallatin to the extent of one quarter in
the purchase. Soon after the completion of this transaction the sale of
some small portions reimbursed them for three fourths of the original
cost. This was the first time when, and Savary was the first person to
whom, Gallatin was willing to incur a pecuniary obligation. Throughout
his life he had an aversion to debt; small or large, private or public.
It was arranged that Gallatin's part of the purchase money was not to be
paid until his majority,--January 29, 1786,--but in the meanwhile he
was, in lieu of interest money, to give his services in personal
superintendence. Later Savary increased Gallatin's interest to one half.
Soon after these plans were completed, Savary and Gallatin moved to
Richmond, where they made their residence.
In February, 1784, Gallatin returned to Philadelphia, perfected the
arrangements for his expedition, and in March crossed the mountains,
and, with his exploring party, passed down the Ohio River to Monongalia
County in Virginia. The superior advantages of the country north of the
Virginia line determined him to establish his headquarters there. He
selected the farm of Thomas Clare, at the junction of the Monongahela
River and George's Creek. This was in Fayette County, Pennsylvania,
about four miles north of the Virginia line. Here he built a log hut,
opened a country store, and remained till the close of the year. It was
while thus engaged at George's Creek, in September of the year 1784,
that Gallatin first met General Washington, who was examining the
country, in which he had large landed interests, to select a route for a
road across the Alleghanies. The story of the interview was first made
public by Mr. John Russell Bartlett, who had it from the lips of Mr.
Gallatin. The version of the late Hon. William Beach Lawrence, in a
paper prepared for the New York Historical Society, differs slightly in
immaterial points. Mr. Lawrence says:--
"Among the incidents connected with his (Mr. Gallatin's) earliest
explorations was an interview with General Washington, which he
repeatedly recounted to me. He had previously observed that of all
the inaccessible men he had ever seen, General Washington was the
most so. And this remark he made late in life, after having been
conversant with most of the sovereigns of Europe and their prime
ministers. He said, in connection with his office, he had a cot-bed
in the office of the surveyor of the district when Washington, who
had lands in the neighborhood, and was desirous of effecting
communication between the rivers, came there. Mr. Gallatin's bed
was given up to him,--Gallatin lying on the floor, immediately
below the table at which Washington was writing. Washington was
endeavoring to reduce to paper the calculations of the day.
Gallatin, hearing the statement, came at once to the conclusion,
and, after waiting some time, he himself gave the answer, which
drew from Washington such a look as he never experienced before or
since. On arriving by a slow process at his conclusion, Washington
turned to Gallatin and said, 'You are right, young man.'"
The points of difference between the two accounts of this interview are
of little importance. The look which Washington is said to have given
Mr. Gallatin has its counterpart in that with which he is also said to
have turned upon Gouverneur Morris, when accosted by him familiarly with
a touch on the shoulder. Bartlett, in his recollection of the anecdote,
adds that Washington, about this period, inquired after the forward
young man, and urged him to become his land agent,--an offer which
Gallatin declined.
The winter of 1784-85 was passed in Richmond, in the society of which
town Mr. Gallatin began to find a relief and pleasure he had not yet
experienced in America. At this period the Virginia capital was the
gayest city in the Union, and famous for its abundant hospitality,
rather facile manners, and the liberal tendency of its religious
thought. Gallatin brought no prudishness and no orthodoxy in his
Genevese baggage. One of the last acts of his life was to recognize in
graceful and touching words the kindness he then met with:--
"I was received with that old proverbial Virginia hospitality to
which I know no parallel anywhere within the circle of my travels.
It was not hospitality only that was shown to me. I do not know how
it came to pass, but every one with whom I became acquainted
appeared to take an interest in the young stranger. I was only the
interpreter of a gentleman, the agent of a foreign house, that had
a large claim for advances to the State, and this made me known to
all the officers of government, and some of the most prominent
members of the Legislature. It gave me the first opportunity of
showing some symptoms of talent, even as a speaker, of which I was
not myself aware. Every one encouraged me, and was disposed to
promote my success in life. To name all those from whom I received
offers of service would be to name all the most distinguished
residents at that time in Richmond."
In the spring of 1785, fortified with a certificate from Governor
Patrick Henry, commending him to the county surveyor, and intrusted by
Henry with the duty of locating two thousand acres of lands in the
western country for a third party, he set out from Richmond, on March
31, alone, on horseback. Following the course of the James River he
crossed the Blue Ridge at the Peaks of Otter, and reached Greenbrier
Court House on April 18. On the 29th he arrived at Clare's, on George's
Creek, where he was joined by Savary. Their surveying operations were
soon begun, each taking a separate course. An Indian rising broke up the
operations of Savary, and both parties returned to Clare's. Gallatin
appeared before the court of Monongalia County, at its October term, and
took the "oath of allegiance and fidelity to the Commonwealth of
Virginia." Clare's, his actual residence, was north of the Virginia
line, but his affections were with the old Dominion. In November the
partners hired from Clare a house at George's Creek, in Springfield
township, and established their residence, after which they returned to
Richmond by way of Cumberland and the Potomac. In February, 1786,
Gallatin made his permanent abode at his new home.
Mention has been made of the intimacy of the young emigrants with Jean
Badollet, a college companion. When they left Geneva he was engaged in
the study of theology, and was now a teacher. He was included in the
original plan of emigration, and the first letters of both Gallatin and
Serre, who had for him an equal attachment, were to him, and year by
year, through all the vicissitudes of their fortune, they kept him
carefully informed of their movements and projects. For two years after
their departure no word was received from him. At last, spurred by the
sharp reproaches of Serre, he broke silence. In a letter written in
March, 1783, informing Gallatin of the troubles in Switzerland, he
excused himself on the plea that their common friend, Dumont, retained
him at Geneva. In answer, Gallatin opened his plans of western
settlement, which included the employment of his fortune in the
establishment of a number of families upon his lands. He suggested to
Badollet to bring with him the little money he had, to which enough
would be added to establish him independently. Dumont was invited to
accompany him. But with a prudence which shows that his previous
experience had not been thrown away upon him, Gallatin recommends his
friend not to start at once, but to hold himself ready for the next, or,
at the latest, the year succeeding, at the same time suggesting the idea
of a general emigration of such Swiss malcontents as were small
capitalists and farmers; that of manufacturers and workmen he
discouraged. It was not, however, until the spring of 1785, on the eve
of leaving Richmond with some families which he had engaged to establish
on his lands, that he felt justified in asking his old friend to cross
the seas and share his lot. This invitation was accepted, and Badollet
joined him at George's Creek.
The settlement beginning to spread, Gallatin bought another farm higher
up the river, to which he gave the name of Friendship Hill. Here he
later made his home.
The western part of Pennsylvania, embracing the area which stretches
from the Alleghany Mountains to Lake Erie, is celebrated for the wild,
picturesque beauty of its scenery. Among its wooded hills the head
waters of the Ohio have their source. At Fort Duquesne, or Pittsburgh,
where the river takes a sudden northerly bend before finally settling in
swelling volume on its southwesterly course to the Mississippi, the
Monongahela adds its mountain current, which separates in its entire
course from the Virginia line the two counties of Fayette and
Washington. The Monongahela takes its rise in Monongalia County,
Virginia, and flows to the northward. Friendship Hill is one of the
bluffs on the right bank of the river, and faces the Laurel Ridge to the
eastward. Braddock's Road, now the National Road, crosses the mountains,
passing through Uniontown and Red Stone Old Fort (Brownsville), on its
course to Pittsburgh. The county seat of Fayette is the borough of Union
or Uniontown. Gallatin's log cabin, the beginning of New Geneva, was on
the right bank of the Monongahela, about twelve miles to the westward of
the county seat. Opposite, on the other side of the river, in Washington
County, was Greensburg, where his friend Badollet was later established.
Again for a long period Gallatin left his family without any word
whatever. His most indulgent friend, Mademoiselle Pictet, could hardly
excuse his silence, and did not hesitate to charge that it was due to
misfortunes which his pride prompted him to conceal. In the early days
of 1786 a rumor of his death reached Geneva, and greatly alarmed his
family. Mr. Jefferson, then minister at Paris, wrote to Mr. Jay for
information. This was Jefferson's first knowledge of the existence of
the young man who was to become his political associate, his philosophic
companion, and his truest friend. Meanwhile Gallatin had attained his
twenty-fifth year and his majority. His family were no longer left in
doubt as to his existence, and in response to his letters drafts were at
once remitted to him for the sum of five thousand dollars, through the
banking-house of Robert Morris. This was, of course, immediately applied
to his western experiment. The business of the partnership now called
for his constant attention. It required the exercise of a great variety
of mental powers, a cool and discriminating judgment, combined with an
incessant attention to details. Nature, under such circumstances, is not
so attractive as she appears in youthful dreams; admirable in her
original garb, she is annoying and obstinate when disturbed. The view of
country which Friendship Hill commands is said to rival Switzerland in
its picturesque beauty, but years later, when the romance of the
Monongahela hills had faded in the actualities of life, Gallatin wrote
of it that "he did not know in the United States any spot which afforded
less means to earn a bare subsistence for those who could not live by
manual labor."
Gallatin has been blamed for "taking life awry and throwing away the
advantages of education, social position, and natural intelligence," by
his removal to the frontier, and his career compared with that of
Hamilton and Dallas, who, like him, foreign born, rose to eminence in
politics, and became secretaries of the treasury of the United States.
But both of these were of English-speaking races. No foreigner of any
other race ever obtained such distinction in American politics as Mr.
Gallatin, and he only because he was the choice of a constituency, to
every member of which he was personally known. It is questionable
whether in any other condition of society he could have secured
advancement by election--the true source of political power in all
democracies. John Marshall, afterwards Chief Justice, recognized
Gallatin's talent soon after his arrival in Richmond, offered him a
place in his office without a fee, and assured him of future distinction
in the profession of the law; but Patrick Henry was the more sagacious
counselor; he advised Gallatin to go to the West, and predicted his
success as a statesman. Modest as the beginning seemed in the country he
had chosen, it was nevertheless a start in the right direction, as the
future showed. It was in no sense a mistake.
Neither did the affairs of the wilderness wholly debar intercourse with
the civilized world. Visiting Richmond every winter, he gradually
extended the circle of his acquaintance, and increased his personal
influence; he also occasionally passed a few weeks at Philadelphia. Two
visits to Maine are recorded in his diary, but whether they were of
pleasure merely does not appear. One was in 1788, in midwinter, by stage
and sleigh. On this excursion he descended the Androscoggin and crossed
Merrymeeting Bay on the ice, returning by the same route in a snowstorm,
which concealed the banks on either side of the river, so that he
governed his course by the direction of the wind. With the intellect of
a prime minister he had the constitution of a pioneer. On one of these
occasions he intended to visit his old friends and hosts, the
Lesderniers, but the difficulty of finding a conveyance, and the rumor
that the old gentleman was away from home, interfered with his purpose.
He remembered their kindness, and later attempted to obtain pensions for
them from the United States government.
But the time now arrived when the current of his domestic life was
permanently diverted, and set in other channels. In May, 1789, he
married Sophie Allègre, the daughter of William Allègre of a French
Protestant family living at Richmond. The father was dead, and the
mother took lodgers, of whom Gallatin was one. For more than a year he
had addressed her and secured her affections. Her mother now refused her
consent, and no choice was left to the young lovers but to marry without
it. Little is known of this short but touching episode in Mr. Gallatin's
life. The young lady was warmly attached to him, and the letter written
to her mother asking forgiveness for her marriage is charmingly
expressed and full of feeling. They passed a few happy months at
Friendship Hill, when suddenly she died. From this time Mr. Gallatin
lost all heart in the western venture, and his most earnest wish was to
turn his back forever upon Fayette County. In his suffering he would
have returned to Geneva to Mademoiselle Pictet, could he have sold his
Virginia lands. But this had become impossible at any price, and he had
no other pecuniary resource but the generosity of his family.
Meanwhile the revolution had broken out in France. The rights of man had
been proclaimed on the Champ de Mars. All Europe was uneasy and alarmed,
and nowhere offered a propitious field for peaceful labor. But Gallatin
did not long need other distraction than he was to find at home.
CHAPTER II
PENNSYLVANIA LEGISLATURE
Political revolutions are the opportunity of youth. In England, Pitt and
Fox; in America, Hamilton and Gouverneur Morris; in Europe, Napoleon and
Pozzo di Borgo, before they reached their thirtieth year, helped to
shape the political destiny of nations. The early maturity of Gallatin
was no less remarkable. In his voluminous correspondence there is no
trace of youth. At nineteen his habits of thought were already formed,
and his moral and intellectual tendencies were clearly marked in his
character, and understood by himself. His tastes also were already
developed. His life, thereafter, was in every sense a growth. The germs
of every excellence, which came to full fruition in his subsequent
career, may be traced in the preferences of his academic days. From
youth to age he was consistent with himself. His mind was of that rare
and original order which, reasoning out its own conclusions, seldom has
cause to change.
His political opinions were early formed. A letter written by him in
October, 1783, before he had completed his twenty-third year, shows the
maturity of his intellect, and his analytic habit of thought. An extract
gives the nature of the reasons which finally determined him to make his
home in America:--
"This is what by degrees greatly influenced my judgment. After my
arrival in this country I was early convinced, upon a comparison of
American governments with that of Geneva, that the latter is
founded on false principles; that the judicial power, in civil as
well as criminal cases, the executive power wholly, and two thirds
of the legislative power being lodged in two bodies which are
almost self-made, and the members of which are chosen for life,--it
is hardly possible but that this formidable aristocracy should,
sooner or later, destroy the equilibrium which it was supposed
could be maintained at Geneva."
The period from the peace of 1783 to the adoption of the federal
Constitution in 1787 was one of political excitement. The utter failure
of the old Confederation to serve the purposes of national defense and
safety for which it was framed had been painfully felt during the war.
Independence had been achieved under it rather than by it, the patriotic
action of some of the States supplying the deficiencies of others less
able or less willing. By the radical inefficiency of the Confederation
the war had been protracted, its success repeatedly imperiled, and, at
its close, the results gained by it were constantly menaced. The more
perfect union which was the outcome of the deliberations of the federal
convention was therefore joyfully accepted by the people at large.
Indeed, it was popular pressure, and not the arguments of its advocates,
that finally overcame the formidable opposition in and out of the
convention to the Constitution. No written record remains of Mr.
Gallatin's course during the sessions of the federal convention. He was
not a member of the body, nor is his name connected with any public act
having any bearing upon its deliberations. Of the direction of his
influence, however, there can be no doubt. He had an abiding distrust of
strong government,--a dread of the ambitions of men. Precisely what form
he would have substituted for the legislative and executive system
adopted nowhere appears in his writings, but certainly neither president
nor senate would have been included. They bore too close a resemblance
to king and lords to win his approval, no matter how restricted their
powers. He would evidently have leaned to a single house, with a
temporary executive directly appointed by itself; or, if elected by the
people, then for a short term of office, without renewal; and he would
have reduced its legislative powers to the narrowest possible limit. The
best government he held to be that which governs least; and many of the
ablest of that incomparable body of men who welded this Union held these
views. But the yearning of the people was in the other direction. They
felt the need of government. They wanted the protection of a strong arm.
It must not be forgotten that the thirteen colonies which declared
their independence in 1776 were all seaboard communities, each with its
port. They were all trading communities. The East, with its fisheries
and timber; the Middle States, with their agricultural products and
peltries; the South, with its tobacco; each saw, in that freedom from
the restrictions of the English navigation laws which the treaty of
peace secured, the promise of a boundless commerce. To protect commerce
there must be a national power somewhere. Since the peace the government
had gained neither the affection of its own citizens nor the respect of
foreign powers.
The federal Constitution was adopted September 17, 1787. The first State
to summon a convention of ratification was Pennsylvania. No one of the
thirteen original States was more directly interested than herself. The
centre of population lay somewhere in her limits, and there was
reasonable ground for hope that Philadelphia would become once more the
seat of government. The delegates met at Philadelphia on November 2. An
opposition declared itself at the beginning of the proceedings.
Regardless of the popular impatience, the majority allowed full scope to
adverse argument, and it was not until December 12 that the final vote
was taken and the Constitution ratified, without recommendations, by a
majority of two to one. In this body Fayette County was represented by
Nicholas Breading and John Smilie. The latter gentleman, of Scotch-Irish
birth, an adroit debater, led the opposition. In the course of his
criticisms he enunciated the doctrines which were soon to become a party
cry; the danger of the Constitution "in inviting rather than guarding
against the approaches of tyranny;" "its tendency to a consolidation,
not a confederation, of the States." Mr. Gallatin does not appear to
have sought to be a delegate to this body, but his hand may be traced
through the speeches of Smilie in the precision with which the
principles of the opposition were formulated and declared; and his
subsequent course plainly indicates that his influence was exerted in
the interest of the dissatisfied minority. The ratification was received
by the people with intense satisfaction, but the delay in debate lost
the State the honor of precedence in the honorable vote of
acquiescence,--the Delaware convention having taken the lead by a
unanimous vote. For the moment the Pennsylvania Anti-Federalists clung
to the hope that the Constitution might yet fail to receive the assent
of the required number of States, but as one after another fell into
line, this hope vanished.
One bold expedient remained. The ratification of some of the States was
coupled with the recommendation of certain amendments. Massachusetts led
the way in this, Virginia followed, and New York, which, in the language
of the day, became the eleventh pillar of the federal edifice, on July
26, 1788, accompanied her ratification with a circular letter to the
governors of all the States, recommending that a general convention be
called.[1]
The argument taken in this letter was the only one which had any chance
of commending itself to popular favor. It was in these words: "that the
apprehension and discontents which the articles occasion cannot be
removed or allayed unless an act to provide for the calling of a new
convention be among the first that shall be passed by the next
Congress." This document, made public at once, encouraged the
Pennsylvania Anti-Federalists to a last effort to bring about a new
convention, to undo or radically alter the work of the old. A conference
held at Harrisburg, on September 3, 1788, was participated in by
thirty-three gentlemen, from various sections of the State, who
assembled in response to the call of a circular letter which originated
in the county of Cumberland in the month of August. The city of
Philadelphia and thirteen counties were represented; six of the
dissenting members of the late convention were present, among whom was
Smilie. He and Gallatin represented the county of Fayette.
Smilie, Gallatin's earliest political friend, was born in 1742, and was
therefore about twenty years his senior. He came to the United States in
youth, and had grown up in the section he now represented. His
popularity is shown by his service in the state legislature, and during
twelve years in Congress as representative or as senator. In any
estimate of Mr. Gallatin, this early influence must be taken into
account. The friendship thus formed continued until Smilie's death in
1816. From the adviser he became the ardent supporter of Mr. Gallatin.
Blair McClanachan, of Philadelphia County, was elected chairman of the
conference. The result of this deliberation was a report in the form of
a series of resolutions, of which two drafts, both in Mr. Gallatin's
handwriting, are among his papers now in the keeping of the New York
Historical Society. The original resolutions were broad in scope, and
suggested a plan of action of a dual nature; the one of which failing,
resort could be had to the other without compromising the movement by
delay. In a word, it proposed an opposition by a party organization. The
first resolution was adroitly framed to avoid the censure with which the
people at large, whose satisfaction with the new Constitution had grown
with the fresh adhesions of State after State to positive enthusiasm,
would surely condemn any attempt to dissolve the Union formed under its
provisions. This resolution declared that it was in order to _prevent_ a
dissolution of the Union and to secure liberty, that a revision was
necessary. The second expressed the opinion of the conference to be,
that the safest manner to obtain such revision was to conform to the
request of the State of New York, and to urge the calling of a new
convention, and recommended that the Pennsylvania legislature be
petitioned to apply for that purpose to the new Congress. These were
declaratory. The third and fourth provided, first, for an organization
of committees in the several counties to correspond with each other and
with similar committees in other States; secondly, invited the friends
to amendments in the several States to meet in conference at a fixed
time and place. This plan of committees of correspondence and of a
meeting of delegates was simply a revival of the methods of the Sons of
Liberty, from whose action sprung the first Continental Congress of
1774.
The formation of such an organization would surely have led to
disturbance, perhaps to civil war. During the progress of the New York
convention swords and bayonets had been drawn, and blood had been shed
in the streets of Albany, where the Anti-Federalists excited popular
rage by burning the new Constitution. But the thirty-three gentlemen who
met at Harrisburg wisely tempered these resolutions to a moderate tone.
Thus modified, they recommended, first, that the people of the State
should acquiesce in the organization of the government, while holding in
view the necessity of very considerable amendments and alterations
essential to preserve the peace and harmony of the Union. Secondly, that
a revision by general convention was necessary. Thirdly, that the
legislature should be requested to apply to Congress for that purpose.
The petition recommended twelve amendments, selected from those already
proposed by other States. These were of course restrictive. The report
was made public in the "Pennsylvania Packet" of September 15. With this
the agitation appears to have ceased. On September 13 Congress notified
the States by resolution to appoint electors under the provisions of the
Constitution. The unanimous choice of Washington as president hushed all
opposition, and for a time the Anti-Federalists sunk into
insignificance.
The persistent labors of the friends of revision were not without
result. The amendments proposed by Virginia and New York were laid
before the House of Representatives. Seventeen received the two thirds
vote of the House. After conference with the Senate, in which Mr.
Madison appeared as manager for the House, these, reduced in number to
twelve by elimination and compression, were adopted by the requisite two
thirds vote, and transmitted to the legislatures of the States for
approval. Ratified by a sufficient number of States, they became a part
of the Constitution. They were general, and declaratory of personal
rights, and in no instance restrictive of the power of the general
government.
In 1789, the Assembly of Pennsylvania calling a convention to revise the
Constitution of the State, Mr. Gallatin was sent as a delegate from
Fayette County. To the purposes of this convention he was opposed, as a
dangerous precedent. He had endeavored to organize an opposition to it
in the western counties, by correspondence with his political friends.
His objections were the dangers of alterations in government, and the
absurdity of the idea that the Constitution ever contemplated a change
by the will of a mere majority. Such a doctrine, once admitted, would
enable not only the legislature, but a majority of the more popular
house, were two established, to make another appeal to the people on the
first occasion, and, instead of establishing on solid foundations a new
government, would open the door to perpetual change, and destroy that
stability which is essential to the welfare of a nation; since no
constitution acquires the permanent affection of the people, save in
proportion to its duration and age. Finally, such changes would sooner
or later conclude in an appeal to arms,--the true meaning of the popular
and dangerous words, "an appeal to the people." The opposition was begun
too late, however, to admit of combined effort, and was not persisted
in; and Mr. Gallatin himself, with practical good sense, consented to
serve as a delegate. Throughout his political course the pride of
mastery never controlled his actions. When debarred from leadership he
did not sulk in his tent, but threw his weight in the direction of his
principles. The convention met at Philadelphia on November 24, 1789, and
closed its labors on September 2, 1790. This was Gallatin's
apprenticeship in the public service. Among his papers are a number of
memoranda, some of them indicating much elaboration of speeches made, or
intended to be made, in this body. One is an argument in favor of
enlarging the representation in the House; another is against a plan of
choosing senators by electors; another concerns the liberty of the
press. There is, further, a memorandum of his motion in regard to the
right of suffrage, by virtue of which "every freeman who has attained
the age of twenty-one years, and been a resident and inhabitant during
one year next before the day of election, every naturalized freeholder,
every naturalized citizen who had been assessed for state or county
taxes for two years before election day, or who had resided ten years
successively in the State, should be entitled to the suffrage, paupers
and vagabonds only being excluded." Certainly, in his conservative
limitations upon suffrage, he did not consult his own interest as a
large landholder inviting settlement, nor pander to the natural desires
of his constituency.
In an account of this convention, written at a later period, Mr.
Gallatin said that it was the first public body to which he was elected,
and that he took but a subordinate share in the debates; that it was one
of the ablest bodies of which he was ever a member, and with which he
was acquainted, and, excepting Madison and Marshall, that it embraced as
much talent and knowledge as any Congress from 1795 to 1812, beyond
which his personal knowledge did not extend. Among its members were
Thomas McKean, signer of the Declaration of Independence and president
of the Continental Congress, Thomas Mifflin and Timothy Pickering, of
the Revolutionary army, and Smilie and Findley, Gallatin's political
friends. General Mifflin was its president.
But mental distraction brought Mr. Gallatin no peace of heart at this
period, and when the excitement of the winter was over he fell into a
state of almost morbid melancholy. To his friend Badollet he wrote from
Philadelphia, early in March, that life in Fayette County had no more
charms for him, and that he would gladly leave America. But his lands
were unsalable at any price, and he saw no means of support at Geneva.
Some one has said, with a profound knowledge of human nature, that no
man is sure of happiness who has not the capacity for continuous labor
of a disagreeable kind. The occasional glimpses into Mr. Gallatin's
inner nature, which his correspondence affords, show that up to this
period he was not supposed by his friends or by himself to have this
capacity. In the letter which his guardian wrote to him after his flight
from home, he was reproached with his "natural indolence." His good
friend, Mademoiselle Pictet, accused him of being hard to please, and
disposed to _ennui_; and again, as late as 1787, repeats to him, in a
tone of sorrow, the reports brought to her of his "continuance in his
old habit of indolence," his indifference to society, his neglect of
his dress, and general indifference to everything but study and reading,
tastes which, she added, he might as well have cultivated at Geneva as
in the new world; and he himself, in the letter to Badollet just
mentioned, considers that his habits and his laziness would prove
insuperable bars to his success in any profession in Europe. In
estimation of this self-condemnation, it must be borne in mind that the
Genevans were intellectual Spartans. Gallatin must be measured by that
high standard. But if the charge of indolence could have ever justly
lain against Gallatin,--a charge which his intellectual vigor at
twenty-seven seems to challenge,--it certainly could never have been
sustained after he fairly entered on his political and public career. In
October, 1790, he was elected by a two thirds majority to represent
Fayette County in the legislature of the State of Pennsylvania; James
Findley was his colleague, John Smilie being advanced to the state
Senate. Mr. Gallatin was reëlected to the Assembly in 1791 and 1792,
without opposition.
Among his papers there is a memorandum of his legislative service during
these three years, and a manuscript volume of extracts from the Journals
of the House, from January 14, 1791, to December 17, 1794. They form
part of the extensive mass of documents and letters which were collected
and partially arranged by himself, with a view to posthumous
publication. Here is an extract from the memorandum:--
"I acquired an extraordinary influence in that body [the
Pennsylvania House of Representatives]; the more remarkable as I
was always in a party minority. I was indebted for it to my great
industry and to the facility with which I could understand and
carry on the current business. The laboring oar was left almost
exclusively to me. In the session of 1791-1792, I was put on
thirty-five committees, prepared all their reports, and drew all
their bills. Absorbed by those details, my attention was turned
exclusively to administrative laws, and not to legislation properly
so called.... I failed, though the bill I had introduced passed the
House, in my efforts to lay the foundation for a better system of
education. Primary education was almost universal in Pennsylvania,
but very bad, and the bulk of schoolmasters incompetent, miserably
paid, and held in no consideration. It appeared to me that in order
to create a sufficient number of competent teachers, and to raise
the standard of general education, intermediate academical
education was an indispensable preliminary step, and the object of
the bill was to establish in each county an academy, allowing to
each out of the treasury a sum equal to that raised by taxation in
the county for its support. But there was at that time in
Pennsylvania a Quaker and a German opposition to every plan of
general education.
"The spirit of internal improvements had not yet been awakened.
Still, the first turnpike-road in the United States was that from
Philadelphia to Lancaster, which met with considerable opposition.
This, as well as every temporary improvement in our communications
(roads and rivers) and preliminary surveys, met, of course, with my
warm support. But it was in the fiscal department that I was
particularly employed, and the circumstances of the times favored
the restoration of the finances of the State.
"The report of the Committee of Ways and Means of the session
1790-91 was entirely prepared by me, known to be so, and laid the
foundation of my reputation. I was quite astonished at the general
encomiums bestowed upon it, and was not at all aware that I had
done so well. It was perspicuous and comprehensive; but I am
confident that its true merit, and that which gained me the general
confidence, was its being founded in strict justice, without the
slightest regard to party feelings or popular prejudices. The
principles assumed, and which were carried into effect, were the
immediate reimbursement and extinction of the state paper-money,
the immediate payment in specie of all the current expenses, or
warrants on the treasury (the postponement and uncertainty of which
had given rise to shameful and corrupt speculations), and provision
for discharging without defalcation every debt and engagement
previously recognized by the State. In conformity with this, the
State paid to its creditors the difference between the nominal
amount of the state debt assumed by the United States and the rate
at which it was funded by the act of Congress.
"The proceeds of the public lands, together with the arrears, were
the fund which not only discharged all the public debts, but left a
large surplus. The apprehension that this would be squandered by
the legislature was the principal inducement for chartering the
Bank of Pennsylvania, with a capital of two millions of dollars, of
which the State subscribed one half. This, and similar subsequent
investments, enabled Pennsylvania to defray, out of the dividends,
all the expenses of government without any direct tax during the
forty ensuing years, and till the adoption of the system of
internal improvement, which required new resources.
"It was my constant assiduity to business, and the assistance
derived from it by many members, which enabled the Republican party
in the legislature, then a minority on a joint ballot, to elect me,
and no other but me of that party, senator of the United States."
Among the reports enumerated by Mr. Gallatin, as those of which he was
the author, is one made by a committee on March 22, 1793, that they ...
are of opinion slavery is inconsistent with every principle of humanity,
justice, and right, and repugnant to the spirit and express letter of
the Constitution of the Commonwealth. Added to this was a resolution for
its abolition in the Commonwealth.
The seat of government was changed from New York to Philadelphia in
1790, and the first Congress assembled there in the early days of
December for its final session. Philadelphia was in glee over the
transfer of the departments. The convention which framed the new state
Constitution met here in the fall, and the legislature was also holding
its sessions. The atmosphere was political. The national and local
representatives met each other at all times and in all places, and the
public affairs were the chief topic in and out of doors. In this busy
whirl Gallatin made many friends, but Philadelphia was no more to his
taste as a residence than Boston. He was disgusted with the
ostentatious display of wealth, the result not of industry but of
speculation, and not in the hands of the most deserving members of the
community. Later he became more reconciled to the tone of Pennsylvania
society, comparing it with that of New York; he was especially pleased
with its democratic spirit, and the absence of _family influence_. "In
Pennsylvania," he says, "not only we have neither Livingstons, nor
Rensselaers, but from the suburbs of Philadelphia to the banks of the
Ohio I do not know a single family that has any extensive influence. An
equal distribution of property has rendered every individual
independent, and there is amongst us true and real equality. In a word,
as I am lazy, I like a country where living is cheap; and as I am poor,
I like a country where no person is very rich."
Hamilton's excise bill was a bone of contention in the national and
state legislatures throughout the winter. Direct taxation upon anything
was unpopular, that on distilled spirits the most distasteful to
Pennsylvania, where whiskey stills were numerous in the Alleghanies. To
the bill introduced into Congress a reply was immediately made January
14, 1791, by the Pennsylvania Assembly in a series of resolutions which
are supposed to have been drafted by Mr. Gallatin, and to have been the
first legislative paper from his pen. They distinctly charged that the
obnoxious bill was "subversive of the peace, liberty, and rights of the
citizen."
Tax by excise has always been offensive to the American people, as it
was to their ancestors across the sea. It was characterized by the first
Continental Congress of 1774 as "the horror of all free States."
Notwithstanding their warmth, these resolutions passed the Assembly by a
vote of 40 to 16. The course of this excitement must be followed; as it
swept Mr. Gallatin in its mad current, and but for his self-control,
courage, and adroitness would have wrecked him on the breakers at the
outset of his political voyage. The excise law passed Congress on March
3, 1791. On June 22 the state legislature, by a vote of 36 to 11,
requested their senators and representatives in Congress to oppose every
part of the bill which "shall militate against the rights and liberties
of the people."
The western counties of Pennsylvania--Westmoreland, Fayette, Washington,
and Allegheny--lie around the head-waters of the Ohio in a radius of
more than a hundred miles. At this time they contained a population of
about seventy thousand souls. Pittsburgh, the seat of justice, had about
twelve hundred inhabitants. The Alleghany Mountains separate this wild
region from the eastern section of the State. There were few roads of
any kind, and these lay through woods. The mountain passes could be
traveled only on foot or horseback. The only trade with the East was by
pack-horses, while communication with the South was cut off by hostile
Indian tribes who held the banks of the Ohio. This isolation from the
older, denser, and more civilized settlements bred in the people a
spirit of self-reliance and independence. They were in great part
Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, a religious and warlike race to whom the
hatred of an exciseman was a tradition of their forefathers. Having no
market for their grain, they were compelled to preserve it by converting
it into whiskey. The still was the necessary appendage of every farm.
The tax was light, but payable in money, of which there was little or
none. Its imposition, therefore, coupled with the declaration of its
oppressive nature by the Pennsylvania legislature, excited a spirit of
determined opposition near akin to revolution.
Unpopular in all the western part of the State, Hamilton's bill was
especially odious to the people of Washington County. The first meeting
in opposition to it was held at Red Stone Old Fort or Brownsville, the
site of one of those ancient remains of the mound-builders which abound
in the western valleys. It was easily reached by Braddock's Road, the
chief highway of the country. Here gathered on July 27, 1791, a number
of persons opposed to the law, when it was agreed that county committees
should be convened in the four counties at the respective seats of
justice. Brackenridge, in his "Incidents of the Western Insurrection,"
says that Albert Gallatin was clerk of the meeting. One of these
committees met in the town of Washington on August 23, when violent
resolutions were adopted. Gallatin, engaged at Philadelphia, was not
present at this assemblage, three of whose members were deputed to meet
delegates from the counties of Westmoreland, Fayette, and Allegheny, at
Pittsburgh, on the first Tuesday in September following, to agree upon
an address to the legislature on the subject of excise and other
grievances. At the Pittsburgh meeting eleven delegates appeared for the
four counties. The resolutions adopted by them, general in character,
read more like a declaration of grievances as a basis for revolution
than a petition for special redress. No wonder that the secretary of the
treasury stigmatized them as "intemperate." They charge that in the laws
of the late Congress hasty strides had been made to all that was unjust
and oppressive. They complain of the increase in the salaries of
officials, of the unreasonable interest of the national debt, of the
non-discrimination between original holders and transferees of the
public securities, of the National Bank as a base offspring of the
funding system; finally, in detail, of the excise law of March 3, 1791.
At this meeting James Marshall and David Bradford represented Washington
County.
In August government offices of inspection were opened. The spirit of
resistance was now fully aroused, and in the early days of September the
collectors for Washington, Westmoreland, and Fayette were treated with
violence. Unwilling to proceed to excessive measures, and no doubt
swayed by the attitude of the Pennsylvania legislature, Congress in
October referred the law back to Hamilton for revision. He reported an
amended act on March 6, 1792, which was immediately passed, and became a
law March 8. It was to take effect on the last day of June succeeding.
By it the rate of duty was reduced, a privilege of time as to the
running of licenses of stills granted, and the tax ordered only for such
time as they were actually used.
But these modifications did not satisfy the malcontents of the four
western counties, and they met again on August 21, 1792, at Pittsburgh.
Of this second Pittsburgh meeting Albert Gallatin was chosen secretary.
Badollet went up with Gallatin. John Smilie, James Marshall, and James
Bradford of Washington County were present. Bradford, Marshall,
Gallatin, and others were appointed to draw up a remonstrance to
Congress. In order to carry out with regularity and concert the measures
agreed upon, a committee of correspondence was appointed, and the
meeting closed with the adoption of the violent resolutions passed at
the Washington meeting of 1791:--
"Whereas, some men may be found among us so far lost to every sense
of virtue and feeling for the distresses of this country as to
accept offices for the collection of the duty.
"Resolved, therefore, that in future we will consider such persons
as unworthy of our friendship; have no intercourse or dealings with
them; withdraw from them every assistance, and withhold all the
comforts of life which depend upon those duties that as men and
fellow citizens we owe to each other; and upon all occasions treat
them with that contempt they deserve; and that it be, and it is
hereby, most earnestly recommended to the people at large, to
follow the same line of conduct towards them."
If such an excommunication were to be meted out to an offending
neighbor, what measure would the excise man receive if he came from
abroad on his unwelcome errand?
These resolutions were signed by Mr. Gallatin as clerk, and made public
through the press. Resolutions of this character, if not criminal, reach
the utmost limit of indiscretion, and political indiscretion is quite as
dangerous as crime. The petition to Congress, subscribed by the
inhabitants of western Pennsylvania, was drawn by Gallatin; while
explicit in terms, it was moderate in tone. It represented the unequal
operation of the act. "A duty laid on the common drink of a nation,
instead of taxing the citizens in proportion to their property, falls as
heavy on the poorest class as on the rich;" and it ingeniously pointed
out that the distance of the inhabitants of the western counties from
market prevented their bringing the produce of their lands to sale,
either in grain or meal. "We are therefore distillers through necessity,
not choice; that we may comprehend the greatest value in the smallest
size and weight."
Hamilton, indignant, reported the proceedings to the President on
September 9, 1792, and demanded instant punishment. Washington, who was
at Mount Vernon, was unwilling to go to extremes, but consented to issue
a proclamation, which, drafted by Hamilton, and countersigned by
Jefferson, was published September 15, 1792. It earnestly admonished all
persons to desist from unlawful combinations to obstruct the operations
of the laws, and charged all courts, magistrates, and officers with
their enforcement. There was no mistaking Hamilton's intention to
enforce the law. Prosecutions in the Circuit Court, held at Yorktown in
October, were ordered against the Pittsburgh offenders, but no proof
could be had to sustain an indictment.
The President's proclamation startled the western people, and some
uneasiness was felt as to how such of their representatives as had taken
part in the Pittsburgh meeting would be received when they should go up
to the legislature in the winter. Bradford and Smilie accompanied
Gallatin; Smilie to take his seat in the state Senate, and Bradford to
represent Washington County in the House, where he "cut a poor figure."
Gallatin despised him, and characterized him as a "tenth-rate lawyer and
an empty drum." Gallatin found, however, that although the Pittsburgh
meeting had hurt the general interest of his party throughout the State,
and "rather defeated" the repeal of the excise law, his eastern friends
did not turn the cold shoulder to him. He said to every one whom he
knew that the resolutions were perhaps too violent and undoubtedly
highly impolitic, but, in his opinion, contained nothing illegal.
Meanwhile federal officers proceeded to enforce the law in Washington
County. A riot ensued, and the office was forcibly closed. Bills were
found against two of the offenders in the federal court, and warrants to
arrest and bring them to Philadelphia for trial were issued. Gallatin
believed the men innocent, and did not hesitate to advise Badollet to
keep them out of the way when the marshal should go to serve the writs,
but deprecated any insult to the officer. He thought "the precedent a
very dangerous one to drag people such a distance in order to be tried
on governmental prosecutions." Here the matter rested for a season.
At this session of the legislature Gallatin introduced a new system of
county taxation, proposed a clause providing for "trustees yearly
elected, one to each township, without whose consent no tax is to be
raised, nor any above one per cent. on the value of lands," which he
hoped would "tend to crush the aristocracy of every town in the State."
Also he proposed a plan to establish a school and library in each
county, with a sufficient immediate sum in money, and a yearly allowance
for a teacher in the English language.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: The drafting of this letter was, notwithstanding his
protest, intrusted to John Jay, one of the strongest of the Federal
leaders, and a warm supporter of the Constitution as it stood.]
CHAPTER III
UNITED STATES SENATE
The death of the grandfather of Mr. Gallatin, and soon after of his
aunt, strongly tempted him to make a journey to Geneva in the summer of
1793. The political condition of Europe at that time was of thrilling
interest. On January 21 the head of Louis XVI. fell under the
guillotine, to which Marie Antoinette soon followed him. The armies of
the coalition were closing in upon France. Of the political necessity
for these state executions there has always been and will always be
different judgments. That of Mr. Gallatin is of peculiar value. It is
found expressed in intimate frankness in a letter to his friend
Badollet, written at Philadelphia, February 1, 1794.
"France at present offers a spectacle unheard of at any other
period. Enthusiasm there produces an energy equally terrible and
sublime. All those virtues which depend upon social or family
affections, all those amiable weaknesses, which our natural
feelings teach us to love or respect, have disappeared before the
stronger, the only, at present, powerful passion, the _Amor
Patriæ_. I must confess my soul is not enough steeled, not
sometimes to shrink at the dreadful executions which have restored
at least apparent internal tranquillity to that republic. Yet upon
the whole, as long as the combined despots press upon every
frontier, and employ every engine to destroy and distress the
interior parts, I think they, and they alone, are answerable for
every act of severity or injustice, for every excess, nay for every
crime, which either of the contending parties in France may have
committed."
Within a few years the publication of the correspondence of De Fersen,
the agent of the king and queen, has supplied the proof of the charge
that they were in secret correspondence with the allied sovereigns to
introduce foreign troops upon the soil of France,--a crime which no
people has ever condoned.
The French Revolution, which from its beginning in 1789 reacted upon the
United States with fully the force that the American Revolution exerted
upon France, had become an important factor in American politics. The
intemperance of Genet, the minister of the French Convention to the
United States on the one hand, and the breaches of neutrality by England
on the other, were dividing the American people into English and French
parties. The Federalists sympathized with the English, the late enemies,
and the Republicans with the French, the late allies, of the United
States.
Mr. Gallatin had about made up his mind to visit Europe, when an
unexpected political honor changed his plans. The Pennsylvania
legislature elected him a senator of the United States on joint ballot,
a distinction the more singular in that the legislature was Federalist
and Mr. Gallatin was a representative of a Republican district, and
strong in that faith. Moreover, he was not a candidate either of his own
motion or by that of his friends, but, on the contrary, had doubts as to
his eligibility because of insufficient residence. This objection, which
he himself stated in caucus, was disregarded, and on February 28, 1793,
by a vote of 45 to 37, he was chosen senator. Mr. Gallatin had just
completed his thirty-second year, and now a happy marriage came
opportunely to stimulate his ambition and smooth his path to other
honors.
Among the friends made at Philadelphia was Alexander J. Dallas, a
gentleman two years Gallatin's senior, whose career, in some respects,
resembled his own. He was born in Jamaica, of Scotch parents; had been
thoroughly educated at Edinburgh and Westminster, and, coming to the
United States in 1783, had settled in Philadelphia. He now held the post
of secretary of state for Pennsylvania. Mr. Gallatin's constant
committee service brought him into close relations with the secretary,
and the foundation was laid of a lasting political friendship and social
intimacy. In the recess of the legislature, Mr. Gallatin joined Mr.
Dallas and his wife in an excursion to the northward. Mr. Gallatin's
health had suffered from close confinement and too strict attention to
business, and he needed recreation and diversion. In the course of the
journey the party was joined by some ladies, friends of Mrs. Dallas,
among whom was Miss Hannah Nicholson. The excursion lasted nearly four
weeks. The result was that Mr. Gallatin returned to Philadelphia the
accepted suitor of this young lady. He describes her in a letter to
Badollet as "a girl about twenty-five years old, who is neither handsome
nor rich, but sensible, well-informed, good-natured, and belonging to a
respectable and very amiable family." Nor was he mistaken in his
choice,--a more charming nature, a more perfect, well-rounded character
than hers is rarely found. They were married on November 11, 1793. She
was his faithful companion throughout his long and honorable career, and
death separated them but by a few months. This alliance greatly widened
his political connection.
Commodore James Nicholson, his wife's father, famous in the naval annals
of the United States as the captain of the Trumbull, the first of
American frigates, at the time resided in New York, and was one of the
acknowledged leaders of the Republican party in the city. His two
brothers--Samuel and John--were captains in the naval service. His two
elder daughters were married to influential gentlemen;--Catharine to
Colonel Few, senator from Georgia; Frances, to Joshua Seney, member of
Congress from Maryland; Maria later (1809) married John Montgomery, who
had been member of Congress from Maryland, and was afterwards mayor of
Baltimore. A son, James Witter Nicholson, then a youth of twenty-one,
was, in 1795, associated with Mr. Gallatin in his Western Company, and,
removing to Fayette, made his home in what was later and is now known as
New Geneva. Here, in connection with Mr. Gallatin and the brothers
Kramer, Germans, he established extensive glass works, which proved
profitable.
* * * * *
Mr. Gallatin's election to the United States Senate did not disqualify
him for his unfinished legislative term, and, on his return to
Philadelphia, he was again plunged in his manifold duties. The few days
which intervened between his marriage and the meeting of Congress--a
short honeymoon--were spent under the roof of Commodore Nicholson in New
York.
On February 28, 1793, the Vice-President laid before the Senate a
certificate from the legislature of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to
the election of Albert Gallatin as senator of the United States. Mr.
Gallatin took his seat December 2, 1793. The business of the session was
opened by the presentation of a petition signed by nineteen individuals
of Yorktown, Pennsylvania, stating that Mr. Gallatin had not been nine
years a citizen of the United States. This petition had been handed to
Robert Morris, Mr. Gallatin's colleague for Pennsylvania, by a member of
the legislature for the county of York, but he had declined to present
it, and declared to Mr. Gallatin his intention to be perfectly neutral
on the occasion--at least so Mr. Gallatin wrote to his wife the next
day; but Morris did not hold fast to this resolution, as the votes in
the sequel show. The petition was ordered to lie upon the table. On
December 11 Messrs. Rutherford, Cabot, Ellsworth, Livermore, and
Mitchell were appointed a committee to consider the petition. These
gentlemen, Gallatin wrote, were undoubtedly "the worst for him that
could have been chosen, and did not seem to him to be favorably
disposed." He himself considered the legal point involved as a nice and
difficult one, and likely to be decided by a party vote. The fourth
article of the Constitution of the first Confederation of the United
States reads as follows:--
"The better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and
intercourse among the people of the different States in this Union,
the free inhabitants of each of these States, paupers, vagabonds,
and fugitives from justice excepted, shall be entitled to all
privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several States."
Article 1, section 3, of the new Constitution declares:--
"No person shall be a senator who shall not have attained to the
age of thirty years, and been nine years a citizen of the United
States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that
State for which he shall be chosen."
Mr. Gallatin landed in Massachusetts in July, 1780, while still a minor.
His residence, therefore, which had been uninterrupted, extended over
thirteen years. He took the oath of citizenship and allegiance to
Virginia in October, 1785, since which, until his election in 1793, nine
years, the period called for by the United States Constitution, had not
elapsed. On the one hand, his actual residence exceeded the required
period of citizenship; on the other, his legal and technical residence
as a citizen was insufficient. In point of fact, his intention to become
a citizen dated from the summer of 1783.
To take from the case the air of party proscription, which it was
beginning to assume, the Senate discharged its special committee, and
raised a general committee on elections to consider this and other
cases. On February 10, 1794, the report of this committee was submitted,
and a day was set for a hearing by the Senate, with open doors. On that
day Mr. Gallatin exhibited a written statement of facts, agreed to
between himself and the petitioners, and the case was left to the Senate
on its merits. On the 28th a test vote was taken upon a motion to the
effect that "Albert Gallatin, returned to this House as a member for the
State of Pennsylvania, is duly qualified for and elected to a seat in
the Senate of the United States," and it was decided in the
negative--yeas, 12; nays, 14.[2]
Motion being made that the election of Albert Gallatin to be a senator
of the United States was void,--he not having been a citizen of the
United States for the term of years required as a qualification to be a
senator of the United States,--it was further moved to divide the
question at the word "void;" and the question being then taken on the
first paragraph, it passed in the affirmative--yeas, 14; nays, 12. The
yeas and nays were required, and the Senate divided as before. The
resolution was then put and adopted by the same vote. Thus Mr. Gallatin,
thirteen years a resident of the country, a large land-holder in
Virginia, and for several terms a member of the Pennsylvania
legislature, was excluded from a seat in the Senate of the United
States.
Mr. Gallatin conducted his case with great dignity. On being asked
whether he had any testimony to produce, he replied, in writing, that
there was not sufficient matter charged in the petition and proved by
the testimony to vacate his seat, and declined to go to the expense of
collecting evidence until that preliminary question was settled.
Short as the period was during which Mr. Gallatin held his seat, it was
long enough for him seriously to annoy the Federal leaders. Indeed, it
is questionable whether, if he had delayed his embarrassing motion, a
majority of the Senate could have been secured against him. Certain it
is that the Committee on Elections, appointed on December 11, did not
send in its report until the day after Mr. Gallatin moved his
resolution, calling upon the secretary of the treasury for an elaborate
statement of the debt on January 1, 1794, under distinct heads,
including the balances to creditor States, a statement of loans,
domestic and foreign, contracted from the beginning of the government,
statements of exports and imports; finally for a summary statement of
the receipts and expenditures to the last day of December, 1790,
_distinguishing the moneys received under each branch of the revenue and
the moneys expended under each of the appropriations, and stating the
balances of each branch of the revenue remaining unexpended on that
day_, and also calling for similar and separate statements for the years
1791, 1792, 1793. This resolution, introduced on January 8, was laid
over. On the 20th it was adopted. It was not until February 10 that a
reply from the secretary of the treasury was received by the Senate, and
on the 11th submitted to Gallatin, Ellsworth, and Taylor for
consideration and report. In this letter (February 6, 1794) Hamilton
stated the difficulty of supplying the precise information called for,
with the clerical forces of the department, the interruption it would
cause in the daily routine of the service, and deprecated the practice
of such unexpected demands.
With this response of the secretary the inquiry fell to the ground, but
it was neither forgotten nor forgiven by his adherents, and Mr. Gallatin
paid the penalty on at least one occasion. This was years later, when he
himself was secretary of the treasury. On March 2, 1803, the day before
the adjournment of Congress, Mr. Griswold, Federalist from Connecticut,
attacked the correctness of the accounts of the sinking fund, and
demanded an answer to a resolution of the House on the management of
this bureau. Had such been his desire, Mr. Gallatin was foreclosed from
Hamilton's excuse. On the night of the 3d he sent in an elaborate
statement which set accusation at rest and criticism at defiance.
Mr. Gallatin's short stay in the Senate revealed to the Federalists the
character of the man, who, disdaining the lesser flight, checked only at
the highest game. He accepted his exclusion with perfect philosophy.
Soon after the session opened he said, "My feelings cannot be much hurt
by an unfavorable decision, since having been elected is an equal proof
of the confidence the legislature of Pennsylvania reposed in me, and not
being qualified, if it is so decided, cannot be imputed to me as a
fault." His exclusion was by no means a disadvantage to him. It made
common cause of the honor of Pennsylvania and his own; it endeared him
to the Republicans of his State as a martyr to their principles. It
"secured him," to use his own words, "many staunch" friends throughout
the Union, and extended his reputation, hitherto local and confined,
over the entire land; more than all, it led him to the true field of
political contest--the House of Representatives of the people of the
United States.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 2: The yeas and nays being required by one fifth of the
senators present, there were: _Affirmative_.--Bradley, Brown, Burr,
Butler, Edwards, Gunn, Jackson, Langdon, Martin, Monroe, Robinson,
Taylor; 12.
_Negative_.--Bradford, Cabot, Ellsworth, Foster, Frelinghuysen, Hawkins,
Izard, King, Livermore, Mitchell, Morris, Potts, Strong, Vining; 14.]
CHAPTER IV
THE WHISKEY INSURRECTION
Mr. Gallatin was now out of public life. For eighteen months since he
came up to the legislature with his friends of the Pittsburgh
convention, he had not returned to Fayette. His private concerns were
suffering in his absence. Neither his barn, his meadow, nor his house
was finished at the close of 1793. In May, 1794, he took his wife to his
country home. Their hopes of a summer of recreation and domestic comfort
in the wild beauties of the Monongahela were not to be realized. Before
the end of June the peaceful country was in a state of mad agitation.
The seeds of political discontent, sown at Pittsburgh in 1792, had
ripened to an abundant harvest. An act passed by Congress June 5, 1794,
giving to the state courts concurrent jurisdiction in excise cases,
removed the grievance of which Gallatin complained, the dragging of
accused persons to Philadelphia for trial, but was not construed to be
retroactive in its operation. The marshal, accordingly, found it to be
his duty to serve the writs of May 31 against those who had fallen under
their penalties. These writs were returnable in Philadelphia. They were
served without trouble in Fayette County. Not so in Allegheny. Here on
July 15, 1794, the marshal had completed his service, when, while still
in the execution of his office, and in company with the inspector, he
was followed and fired upon. The next day a body of men went to the
house of the marshal and demanded that he should deliver up his
commission. They were fired upon and dispersed, six were wounded, and
the leader killed. A general rising followed. The marshal's house,
though defended by Major Kirkpatrick, with a squad from the Pittsburgh
garrison, was set on fire, with the adjacent buildings, and burned. On
July 18 the insurgents sent a deputation of two or three to Pittsburgh,
to require of the marshal a surrender of the processes in his
possession, and of the inspector the resignation of his office. These
demands were, of course, rejected; but the officers, alarmed for their
personal safety, left the town, and, descending the Ohio by boat to
Marietta, proceeded by a circuitous route to Philadelphia, and made
their report to the United States authorities.
This was the outbreak of the Western or Whiskey Insurrection. The
excitement spread rapidly through the western counties. Fayette County
was not exempt from it. The collector's house was broken into, and his
commission taken from him by armed men; the sheriff refused to serve the
writs against the rioters of the spring. Since these disturbances there
had been no trouble in this county. But the malcontents elsewhere rose
in arms, riots ensued, and the safety of the whole community was
compromised. The news reaching Fayette, the distillers held a meeting at
Uniontown, the county seat, on July 20. Both Gallatin and Smilie were
present, and by their advice it was agreed to submit to the laws. The
neighboring counties were less fortunate. On July 21 the Washington
County committee was summoned to meet at Mingo Creek Meeting-house. On
the 23d there was a large assemblage of people, including a number of
those who had been concerned in burning the house of the Pittsburgh
inspector. James Marshall, the same who opposed the ratification of the
federal Constitution, David Bradford, the "empty drum," and Judge
Brackenridge of Pittsburgh, attended this meeting. Bradford, the most
unscrupulous of the leaders, sought to shirk his responsibility, but was
intimidated by threats, and thereafter did not dare to turn back.
Brackenridge was present to counsel the insurgents to moderation. In
spite of his efforts the meeting ended in an invitation, which the
officers had not the boldness to sign, to the townships of the four
western counties of Pennsylvania and the adjoining counties of Virginia
to send representatives to a general meeting on August 14, at
Parkinson's Ferry on the Monongahela, in Washington County. Bradford,
determined to aggravate the disturbance, stopped the mail at Greensburg,
on the road between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, and robbed it of the
Washington and Pittsburgh letters, some of which he published, to the
alarm of their authors.
On July 28 a circular signed by Bradford, Marshall, and others was sent
out from Cannonsburg to the militia of the county, whom it summoned for
personal service, and likewise called for volunteers to rendezvous the
following Wednesday, July 30, at their respective places of meeting,
thence to march to Braddock's Field, on the Monongahela, the usual
rendezvous of the militia, about eight miles south of Pittsburgh, by two
o'clock of Friday, August 1. It closed in these words, "Here is an
expedition proposed in which you will have an opportunity for displaying
your military talents and of rendering service to your country." Nothing
less was contemplated by the more extreme of these men than an attack
upon Fort Pitt and the sack of Pittsburgh. Thoroughly aroused at last,
the moderate men of Washington determined to breast the storm. A meeting
was held; James Ross of the United States Senate made an earnest appeal,
and was supported by Scott of the House of Representatives and Stokely
of the Senate of Pennsylvania. Marshall and Bradford yielded, and
consented to countermand the order of rendezvous. But the excited
population poured into the town from all quarters, and Bradford, who
found that he had gone too far to retreat, again took the lead of the
movement, already beyond restraint.
There are accounts of this formidable insurrection by H. H. Brackenridge
and William Findley, eye-witnesses. These supply abundant details.
Findley says that he knew that the movement would not stop at the limit
apparently set for it. "The opposing one law would lead to oppose
another; they would finally oppose all, and demand a new modeling of the
Constitution, and there would be a revolution." There was great alarm in
Pittsburgh. A meeting was held there Thursday evening, July 31, at which
a message from the Washington County insurgents was read, violent
resolutions adopted, and the 9th of August appointed as the day for a
town meeting for election of delegates to a general convention of the
counties at Parkinson's Ferry; Judge Brackenridge of Pittsburgh, a man
of education, influence, and infinite jest and humor, was present at
this meeting. Of Scotch-Irish birth himself, his sympathies of race were
with his countrymen, but in political sentiments he was not in harmony
with their leaders. They were nearly all Republicans, while he had sided
with the Federalists in the convention which adopted the new
Constitution of the United States. He was a man of peace, and of too
much sagacity not to foresee the inevitable ruin upon which they were
rushing. At Mingo Creek he had thwarted the plans of immediate
revolution. The evident policy of moderate men was to prevent any
violence before the convention at Parkinson's Ferry should meet, and to
bend all their energies to control the deliberations of that body. The
people of Pittsburgh were intensely excited by the armed gathering
almost at their doors.
Brackenridge felt that the only safe issue from the situation was to
take part in and shape the action of that gathering. Under his lead a
committee from the Pittsburgh meeting, followed by a large body of the
citizens, went out to the rendezvous. Here they found a motley
assemblage, arrayed in the picturesque campaign costume which the
mountaineers wore when they equipped themselves to meet the
Indians,--yellow hunting-shirts, handkerchiefs tied about their heads,
and rifles on the shoulder; the militia were on foot, and the light
horse of the counties were in military dress. Conspicuous about the
field, "haughty and pompous," as Gallatin described him in the
legislature, was David Bradford, who had assumed the office of
major-general. Brackenridge draws a lifelike picture of him as, mounted
on a superb horse in splendid trappings, arrayed in full uniform, with
plume floating in the air and sword drawn, he rode over the ground, gave
orders to the military, and harangued the multitude. On the historic
ground where Washington plucked his first military laurels were gathered
about seven thousand men, of whom two thousand militia were armed and
accoutred as for a campaign,--a formidable and remarkable assemblage,
when it is considered that the entire male population of sixteen years
of age and upwards of the four counties did not exceed sixteen
thousand, and was scattered over a wide and unsettled country. This is
Brackenridge's estimate of the numbers. Later, Gallatin, on comparison
of the best attainable information, estimated the whole body at from
fifteen hundred to two thousand men. Whatever violence Bradford may have
intended, none was accomplished. That he read aloud the Pittsburgh
letters, taken from the mail, shows his purpose to inflame the people to
vindictive violence. He was accused by contemporary authorities of
imitation of the methods of the French Jacobins, which were fresh
examples of revolutionary vigor. But the mass was not persuaded. After
desultory conversation and discussion, the angry turn of which was at
times threatening to the moderate leaders, the meeting broke up on
August 2; about one third dispersed for their homes, and the remainder,
marching to Pittsburgh, paraded through the streets, and finally
crossing the river in their turn scattered. They did no damage to the
town beyond the burning of a farm belonging to Major Kirkpatrick of the
garrison. The taverns were all closed, but the citizens brought whiskey
to their doors. Judge Brackenridge reports that his sacrifice to peace
on this occasion cost him four barrels of his best old rye.
This moderation was no augury of permanent quiet. Brackenridge, who was
a keen observer of men, says of the temper of the western population at
this period: "I had seen the spirit which prevailed at the Stamp Act,
and at the commencement of the revolution from the government of Great
Britain, but it was by no means so general and so vigorous amongst the
common people as the spirit which now existed in the country." Nor did
the armed bands all return peaceably to their homes. The house of the
collector for Fayette and Washington counties was burned, and warnings
were given to those who were disposed to submit to the law. The
disaffected were called "Tom the tinker" men, from the signature affixed
to the threatening notices. From a passage in one of Gallatin's letters
it appears that there was a person of that name, a New England man, who
had been concerned in Shays's insurrection. Liberty poles, with the
device, "An equal tax and no excise law," were raised, and the trees
placarded with the old revolutionary motto, "United we stand, divided we
fall," with a divided snake as an emblem. Mr. Gallatin's neighborhood
was not represented at Braddock's Field, and not more than a dozen were
present from the entire county. But now the flame spread there also, and
liberty poles were raised. Mr. Gallatin himself, inquiring as to their
significance and expressing to the men engaged the hope that they would
not behave like a mob, was asked, in return, if he was not aware of the
Westmoreland resolution that any one calling the people a mob should be
tarred and feathered,--an amusing example of that mob logic which
proves the affirmative of the proposition it denies.
Mr. Gallatin did not attend the meeting at Braddock's Field. Somewhat
isolated at his residence at the southerly border of the county, engaged
in the care of his long neglected farm, and in the full enjoyment of
release from the bustle and excitement of public life, he had paid
little attention to passing events. He was preparing definitively to
abandon political pursuits and to follow some kind of mercantile
business, or take up some land speculation and study law in his
intervals of leisure. It was not a year since he had given hostages to
fortune. He was now in the full tide of domestic happiness, which was
always to him the dearest and most coveted. He might well have hesitated
before again engaging upon the dangerous and uncertain task of
controlling an excited and aggrieved population. But he did not
hesitate.
The people among whom he had made his home, and whose confidence had
never failed him, were his people. By them he would stand in their
extremity, and if hurt or ruin befell them, it should not be for want of
the interposition of his counsel. He knew his powers, and he determined
to bring them into full play. He knew the danger also, but it only
nerved him to confront and master it. He knew his duty, and did not
swerve one hair from the line it prompted. In no part of his long,
varied, and useful political life does he appear to better advantage
than in this exciting episode of the Whiskey Insurrection. His
self-possession, his cool judgment, swayed neither by timidity nor
rashness, never for a moment failed him. Here he displayed that
remarkable combination of persuasion and control,--the indispensable
equipment of a political chief,--which, in later days, gave him the
leadership of the Republican party. With intuitive perception of the
political situation he saw that the only path to safety, beset with
difficulty and danger though it were, was through the convention at
Parkinson's Ferry. He did not believe that any revolutionary proceedings
had yet been taken, or that the convention was an illegal body, but he
was determined to separate the wheat from the chaff, and disengage the
moderate and the law-abiding from the disorderly. By the light of his
own experience he had learned wisdom. He also had drawn a lesson from
the French Revolution, and knew the uncontrollable nature of large
popular assemblages. The news from Philadelphia, the seat of government,
was of a kind to increase his alarm. Washington was not the man to
overlook such an insult to authority as the resistance to the marshal
and inspector; nor was it probable that Hamilton would let pass such an
occasion for showing the strength and vigor of the government.
Before the meeting at Braddock's Field, the secretary's plans for a
suppression of the insurrection were matured. On August 2 he laid
before the President an estimate of the probable armed force of the
insurgents, and of that with which he proposed to reduce them to
submission. When the question of the use of force came before the
cabinet, Edmund Randolph, who was secretary of state, opposed it in a
written opinion, one phrase of which deserves repetition:--
"It is a fact well known that the parties in the United States are
highly inflamed against each other, and that there is but one
character which keeps both in awe. As soon as the sword shall be
drawn, who shall be able to retain them."
Mifflin, the governor of Pennsylvania, deprecated immediate resort to
force; the venerable Chief Justice McKean suggested the sending of
commissioners on the part of the federal and state governments.
Washington, with perfect judgment, combined these plans, and happily
allied conciliation with force. A proclamation was issued on August 7
summoning all persons involved in the disturbance to lay down their arms
and repair to their homes by September 1. Requisitions were made upon
the governors of Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and New Jersey for
fifteen thousand men in all, and a joint commission of five was
raised,--three of whom on the part of the United States were appointed
by the President, and two on the part of the State of Pennsylvania. This
news was soon known at Pittsburgh, and rapidly spread through the
adjacent country; and it was clear that in the proceedings to be taken
at Parkinson's Ferry the question of resistance or submission must be
definitively settled. On August 14, 1794, the convention assembled; two
hundred and twenty-six delegates in all, of whom ninety-three were from
Washington, forty-nine from Westmoreland, forty-three from Allegheny,
thirty-three from Fayette, two from Bedford, five from Ohio County in
Virginia, with spectators to about the same number.
Parkinson's Ferry, later called Williamsport, and now Monongahela City,
is on the left bank of the Monongahela, about half way between
Pittsburgh and Red Stone Old Fort or Brownsville. Brackenridge pictures
the scene with his usual local color: "Our hall was a grove, and we
might well be called 'the Mountain' (an allusion to the radical left of
the French convention), for we were on a very lofty ground overlooking
the river. We had a gallery of lying timber and stumps, and there were
more people collected there than there was of the committee." In full
view of the meeting stood a liberty pole, raised in the morning by the
men who signed the Braddock's Field circular order, and it bore the
significant motto, "Liberty and no excise and no asylum for cowards."
Among the delegates, or the committee, to use their own term, were
Bradford, Marshall, Brackenridge, Findley, and Gallatin. Before the
meeting was organized, Marshall came to Gallatin and showed him the
resolutions which he intended to move, intimating at the same time that
he wished Mr. Gallatin to act as secretary. Mr. Gallatin told him that
he highly disapproved the resolutions, and had come to oppose both him
and Bradford, and therefore did not wish to serve. Marshall seemed to
waver; but soon the people met, and Edward Cook of Fayette, who had
presided at Braddock's Field, was chosen chairman, with Gallatin for
secretary. Bradford opened the proceedings with a summary sketch of the
action previously taken, declared the purpose of the committee to be to
determine on a course of action, and his own views to be the appointment
of committees to raise money, purchase arms, enlist volunteers, or draft
the militia: in a word, though he did not use it, to levy war.
At this point in the proceedings the arrival of the commissioners from
the President was announced, but the progress of the meeting was not
interrupted. The commissioners were at a house near the meeting, but
there were serious objections against holding a conference at this
place.
Marshall then moved his resolutions. The first, declaratory of the
grievance of carrying citizens great distances for trial, was
unanimously agreed to. The second called for a committee of public
safety "to call forth the resources of the western country to repel any
hostile attempts that may be made against the rights of the citizens, or
of the body of the people." Had this resolution been adopted, the people
were definitively committed to overt rebellion. This brought Mr.
Gallatin at once to his feet. He denied that any hostile attempts
against the rights of the people were threatened, and drew an adroit
distinction between the regular army, which had not been called out, and
the militia, who were a part of the people themselves; and to gain time
he moved a reference of the resolutions to a committee who should be
instructed to wait the action of the government. In the course of his
speech Gallatin denied the assertion that resistance to the excise law
was legal, or that coercion by the government was necessarily hostile.
He was neither supported by his own friends nor opposed by those of
Bradford. He stood alone.
But Marshall withdrew his resolution, and a committee of sixty was
appointed, with power to summon the people. The only other objectionable
resolution was that which pledged the people to the support of the laws,
except the excise law and the taking of citizens out of their counties
for trial,--an exception which Gallatin succeeded in having stricken
out. He then urged the adoption of the resolution, without the
exception, as necessary "to the establishment of the laws and the
conservation of the peace," and here he was supported by Brackenridge.
The entire resolutions were finally referred to a committee of
four,--Gallatin, Bradford, Husbands, and Brackenridge. The meeting then
adjourned. The next morning a standing committee of sixty was chosen,
one from each township. From these a committee of twelve was selected
to confer with the government commissioners. Upon this committee were
Cook, the chairman, Bradford, Marshall, Gallatin, Brackenridge, and
Edgar. The meeting then adjourned.
Upon this representative body there seems to have been no outside
pressure. The proclamation of the President, which arrived while it was
in session, showed the determination, while the appointment of the
commission showed the moderation, of the government. Gallatin availed of
each circumstance with consummate adroitness, pointing out to the
desperate the folly of resistance, and to the moderate an issue for
honorable retreat.
Meanwhile, the commissioners reached Pittsburgh, where on August 20 the
committee of conference was received by them, and an informal
understanding arrived at, which was put in writing. The laws were to be
enforced with as little inconvenience to the people as possible. All
criminal suits for indictable offenses were to be dropped, but civil
suits were to take their course. Notice was given that a definitive
submission must be made by September 1 following. On the 22d the
conference committee answered that they must consult with the committee
of sixty. Thursday the 28th was appointed for a meeting at Red Stone Old
Fort, the very spot where the original resolutions of opposition were
passed in 1791. In the report drawn up every member of the twelve,
except Bradford, favored submission.
The hour was critical, the deliberations were in the open air, and under
the eyes of a threatening party of seventy riflemen accidentally present
from Washington County across the stream. Bradford, who instinctively
felt that he had placed himself beyond the pale of pardon, and to whom
there was no alternative to revolution but flight, pressed an instant
decision and rejection of the written terms of the commissioners. In the
presence of personal danger, the conferrees only dared to move that part
of their report which advised acceptance of the proffered terms. The
question of submission they left untouched. An adjournment was obtained.
The next day, to quote the words of Brackenridge, "the committee having
convened, Gallatin addressed the chair in a speech of some hours. It was
a piece of perfect eloquence, and was heard with attention and without
disturbance." Never was there a more striking instance of intellectual
control over a popular assemblage. He saved the western counties of
Pennsylvania from anarchy and civil war. He was followed by
Brackenridge, who, warned by the example of his companion, or encouraged
by the quiet of the assemblage, supported him with vigor. Bradford, on
the other hand, faced the issue with directness and savage vehemence. He
repelled the idea of submission, and insisted upon an independent
government and a declaration of war. Edgar of Washington rejoined in
support of the report. Gallatin now demanded a vote, but the twelve
conferrees alone supported him. He then proposed an informal vote, but
without result. Finally a secret ballot was proposed by a member. A hat
was passed, and when the slips of paper were taken out, there were
thirty-four yeas and twenty-three nays. The report was declared to be
adopted, and amid the scowls of the armed witnesses the meeting
adjourned; not, however, before a new committee of conference had been
appointed. On this new committee not one of the old leaders was named.
They evidently knew the folly of further delay, or of attempting to
secure better terms. As his final act Colonel Cook, the chairman of the
standing committee of sixty, indorsed the resolution adopted. It
declared it to be "to the interest of the people of the country to
accede to the proposals made by the commissioners on the part of the
United States." This was duly forwarded, with request for a further
conference. The commissioners consented, but declined to postpone the
time of taking the sense of the people beyond September 11.
William Findley said of the famous and critical debate at Red Stone: "I
had never heard speeches that I more ardently desired to see in print
than those delivered on this occasion. They would not only be valuable
on account of the oratory and information displayed in all the three,
and especially in Gallatin's, who opened the way, but they would also
have been the best history of the spirit and the mistakes which then
actuated men's minds." Findley, in his allotment of the honors of the
day, considers that "the verbal alterations made by Gallatin saved the
question." Brackenridge thought that his own seeming to coincide with
Bradford prevented the declaration of war; and he has been credited with
having saved the western counties from the horrors of civil war,
Pittsburgh from destruction, and the Federal Union from imminent danger.
Historians have agreed in according to Gallatin the honor of this field
day. It was left to John C. Hamilton, half a century later, to charge a
want of courage upon Gallatin,--a baseless charge.[3] Not Malesherbes,
the noble advocate defending the accused monarch before the angry French
convention, with the certainty of the guillotine as the reward of his
generosity, is more worthy of admiration than Gallatin boldly pleading
the cause of order within rifle range of an excited band of lawless
frontiersmen. If, as he confessed later, in his part in the Pittsburgh
resolutions he was guilty of "a political sin," he nobly atoned for it
under circumstances that would have tried the courage of men bred to
danger and to arms. Sin it was, and its consequences were not yet summed
up. For although the back of the insurrection was broken at Red Stone
Old Fort, there was much yet to be done before submission could be
completed.
Bradford attempted to sign, but found that his course at Red Stone Old
Fort had placed him outside the amnesty. Well might the moderate men say
in their familiar manner of Scripture allusion, "Dagon is fallen." He
fled down the Ohio and Mississippi to Louisiana, then foreign soil. The
commissioners waited at Pittsburgh for the signatures of adhesion on
September 10, which was the last day allowed by the terms of amnesty.
They required that meetings should be held on this day in the several
townships; the presiding officers to report the result to commissioner
Ross at Uniontown the 16th of the same month, on which day he would set
out for Philadelphia. The time was inadequate, but there was no help.
Gallatin hastened the submission of Fayette, and a meeting of committees
from the several townships met at the county seat, Uniontown, on
September 10, 1794, when a declaration drawn by Mr. Gallatin was
unanimously adopted. A passage in this admirable paper shows the
comparative order which prevailed in Fayette County during this period
of trouble. It is an appeal to the people of the neighboring counties,
who, under the influence of their passions and resentment, might blame
those of Fayette for their moderation.
"The only reflection we mean to suggest to them is the
disinterestedness of our conduct upon this occasion. The indictable
offences to be buried in oblivion were committed amongst them, and
almost every civil suit that has been instituted under the revenue
law, in the federal court, was commenced against citizens of this
county. By the terms proposed, the criminal prosecutions are to be
dropped, but no condition could be obtained for the civil suits. We
have been instrumental in obtaining an amnesty, from which those
alone who had a share in the riots derive a benefit, and the other
inhabitants of the western country have gained nothing for
themselves."
This declaration was forwarded on September 17 to Governor Mifflin, with
reasons for the delay, and advice that signatures were fast being
obtained, not only in the neighboring counties, but even in Fayette,
where this formality had not been thought necessary. It closes with a
forcible appeal to delay the sending of troops until every conciliatory
measure should have proved abortive.
But the commissioners, unfortunately, were not favorably impressed with
the reception they met with or the scenes they witnessed on their
western mission. They had heard of Bradford's threat to establish an
independent government west of the mountains, and they had seen a
liberty pole raised upon which the people with the greatest difficulty
had been dissuaded from hoisting a flag with six stripes--emblematic of
the six counties represented in the committee. The flag was made, but
set aside for the fifteen stripes with reluctance. This is Findley's
recollection, but Brackenridge says that it was a flag of seven stars
for the four western counties, Bedford, and the two counties of
Virginia. This, he adds, was the first and only manifestation among any
class of a desire to separate from the Union. But here his memory
failed him.
Hamilton had long been impatient. Again, as in old days, he presented
his arguments directly to the people. Under the heading, "Tully to the
people of the United States," he printed a letter on August 26, of which
the following is a passage:--
"Your representatives in Congress, pursuant to the commission
derived from you, and with a full knowledge of the public
exigencies, have laid an excise. At three succeeding sessions they
have revised that act ... and _you_ have actually paid more than a
million of dollars on account of it. But the four western counties
of Pennsylvania undertake to rejudge and reverse your decrees.
_You_ have said, 'The Congress _shall have power_ to lay
_excises_.' They say, 'The Congress shall _not have_ this power;'
or, what is equivalent, they shall not exercise it, for a _power_
that may not be exercised is a nullity. Your representatives have
said, and four times repeated it, 'An excise on distilled spirits
_shall_ be collected;' they say, 'It _shall not_ be collected. We
will punish, expel, and banish the officers who shall attempt the
collection.'"
The peace commissioners returned to Philadelphia and made their report
on September 24. The next day, September 25, Washington issued a
proclamation calling out the troops. In it he again warned the
insurgents. The militia, already armed, accoutred, and equipped, and
awaiting marching orders, moved at once. Governor Mifflin at first
hesitated about his power to call out the militia, but when the
President's requisition was made, he summoned the legislature in special
session, and obtained from it a hearty support, with authority to accept
volunteers and offer a bounty. Thus fortified, he made a tour through
the lower counties of the State, and by his extraordinary popular
eloquence soon filled up the ranks. The old soldier led his troops in
person. Those of New Jersey were commanded by their governor, Richard
Howell of Revolutionary fame. These formed the right wing and marched to
rendezvous at Bedford to cross the mountains by the northern and
Pennsylvania route. The left wing, composed of the Virginia troops,
under the veteran Morgan, and those of Maryland, under Samuel Smith, a
brigadier-general in the army of the Revolution, assembled at Cumberland
to cross the mountains by Braddock's Road. The chief command was
confided to Governor Henry Lee of Virginia. Washington accompanied the
army as far as Bedford. Hamilton continued with it to Pittsburgh, which
was reached in the last days of October and the first of November, after
a wearisome march across the mountains in heavy weather. Arrived in the
western counties, the army found no opposition.
Meanwhile, on October 2, the standing committee met again at Parkinson's
Ferry, and unanimously adopted resolutions declaring the general
submission, and explaining the reasons why signatures to the amnesty had
not been general. Findley and Redick were appointed to take these
resolutions to the President, and to urge him to stop the march of the
troops. They met the left wing at Carlisle. Washington received them
courteously, but did not consent to countermand the march. They hurried
back for more unequivocal assurances, which they hoped to be able to
carry to meet Washington on his way to review the right wing. On October
14, the day of the autumn elections, general submissions were
universally signed, and finally, on October 24, a third and last meeting
was held at Parkinson's Ferry, at which a thousand people attended,
when, with James Edgar, chairman, and Albert Gallatin, secretary, it was
resolved, first, that the civil authority was fully competent to punish
both past and future breaches of the law; secondly, that surrender
should be made of all persons charged with offenses, in default of which
the committee would aid in bringing them to justice; thirdly, that
offices of inspection might be opened, and that the distillers were
willing and ready to enter their stills.
These resolutions were published in the "Pittsburgh Gazette." Findley
carried them to Bedford, but before he reached the army the President
had returned to Philadelphia. The march of the army was not stopped. The
two wings made a junction at Uniontown. Companies of horse were
scattered through the country. New submissions were made, and the oath
of allegiance, required by General Lee, was generally taken.
Hamilton now investigated the whole matter of the insurrection, and it
was charged against him, and the charge is supported by Findley, with
names of persons, that he spared no effort to secure evidence to bring
Gallatin within the pale of an indictment. Of course he failed in this
purpose, if indeed it were ever seriously entertained. But the belief
that Gallatin was the arch-fiend, who instigated the Whiskey
Insurrection, had already become a settled article in the Federalist
creed, and for a quarter of a century, long after the Federalist party
had become a tradition of the past, the Genevan was held up to scorn and
hatred, as an incarnation of deviltry--an enemy of mankind.
On the 8th of November, Hamilton, who remained with the army, wrote to
the President that General Lee had concluded to take hold of all who are
worth the trouble by the military arm, and then to deliver them over to
the disposition of the judiciary. In the mean time, he adds, "all
possible means are using to obtain evidence, and accomplices will be
turned against the others."
The night of November 13, 1794, was appointed for the arrests; a
dreadful night Findley describes it to have been. The night was frosty;
at eight o'clock the horse sallied forth, and before daylight arrested
in their beds about two hundred men. The New Jersey horse made the
seizures in the Mingo Creek settlement, the hot-bed of the insurrection
and the scene of the early excesses. The prisoners were taken to
Pittsburgh, and thence, mounted on horses, and guarded by the
Philadelphia Gentlemen Corps, to the capital. Their entrance into
Cannonsburg is graphically described by Dr. Carnahan, president of
Princeton College, in his account of the insurrection.
"The contrast between the Philadelphia horsemen and the prisoners
was the most striking that can be imagined. The Philadelphians were
some of the most wealthy and respectable men of that city. Their
uniform was blue, of the finest broadcloth. Their horses were large
and beautiful, all of a bay color, so nearly alike that it seemed
that every two of them would make a good span of coach horses.
Their trappings were superb. Their bridles, stirrups, and
martingales glittered with silver. Their swords, which were drawn,
and held elevated in the right hand, gleamed in the rays of the
setting sun. The prisoners were also mounted on horses of all
shapes, sizes, and colors; some large, some small, some long tails,
some short, some fat, some lean, some every color and form that can
be named. Some had saddles, some blankets, some bridles, some
halters, some with stirrups, some with none. The riders also were
various and grotesque in their appearance. Some were old, some
young, some hale, respectable looking men; others were pale,
meagre, and shabbily dressed. Some had great coats,--others had
blankets on their shoulders. The countenance of some was downcast,
melancholy, dejected; that of others, stern, indignant, manifesting
that they thought themselves undeserving such treatment. Two
Philadelphia horsemen rode in front and then two prisoners, and two
horsemen and two prisoners, actually throughout a line extending
perhaps half a mile.... If these men had been the ones chiefly
guilty of the disturbance, it would have been no more than they
deserved. But the guilty had signed the amnesty, or had left the
county before the army approached."
Dallas, the secretary of state, Gallatin's friend, was one of this
troop. Gallatin saw him soon after his return. In a letter to his wife
of December 3, Gallatin relates the experience of the trooper who had
little stomach for the work he had to do.
"I saw Dallas yesterday. Poor fellow had a most disagreeable
campaign of it. He says the spirits, I call it the madness, of the
Philadelphia Gentlemen's Corps was beyond conception before the
arrival of the President. He saw a list (handed about through the
army by officers, nay, by a general officer) of the names of those
persons who were to be destroyed at all events, and you may easily
guess my own was one of the most conspicuous. Being one day at
table with sundry officers, and having expressed his opinion that,
if the army were going only to support the civil authority, and not
to do any military execution, one of them (Dallas did not tell me
his name, but I am told it was one Ross of Lancaster, aide-de-camp
to Mifflin) half drew a dagger he wore instead of a sword, and
swore any man who uttered such sentiments ought to be dagged. The
President, however, on his arrival, and afterwards Hamilton, took
uncommon pains to change the sentiments, and at last it became
fashionable to adopt, or at least to express, sentiments similar to
those inculcated by them."
Randolph was, perhaps, not far out of the way in his fear of a civil war
should blood be drawn, and in his conviction that the influence of
Washington was the only sedative for the fevered political pulse. On
November 17 general orders were issued for the return of the army, a
detachment of twenty-five hundred men only remaining in the West, under
command of General Morgan. There were no further disturbances. The army
expenses gave a circulating medium, and the farmers, having now the
means to pay their taxes, made no further complaints of the excise law.
The total expense of the insurrection to the government was $800,000.
Mr. Gallatin returned with his wife from his western home early in
November. He had been again chosen at the October elections to represent
Fayette in the Pennsylvania Assembly. Moreover, at the same time, he was
elected to represent the congressional district of Washington and
Allegheny in the House of Representatives of the United States. Of four
candidates Gallatin led the poll. Judge Brackenridge was next in order.
No better proof is needed of the firm hold Gallatin had in the esteem
and affection of the people. No doubt, either, that they understood his
principles, and relied upon his sincere attachment to the country he had
made his home.
When he appeared to take his seat in the Assembly he found that his
election was contested. A petition was presented from thirty-four
persons calling themselves peaceable citizens of Washington County,
which stated that their votes had not been cast, because of the
disturbed condition of the country, and requested the Assembly to
declare the district to have been in a state of insurrection at the time
of the election, and to vacate the same. Mr. Gallatin knew the person
who procured the signatures, and also that the business originated in
the army. It was couched in terms insulting to all the members elect
from that district. After a protracted debate the election was declared
void on January 9, 1795. It was during this debate that Mr. Gallatin
made the celebrated speech called "The speech on the western elections,"
in which occurs the confession already alluded to. Speaking of the
Pittsburgh resolutions of 1792, he said:--
"I might say that those resolutions did not originate at
Pittsburgh, as they were almost a transcript of the resolutions
adopted at Washington the preceding year; and I might even add that
they were not introduced by me at the meeting. But I wish not to
exculpate myself where I feel I have been to blame. The sentiments
thus expressed were not illegal or criminal; yet I will freely
acknowledge that they were violent, intemperate, and reprehensible.
For, by attempting to render the office contemptible, they tended
to diminish that respect for the execution of the laws which is
essential to the maintenance of a free government; but whilst I
feel regret at the remembrance, though no hesitation in this open
confession of that _my only political sin_, let me add that the
blame ought to fall where it is deserved."
This was the first speech of Gallatin that appeared in print--simple,
lucid, convincing. The result of the new Assembly election would
naturally determine the right of the representatives of the contested
district to their seats in Congress. Word had gone forth from the
Treasury Department that Gallatin must not take his seat in Congress,
and the whippers-in took heed of the desire of their chief. A line of
instruction to Badollet, who lived at Greensburg in Washington County,
across the river from Gallatin's residence, determined the matter.
Gallatin warned him against the attempt that would be made to disaffect
that district because none of the representatives whose seats had been
vacated were residents of it. "Fall not into the snare," he wrote; "take
up nobody from your own district; reëlect unanimously the same members,
whether they be your favorites or not. It is necessary for the sake of
our general character." Here is an instance of that true political
instinct which made of him "the ideal party leader." His advice was
followed, and all the members were reëlected but one, who declined. Mr.
Gallatin returned to his seat in the Assembly on February 14, and
retained it until March 12, when he asked and obtained leave of absence.
He does not appear to have taken further part in the session. The
subjects, personal to himself, which occupied his attention during the
summer will be touched upon elsewhere.
The pitiful business of the trial of the western prisoners needs only
brief mention. In May Gallatin was summoned before the grand jury as a
witness on the part of the government. The inquiry was finished May 12,
and twenty-two bills were found for treason. Against Fayette two bills
were found; one for misdemeanor in raising the liberty pole in
Uniontown. The petit jury was composed of twelve men from each of the
counties of Fayette, Washington, Allegheny, and Northumberland, but none
from Westmoreland. One man, a German from Westmoreland, who was
concerned in a riot in Fayette, was found guilty and condemned to death.
Mr. Gallatin, at the request of the jury, drew a petition to the
President, who granted a pardon. Washington extended mercy to the only
other offender who incurred the same penalty.
To the close of this national episode, which, in its various phases of
incident and character, is of dramatic interest, Gallatin, through good
repute and ill repute, stood manfully by his constituents and friends.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 3: Hamilton's _History of the Republic_, vi. 96.]
CHAPTER V
MEMBER OF CONGRESS
The first session of the fourth Congress began at Philadelphia on
Monday, December 7, 1795. Washington was president, John Adams
vice-president. No one of Washington's original constitutional advisers
remained in his cabinet. Jefferson retired from the State Department at
the beginning of the first session of the third Congress. Edmund
Randolph, appointed in his place, resigned in a cloud of obloquy on
August 19, 1795, and the portfolio was temporarily in charge of Timothy
Pickering, secretary of war. Hamilton resigned the department of the
Treasury on January 31, 1795, and Oliver Wolcott, Jr., succeeded him in
that most important of the early offices of the government. General
Henry Knox, the first secretary of war, pressed by his own private
affairs and the interests of a large family, withdrew on December 28,
1794, and Timothy Pickering, the postmaster-general, had been appointed
in his stead January 2, 1795. The Navy Department was not as yet
established (the act creating it was passed April 30, 1798), but the
affairs which concerned this branch of the public service were under
the direction of the secretary of war. The administration of Washington
was drawing to a close. In the lately reconstructed cabinet, honest,
patriotic, and thorough in administration, there was no man of shining
mark. The Senate was still in the hands of the Federal party. The bare
majority which rejected Gallatin in the previous Congress had increased
to a sufficient strength for party purposes, but neither in the ranks of
the administration nor the opposition was there in this august
assemblage one commanding figure.
The House was nearly equally divided. The post of speaker was warmly
contested. Frederick A. Muhlenberg of Pennsylvania, who had presided
over the House at the sessions of the first Congress, 1789-1791, and
again over the third, 1793-1795, was the candidate of the Federalists,
but was defeated by Jonathan Dayton of New Jersey, whose views in the
last session had drifted him into sympathy with the Republican
opposition. The House, when full, numbered one hundred and five members,
among whom were the ablest men in the country, veterans of debate versed
in parliamentary law and skilled in the niceties of party fence. In the
Federal ranks, active, conscious of their power, and proud of the great
party which gloried in Washington as their chief, were Robert Goodloe
Harper of South Carolina, Theodore Sedgwick of Massachusetts, Roger
Griswold and Uriah Tracy of Connecticut, who led the front and held the
wings of debate; while in reserve, broken in health but still in the
prime of life, the pride of his party and of the House, was Fisher Ames,
the orator of his day, whose magic tones held friend and foe in rapt
attention, while he mastered the reason or touched the heart. Upon these
men the Federal party relied for the vindication of their principles and
the maintenance of their power. Supporting them were William Vans Murray
of Maryland, Goodrich and Hillhouse of Connecticut, William Smith of
South Carolina, Sitgreaves of Pennsylvania, and in the ranks a
well-trained party. Opposed to this formidable array of Federal talent
was the Republican party, young, vigorous, and in majority, bold in
their ideas but as yet hesitating in purpose under the controlling if
not overruling influence of the name and popularity of Washington.
[Illustration: Rob. G. Harper]
Hamilton watched the shifting fortunes of his party from a distance, and
found time in the pressure of a large legal practice to aid each branch
of administration in turn with his advice. But though he still inspired
its councils, he no longer directed its course. In his Monticello home
Jefferson waited till the fruit was ripe for falling, occasionally
impatient that his followers did not more roughly shake the tree.
The open rupture of Jefferson with Hamilton was the first great break in
the Federal administration; the lukewarmness of Madison, whose leanings
were always towards Jefferson, followed.
At the head of the Republican opposition was Madison. Wise in council,
convincing in argument, an able and even adroit debater, he was an
admirable leader, but his tactics were rather of the closet than the
field. He was wanting in the personal vigor which, scorning defense,
delights in bold attack upon the central position of the enemy, and
carries opposition to the last limit of parliamentary aggression. With
this mildness of character, though recognized as the leader of his
party, he, as a habit, waived his control upon the floor of the House,
and, reserving his interference for occasions when questions of
constitutional interpretation arose, left the general direction of
debate to William B. Giles of Virginia, a skillful tactician and a ready
debater, keen, bold, and troubled by no scruples of modesty, respect, or
reverence for friend or foe. Of equal vigor, but of more reserve, was
John Nicholas of Virginia--a man of strong intellect, reliable temper,
and with the dignity of the old school. To these were now added Albert
Gallatin and Edward Livingston. Edward Livingston, from New York, was
young, and as yet inexperienced in debate, but of remarkable powers. He
was another example of that early intellectual maturity which was a
characteristic of the time.
When Congress met, the all-disturbing question was the foreign policy of
the United States. The influence of the French Revolution upon American
politics was great. The Federalists, conservative in their views, held
the new democratic doctrines in abhorrence, and used the terrible
excesses of the French Revolution with telling force against their
Republican adversaries. The need of a strong government was held up as
the only alternative to anarchy. In the struggle which now united Europe
against the French republic, the sympathies of the Federalists were with
England. Hence they were accused of a desire to establish a monarchy in
the United States, and were ignominiously called the British party.
Shays's Rebellion in Massachusetts and the Whiskey Insurrection in
Pennsylvania gave point to their arguments.
On the other side was the large and powerful party which, throughout the
war in the Continental Congress, under the confederation in the national
convention which framed and in the state conventions which ratified the
Constitution, had opposed the tendency to centralization, but had been
defeated by the yearning of the body of the plain people for a
government strong enough at least to secure them peace at home and
protection abroad. This natural craving being satisfied, the old
aversion to class distinctions returned. The dread of an aristocracy,
which did not exist even in name, threw many of the supporters of the
Constitution into the ranks of its opponents, who were democrats in name
and in fact. The proclamation of the rights of man awoke this latent
sentiment, and aroused an intense sympathy for the people of France.
This again was strengthened by the memory, still warm, of the services
of France in the cause of independence. Lafayette, who represented the
true French republican spirit, and held a place in the affections of the
American people second only to that of Washington, was languishing, a
prisoner to the coalition of sovereigns, in an Austrian dungeon.
Jefferson returned from France deeply imbued with the spirit of the
French Revolution. His views were warmly received by his political
friends, and the principles of the new school of politics were rapidly
spread by an eager band of acolytes, whose ranks were recruited until
the feeble opposition became a powerful party. Democratic societies,
organized on the plan of the French Jacobin clubs, extended French
influence, and no doubt were aided in a practical way by Genet, whose
recent marriage with the daughter of George Clinton, the head of the
Republican party in New York, was an additional link in the bond of
alliance.
During the second session of the third Congress Madison had led the
opposition in a mild manner; party lines were not yet strongly defined,
and the influence of Washington was paramount. In the interim between
its expiration and the meeting of the fourth Congress in December, the
country was wildly agitated by the Jay treaty. This document not
reaching America until after the adjournment of Congress in March,
Washington convened the Senate in extra and secret session on June 1,
and the treaty was ratified by barely two thirds majority. Imprudently
withheld for a time, it was at last made public by Senator Mason of
Virginia, one of the ten who voted against its ratification. It
disappointed the people, and was denounced as a weak and ignominious
surrender of American rights. The merchants of Boston, New York,
Philadelphia, and Charleston protested against it in public meetings. It
was burned, and the English flag was trailed in the dust before the
British minister's house at the capital. Jay was hung in effigy, and
Hamilton, who ventured to defend the treaty at a public meeting, was
stoned. To add to the popular indignation that the impressment of
American seamen had been ignored in the instrument, came the alarming
news that the British ministry had renewed their order to seize vessels
carrying provisions to France, whither a large part of the American
grain crop was destined. On the other hand, Randolph, the secretary of
state, had compromised the dignity of his official position in his
intercourse with Fauchet, the late French ambassador, whose
correspondence with his government, thrown overboard from a French
packet, had been fished up by a British man-of-war, and forwarded to
Grenville, by whom it was returned to America. Thus petard answered
petard, and the charge by the Republicans upon the Federalists of taking
British gold was returned with interest, and the accusation of receiving
bribe money was brought close home to Randolph, if not proved.
Hard names were not wanting either; Jefferson was ridiculed as a
_sans-culotte_ and red-legged Democrat. Nor was Washington spared. He
was charged with an assumption of royal airs, with political hypocrisy,
and even with being a public defaulter; a charge which no one dared to
father, and which was instantly shown to be false and malicious. It was
made by Bache in "The Aurora," a contemptible sheet after the fashion of
"L'Ami du Peuple," Marat's Paris organ.
Such was the temper of the people when the House of Representatives met
on December 7, 1795. The speaker, Dayton, was strongly anti-British in
feeling. He was a family connection of Burr, but there is no reason to
suppose that he was under the personal influence of that adroit and
unscrupulous partisan. On the 8th President Washington, according to his
custom, addressed both houses of Congress. This day for the first time
the gallery was thrown open to the public. When the reply of the Senate
came up for consideration, the purpose of the Republicans was at once
manifest. They would not consent to the approbation it expressed of the
conduct of the administration. They would not admit that the causes of
external discord had been extinguished "on terms consistent with our
national honor and safety," or indeed extinguished at all, and they
would not acknowledge that the efforts of the President to establish the
peace, freedom, and prosperity of the country had been "enlightened and
firm." Nevertheless the address was agreed to by a vote of 14 to 8.
In the House a resolution was moved that a respectful address ought to
be presented. The opposition immediately declared itself. Objection was
made to an address, and in its stead the appointment of a committee to
wait personally on the President was moved. The covert intent was
apparent through the thin veil of expediency, but the Republicans as a
body were unwilling to go this length in discourtesy, and did not
support the motion. Only eighteen members voted for it. Messrs. Madison,
Sedgwick, and Sitgreaves, the committee to report an address, brought in
a draft on the 14th which was ordered to be printed for the use of the
members. The next day the work of dissection was begun by an objection
to the words "probably unequaled spectacle of national happiness"
applied to the country, and the words "undiminished confidence" applied
to the President. The words "probably unequaled" were stricken out
without decided opposition by a vote of forty-three to thirty-nine.
Opinions were divided on that subject even in the ranks of the
Federalists. The cause of dissatisfaction was the Jay treaty. The
address was recommitted without a division. The next day Madison brought
in the address with a modification of the clause objected to. In its new
form the "very great share" of Washington's zealous and faithful
services in securing the national happiness was acknowledged. The
address thus amended was unanimously adopted. In this encounter nothing
was gained by the Republicans. The people would not have endured an open
declaration of want of confidence in Washington. But the entering wedge
of the new policy was driven. The treaty was to be assailed. It was,
however, the pretext, not the cause of the struggle, the real object of
which was to extend the powers of the House, and subordinate the
executive to its will. Before beginning the main attack the Republicans
developed their general plan in their treatment of secondary issues; of
these the principal was a tightening of the control of the House over
the Treasury Department.
In this Mr. Gallatin took the lead. His first measure was the
appointment of a standing Committee of Finance to superintend the
general operations of this nature,--an efficient aid to the Treasury
when there is accord between the administration and the House, an
annoying censor when the latter is in opposition. This was the beginning
of the Ways and Means Committee, which soon became and has since
continued to be the most important committee of the House. To it were to
be referred all reports from the Treasury Department, all propositions
relating to revenue, and it was to report on the state of the public
debt, revenue, and expenditures. The committee was appointed without
opposition. It consisted of fourteen members, William Smith, Sedgwick,
Madison, Baldwin, Gallatin, Bourne, Gilman, Murray, Buck, Gilbert,
Isaac Smith, Blount, Patten, and Hillhouse, and represented the strength
of both political parties. To this committee the estimates of
appropriations for the support of the government for the coming year
were referred. The next step was to bring to the knowledge of the House
the precise condition of the Treasury. To this end the secretary was
called upon to furnish comparative views of the commerce and tonnage of
the country for every year from the formation of the department in 1789,
with tables of the exports and imports, foreign and domestic, separately
stated, and with a division of the nationality of the carrying vessels.
Later, comparative views were demanded of the receipts and expenditures
for each year; the receipts under the heads of Loans, Revenue in its
various forms, and others in their several divisions; the expenditures,
also, to be classified under the heads of Civil List, Foreign
Intercourse, Military Establishment, Indian Department, Naval, etc.
Finally a call was made for a statement of the annual appropriations and
the applications of them by the Treasury. The object of Mr. Gallatin was
to establish the expenses of the government in each department of
service on a permanent footing for which annual appropriations should be
made, and for any extraordinary expenditure to insist on a special
appropriation for the stated object and none other. By keeping
constantly before the House this distinction between the permanent fund
and temporary exigencies, he accustomed it to take a practical business
view of its legislative duties, and the people to understand the
principles he endeavored to apply.
In a debate at the beginning of the session, on a bill for establishing
trading houses with the Indians, Mr. Gallatin showed his hand by
declaring that he would not consent to appropriate any part of the war
funds for the scheme; nor, in view of the need of additional permanent
funds for the discharge of the public debt, would he vote for the bill
at all, unless there was to be a reduction in the expense of the
military establishment; and he would not be diverted from his purpose
although Mr. Madison advocated the bill because of its extremely
benevolent object. The Federal leaders saw clearly to what this doctrine
would bring them, and met it in the beginning. The first struggle
occurred when the appropriations for the service of 1796 were brought
before the House. Beginning with a discussion upon the salaries of the
officers of the mint, the debate at once passed to the principle of
appropriations. The Federalists insisted that a discussion of the merits
of establishments was not in order when the appropriations were under
consideration; that the House ought not, by withholding appropriations,
to destroy establishments formed by the whole legislature, that is, by
the Senate and House; that the House should vote for the appropriations
agreeably to the laws already made. This view was sanctioned by
practice. Mr. Gallatin immediately opposed this as an alarming and
dangerous principle. He insisted that there was a certain discretionary
power in the House to appropriate or not to appropriate for any object
whatever, whether that object were authorized or not. It was a power
vested in the House for the purpose of checking the other branches of
government whenever necessary. He claimed that this power was shown in
the making of yearly instead of permanent appropriations for the civil
list and military establishments, yet when the House desired to
strengthen public credit it had rendered the appropriation for those
objects permanent and not yearly. It was, therefore, "contradictory to
suppose that the House was bound to do a certain act at the same time
that they were exercising the discretionary power of voting upon it."
The debate determined nothing, but it is of interest as the first
declaration in Congress of the supremacy of the House of
Representatives.
The great debate which, from the principles involved in it as well as
the argument and oratory with which they were discussed, made this
session of the House famous, was on the treaty with Great Britain. This
was the first foreign treaty made since the establishment of the
Constitution. The treaty was sent in to the House "for the information
of Congress," by the President, on March 1, with notice of its
ratification at London in October. The next day Mr. Edward Livingston
moved that the President be requested to send in a copy of the
instructions to the minister of the United States who negotiated the
treaty, together with the correspondence and other documents. A few days
later he amended his resolution by adding an exception of such of said
papers as any existing negotiations rendered improper to disclose. The
Senate in its ratification of the treaty suspended the operation of the
clause regulating the trade with the West Indies, on which Great Britain
still imposed the old colonial restriction, and recommended the
President to open negotiations on this subject; and in fact such
negotiations were in progress. The discussion was opened on the Federal
side by a request to the gentlemen in favor of the call to give their
reasons. Mr. Gallatin supported the resolution, and expressed surprise
at any objection, considering that the exception of the mover rendered
the resolution of itself unexceptionable. The President had not informed
the House of the reasons upon which the treaty was based. If he did not
think proper to give the information sought for, he would say so to
them. A question might arise whether the House should get at those
secrets even if the President refused the request, but that was not the
present question. In reply to Mr. Murray, who asserted that the treaty
was the supreme law of the land, and that there was no discretionary
power in the House except on the question of its constitutionality, Mr.
Gallatin said that Congress possessed the power of regulating
trade,--perhaps the treaty-making power clashed with that,--and
concluded by observing that the House was the grand inquest of the
nation, and that it had the right to call for papers on which to ground
an impeachment. At present he did not contemplate an exercise of that
right. Mr. Madison said it was now to be decided whether the general
power of making treaties supersedes the powers of the House of
Representatives, particularly specified in the Constitution, so as to
give to the executive all deliberative will and leave the House only an
executive and ministerial instrumental agency; and he proposed to amend
the resolution so as to read, "except so much of said papers as in his
(the President's) judgment it may be inconsistent with the interest of
the United States at this time to disclose." But his motion was defeated
by a vote of 47 nays to 37 yeas.
The discussion being resumed in committee of the whole, the expressions
of opinion were free on both sides, but so moderate that one of the
members made comment on the calmness and temper of the discussion.
Nicholas said that, if the treaty were not the law of the land, the
President should be impeached. But the parts of the treaty into which
the President had not the right to enter, he could not make law by
proclamation. Swanwick supported the call as one exercised by the House
of Commons. On the Federal side, Harper said that the papers were not
necessary, and, being unnecessary, the demand was an improper and
unconstitutional interference with the executive department. If he
thought them necessary, he would change the milk and water style of the
resolutions. In that case the House had a right to them and he had no
idea of requesting as a favor what should be demanded as a right.
Gallatin, he said, had declared that it was a request, but that in case
of refusal it might be considered whether demand should not be made, and
he charged that when, at the time the motion was made, the question had
been asked, what use was to be made of the papers, Gallatin did not and
could not reply. Mr. Gallatin answered that whether the House had a
discretionary power, or whether it was bound by the instrument, there
was no impropriety in calling for the papers. He hoped to have avoided
the constitutional question in the motion, but as the gentlemen had come
forward on that ground, he had no objection to rest the decision of the
constitutional power of Congress on the fate of the present question. He
would therefore state that the House had a right to ask for the papers.
The constitutional question being thus squarely introduced, Mr. Gallatin
made an elaborate speech, which, from its conciseness in statement,
strength of argument, and wealth of citations of authority, was, to say
the least, inferior to no other of those drawn out in this memorable
struggle. In its course he compared the opinion of those who had opposed
the resolution to the saying of an English bishop, that the people had
nothing to do with the law but to obey it, and likened their conduct to
the servile obedience of a Parliament of Paris under the old order of
things. He concluded with the hope that the dangerous doctrine, that the
representatives of the people have not the right to consult their
discretion when about exercising powers delegated by the Constitution,
would receive its death-blow. Griswold replied in what by common consent
was the strongest argument on the Federal side. The call, at first view
simple, had, he said, become a grave matter. The gist of his objection
to it was that the people in their Constitution had made the treaty
power paramount to the legislative, and had deposited that power with
the President and Senate.
Mr. Madison once more rose to the constitutional question. He said that,
if the passages of the Constitution be taken literally, they must clash.
The word _supreme_, as applied to treaties, meant as over the state
Constitutions, and not over the Constitution and laws of the United
States. He supported Mr. Gallatin's view of the congressional power as
coöperative with the treaty power. A construction which made the treaty
power omnipotent he thought utterly inadmissible in a constitution
marked throughout with limitations and checks.
Mr. Gallatin again claimed the attention of the House, as the original
question of a call for papers had resolved itself into a discussion on
the treaty-making power. In the treaty of peace of 1783 there were
three articles which might be supposed to interfere with the legislative
powers of the several States: 1st, that which related to the payment of
debts; 2d, the provision for no future confiscations; 3d, the
restitution of estates already confiscated. The first could not be
denied. "Those," he said, "might be branded with the epithet of
disorganizers, who threatened a dissolution of the Union in case the
measures they dictated were not obeyed; and he knew, although he did not
ascribe it to any member of the House, that men high in office and
reputation had industriously spread an alarm that the Union would be
dissolved if the present motion was carried." He took the ground that a
treaty is not valid, and does not bind the nation as such, till it has
received the sanction of the House of Representatives. Mr. Harper closed
the argument on the Federal side. On March 24 the resolution calling for
the papers was carried by a vote of yeas 62, nays 37, absent 5, the
speaker 1 (105). Livingston and Gallatin were appointed to present the
request to the President.
On March 30 the President returned answer to the effect that he
considered it a dangerous precedent to admit this right in the House;
that the assent of the House was not necessary to the validity of a
treaty; and he absolutely refused compliance with the request. The
letter of instructions to Jay would bear the closest examination, but
the cabinet scorned to take shelter behind it, and it was on their
recommendation that the President's refusal was explicit. This message,
in spite of the opposition of the Federalists, was referred, by a vote
of 55 yeas to 37 nays, to the committee of the whole. This reference
involved debate. In his opposition to this motion, Mr. Harper said that
the motives of the friends of the resolution had been avowed by the
"gentleman who led the business, from Pennsylvania;" whereby it appears
that Mr. Gallatin led the Republicans in the first debate. During this
his first session he shared this distinction with Mr. Madison. At the
next he became the acknowledged leader of the Republican party.
On April 3 the debate was resumed. This second debate was led by Mr.
Madison, who considered two points: 1st, the application for papers; 2d,
the constitutional rights of Congress. His argument was of course calm
and dispassionate after his usual manner. The contest ended on April 7,
with the adoption of two resolutions: 1st, that the power of making
treaties is exclusively with the President and Senate, and the House do
not claim an agency in making them, or ratifying them when made; 2d,
that when made a treaty must depend for the execution of its
stipulations on a law or laws to be passed by Congress; and the House
have a right to deliberate and determine the expediency or inexpediency
of carrying treaties into effect. These resolutions were carried by a
vote of 63 to 27.
There was now a truce of a few days. In the meanwhile the country was
agitated to an extent which, if words mean anything, really threatened
an attempt at dissolution of the Union, if not civil war itself. The
objections on the part of the Republicans were to the treaty as a whole.
Their sympathies were with France in her struggle for liberty and
democratic institutions and against England, and their real and proper
ground of antipathy to the instrument lay in its concession of the right
of capture of French property in American vessels, whilst the treaty
with France forbade her to seize British property in American vessels.
The objections in detail had been formulated at the Boston public
meeting the year before. The commercial cities were disturbed by the
interference with the carrying trade; the entire coast, by the search of
vessels and the impressment of seamen; the agricultural regions, by the
closing of the outlet for their surplus product; the upland districts,
by the stoppage of the export of timber. But the country was without a
navy, was ill prepared for war, and the security of the frontier was
involved in the restoration of the posts still held by the British.
The political situation was uncertain if not absolutely menacing. The
threats of disunion were by no means vague. The Pendleton Society in
Virginia had passed secession resolutions, and a similar disposition
appeared in other States. While the treaty was condemned in the United
States, British statesmen were not of one opinion as to the advantages
they had gained by Grenville's diplomacy. Jay's desire, expressed to
Randolph, "to manage so that in case of wars our people should be united
and those of England divided," was not wholly disappointed. And there is
on record the expression of Lord Sheffield, when he heard of the rupture
in 1812, "We have now a complete opportunity of getting rid of that most
impolitic treaty of 1794, when Lord Grenville was so perfectly duped by
Jay."[4] Washington's ratification of the treaty went far to correct the
hasty judgment of the people, and to reconcile them to it as a choice of
evils. Supported by this modified tone of public opinion, the
Federalists determined to press the necessary appropriation bills for
carrying the treaties into effect. Besides the Jay treaty there were
also before the House the Wayne treaty with the Indians, the Pinckney
treaty with Spain, and the treaty with Algiers. With these three the
House was entirely content, and the country was impatient for their
immediate operation. Wayne's treaty satisfied the inhabitants on the
frontier. The settlers along the Ohio, among whom was Gallatin's
constituency, were eager to avail themselves of the privileges granted
by that of Pinckney, which was a triumph of diplomacy; and all America,
while ready to beard the British lion, seems to have been in terror of
the Dey of Algiers. Mr. Sedgwick offered a resolution providing for the
execution of the four treaties. Mr. Gallatin insisted on and received a
separate consideration of each. That with Great Britain was reserved
till the rest were disposed of. It was taken up on April 14. Mr. Madison
opened the debate. He objected to the treaty as wanting in real
reciprocity; 2d, in insufficiency of its provisions as to the rights of
neutrals; 3d, because of its commercial restrictions. Other Republican
leaders followed, making strong points of the position in which the
treaty placed the United States with regard to France, to whom it was
bound by a treaty of commercial alliance, which was a part of the
contract of aid in the Revolutionary War; and also of the possible
injustice which would befall American claimants in the British courts of
admiralty.
The Federalists clung to their ground, defended the treaty as the best
attainable, and held up as the alternative a war, for which the refusal
of the Republicans to support the military establishment and build up a
navy left the country unprepared. In justice to Jay, his significant
words to Randolph, while doubtful of success in his negotiation, should
be remembered: "Let us hope for the best and prepare for the worst." To
the red flag which the Federalists held up, Mr. Gallatin replied,
accepting the consequences of war if it should come, and gave voice to
the extreme dissatisfaction of the Virginia radicals with Jay and the
negotiation. He charged that the cry of war and threats of a
dissolution of the government were designed for an impression on the
timidity of the House. "It was through the fear of being involved in a
war that the negotiation with Great Britain had originated; under the
impression of fear the treaty had been negotiated and signed; a fear of
the same danger, that of war, had promoted its ratification; and now
every imaginary mischief which could alarm our fears was conjured up in
order to deprive us of that discretion which this House thought they had
a right to exercise, and in order to force us to carry the treaty into
effect." He insisted on the important principle that 'free ships make
free goods,' and complained of its abandonment by the negotiators.
In a reply to this attack upon Jay, whose whole life was a refutation of
the charge of personal or moral timidity, Mr. Tracy passed the limits of
parliamentary courtesy. "The people," he said, "where he was most
acquainted, whatever might be the character of other parts of the Union,
were not of the stamp to cry hosannah to-day and crucify to-morrow; they
will not dance around a whiskey pole to-day and curse their government,
and upon hearing of a military force sneak into a swamp. No," said he,
"my immediate constituents, whom I very well know, understand their
rights and will defend them, and if they find the government will not
protect them, they will attempt at least to protect themselves;" and he
concluded, "I cannot be thankful to that gentleman for coming all the
way from Geneva to give Americans a character for pusillanimity." He
held it madness to suppose that if the treaty were defeated war could be
avoided. Called to order, he said that he might have been too personal,
and asked pardon of the gentleman and of the House.
The brilliant crown of the debate was the impassioned speech of Fisher
Ames, the impression of which upon the House and the crowded gallery is
one of the traditions of American oratory. The scene, as it has been
handed down to us, resembles, in all save its close, that which
Parliament presented when Chatham made his last and dying appeal. Like
the great earl, Ames rose pale and trembling from illness to address a
House angry and divided. Defending himself and the Federal party against
the charge of being in English interest, he said, "Britain has no
influence, and can have none. She has enough--and God forbid she ever
should have more. France, possessed of popular enthusiasm, of party
attachments, has had and still has _too much influence_ on our
politics,--any foreign influence is too much and ought to be destroyed.
I detest the man and disdain the spirit that can ever bend to a mean
subserviency to the views of any nation. It is enough to be American.
That character comprehends our duties and ought to engross our
attachments." Considering the probable influence on the Indian tribes of
the rejection of the treaty, he said, "By rejecting the Posts we light
the savage fires, we bind the victims.... I can fancy that I listen to
the yells of savage vengeance and shrieks of torture. Already they seem
to sigh in the west wind,--already they mingle with every echo from the
mountains." His closing words again bring Chatham to mind. "Yet I have
perhaps as little personal interest in the event as any one here. There
is, I believe, no member who will not think his chance to be a witness
of the consequences greater than mine. If, however, the vote should pass
to reject, and a spirit should rise, as rise it will, with the public
disorders to make confusion worse confounded, even I, slender and almost
broken as my hold upon life is, may outlive the government and
Constitution of my country." This appeal, supported by the petitions and
letters which poured in upon the House, left no doubt of the result. An
adjournment was carried, but the speech was decisive. The next day,
April 29, it was resolved to be expedient to make the necessary
appropriations to carry the treaty into effect. The vote stood 49 ayes
to 49 nays, and was decided in the affirmative by Muhlenberg, who was in
the chair. But the House would not be satisfied without an expression of
condemnation of the instrument. On April 30 it was resolved that in the
opinion of the House the treaty was objectionable.
While Mr. Gallatin in this debate rose to the highest rank of
statesmanship, he showed an equal mastery of other important subjects
which engaged the attention of the House during the session. He was
earnest for the protection of the frontier, but had no good opinion of
the Indians. "Twelve years had passed," he said, "since the peace of
1783; ever since that time he had lived on the frontier of Pennsylvania.
Not a year of this period had passed, whether at war or peace, that some
murders had not been committed by the Indians, and yet not an act of
invasion or provocation by the inhabitants." In the matter of
impressment of American seamen, he urged the lodging of sufficient power
in the executive. Men had been impressed, and he held it to be the duty
of the House to take notice of it by war or negotiation. In the
establishment of land offices for the sale of the western lands he
brought to bear upon legislation his practical experience. He urged that
the tracts for sale be divided, and distinctions be made between large
purchasers and actual settlers--proposing that the large tracts be
sold at the seat of government, and the small on the territory itself.
He instanced the fact that in 1792 all the land west of the Ohio was
disposed of at 1_s_. 6_d_. the acre, and a week afterwards was resold at
$1.50, so that the money which should have gone into the treasury went
to the pockets of speculators. He also suggested that the proceeds of
the sales should be a fund to pay the public debt, and that the public
stock should always be received at its value in payment for land; a plan
by which the land would be brought directly to the payment of the debt,
as foreigners would gladly exchange the money obligations of the
government for land. On the question of taxation he declared himself in
favor of direct taxes, and held that a tax on houses and lands could be
levied without difficulty. He would satisfy the people that it was to
pay off the public debt, which he held to be a public curse. He
supported the excise duty on stills under regulations which would avoid
the watching of persons and houses and inspection by officers, and
proposed that licenses be granted for the time applied for.
The military establishment he opposed in every way, attacked the
principle on which it was based, and fought every appropriation in
detail, from the pay of a major-general to the cost of uniforms for the
private soldiers. He was not afraid of the army, he said, but did not
think that it was necessary for the support of the government or
dangerous to the liberties of the people; moreover, it cost six hundred
thousand dollars a year, which was a sum of consequence in the condition
of the finances.
The navy found no more favor in his eyes. He denied that fleets were
necessary to protect commerce. He challenged its friends to show, from
the history of any nation in Europe as from our own, that commerce and
the navy had gone hand in hand. There was no nation except Great
Britain, he said, whose navy had any connection with commerce. Navies
were instruments of power more calculated to annoy the trade of other
nations than to protect that of the nations to which they belonged. The
price England had paid for her navy was a debt of three hundred millions
of pounds sterling. He opposed appropriations even for the three
frigates, United States, Constitution, and Constellation,--the
construction of which had been ordered,--the germs of that navy which
was later to set his theory at naught, redeem the honor of the flag,
protect our commerce, and release the country and the civilized world
from ignominious tribute to the Mediterranean pirates, who were
propitiated in this very session only at the cost of a million of
dollars to the Treasury of the United States, and by the gift of a
frigate.
In the debate over the payment of the sum of five millions, which the
United States Bank had demanded from the government, the greatest part
of which had been advanced on account of appropriations, he lamented the
necessity, but urged the liquidation. This was the occasion of another
personal encounter. In reply to a charge of Gallatin that the
Federalists were in favor of debt, Sedgwick alluded to Gallatin's part
in the Whiskey Insurrection, and said that none of those gentlemen whom
Gallatin had charged with "an object to perpetuate and increase the
public debt" had been known to have combined "in every measure which
might obstruct the operation of law," nor had declared to the world
"that the men who would accept of the offices to perform the necessary
functions of government were lost to every sense of virtue;" "that from
them was to be withheld every comfort of life which depended on those
duties which as men and fellow-citizens we owe to each other. If," he
said, "the gentlemen had been guilty of such nefarious practices, there
would have been a sound foundation for the charge brought against them."
Gallatin made no reply. This was the one political sin he had
acknowledged. His silence was his expiation.
The Treasury Department and its control, past and present, was the
object of his unceasing criticism. In April, 1796, he said, "The
situation of the gentleman at the head of the department [Wolcott] was
doubtless delicate and unpleasant; it was the more so when compared with
that of his predecessor [Hamilton]. Both indeed had the same power to
borrow money when necessary; but that power, which was efficient in the
hands of the late secretary and liberally enough used by him, was become
useless at present. He wished the present secretary to be extricated
from his present difficulty. Nothing could be more painful than to be at
the head of that department with an empty treasury, a revenue inadequate
to the expenses, and no means to borrow." Nevertheless he feared that if
it were declared that the payment of the debt incurred by themselves
were to be postponed till the present generation were over, it might
well be expected that the principle thus adopted by them would be
cherished, that succeeding legislatures and administrations would follow
in their steps, and that they were laying the foundations of that
national curse,--a growing and perpetual debt.
On the last day of the session W. Smith had challenged the correctness
of Gallatin's charge that there had been an increase of the public debt
by five millions under the present administration, and claimed that
there were errors in Gallatin's statement of more than four and a half
millions. Gallatin defended his figures. At this day it is impossible to
determine the merits of this dispute.
One incident of this session deserves mention as showing the distaste of
Gallatin for anything like personal compliment, stimulated in this
instance, perhaps, by his sense of Washington's dislike to himself. It
had been the habit of the House since the commencement of the government
to adjourn for a time on February 22, Washington's birthday, that
members might pay their respects to the President. When the motion was
made that the House adjourn for _half an hour_, the Republicans
objected, and Gallatin, nothing loath to "bell the cat," moved that the
words "half an hour" be struck out. His amendment was lost without a
division. The motion to adjourn was then put and lost by a vote of 50
nays to 38 ayes. The House waited on the President at the close of the
business of the day. On June 1 closed this long and memorable session,
in which the assaults of the Republicans upon the administration were so
persistent and embarrassing as to justify Wolcott's private note to
Hamilton, April 29, 1796, that "unless a radical change of opinion can
be effected in the Southern States, the existing establishments will not
last eighteen months. The influence of Messrs. Gallatin, Madison, and
Jefferson must be diminished, or the public affairs will be brought to a
stand." Here is found an early recognition of the political
"triumvirate," and Gallatin is the first named.
Gallatin seems to have had some doubts as to his reëlection to Congress.
As he did not reside in the Washington and Allegheny district, his name
was not mentioned as a candidate, and, to use his own words, he expected
to "be gently dropped without the parade of a resignation." In his
distaste at separation from his wife, the desire to abandon public life
grew upon him. But personal abuse of him in the newspapers exasperating
his friends, he was taken up again in October, and he arrived on the
scene, he says, too late to prevent it. He had no hope, however, of
success, and was resolved to resign a seat to which he was in every way
indifferent. "Ambition, love of power," he wrote to his wife on October
16, he had never felt, and he added, if vanity ever made one of the
ingredients which impelled him to take an active part in public life, it
had for many years altogether vanished away. He was nevertheless
reëlected by the district he had represented.
* * * * *
The second session of the fourth Congress began on December 5, 1796. At
the beginning of this session Mr. Gallatin took the reins of the
Republican party, and held them till its close. The position of the
Federalists had been strengthened before the country by the energy of
Washington, who, impatient of the delays which Great Britain opposed to
the evacuation of the posts, marched troops to the frontier and obtained
their surrender. Adet, the new French minister, had dashed the feeling
of attachment for France by his impudent notice to the President that
the dissatisfaction of France would last until the executive of the
United States should return to sentiments and measures more conformable
to the interests and friendships of the two nations. In September
Washington issued his Farewell Address, in which he gave the famous
warning against foreign complications, which, approved by the country,
has since remained its policy; but neither the prospect of his final
withdrawal from the political and official field, nor the advice of
Jefferson to moderate their zeal, availed to calm the bitterness of the
ultra Republicans in the House.
The struggle over the answer to the President's message, which Fisher
Ames on this occasion reported, was again renewed. An effort was made to
strike out the passages complimentary to Washington and expressing
regret at his approaching retirement. Giles, who made the motion, went
so far as to say that he 'wished him to retire, and that this was the
moment for his retirement, that the government could do very well
without him, and that he would enjoy more happiness in his retirement
than he possibly could in his present situation.' For his part he did
not consider Washington's administration either "wise or firm," as the
address said. Gallatin made a distinction between the administration and
the legislature, and in lieu of the words, wise, firm, and patriotic
administration, proposed to address the compliment directly to the
wisdom, firmness, and patriotism of Washington. But Ames defended his
report, and it was adopted by a vote of 67 to 12. Gallatin voted with
the majority, but Livingston, Giles, and Macon held out with the small
band of disaffected, among whom it is amusing also to find Andrew
Jackson, who took his seat at this Congress to represent Tennessee,
which had been admitted as a State at the last session.[5]
The indebtedness of the States to the general government, in the old
balance sheet, on the payment of which Gallatin insisted, was a subject
of difference between the Senate and the House. Gallatin was appointed
chairman of the committee of conference on the part of the House. The
reduction of the military establishment, which he wished to bring down
to the footing of 1792, was again insisted upon. Gallatin here
ingeniously argued against the necessity for the number of men
proposed, that it was a mere matter of opinion, and if it was a matter
of opinion, it was not strictly necessary, because if necessary it was
no longer a matter of opinion. Naval appropriations were also opposed,
on the ground that a navy was prejudicial to commerce. Taxation, direct
and indirect, and compensation to public officers were also subjects of
debate at this session. On the subject of appropriations, general or
special, he was uncompromising. He charged upon the Treasury Department
that notwithstanding the distribution of the appropriations they thought
themselves at liberty to take money from an item where there was a
surplus and apply it to another where it was wanted. To check such
irregularity, he secured the passage of a resolution ordering that "the
several sums shall be solely applied to the objects for which they are
respectively appropriated," and tacked it to the appropriation bill. The
Senate added an amendment removing the restriction, but Gallatin and
Nicholas insisting on its retention, the House supported them by a vote
of 52 to 36, and the Senate receded.
Notwithstanding the apparent enthusiasm of the House in the early part
of the session, when the tricolor of France, a present from the French
government to the United States, was sent by Washington to Congress, to
be deposited with the archives of the nation, French influence was on
the wane. The common sense of the country got the better of its
passion. In the reaction the Federalists regained the popular favor for
a season.
Whatever latent sympathy the French people may have had for America as
the nation which set the example of resistance to arbitrary rule, the
French government certainly was moved by no enthusiasm for abstract
rights. Its only object was to check the power of their ancient enemy,
and deprive it of its empire beyond the seas. Nevertheless, France did
contribute materially to American success. The American government and
people acknowledged the value of her assistance, and, in spite of the
prejudices of race, there was a strong bond of sympathy between the two
nations; and when, in her turn, France, in 1789, threw off the feudal
yoke, she expected and she received the sympathy of America. Beyond this
the government and the people of the United States could not and would
not go. The position of France in the winter of 1796-97 was peculiar.
She was at war with the two most formidable powers of Europe,--Austria
and England, the one the mistress of Central Europe, the other supreme
ruler of the seas. The United States was the only maritime power which
could be opposed to Great Britain. The French government determined to
secure American aid by persuasion, if possible, otherwise by threat. The
Directory indiscreetly appealed from the American government to the
American people, forgetting that in representative governments these are
one. Nor was the precedent cited in defense of this unusual
proceeding--namely, the appeal of the American colonists to the people
of England, Ireland, and Canada to take part in the struggle against the
British government--pertinent; for that was an appeal to sufferers under
a common yoke.
The enthusiasm awakened in France by the dramatic reception of the
American flag, presented by Monroe to the French Convention, was
somewhat dampened by the cooler manner with which Congress received the
tricolor, and was entirely dashed by the moderation of the reply of the
House to Washington's message. The consent of the House to the
appropriations to carry out the Jay Treaty decided the French Directory
to suspend diplomatic relations with the United States. The marvelous
successes of Bonaparte in Italy over the Austrian army encouraged Barras
to bolder measures. The Directory not only refused to receive Charles C.
Pinckney, the new American minister, but gave him formal notice to
retire from French territory, and even threatened him with subjection to
police jurisdiction. In view of this alarming situation, President Adams
convened Congress.
The first session of the fifth Congress began at Philadelphia on Monday,
May 15, 1797. Jonathan Dayton was reëlected speaker of the House. Some
new men now appeared on the field of national debate: Samuel Sewall and
Harrison Gray Otis from Massachusetts, James A. Bayard from Delaware,
and John Rutledge, Jr., from South Carolina. Madison and Fisher Ames did
not return, and their loss was serious to their respective parties.
Madison was incontestably the finest reasoning power, and Ames, as an
orator, had no equal in our history until Webster appeared to dwarf all
other fame beside his matchless eloquence. Parties were nicely balanced,
the nominal majority being on the Federal side. Harper and Griswold
retained the lead of the administration party. Giles still led the
Republican opposition, but Gallatin was its main stay, always ready,
always informed, and already known to be in the confidence of Jefferson,
its moving spirit. The President's message was, as usual, the touchstone
of party. The debate upon it unmasked opinions. It was to all intents a
war message, since it asked provision for war. The action of France left
no alternative. The Republicans recognized this as well as the
Federalists. They must either respond heartily to the appeal of the
executive to maintain the national honor, or come under the charge they
had brought against the Federalists of sympathy with an enemy. At first
they sought a middle ground. Admitting that the rejection of our
minister and the manner of it, if followed by a refusal of all
negotiation on the subject of mutual complaints, would put an end to
every friendly relation between the two countries, they still hoped that
it was only a suspension of diplomatic intercourse. Hence, in response
to the assurance in the message that an attempt at negotiation would
first be made, Nicholas moved an amendment in this vein. The Federalists
opposed all interference with the executive, but the Republicans took
advantage of the debate to clear themselves of any taint of unpatriotic
motives in their semi-opposition. The Federalists, repudiating the
charge of British influence, held up Genet to condemnation, as making an
appeal to the people, Fauchet as fomenting an insurrection, and Adet as
insulting the government. The Republicans retorted upon them Grenville's
proposition to Mr. Pinckney, to support the American government against
the dangerous Jacobin factions which sought to overturn it. Gallatin
deprecated bringing the conduct of foreign relations into debate, and
hoped that the majority would resist the rashness which would drive the
country into war; he claimed that a disposition should be shown to put
France on an equal footing with other nations. He would offer an
ultimatum to France. Harper closed the debate in a powerful and
brilliant speech, opposing the amendment because he was for peace, and
because peace could only be maintained by showing France that we were
preparing for war. So the rival leaders based their opposite action on a
common ground. Dayton, the speaker, now embodied Gallatin's idea in
another form, and introduced a paragraph to the effect that "the House
receive with the utmost satisfaction the information of the President
that a fresh attempt at negotiation will be instituted, and cherish the
hope that a mutual spirit of conciliation and a disposition on the part
of the United States to place France on grounds as favorable as other
countries will produce an accommodation compatible with the engagements,
rights, and honor of our nation."
Kittera, who was one of the committee on the address, then moved to add
after "mutual spirit of conciliation" the clause, "to compensate for any
injury done to our neutral rights," etc. This both Harper and Gallatin
opposed. Gallatin objected to being forced to this choice. To vote in
its favor was a threat, if compensation were refused; to vote against it
was an abandonment of the claim. But he should oppose it, if forced to a
choice. The Federal leaders insisted; the previous question was ordered,
51 to 48. Here Mr. Gallatin showed himself the leader of his party. He
stated that, the majority having determined the question, it was now a
choice of evils, and he should vote for the amendment, and it was
adopted, 78 ayes to 21 nays. Among the nays were Harper, the Federalist
leader, Giles, the nominal chief of the Republicans, and Nicholas, high
in rank in that party. But the last word was not yet said. Edward
Livingston, who day by day asserted himself more positively, denied that
the conduct of the executive had been "just and impartial to foreign
nations," and moved to strike out the statement; Gallatin was more
moderate. Though he did not believe that in every instance the
government had been just and impartial, yet, generally speaking, it had
been so. He did not approve the British treaty, though he attributed no
bad motives to its makers; but he did not think that the laws respecting
the subordinate departments of the executive and judiciary had been
fairly executed. He therefore would not consent to the sentence in the
answer to the address, that the House did not hesitate to declare that
"they would give their most cordial support to principles so
deliberately and uprightly established."
What, he asked, were these principles? Otis denounced this as an artful
attempt to cast a censure, not only on the executive, but on all the
departments of government, and Allen of Connecticut declared "that there
was American blood enough in the House to approve this clause and
American accent enough to pronounce it." The rough prejudice of the
Saxon against the Latin race showed itself in this language, and
expressed the antagonism which Mr. Gallatin found to increase with his
political progress. Both the resolution and the amendment were defeated,
53 nays to 45 yeas. But when the final vote came upon the address, Mr.
Gallatin, with that practical sense which made him the sheet anchor of
his party in boisterous weather, voted with the Federalists and carried
the moderate Republicans with him. The vote was 62 to 36. Among the
irreconcilables the name of Edward Livingston is recorded.
The answer of the President was a model of good sense. "No event can
afford me so much cordial satisfaction as to conduct a negotiation with
the French Republic to a removal of prejudices, a correction of errors,
a dissipation of umbrages, an accommodation of all differences, and a
restoration of harmony and affection to the mutual satisfaction of both
nations."
This was the leading debate of the session. The situation was too grave
for trifling. On June 5, two days after the President's reply,
resolutions were introduced to put the country in a state of defense.
Gallatin struggled hard to keep down the appropriations, and opposed the
employment of the three frigates, which as yet had not been equipped or
manned. If they got to sea, the President would have no option except to
enforce the disputed articles of the French treaty. Gallatin laid down
also the law of search in accordance with the law of nations, and
pointed out that resistance to search or capture by merchantmen would
not only lead to war, but was war. In the remaining acts of the session
he was in favor of the defense of ports and harbors, with no preference
as to fortification on government territory; in favor of a prohibition
of the export of arms; against raising an additional corps of artillery;
against expatriation of persons who took service under foreign
governments. He opposed the duty on salt as unequal and unnecessary, and
sought to have the loan, which became necessary, cut down to the exact
sum of the deficiency in the appropriations; and finally, on the
impeachment of William Blount, Senator of the United States, charged
with having conspired with the British government to attack the
Spaniards of St. Augustine, he pointed out the true method of procedure
in the preparation of the bill of impeachment and the arraignment of the
offender.
The House adjourned on July 10. Jefferson complained of the weakness and
wavering of this Congress, the majority of which shifted with the breeze
of "panic or prowess." This was, however, a very narrow view; for at
this session the House fairly represented the prevailing sentiment of
the country, which was friendly to France as a nation, but indignant
with the insolence of her rulers. Gallatin, in the middle of the
session, wrote to his wife that the Republicans "were beating and beaten
by turns." He supposed that her father, Commodore Nicholson, 'thought
him too moderate and about to trim,' and then declared, 'Moderation and
firmness hath ever been, and ever will be, my motto.' Gallatin tells a
story of his colleague from Pennsylvania, the old Anti-Federalist, Blair
McClanachan, which shows the warmth of party feeling. They were both
dining with President Adams, who entertained the members of Congress in
turn. "McClanachan told the President that, by God, he would rather see
the world annihilated than this country united with Great Britain; that
there would not remain a single king in Europe within six months, etc.,
all in the loudest and most decisive tone."
Jefferson, who, as vice-president, presided over the debates in the
Senate, had no cause to complain of any hesitation in that body, in
which the Federalists had regained a clear working majority, giving him
no chance of a deciding vote.
* * * * *
The second session of the fifth Congress began on November 13, 1797. The
words of the President's address, "We are met together at a most
interesting period, the situation of the powers of Europe is singular
and portentous," was not an idle phrase. The star of Bonaparte already
dominated the political firmament. Europe lay prostrate at the feet of
the armies of the Directory. England, who was supposed to be the next
object of attack, was staggering under the load of debt; and the sailors
of her channel fleet had risen in mutiny. Even the Federalists, the
aristocrats as Mr. Gallatin delighted to call them, believed that she
was gone beyond recovery. But the admirers of France were no better
satisfied with the threatening attitude of the Directory towards
America, and eagerly waited news of the reception given to the envoys
extraordinary, Gerry, Pinckney, and Marshall, whom Adams with the
consent of the Senate dispatched to Paris in the summer. Even Jefferson
lost his taste for a French alliance, and almost wished there were "an
ocean of fire between the new and the old world."
The tone of the President's address was considered wise on all sides,
and it was agreed that the answer should be general and not a subject
of contention. One of the members asked to be excused from going with
the House to the President, but Gallatin showed that, as there was no
power to compel attendance, no formal excuse was necessary. When the
motion was put as to whether they should go in a body as usual to
present their answer, Mr. Gallatin voted in the negative. He
nevertheless accompanied the members, who were received pleasantly by
President Adams and "treated to cake and wine."
Harper was made the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. Though of
high talents and a fine speaker, Gallatin found him a "great bungler" in
the business of the House, a large share of which fell upon his own
shoulders as well as the direction of the Republicans, of whom,
notwithstanding the jealousy of Giles, he now was the acknowledged
leader. As a member for Pennsylvania, Mr. Gallatin presented a memorial
from the Quakers with regard to the arrest of fugitive slaves on her
soil; the law of Pennsylvania declaring all men to be free who set foot
in that State except only servants of members of Congress. There was
already an opposition to hearing any petition with regard to slaves, but
Gallatin insisted on the memorial taking the usual course of reference
to a committee. He directed the House also in the correct path in its
legislation as to foreign coins. It was proposed to take from them the
quality of legal tender; but he showed that it was policy not to
discriminate against such coins until the mint could supply a
sufficiency for the use of the country. In this argument he estimated
the entire amount of specie in the United States at eight millions of
dollars. At this early period in his political career he was acquiring
that precise knowledge of the facts of American finance which later
served to establish the principles upon which it is based.
This session was noteworthy by reason of the first personal encounter on
the floor of the House. It was between two Northern members, Lyon of
Vermont and Griswold of Connecticut. Gallatin stood by Lyon, who was of
his party, and showed that the House could not expel him, since it was
not at the time in organized session. As the Federalists would not
consent to censure Griswold, both offenders escaped even a formal
reproof. The general bitterness of feeling which marked the summer
session was greatly modified in the expectant state of foreign politics;
but the occasion for display of political divergence was not long
delayed.
On January 18, 1798, Mr. Harper, who led the business of the House,
moved the appropriation for foreign intercourse. This was seized upon by
the opposition to advance still further their line of attack by a
limitation of the constitutional prerogative of the President. In
addition to the usual salaries of the envoys to Great Britain and
France, appropriations were asked for the posts at Madrid, Lisbon, and
Berlin, which last Mr. Adams had designated as a first-class mission.
The discussion on the powers of the President, and the extent to which
they might be controlled by paring down the appropriations, lifted the
debate from the narrow ground of economy in administration to the
higher plane of constitutional powers. Nicholas opened on the
Republican side by announcing that it was seasonable to bring back the
establishment of the diplomatic corps to the footing it had been on
until the year 1796. In all governments like our own he declared that
there was a tendency to a union and consolidation of all its parts into
the executive, and the limitation and annexion of the parts with each
other as settled by the Constitution would be destroyed by this
influence unless there were a constant attention on the part of the
legislature to resist it. The appointment of a minister plenipotentiary
to Prussia, with which we had little or no commercial intercourse,
offered an opportunity to determine this limitation. Harper said that
this was a renewal of the old charge that foreign intercourse was
unnecessary, and the old suggestion that our commerce ought to be given
up or left to shift for itself. Mr. Gallatin laid down extreme theories
which have never yet found practical application. He took the question
at once from party or personal ground by admitting that the government
was essentially pure, its patronage not extensive, or its effect upon
the legislative or any other branch of the government as yet material.
The Constitution had placed the patronage in the executive. There he
thought it was wisely placed. The legislature would be more corrupt
than the executive were it placed with them. While not willing at once
to give up political foreign intercourse, he thought that it should by
degrees be altogether declined. To it he ascribed the critical situation
of the country. Commercial intercourse could be protected by the
consular system. He then argued that the power to provide for expenses
was the check intended by the Constitution. To this Griswold answered
that this doctrine of checks contained more mischief than Pandora's box;
Bayard, that the checks were all directed to the executive, and that
they would check and counter-check until they _stopped the wheels of
government_.[6] When the President was manacled and at the mercy of the
House they would be satisfied. He held the executive to be the weakest
branch of the government, because its powers are defined; but the limits
of the House are undefined.
As the debate advanced, Nicholas declared that the purpose of the
Republicans was to define the executive power and to put an end to its
extension through their power over appropriations. Later he would bring
in a motion to do away with all foreign intercourse. Goodrich answered
that the office of foreign minister was created by the Constitution
itself, and the power of appointment was placed in the President. The
House might speculate upon the propriety of doing away with all
intercourse with foreign powers, but could not decide on it, for
political intercourse did not depend on the sending of ministers abroad.
Foreign ministers would come here and the Constitution required their
reception. The idea that we should have no foreign intercourse was taken
from Washington's Farewell Address, but his words applied only to
alliances offensive and defensive. If ministers were abandoned, envoys
extraordinary must be sent, a much more dangerous practice; the only
choice was between ministers and spies. In conclusion he accused the
Republicans of making one continuous attack upon the administration, and
charged that the opposition to the appropriation bill was not a single
measure, but connected with others, and intended to clog the wheels of
government.
The purpose of the Republicans being thus declared by Nicholas and
squarely met by the friends of the administration, Mr. Gallatin, March
1, 1798, summed up the opposition arguments in an elaborate speech three
hours and a quarter in length. He denied the novel doctrine that each
department had checks within itself, but none upon others; he claimed
that the principle of checks is admitted in all mixed governments.
Commercial intercourse, he said, is regulated by the law of nations, by
the municipal law of respective countries and by treaties of commerce,
the application of which is the province of consuls. What advantages, he
asked, had our commercial treaties given us, either that with France or
that with England? He excepted that part of the treaty with Great
Britain which arranged our difference with that power, as foreign to the
discussion. He claimed that the restriction which we had laid upon
ourselves by our commercial treaties had been attended with political
consequences fatal to our tranquillity. Washington had advised a
separation of our political from our commercial relations. The message
of President Adams intimated a different policy and alluded to the
balance of power in Europe as not to be forgotten or neglected.
Interesting as that balance may be to Europe, how does it concern us? We
shall never throw our weight into the scale. Passing from this to the
danger of the absorption of powers by the executive, he cited the
examples of the Córtes of Spain, the États Généraux of France, the Diets
of Denmark. In all these countries the executive is in possession of
legislative, of absolute powers. The fate of the European republics was
similar. Venice, Switzerland, and Holland had shown the legislative
powers merging into the executive. The object of the Constitution of the
United States is to divide and distribute the powers of government. With
uncontrolled command over the purse of the people the executive tends to
prodigality, to taxes, and to wars. He closed with a hope that a fixed
determination to prevent the increase of the national expenditure, and
to detach the country from any connection with European politics, would
tend to reconcile parties, promote the happiness of America, and
conciliate the affection of every part of the Union. No such admirable
exposition of the true American doctrine of non-interference with
European politics had at that time been heard in Congress.
In reply, Harper insisted on the admission that the purpose of the
amendment of Nicholas was to restrain the President; that it was a
question of power, not of money. Mr. Gallatin admitted the right of
appointment, but denied that the House was bound to appropriate. Harper
rejoined that the offices did not originate with the President but with
the Constitution, and that they could not be destroyed by the action of
the House, and, leaving the general ground of debate, made a brilliant
attack upon the Republicans as revolutionists, whom he divided into
three classes: the philosophers, the Jacobins, and the _sans-culottes_.
The philosophers are most to be dreaded. "They declaim with warmth on
the miseries of mankind, the abuses of government, and the vices of
rulers; all which they engage to remove, providing their theories should
once be adopted. They talk of the perfectibility of man and of the
dignity of his nature; and, entirely forgetting what he is, declaim
perpetually about what he should be." Of Jacobins there are plenty. They
profit by the labors of others; tyrants in power, demagogues when not.
Fortunately for America there are few or no _sans-culottes_ among her
inhabitants. Jefferson, he said, returned from France a missionary to
convert Americans to the new faith, and he charged that the system of
French alliance and war with Great Britain by the United States was a
part of the scheme of the French revolutionists, and was imported into
this country. Gallatin and his friends he regarded in the light of an
enemy who has commenced a siege against the fortress of the
Constitution.
The restricting amendment was lost, and the bill passed by a vote of 52
yeas to 43 nays. Nor is it easy to see how the theory of Mr. Gallatin
with regard to diplomatic relations could have been applied successfully
with the existing channels of intercourse. Now that the ocean cable
brings governments into direct relation with each other, there is a
tendency to restrict the authority of ambassadors, for whom there is no
longer need, and the entire system will no doubt soon disappear. Mr.
Gallatin's speech was the delight of his party and his friends. He was
called upon to write it out, and two thousand copies of it were
circulated as the best exposition of Republican doctrine.
Early in February the President informed Congress of certain captures
and outrages committed by a French privateer within the limits of the
United States, including the burning of an English merchantman in the
harbor of Charleston. On March 19, in a further special message, he
communicated dispatches from the American envoys in France, and also
informed Congress that he should withdraw his order forbidding merchant
vessels to sail in an armed condition. A collision might, therefore,
occur at any moment.
On March 27, 1798, a resolution was introduced that it is not now
expedient for the United States to resort to war against the French
Republic; a second, to restrict the arming of merchant vessels; and a
third, to provide for the protection of the seacoast and the internal
defense of the country. Speaking to the first resolution, Mr. Gallatin
said that the United States had arrived at a crisis at which a stand
must be made, when the House must say whether it will resort to war or
preserve peace. If to war, the expense and its evils must be met; if
peace continue, then the country must submit: in either case American
vessels would be taken. It was a mere matter of calculation which course
would best serve the interest and happiness of the country. If he could
separate defensive from offensive war, he should be in favor of it; but
he could not make the distinction, and therefore he should be in favor
of measures of peace. The act of the President was a war measure.
Members of the House so designated it in letters to their constituents.
On April 2 the President was requested to communicate the instructions
and dispatches from the envoys extraordinary, mention of which he had
made in his message of March 19. Gallatin supported the call. He said
that the President was not afraid of communicating information, as he
had shown in the preceding session, and that to withhold it would
endanger the safety of our commerce, or prevent the happy issue of
negotiation. On April 3 Mr. Gallatin presented a petition against
hazarding the neutrality and peace of the nation by authorizing private
citizens to arm and equip vessels. This was signed by forty members of
the Pennsylvania legislature. Protests of a similar character were
presented from other parts of the country. On the same day the President
sent in the famous X Y Z dispatches, in confidence. These letters
represented the names of Hottinguer, Bellamy, and Hauteval, the agents
of Talleyrand, the foreign minister of the First Consul, which were
withheld by the President. The mysterious negotiations contained a
distinct demand by Talleyrand of a douceur of 1,200,000 livres to the
French officials as a condition of peace. The effect was immediately to
strengthen the administration, Dayton, the speaker, passing to the ranks
of the Federalists.
On the 18th the Senate sent down a bill authorizing the President to
procure sixteen armed vessels to act as convoys. Gallatin still held
firm. He admitted that from the beginning of the European contest the
belligerent powers had disregarded the law of nations and the
stipulations of treaties, but he still opposed the granting of armed
convoys, which would lead to a collision. Let us not, he said, act on
speculative grounds; if our present situation is better than war, let us
keep it. Better even, he said, suffer the French to go on with their
depredations than to take any step which may lead to war.
Allen of Connecticut read a passage from the dispatches which envenomed
the debate. By it one of the French agents appears to have warned the
American envoys that they were mistaken in supposing that an exposition
of the unreasonable demands of France would unite the people of the
United States. He said, "You should know that the _diplomatic skill_ of
France and the _means_ she possesses in your country are sufficient to
enable her, with the _French party_ in America, to throw the blame which
will attend the rupture of the negotiations on the _Federalists_, as you
term yourselves, but on the _British party_, as France terms you, and
you may assure yourselves this will be done." Allen then charged upon
Gallatin that his language was that of a foreign agent. Gallatin replied
that the representatives of the French Republic in this country had
shown themselves to be the worst diplomatists that had ever been sent to
it, and he asked why the gentlemen who did not come forward with a
declaration of war (though they were willing to go to war without the
declaration) charge their adversaries with meaning to submit to France.
France might declare war or give an order to seize American vessels, but
as long as she did not, some hope remained that the state of peace might
not be broken; and he said in conclusion "that, notwithstanding all the
violent charges and personal abuse which had been made against him, it
would produce no difference in his manner of acting, neither prevent him
from speaking against every measure which he thought injurious to the
public interest, nor, on the other hand, inflame his mind so as to
induce him to oppose measures which he might heretofore have thought
proper."
The war feeling ran high in the country; "Millions for defense, but not
one cent for tribute,"[7] was the popular cry. On May 28 Mr. Harper
introduced a bill to suspend commercial intercourse with France.
Gallatin thought this a doubtful measure. Its avowed purpose was to
distress France in the West Indies, but he said that in six months that
entire trade would be by neutral vessels. In the discussion on the bill
to regulate the arming of merchant vessels, he showed that it was the
practice of neutral European nations to allow such vessels to arm, but
not to regulate their conduct. Bonds are required in cases of letter of
marque, and the merchant who arms is bound not to break the laws of
nations or the agreements of treaties. Restriction was therefore
unnecessary. Government should not interfere. Commercial intercourse
with France was suspended June 13.
In the pride of their new triumph and the intensity of their personal
feeling the Federalists overleaped their mark, and began a series of
measures which ultimately cost them the possession of the government
and their political existence. The first of these was the Sedition Bill,
which Jefferson believed to be aimed at Gallatin in person. Mr. Gallatin
met it at its inception with a statement of the constitutional
objections, viz., 1st, that there was no power to make such a law, and
2d, the special provision in the Constitution that the writ of _habeas
corpus_ shall not be suspended except in cases of rebellion and
invasion. There was neither. The second, the Alien Bill, gave the
President power to expel from the country all aliens. Over this measure
Gallatin and Harper had hot words. Gallatin charged upon Harper not only
a misrepresentation of the arguments of his opponents, but an
arraignment of the motives of others, while claiming all purity for his
own. Harper answered in words which show that Gallatin, for once, had
met warmth with warmth, and anger with anger. When, Harper said, a
gentleman, who is usually so cool, all at once assumes such a tone of
passion as to forget all decorum of language, it would seem as if the
observation had been properly applied. On the vote to strike out the
obnoxious sections, the Federalists defeated their antagonists, and on
June 21 the bill itself was passed with all its odious features by 46 to
40.
On June 21 President Adams sent in a message with letters from Gerry,
who had remained at Paris after the return of Marshall and Pinckney, on
the subject of a loan. They contained an intimation from Talleyrand that
he was ready to resume negotiations. In this message Adams said, "I
will never send another minister to France without assurances that he
will be received, respected, and honored as the representative of a
great, free, powerful, and independent nation." On the 25th an act was
passed authorizing the commanders of merchant vessels to defend
themselves against search and seizure under regulations by the
President. On June 30 a further act authorized the purchase and
equipment of twelve vessels as an addition to the naval armament. To all
intents and purposes a state of war between the two countries already
existed.
The 4th of July (1798) was celebrated with unusual enthusiasm all over
the United States, and the black cockade was generally worn. This was
the distinctive badge of the Federalists, and a response to the tricolor
which Adet had recommended all French citizens to wear in 1794.
On July 5 a resolution was moved to appoint a committee to consider the
expediency of declaring, by legislative act, the state of relations
between the United States and the French Republic. Mr. Gallatin asked if
a declaration of war could not be moved as an amendment, but the
speaker, Mr. Dayton, made no reply. Mr. Gallatin objected that Congress
could not declare a state of facts by a legislative act. But this view,
if tenable then, has long since been abandoned. In witness of which it
is only necessary to name the celebrated resolution of the Congress of
1865 with regard to the recognition of a monarchy in Mexico. July 6 the
House went into committee of the whole on the state of the Union to
consider a bill sent down by the Senate abrogating the treaty with
France. The bill was passed on the 16th by a vote of 47 ayes to 37 nays,
Gallatin voting in the negative. The House adjourned the same day.
While thus engaged in debates which called into exercise his varied
information and displayed not only the extent of his learning but his
remarkable powers of reasoning and statement, Mr. Gallatin never lost
sight of reform in the administration of the finances of the government.
To the success of his efforts to hold the Treasury Department to a
strict conformity with his theory of administration, Mr. Wolcott, the
secretary, gave ample if unwilling testimony. To Hamilton he wrote on
April 5, 1798, "The management of the Treasury becomes more and more
difficult. The legislature will not pass laws in gross; their
appropriations are minute. Gallatin, to whom they yield, is evidently
intending to break down this department by charging it with an
impracticable detail."
During these warm discussions Gallatin rarely lost his self-control.
Writing to his old friend Lesdernier at this period, he said, "You may
remember I am blessed with a very even temper; it has not been altered
by time or politics."
* * * * *
The third session of the fifth Congress opened on December 3, 1798. On
the 8th, when the President was expected, Lieutenant-General Washington
and Generals Pinckney and Hamilton entered the hall and took their
places on the right of the speaker's chair. They had been recently
appointed to command the army of defense.
The President's speech announced no change in the situation. "Nothing,"
he said, "is discoverable in the conduct of France which ought to change
or relax our measures for defense. On the contrary, to extend and
invigorate them is our true policy. An efficient preparation for war can
alone insure peace. It must be left to France, if she is indeed desirous
of accommodation, to take the requisite steps. The United States will
steadily observe the maxims by which they have hitherto been governed."
The reply to this patriotic sentiment was unanimously agreed to, and was
most grateful to Adams, who thanked the House for it as "consonant to
the characters of representatives of a great and free people."
On December 27 a peculiar resolution was introduced to punish the
usurpation of the executive authority of the government of the United
States in carrying on correspondence with the government of any foreign
prince or state. Gallatin thought this resolution covered too much
ground. The criminality of such acts did not lie in their being
usurpations, but in the nature of the crime committed. There was no
authority in the Constitution for a grant of such a power to the
President. To afford aid and comfort to the enemy was treason, but
there was no war, and therefore no enemy. He claimed the right to
himself and others to do all in his power to secure a peace, even by
correspondence abroad, and he would not admit that the ground taken by
the friends of the measure was a proper foundation for a general law. A
committee was, however, appointed, in spite of this remonstrance, to
consider the propriety of including in the general act all persons who
should commence or carry on a correspondence, by a vote of 65 to 23. A
bill was reported on January 9, when Gallatin endeavored to attach a
proviso that the law should not operate upon persons seeking justice or
redress from foreign governments; but his motion was defeated by a vote
of 48 to 37. Later, however, a resolution of Mr. Parker, that nothing in
the act should be construed to abridge the rights of any citizen to
apply for such redress, was adopted by a vote of 69 yeas to 27 nays. On
this vote Harper voted yea. Griswold, Otis, Bayard, and Goodrich were
found among the nays. Gallatin succeeded in carrying an amendment
defining the bill, after which it was passed by a vote of 58 to 36.
Towards the close of January, 1799, a bill was brought in authorizing
the President to discontinue the restraints of the act suspending
intercourse with the French West India Islands, whenever any persons in
authority or command should so request. This was to invite a secession
of the French colonies from the mother country. Gallatin deprecated any
action which might induce rebellion against authority, or lead to
self-government among the people of the islands who were unfit for it.
Moreover, such action would remove still further every expectation of an
accommodation with France. The bill was passed by a vote of 55 to 37. He
objected to the bill to authorize the President to suspend intercourse
with Spanish and Dutch ports which should harbor French privateers, as
placing an unlimited power to interdict commerce in the hands of the
executive. The bill was carried by 55 to 37. On the question of the
augmentation of the navy he opposed the building of the seventy-fours.
In February Edward Livingston presented a petition from aliens, natives
of Ireland, against the Alien and Sedition laws. Numerous similar
petitions followed; one was signed by 18,000 persons in Pennsylvania
alone. To postpone consideration of the subject, the Federalists sent
these papers to a select committee, against the protests of Livingston
and Gallatin. This course was the more peculiar because of the reference
of petitions of a similar character in the month previous to the
committee of the whole. The Federalists were abusing their majority, and
precipitating their unexpected but certain ruin. One more effort was
made to repeal the offensive penal act; the constitutional objection was
again pleaded, but the repeal was defeated by a vote of 52 in the
affirmative. Mr. Gallatin opposed these laws in all their stages, but,
failing in this, persistently endeavored to make them as good as
possible before they passed. Jefferson later said that nothing could
obliterate from the recollection of those who were witnesses of it the
courage of Gallatin in the "Days of Terror."[8] The vote of thanks to
Mr. Dayton, the speaker, was carried by a vote of 40 to 22. On March 3,
1800, this Congress adjourned.
* * * * *
The sixth Congress met at Philadelphia on December 2, 1799. The
Federalists were returned in full majority. Among the new members of the
House, John Marshall and John Randolph appeared for Virginia. Theodore
Sedgwick was chosen speaker. President Adams came down to the House on
the 3d and made the usual speech. The address in reply, reported by a
committee of which Marshall was chairman, was agreed to without
amendment. Adams was again delighted with the very respectful terms
adopted at the "first assembly after a fresh election, under the strong
impression of the public opinion and national sense at this interesting
and singular crisis." At this session it was the sad privilege of
Marshall to announce the death of Washington, "the Hero, the Sage, and
the Patriot of America." In the shadow of this great grief, party
passion was hushed for a while.
Gallatin again led the Republican opposition; Nicholas and Macon were
his able lieutenants. The line of attack of the Republicans was clear.
If war could be avoided, the growing unpopularity of the Alien and
Sedition laws would surely bring them to power. The foreign-born voter
was already a factor in American politics. In January the law providing
for an addition to the army was suspended. Macon then moved the repeal
of the Sedition Law. He took the ground that it was a measure of
defense. Bayard adroitly proposed as an amendment that "the offenses
therein specified shall remain punishable as at common law, provided
that upon any prosecution it shall be lawful for the defendant to give
as his defense the truth of the matter charged as a libel." Gallatin
called upon the chair to declare the amendment out of order, as intended
to destroy the resolution, but the speaker declined, and the amendment
was carried by a vote of 51 to 47. The resolution thus amended was then
defeated by a vote of 87 to 1. The Republicans preferred the odious act
in its original form rather than accept the Federal interpretation of
it.
On February 11, 1800, a bill was introduced into Congress further to
suspend commercial intercourse with France. It passed the House after a
short debate by a vote of 68 yeas to 28 nays. On this bill the
Republican leaders were divided. Nicholas, Macon, and Randolph opposed
it; but Gallatin, separating from his friends, carried enough of his
party with him to secure its passage. Returned by the Senate with
amendments, it was again objected to by Macon as fatal to the interests
of the Southern States, but the House resolved to concur by a vote of 50
to 36.
In March the country was greatly excited by the news of an engagement on
the 1st of February, off Guadaloupe, between the United States frigate
Constellation, thirty-eight guns, and a French national frigate, La
Vengeance, fifty-four guns. The House of Representatives called on the
secretary of the navy for information, and, by 84 yeas to 4 nays, voted
a gold medal to Captain Truxton, who commanded the American ship. John
Randolph's name is recorded in the negative.
Notwithstanding this collision, the relations of the United States and
France were gradually assuming a kindlier phase. The Directory had
sought to drive the American government into active measures against
England. Bonaparte, chosen First Consul, at once adopted a conciliatory
tone. Preparing for a great continental struggle, he was concentrating
the energies and the powers of France. In May Mr. Parker called the
attention of the House to this change of conduct in the French
government and offered a resolution instructing the Committee on
Commerce to inquire if any amendments to the Foreign Intercourse Act
were necessary. Macon moved to amend so that the inquiry should be
whether it were not expedient to repeal the act. Gallatin opposed the
resolution on the ground that it was highly improper to take any
measures at the present time which would change the defensive system of
the country. The resolution was negatived,--43 nays to 40 yeas.
One singular opposition of Gallatin is recorded towards the close of the
session; the Committee on the Treasury Department reported an amendment
to the act of establishment, providing that the secretary of the
treasury shall lay before Congress, at the commencement of every
session, a report on finance with plans for the support of credit, etc.
Gallatin and Nicholas opposed this bill, because it came down from the
Senate, which had no constitutional right to originate a money bill; but
Griswold and Harper at once took the correct ground that it was not a
bill, but a report on the state of the finances, in which the Senate had
an equal share with the House. The bill was passed by a vote of 43 to
39. It is worthy of note that the first report on the state of the
finances communicated under this act was by Mr. Gallatin himself the
next year, and that it was sent in to the Senate. The House adjourned on
May 14, 1800.
* * * * *
The second session of the sixth Congress was held at the city of
Washington, to which the seat of government had been removed in the
summer interval. After two southerly migrations they were now
definitively established at a national capital. The session opened on
November 17, 1800. On the 22d President Adams congratulated Congress on
"the prospect of a residence not to be changed." The address of the
House in reply was adopted by a close vote.
The situation of foreign relations was changed. The First Consul
received the American envoys cordially, and a commercial convention was
made but secured ratification by the Senate only after the elimination
of an article and a limitation of its duration to eight years. While the
bill was pending in the Senate, Mr. Samuel Smith moved to continue the
act to suspend commercial intercourse with France. Mr. Gallatin opposed
this motion; at the last session he had voted for this bill because
there was only the appearance of a treaty. Now that the precise state of
negotiation was known, why should the House longer leave this matter to
the discretion of the President? The House decided to reject the
indiscreet bill by a vote of 59 to 37. An effort was also made to repeal
a part of the Sedition Law, and continue the rest in force, but the
House refused to order the engrossing of the bill, taking wise counsel
of Dawson, who said that, supported by the justice and policy of their
measures, the approaching administration would not need the aid of
either the alien, sedition, or common law. The opponents of the bill
would not consent to any modification. The last scenes of the session
were of exciting interest.
Freed from the menace of immediate war, the people of plain common sense
recognized that the friendship of Great Britain was more dangerous than
the enmity of France. They dreaded the fixed power of an organized
aristocracy far more than the ephemeral anarchy of an ill-ordered
democracy; they were more averse to class distinctions protected by law
than even to military despotism which destroyed all distinctions, and
they preferred, as man always has preferred and always will prefer,
personal to political equality. The Alien and Sedition laws had borne
their legitimate fruit. The foreign-born population held the balance of
power; a general vote would have shown a large Republican or, it is more
correct to say, anti-Federalist majority. But the popular will could not
be thus expressed. Under the old system each elector in the electoral
college cast his ballot for president and vice-president without
designation of his preference as to who should fill the first place. New
England was solid for Adams, who, however, had little strength beyond
the limits of this Federal stronghold. New York and the Southern States
with inconsiderable exceptions were Republican. Pennsylvania was so
divided in the legislature that her entire vote would have been lost but
for a compromise which gave to the Republicans one vote more than to the
Federalists. Adams being out of the question, the election to the first
place lay between Jefferson and Burr, both Republicans. The Federalists,
therefore, had their option between the two Republican candidates, and
the result was within the reach of that most detestable of combinations,
a political bargain. Mr. Gallatin's position in this condition of
affairs was controlling. His loyalty to Jefferson was unquestioned,
while Burr was the favorite of the large Republican party in New York
whose leaders were Mr. Gallatin's immediate friends and warm supporters.
Both Jefferson and Burr were accused of bargaining to secure enough of
the Federalist vote to turn the scale. That Mr. Jefferson did make some
sacrifice of his independence is now believed. Whether Mr. Gallatin was
aware of any such compromise is uncertain. If such bargain were made,
General Samuel Smith was the channel of arrangement, and in view of the
inexplicable and ignominious deference of Jefferson and Madison to his
political demands, there is little doubt that he held a secret power
which they dared not resist. Gallatin felt it, suffered from it,
protested against it, but submitted to it.
The fear was that Congress might adjourn without a conclusion. To meet
this emergency Mr. Gallatin devised a plan of balloting in the House,
which he communicated to Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Nicholas. It stated the
objects of the Federalists to be, 1st, to elect Burr; 2d, to defeat the
present election and order a new one; 3d, to assume _executive_ power
during the interregnum. These he considers, and suggests alternative
action in case of submission or resistance on the part of the
Republicans. The Federalists, holding three branches of government,
viz., the presidency, a majority in the Senate, and a majority in the
House, might pass a law declaring that one of the great officers
designated by the Constitution should act as president pro tempore,
which would be constitutional. But while Mr. Gallatin in this paragraph
admitted such a law to be constitutional, in the next he argued that the
act of the person designated by law, or of the president pro tempore,
assuming the power is clearly "unconstitutional." By this ingenious
process of reasoning, to which the strict constructionists have always
been partial, it might be unconstitutional to carry out constitutional
law. The assumption of such power was therefore, Mr. Gallatin held,
usurpation, to be resisted in one of two ways; by declaring the interval
till the next session of Congress an interregnum, allowing all laws not
immediately connected with presidential powers to take their course, and
opposing a silent resistance to all others; or by the Republicans
assuming the executive power by a joint act of the two candidates, or by
the relinquishment of all claims by one of them. On the other hand, the
proposed outlines of Republican conduct were, 1st, to persevere in
voting for Mr. Jefferson; 2d, to use every endeavor to defeat any law on
the subject; 3d, to try to persuade Mr. Adams to refuse his consent to
any such law and not to call the Senate on any account if there should
be no choice by the House.
In a letter written in 1848 Mr. Gallatin said that a provision by law,
that if there should be no election the executive power be placed in the
hands of some public officer, was a revolutionary act of usurpation
which would have been put down by force if necessary. It was threatened
that, if any man should be thus appointed President he should instantly
be put to death, and bodies of men were said to be organized, in
Maryland and Virginia, ready to march to Washington on March 4 for that
purpose. The fears of violence were so great that to Governor McKean of
Pennsylvania was submitted the propriety of having a body of militia in
readiness to reach the capital in time to prevent civil war. From this
letter of Mr. Gallatin, then the last surviving witness of the election,
only one conclusion can be drawn: that the Republicans would have
preferred violent resistance to temporary submission, even though the
officer exercising executive powers was appointed in accordance with
law. Fortunately for the young country there was enough good sense and
patriotism in the ranks of the Federalists to avert the danger.
On the suggestion of Mr. Bayard it was agreed by a committee of sixteen
members, one from each State, that if it should appear that the two
persons highest on the list, Jefferson and Burr, had an equal number of
votes, the House should immediately proceed in their own chamber to
choose the president by ballot, and should not adjourn until an
election should have been made. On the first ballot there was a tie
between Jefferson and Burr; the deadlock continued until February 17,
when the Federalists abandoned the contest, and Mr. Jefferson received
the requisite number of votes. Burr, having the second number, became
vice-president.
Mr. Gallatin's third congressional term closed with this Congress. In
his first term he asserted his power and took his place in the councils
of the party. In his second, he became its acknowledged chief. In the
third, he led its forces to final victory. But for his opposition, war
would have been declared against France, and the Republican party would
have disappeared in the political chasm. But for his admirable
management, Mr. Jefferson would have been relegated to the study of
theoretical government on his Monticello farm, or to play second fiddle
at the Capitol to the music of Aaron Burr.
In the foregoing analysis of the debates and resolutions of Congress,
and the recital of the part taken in them by Mr. Gallatin, attention has
only been paid to such of the proceedings as concerned the
interpretation of the Constitution or the forms of administration with
which Mr. Gallatin interested himself. From the day of his first
appearance he commanded the attention and the respect of his fellows.
The leadership of his party fell to him as of course. It was not grasped
by him. He was never a partisan. He never waived his entire
independence of judgment. His ingenuity and adroitness never tempted him
to untenable positions. Hence his party followed him with implicit
confidence. Yet while the debates of Congress, imperfectly reported as
they seem to be in its annals, show the deference paid to him by the
Republican leaders, and display the great share he took in the
definition of powers and of administration as now understood, his name
is hardly mentioned in history. Jefferson and Madison became presidents
of the United States. They, with Gallatin, formed the triumvirate which
ruled the country for sixteen years. Gallatin was the youngest of the
three.[9] To this political combination Gallatin brought a knowledge of
constitutional law equal to their own, a knowledge of international law
superior to that of either, and a habit of practical administration of
which they had no conception. The Republican party lost its chief when
Gallatin left the House; from that day it floundered to its close.
In the balance of opinion there are no certain weights and measures. The
preponderance of causes cannot be precisely ascertained. The freedom
which the people of the United States enjoy to-day is not the work of
any one party. Those who are descended from its original stock, and
those whom its free institutions have since invited to full membership,
owe that freedom to two causes: the one, formulated by Hamilton, a
strong, central power, which, deriving its force from the people,
maintains its authority at home and secures respect abroad; the other,
the spirit of liberty which found expression in the famous declaration
of the rights of man. This influence Jefferson represented. It taught
the equality of man; not equality before the law alone, nor yet
political equality, but that absolute freedom from class distinction
which is true social equality; in a word, mutual respect. But for
Hamilton we might be a handful of petty States, in discordant
confederation or perpetual war; but for Jefferson, a prey to the class
jealousy which unsettles the social relations and threatens the
political existence of European States.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 4: Lord Sheffield to Mr. Abbott, November 6, 1812.
_Correspondence of Lord Colchester_, ii. 409.]
[Footnote 5: Gallatin later described Jackson as he first saw him in his
seat in the House: "A tall, lank, uncouth looking individual, with long
locks of hair hanging over his brows and face, while a queue hung down
his back tied in an eelskin. The dress of this individual was singular,
his manners and deportment that of a backwoodsman." Bartlett's
_Reminiscences of Gallatin_.]
[Footnote 6: The phrase "stop the wheels of government" originated with
"Peter Porcupine" (William Cobbett) and was on every tongue.]
[Footnote 7: Charles C. Pinckney, when ambassador to France, 1796.]
[Footnote 8: Jefferson to William Duane, March 28, 1811. Jefferson's
_Works_, vol. v. p. 574.]
[Footnote 9: Jefferson was born in 1743, Madison in 1751, Gallatin in
1761.]
CHAPTER VI
SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY
_Funding_
The material comfort of every people depends more immediately upon the
correct management of its finances than upon any other branch of
government. _Haute finance_, to use a French expression for which there
is no English equivalent, demands in its application the faculties of
organization and administration in their highest degree. The relations
of money to currency and credit, and their relations to industry and
agriculture, or in modern phrase of capital to labor, fall within its
scope. The history of France, the nation which has best understood and
applied true principles of finance, supplies striking examples of the
benefits a finance minister of the first order renders to his country,
and the dangers of false theories. The marvelous restoration of its
prosperity by the genius of Colbert, the ruin caused by the malign
sciolism of Law, are familiar to all students of political economy. Nor
has the United States been less favored. The names of Morris, Hamilton,
Gallatin, and Chase shine with equal lustre.
Morris, the Financier of the Revolution, was called to the
administration of the money department of the United States government
when there was no money to administer. Before his appointment as
"Financier" the expenses of the government, military and civil, had been
met by expedients; by foreign loans, lotteries, and loan office
certificates; finally by continental money, or, more properly speaking,
bills of credit emitted by authority of Congress and made legal tender
by joint action of Congress and the several States. The relation of coin
to paper in this motley currency appears in the appendix to the "Journal
of Congress" for the year 1778, when the government paid out in fourteen
issues of paper currency, $62,154,842; in specie, $78,666; in French
livres, $28,525.[10] The power of taxation was jealously withheld by the
States, and Congress could not go beyond recommending to them to levy
taxes for the withdrawal of the bills emitted by it for their quotas,
_pari passu_ with their issue. When the entire scheme of paper money
failed, the necessary supplies for the army were levied in kind. In the
spring of 1781 the affairs of the Treasury Department were investigated
by a committee of Congress, and an attempt was made to ascertain the
precise condition of the public debt. The amount of foreign debt was
approximately reached, but the record of the domestic debt was
inextricably involved, and never definitely discovered. Morris soon
brought order out of this chaos. His plan was to liquidate the public
indebtedness in specie, and fund it in interest-bearing bonds. The Bank
of North America was established, the notes of which were soon preferred
to specie as a medium of exchange. Silver, then in general use as the
measure of value, was adopted as the single standard. The weight and
pureness of the dollar were fixed by law. The dollar was made the unit
of account and payment, and subdivisions were made in a decimal ratio.
This was the dollar of our fathers. Gouverneur Morris, the assistant of
the Financier, suggested the decimal computation, and Jefferson the
dollar as the unit of account and payment. The board of treasury, which
for five years had administered the finances in a bungling way, was
dissolved by Congress in the fall of 1781, and Morris was left in sole
control. Semi-annual statements of the public indebtedness were now
begun. The expenses of the government were steadily and inflexibly cut
down to meet the diminishing income. A loan was negotiated in Holland,
and, with the aid of Franklin, the amount of indebtedness to France was
established.
The public debt on January 1, 1783, was $42,000,375, of which $7,885,088
was foreign, bearing four and five per cent. interest; and $34,115,290
was held at home at six per cent. The total amount of interest was
$2,415,956. No means were provided for the payment of either principal
or interest. In July of the previous year Morris urged the wisdom of
funding the public debt, in a masterly letter to the president of
Congress. On December 16 a sinking fund was provided for by a
resolution, which, though inadequate to the purpose, was at least a
declaration of principle. In February, 1784, Morris notified Congress of
his intended retirement from office. He may justly be termed the father
of the American system of finance. In his administration he inflexibly
maintained the determination, with which he assumed the office, to apply
the public funds to the purpose to which they were appropriated. He
declared that he would "neither pay the interest of our debts out of the
moneys which are called for to carry on the war, nor pay the expenses of
the war from the funds which are called for to pay the interest of our
debts." One new feature of Morris's administration was the beginning of
the sale of public lands.
On the retirement of Mr. Morris, November, 1784, a new board of treasury
was charged with the administration of the finances, and continued in
control until September 30, 1788, when a committee, raised to examine
into the affairs of the department, rendered a pitiful report of
mismanagement for which the board had not the excuse of their
predecessors during the war. They had only to observe the precepts which
Morris had enunciated, and to follow the methods he had prescribed, with
the aid of the assistants he had trained. But the taxes collected had
not been covered into the Treasury by the receivers. Large sums
advanced for secret service were not accounted for; and the entire
system of responsibility had been disregarded. John Adams attributed all
the distresses at this period to "a downright ignorance of the nature of
coin, credit and circulation;" an ignorance not yet dispelled. More
truly could he have said that our distresses arose from willful neglect
of the principle of accountability in the public service.
The first Congress under the new Constitution met at New York on March
4, 1789, but it was not until the autumn that the executive
administration of the government was organized by the creation of the
three departments: State, Treasury, and War.
The bill establishing the Treasury Department passed Congress on
September 2, 1789. Hamilton was appointed secretary by Washington on
September 11. On September 21 the House directed the secretary to
examine into and report a financial plan. On the assembling of Congress,
June 14, 1790, Hamilton communicated to the House his first report,
known as that on public credit. The boldness of Hamilton's plan startled
and divided the country. Funding resolutions were introduced into the
House. The first, relating to the foreign debt, passed unanimously; the
second, providing for the liquidation of the domestic obligations, was
sharply debated, but in the end Hamilton's scheme was adopted. The
resolutions providing for the assumption of the state debts, which he
embodied in his report, aroused an opposition still more formidable, and
it was not until August 4 that by political machinery this part of his
plan received the assent of Congress. To provide for the interest on the
debt and the expenses of the government, the import and navigation
duties were raised to yield the utmost revenue available; but, in the
temper of Congress, the excise law was not pressed at this session. The
secretary had securely laid the foundations of his policy. Time and
sheer necessity would compel the completion of his work in essential
accord with his original design. The President's message at the opening
of the winter session added greatly to the prestige of Hamilton's policy
by calling attention to the great prosperity of the country and the
remarkable rise in public credit. The excise law, modified to apply to
distilled spirits, passed the House in January. The principle of a
direct tax was admitted. On December 14, 1790, in obedience to an order
of the House requiring the secretary to report further provision for the
public credit, Hamilton communicated his plans for a national bank. Next
in order came the establishment of a national mint. Thus in two sessions
of Congress, and in the space of little more than a year from the time
when he took charge of the Treasury, Hamilton conceived and carried to
successful conclusion an entire scheme of finance.
One more measure in the comprehensive system of public credit crowned
the solid structure of which the funding of the debt was the
cornerstone. This was the establishment of the sinking fund for the
redemption of the debt. Hamilton conformed his plan to the maxim, which,
to use his words, "has been supposed capable of giving immortality to
credit, namely, that with the creation of debts should be incorporated
the means of extinguishment, which are twofold. 1st. The establishing,
at the time of contracting a debt, funds for the reimbursement of the
principal, as well as for the payment of interest within a determinate
period. 2d. The making it a part of the contract, that the fund so
established shall be inviolably applied to the object." The ingenuity
and skill with which this master of financial science managed the
Treasury Department for more than five years need no word of comment.
Nor do they fall within the scope of this outline of the features of his
policy. His reports are the textbook of American political economy.
Whoever would grasp its principles must seek them in this limpid source,
and study the methods he applied to revenue and loans. Well might
Webster say of him in lofty praise, "He smote the rock of national
resources, and abundant streams of revenue gushed forth; he touched the
dead corpse of Public Credit, and it sprung upon its feet."
On the resignation of Hamilton, January 31, 1795, Washington invited
Wolcott, who was familiar with the views of Hamilton and on such
intimate terms with him that he could always have his advice in any
difficult emergency, to take the post. Wolcott had been connected with
the department from its organization, first as auditor, afterwards as
comptroller of the Treasury. He held the Treasury until nearly the end
of Adams's administration. On November 8, 1800, upon the open breach
between Mr. Adams and the Hamilton wing of the Federal party, Wolcott,
whose sympathies were wholly with his old chief, tendered his
resignation, to take effect at the close of the year. On December 31 Mr.
Samuel Dexter was appointed to administer the department. But the days
of the Federal party were now numbered: it fell of its own dissensions,
"wounded in the house of its friends."
There is little in the administration of the finances by Wolcott to
attract comment. He managed the details of the department with integrity
and skill. On his retirement a committee of the House on the condition
of the Treasury was appointed. No similar examination had been made
since May 22, 1794. On January 28, 1801, Mr. Otis, chairman of the
committee, submitted the results of the investigation in an unanimous
report that the business of the Treasury Department had been conducted
with regularity, fidelity, and a regard to economy; that the
disbursements of money had always been made pursuant to law, and
generally that the financial concerns of the country had been left by
the late secretary in a state of good order and prosperity. During his
six years of administration of the finances Wolcott negotiated six
loans, amounting in all to $2,820,000. The emergencies were
extraordinary,--the expenses of the suppression of the Whiskey
Insurrection in 1794, and the sum required to effect a treaty of peace
with Algiers in 1795. To fund these sums Mr. Wolcott had recourse to an
expedient which marked an era in American finance. This was the creation
of _new stock_, subscribed for at home. No loan had been previously
placed by the government among its own citizens. Between 1795 and 1798,
four and a half, five, and six per cent. stocks were created. In 1798
the condition of the country was embarrassing. There was a threatening
prospect of war. Foreign loans were precarious and improvident; the
market rate of interest was eight per cent. Under these circumstances an
eight per cent. stock was created, not redeemable until 1809. An Act of
March 3, 1795, provided for vesting in the sinking fund the surplus
revenues of each year.
In the formation of the first Republican cabinet Mr. Gallatin was
obviously Mr. Jefferson's first choice for the Treasury. The appointment
was nevertheless attended with some difficulties of a political and
party nature. The paramount importance of the department was a legacy of
Hamilton's genius. Its possession was the Federalist stronghold, and the
Senate, which held the confirming power, was still controlled by a
Federalist majority. To them Mr. Gallatin was more obnoxious than any
other of the Republican leaders. In the few days that he held a seat in
the Senate (1793) he offended Hamilton, and aroused the hostility of the
friends of the secretary by a call for information as to the condition
of the Treasury. As member of Congress in 1796 he questioned Hamilton's
policy, and during Adams's entire administration was a perpetual thorn
in the sides of Hamilton's successors in the department. The day after
his election, February 18, 1801, Mr. Jefferson communicated to Mr.
Gallatin the names of the gentlemen he had already determined upon for
his cabinet, and tendered him the Treasury. The only alternative was
Madison; but he, with all his reputation as a statesman and party
leader, was without skill as a financier, and in the debate on the
Funding Bill in 1790 had shown his ignorance in the impracticability of
his plans. If Jefferson ever entertained the thought of nominating
Madison to the Treasury, political necessity absolutely forbade it. That
necessity Mr. Gallatin, by his persistent assaults on the financial
policy of the Federalists, had himself created, and he alone of the
Republican leaders was competent to carry out the reforms in the
administration of the government, and to contrive the consequent
reduction in revenue and taxation, which were cardinal points of
Republican policy. Public opinion had assigned Gallatin to the post, and
the newspapers announced his nomination before Mr. Jefferson was
elected, and before he had given any indication of his purpose. To his
wife Mr. Gallatin expressed some doubt whether his abilities were equal
to the office, and whether the Senate would confirm him, and said,
certainly with sincerity, 'that he would not be sorry nor hurt in his
feelings if his nomination should be rejected, for exclusively of the
immense responsibility, labor, etc., attached to the intended office,
another plan which would be much more agreeable to him and to her had
been suggested, not by his political friends, but by his New York
friends.' He was by no means comfortable in his finances, and he had
already formed a plan of studying law and removing to New York. He had
made up his mind to leave the western country, which would necessarily
end his congressional career. His wife was forlorn in his absence, and
suffered so many hardships in her isolated residence that he felt no
reluctance to the change. To one of his wife's family he wrote at this
time:--
"As a political situation, the place of secretary of the treasury
is doubtless more eligible and congenial to my habits; but it is
more laborious and responsible than any other, and the same
industry which will be necessary to fulfill its duties, applied to
another object, would at the end of two years have left me in the
possession of a profession which I might have exercised either in
Philadelphia or New York. But our plans are all liable to
uncertainty, and I must now cheerfully undertake that which had
never been the object of my ambition or wishes."
Well might he hesitate as he witnessed the distress which had overtaken
the great party which for twelve years had held the posts of political
honor. Fortunately, perhaps for himself and certainly for his party and
the country, the proposition came at a time when he had definitively
determined upon a change of career. His situation was difficult. The
hostility of the Federal senators, and the great exertions which were
being made to defeat the appointment, led him to the opinion that, if
presented on March 4, it would be rejected. There was the alternative of
delay until after that date, which would involve a postponement of the
confirmation until the meeting of Congress in December, but there was no
certainty that it would then be ratified. Meanwhile he would be
compelled to remove to Washington at some sacrifice and expense. He
therefore at first positively refused "to come in on any terms but a
confirmation by the Senate first given." He was finally induced to
comply with the general wish of his political friends. The appointment
was withheld by the President that the feeling in the Senate might be
judged from its action on the rest of the nominations submitted. They
were all approved, and Mr. Dexter consented to hold over until his
successor should be appointed. Thus Mr. Gallatin's convenience was
entirely consulted. He remained in Washington a few days to confer with
the President as to the general conduct of the administration, and on
March 14 set out for Fayette to put his affairs in order and to bring
his wife and family to Washington. On May 14 Jefferson wrote to Macon,
"The arrival of Mr. Gallatin yesterday completed the organization of our
administration."
Mr. Gallatin soon realized the magnitude of his task. He did nothing by
halves. To whatever work he had to do, he brought the best of his
faculty. No man ever better deserved the epithet of "thorough." He
searched till he found the principle of every measure with which he had
concern and understood every detail of its application. This perfect
knowledge of every subject which he investigated was the secret of his
political success. As a committee man, he was incomparable. No one could
be better equipped for the direction of the Treasury Department than he,
but he was not satisfied with direction; he would manage also; and he
went to the work with untiring energy. A quarter of a century later he
said of it, in a letter to his son, "To fill that office in the manner I
did, and as it ought to be filled, is a most laborious task and labor of
the most tedious kind. To fit myself for it, to be able to understand
thoroughly, to embrace and control all its details, took from me, during
the two first years I held it, every hour of the day and many of the
night and had nearly brought on a pulmonary complaint. I filled the
office twelve years and was fairly worn out."
Mr. Gallatin first drew public attention to his knowledge of finance in
the Pennsylvania legislature. An extract from his memorandum of his
three years' service gives the best account of this incident. In it
appear the carefully matured convictions which he inflexibly maintained.
"The report of the Committee of Ways and Means of the session
1790-1791 (presented by Gurney, chairman) was entirely prepared by
me, known to be so, and laid the foundation of my reputation. I was
quite astonished at the general encomiums bestowed upon it, and was
not at all aware that I had done so well. It was perspicuous and
comprehensive; but I am confident that its true merit, and that
which gained me the general confidence, was its being founded in
strict justice without the slightest regard to party feelings or
popular prejudices. The principles assumed, and which were carried
into effect, were the immediate reimbursement and extinction of the
state paper money, the immediate payment in specie of all the
current expenses or warrants on the Treasury (the postponement and
uncertainty of which had given rise to shameful and corrupt
speculations), and provision for discharging, without defalcation,
every debt and engagement previously recognized by the State. In
conformity with this, the State paid to its creditors the
difference between the nominal amount of the state debt assumed by
the United States and the rate at which it was funded by the act of
Congress.
"The proceeds of the public lands, together with the arrears, were
the fund which not only discharged all the public debts, but left a
large surplus. The apprehension that this would be squandered by
the Legislature was the principal inducement for chartering the
Bank of Pennsylvania with a capital of two millions of dollars, of
which the State subscribed one half. This and similar subsequent
investments enabled Pennsylvania to defray out of the dividends all
the expenses of government without any direct tax during the forty
ensuing years, and till the adoption of the system of internal
improvement, which required new resources."
This report was printed in the Journal of the House, February 8, 1791.
The next year he made a report on the same subject which was printed
February 22, 1792.
But his equal grasp of larger subjects was shown in his sketch of the
finances of the United States, which he published in November, 1796. It
presents under three sections the revenues, the expenses, and the debts
of the United States, each subdivided into special heads. The arguments
are supported by elaborate tabular statements. No such exhaustive
examination had been made of the state of the American finances. The one
cardinal principle which he laid down was the extinguishment of debt. He
severely criticised Hamilton's methods of funding, and outlined those
which he himself later applied. He charged upon Hamilton direct
violations of law in the application of money, borrowed as principal, to
the payment of interest on that principal. The public funds he regarded
as three in number: 1st, the sinking fund; 2d, the surplus fund; 3d, the
general fund.
In July, 1800, Mr. Gallatin published a second pamphlet, "Views of the
Public Debt, Receipts, and Expenditures of the United States," the
object of the inquiry being to ascertain the result of the fiscal
operations of the government under the Constitution. The entire field of
American finance is examined from its beginning. He severely condemns
the mode of assumption of the state debts in Hamilton's original plan,
and no doubt his strictures are technically correct. The debts assumed
for debtor States were not due by the United States, nor was there any
moral reason for their assumption. But the assumption was sound
financial policy, and all the cost to the nation was amply repaid by the
order which their assumption drew out of chaos, and the vigor given to
the general credit by the strengthening of that of its parts. The course
of the Federalists and Republicans on this question shows that the
former had at heart the welfare of all the States, while the latter
confined their interest to their own body politic.
Had Mr. Gallatin never penned another line on finance, these two
remarkable papers would place him in the first rank of economists and
statisticians. There are no errors in his figures, no flaws in his
reasoning, no faults in his deductions. In construction and detail, as
parts of a complete financial system of administration, they are beyond
criticism. Opinions may differ as to the ends sought, but not as to the
means to those ends.
For a long period Mr. Gallatin found no more time for essays; he was
now to apply his methods. These may be traced in his printed treasury
reports, which are lucid and instructive. He was appointed to the
Treasury on May 14, 1801, as appears by the official record in the State
Department. Before he entered on the duties of the office he submitted
to Mr. Jefferson, March 14, 1801, some rough sketches of the financial
situation, and suggested the general outlines of his policy. He insisted
upon a curtailment in the appropriations for the naval and military
establishments, the only saving adequate to the repeal of all internal
duties; and upon the discharge of the foreign debt within the period of
its obligation. He estimated that the probable receipts and expenditures
for the year 1801 would leave a surplus of more than two millions of
dollars applicable to the redemption of the debt.
On taking personal charge of the Treasury Department, his first business
was to get rid of the arrears of current business which had accumulated
since the retirement of Wolcott; his next, to perfect the internal
revenue system, so far as it could be remedied without new legislation.
The entire summer of 1801 was passed in "arranging, or rather procuring
correct statements amongst the Treasury documents," a task of such
difficulty that he was unwilling, on November 15, to arrive at an
estimate of the revenue within half a million, or to commit himself to
any opinion as to the feasibility of abolishing the internal revenues.
In his "notes" submitted to Jefferson upon the draft of his first
message, there are several passages of interest which show Mr.
Gallatin's logical habit of searching out economic causes. Under the
head of finances, he remarks, "The revenue has increased more than in
the same ratio with population: 1st, because our wealth has increased in
a greater ratio than population; 2d, because the seaports and towns,
which consume imported articles much more than the country, have
increased in a greater proportion." The final paragraph in these "notes"
is a synopsis of his entire scheme of administration.
"There is but one subject not mentioned in the message which I feel
extremely anxious to see recommended. It is generally that Congress
should adopt such measures as will effectually guard against
misapplications of public moneys, by making specific appropriations
whenever practicable; by providing against the application of
moneys drawn from the Treasury under an appropriation to any other
object or to any greater amount than that for which they have been
drawn; by limiting discretionary power in the application of that
money; whether by heads of department or by any other agents; and
by rendering every person who receives public moneys from the
Treasury as immediately, promptly, and effectually accountable to
the accounting officer (the comptroller) as practicable. The great
characteristic, the flagrant vice, of the late administration has
been total disregard of laws, and application of public moneys by
the Department to objects for which they were not appropriate."
Outlines for a system of specific appropriations were inclosed.
That the mission of Jefferson's administration was the reduction of the
debt, Gallatin set forth in his next letter of November 16, 1801. "I am
firmly of opinion that if the present administration and Congress do not
take the most effective measures for that object, the debt will be
entailed on us and the ensuing generations, together with all the
systems which support it, and which it supports." On the other hand he
says, "If this administration shall not reduce taxes, they never will be
permanently reduced." To reduce both the debt and the taxes was as much
a political as a financial problem. To solve it required the reduction
to a minimum of the departments of War and Marine. But Mr. Jefferson was
not a practical statesman. His individuality was too strong for much
surrender of opinion. He stated the case very mildly when he wrote in
his retirement that he sometimes differed in opinion from some of his
friends, from those whose views were as "pure and as sound as his own."
It was not his habit to consult his entire cabinet except on general
measures. The heads of each department set their views before him
separately. Under this system Mr. Gallatin was never able to realize
that harmonious interdependence of departments and subordination of ways
to means which were his ideal of cabinet administration.
The successful application of Mr. Gallatin's plan would have
subordinated all the executive departments to the Treasury. The theory
was perfect, but it took no account of the greed of office, the
jealousies of friends, the opposition of enemies, and the unknown factor
of foreign relations. A speck on the horizon would cloud the peaceful
prospect, a hostile threat derange the intricate machinery by which the
delicate financial balance was maintained. Mr. Gallatin was fast
realizing the magnitude of his undertaking, in which he was greatly
embarrassed by the difficulty of finding faithful examining clerks, on
whose correctness and fidelity a just settlement of all accounts
depends. The number of independent offices attached to the Treasury made
the task still more arduous. He wrote to Jefferson at this time, "It
will take me twelve months before I can thoroughly understand every
detail of all these several offices. Current business and the more
general and important duties of the office do not permit me to learn the
lesser details, but incidentally and by degrees. Until I know them all I
dare not touch the machine." One of the acquirements which he considered
indispensable for a secretary of the treasury was a "thorough knowledge
of book-keeping." The recollection of his persistent demands for
information from Hamilton and Wolcott during his congressional career
would have stung the conscience of an ordinary man. But Gallatin was not
an ordinary man. He asked nothing of others which he himself was not
willing to perform. His ideal was high, but he reached its summit. It
seems almost as if, in his persistent demand that money accountability
should be imposed by law upon the Treasury Department, he sought to set
the measure of his own duty, while in the requirement that it should be
extended to the other departments, he pledged himself to the perfect
accomplishment of that duty in his own.
In his first report to Congress,[11] made December 18, 1801, Mr.
Gallatin submitted his financial estimate for the year 1802.
REVENUE. EXPENDITURES.
Imposts $9,500,000 Int. on debts. $7,100,000
Lands } 450,000 Civil List 980,000
Postages } Army 1,420,000
Internal Rev. 650,000 Navy 1,100,000
---------- ----------
$10,600,000 $10,600,000
Mr. Wolcott, in his last report to the Commissioners of the Sinking
Fund, stated the amount in the Treasury to its credit at $500,718. Mr.
Gallatin denied that there was any such surplus, but said that instead
of a credit balance the treasury books showed a deficiency of $930,128
on the aggregate revenue from the establishment of the government to the
close of the year 1799. Elliott, in his "Funding System," said
concerning this once vexed controversy, that it was difficult to
reconcile such a diversity of opinion on so intricate a subject; and
concerning the official statements of Hamilton and Wolcott, that it was
hardly to be credited that they were so superficial or imperfect. Mr.
Gallatin himself furnishes the apology that the difference might arise
from "entries made or omitted on erroneous principles." To the Federal
financiers the palliation was as offensive as the charge, and rankled
long and sore. If it were not possible, when Elliott made an
examination, to arrive at the precise facts, it is certainly now a
secret as secure from discovery as the lost sibylline leaves.
Mr. Gallatin stated the debt of the United States--
On January 1, 1801, at $80,161,207.60
On January 1, 1802, at 77,881,890.29
---------------
Reduction $2,279,317.31
This difference was the amount of principal paid during the year 1801,
the result of the management of his predecessors. On December 18, 1801,
Mr. Gallatin entered upon an examination of the time in which the total
debt might be discharged, and showed that, by the annual application of
$7,300,000 to the principal and interest the debt would in eight years,
_i. e._ on January 1, 1810, be reduced (by the payment of $32,289,000 of
the principal) to $45,592,739, and that the same annual sum of
$7,300,000 would discharge the whole debt by the year 1817. The revenues
of the Union he found sufficient to defray all the current expenses. In
his report to Congress at the beginning of the session he designated
this sum of $7,300,000 to be set aside from the revenues, and Congress
gave the requisite authority. An extract from a tabular statement
submitted to the House of Representatives, April 16, 1810, will show how
nearly Mr. Gallatin approached the result at which he aimed, and the
nature of the embarrassment he encountered on the path.
------+--------------+--------------+---------------+-------------+
| Amount of | Payments | Debt | Annual |
Years.| Public Debt | on | Contracted. | Increase. |
| January 1st. | Principal. | | |
------+--------------+--------------+---------------+-------------+
1802 |$80,712,632.25| $3,657,945.95| - | - |
1803 | 77,054,686.30| 5,627,565.42| $15,000,000* |$9,372,434.58|
1804 | 86,427,120.88| 4,114,970.38| - | - |
1805 | 82,312,150.50| 6,588,879.84| - | - |
1806 | 75,723,270.66| 6,504,872.02| - | - |
1807 | 69,218,398.64| 4,022,080.67| - | - |
1808 | 65,196,317.97| 8,173,125.88| - | - |
1809 | 57,023,192.09| 3,850,889.77| - | - |
1810 | 53,172,302.32| - | - | - |
------+--------------+--------------+---------------+-------------+
-----------------
Annual
Decrease.
-----------------
$3,657,948.95
-
4,114,970.38
6,588,879.84
6,504,872.02
4,022,080.67
8,173,125.88
3,850,889.77
-
-----------------
* Louisiana purchase.
1802 $80,712,632.25 Decrease $36,912,764.51
1810 53,172,302.32 Increase 9,372,434.58
-------------- --------------
$27,540,329.93 Decrease in 8 yrs. $27,540,329.93
From this it appears that, notwithstanding the extraordinary increase of
the principal by the amount of the Louisiana purchase, Mr. Gallatin
contrived a reduction of $27,540,329. But if to this be added the true
reduction for the year 1803, namely, the difference between the
Louisiana debt, $15,000,000, and the increase for that year, by reason
of that purchase, $9,372,434, say $6,627,565, the reduction is found to
be, and but for that disturbing cause would have reached, $34,167,895,
a sum exceeding by $1,878,895 that estimated by Mr. Gallatin in his
report of 1801 as the amount of eight years' reduction, namely,
$32,289,000.
The ways and means of this remarkable example of financial management
appear in the following extracts from Elliott's synoptical statement
(table given on page 194).
The purchase of Louisiana was the extraordinary financial measure of
Jefferson's first presidential term. Though the new obligation for the
consideration money, fifteen millions of dollars, was a large sum in
proportion to the total existing debt of the United States, it did not
in the least derange Gallatin's plan of funding and reduction, but was
brought without friction within his general scheme. With the terms of
the contract Gallatin had nothing to do. They were arranged by
Livingston and Monroe, the American commissioners; the intervention of
the houses of Hope and the Barings being a part of the understanding
between the commissioners and the French government. These bankers
engaged to make the money payments and take six per cent. stock of the
United States at seventy-eight and one half cents on the dollar. With
this price Mr. Gallatin does not seem to have been satisfied, though of
course he interposed no objection to the terms; but to Jefferson he
wrote, August 31, 1803, that the low price at which that stock had been
sold, was "not ascribable to the state of public credit nor to any act
of your administration, and particularly of the Treasury Department;"
and he adds in a postscript, "at that period our threes were in England
worth one per cent. more at market than the English."
RECEIPTS.
------------------+----------------+---------------+-------------+
Four years | Customs. | Internal | Direct |
ending | | Revenue. | Taxes. |
December 31. | | | |
------------------+----------------+---------------+-------------+
Adams, 1800 | $30,347,093.62 | $2,808,382.37 | $734,223.97 |
+--------------- +-------------- +------------ +
Jefferson, 1804 | 44,766,997.61 | 1,936,053.30 | 862,986.46 |
1808 | 59,813,257.40 | 63,110.73 | 131,539.54 |
+--------------- +-------------- +------------ +
| 104,580,255.01 | 1,999,146.03 | 994,526.00 |
------------------+----------------+---------------+-------------+
------------------+-------------+--------------+---------------+
Four years | Postage. | Public | Loans and |
ending | | Lands. | Treasury |
December 31. | | | Notes. |
------------------+-------------+--------------+---------------+
Adams, 1800 | $223,000.00 | $95,947.46 | $7,055,791.25 |
+-------------+--------------+---------------+
Jefferson, 1804 | 157,427.26 | 1,009,556.56 | 25,255.00 |
1808 | 60,074.90 | 2,419,541.86 | 179,534.81 |
+-------------+--------------+---------------+
| 217,502.10 | 3,429,098.42 | 205,089.81 |
------------------+-------------+--------------+---------------+
------------------+--------------+----------------+----------------
Four years | Dividends | Miscellaneous. | Total.
ending | and sales of | |
December 31. | Bank Stock. | |
------------------+--------------+-------------- -+----------------
Adams, 1800 | $607,220.00 | $168,971.76 | $42,040,630.45
+--------------+----------------+----------------
Jefferson, 1804 | 1,416,360.00 | 672,148.72 | 50,846,784.91
1808 | -- | 85,782.03 | 62,758,841.27
+--------------+----------------+----------------
| 1,416,360.00 | 757,930.75 | 113,605,626.18
------------------+--------------+----------------+----------------
EXPENDITURES.
------------------+---------------+---------------+--------------+
Four years | Civil List. | Foreign |Miscellaneous.|
ending | | Intercourse | |
December 31. | | including | |
| | Awards. | |
------------------+---------------+---------------+--------------+
Adams, 1800 | $2,329,433.08 | $1,793,879.57 | $621,633.37 |
+---------------+---------------+--------------+
Jefferson, 1804 | 2,297,648.17 | 3,144,093.00 | 1,169,601.87 |
1808 | 2,616,772.77 | 5,441,669.24 | 1,721,876.87 |
+---------------+---------------+--------------+
| 4,914,420.94 | 8,585,762.24 | 2,891,478.74 |
------------------+---------------+---------------+--------------+
------------------+---------------+-------------+--------------+
Four years | Military | Pensions. | Indian |
ending | Forts, etc. | | Department. |
December 31. | | | |
| | | |
------------------+---------------+-------------+--------------+
Adams, 1800 | $8,076,750.71 | $356,677.06 | $99,299.88 |
+---------------+-------------+--------------+
Jefferson, 1804 | 4,549,572.11 | 301,968.66 | 279,500.00 |
1808 | 6,126,656.97 | 316,806.16 | 849,700.00 |
+---------------+-------------+--------------+
| 10,676,229.08 | 618,774.82 | 1,129,200.00 |
------------------+---------------+-------------+--------------+
------------------+----------------+----------------+----------------
Four years | Naval | Public Debt. | Total.
ending | Establishment. | |
December 31. | | |
| | |
------------------+----------------+----------------+----------------
Adams, 1800 | $8,070,777.52 | $18,957,962.69 | $40,306,413.88
+----------------+----------------+----------------
Jefferson, 1804 | 5,432,049.15 | 32,258,658.68 | 49,433,091.64
1808 | 6,853,673.79 | 32,927,739.85 | 56,854,985.65
+----------------+----------------+----------------
| 12,285,722.94 | 65,186,398.53 | 106,288,077.29
------------------+----------------+----------------+----------------
Adams--Receipts $42,040,630.45
Adams--Expenditures 40,306,413.88
--------------
Under Wolcott, Secretary 1,734,216.57
Jefferson--Receipts $113,605,626.18
Jefferson--Expenditures 106,288,077.29
--------------
Under Gallatin, Secretary 7,317,584.89[12]
[**Transcriber's Note: Some of the numbers in the above tables do not
add up, but reflect the actual numbers given in the original document.]
The arrangements being completed, Jefferson called Congress together in
October, 1803, for a ratification of the treaty; the commissioners, by
virtue of the authority granted them, had already guaranteed the advance
by the Barings of ten million livres ($2,000,000). On October 25, 1803,
Gallatin made a report to Congress on the state of the finances. It
showed a reduction of the public debt in the two and one half years of
his management, April 1, 1801, to September 30, 1803, of $12,702,404.
The only question to be considered was whether any additional revenues
were wanted to provide for the _new debt_ which would result from the
purchase of Louisiana.
The sum called for by treaty, fifteen millions, consisted of two items:
1st, $11,250,000 payable to the government of France in a stock bearing
an interest of six per cent. payable in Europe, and the principal to be
discharged at the Treasury of the United States; 2d, a sum which could
not exceed, but might fall short of, $3,750,000, payable in specie at
the Treasury of the United States to American citizens having claims of
a certain description upon the government of France.
It is interesting here to note Mr. Gallatin's distinction between the
place of payment of interest and of principal as a new departure in
American finance. The principal and interest of foreign loans had up to
that period been paid abroad. But a United States stock was an
obligation of a different character and properly payable at home. In the
large negotiations which Secretary Chase had in 1862 with the Treasury
Note Committee of the Associated Banks,[13] this policy was matter of
grave debate. The determined American pride of Mr. Chase prevailed, and
both the principal _and interest_ of the loans created were made payable
at the Treasury of the United States. These may be small matters in
their financial result, but are grave points in national policy.
The only financial legislation necessary to carry out the Louisiana
purchase was a provision that $700,000 of the duties on merchandise and
tonnage, a sum sufficient to pay the interest on the new debt, be added
to the annual permanent appropriation for the sinking fund, making a sum
of $8,000,000 in all.
The new debt would, Gallatin said, neither impede nor retard the payment
of the principal of the old debt; and the fund would be sufficient,
besides paying the interest on both, to discharge the principal of the
old debt before the year 1818, and of the new, within one year and a
half after that year. In this expectation he relied solely on the
maintenance of the revenue at the amount of the year 1802, and in no way
depended on its probable increase as a result of neutrality in the
European war; nor on any augmentation by reason of increase of
population or wealth, nor the effect which the opening of the
Mississippi to free navigation might be expected to have on the sales of
public lands and the general resources of the country.
In his report of December 9, 1805, Mr. Gallatin reviewed the results of
his first four years of service, April 1, 1801, to March 31, 1805.
RECEIPTS.
Duties on tonnage and importation of
foreign merchandise $45,174,837.22
From all other sources 5,492,629.82
--------------
$50,667,467.04
==============
EXPENDITURES.
Civil list and miscellaneous $3,786,094.79
Intercourse with foreign nations 1,071,437.84
Military establishment and Indian department 4,405,192.26
Naval establishment 4,842,635.15
Interest on foreign debt 16,278,700.95
Reimbursement of debt from surplus
revenue 19,281,446.57
--------------
$49,665,507.56
The Louisiana purchase and the admirable manner of its financial
arrangement were important factors in Jefferson's reëlection. Mr.
Gallatin was now sure of four years, at least, for the prosecution of
his plan of redemption of the public debt. Estimating that with the
increase of population at the rate of thirty-five per cent. in ten
years, and the corresponding growth of the revenue, he could count upon
a net annual surplus of $5,500,000, he now proposed to convert the
several outstanding obligations into a six per cent. stock amounting,
January 1, 1809, to less than _forty millions of dollars_, which the
continued annual appropriation of $8,000,000 would, besides paying the
interest on the Louisiana debt, reimburse within a period of less than
seven years, or before the end of the year 1815. After that year no
other incumbrance would remain on the revenue than the interest and
reimbursement of the Louisiana stock, the last payment of which in the
year 1821 would complete the final extinguishment of the public debt.
The conversion act was passed February 1, 1807, and books were opened on
July 1 following. On February 27, 1807, Mr. Gallatin made a special
report on the state of the debt from 1801 to 1807, showing a diminution,
notwithstanding the Louisiana purchase, of $14,260,000.
In the summer of 1807 war with England seemed inevitable. Gallatin had
the satisfaction to report a full treasury,--the amount of specie
October 7, 1807, reaching over eight and one half millions,--and an
annual unappropriated surplus, which could be confidently relied upon,
of at least three millions of dollars. On this subject his remarks in
the light of subsequent history are of extreme interest. While
refraining from any recommendations as to the application of this
surplus, either to "measures of security and defense," or to "internal
improvements which, while increasing and diffusing the national wealth,
will strengthen the bonds of union," as "subjects which do not fall
within the province of the Treasury Department," he proceeds to consider
the advantage of an accumulation in the Treasury. In this report he
rises with easy flight far above the purely financial atmosphere into
the higher plane of political economy.
"A previous accumulation of treasure in time of peace might in a
great degree defray the extraordinary expenses of war and diminish
the necessity of either loans or additional taxes. It would provide
during periods of prosperity for those adverse events to which
every nation is exposed, instead of increasing the burthens of the
people at a time when they are least able to bear them, or of
impairing, by anticipations, the resources of ensuing
generations....
"That the revenue of the United States will in subsequent years be
considerably impaired by a war neither can nor ought to be
concealed. It is, on the contrary, necessary, in order to be
prepared for the crisis, to take an early view of the subject, and
to examine the resources which should be selected for supplying the
deficiency and defraying the extraordinary expenses....
"Whether taxes should be raised to a greater amount or loans be
altogether relied on for defraying the expenses of the war, is the
next subject of consideration.
"Taxes are paid by the great mass of the citizens, and immediately
affect almost every individual of the community. Loans are supplied
by capital previously accumulated by a few individuals. In a
country where the resources of individuals are not generally and
materially affected by the war, it is practicable and wise to raise
by taxes the greater part at least of the annual supplies. The
credit of the nation may also from various circumstances be at
times so far impaired as to have no resource but taxation. In both
respects the situation of the United States is totally
dissimilar....
"An addition to the debt is doubtless an evil, but experience
having now shown with what rapid progress the revenue of the Union
increases in time of peace, with what facility the debt, formerly
contracted, has in a few years been reduced, a hope may confidently
be entertained that all the evils of the war will be temporary and
easily repaired, and that the return of peace will, without any
effort, afford ample resources for reimbursing whatever may have
been borrowed during the war."
He then enumerates the several branches of revenue which might be
selected to provide for the interest of war loans and to cover
deficiencies. First, a considerable increase of the duties on
importations; and here he says:--
"Without resorting to the example of other nations, experience has
proven that this source of revenue is in the United States the most
productive, the easiest to collect, and the least burthensome to
the great mass of the people. 2d. Indirect taxes, however
ineligible, will doubtless be cheerfully paid as _war taxes_, if
necessary. 3d. Direct taxes are liable to a particular objection
arising from unavoidable inequality produced by the general rule
of the Constitution. Whatever differences may exist between the
relative wealth and consequent ability of paying of the several
States, still the tax must necessarily be raised in proportion to
their relative population."
The Orders in Council of November 11, 1807, avowedly adopted to compel
all nations to give up their maritime trade or accept it through Great
Britain, reached Washington on December 18, 1807, and were immediately
replied to by the United States by an embargo act on December 22. The
history of the political effect of this measure is beyond the limits of
this economic study, and will be touched upon in a later chapter, but
the result of its application upon the Treasury falls within this
analysis of the methods of Mr. Gallatin's administration.
On December 18 Gallatin wrote Jefferson that "in every point of view,
privations, sufferings, revenue, effect on the enemy, politics at home,
etc.," he preferred "war to a permanent embargo;" nevertheless he was
called upon to draft the bill. The correctness of Mr. Gallatin's
prevision was soon apparent. In his report of December 10, 1808, he
reviewed the general effect of the measure. "The embargo has brought
into and kept in the United States almost all the floating property of
the nation. And whilst the depreciated value of domestic product
increases the difficulty of raising a considerable revenue by internal
taxes, at no former time has there been so much specie, so much
redundant unemployed capital in the country." Again stating his opinion
that loans should be principally relied on in case of war, he closed
with the following words: "The high price of public stocks (and indeed
of all species of stocks), the reduction of the public debt, the
unimpaired credit of the general government, and the large amount of
existing bank stock in the United States [estimated by him at forty
millions of dollars], leave no doubt of the practicability of obtaining
the necessary loans on reasonable terms."
The receipts into the Treasury during the
year ending September, 1808, the last of
Jefferson's administration, were $17,952,419.90
The disbursements during the same period
were 12,635,275.46
-------------
Excess of receipts $5,317,144.44
And the specie in Treasury, October 1,
1808 $13,846,717.82
From January 1, 1791, to January 1, 1808, the debt had fallen from
$75,169,974 to $57,023,192; during the first ten years it had increased
nearly seven millions of dollars, in the last eight it had been
diminished more than twenty millions and Louisiana had been purchased.
Thus closed the second term of Gallatin's service. Happen what might,
the credit of the country could not be in a better situation to meet the
exigencies of a war. A letter from Mr. Jefferson to Mr. Gallatin after
the close of this administration, and Gallatin's reply, show the entire
accord between them upon the one cardinal point of financial policy. Mr.
Jefferson, October 11, 1809, wrote from Monticello, "I consider the
fortunes of our republic as depending in an eminent degree on the
extinction of the public debt before we engage in any war; because, that
done, we shall have revenue enough to improve our country in peace and
defend it in war, without incurring either new taxes or new loans." And
urging Gallatin to retain his post, he closed with the striking words,
"I hope, then, you will abandon entirely the idea you expressed to me,
and that you will consider the eight years to come as essential to your
political career. I should certainly consider any earlier day of your
retirement as the most inauspicious day our new government has ever
seen." To which Gallatin replied from Washington, on November 10:--
"The reduction of the public debt was certainly the principal
object in bringing me into office, and our success in that respect
has been due both to the joint and continued efforts of the several
branches of government and to the prosperous situation of the
country. I am sensible that the work cannot progress under adverse
circumstances. If the United States shall be forced into a state of
actual war, all the resources of the country must be called forth
to make it efficient and new loans will undoubtedly be wanted. But
whilst peace is preserved, the revenue will, at all events, be
sufficient to pay the interest and to defray necessary expenses. I
do not ask that in the present situation of our foreign relations
the debt be reduced, but only that it shall not be increased so
long as we are not at war."
In his eight years of service under Jefferson, Gallatin had not found
the Treasury Department a bed of roses. Under Madison there was an undue
proportion of thorns.
It has been shown that the entire reliance of Gallatin for the expenses
of government was on customs, tonnage dues, and land sales. The effect
of the Embargo Act was soon felt in the falling off of importations, and
consequently in the revenue from this source. Mr. Gallatin felt the
strain in the spring of 1809; and on March 18, soon after Mr. Madison's
inauguration, he gave notice to the commissioners of the sinking fund of
a probable deficiency. In his annual report to Congress, December, 1809,
he announced the expenses of government, exclusive of the payments on
account of the principal of the debt, to have exceeded the actual
receipts into the Treasury by a sum of near $1,300,000. For this
deficiency, and the sum required for the sinking fund, Gallatin was
authorized in May to borrow from the Bank of the United States
$3,750,000 at six per cent., reimbursable on December 31, 1811. Of this
sum only $2,750,000 was taken, the expenses having proved less than Mr.
Gallatin had anticipated.
Madison called Congress together on November 1, 1811. The political
tension was strong, and he was anxious to throw the responsibility of
peace or war upon Congress. On November 22, 1811, Mr. Gallatin made his
report on the finances and the public debt. It was, as usual, explicit
and in no manner despondent. The actual receipts arising from revenue
alone exceeded the current expenses, including the interest paid on the
debt, by a sum of more than five and one half millions of dollars. The
public debt on January 1, 1812, was $45,154,463. Since Gallatin took
charge of the department, the United States had in ten years and nine
months paid in full the purchase money of Louisiana, and increased its
revenue nearly two millions of dollars. For eight years eight millions
of dollars had been annually paid on account of the principal and
interest of the debt. And as though intending to leave as the legacy of
his service a lesson of financial policy, he said:--
"_The redemption of principal has been effected without the aid of
any internal taxes, either direct or indirect, without any addition
during the last seven years to the rate of duties on importations,
which on the contrary have been impaired by the repeal of the duty
on salt, and notwithstanding the great diminution of commerce
during the last four years._ It therefore proves decisively the
ability of the United States with their ordinary revenue to
discharge, in ten years of peace, a debt of forty-two millions of
dollars, a fact which considerably lessens the weight of the most
formidable objection to which that revenue, depending almost solely
on commerce, appears to be liable. In time of peace it is almost
sufficient to defray the expenses of a war; in time of war it is
hardly competent to support the expenses of a peace establishment.
Sinking at once, under adverse circumstances, from fifteen to six
or eight millions of dollars, it is only by a persevering
application of the surplus which it affords us in years of
prosperity, to the discharge of the debt, that a total change in
the system of taxation or a perpetual accumulation of debt can be
avoided. But if a similar application of such surplus be hereafter
strictly adhered to, forty millions of debt, contracted during five
or six years of war, may always, without any extraordinary
exertions, be reimbursed in ten years of peace. This view of the
subject at the present crisis appears necessary for the purpose of
distinctly pointing out one of the principal resources within reach
of the United States. But to be placed on a solid foundation, it
requires the aid of a revenue sufficient at least to defray the
ordinary expenses of government, and to pay the interest on the
public debt, including that on new loans which may be authorized."
From this plain declaration, it was evident that the sum necessary to
pay interest on new loans, and provide for their redemption by the
operation of the sinking fund, could not be obtained from the ordinary
sources of revenue, and that resort must be had to extraordinary imposts
or direct taxation. On January 10, 1812, in response to an inquiry of
the Ways and Means Committee as to an increase of revenue in _the event
of a war_, Gallatin submitted a project for war loans of ten millions a
year, irredeemable for ten years. He pointed out that the government had
never since its organization obtained considerable loans at six per
cent. per annum, except from the Bank of the United States, and these,
on a capital of seven millions, never amounted to seven millions in the
whole. As the amount of prospective loans would naturally raise the
amount of interest, it seemed prudent not to limit the rate of interest
by law; ineligible as it seemed to leave that rate discretionary with
the executive, it was preferable to leaving the public service
unprovided for. For the same reason the loans should be made
irredeemable for a term not less than ten years.
He then repeated a former suggestion, that "treasury notes," bearing
interest, might be issued, which would to that extent diminish the
amount to be directly borrowed and also provide a part of the
circulating medium, passing as bank notes; but their issue must be
strictly limited to that amount at which they would circulate without
depreciation. So long as the public credit is preserved and a sufficient
revenue provided, he entertained no doubts of the possibility of
procuring on loan the sums necessary to defray the extraordinary
expenses of a war. He warned the committee, and through it Congress,
that "no artificial provisions, no appropriations or investments of
particular funds in certain persons, _no nominal sinking fund_, however
constructed, will ever reduce a public debt unless the net annual
revenue shall exceed the aggregate of the annual expenses, including the
interest of the debt." He then submitted the following estimates:--
"The current or peace expenses have been estimated at nine millions
of dollars. Supposing the debt contracted during the war not to
exceed fifty millions and its annual interest to amount to three
millions, the aggregate of the peace expenditure would be no more
than twelve millions. And as the peace revenue of the United States
may at the existing rate of duties be fairly estimated at fifteen
millions, there would remain from the first outset a surplus of
three millions applicable to the redemption of the debt. So far,
therefore, as can be now foreseen, there is the strongest reason to
believe that the debt thus contracted will be discharged with
facility and as speedily as the terms of the loans will permit. Nor
does any other plan in that respect appear necessary than to extend
the application of the annual appropriation of eight millions (and
which is amply sufficient for that purpose) to the payment of
interest and reimbursement of the principal of the new debt.... If
the national revenue exceeds the national expenditure, a simple
appropriation for the payment of the principal of the debt and
coextensive with the object is sufficient and will infallibly
extinguish the debt. If the expense exceeds the revenue, the
appropriation of any specific sum and the investment of the
interest extinguished or of any other fund, will prove altogether
nugatory; and the national debt will, notwithstanding that
apparatus, be annually increased by an amount equal to the deficit
in the revenue.... What appears to be of vital importance is that
_the crisis_ should at once be met by the adoption of efficient
measures, which will with certainty provide means commensurate with
the expense, and, by _preserving unimpaired instead of abusing that
public credit on which the public resources so eminently depend,
will enable the United States to persevere in the contest until an
honorable peace shall have been obtained_."
On March 14 Congress authorized a public loan of eleven millions of
dollars, leaving it optional with the banks who subscribed to take
stock, or to loan the money on special contract. The books were opened
May 1 and 2, and in the two days $6,118,900 were subscribed: $4,190,000
by banks and $1,928,000 by individuals. The rate was six per cent. Mr.
Gallatin reported this result, and proposed the issue of treasury notes
for such amount as was desired within the limit of the loan to bear
interest at five and two fifths per cent. a year, equal to a cent and a
half per day on a hundred dollars' note; 2d, to be payable one year
after date of issue; 3d, to be in the meanwhile receivable in payment of
all duties, taxes, or debts due to the United States. The first of these
ingenious qualifications was adopted by Mr. Chase in his issue of the
seven-thirties.
On June 18 war was declared. On the 28th Mr. Gallatin submitted his
estimate of receipts and expenditures for the year.
EXPENDITURES IN ROUND NUMBERS.
Civil and miscellaneous $1,560,000
Military establishment, and Indian dept 12,800,000
Naval establishment 3,940,000
Public debt 8,000,000
----------
$26,300,000
==========
FUNDS PROVIDED.
Balance in Treasury, January 1 $2,000,000
Receipts from duties and sales of lands
as by estimate of November 22, 1811 8,200,000
Loan authorized by law 11,000,000
Treasury notes as authorized by House
of Representatives 5,000,000
----------
$26,200,000
The issue of _treasury notes_ was a novel experiment in the United
States; but they were favorably received, and Mr. Gallatin calculated
that the full amount authorized by law, $5,000,000, could be put in
circulation during the year. The result of a loan seemed more doubtful.
The old six per cents. and deferred stock had already fallen two or
three per cent. below par. Mr. Gallatin again recommended the conversion
of these securities into a new six per cent. stock, which would
facilitate the new loan, and to prevent the necessity of applying, the
same years, the large sums required in reimbursement of and purchase of
the public debt.
On December 1 Mr. Gallatin made his last annual statement.
_Treasury Report for Fiscal Year ending September_ 30, 1812.
RECEIPTS.
Customs, sales of lands, etc. $10,934,946.20
On account of loan of eleven millions,
act 14 March, 1812 5,847,212.50
--------------
$16,782,158.70
Balance in Treasury October 1, 1811 3,947,818.36
--------------
$20,729,977.06
==============
DISBURSEMENTS.
Civil Department, foreign intercourse $1,823,069.35
Army, militia, forts, etc. $7,770,300.00
Navy Department 3,107,501.54
Indian Department 230,975.00
------------- 11,108,776.54
Interest on debt $2,498,013.19
On account of principal 2,938,465.99
------------- 5,436,479.18
--------------
$18,368,325.07
Leaving in Treasury 30 Sept., 1812 2,361,652.69
--------------
$20,729,977.76
The sums obtained or secured on loans during the year amounted to
$13,100,209, and the secretary had the satisfaction to state "that
notwithstanding the addition thus made to the public debt, and although
a considerable portion has been remitted from England and brought to
market in America, the public stocks (which had at first experienced a
slight depression) have been for the last three months, and continue to
be, at par." His last report to the commissioners of the sinking fund of
February 5, 1813, stated the usual application of $8,719,773 to the
principal and interest of the debt.
In his report of December 1, 1812, Mr. Gallatin announced that a loan of
twenty-one millions was needed for the service of 1813. Congress
authorized a loan of $16,000,000, having six years to run, and an
additional issue of $5,000,000 of treasury notes. Congress adjourned on
March 4. Their procrastination and the pressing demands of the War
Department nearly beggared the Treasury before the loans could be
negotiated and covered into it.
On April 17 Mr. Gallatin wrote to the secretaries of the army and of the
navy, and sent a copy of his letters to Mr. Madison with information
that the loan had been filled, and the probable receipts of the Treasury
from ordinary sources for the year ascertained. These he estimated at
$9,300,000. Deducting the annual appropriation for interest on the debt,
the sum expended to March 31, and the amount needed for the civil
service, there remained for the War and Navy Departments together the
sum of $18,720,000.
The loan of $16,000,000 was obtained in the following places:--
States east of New York $486,700
State of New York 5,720,000
Philadelphia, Pa. 6,858,400
Baltimore and District of Columbia 2,393,300
State of Virginia 187,000
Charleston, S. C. 354,000
-----------
$16,000,000
The history of this subscription is not without interest. The extremely
small subscriptions in New England and in the Southern States can hardly
be explained on any other theory than that of a belief in the collapse
of the finances of the United States and a dissolution of the Union, for
which the New England States had certainly been prepared by their
governing minds.[14]
Books were opened on March 12 and 13, 1813, at Portsmouth, Salem,
Boston, Providence, New York, Albany, Philadelphia, Baltimore,
Washington, Richmond, and Charleston. In the two days the subscriptions
only reached the sum of $3,956,400. They were again opened on the 25th
of March at New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. The New
England and Southern States seem to have been disregarded because of
their indifference in the first instance. The books remained open from
March 25 to 31, during which time there were received $1,881,800, a
total of $5,838,200.
The pressure fell on the Middle States. In these, fortunately for the
government, there were three great capitalists whose faith in the future
prosperity of the United States was unimpaired. All were foreigners:
David Parish and Stephen Girard in Philadelphia and John Jacob Astor in
New York. These now came forward, no doubt at the instance of Mr.
Gallatin, who was a personal friend of each. Parish and Girard offered
on April 5 to take eight millions of the loan at the rate of
eighty-eight dollars for a certificate of one hundred dollars bearing
interest at six per cent., redeemable before December 31, 1825, they to
receive one quarter of one per cent. commission on the amount accepted,
and in case of a further loan for the service of the year 1813, to be
placed on an equal footing with its takers. John Jacob Astor on the same
day and at the same place proposed to take for himself and his friends
the sum of two million and fifty-six thousand dollars of the loan on the
same conditions. These offers were accepted and the loan was complete.
An offer on behalf of the State of Pennsylvania to take one million of
the loan was received too late. Altogether the offers amounted to about
eighteen millions, or two millions more than the sum demanded. Mr.
Gallatin, clinging to his old plan, endeavored to negotiate this loan at
par, by offering a premium of a thirteen years' annuity of one per
cent., but found it impracticable. Indeed, the system of annuity,
general in England, has never found favor as an investment in the United
States.
This was Mr. Gallatin's last financial transaction. A few weeks later,
at his own request, he severed his actual connection with the Treasury
Department and was on his way to St. Petersburg to secure the proffered
mediation of the emperor of Russia between the United States and Great
Britain.
Thus ended Mr. Gallatin's administration of the national finances. The
hour for saving had passed. The imperious necessities of war take no
heed of economic principles. The work which the secretary had done
became as the rope of sand. It is not surprising that Gallatin wearied
of his post; that he watched with vain regret and unavailing sighs the
unavoidable increase of the national debt, and that he sought relief in
other services where success was not so evanescent as in the Treasury
Department. Before the close of Madison's administration, February 12,
1816, the public debt had run up to over one hundred and twenty-three
millions,[15] and a sum equal to the entire amount of Mr. Gallatin's
savings in two terms had been expended in one. But his work had not been
in vain. The war was the crucial test of the soundness of his financial
policy. The maxims which he announced, that debt can only be reduced by
a surplus of revenue over expenditure, and the accompaniment of every
loan by an appropriation for its extinguishment, became the fundamental
principle of American finance. Mr. Gallatin was uniformly supported in
it by Congress and public opinion. It was faithfully adhered to by his
distinguished successors, Dallas and Crawford, and the impulse thus
given continued through later administrations, until, in 1837, twenty
years after the peace, the entire debt had been extinguished. All this
without any other variation from Mr. Gallatin's original plan than an
increase of the annual appropriation, to the sinking fund for its
reimbursement, from eight to ten millions.[16]
The only charge which has ever been made against Gallatin's
administration was, that he reduced the debt at the expense of the
defenses and security of the country; but, to quote the words of one of
his biographers:[17] "Mr. Gallatin had the sagacity to know that it [the
redemption of the debt] would make but little difference in the degree
of preparation of national defense and means of contest, for which it is
impossible ever to obtain a considerable appropriation before the near
approach of the danger that may render them necessary. He knew that the
money thus well and wisely devoted to the payment of the debt was only
rescued from a thousand purposes of extravagance and mal-application to
which all our legislative bodies are so prone whenever they have control
of surplus funds." In our own day the irresistible temptations of a full
treasury need no labored demonstration. Friend and foe drop political
differences over the abundant fleshpot. The very thought of catering to
such appetites disgusted Gallatin. To Jefferson he frankly said, in
1809, that while he did not pretend to step out of his own sphere and to
control the internal management of other departments, yet he could not
"consent to act the part of a mere financier, to become a contriver of
taxes, a dealer of loans, a seeker of resources for the purpose of
supporting useless baubles, of increasing the number of idle and
dissipated members of the community, of fattening contractors, pursers,
and agents, and of introducing in all its ramifications that system of
patronage, corruption, and rottenness which you justly execrate."
RECEIPTS AND EXPENDITURES DURING MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION, FROM
ELLIOTT'S SYNOPTICAL EXHIBITS.
RECEIPTS.
------------+----------------+---------------+----------------+
Four Years | Customs. | Internal | Direct Taxes. |
Ending | | Revenue. | |
Dec. 31. | | | |
------------+----------------+---------------+----------------+
1812 | $38,151,330.15 | $18,674.03 | $28,491.87 |
1816 | 62,813,212.43 | 11,470,507.24 | 8,639,611.38 |
|----------------+---------------+----------------+
Madison | 100,964,542.58 | 11,489,181.27 | 8,668,103.25 |
------------+----------------+---------------+----------------+
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
Postage. | Public Lands. | Loans and | Dividends |
| | Treasury Notes. | Sales of |
| | | Bank Stock. |
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
$85,077.40 | $2,889,466.46 | $15,606,201.30 | - |
364,787.84 | 4,977,570.54 | 94,321,103.73 | - |
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
449,865.24 | 7,867,037.00 | 109,927,305.03 | - |
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
----------------+----------------
Miscellaneous. | Total.
|
|
----------------+----------------
$209,309.34 | $56,988,550.55
630,248.16 | 183,217,041.32
----------------+----------------
839,557.50 | 240,205,591.87
----------------+----------------
EXPENDITURES.
-----------+-----------------+---------------+----------------+
Four Years | Civil List. | Foreign | Miscellaneous. |
Ending | | Intercourse. | |
Dec. 31. | | | |
-----------+-----------------+---------------+----------------+
1812 | $2,887,197.98 | $860,281.28 | $1,619,849.12 |
1816 | 3,768,342.61 | 1,042,633.42 | 5,015,100.92 |
|-----------------+---------------+----------------+
Madison | 6,655,540.59 | 1,902,914.70 | 6,634,950.04 |
-----------+-----------------+---------------+----------------+
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
Military Dept. | Pensions. | Indian Dept. | Naval Dept. |
| | | |
| | | |
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
$19,480,722.54 | $338,023.68 | $944,848.84 | $10,006,934.54 |
70,809,210.90 | 435,614.48 | 1,140,015.30 | 26,326,169.25 |
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
90,289,933.44 | 773,638.16 | 2,084,864.14 | 36,333,103.79 |
----------------+----------------+-------------------+----------------+
----------------+----------------
Public Debt. | Total.
|
|
----------------+----------------
$26,920,285.12 | $63,058,143.10
56,508,652.66 | 165,045,739.54
----------------+----------------
83,428,937.78 | 228,103,882.64
----------------+----------------
* * * * *
_Revenue_
_L'État c'est moi_ was the autocratic maxim of Louis Quatorze. An
adherence to it cost the Bourbons their throne. Burke was more
philosophical when he said, "The revenue of the State is the State." Its
imposition, its collection, and its application involve all the
principles and all the powers of government, constitutional or
extraordinary. It is the sole foundation of public credit, the sole
support of the body politic, its life-blood in peace, its nerve in war.
The "purse and the sword" are respectively the resource and defense of
government and peoples, and they are interdependent powers. With the
discovery of the sources of revenue, and the establishment of its
currents, Mr. Gallatin, in the first eight years of his administration
of the Treasury, had nothing to do. He had only to maintain those
systems which Hamilton had devised, and which, wisely adapted to the
growth of the country, proved amply adequate to the ordinary
expenditures of the government and to the gradual extinguishment of the
debt. The entire revenue included three distinct branches: imposts on
importations and tonnage, internal revenue, sales of public lands. The
duties on imports of foreign merchandise were alone sufficient to meet
the current expenses of the various departments of administration on a
peace establishment, and, increasing with the growth of the country,
would prove ample in future. The gross amount of imports in the four
years of Adams's administration, 1796-1800, was about three hundred and
fourteen millions of dollars, and the customs yielded about thirty
millions.
Mr. Gallatin's first annual report, submitted to the House of
Representatives in December, 1801, exhibited his financial scheme. He
recapitulated the various sources of permanent revenue. They were those
of Hamilton's original tariff.
The revenues for the year ended September 30, 1801, were the basis of
the estimates for future years. These were
Duties on imports and tonnage $10,126,213.92
Internal revenue 854,000.00
Land sales 400,000.00
--------------
$11,380,213.92
But the close of the war in Europe sensibly diminished the enormous
carrying trade which fell to the United States as neutrals, and, as a
consequence, the revenue from that source; large quantities of goods
were brought into the United States and reëxported to foreign ports
under a system of debenture. The revenue on what Mr. Gallatin calls
"this accidental commerce" was $1,200,000. He therefore _estimated the
permanent revenues at_
Customs duties $9,500,000
Land sales 400,000
Postage 50,000
Internal revenue 650,000
-----------
$10,600,000
Or, without the internal revenue, say ten millions of permanent revenue,
as a basis for _the permanent expenditures_.
To bring the expenditures within this sum, however, a reduction in the
army and navy establishments was necessary. This Gallatin soon found to
be too radical a measure for success, either in the cabinet or Congress,
however well it may have accorded with Jefferson's utopian views. In the
budget of 1802 the internal revenue, $650,000, was, therefore, a
necessary item. The expenditures proposed were
Annual appropriation for interest and
principal of debt $7,100,000
Civil list $780,000
Foreign intercourse 200,000
Military and Indian Dept 1,420,000
Naval 1,100,000
-----------
$3,500,000 3,500,000
-----------
$10,600,000
In this budget the estimate for the military establishment was an
increase over that of Wolcott for 1801, which was $1,120,000. But the
Republicans in the House were not content with this arrangement. The
internal revenues were utterly distasteful to them. They had been laid
against their protest and collected under military menace. They were of
those Federal measures of which they would have none. John Randolph,
chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means, reported, March 2, 1802,
against the entire system of internal duties, in the old words of the
Pennsylvania radicals, as vexatious, oppressive, and peculiarly
obnoxious; as of the nature of an excise which is hostile to the genius
of a free people, and finally because of their tendency to multiply
offices and increase the patronage of the executive. The repeal was
imperative upon the Republican party. On April 6, 1802, the act was
repealed and the surplus of the budget stripped from it, without Mr.
Gallatin's consent, certainly, but also without protest from him.
The prosperity of the country continued. The impost duties for the
fiscal year ending September 30, 1802, rose to $12,280,000, the sales of
the public lands to $326,000, and the postage to $50,500, a total of
$12,656,500, and left in the Treasury, September 30, 1802, the sum of
$4,539,675. This large increase in the Treasury did not in the least
change Mr. Gallatin's general plan, and his budget for 1803 was based on
his original scale of a permanent revenue of $10,000,000, to correspond
with which the estimates of the preceding year were reduced. The fiscal
year closed September 30, 1803, with a balance in the Treasury of
$5,860,000. This situation of the finances was fortunate in view of
secret negotiations which the President and Congress were initiating for
the purchase of Louisiana from France.
The secretaries of war and of the navy had promised to reduce their
expenditures to a figure approximate to Mr. Gallatin's estimates; but
the breaking out of hostilities with Tripoli prevented the proposed
economy, and Mr. Gallatin was called upon to provide for an increased
expenditure with one certain source of revenue definitively closed. He
therefore proposed an additional tax of two and one half per cent. on
all importations which paid an _ad valorem_ duty. This additional
impost, laid by act of March 25, 1804, called the Mediterranean Fund,
remained in force long after the war closed and held its place on the
books of the Treasury under that name.
The bulk of the cost of Louisiana was met by an issue of bonds; but Mr.
Gallatin, true to his principle, applied the moneys in the Treasury as
far as they would go. The budget for 1805 was on a different scale. The
increase in the debt demanded a proportionate increase in the revenue to
meet the additional sum required for interest and gradual annual
reimbursement. The Mediterranean Fund was sufficient to meet the
increased amounts required for the navy. In this manner he held up the
Navy Department to a strict accountability and made it responsible to
Congress and not to the cabinet for its administration, and he thus,
from his own point of view, relieved the Treasury Department from any
responsibility for extraordinary expenditure.
Mr. Gallatin closed his four years of administration with flying colors.
The successful management of the finances was an important factor in the
election of 1804, which returned Mr. Jefferson to the presidential chair
and insured to the country the inestimable advantages of Mr. Gallatin's
practical mind. Order reigned in his department at least, and order
subordinate to the strictest requirements of law. In the four years,
1801-1804, Jefferson's first term, the imports aggregated $337,363,510
and the customs yielded $45,000,000.
The annual report, made December 9, 1805, announced an increasing
revenue, amounting in all to thirteen and one half millions of dollars,
chiefly from customs. Still Mr. Gallatin made but small addition to his
estimates for the coming year. The permanent revenue he raised to twelve
and one half millions and increased the appropriation for the payment of
the debt and interest to eight millions. Nothing occurred during the
next year to check the growth of the country; the revenue continued on a
rising scale, and reached close upon fifteen millions of dollars.
So far Mr. Gallatin had met but inconsiderable obstacles in his course,
and these he used to his advantage to impress economy upon the Army and
Navy Departments, and enforce his principle of minute appropriations
for their government. All that he had already accomplished in the
establishment of a sound financial system and the support of the credit
of the United States was but the basis of a broader structure of
national economy. His extensive scheme of internal improvements was
hardly matured when the thunder broke in the clear sky.
The acquisition of Louisiana, the large carrying trade which had passed
under the American flag, and the rapid prosperity of the financial and
industrial condition of the country aroused the jealousy of Great
Britain, and determined her to check the further progress of the United
States by war, if need be. The capture of the American frigate
Chesapeake by the man-of-war Leopard, June 22, 1807, was only the first
in a series of outrages which rendered the final collision, though long
delayed, inevitable. Mr. Gallatin at once recognized that the Treasury
could no longer be conducted on a peace basis. "Money," he wrote to
Joseph H. Nicholson, "we will want to carry on the war; our revenue will
be cut up; new and internal taxes will be slow and not sufficiently
productive; we must necessarily borrow. This is not pleasing to me, but
it must be done." Congress was called together for October 26, 1807, and
on November 5, Mr. Gallatin sent in his annual report. There was still
hope that Great Britain would make amends for the outrage, and Congress
was certainly peaceably disposed. In the condition of the Treasury
there was no reason as yet for recommending extraordinary measures. The
revenues for the year passed the sum of seventeen millions; the balance
in the Treasury reached eight and one half millions; the surplus on a
peace footing was twelve millions. Mr. Gallatin recommended that the
duties should be doubled in case war were threatened. He said, "Should
the revenue fall below seven millions of dollars, not only the duty on
salt and the Mediterranean duties could be immediately revived, but the
duties on importation generally be considerably increased, perhaps
double, with less inconvenience than would arise from any other mode of
taxation." Experience had proven that this source of revenue is in the
United States "the most productive, the easiest to collect, and least
burdensome to the great mass of the people." But still the war-cloud did
not break. Mr. Canning contented himself with war in disguise, and by
his Order in Council of November 11, 1807, shut the ports of Europe to
American trade, and wiped away the advantages of the United States as a
neutral power. The United States answered with the act of embargo on
December 22, 1807, completing, as far as it was possible for legislation
to effect it, the blockade of the Treasury Department as regarded
revenues from foreign imports. The immediate effect, however, of these
acts in Great Britain and America was an enormous temporary increase of
importations in the interim from the time of the passage of the act
until the date when it took effect. To aid merchants in this peculiar
condition of affairs an act was passed by Congress, on March 10, 1808,
extending the terms of credit on revenue bonds.
Mr. Gallatin's report of December 16, 1808, closed the record of his
eight years of management of the Department. In the second term of
Jefferson's administration, 1805-1808, the gross amount of imports had
risen to $443,990,000, and the customs collected to nearly $60,000,000.
In the entire eight years, 1800-1808, the gross amount of importations
was $781,000,000, and the customs yielded $105,000,000. The entire
expenses of the government in the same period, including $65,000,000 of
debt, had been liquidated from customs alone.
The specie in the Treasury on September 20, 1808, reached nearly
$14,000,000. Mr. Jefferson knew of the amount in the Treasury when he
wrote his last message, November 8, 1808, and he could not have been
ignorant of Mr. Gallatin's warning of the previous year that a
continuance of the embargo restriction would reduce the revenue below
the point of annual expenditures and require an additional impost; yet
he had the ignorance or the presumption to say in his message, "Shall it
(the surplus revenue) lie unproductive in the public vaults? Shall the
revenue be reduced? or shall it not rather be appropriated to the
improvement of roads, canals, rivers, education, and other great
foundations of prosperity and union under the powers which Congress may
already possess or such amendments of the Constitution as may be
approved by the States? While uncertain of the course of things, the
time may be advantageously employed in obtaining the powers necessary
for a system of improvement, should it be thought best." In these words
Jefferson surrendered the vital principle of the Republican party. In
his satisfaction at the only triumph of his administration, the
management of the finances and the purchase of a province without a
ripple on the even surface of national finance, he gave up the very
basis of the Republican theory, the reduction of the government to its
possible minimum, and actually proposed a system of administration
coextensive with the national domain, an increase of the functions of
government, and consequently of executive power.
The annual report of the Treasury, presented December 16, 1808, showed
no diminution of resources. The total receipts for the fiscal year were
nearly eighteen millions. The total receipts for--
Customs reached $26,126,648
On which debentures were allowed
on exportations 10,059,457
-----------
Actual receipts from customs $16,067,191
But this source of revenue was now definitively closed by the embargo,
while the expenditures of the government were increased. Mr. Gallatin
met the situation frankly and notified Congress of the resources of the
Treasury.
RESOURCES FOR 1809
Cash in Treasury $13,846,717.52
Back customs, net 2,154,000.00
--------------
Total resources $16,000,717.52
The receipts from importations and land sales would be offset by
deductions for bad debts and extensions of credit to importers. The
expenditures were set at $13,000,000, which would leave in the Treasury
for extraordinary expenditure $3,000,717. The disbursements had been far
beyond the estimates; those for the military and naval establishments
reaching together six millions.
It is not to be supposed that Mr. Gallatin saw this depletion of the
Treasury, this rapid dissipation of the specie,--always desirable and
never more so than in periods of trouble,--without disappointment and
regret. His report to Congress was as outspoken politically as it was
financially, and from a foreign-born citizen to an American Congress
must have carried its sting. "Either America," he wrote, "must accept
the position of commerce allotted to her by the British edicts, and
abandon all that is forbidden,--and it is not material whether this is
done by legal provisions limiting the commerce of the United States to
the permitted places, or by acquiescing in the capture of vessels
stepping beyond the prescribed bounds. Or the nation must oppose force
to the execution of the orders of England; and this, however done, and
by whatever name called, will be war." He recalled to them his advice of
the preceding years in a vein of tempered bitterness: "Had the duties
been doubled on January 1, 1808, as was then suggested, in case of war
the receipts into the Treasury during that and the ensuing year would
have been increased nine or ten millions of dollars." He then proposed
to continue the Mediterranean Fund and to double all existing duties on
importations after January 1, 1809. He informed them that no internal
taxes, either direct or indirect, were contemplated by him even in the
case of hostilities against the two belligerent powers; France having
responded to the Orders in Council by Napoleon's Milan decree, December
17, 1807, which was quite as offensive to the United States as that of
Canning. With true statesmanship Mr. Gallatin nerved the country to
extraordinary exertion by reminding it that the geographical situation
of the United States and their history since the Revolution removed
every apprehension of frequent wars.
During the year 1809 the country drifted along apparently without rudder
or compass, helmsman or course, and the treasury locker was being
rapidly reduced to remainder biscuit. Mr. Madison was inaugurated in
March. In his first message, May 23, 1809, he exposed the financial
situation with an indecision which was as marked a trait of his
character as optimism was of that of Jefferson. In his message of
November 29, 1809, he said "the sums which had been previously
accumulated in the Treasury, together with the receipts during the year
ending on September 30 last, and amounting to more than nine millions of
dollars, have enabled us to fulfill all our engagements and defray the
current expenses of government without recurring to any loan; but the
insecurity of our commerce and the consequent demands of the public
revenue will probably produce a deficiency in the receipts of the
ensuing year." Beyond this Madison did not venture; Gallatin was left
alone.
The Treasury report of December 8, 1809, announced the beginning of
short rations. The expenses of government, exclusively of the payments
on account of the principal of the debt, had exceeded the actual
receipts into the Treasury by a sum of near $1,300,000. If the military
and naval establishments were to be continued at the figures of 1809,
when six millions were expended, there would result a deficiency of
$3,000,000, and a loan of $4,000,000 would be necessary. Otherwise the
Mediterranean Fund would suffice. The cash in the Treasury had fallen
from nearly fourteen millions on June 2, 1809, to less than six millions
on September 3, following. In this report Gallatin expressed his
opinion, that the system of restriction established by the embargo and
partly relaxed must be entirely reinstated or wholly abandoned. On May
1, 1810, an act of strict prohibition of importations from Great
Britain and her dependencies was passed.
While from the incompetency of the administration the country was fast
approaching the real crisis of open war, the Republicans in Congress
were deliberately destroying and undermining the basis of national
credit, by which alone it could be carried on. In February the United
States Bank, by which, and its branches, the customs were collected
throughout the country, was destroyed by the refusal of Congress to
renew its charter. Mr. Gallatin in his combinations never contemplated
such a contingency as the total destruction of the fiscal agency on
which the government had relied for twenty years. Unwilling to struggle
longer against the mean personalities and factious opposition of his own
party in Congress, he tendered his resignation to Mr. Madison. But the
Republican party was a party of opposition, not of government. With the
exception of Mr. Gallatin, no competent administrative head had as yet
appeared. There was no one in the party or out of it to take his place.
Mr. Madison knew it. Mr. Gallatin felt it, and remained. Congress met in
November. On the 25th Mr. Gallatin sent in his annual report; the
receipts reached thirteen and a half million dollars.
The budget for 1812 left a deficiency to be provided for of $1,200,000.
This was a small matter. The revenue Mr. Gallatin proposed to increase,
on the plan before recommended, by additions of fifty per cent, to the
imposts on foreign commerce. This he preferred to any internal tax.
At the close of the year the country, chafed beyond endurance by the
indignities put upon it and the sufferings it encountered without
compensation to its pride, was eager for war. Congress was no way loath
to try the dangerous path out of its labyrinth of blunders. The near
contingency imposed the necessity of an immediate examination of the
sources of revenue. In January, 1812, Mr. Gallatin was requested by the
chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means to give his opinion as to
the probable amount of receipts from duties on tonnage and merchandise
in the event of war. This, in view of the vigorous restrictions laid by
France under her continental system of exclusion, Mr. Gallatin estimated
under existing rules as not to exceed $2,500,000. He then stated,
without hesitation, that it was practicable and advisable to double the
rate of duties, and to renew the old duty on salt. The sum acquired,
with this addition, he anticipated, would amount to $5,400,000.
On the basis of annual loans of ten millions of dollars during the
continuance of the war (the sum assumed by the committee), the
deficiency for 1814 would amount, by Mr. Gallatin's estimate, to
$4,200,000. To produce a net revenue equal to this deficiency he stated
that the gross sum of taxes to be laid must be five millions of dollars.
He then reverted to his report of December 10, 1808, in which he had
stated that "no internal taxes, either direct or indirect, were
contemplated, even in the case of hostilities carried on against the two
great belligerent powers." The balance in the Treasury was then nearly
fourteen millions of dollars, but in view of the daily decrease of the
revenue he had recommended "that all the existing duties be doubled on
importations subsequent to the first day of January, 1809." As the
revenues of 1809, 1810, and 1811 had yielded $26,000,000, the sum on
hand, with the increase thus recommended, would have reached
$20,000,000, a sum greater than the net amount of the proposed internal
taxes in four years.
At that time no symptoms had appeared from which the absolute
dissolution of the Bank of the United States without any substitute
could have been anticipated. If its charters had been renewed, on the
conditions suggested by Mr. Gallatin, the necessity for internal taxes
would have been avoided. The resources of the country, properly applied,
however, were amply sufficient to meet the emergency; but Mr. Gallatin
distinctly threw upon Congress, and by implication upon the Republican
majority, the responsibility for the state of the Treasury, and the
imperative necessity for a form of taxation which it detested as
oppressive, and which it was a party shibboleth to declare in and out of
season, to be unconstitutional. The choice of the administration was
between the Bank which Jefferson detested and Gallatin favored, and the
internal tax which Mr. Gallatin considered as the most repulsive in its
operation of any form of revenue.
But necessity knows no law, and the prime mover, if not the original
author, of the opposition to Hamilton's system was driven to propose the
renewal of the measures, opposition to which had brought the Republican
party into power, and had placed himself at the head of the Treasury. He
now proposed to raise the five millions deficiency by internal
taxation--$3,000,000 by direct tax and $2,000,000 by indirect tax.
Continuing his lucid and remarkable report with careful details of the
methods to be adopted, Gallatin closed with an urgent recommendation
that the crisis should at once be met by the adoption of efficient
measures to provide, with certainty, means commensurate with the
expense, and by preserving unimpaired, instead of abusing, that credit
on which the public resources eminently depend, to enable the United
States to persevere in the contest until an honorable peace should be
obtained. Thus he held the bitter cup to the lips of the Republican
Congress, which, however, was not yet to drain its full measure. War was
declared June 18, 1812. On July 1, 1812, an act was passed imposing an
additional duty of one hundred per cent. on all importations, an
additional ten per cent. on goods brought in foreign vessels, and also a
duty of $1.50 per ton on all foreign vessels. The duty was to remain
until the expiration of one year after peace should be made with Great
Britain. On December 5, 1812, Mr. Gallatin sent in his last report. The
balance in the treasury was $3,947,818. His estimate for the service of
the year 1813 was a war budget. Resources, $12,000,000; expenditures,
$31,926,000; promising a deficiency of $19,925,000. For this and other
contingencies Mr. Gallatin asked for a loan of twenty millions. The
authority was granted, but the recommendations of direct and indirect
taxes were disregarded. Here Mr. Gallatin's direct connection with the
customs system closed.
The value of foreign importations during Madison's first term was
$275,230,000, and the customs derived from them thirty-eight millions of
dollars.
* * * * *
Congress adjourned March 4, 1813, but was called together again in May,
when the subject of internal taxes was again forced upon them. The
internal revenue was a part of Hamilton's general scheme. His original
bill was passed, and, after numerous amendments suggested by trial, its
grievances were tempered and the friction removed. In Adams's term it
yielded nearly three millions of dollars. In Jefferson's first term,
before the rise in customs revenue allowed of its abandonment, Mr.
Gallatin drew from this source nearly two millions of dollars, enough to
pay the interest and provide for the extinguishment of a six per cent.
loan of thirty millions; a war budget in itself. But it had been so
entirely set aside that in Jefferson's second term, 1808-1812, it had
fallen to a little over sixty-three thousand; in Madison's first term,
to a little under nineteen thousand dollars. Was it to this Mr. Dallas
referred in that passage of his report, made in 1815, on the financial
operations of the war, in which he expresses his regret "that there
existed no system by which the internal resources of the country could
be brought at once into action, when the resources of its external
commerce became incompetent to answer the exigencies of the time? The
existence of such a system would probably have invigorated the early
movements of the war, might have preserved the public credit unimpaired,
and would have rendered the pecuniary contributions of the people more
equal, as well as more effective." "It certainly," to use the words of
this Mr. Gallatin's oldest and best political friend, "furnishes a
lesson of practical policy." Disagreeable as the necessity was, it could
not be avoided, and Mr. Gallatin met it manfully. Nay more, he seems to
have had a grim satisfaction in proposing the measure to the Congress
which had thwarted him in his plans. In accordance with his suggestions,
Congress, in the extra session of May, 1813, laid a direct tax of
$3,000,000 upon the States, and specific duties upon refined sugar,
carriages, licenses to distillers of spirituous liquors, sales at
auction, licenses to retailers of wines, and upon notes of banks and
bankers. These duties, in the beginning temporary, were calculated to
yield $500,000, and with the direct tax to give a sum of $3,500,000. But
the increasing expenditures again requiring additional sums of revenue,
the duties were made permanent and additional taxes were laid; the
entire revenue for 1815 being raised so as to yield $12,400,000. In the
second term of Mr. Madison the internal revenue brought in nearly eleven
and a half millions. The Federalists, who as a party were opposed to the
war, enjoyed the situation; Mr. Gallatin was compelled to impose the
internal revenue tax which he detested, and Mr. Dallas was called upon
to enforce its application.
[Illustration: A. J. Dallas]
* * * * *
The only remaining source of revenue was the sale of public lands. This
also was a part of Hamilton's original scheme. The public lands of the
United States were acquired in three different ways, namely, 1, by
cessions from the States of such lands as they claimed, or were entitled
to by their original grants or charters from the crown, while colonies;
2, by purchase from Indian tribes; 3, by treaties with foreign
nations,--those of 1783 and 1794 with Great Britain, of 1795 with Spain,
and of 1803 with France. The need of bringing this vast territory under
the control of the government and disposing of it for settlement was
early apparent. In July, 1791, Hamilton sent in to the House a report on
"A uniform system for the disposition of the lands, the property of the
United States." In March preceding, grants of the United States had
confirmed to the actual settlers in the Illinois country the possession
of their farms. But what with the Indian wars and the rebellion within
the United States, no action was taken by Congress to carry the
recommendations of the secretary into effect, until Mr. Gallatin, whose
residence on the frontier gave him direct interest in the subject,
brought up the matter at the very first session he attended. In 1796 a
bill was passed authorizing and regulating the sale of lands northwest
of the Ohio and above the mouth of the Kentucky River, and a
surveyor-general was appointed with directions to lay out these lands in
townships. The sales under Adams's administrations were trifling, the
total amount received from this source before the year 1800 being
slightly over one hundred thousand dollars. In May, 1800, sales of the
same lands were authorized at public vendue at not less than two dollars
per acre; four land offices were established in the territory; surveyors
were appointed, and a register of the land office was made a permanent
official. In March, 1803, an act was passed to regulate the sale of the
United States lands south of the Tennessee River, two land offices were
established and public sale provided for at the same price set in the
act of 1800. In March, 1804, the Indiana lands lying north of the Ohio
and east of the Mississippi were brought within similar regulations, and
an act was passed concerning the country acquired under Spanish and
British grants. In the same month Louisiana was erected into two
territories. The sums received from the sales during the first term of
Jefferson's administration amounted to little more than one million of
dollars. In January, 1805, the territory of Indiana was divided into two
separate governments; that one which was set off received the name of
Michigan, and in 1808, its territory was brought under the regulations
of the land office.
The sums received from the sales in the second term of Jefferson's
administration reached nearly two and one half millions of dollars, and
in Madison's first term, nearly three millions of dollars. From first to
last Mr. Gallatin never lost sight of the subject, though occasion did
not serve for more than organization of the system which, in the four
years ending 1836, yielded nearly fifty million dollars, and paid more
than one third of the entire expenses of the government. To John W.
Eppes[18] Mr. Gallatin wrote in the crisis of 1813, "The public lands
constitute the only great national resource exclusive of loans and
taxes. They have already been mentioned as a fund for the ultimate
extinguishment of the public debt." The land offices were then in full
operation.
In 1810 Mr. Gallatin prepared an "Introduction to the collection of
laws, treaties, and other documents respecting the public lands," which
was published pursuant to an act of Congress passed in April of that
year.
_Free Trade_
While Mr. Gallatin differed from his early Republican associates in many
of their theories of administration, he was a firm believer in the best
of their principles, namely, the wisdom of giving free scope to the
development of national resources with the least possible interference
on the part of government. One of his purposes in his persistent desire
for economy in expenditure was to reduce the tariff upon foreign
importations to the lowest practicable limit. He was the earliest public
advocate in America of the principles of free trade, and an experience
of sixty years confirmed him in his convictions.
The extinguishment of the debt rendered a great reduction in the revenue
possible. On the other hand, it brought the friends of a low tariff face
to face with the problem of internal improvements. As the election of
1832 drew near, the advocates of the two systems ranged themselves in
two great parties precisely as to-day: the advocates of the protective
or American system with internal improvements as an outlet for
accumulations of revenue on the one side; on the other the advocates of
free trade. Between his desire for the advantages of the one with its
attendant disadvantages of government interference in its prosecution,
and the freedom of commerce from undue restrictions, Mr. Gallatin did
not hesitate. He threw the whole force of his experience and character
into the free trade cause, and became the leader of its friends.
On September 30, 1831, a convention of the advocates of free trade,
without distinction of party, met at the Musical Fund Hall in
Philadelphia. Two hundred and twelve delegates appeared. Among them were
Theodore Sedgwick, George Peabody, and John L. Gardner from
Massachusetts; Preserved Fish, John Constable, John A. Stevens, Jonathan
Goodhue, James Boorman, Jacob Lorillard, and Albert Gallatin from New
York; C. C. Biddle, George Emlen, Isaac W. Norris from Pennsylvania;
Langdon Cheves, Henry Middleton, Joseph W. Allston, and William C.
Preston from South Carolina; and men of equal distinction, bankers,
merchants, statesmen, and political economists from other States. Of
this convention Mr. Gallatin was the soul. He opened its business by
stating the objects of the meeting, and nominated the Hon. Philip P.
Barbour of Virginia for president. A general committee of two from each
State was appointed, which recommended an address to the people of the
United States and a memorial to Congress. The address to the people
closed with a declaration that the near extinguishment of the national
debt, which would be discharged by the available funds of the government
on January 1, 1833, suggested that the moment was propitious for the
establishment of the principles of free trade. Thus the people of the
United States, who had successfully asserted the doctrines of free
government, might add to its claims upon the gratitude of the world by
being the first also to proclaim the theory of a free and unrestricted
commerce, the genuine "American system." Mr. Gallatin was the chairman
of the committee of fourteen, one from each State represented in the
convention, to prepare the memorial which was presented in their behalf
to Congress, the conclusions of which, presented with his consummate
ability, demonstrated with mathematical precision that a duty of
twenty-five per cent. was sufficient for all the legitimate purposes of
government. Here he found himself in direct opposition to Mr. Clay,
whose political existence was staked upon the opposite theory. Mr. Clay
answered in a great speech in the Senate in February, 1832, and forgot
himself in personal denunciation of Mr. Gallatin as a foreigner with
European interests at heart, and of utopian ideas; for this he expressed
his regret to Mr. Gallatin in an interview arranged by mutual friends at
a much later period. Mr. Gallatin's views were accepted as the policy of
the country, and after some shifting of parties, in which friends and
foes changed ground in subordination to other political exigencies, they
prevailed in the tariff of 1846, the best arranged and most reasonable
which the United States has yet seen.
It is certain that Mr. Gallatin was opposed to "protective" revenue. His
preference was for an "even" duty on all imports. This is not the place
for an economic discussion. The true policy of the United States is
probably between the extremes of protection and free trade. The nature
of our population has been changed by the enormous immigration of the
last fifty years. Moreover, instead of an absolute freedom from debt the
nation has had to endure the legacy of debt left by the Civil War, to
meet which a development of all its resources of manufacture as well as
of agriculture is required.
_Administration_
To arrive at a correct estimate of Mr. Gallatin's administration of the
Treasury Department, a cursory review of the establishment as he
received it from the hands of Mr. Wolcott is necessary. This review is
confined to administration in its limited sense, namely, the direction
of its clerical management under the provisions of statute law. The
organization of the department as originated by Hamilton and established
by the act of September 2, 1789, provided for a secretary of the
treasury as head of the department, whose general duty should be to
supervise the fiscal affairs of the country, and particularly to suggest
and prepare plans for the improvement and support of the public credit;
and, under his direction and supervision, a comptroller to adjust and
preserve accounts; an auditor to receive, examine, and rectify accounts;
a treasurer to receive, keep, and disburse moneys on warrants signed and
countersigned; a register to keep the accounts of receipts and
expenditures; and an assistant to the secretary of the treasury to fill
any vacancy from absence or other temporary cause. In addition to the
departments of State, Treasury, and War, a fourth, that of the Navy, was
established April 30, 1798. The three departments were brought into
relation with that of the Treasury by an act passed July 16, 1798,
supplementary to that organizing the Treasury, and which provided, 1st,
for the appointment of an accountant in each department, who was
required to report to the accounting officer of the Treasury; 2d, that
the Treasurer of the United States should only disburse by warrants on
the Treasury, countersigned by the accountant of the Treasury; 3d, that
all purchases for supplies for military or naval service should be
subject to the inspection and revision of the officers of the Treasury.
Mr. Jefferson, after his usual fashion of economy in the wrong
direction, proposed to Mr. Gallatin "to amalgamate the comptroller and
auditor into one, and reduce the register to a clerk of accounts: so
that the organization should consist, as it should at first, of a keeper
of money, a keeper of accounts, and the head of the department." But in
the Treasury Department there was no extravagance during Gallatin's
administration, and the shifting of responsibility would bring no saving
of salaries.
In May, 1800, an act was passed making it "the duty of the secretary of
the treasury to digest, prepare, and lay before Congress at the
commencement of every session a report on the subject of finances,
containing estimates of the public revenue and expenditures, and plans
for improving and increasing the revenue from time to time, for the
purpose of giving information to Congress in adopting modes for raising
the money requisite to meet the expenditures." Hamilton had never sent
in any other than a statement of expenditure for the past fiscal year,
together with the estimate of the accountant of the Treasury for the
proximate wants of the departments of government. Mr. Gallatin
incorporated in his annual report a balance sheet in accordance with the
ordinary forms of book-keeping familiar to every accountant and
indispensable in every business establishment, and such as is presented
to the public in the monthly and annual statements of the Treasury
Department at this day.
The statutes show no legislation during Mr. Gallatin's period of
administration, and to its close he was in continual struggle to force
upon Congress and the departments an accord with his pet plan of minute
specific appropriation of the sums estimated for and expended by each.
Mr. Madison heartily agreed with Mr. Gallatin on this subject, and on
taking office placed the relations of the State Department upon the
desired footing. But the heads of the Army and Navy were never willing
to consent to the strict limitation which Mr. Gallatin would have
imposed on their expenditures. In his notes to Jefferson for the draft
of his first message in 1801, Mr. Gallatin said that the most important
reform he could suggest was that of 'specific appropriations,' and he
inclosed an outline of a form to be enforced in detail. In January,
1802, he sent to Joseph H. Nicholson a series of inquiries to be
addressed to himself by a special committee on the subject, with regard
to the mode by which money was drawn from the Treasury and the situation
of accounts between that department and those of the Army and Navy. To
these questions he sent in to the House an elaborate reply, which he
intended to be the basis of legislation. Strict appropriation was the
ideal at which he aimed, and this word was so often on his tongue or in
his messages that it could not be mentioned without a suggestion of his
personality. He carried the same nicety of detail into his domestic
life. He managed his own household expenses, and at a time when
bountiful stores were the fashion in every household he insisted on a
rigid observance of the more precise French system. He made an
appropriation of a certain sum each day for his expenses, and required
from his purveyor a strict daily account of disbursements. An amusing
story is told of him at his own table. On an occasion when entertaining
a company at dinner, he was dissatisfied with the menu and expressed his
disapprobation to his maître d'hôtel, a Frenchman, who replied to him
in broken English, that it was not his fault, but that of the
"mal-appropriations."
The example set by Mr. Gallatin in this particular was never forgotten,
and from his day to this strict accountability has been the tradition of
the Treasury Department, now greatly increased in detail, but in
structure essentially as it was originally organized. Of its management
Mr. Sherman was able to say in his report of December 1, 1879, "The
organization of the several bureaus is such, and the system of
accounting so perfect, that the financial transactions of the government
during the past two years, aggregating $3,354,345,040, have been
adjusted without question with the exception of a few small balances,
now in the process of collection, of which it is believed that the
government will eventually lose less than $13,000, or less than four
mills for each $1000 of the amount involved;" and in 1880 he said with
entire truth, "The department is a well organized and well conducted
business office, depending mainly for its success upon the integrity and
fidelity of the heads of bureaus and chiefs of divisions."
_Banking_
There is no more instructive chapter in the history of finance than that
upon the banking system of the United States. It has its distinct eras
of radical change, each of which presents a series of tentative
experiments. The outcome, by a process of development, in which
political expediency has been as effective an agency as financial
necessity, is the present national banking system. Though the term
"government," or "national," bank is constantly used in reference to the
great banking institutions of England, France, and the United States, no
one of these is in the true sense of the word a national bank. The Bank
of England is a chartered corporation, the Bank of France an association
instituted by law. The Bank of North America, and the Bank of the United
States which followed it, were founded on the same principle. Both were
corporations of individuals intimately connected with the government,
enjoying certain privileges accorded and being under certain
restrictions, but otherwise independent of government control.
The Bank of North America, the first bank established in the United
States, was also the first which had any direct relation to the
government. It was the conception of the comprehensive and original mind
of Robert Morris, the financier or superintendent of the public finances
of the United States. Its purpose was not the convenience or profit of
individuals, but to draw together the scattered financial resources of
the country and found a public credit. He submitted his plan to
Congress, which adopted a resolution of approval May 26, 1781. The
original plan contemplated a capital of ten millions of dollars; but the
collection of such a sum in gold and silver in one depository was beyond
the range of possibility at that period, and the capital was finally
fixed at four hundred thousand dollars, in one thousand shares of four
hundred dollars each. Subscription books were immediately opened, but
not more than $70,000 was entered during the summer months. The arrival
at Boston of a French war frigate with a remittance of $470,000 in
specie, which was brought to Philadelphia and deposited in the vaults of
the bank, enabled Mr. Morris to mature his plans. He designed to retain
this sum in the bank as a specie basis; but the necessities of the
country were so urgent during the critical season of the Yorktown
campaign, that nearly one half of it was exhausted before an
organization could be effected. In December Congress passed an ordinance
of incorporation. Mr. Morris then subscribed the specie remaining in the
Treasury, about $254,000, for shares for account of the United States,
which became thereby the principal stockholder. The limit assigned by
the ordinance remained, however, at ten millions of dollars. There was
nothing in the acts of Congress which implied any exclusive right of the
United States government in the bank except during the war of the
Revolution. A local charter was obtained from the legislature of
Pennsylvania, and the bank was opened in Philadelphia for the
transaction of business in January, 1782. Its services to the government
during the period of the war were inestimable. In the words of Hamilton,
"American independence owes much to it." But after the war such were
the local jealousies, the fears of oppression, and the dread of foreign
influence, that, on the petition of the inhabitants of Philadelphia and
some of the neighboring counties, the legislature of Pennsylvania
repealed its charter on September 13, 1785. The bank continued its
operations, however, under the charter from Congress. On March 17, 1787,
the legislature of Pennsylvania renewed the charter for fourteen years
and limited the capital to two millions of dollars. The charter was
extended for a similar term of fourteen years on March 26, 1799. Thus in
the beginning of the American banking system are found that distrust and
jealousy of money power which seem inherent in democracies. The exercise
of state jurisdiction over the existence of the Bank of North America
suggested possible embarrassments, which could not escape the
discernment of Hamilton, whose policy, as it was also that of the
Federal party, was to strengthen the powers of the government in every
vital branch of administration.
* * * * *
In his comprehensive plan of government Hamilton included a financial
institution to develop the national resources, strengthen the public
credit, aid the Treasury Department in its administration, and provide a
secure and sound circulating medium for the people. On December 13,
1790, he sent in to Congress a report on the subject of a national bank.
The Republican party, then in the minority, opposed the plan as
unconstitutional, on the ground that the power of creating banks or any
corporate body had not been expressly delegated to Congress, and was
therefore not possessed by it. Washington's cabinet was divided;
Jefferson opposing the measure as not within the implied powers, because
it was an expediency and not a paramount necessity. Later he used
stronger language, and denounced the institution as "one of the most
deadly hostility existing against the principles and form of our
Constitution," nor did he ever abandon these views. There is the
authority of Mr. Gallatin for saying that Jefferson "died a decided
enemy to our banking system generally, and specially to a bank of the
United States." But Hamilton's views prevailed. Washington, who in the
weary years of war had seen the imperative necessity of some national
organization of the finances, after mature deliberation approved the
plan, and on February 25, 1791, the Bank of the United States was
incorporated. The capital stock was limited to twenty-five thousand
shares of four hundred dollars each, or ten millions of dollars, payable
one fourth in gold and silver, and three fourths in public securities
bearing an interest of six and three per cent. The stock was immediately
subscribed for, the government taking five thousand shares, two millions
of dollars, under the right reserved in the charter. The subscription of
the United States was paid in ten equal annual installments. A large
proportion of the stock was held abroad, and the shares soon rose above
par. By an act of March 2, 1791, the funded three per cents. were also
made receivable in payment of subscriptions to the bank, whence it has
been said that out of the funding system sprung the bank, as three
fourths of its capital consisted of public stocks. Authority was given
the bank to establish offices of discount and deposit within the United
States. The chief bank was placed in Philadelphia, and branches were
established in eight cities, with capitals in proportion to their
commercial importance.
In 1809 the stockholders of the Bank of the United States memorialized
the government for a renewal of their charter, which would expire on
March 4, 1811; and on March 9, 1809, Mr. Gallatin sent in a report in
which he reviewed the operations of the bank from its organization. Of
the government shares, five million dollars at par, two thousand four
hundred and ninety-three shares were sold in 1796 and 1797 at an advance
of 25 per cent., two hundred and eighty-seven in 1797 at an advance of
20 per cent., and the remaining 2220 shares in 1802, at an advance of 45
per cent., making together, exclusive of the dividends, a profit of
$671,680 to the United States. Eighteen thousand shares of the bank
stock were held abroad, and seven thousand shares, or a little more than
one fourth part of the capital, in the United States. A table of all the
dividends made by the bank showed that they had on the average been at
the rate of 8-3/8 (precisely 8-13/34) per cent. a year, which proved
that the bank had not in any considerable degree used the public
deposits for the purpose of extending its discounts. From a general view
of the debits and credits, as presented, it appeared that the affairs of
the Bank of the United States, considered as a moneyed institution, had
been wisely and skillfully managed. The advantages derived by the
government Mr. Gallatin stated to be, 1, safekeeping of the public
moneys; 2, transmission of the public moneys; 3, collection of the
revenue; 4, loans. The strongest objection to the renewal of the charter
lay in the great portion of the bank stock held by foreigners. Not on
account of any influence over the institution, since they had no vote;
but because of the high rate of interest payable by America to foreign
countries. If the charter were not renewed the principal of that
portion, amounting to $7,200,000, must at once be remitted abroad; but
if the charter were renewed, dividends equal to an interest of about
8-1/2 per cent. per annum must be remitted. Mr. Gallatin's report closed
with the following suggestions:--
I. That the bank should pay an interest to the United States on the
public deposits above a certain sum.
II. That it should be bound to lend the United States a sum not
exceeding three fifths of its capital.
III. That the capital stock of the bank should be increased to thirty
millions of dollars, to be subscribed for, 1, five millions by citizens
of the United States; 2, fifteen millions by the States; a branch to be
established in each subscribing State; 3, payments by either individuals
or States to be in specie or public stock of the United States at rates
to be fixed by law; the subscribing States to pay in ten annual
installments.
IV. That some share should be given in the direction to the general and
state governments by appointment of directors in the general direction
and branches.
The result of this plan would be, 1st, that the United States might,
from the interest on the public deposits, accumulate during years of
peace and prosperity a treasure sufficient to meet periods of war and
calamity; 2d, that they might rely on a loan of eighteen millions of
dollars in any sudden emergency; 3d, that by the payment in ten
installments the increase in capital would be in proportion to the
progressive state of the country; 4th, that the bank itself would form
an additional bond of common interest and union amongst the several
States. But these arguments availed not against the blind and ignorant
jealousy of the Republican majority in the House. The days of the bank
were numbered. Congress refused to prolong its existence, and the
institution was dissolved. Fortunately for the country, it wound up its
affairs with such deliberation and prudence as to allow of the
interposition of other bank credits in lieu of those withdrawn, and
thus prevented a serious shock to the interests of the community. In the
twenty years of its existence from 1791 to 1811 its management was
irreproachable. Its annual dividends from 1791 to 1809 were 8-2/3 per
cent., and its stock, always above par, from 1805 to 1809 ranged from 20
to 40 per cent. premium.
In its numerous and varied relations to the government it had been a
useful and faithful servant, and its directors had never assumed the
attitude of money kings, of which the Jeffersonian democracy pretended
to stand in hourly dread. To the general and important nature of its
financial service Mr. Gallatin gave his testimony in 1830; after his own
direct participation in public affairs had ended.
"Experience, however, has since confirmed the great utility and
importance of a bank of the United States in its connection with
the Treasury. The first great advantage derived from it consists in
the safekeeping of the public moneys, securing in the first
instance the immediate payment of those received by the principal
collectors, and affording a constant check on all their
transactions; and afterwards rendering a defalcation in the moneys
once paid, and whilst nominally in the treasury, absolutely
impossible. The next, and not less important, benefit is to be
found in the perfect facility with which all the public payments
are made by checks or treasury drafts, payable at any place where
the bank has an office; all those who have demands against
government are paid in the place most convenient to them; and the
public moneys are transferred through our extensive territory at a
moment's warning without any risk or expense, to the places most
remote from those of collection, and wherever public exigencies may
require."
Late in life, in a letter to John M. Botts, June 14, 1841, Mr. Gallatin
expressed the same opinions with regard to the usefulness of a
government bank as an aid to the Treasury Department, but limited his
approval to that use. "Except in its character of fiscal agent to the
general government I attach much less importance to a national bank than
several of those who are in favor of it." "Did I believe," he adds in
the same letter, "that a bank of the United States would effectually
secure us a sound currency, I would think it a duty at all hazards to
promote the object."
The reason for his doubts in 1841 is easily seen in the impossibility of
annihilating or controlling the three hundred distinct currencies of as
many banks, each nominally convertible into specie at its point of
issue; a financial puzzle which Mr. Chase solved in the device and
organization of the present national banking system, which, without
involving the government in banking operations, affords to the people a
homogeneous currency of uniform value, and secures its convertibility by
reasonable but absolute restrictions, upon conformity to which the
existence of the banks depends. The exigencies of war compelled an
acquiescence in the plans of Mr. Chase, which, at the time when Mr.
Gallatin expressed his doubts, could not have been had in any system
whatever which involved the subordination of the banks.
The wide spread of the state bank system, with its irresponsible and
unlimited issues, occurring subsequent to Mr. Gallatin's withdrawal from
the Treasury, was a consequence of the failure to renew the charter of
the Bank of the United States; and if ever there were a system by which
the inhabitants of States whose floating capital was small were placed
at the mercy of moneyed corporations of the States where it was
abundant, it was the state bank system. The experience of the old
confederation had not taught this lesson. The colonial system was
continued by the several States, and bills of credit were issued on
their faith. The continental system was a compound of the main features
of this plan. The bills were issued by the Congress, but the States were
relied upon for their ultimate redemption.
The collapse of the entire fabric of finance led to the establishment of
the Bank of North America, the notes of which were redeemable and
redeemed at the bank counters. The article in the Constitution of 1787,
prohibiting the issue of bills of credit by the States, was evidently
intended to secure a uniform currency to the people of the United
States, and it has been by a strange perversion of this manifest
intention that the power has been conceded to the States to charter
corporations to do that which was forbidden to themselves in their
sovereign capacity; namely, to issue bills of credit, which bank-notes
are. It is idle to say that, because such bills were not a "legal
tender," they were therefore not of the character which the Constitution
forbade. Necessity knows no law, and in the absence of any other
currency the people were perforce compelled to take what they could get.
Experience later showed that large amounts of paper money manufactured
in one State were easily put in circulation in far distant communities,
and considerable sums, through the operations of wear and tear and the
vicissitudes incident to its fragile nature, never returned to plague
the inventor.
At the time of the organization of the National Bank by Hamilton, there
were but three banks in the United States: the Bank of North America,
the Bank of New York, and the Bank of Massachusetts. Their added capital
amounted to two millions of dollars, and their issues were
inconsiderable.
Mr. Gallatin estimated that in January, 1811, just before the expiration
of the bank charter, there were in the United States eighty-eight state
banks with a capital of $42,612,000.
--------------------------+-------------+---------------+------------
| | Notes in |
| Capital. | Circulation. | Specie.
--------------------------+-------------+---------------+------------
Bank of the United States | $10,000,000 | $5,400,000 | $5,800,000
Eighty-eight State Banks | 42,610,601 | 22,700,000 | 9,600,000
--------------------------+-------------+---------------+------------
| $52,610,601 | $28,100,000 | $15,400,000
--------------------------+-------------+---------------+------------
Over the local institutions the Bank of the United States always
exercised a salutary control, checking any disposition to overtrade by
restraining their issues and holding them to a proper specie reserve;
and this by no other interference except its countenance or ill favor,
as such banks severally observed or disregarded the ordinary rules of
financial prudence. The immediate effect of the refusal of Congress to
recharter the Bank of the United States was to bring the Treasury to the
verge of bankruptcy. The interference of Parish, Girard, and Astor alone
saved the credit of the government, and this interference was no doubt
prompted by self-interest. That Mr. Astor was hostile to the bank is
certain. Gallatin wrote to Madison in January, 1811, that Mr. Astor had
sent him a verbal message, "that in case of non-renewal of the charter
of the Bank of the United States, all his funds and those of his
friends, to the amount of two millions of dollars, would be at the
command of government, either in importing specie, circulating
government paper, or in any other way best calculated to prevent any
injury arising from the dissolution of the bank," and he added that Mr.
Bentson, Mr. Astor's son-in-law, in communicating this message said,
"that in this instance profit was not Mr. Astor's object, and that he
would go great lengths, partly from pride and partly from wish, to see
the bank down." In 1813, when the bank was "down," Mr. Gallatin was no
longer master of the situation. He offered to treat directly with
Parish, Girard, and Astor for ten millions of dollars, but finding some
hesitation, he opened the loan for subscription. When the subscription
failed, he was at the mercy of the capitalists.
Another immediate effect of the dissolution of the bank was the
withdrawal from the country of the foreign capital invested in the bank,
more than seven millions of dollars. This amount was remitted, in the
twelve months preceding the war, in specie. Specie was at that time a
product foreign to the United States, and by no means easy to obtain.
Specie, as Mr. Gallatin profoundly observed, does not precede, but
follows wealth. The want of it nearly destroyed Morris's original plan
for the Bank of North America, and was only made up by the fortunate
receipt of the French remittances. In 1808 the specie in the vaults of
the treasury reached fourteen millions of dollars, but during the
operation of the Embargo Act, the banks of New England had gradually
accumulated a specie reserve, and that of Richmond, Virginia, pursued
the same policy. Together they held one third of the entire specie
reserve of the banks. The amount of specie in the Bank of the United
States, January 1, 1811, had fallen to $5,800,000, which soon found its
way abroad.
The notes of the Bank of the United States, payable on demand in gold
and silver at the counters of the bank, or any of its branches, were,
by its charter, receivable in all payments to the United States; but
this quality was also stripped from them on March 19, 1812, by a repeal
of the act according it. To these disturbances of the financial
equilibrium of the country was added the necessary withdrawal of fifteen
millions of bank credit and its transfer to other institutions. This
gave an extraordinary impulse to the establishment of local banks, each
eager for a share of the profits. The capital of the country, instead of
being concentrated, was dissipated. Between January 1, 1811, and 1815,
one hundred and twenty new banks were chartered, and forty millions of
dollars were added to the banking capital. To realize profits, the
issues of paper were pushed to the extreme of possible circulation.
Meanwhile New England kept aloof from the nation. The specie in the
vaults of the banks of Massachusetts rose from $1,706,000 on June 1,
1811, to $7,326,000 on June 1, 1814. This was a consequence of the New
England policy of opposition. Mr. Gallatin estimated that the proceeds
of loans, exclusive of treasury notes and temporary loans, paid into the
treasury from the commencement of the war to the end of the year 1814
were $41,010,000: of which sum the Eastern States lent $2,900,000; the
Middle States, $35,790,000; Southwestern States, $2,320,000.
The floating debt of the United States, consisting of treasury notes
and temporary loans unpaid, amounted, January 1, 1815, to $11,250,000,
of which nearly four fifths were loaned by the cities of New York,
Philadelphia, and Baltimore, and the District of Columbia. The
suspension of the banks was precipitated by the capture of Washington.
It began in Baltimore, which was threatened by the British, and was at
once followed in Philadelphia and New York. Before the end of September
all the banks south and west of New England had suspended specie
payment. In his "Considerations on the Currency," Mr. Gallatin expressed
his--
"deliberate opinion that the suspension might have been prevented
at the time when it took place, had the Bank of the United States
been in existence. The exaggerated increase of state banks,
occasioned by the dissolution of that institution, would not have
occurred. That bank would _as before_ have restrained them within
proper bounds and checked their issues, and through the means of
its offices it would have been in possession of the earliest
symptoms of the approaching danger. It would have put the Treasury
Department on its guard; both, acting in concert, would certainly
have been able, at least, to retard the event; and as the treaty of
peace was ratified within less than six months after the suspension
took place, that catastrophe would have been avoided."
But within fifteen months the bank issues increased from forty-five and
a half to sixty millions.
----------------------+-------------+--------------+------------
| Capital. | Circulation. | Specie.
----------------------+-------------+--------------+------------
Banks of New England. | $15,690,000 | $5,320,000 | $8,200,000
Other Banks | 66,930,000 | 44,730,000 | 8,600,000
----------------------+-------------+--------------+------------
1815. 208 State Banks.| $82,620,000 | $50,050,000 | $16,800,000
1816. 246 State Banks.| 89,822,422 | 68,000,000 | 19,000,000
----------------------+-------------+--------------+------------
The depression of the local currencies ranged from seven to twenty-five
per cent. In New York and Charleston it was seven to ten per cent. below
the par of coin. At Philadelphia from seventeen to eighteen per cent. At
Washington and Baltimore from twenty to twenty-two, and at Pittsburgh
and on the frontier, twenty-five per cent. below par. The circulating
medium, or measure of values, being doubled, the price of commodities
was doubled. The agiotage, of course, was the profit of the bankers and
brokers; a sum estimated at six millions of dollars a year, or ten per
cent. on the exchanges of the country, which McDuffie, in his celebrated
report, estimated at sixty millions annually.
In November the Treasury Department found itself involved in the common
disaster. The refusal of the banks, in which the public moneys were
deposited, to pay their notes or the drafts upon them in specie deprived
the government of its gold and silver; and their refusal, likewise, of
credit and circulation to the issues of banks in other States deprived
the government also of the only means it possessed for transferring its
funds to pay the dividends on the debt and discharge the treasury notes.
Mr. Dallas found himself compelled to appeal to the banks by circular to
subscribe for sufficient treasury notes to secure them such advances as
might be asked of them for the discharge of the public obligations.
"In the latter end of the year 1814," says Mr. Gallatin, "Mr. Jefferson
suggested the propriety of a gradual issue by government of two hundred
millions of dollars in paper;" commenting upon which Mr. Gallatin
remarks that Mr. Jefferson, from the imperfect data in his possession,
"greatly overrated the amount of paper currency which could be sustained
at par; and he had, on the other hand, underrated the great expenses of
the war;" but at "all events," he adds, "the issue of government paper
ought to be kept in reserve for extraordinary circumstances." But here
it may be remarked that the evolution of the systems of American finance
seems to lead slowly but surely to an entire divorce of banking from
currency, and the day is not far distant when the circulating medium of
the United States will consist of gold and silver, and of government
issues restricted, according to the English principle, to the minimum of
circulation, and kept equivalent to coin by a specie reserve in the
treasury; while the banks, their circulation withdrawn and the
institutions freed from any tax, will be confined to their legitimate
business of receiving deposits and making loans and discounts.
On October 14, 1814, Alexander J. Dallas, Mr. Gallatin's old friend, who
had been appointed secretary of the treasury on the 6th of the same
month, in a report of a plan to support the public credit, proposed the
incorporation of a national bank. A bill was passed by Congress, but
returned to it by Madison with his veto on January 15, 1815. In this
peculiar document Madison "waived the question of the constitutional
authority of the legislature to establish an incorporated bank, as being
precluded, in his judgment, by repeated recognitions, under varied
circumstances, of the validity of such an institution in acts of the
legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the government." But he
objected for reasons of detail. Mr. Dallas again, as a last resort,
insisted on a bank as the only means by which the currency of the
country could be restored to a sound condition. In December, 1815,
Dallas reported to the committee of the House of Representatives on the
national currency, of which John C. Calhoun was chairman, a plan for a
national bank, and on March 3, 1816, the second Bank of the United
States was chartered by Congress. The capital was thirty-five millions,
of which the government held seven millions in seventy thousand shares
of one hundred dollars each. Mr. Madison approved the bill. This
completed the abandonment of every shred of principle claimed by the
Republican party as their rule of action. They struggled through the
rest of their existence without a political conviction. The national
bank, and the system of internal taxation which had been scorned by
Jefferson and Madison as unconstitutional, were accepted actually under
Madison's administration. Gallatin's success, owing to the development
and application of Hamilton's plans, was a complete vindication of the
theory and practice of the Federalists which they abhorred; Jefferson's
plan of a government issue of paper money was a higher flight into the
upper atmosphere of implied powers than Hamilton ever dreamed of.
The second national bank of the United States was also located at
Philadelphia, and chartered for twenty years. The manner in which it
performed its financial service is admirably set forth in Mr. Gallatin's
"Considerations on the Currency," already mentioned. It acted as a
regulator upon the state banks, checked excessive issues on their part,
and brought the paper currency of the country down from sixty-six to
less than forty millions, before the year 1820.
In April, 1816, Mr. Dallas having signified his intention to resign the
Treasury, Mr. Madison wrote to Gallatin, offering him his choice between
the mission to France and the Treasury Department. Mr. Gallatin's reply
was characteristic. He declined the Treasury, but with reluctance, since
he thought he would be more useful at home than abroad, and because he
preferred to be in America rather than in Europe. One of his
preponderating reasons was that, although he felt himself competent to
the higher duties of the office, there was, for what he conceived "a
proper management of the Treasury, a necessity for a mass of mechanical
labor connected with details, forms, calculating, etc., which having
lost sight of the thread and routine, he could not think of again
learning and going through." He was aware that there was "much confusion
due to the changes of office and the state of the currency, and thought
that an active young man could alone reinstate and direct properly that
department."
In June of the same year, while waiting for the Peacock, which was to
carry him across the sea, Gallatin wrote Mr. Madison an urgent letter,
impressing upon him the necessity of restoring specie payment, and his
perfect conviction that nothing but the will of the government was
wanted to reinstate the country in its moral character in that respect.
He dreaded the "paper taint," which he found spreading as he journeyed
northward.
In January 1817, delegates from the banks of New York, Philadelphia,
Baltimore and Virginia met in Philadelphia and agreed to a general and
simultaneous resumption of specie payments. The Bank of the United
States proposed a compact which was accepted by the state banks and
ratified by the secretary of the treasury. That institution engaged, to
a reasonable extent, to support any bank menaced. This engagement and
the importation of seven millions of specie from abroad by the Bank of
the United States secured a general restoration of specie payment. In
1822 Mr. Gallatin was tendered and declined the office of president of
the Bank of the United States.
In 1829 he prepared for Mr. Ingham, then secretary of the treasury, a
masterly statement of the relative value of gold and silver. In 1830 Mr.
Gallatin wrote for the "American Quarterly Review" his essay,
"Considerations on the Currency and Banking System of the United
States." Appearing at the time when the renewal of the charter of the
Bank of the United States was an absorbing question, this essay was
equally sought for by both the friends and opponents of the bank. It is
not confined, however, to this subject, but covers the entire field of
American finance. His treatment of the currency question was novel. He
analyzed the systems of Europe, compared them with those which prevailed
in the United States, and reached the conclusion, the general
correctness of which has been justified by the experience of all other
nations, and sooner or later will be accepted by our own; namely, the
necessity of a currency strong in the precious metals, and the
restriction of paper money to notes of one hundred dollars to be issued
by the government. This limit is higher than that adopted in France and
England, but the general principle that a circulating medium is sound
only as it is strong in gold and silver, and that gold and silver can
only be retained permanently by making a place for them in the
circulating medium by a restriction of paper issues, will yet find
favor even in this paper-loving country.
In 1832 Mr. Gallatin accepted the presidency of a bank in New York, the
subscription to the stock of which, $750,000, was completed by Mr. John
Jacob Astor on condition that Mr. Gallatin should manage its affairs.
The direction of its concerns, without absorbing his time, kept him in
the financial current. The bank was called the National Bank of New
York. But not in this modest post was he to find the financial path
smooth. It is true he had lived in the flesh to see the financial
millennium. The rapid growth of the country and the faithful adherence
of his successors in the Treasury Department to the funding principle
had at last realized his dream. The national debt was extinguished. The
last dollar was paid. Louis McLane, secretary of the treasury, on
December 5, 1832, in his report on the finances, said that the dividends
derived from the bank shares held by the United States were more than
was required to pay the interest, and that the _debt_ might therefore be
considered as substantially extinguished after January 1, 1833.
On December 3, 1833, Roger B. Taney, secretary of the treasury, reported
to Congress that he had directed the removal of the deposits of the
government from the Bank of the United States and placed them in banks
of his own selection. He gave a number of reasons for this extraordinary
exercise of the power which he obtained by his appointment on September
23, 1833. He received his reward in June, 1834, being then transferred
by President Jackson to the seat of chief justice of the Supreme Court.
In his annual report Taney named, among his elaborate reasons for the
removal, that the bank had used its money for electioneering purposes,
and that he "had always regarded the result of the last election of
President of the United States as the declaration of a majority of the
people that the charter ought not to be renewed." He further expressed
the opinion "that a corporation of that description was not necessary
either for the fiscal operations of the government or the general
convenience of the people." It mattered little to him that Mr. Gallatin
had only recently pointed out that from the year 1791 the operations of
the Treasury had, without interruption, been carried on through the
medium of banks; during the years 1811 to 1814, by the state banks, with
a result which no one had as yet forgotten; before and since that brief
interval through the Bank of the United States. Enough for Taney, that
it was the will of his imperious master, 'the pugnacious animal,' as
Gallatin aptly termed him.
In October, 1834, Taney's successor in the Treasury, Levi Woodbury, gave
notice that the remaining debt, unredeemed after January 1, 1835, would
cease to bear interest and be promptly paid on application to the
commissioners of loans in the several States. On December 8, 1835, Mr.
Woodbury reported "an unprecedented spectacle presented to the world of
a government virtually without any debts and without any direct
taxation." The surplus revenues, about thirty-seven and a half millions
of dollars, had by an act of the previous session been distributed among
the several States. But the secretary and the country soon found that
they were on dangerous ground. In December, 1837, the same secretary,
alarmed at his responsibility, said to Congress, in warning words, "We
are without any national debt to absorb and regulate surpluses, or any
adequate supply of banking institutions which provide a sound currency
for general purposes by paying specie on demand, or which are in a
situation fully to command confidence for keeping, disbursing, and
transferring the public funds in a satisfactory manner."
The Bank of the United States, on the expiration of its charter in
March, 1836, accepted a charter from the State of Pennsylvania; but,
though its influence continued to be as great, its direction was no
longer the same. Abandoning its legitimate business, it speculated in
merchandise, and even kept an agent in New Orleans to compete with the
Barings in purchases of the cotton crop as a basis for exchange.
Precisely as in 1811, after the withdrawal of the control of the Bank of
the United States, the state banks ran a wild career of speculation.
From 1830 to 1837 three hundred new banks sprang up with an additional
capital of one hundred and forty-five millions, doubling, as twenty
years before, the banking capital of the country. This volume the
deposits of the Treasury continued to swell. Mr. Woodbury was the first
to take alarm. In December, 1836, he reported the specie in the country
to have increased from thirty millions in 1833 to seventy-three millions
at the date of his report, and the paper circulation, in the same
period, to have advanced, since the removal of the deposits from the
Bank of the United States, from eighty millions to one hundred and
twenty millions, or forty millions in eighteen months; and the bank
capital, in the same period, to have increased from two hundred to three
hundred millions. Importation augmented; the balance of trade suddenly
turned against the United States to the extent of one hundred and fifty
millions, and coin began to flow abroad to liquidate the account. There
was no debt to attract foreign investment and arrest the export of
specie. Added to this was the withdrawal of the government deposits from
the pet banks, which compelled an immediate contraction. The result was
inevitable. On May 10, 1837, the New York banks suspended, Mr.
Gallatin's institution being of course dragged down with the rest. It is
idle to suppose that any single bank can hold out against a general
suspension. It may liquidate or become a bank of deposits, but it cannot
maintain its relations with its sister institutions except on a basis of
common accord.
A general suspension followed. Mr. Woodbury proved himself equal to the
emergency, and recommended a plan of "keeping the public money under new
legislative provisions without using banks at all as fiscal agents."
This was the beginning of the sub-treasury system, a new departure in
treasury management, and a further evolution in American finance. It
still remains, and will no doubt be permanent. Its establishment was
necessary because of the absence of a national bank.
Mr. Gallatin at once turned his attention to bring about first a
liquidation and then a resumption. It was a favorite maxim with him,
that "the agonies of resumption are far harder to endure than those of
suspension," as it is easier to refrain from lapse of virtue than to
restore moral integrity once impaired. But in resumption the suffering
falls where it belongs, on the careless, the improvident, and the
over-trader.
On August 15, 1837, the officers of the banks of New York city, in a
general meeting, appointed a committee of three to call a convention of
the principal banks to agree upon a time for a resumption of specie
payments. This committee, of which Mr. Gallatin was chairman, on August
18 addressed a circular to the principal banks in the United States,
inviting the expression of their wishes as to the time and place for a
convention, suggesting New York as the place, and October, 1837, as the
time. They said, in addition, that the banks of New York city, in view
of the law of the State dissolving them as legal corporations in case
of suspension for one year, must resume at some time between January 1
and March 15, 1838. The circular committed the New York banks to no
definite action, but expressed the opinion that the fall in the rate of
exchanges indicated an early return of specie to par, when resumption
could be effected without danger. The banks of Philadelphia held a
meeting on August 29, and adopted resolutions declaring it inexpedient
to appoint delegates to the proposed convention. Aware of the reasons
for this action, the chief of which was the extended and perhaps
insolvent condition of the United States Bank of Pennsylvania, the New
York committee invited the banks in the several States to appoint
delegates to meet on November 27, 1837, in New York. Delegates from
banks of seventeen States and the District of Columbia appeared. On the
30th resolutions were brought in recommending a general resumption on
July 1, without precluding an earlier resumption on the part of such
banks as might find it necessary. The Pennsylvania banks opposed this
action with resolutions condemning the idea of immediate resumption as
impracticable, and also, in the absence of delegates from the banks of
Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee, as unwise. The
convention met again on December 2, when an adjournment was carried to
April 11, 1838, when delegates from the banks not represented were
invited to attend. Mr. Gallatin saw that the combination of the
Philadelphia and Boston banks, under the lead of Mr. Biddle, would
certainly force a further postponement. Exchange on London, which had
been as high as 121, the true par being about 109-1/2, nominal, had
fallen to 111-1/2, which, considering that the city bank paper was at a
discount of five per cent., was at the rate of 2-1/2 per cent. below
specie par. The exportation of specie had entirely ceased.
On December 15 Mr. Gallatin and his committee appointed at the general
convention submitted a report which he had drafted, which, though
addressed to the New York banks, covered the whole ground. Meanwhile the
highest authority in Pennsylvania had given it as his opinion "that the
banks of Pennsylvania were in a much sounder state than before the
suspension, and that the resumption of specie payments, so far as it
depends on their situation and resources, may take place at any time."
On February 28, 1838, Mr. Gallatin's committee made a further report
showing that the liabilities of the New York banks had been reduced more
than twelve millions and a half, or fifty per cent., and asserting that
with the support of the community and the state authorities they could
resume on an equal footing on May 10. This declaration was welcomed with
great satisfaction by a general meeting of the citizens of New York. On
April 11 the general convention again met in New York. The Philadelphia
banks declined to attend. A letter from Mr. Woodbury promised the
support of the Treasury Department. A committee of one from each State
was appointed, which recommended the first Monday in October as the
earliest day for a general resumption. The convention could not,
however, be brought to fix upon so early a day, but finally fixed upon
January 1, 1839, and adjourned. The New York banks would have accepted
July 1, 1838, but this being refused they resumed alone on May 10, and
the force of public opinion compelled resumption by nearly all the banks
of the country on July 1.
The terrible contraction was fatal to the United States Bank of
Pennsylvania, which after a vain struggle closed its doors in October,
1839, and carried with it the entire banking system of the Southern and
Southwestern States. Although in no way similar to the semi-governmental
institutions which preceded it, yet, from its similarity of name and
identity of location, its disastrous failure added to the blind popular
distrust of its predecessors, which narrow-minded politicians had
fostered for their own selfish purposes. Fortunately the sub-treasury
plan of Mr. Woodbury supplied the need of a safe place of deposit which,
since the refusal of Congress to renew the charter of the old bank, had
been sorely felt.
In 1838, on the foundation of the Bank of Commerce under the free
banking law of the State of New York, the presidency of it was first
tendered to Mr. Gallatin. The directors of this bank were among the most
distinguished financiers of the city, and its object was to provide a
conservative institution with sufficient power and capital to act as a
regulator upon the New York banks. Profit to the stockholders was
secondary to the reserve power for general advantage.
In June, 1839, Mr. Gallatin resigned his post as president of the
National Bank of New York. In 1841 he published a financial essay, which
he entitled "Suggestions on the Banks and Currency of the United
States," a paper full of information, but from the nature of the subject
not to be compared in general interest with his earlier paper, which is
as fresh to-day as when it was written. Mr. Gallatin condemned paper
currency as an artificial stimulus, and the ultimate object of his
essays was to annihilate what he termed the "dangerous instrument." He
admitted its utility and convenience, when used with great sobriety, but
he deprecated its tendency to degenerate into a depreciated and
irredeemable currency. This tendency the present national banking law
arrests, but the law rather invites than prohibits the stimulus of
increased issues. The last word has not yet been said on national
currency, which, though the basis of all commercial transactions, has
necessarily no other relation to banks than that which it holds to any
individual in the community.
Economic questions have interested the highest order of mind on the two
continents. Sismondi published a paper on commercial wealth in 1803, and
in 1810 a memoir on paper money, which he prepared to show how it might
be suppressed in the Austrian dominions; Humboldt made a special study
of the sources and quantity of the precious metals in the world, in
which Mr. Gallatin aided him by investigation in America. Michel
Chevalier was interested in the same subjects; surviving his two masters
in the art and witnessing the marvelous effects of the additions made by
America to the store of precious metals, he continued the study in the
spirit of his predecessors, and favored the world with instructive
papers. Mr. Gallatin's contributions to this science are remarkable for
minute research and careful deductions.
In 1843 President Tyler tendered the Treasury portfolio to Mr. Gallatin.
The venerable financier looked upon the offer as an act of folly to
which a serious answer seemed hardly necessary. Yet as silence might be
misconstrued, he replied that he wanted no office, and to accept at his
age that of secretary of the treasury would "be an act of insanity." He
was then in his eighty-third year. The offer of the post was but an
ill-considered caprice of Mr. Tyler.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 10: Cents are omitted as confusing figures.]
[Footnote 11: The first Annual Report of the Secretary of the Treasury.
This was under the Supplementary Treasury Act.]
[Footnote 12: Excess of receipts, notwithstanding the purchase of
Louisiana and payments on account of principal and interest of the
debt.]
[Footnote 13: These were the banks of New York, Boston, Philadelphia,
and Baltimore. Seven presidents formed the committee. John A. Stevens of
New York was chairman, by request of the Secretary of the Treasury. The
other members were named by him. The sum advanced to the government was
one hundred and fifty millions of dollars in coin.]
[Footnote 14: At Portland, $120,000; Salem, $183,600; Boston, $75,300;
Providence, $67,800; Richmond, $49,000; Norfolk, $103,000; Charleston,
$354,000.]
[Footnote 15: Report of Secretary Dallas, September 20, 1816.]
[Footnote 16: Act of March 3, 1817.]
[Footnote 17: _Democratic Review_, xii. 641.]
[Footnote 18: Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means.]
CHAPTER VII
IN THE CABINET
The general principles which Mr. Jefferson proposed to apply in his
conduct of the government were not principles of organization but of
administration. The establishments devised by Hamilton, in accordance
with or in development of the provisions of the Constitution, were
organic. The new policy was essentially restrictive and economic. The
military and naval establishments were to be kept at their lowest
possible limit. The Treasury Department was to be conducted on strictly
business principles. The debt was to be reduced and finally paid by a
fixed annual appropriation. The revenue was to be raised by imposts on
importation and tonnage, and by direct taxation, if necessary. The
public land system was to be developed. A scheme of internal
improvements by land and water highways was to be devised. All these
purposes except the last had been declared by the opposition during the
last part of Washington's second term and during Adams's presidency, and
had been lucidly expounded by Madison, Gallatin, Giles, Nicholas, and
others of the Republican leaders. On all these subjects Mr. Gallatin
was in accord with his chief. Only upon the bank question were they at
issue. Mr. Jefferson detested or feared the aristocracy of money, while
Gallatin, with a clearer insight into commercial and financial
questions, recognized that in a young country where capital was limited,
and specie in still greater disproportion to the increasing demands of
trade, a well-ordered, well-managed money institution was an enormous
advantage, if not an imperative necessity to the government and the
people.
Peace was necessary to the success of this general policy of internal
progress, but peace was not to be had for the asking. It was not till
half a century later that the power of the western continent as a
food-producing country was fully felt by Europe, and peace with the
United States became almost a condition of existence to millions in the
old world, while this country became independent, in fact as in name, to
the fullest meaning of the word. Peace was not menaced during
Jefferson's first administration, for the Federalists had left no legacy
of diplomatic discord to embarrass their successors. The divisions of
opinion were on home affairs. The Republican party was the first
opposition which had reached power since the formation of the
government. The Federalists had not hesitated to confine the patronage
of the executive to men of their own way of thinking. The Republicans
had attacked that principle. There were men even in the ranks of
Jefferson's administration who scouted the idea that the President of
the United States could become "the President of a party." But practice
and principle are not always in accord, even in administrations of
sentimental purity, and the pressure for office was as great in 1800 as
it has ever since been on the arrival of a new party to power. Beyond
all other departments of government, the Treasury depends for its proper
service upon business capacity and a knowledge of the principles of
accounting and office routine. Mr. Gallatin was well aware of the
difficulties his predecessors had encountered in finding and retaining
competent examining and auditing clerks. As there was no reason to
suppose that all this talent was to be found in the ranks of the
Republican party, and his common sense pointed out the folly of limiting
the market of supply, he early (July 25, 1801) prepared a circular to
collectors, in which he informed them "that the door of office was no
longer to be shut against any man because of his political opinions, but
that integrity and capacity suitable to the station were to be the only
qualifications required; and further, the President, considering freedom
of opinion or freedom of suffrage at public elections imprescriptible
rights of citizens, would regard any exercise of official influence to
sustain or control the same rights in others as injurious to the public
administration and practically destructive of the fundamental principles
of a republican Constitution." But Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madison
opposed this simple declaration of a principle which has since been the
base of every attempt at reform in the civil service. Mr. Jefferson
answered that after one half of the subordinates were exchanged, talents
and worth might alone be inquired into in the case of new vacancies.
This was a miserable shuffling policy which defeated itself. For a
Federalist to retain office when such a discrimination was applied was
of itself a degradation. Mr. Jefferson here threw away and forever lost
the power to establish the true system, and fixed the curse of patronage
upon American administration. The true principle may be stated in the
form of an axiom. Administrations should rely for continuation upon
measures, not on patronage. Gallatin yielded with reluctance to the
spirit of persecution which he did not hesitate to say disgraced the
Republican cause, and sank them to a level with their predecessors.
Notwithstanding his aversion, he was compelled to follow the policy of
the cabinet. Its first result was to divide the Republican party, and to
alienate Burr, whose recommendation of Matthew L. Davis for the naval
office at New York was disregarded. Had the new administration declined
to make removals except for cause, such a dispute would have been
avoided. As it was, the friends of Burr considered the refusal as a
declaration of war. Appointments became immediately a part of the
machinery of Republican administration, as it had been part of that of
their predecessors, and each was carefully weighed and considered in
its reference to party quite as much as to public service.
Already looking forward to the next presidential election, Gallatin was
anxious for an agreement upon Jefferson's successor, and even before the
meeting of the first Congress of his term he advised the President on
this point, and he also proposed the division of every State into
election districts by a general constitutional provision.
Jefferson submitted the draft of his annual messages to the head of each
department, and invited their comments. Gallatin was minute in his
observations, and it is interesting to note the peculiar precision and
caution of his character in the nice criticisms of language and style,
sometimes declaratory, sometimes non-committal, but always and obviously
reasonable, and often presenting a brief argument for the change
proposed. In these days of woman's rights it is curious to read "Th. J.
to Mr. Gallatin. The appointment of a woman to office is an innovation
for which the public is not prepared, nor am I."
Gallatin suggested a weekly general conference of the President and the
secretaries at what is now styled a cabinet meeting, and private
conferences of the President with each of the secretaries once or twice
a week on certain days and at fixed hours. The business to come before
the House was also to be considered, and the policy to be pursued
determined upon. Unfortunately in this case again Jeffersonian theory
did not accord with Jeffersonian practice. Even erratic Randolph
complained of the want of system at these cabinet meetings, where each
was at liberty to do and say as he chose; a severe trial, this, to
Gallatin. In 1845 Mr. Gallatin wrote to Edward Coles that it was "quite
unusual to submit to the cabinet the manner in which the land or naval
forces authorized by Congress, and for which appropriations had been
made, should be employed," and added that on no occasion, in or out of
cabinet, was he ever consulted on those subjects prior to the year 1812.
In the difficulty which arose with the Barbary powers Mr. Gallatin
earnestly urged the payment of an annuity to Tripoli, if necessary for
peace. He considered it a mere matter of calculation whether the
purchase of peace was not cheaper than the expense of a war. This policy
was to be continued for eight years, at the end of which he hoped that a
different tone might be assumed. In a note on the message of 1802,
Gallatin expressed the hope to Jefferson that his administration would
"afford but few materials for historians." He would never sacrifice
permanent prosperity to temporary glitter.
Mr. Gallatin's counsel was sought, and his opinion deferred to, on
subjects which did not fall directly within the scope of administration.
Even on questions of fundamental constitutional law his judgment was not
inferior to that of Madison himself. In one notable instance he differed
from Mr. Lincoln, the attorney-general, whom he held in high esteem as
a good lawyer, a fine scholar, "a man of great discretion and sound
judgment." This was in 1803, when the acquisition of East Louisiana and
West Florida was a cabinet question. Mr. Lincoln considered that there
was a difference between a power to acquire territory for the United
States and the power to extend by treaty the territory of the United
States, and held that the first was unconstitutional. Mr. Gallatin held
that the United States as a nation have an inherent right to acquire
territory, and that, when acquisition is by treaty, the same constituted
authorities in whom the treaty power is vested have a constitutional
right to sanction the acquisition, and that when the territory has been
acquired Congress has the power either of admitting into the Union as a
new State or of annexing to a State, with the consent of that State, or
of making regulations for the government of the territory. Mr. Jefferson
concurred in this opinion, while at the same time he thought it safer
not to permit the enlargement of the Union except by amendment of the
Constitution. Mr. Gallatin's view was practically applied in the cases
named, and later in the annexation of Texas, although he disapproved of
the latter as contrary to good faith and the law of nations. He advised
Jefferson, also, not to lay the treaty by which Louisiana was acquired
before the House until after its ratification by the Senate, taking the
ground that until then it was not a treaty, and urging that great care
should be taken to do nothing which might be represented as containing
any idea of encroachment on the rights of the Senate. He personally
interested himself in the arrangements for taking possession of New
Orleans, and, considering the expense as trifling compared with the
object, urged the dispatch of an imposing force of not less than fifteen
thousand men, which would add to the opinion entertained abroad of our
power, resources, and energy; five thousand of these to be active
troops; ten thousand an enrolled reserve. The acquisition of Louisiana
was the grand popular feature of the foreign policy of the first term of
Jefferson's administration. The internal management left much to be
desired.
While his general views were exalted, and his principles would stand the
nicest examination in their application, Mr. Jefferson was not fortunate
in his choice of methods or men. It is not enough for an administration
to be pure; it should be above suspicion. This his was not. Time has not
washed out the stain of his intimacy with William Duane, the editor of
the infamous "Aurora." Citizen Duane, as he styled himself in the first
days of the administration, quarreled with Gallatin because he would not
apply the official guillotine, and thereafter pursued him with
uncompromising hostility. Of favoritism in appointments Mr. Gallatin
could not be accused. During his twelve years in the Treasury he
procured places for but two friends; one was given an obscure clerkship
in the department; the other, John Badollet, was made register in the
land office at Vincennes, against whom Gallatin said in the application
for appointment which he reluctantly made, there was but one objection,
"that of being his personal and college friend."
The dispositions for the sale of lands in the western territory, the
extinguishment of titles, and the surveys fell under Mr. Gallatin's
general supervision, and were the objects of his particular care. So
also was the establishment of the authority of the United States in the
Louisiana territory. In the course of these arrangements he was brought
into contact with Mr. Pierre Chôteau of St. Louis, who controlled the
Indian trade of a vast territory. The foundation of an intimate
acquaintance was then laid. The influence of this remarkable man over
the Western Indians and the extent of his trading operations with them
was great, and has never since been equaled. About this period Mr. John
Jacob Astor informed the government that he had an opportunity, of which
he intended to take advantage, to purchase one half of the interest of
the Canadian Fur Company, which, notwithstanding the treaty of 1794,
engrossed the trade by way of Michilimackinac with our own Indians.
Before that period this lucrative traffic had been exclusively in
British hands, and the hostility of the Indian tribes rendered any
interference in it by Americans dangerous to life and property, and
their participation since had been merely nominal. Jefferson's cabinet
received the proposal with satisfaction, but, in their strict
interpretation of the Constitution, could find no way of giving any aid
to the scheme beyond the _official_ promise of protection, which it fell
to Mr. Gallatin to draft. Mr. Jefferson wrote to Mr. Astor a letter to
the same effect. Mr. Astor, however, was not deterred from his
enterprise, but, under the charter of the American Fur Company granted
by the State of New York, extended his project to the Indians west of
the Rocky Mountains, and made of it an immense business, employing
several vessels at the mouth of the Columbia River and a large land
party beyond the Rocky Mountains. He finally founded the establishment
of Astoria. This settlement fell into the hands of the British during
the war of 1812. Mr. Astor sought to persuade the American government to
permit him to renew the establishment at its close, only asking a flag
and a lieutenant's command, but Mr. Madison would not commit himself to
the plan.
Among Mr. Jefferson's pet schemes was that of a substitution of gunboats
for fortifications, and for supporting the authority of the laws within
harbors. The mind of Mr. Jefferson had no doubt been favorably disposed
to this mode of offensive defense by the experience of Lafayette at
Annapolis, in his southern expedition in the spring of 1781, when his
entire flotilla, ammunition of war, and even the city of Annapolis,
were saved from destruction by two improvised gunboats, which, armed
with mortars and hot shot, drove the British blockading vessels out of
the harbor. Jefferson first suggested the scheme in his annual message
of 1804, and Gallatin did not interfere; but when, in 1807, the
President insisted, in a special message, on the building of two hundred
vessels of this class, Mr. Gallatin objected, because of the expense in
construction and maintenance, and secondly, of their infallible decay.
Mr. Jefferson persisted, and Mr. Gallatin's judgment was vindicated by
the result. Two years later, of one hundred and seventy-six gunboats
constructed, only twenty-four were in actual service. In his letter of
criticism, Mr. Gallatin gave as his opinion, that "it would be an
economical measure for every naval nation to burn their navy at the end
of a war and to build a new one when again at war, if it was not that
time was necessary to build ships of war." The principle was the same as
to gunboats, and the objection of time necessary for building did not
exist.
This year he also laid before the President a memorandum of preparatory
measures for defense against Great Britain, from whom an attack was
expected by land and sea, and a second plan for offensive operations on
the northern frontier, which is complete in its geographical and
topographical information, and its estimate of resources in men,
material, and money. At the same time he urged upon Mr. Jefferson to
moderate the tone of his message, so as not to widen the breach by
hurting the pride of Great Britain.
In connection with the land system, Mr. Jefferson favored, and Mr.
Gallatin devised, an extensive plan of internal improvements. The route
of the Cumberland road from the Potomac to the Ohio was reported to
Congress in 1807; a coast survey was ordered in the same year. The first
superintendent was Hassler, a Swiss, whom Mr. Gallatin brought to the
notice of Mr. Jefferson. In 1808 a general plan of improvement was
submitted to the Senate. This included canals parallel with the
seacoast, making a continuous line of inland navigation from the Hudson
to Cape Fear; a great turnpike from Maine to Georgia; the improvement of
the Susquehanna, Potomac, James, and Santee rivers to serve the slope
from the Alleghanies to the Atlantic; of the Alleghany, Monongahela, and
Kanawha, to serve the country westward to the Mississippi, the head
waters of these rivers to be connected by four roads across the
Appalachian range; a canal at the falls of the Ohio; a connection of the
Hudson with Lake Champlain, and of the same river with Lake Ontario at
Oswego; and a canal around Niagara Falls. The entire expense he
estimated at $20,000,000, to be met by an appropriation of $2,000,000 a
year for ten years; the stock created for turnpikes and canals to be a
permanent fund for repairs and improvements.
A national university for education in the higher sciences was also
recommended by Jefferson in his message of 1806, but Mr. Gallatin had
little faith in the popularity of this scheme. After the convulsion of
1794 in Geneva, Gallatin's old college mate, D'Yvernois, conceived the
plan of transporting the entire University of Geneva to the United
States, and wrote on the subject to Jefferson and Adams; but his idea
was based on the supposition that fifteen thousand dollars' income could
be had from the United States in support of the institution, which was,
of course, at the time impracticable. Jefferson believed that these
plans of national improvement could be carried into effect only by an
amendment to the Constitution; but Mr. Gallatin, as in the bank
question, was disturbed by no such scruples, and he recommended Mr.
Jefferson to strike from his message the words "general welfare," as
questionable in their nature, and because the proposition seemed to
acknowledge that the words are susceptible of a very dangerous meaning.
To a permanent embargo act Mr. Gallatin was from the beginning opposed.
He recognized the mischief of government prohibitions, and thought that
statesmen might well hesitate before they took the hazard of regulating
the concerns of individuals. The sequel proved the correctness of this
judgment. But Mr. Jefferson could not bring his mind to any more
decisive measure, indeed, it may justly be said, to any measure
whatever. Taking advantage of Mr. Madison's election to the presidency,
he simply withdrew from the triumvirate, and, passing over the subject
in silence in his last message, he ignominiously left to Mr. Madison and
Mr. Gallatin the entire responsibility which the threatening state of
the foreign relations of the country imposed on the Republican party.
The question was now between the enforcement of the Embargo Act and war.
To take off the embargo seemed a declaration of weakness. To add to it a
non-importation clause was the only alternative. In November, 1808, Mr.
Gallatin prepared for George W. Campbell, chairman of the Committee on
Foreign Relations of the House, the declaration known as Campbell's
report, which recited, in clear, compact form, the injuries done to the
United States by Great Britain, and closed with resolutions to the
effect that the United States could not submit to the edicts of Great
Britain and France, and with a recommendation of non-intercourse and for
placing of the country in a state of defense. After long debate the
resolutions were adopted by large majorities, and the policy of
resistance was finally determined upon--resistance, not war. Thus the
United States resorted, as the colonies had resorted in 1774, to a
policy of non-importation. But the condition of the States was not that
of the colonies. Then all the colonies were commercial, and the entire
population was on the seaboard; the prohibition fell with equal weight
upon all. Now there were large interior communities whom restrictions
upon commerce would rather benefit than injure. Yet neither the Sons of
Liberty nor the non-importation associations had been able to enforce
their voluntary agreements either before or after the Congress of 1774.
If this were to be the mode of resistance, stringent measures must be
adopted to make it effective. Mr. Gallatin accordingly called upon
Congress for the necessary powers. They at once responded with the
Enforcement Act, which Mr. Gallatin proceeded to apply with
characteristic administrative vigor, and summoned Jefferson to authorize
the collectors of revenue to call the military force of the United
States to support them in the exercise of their restrictive authority.
There was to be no evasion under the systems which Hamilton devised and
Gallatin knew so well how to administer.
His annual report made to Congress on December 10 had clearly set forth
the situation, and, without recommending war, had pointed out how it
might be carried on. Macon wrote of him on December 4 to their mutual
friend, Joseph H. Nicholson, "Gallatin is decidedly for war." After his
report was sent in the situation became still more perplexing. Rumors
came of an intention to call a convention of the five New England
States, with New York, if possible, to take ground against the embargo.
As these indications of dissatisfaction became manifest, and the
contingency of the employment of force at home presented itself,
Gallatin made a careful balance of the advantages and inconveniences of
embargo, non-intercourse, and letters of marque. This paper, dated
February, 1809, and entitled, "Notes on the Political Situation," no
doubt served as a brief for consultation with Madison upon his inaugural
message, it being then understood that Gallatin was to be secretary of
state. As he states one of the advantages of letters of marque to be "a
greater chance of unity at home," this measure he probably preferred.
The Senate had already, on January 4, passed a bill ordering out the
entire naval force of the country, and on the 10th the House adopted the
same bill by a vote of 64 to 59. Mr. Gallatin opposed this action
strenuously. On February 2 the House voted by a large majority to remove
the embargo on March 4. Non-intercourse with Great Britain and France
and trade everywhere else were now the conditions. This significant
expression of the feeling of Congress no doubt determined Mr. Gallatin
to suggest letters of marque. Whether he pressed them upon Mr. Madison
or not is uncertain. Meanwhile Mr. Gallatin suffered the odium of
opposition to the will of Congress, and Mr. Madison's power was broken
before he took his seat. A few Republican senators inaugurated an
opposition to their chief after the fashion of modern days, and Mr.
Madison was given to understand that Mr. Gallatin would not be confirmed
if nominated as secretary of state. Mr. Madison yielded to this
dictation, and from that day forward was, as he deserved to be,
perplexed and harassed by a petty oligarchy. Mr. John Quincy Adams, in a
note on this affair, says that, "had Mr. Gallatin been appointed
secretary of state, it is highly probable war with Great Britain would
not have taken place." But it is improbable that any step in foreign
intercourse was taken without Mr. Gallatin's knowledge and approbation.
Such are the traditions of the triumvirate.
The first term of Madison's administration was not eventful. There was
discord in the cabinet. In the Senate the "invisibles," as the faction
which supported Robert Smith, the secretary of state, was aptly termed,
rejected Madison's nominations and opposed Gallatin's financial policy
as their interests or whims prompted. Randolph said of Madison at this
time, that he was "President _de jure_ only." Besides this domestic
strife, the cabinet was engaged in futile efforts to resist the
gradually tightening cordon of British aggression. Erskine's amateur
negotiations, quickly disavowed by the British government, and the short
and impertinent mission of Jackson, who succeeded him and was dismissed
from the United States, well served Canning's policy of delay. Madison,
whose prejudices were as strongly with Englishmen and English ways as
those of Jefferson were with the men and manners of France, averse to
war and withheld also by Gallatin's persistent objections, negotiated
and procrastinated until there was little left to argue about. In
December, 1809, Macon made an effort to pass a stringent navigation act
to meet the British Orders in Council and the French decrees. The bill
passed the House but was emasculated in the Senate, the Republican cabal
voting with the Federalists to strike out the effective clauses. The act
interdicting commercial intercourse with Great Britain and France
expired in May, 1810, and was not revived. A new act was passed, which
was a virtual surrender of every point in dispute. Resistance was
abandoned, and our ships and seamen were left to the mercy of both
belligerents.
Mr. Gallatin's entire energies were bent upon strengthening the Treasury
and opposing reckless expenditures. His most grievous disappointment,
however, was in the refusal of Congress to renew the charter of the Bank
of the United States. He used every possible effort to save this
institution, which, in the condition of the country, was indispensable
to a sound currency and the maintenance of specie payment. But with the
dead weight of Mr. Madison's silence, if not indifference, the struggle
was unequal and the bank fell. The course of Mr. Madison can hardly be
excused. Political history records few examples of a more cruel
desertion of a cabinet minister by his chief. Mr. Gallatin felt it
deeply and tendered his resignation. The administration was going to
pieces by sheer incapacity. The leaders took alarm and the cabinet was
reconstructed, Monroe being called to the Department of State. But the
enemies of Mr. Gallatin still clung to his skirts, determined to drag
him to the dust. Duane attacked him in the most dangerous manner.
Probably no man in America has ever been abused, vilified, maligned with
such deliberate persistency as was Gallatin in the "Aurora" from the
beginning of 1811 until the cabinet crisis, when Mr. Madison was
compelled to choose between Smith and himself. Day after day leaders
were devoted to personal assault upon him and to indirect insinuations
of his superiority to Madison, by which the artful editor sought to
arouse the jealousy of the President. The "Atlas at the side of the
President," the "Great Treasury Law Giver," the "First Lord of the
Treasury," the "Dagon of the Philistines," were favorite epithets. He
was charged by turns with betraying cabinet secrets to Randolph, with
amateur negotiation with Erskine, and with subserviency to British gold
in the support of the Bank of the United States. Here is an instance of
Duane's style: "We can say with perfect conviction that, if Mr. Madison
suffer this man to lord it over him, Mr. Gallatin will drag him down,
for no honest man in the country can support an administration of which
he is a member with consistency or a pure conscience." It was charged
upon Gallatin that his friends considered him as the real, while Madison
was the nominal, president. More than this, he was accused of
embezzlement and enormous speculations in the public lands. Gallatin's
party pride must have been strong indeed to have induced him to stay an
hour in an administration which granted its favors to the author of such
assaults upon one of its chosen leaders.
Jefferson wrote to Mr. Wirt in May following, that, because of the bank,
endeavors were made to drive from the administration (of Mr. Madison)
the ablest man, except the President, who ever was in it, and to beat
down the President himself because he was unwilling to part with such a
counselor.
Monroe was appointed secretary of state in Smith's place in April, 1811.
Other changes followed in the cabinet, but brought little relief to Mr.
Gallatin. Financial affairs now occupied his entire attention; on the
one hand was a diminishing treasury; on the other an expenditure
reckless in itself and beyond the demands of the administration. Without
the sympathy of either the Senate or House, Mr. Gallatin's position
became daily more irksome, until at last he abandoned all attempt to
control the drift of party policy, took the war party at their word, and
sent in to the House a war budget.
Unfortunately for the country, the Republican party knew neither how to
prepare for war, nor how to keep the peace. Mr. Madison had none of the
qualifications of a war President; neither executive ability, decision
of character, nor yet that more important faculty, knowledge of men. In
his attachment to Mr. Madison and in loyalty to what remained of the
once proud triumvirate of talent and power, Mr. Gallatin supplied the
deficiencies of his fellows as best he could, until an offer of
mediation between the United States and Great Britain on the part of the
emperor of Russia presented an opportunity for honorable withdrawal and
service in another and perhaps more congenial field. In March, 1813, the
Russian minister, in a note to the secretary of state, tendered this
offer. Mr. Gallatin had completed his financial arrangements for the
year, and requested Mr. Madison to send him abroad on this mission.
Unwilling to take the risk of new appointments, the President acceded to
this proposal, and gave him leave of absence from his post in the
Treasury. Mr. Gallatin did not anticipate a long absence, and felt, as
he said to his old friend Badollet, that he could nowhere be more
usefully employed than in this negotiation. Certainly he could have no
regret in leaving a cabinet which had so little regard to his own
feelings and so little political decency as to confer the appointment of
adjutant-general in the United States army on his malignant assailant,
William Duane of the "Aurora."
Mr. Gallatin's mission, followed by the resignation of his post in the
cabinet, finally dissolved the political triumvirate, but not the
personal friendship of the men. Numerous attempts were made to alienate
both Jefferson and Madison from Gallatin while he held the portfolio of
the Treasury, but one and all they signally and ignominiously failed.
For Mr. Jefferson Mr. Gallatin had a regard near akin to reverence. A
portrait of the venerable sage was always on his study table. When about
setting out for France in 1816 he tendered his services to his old chief
and wrote to him that 'in every country and in all times he should never
cease to feel gratitude, respect, and attachment for him.' Jefferson
fully reciprocated this regard. From Monticello he wrote to Gallatin in
1823: "A visit from you to this place would indeed be a day of jubilee,
but your age and distance forbid the hope. Be this as it will, I shall
love you forever, and rejoice in your rejoicings and sympathize in your
ails. God bless and have you ever in His holy keeping." Nor does Mr.
Gallatin seem to have allowed any feeling of disappointment or
dissatisfaction at Mr. Madison's weakness to disturb their kindly
relations. Their letters close with the reciprocal assurance of
affection as well as of esteem.
CHAPTER VIII
IN DIPLOMACY
_The Treaty of Ghent_
On May 9, 1813, the ship Neptune sailed from New Castle on the Delaware,
having on board Albert Gallatin and James A. Bayard, ministers of the
United States, with their four secretaries, of whom were Mr. Gallatin's
son James, and George M. Dallas, son of his old Pennsylvania friend.
They were accompanied to sea by a revenue cutter. Off Cape Henlopen they
were overhauled by the British frigate on the station, and their
passport was countersigned by the English captain. On June 20 they
reached the mouth of the river Gotha. Here the vessel lay at quarantine
for forty-eight hours, during which the gentlemen paid a flying visit to
Gottenburg. At dusk, on the 24th, the Neptune anchored in Copenhagen
inner roads, the scene of Nelson's attack in 1801. Mr. Gallatin's brief
memoranda of his voyage contain some crisp expressions. He found
"despotism and no oppression. Poverty and no discontent. Civility and no
servile obsequiousness amongst the people. Decency and sobriety."
St. Petersburg was reached on July 21. Here Gallatin and Bayard found
John Quincy Adams, then minister to Russia. He was one of the three
commissioners appointed to treat for peace under the mediation which the
Emperor Alexander had offered to the United States. Bayard and Adams
were Federalists. To the moderate counsels of the former Jefferson owed
his peaceable election. Gallatin and Adams had the advantage of thorough
acquaintance with European politics. To Gallatin the study of history
was a passion. He was familiar with the facts and traditions of
diplomacy. He knew the purpose, the tenor, and the result of every
treaty made for centuries between the great powers; even their dates
were at ready command in his wonderful memory. But, excepting the few
Frenchmen of distinction who in the exile which political revulsions
imposed upon them had crossed the sea, he had no acquaintance with
Europeans of high position, and none whatever with the diplomatic
personnel of European courts. In this Adams was more fortunate. Educated
abroad, while his father was minister to the court of St. James, he was
from youth familiar with courts and their ways. To be the son of a
president of the United States was no small matter at that day. The
conjunction of these two men was rare. One of European birth and trained
to American politics, the other of American birth and brought up in the
atmosphere of European diplomacy. In their natural characteristics they
were the opposite of one another. Adams was impetuous, overbearing,
impatient of contradiction or opposition. Gallatin was calm,
self-controlled, persistent; not jealous of his opinions, but ready to
yield or abandon his own methods, if those of others promised better
success; never blinded by passion or prejudice, but holding the end
always in view. That end was peace; "peace at all times desirable," as
Mr. Gallatin said a few days before his departure on his mission, but
much more so, 'because of the incapacity shown in the conduct of the
war, its inefficiency when compared with its expense, and the open
hostility to it of a large number of the American people.' In the face
of the disasters which had befallen the country Mr. Gallatin must have
felt some qualms of conscience for his persistent opposition to the
military and naval establishments. Their reorganization had place in his
desire for peace. He said, May 5, 1813: "Taught by experience, we will
apply a part of our resources to such naval preparations and
organization of the public force as will, within less than five years,
place us in a commanding situation." With the particulars of the dispute
between the two countries he was perfectly familiar. His report prepared
in 1808 for Mr. Campbell, chairman of the Committee on Foreign
Relations, covered the whole ground of the American argument.
At the outset there seemed good ground for hope of an early agreement.
European politics were at a critical point, and England naturally
wished to husband her resources for a sudden emergency. The mediation of
Russia Mr. Gallatin considered a salve to the pride of England. This
reasoning seemed sound enough, but it had not taken account of one
important element: the jealousy of England of any outside interference
between herself and her ancient dependencies. Mr. Gallatin did not hold
English diplomacy in very high regard. Late in life he said that the
history of the relations of England and France was a story of the
triumphs of English arms and of French diplomacy; that England was
always victorious, but France had as often negotiated her out of the
fruits of success. True as this remark was in general, it cannot be said
of the policy of England in American affairs. She pushed to the utmost
her exclusion of France from the American continent when the States were
colonies, and now that they were free and independent she would listen
to no foreign intervention. Neither in peace nor war should any third
government stand between the two nations. This was and ever has been the
true policy of Great Britain, and that it was not lost sight of in the
heat of war is to the credit of her diplomacy. The offer of Russia to
mediate was not welcome, and was set aside by Lord Castlereagh in a note
of discouragement. There was no ground for the commissioners to stand
upon; moreover the emperor and Count Nesselrode were absent from St.
Petersburg, Count Romanzoff being left in charge of the foreign
relations. The offer of mediation had originated with him. His policy
was to curb the maritime power of England, and to secure in the
negotiation a modification at least of the offensive practice of Great
Britain in her assumed police of the sea.
The war was in fact a legacy of the necessarily incomplete diplomacy of
Washington's administration and the Jay treaty. The determining cause
was the enforcement of the right of search and the impressment of seamen
from American vessels; a practice at variance with the rights and the
law of nations. Monroe, Madison's secretary of state, urged the clear
and distinct forbearance of this British practice as the one object to
be obtained. An article in the treaty giving security in that respect
was by Gallatin, as well as by Monroe, considered a _sine qua non_
condition; while Mr. Bayard viewed an informal arrangement as equally
efficient and more practicable than a solemn article. But there was no
doubt of Bayard's determination to reach the result prescribed in their
instructions.
Mr. Gallatin's first act after setting foot on European shores was to
write to Baring Brothers & Co. at London. This he did from Gottenburg,
requesting a passport for the Neptune, which the commission proposed to
retain at St. Petersburg until their return. At the same time he
intimated that he wished the British government to be informed of the
object of the mission. For the expenses of the commission the
ambassadors had authority to draw on the Barings. The reply of Mr.
Alexander Baring must at once have opened Mr. Gallatin's eyes to the
futility of the errand of the commissioners. His words clearly state the
British grounds of objection: "The mediation of Russia was offered, not
sought,--it was fairly and frankly accepted,--I do not see how America
could with any consistency refuse it; but to the eyes of a European
politician it was clear that such an interference could produce no
practical benefit. The only question now seriously at issue between us
is one purely of a domestic nature in each country respectively; no
foreign government can fairly judge of it." Pointing out the difficulty
of establishing any distinction between the great masses of the
seafaring population of Great Britain and America, he finds that no
other country can judge of the various positions of great delicacy and
importance which spring from such a state of things; and says: "This is
not the way for Great Britain and America really to settle their
disputes; intelligent persons of the two countries might devise mutual
securities and concessions which perhaps neither country would offer in
the presence of a third party. It is a sort of family quarrel where
foreign interference can only do harm and irritate at any time, but more
especially in the present state of Europe, when attempts would be made
to make a tool of America." These, he said he had good reason to know,
were the sentiments of the British cabinet on the question of place of
negotiation and foreign mediation. He also informed Mr. Gallatin that
the mediation of Russia had been refused, and that the British
government would express its desire to treat separately and directly
either at London or Gottenburg. He warned Mr. Gallatin that an opinion
prevailed in the British public that the United States were engaged to
France by a secret political connection, which belief, though perhaps
not shared by the government, would lead it to consider the persevering
of the American commission upon bringing the insulated question before
the powers of the Continent as a touchstone of their sincerity. He hoped
that the American commissioners would come at once in contact with the
British ministers, and pointed out the hesitation that every minister
would feel at giving instructions on a matter so delicate as that
"involving the rights and duties of sovereign and subject." He then
declared that there was in England a strong desire for peace and for
ending a contest in which the "two countries could only tease and weaken
each other without any practical result," and at a time when England
desired to carry her resources into the "more important field of
European contest." He then gave Castlereagh's assurance, that the
cartel-ship, the Neptune, should be respected, and expressed his own
personal hope that he should ere long be gratified by seeing it bring,
with the commissioners, the hope of peace to the shores of England.
Meanwhile Mr. Gallatin was engaged in explaining the American case to
Romanzoff by conversation and by a written statement of the facts in
the form of an unofficial note to the emperor. On August 10 word was
received from the Emperor Alexander authorizing the renewal of the offer
of mediation; and shortly after a letter from General Moreau, written to
Mr. Gallatin from the imperial headquarters at Hrushova, assured him of
his sympathy and assistance. His relations with Gallatin were of long
standing and of an intimate nature. Moreau, after a long residence in
America, to which he was warmly attached, had lately crossed the ocean
and tendered his able sword to the coalition against Bonaparte. He
informed Gallatin that one of the British ministers had said to him in
Germany that England would not treat of her maritime rights under any
mediation. He feared that American vanity would hardly consent to treat
directly with Great Britain, and foresaw that the political adversaries
of Madison and Gallatin would blame the precipitation of the United
States government in sending over the envoys before the adhesion of
England to the proposed arbitration was secured. He assured Gallatin of
the interest of the Emperor Alexander in the Americans.
On August 24 Count Romanzoff read to the envoys his dispatch to Count
Lieven, the Russian minister at London, renewing the offer of mediation.
The commissioners considering their authority as limited to treating
under the mediation of Russia, Mr. Gallatin wrote to Monroe, inclosing
a copy of Baring's letter, which he looked upon as an informal
communication of the views of the British government, and asked for
contingent powers and instructions. These they could not expect to
receive before February. Gallatin replied to Mr. Baring that no
information of the refusal of Great Britain to the mediation had been
received, but, even if it had, the commission was not authorized to
negotiate in any other manner. They were, however, competent to treat of
commerce without mediation. He declined to discuss the objection of
Great Britain to the mediation of Russia, confining himself to an
expression of ignorance in America of any such feeling on the part of
the British ministry, and of the confidence placed in the personal
character of the emperor, which was considered a sufficient pledge of
impartiality; while the selection of a sovereign at war with France was
clear evidence that America neither had nor wished to have any political
connection with that power. That he himself believed an arrangement to
be practicable, he said to Mr. Baring, was evident from the fact that he
had given up his political existence, and separated himself from his
family. His opinion was, that while neither nation would be induced to
abandon its rights or pretensions in the matter of impressment, an
arrangement might be made by way of experiment which would reserve to
both their respective abstract rights, real or assumed.
To Moreau he wrote stating his hope that, notwithstanding the first
objections of Great Britain, the mediation of the emperor would be
accepted, and he asked the general for his personal interposition to
this end. France and England he held to be equally at fault in the great
European contest; the one usurping and oppressing the land, the other
dominating and tyrannizing the sea. They alone, said he, have gained, if
not happiness, at least power. Russia, he was firmly persuaded, was the
only power at heart friendly to America. History has shown the sagacity
of this judgment. This letter was never answered. Moreau was at death's
door.
Early in October Mr. Dallas was sent to London to open relations with
the British ministry. His presence there would save two months at least
in each correspondence which involved communication between Washington,
London, and St. Petersburg. Count Romanzoff gave the necessary letter of
introduction to Count Lieven. Gallatin's instructions to the young
secretary were explicit as to the caution he should exercise in a
country where he could consider himself as only on sufferance. Hardly
were these preliminaries concluded, and Dallas had not started on his
journey, when Mr. Gallatin received word from America that the Senate
had refused to confirm him in his position as commissioner. Mr. Gallatin
had not resigned his position of secretary of the treasury. The Senate
refused to sanction the cumulative appointment.
Stripped of his official character, he now felt himself at liberty to
follow his own inclination. His first impulse was to go to London, where
he was sure that Baring's friendship would open to him a means of
usefulness in the matter on which he was engaged. The death of Moreau
cut off the medium of approach to the emperor. This event was of no
consequence, however, in the negotiation, as the emperor had been
positively informed in July that England would not countenance even the
appearance of foreign intervention in her dispute with America. But as
yet no official information of his rejection had been received by Mr.
Gallatin, nor did any reach him until March. Without it he could not
well leave St. Petersburg. Meanwhile a diplomatic imbroglio, caused by
the failure of the emperor to inform Romanzoff of Castlereagh's second
refusal to accept the offer of mediation, embarrassed the commission all
winter. Nor yet were they aware that the British minister, driven to the
wall by the second offer of the emperor, had made proposals to Monroe to
treat directly with the United States government. The British note with
this offer was written on November 4. Mr. Gallatin was apprised of it by
Mr. Dallas in January, 1814. Mr. Baring urged him, if he should return
to America during the winter, to take his way through England, as good
effects might result from even a passing visit. Gallatin was then, as he
expressed it, "chained for the winter to St. Petersburg," nor had he
any way of reaching home, except by a cartel from a British port.
No word coming from the emperor, the envoys concluded to withdraw from
St. Petersburg. Before leaving, Mr. Gallatin addressed a letter of
thanks to Count Romanzoff, and requested him to communicate any
information he might receive from the emperor. It was supposed that the
offer of England to treat directly with America might be inclosed in
Castlereagh's letter of refusal to accept Russian mediation. On January
25, 1814, Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Bayard left St. Petersburg and traveled
by land to Amsterdam, which they reached after a tedious journey on
March 4. The captain of the Neptune was ordered to bring his vessel to a
port of Holland. At Amsterdam, where the envoys remained four weeks,
they learned that Mr. Madison had at once accepted Castlereagh's offer
and appointed a new commission, consisting of Messrs. Adams, Bayard,
Henry Clay, and Jonathan Russell. Mr. Gallatin was not included, as he
was supposed to be on his way home to resume his post in the Treasury
Department, the duties of which had been performed in his absence by Mr.
Jones, the secretary of the navy. When correct information did reach Mr.
Madison, on February 8, he immediately added Mr. Gallatin to the
commission, and appointed Mr. G. W. Campbell to be secretary of the
treasury. Thus it happened that Mr. Gallatin, whom Mr. Madison intended
for the head of the commission, was the last named of those who
conducted the negotiations.
[Illustration: J. A. Bayard]
On April 1, 1814, Mr. Gallatin concluded to pass through England on his
return, and leaving orders for the Neptune on its arrival to proceed to
Falmouth, he took the packet to Harwich, whither he requested Mr. Baring
to send him the requisite passports to enable him to reach London with
his suite without delay.
In company with Mr. Bayard, Mr. Gallatin reached the English capital on
April 9, 1814. There they heard some days later of the arrival of
Messrs. Clay and Russell at Gottenburg. The situation of Great Britain
had greatly changed. Intoxicated with the success of their arms and the
abdication of Napoleon, the English people were quite ready to undertake
the punishment of the United States, while the release of a large body
of trained troops in France, Italy, Holland, and Portugal enabled the
ministry immediately to throw a large force into Canada for the summer
campaign. In the British cabinet a belief was said to be entertained
that a continuance of the war would bring about a separation of the
American Union, and perhaps a return of New England to the mother
country. In this emergency Gallatin availed himself of the opportunity
which presented itself of addressing Lafayette in sending to that
officer the patents for the Louisiana land granted to him by the
American government, and urged the use of his influence to promote an
accommodation between England and the United States.
To Clay he wrote on April 22, proposing that the place of negotiation be
changed from "that corner" Gottenburg, either to London, or some neutral
place more accessible to the friendly interference of those among the
European powers upon which they must greatly rely. The Emperor Alexander
was expected in London, and Castlereagh, who had recently returned from
France where he had been in direct intercourse with him, was understood
to be of all the cabinet the best disposed to the United States. From
Clay Gallatin heard in reply that the British _chargé d'affaires_ at
Stockholm had already asked the sanction of the Swedish government to
the negotiation at Gottenburg. While Clay was unwilling to go to London
he gave his consent to carry on the negotiations in Holland, if the
arrangement could be made in such a manner as to avoid any ill feeling
at the Swedish court by the change from Gottenburg. In May Gallatin and
Bayard asked of Monroe, who was then secretary of state, authority for
the commissioners to remove the negotiation to any place which their
judgment should prefer. In May, also, the British government was
officially notified by the American commissioners of their appointment.
Lord Bathurst answered with an assurance that commissioners would be
forthwith appointed for Great Britain, and with a proposal of Ghent as
the place for negotiation. This was at once acceded to.
Meanwhile Mr. Crawford, the United States minister at Paris, was
endeavoring, at the instance of Mr. Gallatin, to secure the friendly
interposition of the Emperor Alexander, not as a mediator, but as a
common friend and in the interest of peace to the civilized world.
Crawford was unable to obtain an audience of the emperor, or even an
interview with Count Nesselrode, but Lafayette took up the cause with
his hearty zeal for everything that concerned the United States, and, in
a long interview with the emperor at the house of Madame de Staël,
submitted to him the view taken by the United States of the controversy,
and obtained from him his promise to exert his personal influence with
the British government on his arrival at London. Baron von Humboldt, the
Prussian minister at Paris, who had been influenced by British
misrepresentation, was also won over by Lafayette, and now tendered his
services to Mr. Gallatin in any way in which he might be made useful.
Lafayette's letter was brought by Humboldt in person. Gallatin and
Humboldt had met in 1804, when the great traveler passed through
Washington on his return from Peru and Mexico.
The Treaty of Paris having been signed, Lord Castlereagh reached London
early in June, and the emperor arrived a few days later. Mr. Gallatin
had an audience of the emperor on June 17, and on the 19th submitted an
official statement of the American case and an appeal for the
interposition of his imperial majesty, "the liberator and pacifier of
Europe." From the interview Mr. Gallatin learned that the emperor had
made three attempts in the interest of peace, but that he had no hope
that his representations had been of any service. England would not
admit a third party to interfere, and he thought that, with respect to
the conditions of peace, the difficulty would be with England and not
with America.
On June 13 Gallatin warned Monroe of the preparations England was making
which would enable her to land fifteen to twenty thousand men on the
Atlantic coast; that the capture of Washington and New York would most
gratify the British people, and that no help need be expected from the
countries of Europe, all which were profoundly desirous of peace.
The ministry informing Mr. Gallatin that the British commissioners would
start for Ghent on July 1, he improved the interval by a visit to Paris.
He left London, where he had passed nearly three months in the uncertain
preliminaries of negotiation, and after a few days in the French capital
reached Ghent on July 6. The British commissioners only appeared on
August 6. They were Lord Gambier, Henry Goulburn, and William Adams, all
second-rate men, but for this reason suited to the part they had to
play. After the overturn of Napoleon the British cabinet had no desire
for peace, or at least not until they had secured by war some material
advantages in the United States, which a treaty would confirm. The
business of their representatives at Ghent was to make exorbitant
demands of the Americans and delay negotiations pending the military
operations in progress.
In June Gallatin was satisfied of the general hostile spirit of Great
Britain and of its wish to inflict serious injury on the United States.
He notified Monroe of his opinion and warned him that the most favorable
terms to be expected were the _status ante bellum_, and not certainly
that, unless the American people were united and the country able to
stand the shock of the campaign. Mr. Madison's administration had
already humbled itself to an abandonment, or at least to an adjournment,
of the principle to establish which they had resorted to arms. But in
the first stages of the negotiation it was clear that the British
cabinet had more serious and dangerous objects in view, and looked
beyond aggression and temporary injury to permanent objects. At the
first meeting on August 8, the British commissioners demanded, as a
preliminary to any negotiation, that the United States should set apart
to the Indian tribes the entire territory of the Northwest to be held by
them forever in sovereignty under the guaranty of Great Britain. The
absurdity of such a demand is sufficient evidence that it was never
seriously entertained. There could have been no idea that the military
power of Great Britain was able to enforce, or that the United States
would abjectly submit to, such a mutilation of its territory and such a
limitation of its expansion. Behind this cover Mr. Gallatin
instinctively detected the real design of the cabinet to be the conquest
of New Orleans and the mouths of the Mississippi. If to the territory
thus acquired that of Florida should be added by cession from Spain,
which could hardly refuse any compensation asked of her by Great Britain
in return for the liberation of the Peninsula, a second British dominion
would be set up on the American continent. These views Gallatin
communicated to Monroe in a private dispatch of August 20, 1814, by the
hands of Mr. Dallas. To the _sine qua non_ of the British commissioners
no answer was made by the Americans. The negotiation was abruptly
suspended, and only by informal conversation was Mr. Goulburn given to
understand that reference had been had to America for instructions. Mr.
Gallatin was of opinion that the negotiations were at an end, and in his
despair of peace took consolation in the belief that the insolence of
the demand would unite America from Maine to Georgia in defense of her
rights, of her territory, and indeed of her independence. The American
commissioners made no secret of their belief that their mission was
closed. Two of the secretaries started from Ghent on a continental tour,
and notice was given to the landlord of the house where the
commissioners resided of their intention to quit it on October 1. On
August 2, while matters were still at this deadlock, Lord Castlereagh
passed through Ghent on his way to the Congress at Vienna. Goulburn was
ordered to change his tone and Lord Liverpool was advised to moderate
his demands; to use Castlereagh's words, to "a letting down of the
question." Lord Liverpool replied on September 2, that he had already
given Goulburn to understand that the commission had taken a very
erroneous view of British policy. In this communication he betrays the
hope, which the cabinet had entertained, of the outcome of American
dissensions, by his expression of the opinion that if the negotiation
had broken off on the notes already presented by the British commission,
or the answer that the Americans were disposed to make, the war would
have become popular in America.
Lord Bathurst reopened the negotiations, but his modification was of
tone rather than of matter. The surrender of the control of the Lakes to
Great Britain, and of the Northwest Territory to the Indians, was still
adhered to. The reply of the American commissioners was drawn chiefly by
Mr. Gallatin. It absolutely rejected the proposals respecting the
boundary and the military flag on the Lakes, and refused even to refer
them to the American government, but offered to pursue the negotiation
on the other points. To Monroe Mr. Gallatin explained his reason for
assenting to discuss the Indian article, and therein his colleagues
concurred with him, to be: that they had little hope of peace, but
thought it desirable, if there were to be a breach, that it should be on
other grounds than that of Indian pacification. The reply of the
commission on this point, also drafted by Mr. Gallatin, was sent in on
September 26. It merely guaranteed the Indians in all their old rights,
privileges, and possessions.
The destruction of the public buildings at Washington by the British
troops, known in London on October 1, caused a great sensation in
England. As Gallatin said in a letter to Madame de Staël, it was "an act
of vandalism to which no parallel could be found in the twenty years of
European war from the frontiers of Russia to Paris, and from those of
Denmark to Naples." "Was it (he asked), because, with the exception of a
few cathedrals, England had no public buildings comparable to them, or
was it to console the London mob for their disappointment that Paris was
neither pillaged nor burned?" It can hardly be doubted that the flames
which consumed the American capital lighted the way to peace. The
atrocity of war was again brought vividly to the view of nations whose
sole yearning was for peace. Far from discouraging the American
commissioners, it fortified their resolution. They knew that it would
unite the people of the States as one man. It in no way disturbed
Gallatin's confidence either in the present or future of his adopted
country. To those who asked his opinion of the securities of the United
States, he said: "If I have not wholly misunderstood America, its
resources and its political morality, I am not wrong in the belief that
its public funds are more secure than those of all European powers."
In spite of the protests of Mr. Goulburn, who felt the ground on which
he stood daily less stable, and in his letters to his chief was
unsparing in his denunciations, Lord Liverpool accepted the proposed
settlement of the Indian question. Nothing remained but to incorporate
in a treaty form the points agreed upon. Lord Bathurst, who seems
throughout the negotiation to have forgotten the old adage, that "fine
words butter no parsnips," and with true British blindness never to have
appreciated how thoroughly he was overmatched by Mr. Gallatin, submitted
a preliminary notification that the British terms would be based on the
principle of _uti possidetis_, which involved a rectification of the
boundaries on the Canadian frontier. To this the Americans returned a
peremptory refusal. They would not go one step farther except on the
basis of the _status quo ante bellum_. Lord Liverpool considered this as
conclusive. A vigorous prosecution of the war was resolved upon by the
cabinet. Only for reasons of expediency was a show of negotiation still
kept up.
But when the cabinet took a survey of the general field they felt little
complacency in the prospect of a struggle which sooner or later must
interest the maritime powers. France, compelled by the peace of Vienna
to withdraw from what even Lafayette considered as her natural frontier,
was restive, and there was a large party in Russia who would gladly see
the emperor take up the American cause. Moreover the chancellor of the
exchequer saw before him an inevitable addition of ten millions of
pounds sterling to his budget, the only avowable reason for which was
the rectification of the Canadian frontier. In their distress the
cabinet proposed to Wellington to go to the United States with the
olive-branch and the sword, to negotiate or conquer a peace. The desire
of the cabinet to bring the war to an honorable conclusion was avowed.
But Wellington, before accepting this proposal, gave Lord Liverpool a
very frank opinion of the mistake made in exacting territorial
concessions, since the British held no territory of the United States in
other than temporary possession, and had no right to make any such
demand. Lord Liverpool was not tenacious. He was never, he wrote Lord
Bathurst, much inclined to give way to the Americans, but the cabinet
felt itself compelled to withdraw from its extreme ground. He accepted
his defeat and acknowledged it.
The Americans meanwhile arranged a draft of a treaty. The articles on
impressment and other maritime rights, absolutely rejected by the
British, were set aside. There only remained the question of the
boundaries, the fisheries, and the navigation of the Mississippi. Here
Mr. Gallatin had as much difficulty in maintaining harmony between Adams
and Clay as in obtaining a peace from Liverpool and Bathurst. Adams was
determined to save the fisheries; Clay would not hear of opening the
Mississippi to British vessels. A compromise was effected by which it
was agreed that no allusion should be made to either subject. Mr.
Gallatin terminated the dispute by adding a declaration that the
commissioners were willing to sign a treaty applying the principle of
the _status quo ante bellum_ to _all_ the subjects of difference. This
was in strict conformity with the instructions from the home government.
On November 10 the American draft was sent in. On the 25th the British
replied with a counter-draft which made no allusion to the fisheries,
but stipulated for the free navigation of the Mississippi. The Americans
replied that they would give up the navigation of the river for a
surrender of the fisheries. This proposal was at once refused by the
British. The matter was settled by an offer of the Americans to
negotiate under a distinct reservation of all American rights. All
stipulations on either subject were in the end omitted, the British
government on December 22 withdrawing the article referring to these
points. In the course of the negotiation Mr. Gallatin proposed that in
case of a future war both nations should engage never to employ the
savages as auxiliaries, but this article does not appear. To the credit
of civilization, however, the last article contained a mutual engagement
to put an end to the trade in slaves. An agreement entered into in
perfect faith, but which the jealousy of the exercise of search in any
form rendered nugatory for half a century. On Christmas day the treaty
was signed. Mr. Henry Adams[19] justly says, "Far more than
contemporaries ever supposed, or than is now imagined, the Treaty of
Ghent was the special work and the peculiar triumph of Mr. Gallatin."
His own correspondence shows how admirably he was constituted for the
nice work of diplomatic negotiation. In the self-poise which he
maintained in the most critical situations, the unerring sagacity with
which he penetrated the purposes of his adversaries, the address with
which he soothed the passions and guided the judgments of his
colleagues, it is impossible to find a single fault. If he had a fault,
says his biographer, it was that of using the razor when he would have
done better with the axe. But the axe is not a diplomatic weapon. The
simulation of temper may serve an occasional purpose, but temper itself
is a mistake; and to Mr. Gallatin's credit be it said, it was a mistake
never committed by him in the course of this long and sometimes painful
negotiation. Looking back upon its shifting scenes, it is clear that
even the pertinacity of Adams and the irascibility of Clay served to
advance the purpose of the mission. From the first to the last Mr.
Gallatin had his own way, not because it was his own way, but because it
was the best way and was so recognized by the majority of the commission
at every turn of difference. Fortunately for the interests of peace the
battle of New Orleans had not yet been fought. There seems a justice in
this final act of the war. The British attack upon the Chesapeake[20]
was committed before war had been declared. The battle of New Orleans
was fought a fortnight after the Treaty of Ghent was signed. The burning
of Washington was avenged by the most complete defeat which the British
had ever encountered in their long career of military prowess.
By his political life Mr. Gallatin acquired an American reputation; by
his management of the finances of the United States he placed himself
among the first political economists of the day; but his masterly
conduct of the Treaty of Ghent showed him the equal of the best of
European statesmen on their own peculiar ground of diplomacy. No one of
American birth has ever rivaled him in this field. Europeans recognized
his pre-eminent genius. Sismondi praised him in a public discourse.
Humboldt addressed him as his illustrious friend. Madame de Staël
expressed to him her admiration for his mind and character. Alexander
Baring gave him more than admiration, his friendship.
* * * * *
Upon the separation of the commissioners, Mr. Gallatin paid a flying
visit to Geneva. His fame, or "glory," to use the words of Humboldt,
preceded him. Of his old intimates, Serre was under the sod in a West
Indian island; Badollet was leading a quiet life at Vincennes in the
Indiana Territory, where Gallatin had obtained for him an appointment in
the land office; Dumont was in England. Of Gallatin's family few
remained. But he received the honors due to him as a Genevan who had
shed a lustre on his native city. On his way to England, where he had
made an appointment with his colleagues to attempt a commercial treaty
with Great Britain, he stopped at Paris. Here he saw Napoleon, returned
from Elba, his star in full blaze before its final extinction. Here he
heard in April (1815) of his appointment by Madison as minister to
France. His colleagues also had been honored by similar advancements.
Adams was transferred from Russia to England. Bayard was named minister
to Russia, but illness prevented his taking possession of his post.
In April, Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Clay opened negotiations with Lord
Castlereagh in London, where they were quickly joined by Adams. Lord
Castlereagh bore no malice against Mr. Gallatin for the treaty. On the
contrary, he wrote of it to Lord Liverpool as "a most auspicious and
seasonable event," and wished him joy at "being released from the
millstone of an American war." With Lord Castlereagh Mr. Gallatin
arranged in the course of the summer a convention regulating commercial
intercourse between the United States and Great Britain, the only truly
valuable part of which was that which abolished all discriminating
duties. Mr. Gallatin considered this concession as an evidence of
friendly disposition, and rightly judged that British antipathy and
prejudice were modified, and that in the future friendly relations would
be preserved and a rupture avoided. Beyond this, there was little
gained. The old irritating questions of impressment and blockade and the
exclusion of the United States from the West Indies trade remained.
In July Mr. Gallatin parted from Mr. Baring and his London friends on
his homeward journey. From New York, on September 4, he wrote Madison,
thanking him for the appointment of minister to France as an "evidence
of undiminished attachment and of public satisfaction for his services;"
but he still held his acceptance in abeyance. To Jefferson, two days
later, he had also the satisfaction to say with justice, that the
character of the United States stood as "high as ever it did on the
European continents, and higher than ever it did in Great Britain;" and
that the United States was considered "as the nation designed to check
the naval despotism of England." To Jefferson he naturally spoke of that
France from which they had drawn some of their inspirations and their
doctrines.
He thus describes the condition of the people:--
"The revolution (the political change of 1789) has not, however,
been altogether useless. There is a visible improvement in the
agriculture of the country and the situation of the peasantry. The
new generation belonging to that class, freed from the petty
despotism of nobles and priests, and made more easy in their
circumstances by the abolition of tithes, and the equalization of
taxes, have acquired an independent spirit, and are far superior to
their fathers in intellect and information; they are not
republicans and are still too much dazzled by military glory; but I
think that no monarch or ex-nobles can hereafter oppress them long
with impunity."
And again, "Exhausted, degraded, and oppressed as France now is, I do
not despair of her ultimate success in establishing her independence and
a free form of government." But it was not till half a century later
that Gambetta, the Mirabeau of the Republic, led France to the full
possession of her material forces, and reëstablished in their original
vigor the principles of 1789. That Gallatin was not blinded by
democratic prejudices appears in the letter he wrote to Lafayette after
Napoleon's abdication, in which he said: "My attachment to the form of
government under which I was born and have ever lived never made me
desirous that it should, by way of experiment, be applied to countries
which might be better fitted for a limited monarchy."
_Minister to France_
Strange as it appears, there is no doubt that Mr. Gallatin was at this
time heartily weary of political life, and seriously contemplated a
permanent retirement to the banks of the Monongahela. He naturally
enough declined a nomination to Congress, which was tendered him by the
Philadelphia district. His tastes were not for the violence and
turbulence of the popular house.
Madison left him full time to decide whether he could arrange his
private affairs so as to accept the mission to Paris. In November he
positively declined. He considered the compensation as incompetent to
the support of a minister in the style in which he was expected to live.
His private income was at this time about twenty-five hundred dollars a
year. Monroe pressed him earnestly not to quit the public service, but
the year closed and Mr. Gallatin had not made up his mind. In the
situation of France, which he considered "would under her present
dynasty be for some years a vassal of her great rival," he did not
consider the mission important, and his private fortune was limited to a
narrow competence. "I do not wish," he wrote to Monroe, "to accumulate
any property. I will not do my family the injury of impairing the little
I have. My health is frail; they may soon lose me, and I will not leave
them dependent on the bounty of others." But being again earnestly
pressed, he on January 2, 1816, accepted the appointment. To Jefferson
he wrote that he would not conceal 'that he did not feel yet old enough
nor had philosophy enough to go into retirement and abstract himself
wholly from public affairs.'
In April, Madison notified Mr. Gallatin of Dallas's probable retirement
from the Treasury, and offered him the post if he cared to return to it.
He was perfectly aware of his supreme fitness for the direction of the
Treasury, and he declined with reluctance, because he was disturbed by
the suspension of specie payments. Remembering Madison's weakness in
1812 on the subject of the renewal of the bank charter, which Gallatin
considered necessary in the situation of the finances, he could hardly
have felt a desire to return to the cabinet in that or indeed in any
other capacity. He was perfectly conscious that as leader of the House
of Representatives, as secretary of the treasury, and as negotiator of
the Ghent treaty, he had brought into the triumvirate all its practical
statesmanship. His short career abroad had opened to him a new source of
intellectual pleasure. He had earned a right to some hours of ease.
Diplomacy at that period, when communication was uncertain and
difficult, was perforce less restricted than in these latter days, when
ambassadors are little more than foreign clerks of the State Department
without even the freedom of a chief of bureau. Gallatin felt entirely at
home, and was happy in this peculiar sphere. There was no time in his
life when he would not have gladly surrendered all political power for
the enjoyment of intellectual ease, the pursuit of science, and the
atmosphere of society of the higher order of culture in whatever field.
And Paris was then, as it is still, the centre of intellectual and
social civilization.
Jefferson rejoiced in Gallatin's appointment to France, and rightly
judged that he would be of great service there. Of Louis XVIII.,
however, Jefferson had a poor opinion. He thought him 'a fool and a
bigot, but, bating a little duplicity, honest and meaning well.'
Jefferson could give Gallatin no letters. He had 'no acquaintances left
in France; some were guillotined, some fled, some died, some are exiled,
and he knew of nobody left but Lafayette.' With Destutt de Tracy, an
intimate friend of Lafayette, Jefferson was in correspondence. Indeed,
he was engaged on the translation of Tracy's work on political economy,
the best, in Jefferson's opinion, that had ever appeared.[21]
Gallatin reached Paris with his family on July 9, 1816, and had an
interview with the Duc de Richelieu, the minister of Louis XVIII., two
days later. The conversation turned upon the sympathy for Bonaparte in
the United States, which Richelieu could not understand; but Gallatin
explained that it was not extended to him as the despot of France, but
as the most formidable enemy of England. Richelieu warned him of the
prejudices which might be aroused against the reigning family 'by
ex-kings and other emigrants of the same description' who had lately
removed to the United States. This was an allusion to Jerome, who had
fled from the throne of Westphalia to the banks of the Delaware. The
king gave Gallatin an audience on the 11th, when he presented his
credentials. His reception both by his majesty and the princes was, he
wrote to Monroe, "what is called gracious." Louis the Eighteenth was a
Bourbon to the ends of his fingers. He had the _bonhommie_ dashed with
malice which characterized the race. None could better appreciate than
he the vein of good-natured satire, the acquired tone of French society,
which was to Mr. Gallatin a natural gift. Mr. Gallatin was not only
kindly but familiarly received at court; and at the _petits soupers_,
which were the delight of the epicurean king, his majesty on more than
one occasion shelled the crawfish for the youthful daughter of the
republican ambassador. An anecdote is preserved of the king's courteous
malice. To a compliment paid Mr. Gallatin on his French, the king added,
"but I think my English is better than yours."
Gallatin's first negotiations were to obtain indemnity for the captures
under the Berlin and Milan decrees; but although the Duc de Richelieu
never for a moment hinted that the government of the Restoration was not
responsible for the acts of Napoleon, yet he stated that the mass of
injuries for which compensation was demanded by other governments was so
great that indemnity must be limited to the most flagrant cases. They
would pay for vessels burnt at sea, but would go no farther. In spite of
Mr. Gallatin's persistency no advance was made in the negotiation. A
minor matter gave him some annoyance. On July 4, 1816, at a public
dinner, the postmaster at Baltimore proposed a toast which, by its
disrespect, gave umbrage to the king. Hyde de Neuville, the French
minister to the United States, demanded the dismissal of the offender.
If our institutions and habits as well as public opinion had not
forbidden compliance with this request, the dictatorial tone of De
Neuville was sufficient bar. Richelieu could not be made to understand
the reason for the refusal, and while disclaiming any idea of using
force, said that the government would show its dissatisfaction in its
own way. This seemed to intimate an indefinite postponement of a
consideration of American demands, and would have rendered Mr.
Gallatin's further residence useless as well as unpleasant; but French
dignity got the better of what Gallatin termed, "the sickly
sentimentality which existed on the subject of personal abuse of the
king," and the insignificant incident was not allowed to interfere with
friendly intercourse.
In 1817 Mr. Gallatin was engaged not only in advising Mr. Adams at
London upon the points of a commercial treaty with Great Britain, but
also, together with Mr. William Eustis, minister to the Netherlands, in
a negotiation with that government.
The commission met at the Hague, Mr. Goldberg and Mr. Van der Kemp
representing Holland. The subjects were the treaty of 1782 between the
States-general of the Netherlands and the United States, the repeal of
discriminating duties, and the participation of the United States in the
trade with the Dutch East Indies. The basis of a treaty could not be
agreed upon, and the whole matter was referred back to the two
governments, the American commissioners recommending to the President a
repeal of duties discriminating against vessels of the Netherlands,
which would no doubt prevent future exaction of extra tonnage duties
imposed on American vessels by that government. These negotiations
occupied the late summer months. At the end of September Mr. Gallatin
was again at his post in Paris.
In June, 1818, Mr. Richard Rush, who owed his introduction into public
life to Mr. Gallatin, was appointed minister to England, Adams returning
to the United States to take the portfolio of State in President
Monroe's cabinet. Gallatin was joined to Rush, for the conduct of
negotiations with Great Britain, rendered necessary by the approaching
expiration of the commercial convention of July 3, 1815, which had been
limited to four years. The general field of disputed points was again
entered. It included the questions of impressment, the fisheries, the
boundaries, and indemnity for slaves. The commissioners were supported
by a temper of the American people different from that which prevailed
when Jay and Gallatin respectively undertook the delicate work of
negotiation in 1794 and 1814. A compromise was arrived at, which was
signed on October 20, 1818. The articles on maritime rights and
impressment were set aside. A convention was made for ten years in
regard to the fisheries, the northwest boundary, and other points, and
the commercial convention of 1815 was renewed. The English claim to the
navigation of the Mississippi was finally disposed of, and the article
concerning the West India trade was referred to the President. The
arrangement of the fishery question disturbed Mr. Gallatin, who found
himself compelled to sign an agreement which left the United States in a
worse situation in that respect than before the war of 1812. But as the
British courts would certainly uphold the construction by their
government of the treaty of 1783, our vessels, when seized, would be
condemned and a collision would immediately ensue. This, and the
critical condition of our Spanish relations, left no choice between
concession and war. A short time afterward Lord Castlereagh and the Duke
of Wellington expressed friendly dispositions, and the mooted points of
impressment and the West India trade were considered by them to be near
an arrangement. The right of British armed vessels to examine American
crews was abandoned in the convention itself.
In July, 1818, the capture of Fort St. Mark and the occupation of
Pensacola in Florida by General Jackson made some stir in the quiet
waters of our foreign diplomacy. Uncertain as to whether the act would
be disavowed or justified by the American government, Mr. Gallatin
explained to the European ministers that the forcible occupation of the
Spanish province was an act of self-defence and protection against the
Indians, but Richelieu replied that the United States "had adopted the
game laws and pursued in foreign ground what was started in its own."
Yet, to the astonishment of Mr. Gallatin, Richelieu was moderate and
friendly in language, and urged a speedy amicable arrangement of
differences with Spain, in whose affairs France took an interest, and
who had asked her good offices. But Gallatin at once rejected any idea
that the United States would join France in any mediation between Spain
and her revolted colonies. It seems rather singular that, to the
suggestion that a Spanish prince might be sent over to America as an
independent monarch, Gallatin contented himself with expressing a doubt
as to the efficacy of such a course to preserve their independence. Mr.
Adams was informed that public recognition of the independence of the
insurgent colony of Buenos Ayres would shock the feelings and prejudices
of the French ministers, but that notwithstanding this displeasure,
France would not join Spain in a war on this account. England, however,
would see such a war without regret, and privateers under Spanish
commissions would instantly be fitted out, both in France and England.
Under the existing convention with Great Britain three hundred American
vessels arrived at Liverpool in the first nine months of 1818 from the
United States and only thirty English, an advantage to the United States
which war would at once destroy. Russia also was displeased with the
recognition of the independence of the Spanish colonies. At the Congress
of Aix la Chapelle various plans of mediation were proposed, but England
refusing to engage to break off all commercial relations with such of
the insurgent colonies as should reject the proposals agreed to, the
whole project was abandoned. An agreement between the five great powers
for the suppression of the slave trade was also proposed at this
Congress, but France declined to recognize the right to visit French
vessels in time of peace, and Russia making a similar declaration, this
plan also fell to the ground, and even an association against the
exactions of the Barbary powers was prevented by jealousy of the naval
preponderance of Great Britain.
While Mr. Gallatin was still actively engaged in an endeavor to put our
commercial relations with France on a satisfactory basis, and
negotiating with M. Pasquier, the new French minister for foreign
affairs, both with regard to indemnities for captures and the new
Spanish relations involved in the cession of Florida to the United
States, a serious trouble arose in which Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Adams
were at direct difference. In the spring of 1821 a French vessel, the
Apollon, was seized on the St. Mary's River, on the Spanish side, and
condemned for violation of the United States navigation laws. Mr. Adams
sustained the seizure and Mr. Gallatin did his best to defend it, on the
ground that the place where the vessel was seized was embraced in the
occupation of the United States. To Adams he wrote that the doctrine
assumed by the State Department with respect to the non-ratified treaty
with Spain was not generally admitted in Europe, and that "he thought it
equally dangerous and inconsistent with our general principles to assert
that we had a right to seize a vessel for any cause short of piracy in a
place where we did not previously claim jurisdiction." Mr. Gallatin
succeeded in satisfying M. Pasquier that the seizure was not in
violation of the law of nations or an insult to the French flag, and the
captain having instituted a suit for redress against the seizing
officers, the French minister allowed the matter to rest. Adams,
however, was indignant at having his arguments set aside. He complained
of it to Calhoun, and asked what Mr. Gallatin meant. Calhoun answered
that perhaps it was "the pride of opinion." But when Adams got to his
diary, which was the safety-valve of his ill-temper, he set a black mark
against Mr. Gallatin's name in these words: "Gallatin is a man of
first-rate talents, conscious and vain of them, and mortified in his
ambition, checked as it has been, after attaining the last step to the
summit; timid in great perils, tortuous in his paths; born in Europe,
disguising and yet betraying a superstitious prejudice of European
superiority of intellect, and holding principles pliable to
circumstances, occasionally mistaking the left for the right handed
wisdom." Against this judgment, Gallatin's estimate of Adams may be here
set down. It was expressed to his intimate friend Badollet in 1824:
"John Q. Adams is a virtuous man, whose temper, which is not the best,
might be overlooked; he has very great and miscellaneous knowledge, and
he is with his pen a powerful debater; but he wants, to a deplorable
degree, that most essential quality, a sound and correct judgment. Of
this I have had in my official connection and intercourse with him
complete and repeated proofs; and although he may be useful when
controlled and checked by others, he ought never to be trusted with a
place where, unrestrained, his errors might be fatal to the country."
Crawford complained of the difficulty he encountered in the cabinet of
softening the asperities which invariably predominated in the official
notes of the State Department while under Adams's direction, and said
that, had they been allowed to remain as originally drafted, the
government would have been "unembarrassed by diplomatic relations with
more than one power." But it must be remembered that there was no love
lost between Adams and Crawford--political rivals and not personal
friends.
The commercial negotiations, and the discussion of French pretensions
under the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, opened with M.
Pasquier, were continued with the Vicomte de Montmorenci, who succeeded
him as minister of foreign affairs. In September, 1821, Mr. Gallatin had
communicated to Mr. Adams his intention of returning home in the spring;
but there appearing a chance of success in the negotiation of a treaty,
he wrote in February, 1822, to President Monroe that if no successor had
been appointed, he was desirous to remain some time longer. He was loath
to return without having succeeded in any one subject intrusted to his
care. Meanwhile Mr. Adams and M. de Neuville, the French minister, had
been busy in the United States. A commercial convention was signed at
Washington on June 24, 1822. Concerning this agreement Mr. Gallatin
wrote to Adams that the terms were much more favorable to France than he
had been led to presume would be acceded to, and more so than had been
hoped for by the French government. He nevertheless expressed the wish
that, as it had been signed, it should be ratified, in anticipation that
the superior activity of our ship-owners and seamen would enable America
to stand the competition.
In January, 1823, Montmorenci resigned and was succeeded by M. de
Chateaubriand. The change of ministers made no change in the French
persistence in connecting the discussion of the American claims with
that of the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, an arrangement to
which Mr. Gallatin would not consent. As a last resort he so informed M.
de Chateaubriand, but receiving an unsatisfactory answer he concluded
that there was at that time no disposition in France to do us justice;
and as his protracted stay could be of no service to the United States,
he determined to return home in the course of the spring. In April he
received leave of absence from the President. On May 13 he had a final
conference with Chateaubriand, in which he could get no promise of any
redress, but did obtain the explicit declaration that France would in no
manner interfere in American questions.
Mr. Gallatin took passage at Havre, and arrived in New York on June 24,
1823. His political friends, especially Crawford, were eager for his
return. Crawford wished him to stand for vice-president in the coming
presidential campaign. After a short visit to Washington he went to his
home at New Geneva. The real value of perfect public service, or indeed
of any service, is only appreciated when it ceases, and friction takes
the place of smooth and noiseless order. Hardly was Mr. Gallatin settled
at Friendship Hill when a letter from President Monroe (October 15)
arrived, urging him to return to Paris, if only for the winter, or until
the crisis brought on by the rupture between France and Spain should be
over. Mr. Gallatin replied, that the deranged state of his private
affairs rendered his return to Europe extremely improbable.
Goethe says in his "Elective Affinities" that we cannot escape the
atmosphere we breathe. The natural atmosphere of Mr. Gallatin was public
life. In November, 1825, Mr. Clay, Adams's secretary of state, offered,
and, meeting a refusal, pressed upon Mr. Gallatin the post of
representative of the United States at the proposed Congress of American
Republics at Panama. Mr. Clay was right in considering it the most
important mission ever sent from the United States, and had Mr. Gallatin
accepted it, relations with these interesting countries might have been
improved to an immeasurable degree of happiness to them, and of benefit
to both continents. But his family would not hear of his exposure in the
fatal climate of the American Isthmus. Moreover, he pleaded his
ignorance of the Spanish language as a sufficient excuse for declining
the mission,--an example which has not been followed in later days.
_Minister to England_
In the spring of 1826 Mr. Rufus King, who had taken the place of Mr.
Rush at London, that gentleman having been called to the Treasury by
President Adams, fell ill, and requested the assistance of an
extraordinary envoy. Mr. Gallatin accepted the mission. Before his
nomination reached the Senate Mr. King's resignation was received and
accepted. President Adams wishing to intrust Mr. Gallatin alone with
the pending negotiations, and unwilling to make the two nominations of
minister and envoy, proposed to Mr. Gallatin to take the post of
minister, with powers to negotiate, and liberty to return when the
negotiations should be finished. Personal expenses at London were so
great that the post of resident minister was ruinous. Mr. Adams promised
Mr. Gallatin _carte blanche_ as to his instructions. But instead of
latitude and discretionary power he received at New York voluminous
directions which he engaged faithfully to execute, while regretting that
they had not been made known to him sooner. Nevertheless, in the three
days which intervened before his sailing, he wrote to Mr. Clay a lucid
statement of the points in issue, and mentioned the modifications he
desired. The points were: 1. The northeastern boundary. Upon this he was
only authorized to obtain a reference of the subject to a direct
negotiation at Washington. He asked consent, in case it should be
desirable, to open a negotiation on this point at London. Should Great
Britain refuse to open a negotiation at either place, or to agree to a
joint statement, then he was not to be bound to propose an immediate
reference to a third power. 2. The boundary west of the Stony Mountains.
The instructions limited British continuance on settlements south of the
49th parallel to five years. Mr. Gallatin thought this insufficient, and
proposed fifteen years. 3. The St. Lawrence navigation, and the
intercourse with Canada, as to which he suggested alternate plans. 4.
Colonial trade, on which he asked precise instructions as to what was
desired. To the President he complained of his instructions as 'of the
most peremptory nature, leaving no discretion on unimportant points, and
making of him a mere machine,' and he requested that it be officially
announced to him 'that the instructions were intended to guide but not
absolutely to bind him.' He was not afraid of incurring responsibility
where discretion was allowed, but he would not do it in the face of
strict and positive injunctions. Mr. Gallatin sailed from New York with
his wife and daughter July 1, 1826. Mr. William Beach Lawrence, then a
youth, accompanied him as his secretary. They reached London on August
7.
Canning was then at the head of the foreign office, and the temper of
the ministry was not that of Castlereagh and Wellington. Mr. Gallatin
did not like French diplomacy, nor did he admire that of England. He
wrote to his son: 'Some of the French statesmen occasionally say what is
not true; here (in London) they conceal the truth.' But while in
diplomacy he found strength and the opinion of that strength to be the
only weapons, he felt satisfaction that the country could support its
rights and pretensions by assuming a different attitude. In the course
of the negotiations Mr. Gallatin learned that one of the king's
ministers had complained of the tone of United States diplomacy towards
England, and had added, that it was time to show that it was felt and
resented. No such fault could attach to the correspondence of Mr. Rush
and Mr. King, or to that of Mr. Clay, which Mr. Addington had found
quite acceptable; but it was ascribed to Mr. Adams's instructions to Mr.
Rush, printed by order of the Senate. Mr. Gallatin later discovered that
the offensive remarks were in Baylies's report on the territory west of
the Stony Mountains. Mr. Gallatin explained the independence of the
House committees in the United States, but as a diplomatist he felt the
need of a concert between the executive and the committees of Congress
in all that concerns foreign relations. Government, after all, is a
complex science.
The simple directness with which Mr. Gallatin dealt with Lord Liverpool
could not serve with a man of Canning's disposition. Mr. Gallatin did
not fail to bring to bear the pressure of a possible change in the
relations of the United States and Great Britain, which might arise from
the war which seemed imminent between that power and Spain. The new
questions of Cuba, and the old habit of impressment, might at once bring
the United States into collision with England. But the war did not take
place, and the close of the year found the negotiations not far
advanced. Only the convention of 1815 would no doubt be renewed. He
asked for further instructions on that subject, the joint occupancy of
western territory, and impressments, all of which he hoped to arrange
in the spring and summer, and return home. Mr. Lawrence he found to be a
secretary more capable in the current business of the legation than any
of his predecessors. Mr. Gallatin could safely leave him there as
_chargé d'affaires_.
In December, Chateaubriand used in the House of Peers the words which
Mr. Gallatin had said to him, 'that England could not take Cuba without
making war on the United States, and that she knew it.' Mr. Gallatin so
informed Adams, and added, that France would no doubt agree, as
Chateaubriand would have agreed, to a tripartite instrument if England
were of the same opinion.
In March, 1827, Adams warned Gallatin that the sudden and unexpected
determination of Great Britain to break off all negotiation concerning
the colonial trade, and the contemporaneous interdiction of the vessels
of the United States from all British ports in the West Indies, had put
a new face on matters. A renewal of the convention of 1818 would
probably be agreed to by the Senate, but no concession in the form of a
treaty would be acceptable. His words were emphatic. "One inch of ground
yielded on the northwest coast,--one step backward from the claim to the
navigation of the St. Lawrence,--one hair's breadth of compromise upon
the article of impressment would be certain to meet the reprobation of
the Senate." In this temper of parties, Adams added, "All we can hope to
accomplish will be to adjourn controversies which we cannot adjust, and
say to Britain as the Abbé Bernis said to Cardinal Fleuri: 'Monseigneur,
j'attendrai.'"
But changes now occurred in the British ministry: Lord Liverpool died in
February, 1827--Mr. Canning in the following August. Lord Goderich
became prime minister. The new administration returned from Canning's
eccentric course to the old and quiet path. The commercial convention of
1815 was renewed indefinitely, each party being at liberty to abrogate
it at twelve months' notice. The joint occupancy of the Oregon
Territory, agreed to in 1818, was continued in a similar manner. On
September 29 a convention was signed, referring the northeast boundary
to the arbitration of a friendly sovereign. Mr. Gallatin believed that,
had Canning lived, he would have opened a negotiation on the subject of
impressment. Huskisson considered that 'the right, even if well founded,
was one the exercise of which was intolerable, but that this was not the
time to take up the subject.' The new British administration did not
dare to encounter the clamor of the navy, the opposition of the Tories,
and the pride of the nation on this question.
Having accomplished all that was practicable, completed all the current
business, and leaving the British government in a better temper than he
found it, Mr. Gallatin returned to the United States, reaching New York
on November 29, 1827. Nothing remained in foreign relations in respect
to which Mr. Gallatin felt that he could be of much use except the
northeast boundary. In a letter of congratulation to Mr. Gallatin on his
arrival, President Adams made ample amends for all his harsh judgments,
expressed or withheld. The three conventions were entirely satisfactory
to him. Of the negotiation he said, in words as graceful as warm, "I
shall feel most sensibly the loss of your presence at London, and can
form no more earnest wish than that your successor may acquire the same
influence of reason and good temper which you did exercise, and that it
may be applied with as salutary effect to the future discussions between
the two governments." During his visit to London Mr. Gallatin was
overwhelmed with civilities. Canning was courteous to a degree, and
rarely a day passed that the American ambassador had not to choose
between half a dozen invitations to dinner. At the house of the Russian
minister, the Count de Lieven, he was always welcome, and the Countess
de Lieven, the autocrat of foreign society in London, without whose pass
no stranger could cross the sacred threshold of Almack's, was his fast
friend. To each circle he carried that which each most prized. Whether
the conversation turned upon government or science, the dry figures of
finance, or the more genial topic of diplomatic intrigue, Mr. Gallatin
was its easy master, and his words never fell on inattentive ears.
With this mission to London Mr. Gallatin's diplomatic service closed. He
would have accepted the French mission in 1834, and so informed Van
Buren, but General Jackson, who was President, had his own plans, and
'ran his machine' without consulting other than his own prejudices or
whims. But although Mr. Gallatin was no longer in the field of
diplomacy, his counsels were eagerly sought. The northeastern boundary
was a troublesome question, indeed in the new phases of American
politics an imminent danger. The extension of the commercial relations
of Great Britain and the United States rendered it imperative that no
point of dispute should remain which could be determined. For two years
after his return from England, Mr. Gallatin was employed in the
preparation of an argument to be laid before the king of the
Netherlands, who had been selected as the arbiter between the United
States and Great Britain on the boundary. The king undertook to press a
conventional line, which the United States, not being bound to accept,
refused. In 1839 Mr. Gallatin prepared, and put before the world, a
statement of the facts in the case. This, revised, together with the
speech of Mr. Webster, a copy of the Jay treaty, and eight maps, he
published at his own expense in 1840.
At this time conflicts on the Maine frontier brought the subject up in a
manner not to be ignored. Popular feeling was at high pitch. In this
condition of affairs Alexander Baring, who had been raised to the
peerage as Lord Ashburton, was sent to America on a mission of
friendship and peace. As a young man he had listened to the debate on
Jay's treaty in 1795. He was now to be received by Webster in Washington
in the same spirit in which Grenville received Jay in London, when it
was mutually understood that they should discuss the matter as friends
and not as diplomatists, and leave their articles as records of
agreement, not as compromises of discord. Gallatin eagerly awaited the
arrival of his old friend, and was grievously disappointed when contrary
winds blew the frigate which carried him to Annapolis. Letters were
immediately exchanged; Lord Ashburton engaging before he left the
country to find Gallatin out, and, as he said, to "_draw a little wisdom
from the best well_." After the treaty was signed, Lord Ashburton went
from Washington to New York, and the old friends met once more: Mr.
Gallatin was in his 82d year, but in the full possession of his
faculties; Lord Ashburton in his 68th year: a memorable meeting of two
great men, whose lives had much in common; the one the foremost banker
of England, the other the matchless financier of America; and to this
sufficient honor was added for each the singular merit of having
negotiated for his country the most important treaty in its relation to
the other since the separation of 1783,--Mr. Gallatin, the Treaty of
Ghent, which gave peace to America; Lord Ashburton, that treaty which
is known by his name and which secured peace to Great Britain.
In 1846 Mr. Gallatin rendered his last diplomatic service by the
publication of a pamphlet on the Oregon question, which was then as
threatening as that of the northeastern boundary had been. This
admirable exposition, which put before the people as well as the
negotiators the precise merits of the controversy, powerfully
contributed to the ultimate peaceful settlement.
Still once more Mr. Gallatin threw his authoritative words into the
scale of justice. His last appearance in public had been when he
presided on April 24, 1844, at a meeting in New York city to protest
against the annexation of Texas. He then held that the resolution of the
House declaring the treaty of annexation between the United States of
America and the Republic of Texas to be the fundamental law of union
between them, without and against the consent of the Senate, was a
direct and undisguised usurpation of power and a violation of the
Constitution. In the storm of opposition he lifted his feeble voice in
condemnation of the violation of treaties, and the disregard of the
sacred obligations of mankind. "I am highly gratified," were his final
words, "I am highly gratified that the last public act of a long life
should have been that of bearing testimony against this outrageous
attempt. It is indeed a consolation that my almost extinguished voice
has been on this occasion raised in defense of liberty, of justice, and
of our country." Of the war with Mexico, he was wont to say, "that it
was the only blot upon the escutcheon of the United States." Aged as he
was, he would not rest until he had made his last appeal for peace with
Mexico. He also prepared supplementary essays on war expenses: the first
of these was published in 1847, the second in 1848. For months all his
faculties, all his feelings were absorbed in this one subject. These
pamphlets were widely circulated by the friends of peace. The venerable
sage had the comfort of knowing that his words were not in vain. Peace
with Mexico was signed on February 2, 1848.
* * * * *
Mr. Gallatin was no believer in the doctrine of 'manifest destiny,'--the
policy of bringing all North America into the occupation of a race
speaking the same language, and under a single government. On February
16, 1848, before news of the signature of the treaty at Guadalupe
Hidalgo, by Mr. Trist, the American negotiator, was known in New York,
Mr. Gallatin condemned this idea in a remarkable passage, in a letter to
Garrett Davis:--
"What shall be said of the notion of an empire extending from the
Atlantic to the Pacific and from the North Pole to the Equator? Of
the destiny of the Anglo-Saxon race, of its universal monarchy over
the whole of North America? Now, I will ask, which is the portion
of the globe that has attained the highest degree of civilization
and even of power--Asia, with its vast empires of Turkey, India,
and China, or Europe divided into near twenty independent
sovereignties? Other powerful causes have undoubtedly largely
contributed to that result; but this, the great division into ten
or twelve distinct languages, must not be neglected. But all these
allegations of superiority of race and destiny neither require nor
deserve any answer. They are but pretences under which to disguise
ambition, cupidity, or silly vanity."
The justice of these reflections was assuredly borne out by the
experience of history, but manifest destiny takes no account of past
lessons.
Before these lines of Mr. Gallatin were penned, on January 19, 1848,
gold was discovered in California. The announcement startled the world
and opened a new era, not only to Europe, but to mankind. Extending the
metallic basis, which no man better than Mr. Gallatin recognized and
held to be the true solvent of money transactions, it postponed for a
half century the inevitable conflict between capital and labor, the
first outbreaks of which in Europe had been with difficulty suppressed,
when the news of good tidings gave promise of unexpected relief. Credit
revived, new enterprises of colossal magnitude were undertaken, and the
demand for labor quickly exceeded the supply. Emigration to America rose
to incredible proportions. Had Mr. Gallatin lived, he would have found
new elements to be weighed in his nice balance of probabilities. He
would no longer, as in 1839, have been compelled to say that "specie is
a foreign product," but would have given to us inestimable advice as to
the proper use to be made of the vast sums taken out from our own soil.
He would have been also brought to face the ethnologic problem of a
continent inhabited by a single race, not Anglo-Saxon, nor Teutonic, nor
yet Latin, but a composite race in which all these will be merged and
blended; a new American race which, springing from a broader surface,
shall rise to higher summits of intellectual power and, with a greater
variety of natural qualities, achieve excellence in more numerous ways.
This vision was denied to Mr. Gallatin. He died at the threshold of the
new era--of the golden age. A half century has not passed since his
death, and the United States has taken from her soil a value of over
three thousand millions of dollars, in gold and silver (gold two
thousand millions, silver one thousand millions), more than two thirds
of the total amount estimated by Mr. Gallatin as the store of Europe in
1839; and has also added to her population, by immigration alone, ten
millions of people, of whom but a small proportion are of the
Anglo-Saxon race.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 19: _Life of Albert Gallatin_, p. 546.]
[Footnote 20: The frigate Chesapeake was captured by the British
man-of-war Leopard in June, 1807.]
[Footnote 21: A translation of this work, _Economie Politique_, was
published under Jefferson's supervision in 1818.]
CHAPTER IX
CANDIDATE FOR THE VICE-PRESIDENCY
During the twelve years that Mr. Gallatin was in the Treasury he was
continually looking for some man who could take his place in that
office, and aid in the direction of national politics; to use his own
words, "who could replace Mr. Jefferson, Mr. Madison, and himself."
Breckenridge of Kentucky only appeared and died. The eccentricities of
John Randolph unfitted him for leadership. William H. Crawford of
Georgia, Monroe's secretary of the treasury, alone filled Gallatin's
expectations. To a powerful mind Crawford "united a most correct
judgment and an inflexible integrity. Unfortunately he was neither
indulgent nor civil, and, consequently, was unpopular." Andrew Jackson,
Gallatin said, "was an honest man, and the idol of the worshipers of
military glory, but from incapacity, military habits, and habitual
disregard of laws and constitutional provisions, entirely unfit for the
office of president." John C. Calhoun he looked upon as "a smart fellow,
one of the first amongst second-rate men, but of lax political
principles and an inordinate ambition, not over-delicate in the means of
satisfying itself." Clay he considered to be a man of splendid talents
and a generous mind; John Quincy Adams to be 'wanting to a deplorable
degree in that most essential quality, a sound and correct judgment.'
The contest lay between Adams and Crawford. Crawford was the choice of
Jefferson and Madison as well as of Gallatin. The principles of the
Republican party had so changed that Nathaniel Macon could say in 1824,
in reply to a request from Mr. Gallatin to take part in a caucus for the
purpose of forwarding Mr. Crawford's nomination, that there were "not
five members of Congress who entertained the opinions which those did
who brought Mr. Jefferson into power." But Macon was of the Brutus stamp
of politicians; of that stern cast of mind which does not 'alter when it
alteration finds or bend with the remover to remove,' and held yielding
to the compulsion of circumstances to be an abandonment of principle.
Jefferson still held the consolidation of power to be the chief danger
of the country, and the barrier of state rights, great and small, to be
its only protection even against the Supreme Court. Gallatin took
broader ground, and found encouragement in the excellent working of
universal suffrage in the choice of representatives to legislative
bodies. But he was opposed to the extension of the principle to
municipal officers having the application of the proceeds of taxes,
forgetting that universal suffrage is the lever by which capital is
moved to educate labor and relieve it from the burdens of injury,
disease, and physical incapacity at the expense of the whole. Without
stopping to argue these debatable questions, Mr. Gallatin, with
practical statesmanship, determined to maintain in power the only agency
by which he could at all shape the political future, and he threw
himself into the canvass with zeal.
Crawford had unfortunately been stricken with paralysis, and the choice
of a vice-president became a matter of grave concern. Mr. Gallatin was
selected to take this place on the ticket. To this tender he replied
that he did not want the office, but would dislike to be proposed and
not elected, and he honestly felt that as a foreigner and a residuary
legatee of Federal hatred his name could not be of much service to the
cause. Still, he followed the only course by which any party can be held
together, and surrendered his prejudices and fears to the wishes of his
friends. The Republican caucus met on February 14, 1824, in the chamber
of the House of Representatives. Of the 216 members of the party only 66
attended. Martin Van Buren, then senator from New York, managed this,
the last congressional caucus for the selection of candidates.
The solemnity given to the congressional nominations, and the publicity
of the answers of candidates, Mr. Gallatin held to be political
blunders. In fact the plan was adroitly denounced as an attempt to
dictate to the people.
Crawford was nominated for president by 64 votes, Gallatin for
vice-president by 57. This nomination Mr. Gallatin accepted in a note to
Mr. Ruggles, United States senator, on May 10, 1824. But there were
elements of which party leaders of the old school had not taken
sufficient account. Macon was right when he said that "every generation,
like a single person, has opinions of its own, as much so in politics as
anything else," and that 'the opinions of Jefferson and those who were
with him were forgotten.' And Jefferson himself, in his complacent
reflection that even the name of Federalist was "extinguished by the
battle of New Orleans," did not see that the Republican party of the old
school had been snuffed out by the same event. The new democracy, whose
claims to rule were based, not on the policy of peace or restricted
powers, but on the seductive glitter of military glory, was in the
ascendant, and General Jackson was the favorite of the hour. New
combinations became necessary, and Mr. Gallatin was requested to
withdraw from the ticket, and make room for Mr. Clay, whose great
western influence it was hoped would save it from defeat. This he gladly
did in a declaration of October 2, addressed to Martin Van Buren, dated
at his Fayette home, and published in the "National Intelligencer." The
result of the election was singular. Calhoun was elected vice-president
by the people. The presidential contest was decided in the House, Adams
being chosen over Jackson and Crawford, by the influence of Clay. Mr.
Gallatin quickly discerned in the failure of the people to elect a
president the collapse of the Republican party. He considered it as
"fairly defunct."
Jackson had already announced the startling doctrine that no regard was
to be had to party in the selection of the great officers of government,
which Mr. Gallatin considered as tantamount to a declaration that
principles and opinions were of no importance in its administration. To
lose sight of this principle was to substitute men for measures.
Jackson's idea of party, however, was personal fealty. He engrafted the
_pouvoir personnel_ on the Democratic party as thoroughly as Napoleon
could have done in his place. Moreover, Gallatin considered Jackson's
assumption of power in his collisions with the judiciary at New Orleans
and Pensacola, and his orders to take St. Augustine without the
authority of Congress, as dangerous assaults upon the Constitution of
the country and the liberties of the people, and he dreaded the
substitution of the worship of a military chieftain for the maintenance
of that liberty, the last hope of man. Ten years later he uttered the
same opinion in a conversation with Miss Martineau, and he expressed a
preference for an annual president, a cipher, so that all would be done
by the ministry. But in the impossibility of this plan, he would have
preferred a four years' term without renewal or an extension of six
years; an idea adopted by Davis in his plan of disintegration by
secession. The presidency, Mr. Gallatin thought, was "too much power
for one man; therefore it fills all men's thoughts to the detriment of
better things."
When Mr. Gallatin visited Washington in 1829, he found a state of
society, political and social, widely at variance with his own
experience. The ways of Federalist and Republican cabinets were
traditions of an irrevocable past. Jackson was political dictator, and
took counsel only from his prejudices. The old simplicity had given way
to elegance and luxury of adornment. The east room of the presidential
mansion was covered with Brussels carpeting. There were silk curtains at
the windows, French mirrors of unusual size, and three splendid English
crystal chandeliers. In the dining-room were a hundred candles and
lamps, and silver plate of every description, and presiding over this
magnificence the strange successors of Washington and his stately dame,
of Madison and his no less elegant wife,--the Tennessee backwoodsman and
Peggy O'Neil.
When, it is not too soon to ask, in the general reform of civil service,
shall the possibility of such anomalies be entirely removed by
restricting the executive mansion to an executive bureau, and entirely
separating social ceremony from official state, to the final suppression
of back stairs influence and kitchen cabinets?
CHAPTER X
SOCIETY--LITERATURE--SCIENCE
Mr. Gallatin's land speculations were not profitable. His plan of Swiss
colonization did not result in any pecuniary advantage to himself. His
little patrimony, received in 1786, he invested in a plantation of about
five hundred acres on the Monongahela. Twelve years later, in 1798, he
was neither richer nor poorer than at the time of his investment. The
entire amount of claims which he held with Savary he sold in 1794,
without warranty of title, to Robert Morris, then the great speculator
in western lands, for four thousand dollars, Pennsylvania currency. This
sum, his little farm, and five or six hundred pounds cash were then his
entire fortune. In 1794, the revolution in Switzerland having driven out
numbers of his compatriots, he formed a plan of association consisting
of one hundred and fifty shares of eight hundred dollars each, of which
the Genevans in Philadelphia, Odier, Fazzi, the two Cazenove, Cheriot,
Bourdillon, Duby, Couronne, Badollet, and himself took twenty-five each.
Twenty-five were offered to Americans, which were nearly all taken up,
and one hundred were sent to Geneva, Switzerland, to D'Yvernois and his
friends. The project was to purchase land, and Mr. Gallatin had decided
upon a location in the northeast part of Pennsylvania, or in New York,
on the border. In the summer Gallatin made a journey through New York to
examine lands with the idea of occupation. In July, 1795, he made a
settlement with Mr. Morris, taking his notes for three thousand five
hundred dollars. Balancing his accounts, Mr. Gallatin then found himself
worth seven thousand dollars, in addition to which he had about
twenty-five thousand acres of waste lands and the notes of Mr. Morris.
In 1798 Mr. Morris failed, and, under the harsh operations of the old
law, was sent to jail. Mr. Gallatin never recovered the three thousand
dollars owed to him in the final balance of his real estate operations.
After Mr. Gallatin left the Treasury he located patents for seventeen
hundred acres of Virginia military lands in the State of Ohio, on
warrants purchased in 1784. In 1815 he valued his entire estate,
exclusive of his farm on the Monongahela, at less than twelve thousand
dollars. Forty years later he complained of his investment as a
troublesome and unproductive property, which had plagued him all his
life. Besides the purchase of lands, Mr. Gallatin invested part of his
little capital in building houses on his farm, and in the country store
which Badollet managed. The one yielded no return, and the sum put in
the other was lost through the incompetency of his honest but
inexperienced friend. His wife brought him a small property, but at no
time in his life was he possessed of more than a modest competency. But
he had never any discontent with his fortune nor any desire to be rich.
Mrs. Gallatin, who had always until her marriage lived in cities, was
entirely unfit for frontier life. In these days of railroads it is not
easy to measure the isolation of their country home. Pittsburgh was
nearly five days' journey from Philadelphia, and the crossing of the
Alleghanies took a day and a half more. Before his marriage Mr. Gallatin
had seen very little of society. Though in early manhood he felt no
embarrassment among men, he said 'that he never yet was able to divest
himself of an anti-Chesterfieldian awkwardness in mixed companies.' He
did not take advantage of his residence in Philadelphia to accustom
himself to the ways of the world. There he lived in lodgings and met the
leading public characters of both parties. But when he took his seat in
the cabinet, he found it necessary to enter upon housekeeping and to
take a prominent part in society, for which his wife was admirably
suited, both by temperament and education. Washington Irving wrote of
her in November, 1812, that she was 'the most stylish woman in the
drawing-room that session, and that she dressed with more splendor than
any other of the noblesse;' and again the same year compared her with
the wife of the President, whose courtly manners and consummate tact
and grace are a tradition of the republican court. "Tell your good
lady," mother Irving wrote to James Renwick, "that Mrs. Madison has been
much indisposed, and at last Wednesday's evening drawing-room Mrs.
Gallatin presided in her place. I was not present, but those who were
assure me that she filled Mrs. Madison's chair to a miracle." This is in
the sense of dignity, for Mrs. Gallatin was of small stature.
Mr. Gallatin's house shared the fate of the public buildings and was
burned by the British when Washington was captured in 1814. He was then
abroad on the peace mission. On his return from France Mr. Gallatin made
one more attempt to realize his early idea of a country home, and with
his family went in the summer of 1823 to Friendship Hill. Here an Irish
carpenter built for him a house which he humorously described as being
in the 'Hyberno-teutonic style,--the outside, with its port-hole-looking
windows, having the appearance of Irish barracks, while the inside
ornaments were similar to those of a Dutch tavern, and in singular
contrast to the French marble chimney-pieces, paper, mirrors, and
billiard-table.' In the summer Friendship Hill was an agreeable
residence, but Mr. Gallatin found it in winter too isolated even for his
taste.
One exciting circumstance enlivened the spring of 1825. This was the
passage of Lafayette, the guest of the nation, through western
Pennsylvania on his famous tour. Mr. Gallatin welcomed him in an
address before the court-house of Uniontown, the capital of Fayette
County, on May 26. In his speech Mr. Gallatin reviewed the condition of
the liberal cause in Europe, and the emancipation of Greece, then
agitating both continents. In this all scholars as well as all liberals
were of one mind and heart. After the proceedings Lafayette drove with
Mr. Gallatin to Friendship Hill, where he passed the night; crowds of
people pouring down the valley from the mountain roads to see the
adopted son of the United States, the friend of Washington, the
liberator of France. The intimacy between these two great men, who had
alike devoted the flower of their youth to the interests of civilization
and the foundation of the new republic, was never broken.
Mr. Gallatin passed only one winter at New Geneva. On his return from
his last mission to England he settled permanently in New York, and in
1828 took a house at No. 113 Bleecker Street, then in the suburbs of the
city. He wrote to Badollet in March, 1829, that "it was an ill-contrived
plan to think that the banks of the Monongahela, where he was perfectly
satisfied to live and die in retirement, could be borne by the female
part of his family, or by children brought up at Washington and Paris."
The population of New York has always been migratory, and Mr. Gallatin
was no exception to the rule. In the ten years which followed his first
location he changed his residence on four May days, finally settling at
No. 57 Bleecker Street, nearly opposite to Crosby Street. His life in
New York is a complete period in his intellectual as in his physical
existence, and the most interesting of his career. His last twenty years
were in great measure devoted to scientific studies.
The National Bank, over which he presided for the first ten years, took
but a small part of his time. The remainder was given up to study and
conversation, an art in which he had no superior in this country and
probably none abroad. Soon after his arrival in New York, Mr. Gallatin
was chosen a member of "The Club," an association famous in its day. As
no correct account of this social organization has ever appeared, the
letter of invitation to Mr. Gallatin is of some interest. It was written
by Dr. John Augustine Smith, on November 2, 1829. An extract gives the
origin of the club.
"Nearly two years ago some of the literary gentlemen of the city,
feeling severely the almost total want of intercourse among
themselves, determined to establish an association which should
bring them more frequently into contact. Accordingly they founded
the 'Club' as it is commonly called, and which I believe I
mentioned to you when I had the pleasure of seeing you in Bond
Street. Into this 'Club' twelve persons only are admitted, and
there are at present three gentlemen of the Bar, Chancellor Kent,
Messrs. Johnston and Jay, three professors of Columbia College,
Messrs. McVickar, Moore, and Renwick, the Rev. Drs. Wainwright and
Mathews, the former of the Episcopal Church, the latter of the
Presbyterian Church, two merchants, Messrs. Brevoort and Goodhue,
and I have the honor to represent the medical faculty. Our twelfth
associate was Mr. Morse, of the National Academy of Design, of
which he was president, and his departure for Europe has caused a
vacancy. For agreeableness of conversation there is nothing in New
York at all comparable to our institution. We meet once a week; no
officers, no formalities; invitations, when in case of intelligent
and distinguished strangers, and after a plain and light repast,
retire about eleven o'clock."
At this club Mr. Gallatin, with his wonderful conversational powers,
became at once the centre of interest. The club met at the houses of
members in the winter evenings. There was always a supper, but the rule
was absolute that there should be only one hot dish served, a regulation
which the ladies endeavored to evade when the turn of their husbands
arrived to supply the feast. Among the later members were Professor
Anderson, John A. Stevens, Mr. Gallatin's countryman De Rham, John
Wells, Samuel Ward, Gulian C. Verplanck, and Charles King. No literary
symposium in America was ever more delightful, more instructive, than
these meetings. On these occasions Mr. Gallatin led the conversation,
which usually covered a wide field. His memory was marvelous, and his
personal acquaintance with the great men who were developed by the
French Revolution, emperors and princes, heroes, statesmen, and men of
science, gave to the easy flow of his speech the zest of anecdote and
the spice of epigram. Once heard he was never forgotten. And this rare
faculty he preserved undiminished to the close of his life. Washington
Irving, himself the most genial of men, and the most graceful of
talkers, wrote of him, after meeting him at dinner, in 1841: "Mr.
Gallatin was in fine spirits and full of conversation. He is upwards of
eighty, yet has all the activity and clearness of mind and gayety of
spirits of a young man. How delightful it is to see such intellectual
and joyous old age: to see life running out clear and sparkling to the
last drop! With such a blessed temperament one would be content to
linger and spin out the last thread of existence."
At the close of the year 1829 Mr. Gallatin attempted to carry out his
old and favorite plan of the "establishment of a general system of
rational and practical education fitted for all, and gratuitously open
to all." The want of an institution for education, combining the
advantages of a European university with the recent improvements in
instruction, was seriously felt. New York, already a great city, and
rapidly growing, offered the most promising field for the national
university on a broad and liberal foundation correspondent to the spirit
of the age. The difficulty of obtaining competent teachers of even the
lower branches of knowledge in the public schools, the system of which
was in its infancy, was great. Persons could be found with learning
enough, but they were generally deficient in the art of teaching.
Governor Throop noticed this deficiency in his message of January, 1830,
without, however, the recommendation of any remedy by legislation. The
existing colleges could not supply the want. At this period religious
prejudice controlled the actions of men in every walk of life; for the
old colonial jealousies of Episcopalian and Presbyterian survived the
Revolution. The religious distrust of scientific investigation was also
at its height. Columbia College, the successor of old King's College,
was governed in the Episcopalian interest. Private zeal could alone be
relied upon to establish the new enterprise on a foundation free from
the influence of clergy; an indispensable condition of success. These
were the views of Mr. Jefferson in 1807. These were the views of Mr.
Gallatin. In response to his request abundant subscriptions in money and
material were at once forthcoming.
The project of a national university at New York was received by the
literary institutions of the United States with great enthusiasm. In
October, 1830, a convention of more than a hundred literary and
scientific gentlemen, delegates from different parts of the country, and
of the highest distinction, was held in the common-council chamber. The
outcome of their deliberations was the foundation of the New York
University. Mr. Gallatin was the president of the first council, but
his connection with the institution was of short continuance. The
reasons for his withdrawal were set forth in a letter to his old friend,
John Badollet, written February 7, 1833. Beginning with an expression of
his desire to devote what remained of his life "to the establishment in
this immense and growing city (New York) of a general system of rational
and practical education fitted for all and gratuitously opened to all,"
he said, "but finding that the object was no longer the same, that a
certain portion of the clergy had obtained the control, and that their
object, though laudable, was special and quite distinct from mine, I
resigned at the end of one year rather than to struggle, probably in
vain for what was nearly unattainable." The history of the university
through its precarious existence of half a century amply justifies Mr.
Gallatin's previsions and retirement. Instead of an American Sorbonne,
of which he dreamed, it has never been more than a local institution,
struggling to hold a place in a crowded field.
Mr. Gallatin followed the evolutions of French politics with interest.
His friend Lafayette, who, during the Empire, lived in almost enforced
retirement at his estate of La Grange, was a voluntary exile from the
court of Charles X., whose autocratic principles and aggressive course
were rapidly driving France into fresh revolution. In July, 1830, the
crisis was precipitated by the royal decrees published in the
"Moniteur." Lafayette, who was on his estate, hurried instantly to
Paris, where he became a rallying point, and himself signed the note to
the king, announcing that he had ceased to reign. In September following
it fell to him to write to Mr. Gallatin on the occasion of the marriage
of Gallatin's daughter. In this union Lafayette had a triple interest.
Besides his personal attachment for Mr. Gallatin, each of the young
couple was descended from one of his old companions-in-arms. The groom,
Mr. Byam Kerby Stevens, was a son of Colonel Ebenezer Stevens, of the
continental service, who was Lafayette's chief of artillery in his
expedition against Arnold in Virginia, in the spring of 1781; the bride,
Frances Gallatin, was, on the mother's side, the granddaughter of
Commodore James Nicholson, who commanded the gunboats which, improvised
by Colonel Stevens, drove out the British vessels from Annapolis Bay and
opened the route to the blockaded American flotilla.[22]
"PARIS, _September_ 8, 1830.
"MY DEAR FRIEND:--A long time has elapsed since I had the pleasure
to hear from you. I need not, I hope, add, that my affectionate
feelings have been continually with you, especially in what related
to my young friend whose change of name has more deeply interested
every member, and in a very particular manner, the younger part of
the family. Let me hear of you all, and receive my tender regards
and wishes, with those of my children and grandchildren.
LAFAYETTE."
Both of the young people had the honor of Lafayette's acquaintance,--Mr.
Stevens during a visit to Paris, and Miss Gallatin during her father's
residence there as minister, when she was much admired, and was, in the
words of Madame Bonaparte (Miss Patterson), 'a beauty.' In this letter
Lafayette gives a picturesque account of the three days' fighting at the
barricades, and of the departure of the ex-king and the royal army,
accompanied by "some twenty thousand Parisians, in coaches, hacks, and
omnibus.... The royal party, after returning the jewels of the crown,
went slowly to Cherbourg with their own escort, under the protection of
three commissioners, and were there permitted quietly to embark for
England."
In 1834 Mr. Gallatin's sympathies were greatly excited by the arrival at
New York of a number of Poles, many of them educated men, and among them
Etsko, a nephew of Kosciusko. A public committee was raised, called the
Polish committee, of which Mr. Gallatin was chosen chairman. Besides
superintending the collection of funds, he arranged and carried out in
the minutest details a plan to quarter the exiles upon the inhabitants.
A list of names ending in _ski_ still remains among his papers; to each
was assigned a number, and they were allotted by streets and
numbers,--number 182, one Szelesegynski, was taken by Mr. Gallatin
himself, to look after horses. These unfortunate men were then
distributed through the country, as occupations could be found. In
October Mr. Gallatin's notes show that all had been provided for except
fourteen boys, for whom a subscription was taken up. A tract of land in
Illinois was assigned by Congress to these political exiles.
Mr. Gallatin's first acquaintance with the American Indian was made at
Machias. In the neighborhood of this frontier town, across the Canadian
border, there were still remnants of the Abenaki and Etchemin tribes.
They were French in sympathy, and all converts to the Roman Catholic
faith. Mr. Lesdernier, with whom Gallatin lodged, had influence over
them from the trade he established with them in furs, and as their
religious purveyor. He had paid a visit to Boston at the time the French
fleet was there in 1781, and brought home a Capuchin priest for their
service. To the young Genevan, brought up in the restrictions of
European civilization, the history of the savage was a favorite study.
In the winter evenings, in the quiet of the log hut, with the aid of one
familiar with the customs and traditions of the race, the foundations
were laid of a permanent interest in this almost untrodden branch of
human science. The Canadian Indians, however, hemmed in by French and
English settlements, were semi-civilized. The Miamis and Shawnees, who
ranged the valley of the Ohio, were the tribes nearest to Gallatin's
home on the Monongahela. These, though for a long time under the
influence of the French, retained their original wildness, and were,
during the first years of his residence, the dread of the frontier.
The interest aroused in the mind of Mr. Gallatin by personal observation
was quickened by his intimacy with Jefferson, whose "Notes on Virginia,"
published in 1801, contained the first attempt at a classification and
enumeration of American tribes. The earlier work of Colden was confined
to the Five Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy. The arrangement of the
Louisiana territory, ceded by France, brought Mr. Gallatin into contact
with Pierre Louis Chouteau, and an intimacy formed with John Jacob
Astor, who was largely concerned in the fur trade of the Northwest,
widened the field of interest, which included the geography of the
interior and the customs of its inhabitants. Mr. Gallatin's examination
of the subject was general, however, and did not take a practical
scientific turn until the year 1823, when, at the request of Baron
Alexander von Humboldt, he set forth the results of his studies in the
form of a Synopsis of the Indian tribes. This essay, communicated by
Humboldt to the Italian geographer Balbi, then engaged upon his "Atlas
Ethnographique du Globe,"--a classification by languages of ancient and
modern peoples,--was quoted by him in his volume introductory to that
remarkable work published in 1826, in a manner to attract the attention
of the scientific world. Vater, in his "Mithridates," first attempted a
classification of the languages of the globe, but the work of Mr.
Gallatin, though confined in subject, was original in its conception and
treatment. In the winter of 1825-26 a large gathering of southern
Indians at Washington enabled him to obtain good vocabularies of several
of the tribes. Uniting these to those already acquired, he published a
table of all the existing tribes, and at the same time, at his instance,
the War Department circulated through its posts a vocabulary containing
six hundred words of verbal forms and of selected sentences, and a
series of grammatical queries, to which answers were invited. He also
opened an elaborate correspondence with such persons as were best
acquainted with the Indian tribes in different sections of the
country.[23] The replies to these various queries were few in number,
but the practical plan, adhered to in substance, has resulted in the
collection by the Smithsonian Institution of a very large number of
Indian vocabularies.[24]
This class of investigation, in its ample scope for original research
and the ascertainment of principles by analysis and analogic expression,
was peculiarly agreeable to Mr. Gallatin. His friend, du Ponceau,[25]
who served in the American war as the secretary of Steuben, and was now
established in Philadelphia, was likewise deeply engaged in philologic
studies; in 1819 he had published a memoir of the construction of the
languages of the North American Indians, which he followed later with
other papers of a similar nature, among which were a "Grammar of the
Languages of the Lenni Lenape or Delaware Indians," and a memoir on the
grammatical system of the languages of the Indian tribes of North
America, a learned and highly instructive paper, which took the Volney
prize at Paris.
In 1836 Mr. Gallatin's original paper, contributed to Balbi, amplified
by subsequent acquisitions, was published by the American Antiquarian
Society of Worcester, in the first volume of its Transactions. It was
entitled "A Synopsis of the Indian Tribes, within the United States east
of the Rocky Mountains, and in the British and Russian Possessions in
North America." This elaborate inquiry, the foundation of the science in
America, was intended originally to embrace all the tribes north of the
Mexican semi-civilized nations. From the want of material, however, it
was confined at the southward to the territory of the United States, and
eastward of the Rocky Mountains. It included eighty-one tribes, divided
into twenty-eight families, and was accompanied by a colored map, with
tribal indications. The result of the investigation Mr. Gallatin held to
be proof that all the languages, not only of our own Indian tribes, but
of the nations inhabiting America from the Arctic Ocean to Cape Horn,
have a distinct character common to all. This paper attracted great
attention in Europe. It was reviewed by the Count de Circourt, whose
interest in the subject was heightened by personal acquaintance with the
author. John C. Calhoun, acknowledging receipt of a copy of the
Synopsis, said in striking phrase 'that he had long thought that the
analogy of languages is destined to recover much of the lost history of
nations just as geology has of the globe we inhabit.'
In 1838, Congress having accepted the trust of John Smithson of
£100,000, and pledged the faith of the United States for its purposes,
Mr. Forsyth, the secretary of state, addressed Mr. Gallatin, at the
request of the President, requesting his views as to its proper
employment; but Mr. Gallatin does not appear to have answered the
communication. The programme of the Smithsonian Institution, inclosed to
the board of regents in its first report, stated its object to be the
increase and diffusion of knowledge, and bears marks of the general
views which Mr. Gallatin had for many years urged on public attention.
The first of the Smithsonian "Contributions to Knowledge" was the memoir
of Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, by Squier and Davis.
Before its publication was undertaken, however, it was submitted to the
Ethnological Society. Mr. Gallatin returned it, with the approval of the
society, and some words of commendation of his own addressed to
Professor Henry, the learned superintendent of the Smithsonian
Institution.
The period of temporary political repose, which followed the peace of
Vienna and the establishment of the balance of power by the allied
sovereigns, was an era in human knowledge. Science made rapid progress,
and in its turn showed the broad and liberal influence of the great
revolution. In 1842 societies were founded in Paris and London to
promote the study of ethnology. Mr. Gallatin would not be behindhand in
this important work for which America offered a virgin field. Drawing
about him a number of gentlemen of similar tastes with his own, he
founded in New York, in 1842, the American Ethnological Society. Among
his associates were Dr. Robinson, the famous explorer of Palestine,
Schoolcraft, Bartlett, and Professor Turner, noted for their researches
in the history and languages of the Indian races. Messrs. Atwater,
Bradford, Hawks, Gibbs, Mayer, Dr. Morton, Pickering, Stephens, Ewbank,
and Squier were also, either in the beginning or soon after, members of
this select and learned institution, of which Mr. Gallatin was the
central figure. One of its members said in 1871, 'Mr. Gallatin's house
was the true seat of the society, and Mr. Gallatin himself its
controlling spirit. His name gave it character, and from his purse
mainly was defrayed the cost of the two volumes of the "Transactions"
which constitute about the only claim the society possesses to the
respect of the scientific world.' To the first of these volumes,
published in 1845, Mr. Gallatin contributed an "Essay on the
semi-civilized nations of Mexico and Central America, embracing
elaborate notes on their languages, numeration, calendars, history, and
chronology, and an inquiry into the probable origin of their
semi-civilization." In this he included all existing certain knowledge
of the languages, history, astronomy, and progress in art of these
peoples. A copy of this work he sent to General Scott, then in the city
of Mexico after his triumphant campaign, inclosing a memorandum which he
urged the general to hand to civilians attached to the army. This was a
request to purchase books, copies of documents, printed grammars, and
vocabularies of the Mexican languages, and he authorized the general to
spend four hundred dollars in this purpose on his account. In the second
volume, published in 1848, he printed the result of his continued
investigations on the subject which first interested him, as an
introduction to a republication of a work by Mr. Hale on the "Indians of
Northwest America." This consisted of geographical notices, an account
of Indian means of subsistence, the ancient semi-civilization of the
Northwest, Indian philology, and analogic comparisons with the Chinese
and Polynesian languages. These papers Mr. Gallatin modestly described
to Chevalier as the 'fruits of his leisure,' and to Sismondi he wrote
that he had not the requisite talent for success in literature or
science. They nevertheless entitle him to the honorable name of the
Father of American Ethnography.
In 1837 Mr. Wheaton, the American minister at Berlin, requested Mr.
Gallatin to put the Baron von Humboldt in possession of authentic data
concerning the production of gold in the United States. Humboldt had
visited the Oural and Siberian regions in 1829, at the request of the
Emperor of Russia, to make investigations as to their production of the
precious metals. Mr. Gallatin was the only authority in the United
States on the subject. Later von Humboldt wrote to Mr. Gallatin of the
interest felt abroad, and by himself, in the gold of the mountains of
Virginia and Tennessee, a country which rivaled on a small scale the
Dorado of Siberia. The treasures of the Pacific coast were not yet
dreamed of.
Mr. Gallatin perfectly understood the range of his own powers. He said
of himself:--
"If I have met with any success, either in public bodies, as an
executive officer, or in foreign negotiations, it has been
exclusively through a patient and most thorough investigation of
all the attainable facts, and a cautious application of these to
the questions under discussion.... Long habit has given me great
facility in collating, digesting, and extracting complex documents,
but I am not hasty in drawing inferences; the arrangement of the
facts and arguments is always to me a considerable labor, and
though aiming at nothing more than perspicuity and brevity, I am a
very slow writer."
Mr. Gallatin's manuscripts and drafts show long and minute labor in
their well considered and abundant alterations. Referring on one
occasion to his habit of reasoning, Mr. Gallatin remarked, that of all
processes that of analogy is the most dangerous, yet that which he
habitually used; that it required the greatest possible number of facts.
This is the foundation of philology, and his understanding of its method
and its dangers is the reason of his success in this branch of science.
The difficulty experienced in establishing any literary or scientific
institutions in New York was very great. An effort made in 1830, which
Mr. Gallatin favored, to establish a literary periodical failed, not on
account of the pecuniary difficulties, but from the impossibility of
uniting a sufficient number of able coöperators. But Mr. Gallatin's
interest in literature was not as great as in science.[26]
In 1841 a national institution for the promotion of science was
organized at Washington. The coöperation of Mr. Gallatin was invited,
but the society had a short existence. In 1843 Mr. Gallatin was chosen
president of the New York Historical Society. His inaugural address is
an epitome of political wisdom. Pronounced at any crisis of our history,
it would have become a text for the student. In this sketch he analyzed
the causes which contributed to form our national character and to
establish a government founded on justice and on equal rights. He showed
how, united by a common and imminent danger, the thirteen States
succeeded in asserting and obtaining independence without the aid of a
central and efficient government, and the difficulties which were
encountered when a voluntary surrender of a part of their immense
sovereignty became necessary as a condition of national existence. He
said that the doctrine that all powers should emanate from the people is
not a question of expediency.
In this address he summed up the reasons why Washington exercised such a
beneficial influence upon the destinies of his country. In a
confidential letter to his wife in 1797, he expressed an opinion that
the father of his country was not a good-natured and amiable man, but
time had mellowed these recollections and softened the asperity of this
judgment. Washington had not, he said (in 1843), 'an extraordinary
amount of acquired knowledge; he was neither a classical scholar nor a
man of science, nor was he endowed with the powers of eloquence, nor
with other qualities more strong than solid, which might be mentioned;
but he had a profound and almost innate sense of justice, on all public
occasions a perfect control of his strong passions,[27] above all a most
complete and extraordinary self-abnegation. Personal consequences and
considerations were not even thought of, they never crossed his mind,
they were altogether obliterated.' Mr. Gallatin held that "the Americans
had a right to be proud of Washington, because he was selected and
maintained during his whole career by the people--never could he have
been thus chosen and constantly supported had he not been the type and
representative of the American people."
The commemoration of the fortieth anniversary of the foundation of the
New York Historical Society, November, 1844, was an occasion of unusual
interest. John Romeyn Brodhead, who had just returned from the Hague
with the treasures of New Netherland history gathered during his
mission, was the orator of the day. The venerable John Quincy Adams, Mr.
Gallatin's old associate at Ghent, was present. After the address, which
was delivered at the Church of the Messiah on Broadway, the society and
its guests crossed the street to the New York Hotel, where a banquet
awaited them. Mr. Gallatin retired early, leaving the chair to the first
vice-president, Mr. Wm. Beach Lawrence. After he had left the room, Mr.
Adams, speaking to a toast to the archæologists of America, said: "Mr.
Gallatin, in sending to me the invitations of the society, added the
expression of his desire 'to shake hands with me once more in this
world.'" Mr. Adams could not but respond to his request. In his remarks
he said:
"I have lived long, sir, in this world, and I have been connected
with all sorts of men, of all sects and descriptions. I have been
in the public service for a great part of my life, and filled
various offices of trust, in conjunction with that venerable
gentleman, Albert Gallatin. I have known him half a century. In
many things we differed; on many questions of public interest and
policy we were divided, and in the history of parties in this
country there is no man from whom I have so widely differed as from
him. But in other things we have harmonized; and now there is no
man with whom I more thoroughly agree on all points than I do with
him. But one word more let me say, before I leave you and him,
birds of passage as we are, bound to a warmer and more congenial
clime,--that among all public men with whom I have been associated
in the course of my political life, whether agreeing or differing
in opinion from him, I have always found him to be an honest and
honorable man."
In the road to harmony Mr. Adams had to do the traveling. Mr. Gallatin
never changed his political opinions. The political career of the two
men offered this singular contrast: Adams, dissatisfied with his party,
passed into opposition; Gallatin, though at variance with the policy of
the administration of which he made a part, held his fealty, and
confined himself to the operations of his own bureau.
For a period far beyond the allotted years of man Mr. Gallatin retained
the elasticity of his physical nature as well as his mental
perspicacity. In middle age he was slight of figure, his height about
five feet ten inches, his form compact and of nervous vigor. His
complexion was Italian;[28] his expression keen; his nose long,
prominent; his mouth small, fine cut, and mobile; his eyes hazel, and
penetrative; his skull a model for the sculptor. Thus he appears in the
portrait painted by Gilbert Stuart about the time that he took charge of
the Treasury Department; he was then about forty years of age. In the
fine portrait by William H. Powell, taken from life in 1843, and
preserved in the gallery of the New York Historical Society, these
characteristics appear in stronger outline. Monsieur de Bacourt,[29] the
literary executor of Talleyrand, who was the French Ambassador to the
United States in 1840, paid a visit to Mr. Gallatin in that year, and
describes him as a "beau vieillard de quatre-vingt ans," who has fully
preserved his faculties. Bacourt alludes to his remarkable face, with
its clear, fine cut features, and his "physiognomie pleine de finesse;"
and dwells also upon the ease and charm of his conversation.
As his life slowly drew to its close, one after another of the few of
his old friends who remained dropped from the road. Early in 1848 Adams
fell in harness, on the floor of the House of Representatives; Lord
Ashburton died in May. Finally, nearest, dearest of all, the companion
of his triumphs and disappointments, the sharer of his honors and his
joys, his wife, was taken from him by the relentless hand. The summer of
1849 found him crushed by this last affliction, and awaiting his own
summons of release. He was taken to Mount Bonaparte, the country-seat of
his son-in-law, at Astoria on Long Island, where he died in his
daughter's arms on Sunday, August 12, 1849. The funeral services were
held in Trinity Church on the Tuesday following, and his body was laid
to rest in the Nicholson vault,[30] in the old graveyard adjoining. The
elegant monument erected during his lifetime is one of the attractive
features of this venerable cemetery, in whose dust mingle the remains of
the temple of no more elevated spirit than his own. The season was a
terrible one--the cholera was raging, the city was deserted. In the
general calamity private sorrow disappeared, or the occasion would have
been marked by a demonstration of public grief and of public honor. As
the tidings went from city to city, and country to country, the friends
of science, of that universal wisdom which knows neither language nor
race, paused in their investigations to pay respectful homage to his
character, his intellect, and to that without which either or both in
combination are inadequate to success--his labor in the field.
On October 2, 1849, at the first meeting of the Historical Society
after the death of Mr. Gallatin, Mr. Luther Bradish, the presiding
officer, spoke of him in impressive words, as the last link connecting
the present with the past. He dwelt upon the peculiar pleasure with
which the presence of Mr. Gallatin was always hailed, and the peculiar
interest it gave to the proceedings of the society, and many an eye was
dimmed, as he recalled the venerable form, the beautifully classic head,
the countenance ever beaming with intelligence, and summed up the long
and useful career of the departed sage in these impressive words:--
"The name of Albert Gallatin is emphatically a name of history. Few
men have lived in any age whose biographies have been so intimately
connected with the history of their country. Living in one of the
most interesting periods of the world, a period of great events, of
the discussion of great principles and the settlement of great
interests, almost the whole of his long and active life was passed
in public service amidst those events and in those discussions....
For nearly half a century he was almost constantly employed in the
public service; almost every department of that service has
received the benefit of his extraordinary talents and his varied
and extensive and accurate knowledge. Whether in legislation, in
finance, or in diplomacy, he has been equally distinguished in all.
In all or in either he has had few equals and still fewer
superiors."
To Jeremy Bentham Mr. Gallatin acknowledged himself indebted, as his
master in the art of legislation; but from whatever ground he drew his
maxims of government, they were reduced to harmony in the crucible of
his own intelligence by the processes of that brain which Spurzheim
pronounced capital,[31] and Dumont held to be the best head in America.
In that massive and profound structure lay faculties of organization and
administration which mark the Latin and Italian mind in its highest form
of intellectual development.
His moral excellence was no less conspicuous than his intellectual
power. He had a profound sense of justice, a love of liberty, and an
unfaltering belief in the capacity of the human race for self-rule.
Versed in the learning of centuries, and familiar with every experiment
of government, he was full of the liberal spirit of his age. To a higher
degree than any American, native or foreign born, unless Franklin, with
whose broad nature he had many traits in common, Albert Gallatin
deserves the proud title, aimed at by many, reached by few, of Citizen
of the World.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 22: An account of this expedition may be found in the
publications of the Maryland Historical Society.]
[Footnote 23:
WASHINGTON, 29_th May_, 1826.
SIR,--Mr. Stewart communicated to me your answer of 4th April last to
the letter which, at my request, he had addressed to you; and I return
you my thanks for your kind offer to forward the object in view,--one
which is not, however, of a private nature but connected with what is
intended to be a National work; and I have delayed writing in order to
be able to send at the same time the papers herewith transmitted.
It is at my suggestion that the Secretary of War has, with the
approbation of the President, taken measures to collect comparative
vocabularies of all the languages and dialects of the Indian tribes
still existing within the United States. The circular is addressed to
all the Indian superintendents and agents, and to the missionaries with
whom the Department corresponds. But they have no agent with the
Nottoways, and we are fortunate that you should have been disposed to
lend your aid on this occasion.
It is the intention of government that the result of these researches
should be published, giving due credit to every individual who shall
have assisted in a work that has been long expected from us, and which
will be equally honorable to the persons concerned and to the country.
It had been my intention to contribute my share in its further progress:
this my approaching departure for Europe forbids. The inclosed papers,
attending to the Notes and to the circular, are so full that I need not
add any further explanation, and have only to request that you will have
the goodness to transmit whatever vocabulary and other information you
may obtain to Colonel Tho. L. McKinney, Office of Indian Affairs, under
cover directed to the Secretary of War. Mr. McKinney will also be happy
to answer any queries on the subject you may have to propose.
I have the honor to be respectfully, sir,
Your most obedient servant,
ALBERT GALLATIN
Mr. James Rochelle,
Jerusalem, Southampton County, Virginia.
_Communicated by J. H. Rochelle, Jerusalem, Virginia._]
[Footnote 24: Among the most distinguished of those who have followed
the pathway indicated by Mr. Gallatin was the late George Gibbs, an
indefatigable student and an admirable ethnologist. His Chinook jargon
was published by the Smithsonian Institution.]
[Footnote 25: Mr. du Ponceau became president of the learned societies
of Pennsylvania: the Historical Society and the American Philosophical
Society.]
[Footnote 26: His favorite novel was _The Antiquary_, which he read once
a year. Novels, he said, should be read, the last chapter first, in
order that appreciation of the style should not be lost in the interest
excited by the story.]
[Footnote 27: Mr. Gallatin's assertion, which corresponded with that of
Jefferson, that Washington had naturally strong passions, but had
attained complete mastery over them, is quoted by the Earl of Stanhope
(Lord Mahon) in his famous eulogy of Washington's attributes.]
[Footnote 28: The Gallatins claim to descend from one Callatinus, a
Roman Consul.]
[Footnote 29: _Souvenirs d'un Diplomate._ Paris, 1882.]
[Footnote 30: This was the vault of the Witter family, a daughter of
which Commodore Nicholson married.]
[Footnote 31: "In my youth the fashion was to decide in conformity
with Lavater's precepts; then came Camper's facial angle, which gave a
decided superiority to the white man and monkey; and both have been
superseded by the bumps of the skull. This criterion is that which suits
me best, for Spurzheim declared I had a _capital_ head, which he might
without flattery say to everybody." _Gallatin to Lewis T. Cist of
Cincinnati, November_ 21, 1837.]
INDEX
Adams, Henry, calls treaty of Ghent the work of Gallatin, 324.
Adams, John, announces election of Gallatin as senator, 60;
convenes Congress to consider relations with France, 132;
his message, 133; replies coolly to resolution of House, 136, 137;
remarks of McClanachan to, 138;
his message in 1797, 139;
visited by House to present answer, 140;
wishes to establish new foreign missions, 141;
informs Congress of French outrages, 147;
and of preparations for war, 147;
sends in X Y Z dispatches, 149;
sends message on French relations, 152, 153;
urges preparation for war, 155;
thanks House for support, 155;
delighted with support of Congress in 1799, 158;
congratulates Congress on settlement at Washington, 162;
supported for President by New England, 163;
in election of 1800, 165;
attributes distresses of Confederation to financial ignorance, 174;
his breach with Hamilton, 177.
Adams, John Quincy, on results of Gallatin's proposed appointment as
secretary of state, 295;
meets Gallatin and Bayard at St. Petersburg, 302;
his training, comparison with Gallatin, 302, 303;
given new commission, 312;
differs with Clay over fisheries and Mississippi navigation, 323;
appointed minister to England, 326;
advised by Gallatin concerning commercial treaty, 333;
appointed secretary of state, 334;
informed by Gallatin of disadvantages of a war with Spain, 336, 337;
his arguments in Apollon case disregarded by Gallatin, 338;
his indignation, 338;
writes opinion of Gallatin in his diary, 333, 339;
described by Gallatin to Badollet, 339, 356;
his pugnacity complained of by Crawford, 339;
negotiates treaty with De Neuville, 340;
comments of Gallatin upon, 340;
appoints Rush secretary of treasury, 342;
offers mission to England to Gallatin, 342, 343;
promises Gallatin _carte blanche_, but gives him full instructions, 343;
his instructions to Rush printed, 345;
warns Gallatin to yield nothing, 346;
congratulates Gallatin on his success, 348;
candidate for presidency, 356;
elected by House of Representatives, 358;
at meeting of New York Historical Society, 384;
Gallatin's friendly greeting to, 384;
eulogizes Gallatin, 384, 385;
his changing party compared with Gallatin's steadiness, 385;
death, 386.
Adams, William, on English peace commission, 316.
Addington, Henry, on Clay's tone as diplomat, 345.
Adet, P. A., French minister, imperils sympathy for France by impudence
to Washington, 128;
condemned by Federalists, 134;
recommends tricolor, 153.
Aix-la-Chapelle, Congress of, 337.
Alexander, Emperor of Russia, authorizes renewal of mediation, 308;
fails to inform Romanzoff of Castlereagh's refusal, 311, 312;
vain efforts of Crawford to secure interview with, 315;
promises Lafayette to use influence in behalf of United States, 315;
has interview with Gallatin, 315;
informs Gallatin that he can do nothing more, 316.
Algiers, treaty with, 117, 118.
Alien Bill, debate and passage in House, 152;
petitions against, in Congress, 157.
Allegheny County, its part in Whiskey Insurrection, 49, 68, 78, 96;
elects Gallatin to Congress, 93, 127.
Allègre, Sophie, marries Gallatin, her character and death, 30.
Allègre, William, father-in-law of Gallatin, 30.
Allen, ----, in debate on French relations, 136;
attacks Gallatin as a French agent, 150.
Allston, Joseph W., at free trade convention, 1831, 241.
American Ethnological Society, founded by Gallatin, 379;
its transactions, 379, 380.
Ames, Fisher, leading orator of Federalists, 99;
his speech on the Jay treaty, 120, 121;
reports answer to President's Message, 128;
defends it against Giles, 129;
leaves Congress, his oratory, 133.
Anderson, Professor, member of "The Club," 367.
Anti-Federalists, call convention to organize in favor of amending
Constitution, 37;
adopt resolutions to organize throughout the State, 39, 40;
recommend amendments by petition, 40.
Apollon, seizure of, explained by Gallatin and Adams, 338.
Army, reduction of, advocated by Gallatin, 108, 123, 129, 130, 186, 188;
his course defended, 216.
Arnold, Benedict, effect of his treason, 12;
campaign of Lafayette against, 371.
Ashburton, Lord. See Baring, Alexander.
Astor, John Jacob, assists Gallatin to float loan, 214;
wishes destruction of United States Bank, 259;
subscribes capital of bank on condition that Gallatin manage its
affairs, 269;
his fur enterprise, 287;
offered protection by Jefferson, 288;
his settlement at Astoria, 288;
unable to persuade Madison to support him, 288.
Astoria, foundation and history of, 288.
Atwater, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Bache, Franklin, educated at Geneva, 4;
attacks Washington as a defaulter, in "Aurora," 104.
Bache, Richard, letter to, furnished by Franklin to Gallatin, 11.
Bacourt, M. de, describes Gallatin in old age, 386.
Badollet, Jean, college friend of Gallatin, 5;
Arcadian schemes of, 9;
letter of Gallatin to, 9;
letters of Serre to, on life in Maine, 15, 25;
informs Gallatin of troubles in Geneva, 25;
at Gallatin's invitation, joins him in America, 25, 26;
established at Greensburg, 27;
letter of Gallatin to, 43;
with Gallatin at anti-excise convention, 52;
advised by Gallatin to avoid United States marshal, 55;
letter of Gallatin to, on French Revolution, 56;
letter of Gallatin to, on his wife, 59;
instructed by Gallatin to secure reëlection of unseated members of
legislature, 95;
given an office by Gallatin, 287, 326;
remark of Gallatin to, 299;
letter of Gallatin to, on J. Q. Adams, 339;
takes shares in Gallatin's land scheme, 361;
manages store for Gallatin, 362;
letters of Gallatin to, 365, 370.
Balbi, quotes Gallatin in his Atlas, 374.
Baldwin, Abraham, on committee on finance, 106.
Bank of North America, established by Morris, 172, 248;
its purpose, 248;
organization, 248, 249;
difficulties of starting, 249, 260;
its services, 249;
jealousy of Pennsylvania toward, 250.
Bank of United States, established by Hamilton, 175, 250, 251;
its organization, 251, 252;
borrowed from, by Gallatin, 204;
petitions for a re-charter, 252;
Gallatin's report in favor of, 252-254;
a re-charter refused, 231, 254;
its value, 255;
opinion of Gallatin on, 255;
controls state banks, 259;
desire of Astor to crush, 259;
remits specie to foreign stockholders, 260;
its dissolution causes panic, 262, 263;
reincorporation proposed, 265;
vetoed, then approved, by Madison, 265;
its subsequent history, 266;
helps resumption of specie payments, 267;
presidency of, declined by Gallatin, 268;
deposits removed from, by Taney, 269;
accepts charter from Pennsylvania, 271;
its subsequent career, 271;
fails in 1839, 276;
weakness of Madison in 1812 in allowing its dissolution, 296.
Bank, National, of New York, connection of Gallatin with, 269-277.
Banks, state, difficulty of controlling their issues, 256;
their evil effects, 257;
status in 1811, 258;
increase after termination of Bank of United States, 261, 262;
suspend payment in 1815, 262;
agree to resume, 267;
supported by second Bank of United States, 267;
Gallatin's "Considerations on," etc., 268;
connection of Gallatin with, 269-277;
speculation craze of, in 1836, 271, 272;
suspend payment in 1837, 272;
conventions of, to prepare for resumption, 273-275;
aided by Treasury, 275; "Suggestions" of Gallatin, 277.
Barbour, Philip P., presides over free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Baring, Alexander, explains to Gallatin British reasons for refusing
Russian mediation, 306, 307;
reply of Gallatin, 309;
urges Gallatin to visit England, 311;
requested by Gallatin to send passports, 313;
his mission to America, 349, 350;
his manner of negotiation with Webster, 350;
visits Gallatin, 350;
comparison with Gallatin, 350;
his death, 386.
Barings, connection with Louisiana purchase, 193, 195;
competition of Bank of United States with, 271;
letter of Gallatin to, 305.
Barras, Comte, encouraged by Napoleon's success to bold measures against
United States, 132.
Bartlett, John Russell, gives anecdotes of Gallatin, 13, 22.
Bartlett, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Bathurst, Lord, promises to appoint peace commissioners, 314;
reopens negotiations, 319;
insists on possession of part of Maine, 321.
Bayard, James A., elected to Congress, 132;
on legislative encroachments on executive, 143;
on resolution to furnish foreign correspondence, 156;
defends Sedition Law by a clever amendment, 159;
moves committee to arrange for balloting in 1800, 166;
accompanies Gallatin as peace commissioner, 301, 302;
willing to accept an informal renunciation of impressment, 305;
goes to Amsterdam, 312;
on new commission to treat directly, 312;
visits London, 313;
asks Monroe for authority to negotiate anywhere, 314;
appointed minister to Russia, 326.
Baylies, ----, his report on Western territory complained of by England,
345.
Bentham, Jeremy, works translated by Dumont, 5;
influences Gallatin, 388.
Bentson, ----, on Astor's hostility to United States Bank, 259.
Berlin and Milan decrees, negotiations for compensation for seizures
under, 333.
Biddle, C. C., at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Biddle, Nicholas, in panic of 1837, 275.
Blount, William, on committee on finance, 107;
impeached, 138.
Bonaparte, Jerome, his flight to America, 332.
Bonaparte, Napoleon, his precocity compared to that of Gallatin, 32;
effect of his Italian successes on French policy, 132, 139;
adopts conciliatory tone, 160;
issues Milan decree, 229;
seen by Gallatin during Hundred Days, 326;
American sympathy for, explained by Gallatin, 331.
Boorman, James, at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Borgo, Pozzo di, compared to Gallatin, 32.
Boston, visit of Gallatin to, 12-14, 17;
Puritanical society in, 13;
prejudice against French, 13;
Gallatin's opinion of, 18;
protests against Jay treaty, 103.
Botts, John M., letter of Gallatin to, on bank, 256.
Boundary, northeast, in treaty of Ghent, 321, 322;
discussed in 1826, 343;
referred to arbitration, 347;
argument concerning, prepared by Gallatin, 349;
decision of King of Netherlands rejected by United States, 349;
documents concerning, published by Gallatin, 349;
settled by Ashburton treaty, 350.
Bourdillon, ----, takes share in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Bourne, Shearjashub, on committee on finance, 106.
Brackenridge, Judge H. H., on Gallatin's part in anti-excise agitation,
50;
in Washington County, advises moderation, 69;
an authority for history of insurrection, 71;
his character and policy, 71;
leads Pittsburgh committee to urge moderation upon rioters, 72;
describes Bradford's behavior, 72;
his estimate of numbers under arms, 72;
compares excitement with that in 1765 and 1775, 74;
at Parkinson's Ferry meeting, 78;
supports Gallatin's efforts to prevent rebellion, 80, 82;
on committee to confer with United States commissioners, 81;
describes Gallatin's speech, 82;
claims credit for preventing civil war, 84;
on threats of secession, 86;
defeated by Gallatin for Congress, 93.
Bradford, David, represents Washington County in anti-excise
proceedings, 51;
elected to legislature, 54;
low opinion of Gallatin concerning, 54;
tries to shirk responsibility, 69;
then determines on extreme measures, robs mail, 69;
calls for armed resistance, 70;
unable to countermand order, 70;
assumes office of major-general, 72;
his harangue to the insurgents, 73;
at meeting at Parkinson's Ferry, 78;
advocates armed resistance, 79;
on committee on resolutions, 80;
named to confer with United States commissioners, 81;
urges rejection of their terms, 81, 82;
excepted from amnesty, flies from the country, 84, 85.
Bradford, James, in anti-excise convention, 52.
Bradford, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Bradish, Luther, his eulogy of Gallatin, 388.
Breading, Nicholas, in Pennsylvania ratifying convention, 35.
Breckenridge, John, his brief career, 355.
Brevoort, ----, member of "The Club," 367.
Brodhead, John Romeyn, orator at fortieth anniversary of New York
Historical Society, 384.
Buck, Daniel, on committee on finance, 107.
Burke, Edmund, on place of revenue in the state, 218.
Burr, Aaron, his connection with Dayton, 104;
in presidential election of 1800, 163, 164, 166, 167;
alienated from Jefferson by refusal to appoint Davis, 282.
Cabinet, its lack of financial coöperation under Jefferson, 188;
criticises Jefferson's messages, 283;
weekly meetings of, suggested by Gallatin, 283;
absence of system in, 284;
dissensions and reorganization under Madison, 296, 297.
Cabot, George, on committee to consider Gallatin's eligibility to
senate, 61.
Calhoun, John C., reports plan for a national bank, 265;
ascribes Gallatin's disregard of Adams's arguments in Apollon case to
"pride," 338;
Gallatin's opinion of, 355;
elected Vice-President, 358;
on Gallatin's ethnological studies, 378.
California, discovery of gold in, 353, 354.
Campbell, George W., furnished with report by Gallatin on injuries of
Great Britain, 292, 303;
secretary of treasury, 312.
Canning, George, his policy toward United States, 225, 295, 344;
attitude of Gallatin toward, in negotiation, 345;
death, 347.
Carnahan, Dr., describes entry of Whiskey Rebellion prisoners into
Cannonsburg, 91.
Castlereagh, Lord, discourages offer of Russia to mediate, 304;
gives assurance of safety to cartel-ship, 307;
refuses second offer of mediation, 311;
offers to deal directly, 312;
member of cabinet most favorable to America, 314;
advises English commissioners to moderate demands, 319;
approves treaty of Ghent, 326;
arranges commercial convention with Gallatin, 326;
expresses friendly feelings, 335.
Cazenove, ----, takes shares in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Charles X., in Revolution of 1830, 370, 372.
Chase, Salmon P., negotiations with Treasury Note Committee, 196 and
note;
follows Gallatin's treasury-note plan, 209;
organizes national banking system, 256.
Chateaubriand, succeeds Montmorenci, 340;
negotiates unsuccessfully with Gallatin, 341;
quotes Gallatin's statement of Cuban question, 346.
Cheriot, ----, takes share in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Chesapeake, captured by Leopard, 224.
Chevalier, Michel, his studies on money, 278.
Cheves, Langdon, at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Chôteau, Pierre Louis, meets Gallatin, his influence over Indians, 287,
374.
Circourt, Count de, reviews Gallatin's "Synopsis of the Indian Tribes,"
378.
Civil service, monopolized by Federalists, 280;
demands of Republicans for a share in, 281;
Gallatin's opinion of appointments to and conduct of, 281;
intention of Jefferson to give one half of, to Republicans, 282.
Clare, Thomas, his house the headquarters of Gallatin in 1784, 22, 24;
rents Gallatin a house, 25.
Clay, Henry, denounces Gallatin for advocating free trade, 242;
apologizes, 242;
on peace commission, 312;
arrives at Gottenburg, 313;
corresponds with Gallatin concerning place of negotiation, 314;
differs with Adams over Mississippi navigation and fisheries, 323;
joins Gallatin in England, 326;
urges Gallatin to accept mission to Panama Congress, 342;
letter of Gallatin to, on instructions as minister to England, 343;
tone of his diplomatic correspondence, 345;
Gallatin's opinion of, 356;
resignation of Gallatin in his favor, 358;
secures election of Adams, 358.
Clinton, George, marriage of his daughter to Genet, 102.
"Club, The," in New York, Gallatin's membership of, 366, 367.
Coast survey, established, 290.
Coinage, debate concerning, in Congress, 140;
regulated by Morris, 172.
Coles, Edward, letter of Gallatin to, 284.
Confederation, Articles of, political conditions under, 33, 34.
Congress, adopts amendments to Constitution suggested by New York and
Virginia, 40;
passes excise law, 49;
modifies it, 52;
gives state courts jurisdiction in excise cases, 67;
receives tricolor from France, 130;
complained of by Jefferson as weak, 138;
suspends commercial intercourse with France, 151;
passes acts authorizing naval defense, 153;
presence of Washington, Pinckney, and Hamilton at, in 1798, 155;
speech of Adams to, 155;
responsibility for war thrown upon, by Madison, 205;
authorizes loan in 1812, 209, 212;
damages Treasury by procrastination, 212;
supports Gallatin's policy of extinguishing debt, 215;
repeals internal revenue act, 221;
passes embargo, 225;
extends terms of credit on revenue bonds, 226;
refuses to recharter the bank, 231, 254;
declares war, imposes increased duties, 234;
reimposes internal taxes, 236;
adopts non-importation against England and France, 292;
orders out naval force, 294;
repeals embargo, 294.
Constable, John, at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Constellation, defeats La Vengeance, 160.
Constitution of Pennsylvania, convention called to revise, 40, 41;
its membership and ability, 42, 43.
Constitution of the United States, adopted, 35;
struggle over ratification in Pennsylvania, 35;
movement in favor of new convention to amend, 36-40;
amended, 40;
power of Representatives to appropriate, 109;
debate in Congress on relation of treaty power to House of
Representatives, 110-115;
argument of Washington on treaty power, 114, 115;
debate in House on relation of Executive to Congress, 142-147;
power of Senate to require treasury reports, 161;
in relation to state bills of credit, 257;
question of power of United States to acquire territory, 285;
in relation to National University, 291;
to annexation of Texas, 351.
Cook, Edward, presides over meeting of whiskey insurgents at Parkinson's
Ferry, 79;
indorses resolution to submit to terms of United States commissioners,
83.
Cooper, Dr. Samuel, interested in Gallatin through Madame Pictet, 17.
Couronne, ----, takes shares in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Crawford, William H., follows Gallatin's treasury policy, 215;
at Gallatin's suggestion, urges Emperor
again to mediate, 315;
complains of Adams's pugnacity, 339;
wishes Gallatin to stand for Vice-President, 341;
looked upon by Gallatin as strongest leader after the triumvirate,
355;
supported by Gallatin, Jefferson, and Madison against Adams, 356;
stricken with paralysis, 357;
nominated for President by caucus, 357;
defeated by Adams, 358.
Cuba, avowed intention of United States to prevent English seizure of,
by war if necessary, 346.
Cumberland Road, reported to Congress in 1807, 290.
Dallas, Alexander J., his career compared to that of Gallatin, 28, 58;
his parentage, 58;
secretary of state for Pennsylvania, 58;
friendship with Gallatin, 58;
excursion with Gallatin, 58, 59;
describes to Gallatin his experiences with militia in suppressing
Whiskey Rebellion, 92;
follows Gallatin's loan policy, 215;
regrets absence of internal taxes, 236;
proposes a national bank, 265;
resigns, 266.
Dallas, Mrs. A. J., on excursion with her husband and Gallatin, 58, 59.
Dallas, George M., accompanies Gallatin to Europe, 301;
sent to London, his instructions, 310;
informs Gallatin of English offer to treat directly, 311;
takes dispatch to Monroe, 318.
Davis, Garrett, letter of Gallatin to, on manifest destiny, 352.
Davis, Matthew L., quarrel between Jefferson and Burr over his
appointment, 282.
Dawson, John, on Sedition Law, 162.
Dayton, Jonathan, elected speaker of House by Democrats, 98;
anti-British in feeling, 104;
not influenced by connection with Burr, 104;
reëlected speaker, 132;
introduces resolution on Adams's message, 134;
joins Federalists after X Y Z affair, 149;
refuses to answer Gallatin, 153;
vote of thanks to, 158.
Debt, public, payment by public lands urged by Gallatin, 122;
its permanence condemned by Gallatin, 126;
controversy between Gallatin and Smith as to increase of, 126;
attempt of Continental Congress to investigate, 171;
attempts of Morris to secure its funding, 172, 173;
funded by Hamilton, 174, 175;
increased under Wolcott, 178;
creation of domestic loans, 178;
Gallatin's subdivision of, 184, 185;
its extinction Gallatin's main desire, 186, 188, 198, 203, 208;
stated by Gallatin in 1801-2, 191;
plan for its discharging, 191;
actual reduction of, 192;
increased through Louisiana purchase, 192, 193, 195;
new funds, 195, 196;
funding of debt in 1807, 198;
statement regarding, in 1808, 202;
its increase during war foreseen by Gallatin, 203;
reduction in 1812, 205;
loan of 1812, 209;
declines below par, 210;
revives, 211;
loan of twenty-one millions, 212;
increase in 1816, 215;
Gallatin's policy toward, continued by Dallas and Crawford, 215;
eventually extinguished, 215, 269, 271;
absence regretted by Woodbury, 271.
De Fersen, his correspondence proves guilt of Louis XVI., 57.
De Lolme, ----, school companion of Gallatin, 5.
Democratic party. See Republican party especially, 358-360.
De Neuville, Hyde, French minister, demands dismissal of insolent
postmaster, 333;
negotiates commercial convention with Adams, 340.
De Rham, ----, member of "The Club," 367.
Dexter, Samuel, succeeds Wolcott in Treasury Department, 177;
consents to hold over until appointment of successor, 181.
Diplomatic history, mission of Genet to United States, 57, 102;
Jay's treaty with England, 102, 103, 117;
Fauchet's dealings with Randolph, 103;
Wayne's treaty with Indians, 117;
Pinckney's treaty with Spain, 117;
expulsion of Pinckney from France, 132;
X Y Z affair and consequences, 149, 152, 153;
events leading up to war of 1812, 295;
offer of Russia to mediate, 299;
mission of Gallatin, Bayard, and Adams to Russia, 301, 303;
correspondence of Gallatin with Baring, 305-307, 309;
renewed offers by Russia, 308;
again refused by England, 311;
offer of England to treat directly, 311;
appointment of a new commission, 312;
place of negotiation, 314;
futile appeal of Lafayette to Emperor to mediate, 315, 316;
appointment of English commissioners, 316;
exorbitant English demands, 317;
suspension of negotiations, 318;
alteration of British tone, 319;
resumption of negotiations and refusal by Americans of English demands,
319;
further English demands for cession of territory refused, 321;
discussion over boundaries, fisheries, and Mississippi navigation, 322,
323;
these points abandoned, 323;
article against slave trade adopted, 323;
conclusion of treaty, 324;
part played by Gallatin, 324, 325;
commercial convention with England, 326, 327;
mission of Gallatin to France, 330-341;
negotiations over French captures under Berlin and Milan decrees, 332,
333;
over an impudent postmaster, 333;
negotiations with Holland, 334;
commercial convention with England, 334, 335;
negotiations with France over Apollon case, 338;
commercial convention with France, 340;
failure to settle American claims, 341;
Gallatin's mission to England, 343-347;
instructions, 343;
negotiations with Canning, 345, 346;
conclusion of convention with Goderich's ministry, 347;
Ashburton treaty negotiations, 349, 350.
Disunion, threatened in 1795, 116;
planned by New England in 1812, 213.
Duane, William, intimate with Jefferson, 286;
abuses Gallatin in "Aurora," 286, 297;
appointed adjutant-general by Madison, 299.
Duby, ----, takes shares in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Dumont, Etienne, college friend of Gallatin, his subsequent career, 5;
Gallatin's opinion of, 5;
invited by Gallatin to come to America, 26;
on shape of Gallatin's head, 389.
Du Ponceau, Peter Stephen, friend of Gallatin, his philological studies
upon Indians, 376, 377.
D'Yvernois, proposes to transport University of Geneva to United States,
291;
receives shares in Gallatin's land scheme, 362.
Edgar, James, on committee of whiskey insurgents to confer with United
States commissioners, 81;
supports Gallatin, 82;
presides over last meeting at Parkinson's Ferry, 89.
Elliott, ----, on controversy between Wolcott and Gallatin, as to
surplus, 190, 191.
Ellsworth, Oliver, on committee to consider Gallatin's eligibility to
Senate, 61.
Embargo, opposed by Gallatin, 201;
its effect stated by him, 201, 202;
adopted as answer to Orders in Council, 225;
its enforcement or abandonment urged by Gallatin, 228, 229, 230, 291;
enforced, 292;
repealed, 294.
Emlen, George, at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
England, anger against, at time of Jay treaty, 103;
renews provision order, 103;
danger of war with, 116, 118, 120;
hard pressed by France in 1797, 139;
its friendship more dangerous than France's enmity, 163;
adopts Orders in Council, 201, 225;
commercial policy toward United States, 224, 225, 295;
danger of war with, 224, 229;
Madison's preference for, 295;
events leading up to war with, 295, 296;
mistaken view of Gallatin concerning its diplomacy, 304;
unwilling to tolerate Russian mediation, 304, 306, 311;
its policy explained by Baring, 306, 307;
offers to treat directly, 311;
willing to push on war after fall of Napoleon, 313, 316;
hopes to divide United States, 313;
appoints commissioners, 316;
makes exorbitant demands, 317;
its policy modified by Castlereagh, 319;
demands cession of territory, 321;
loses interest in war, 322;
rejects article on impressment, 322;
negotiation of convention with, in 1815, 334, 335;
at Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle, 337;
mission of Gallatin to, 343-347;
complains of tone of American diplomacy, 344, 345;
negotiations with, 345, 346;
agrees to renew commercial convention, 347;
refuses to negotiate on impressment, 347;
makes Ashburton treaty, 349, 350.
Eppes, John W., letter of Gallatin to, on public lands, 239.
Erskine, D. M., his negotiations, 295.
Etsko, ----, Polish refugee, helped by Gallatin, 372.
Eustis, William, advised by Gallatin concerning treaty with Netherlands,
333, 334.
Ewbank, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Excise (see Whiskey Insurrection), recommended by Hamilton, 175.
Fauchet, his dealings with Randolph, 103;
condemned by Federalists, 134.
Fayette County, settlement of Gallatin, 22, 26, 27;
life in, 28, 43, 67;
elects Gallatin to legislature, 44;
in Whiskey Insurrection, 49, 51, 52, 68, 78, 85, 96;
reëlects Gallatin, 93, 95;
visited by Lafayette, 365.
Fazzi, ----, takes share in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Federalist party, its origin, 57;
prejudiced against Gallatin by his resolution demanding information from
Hamilton, 64, 65;
opposes his election to Congress, 95;
reconstructs cabinet, 97, 98;
its leaders in House, 98, 99;
attitude toward France and England, 100, 101;
charged with being bribed by England, 103;
in debate on appropriating power, 108, 109;
in debate on treaty power, 111-115;
defends Jay treaty, 118;
strengthened in fourth Congress, 128;
retains nominal majority in fifth Congress, 133;
in debate on French relations, 134-136;
in debate on checks on executive, 143-147;
strengthened by X Y Z affair, 149;
commits mistakes, 151, 152; its badge, 153;
controls sixth Congress, 158;
refuses to repeal Sedition Law, 159;
defeated in 1800, 163;
forced to choose between Burr and Jefferson, 164;
bargain with Jefferson, 164;
its possible plans for defeating any choice, 165;
and for nominating a president pro tempore, 165;
allows Jefferson's election, 166, 167;
its share in building country, 169;
breach in, 177;
enjoys Republican inconsistency, 237;
monopolizes offices, 280;
extinguished by battle of New Orleans, 358.
Few, William, connected by marriage with Gallatin, 59.
Finances, efforts of Gallatin to secure minute supervision of by
Congress, 64, 106, 107;
efforts to establish permanent appropriations, 107;
appropriations, power of Congress over, 108, 109;
their necessity to successful government, 170;
finances of the Revolution under Morris, 170-174;
under treasury board, 173, 174;
under Hamilton, 174-176;
under Wolcott, 176-178;
under Gallatin, 186-215;
sketch of, by Gallatin, 184;
"View of," by Gallatin, 185;
preliminary sketch on Gallatin's assuming office, 186;
estimate of sources of wealth, 187;
estimate for 1801, 190;
denial of a surplus, 190, 191;
plan for discharging debt, 191, 192;
its execution, 192, 194;
report for 1803 on reduction of debt, 195;
Louisiana purchase, 193, 195;
place of payment of principal and interest, 195, 196;
addition to sinking fund, 196;
report for first four years, 197;
estimates of revenue for Jefferson's second term, 198;
conversion of debt, 198;
full treasury in 1807, 198;
Gallatin's consideration of military value of surplus, 199;
on war revenue, 200, 201;
effect of embargo, 201;
sources of revenue, 204;
deficiency in 1809, 204;
report of 1811, 205;
demand of Gallatin for internal revenue, 206;
war estimates, 206-209;
including "treasury notes," 207, 210;
loan of 1812, 209;
estimates for 1812, 210;
report for 1812, 211;
success of loan, 210, 211;
report of loan of twenty-one millions, 212;
stock not taken by New England and Southern States, 213;
saved by Parish, Girard, and Astor, 213, 214;
review of Gallatin's influence, 215-216;
table of revenue and expenditure, 217;
revenue established by Hamilton, 217;
its character, 218;
and amount, 219;
permanent estimate of, 220;
internal revenue retained by Gallatin, 220;
his proposed expenditures, 220;
repeal of internal revenue, 221;
increased income, 221;
establishment of Mediterranean fund, 222;
income during Jefferson's first term, 223;
increased estimates of Gallatin, 223;
internal improvements planned, 224;
doubling of duties recommended as a war measure, 225;
effect of embargo on revenue, 225, 227;
review of revenue during Jefferson's administrations, 226, 227;
surplus in 1808, 226;
internal improvements advocated by Jefferson, 226, 227;
estimates of receipts for 1809, 228;
report of Gallatin to Congress on need for new revenues, 229;
vagueness of Madison concerning, 229, 230;
report for 1809, 230;
refusal of Congress to re-charter bank, 231;
report for 1810, 231;
report of Gallatin in January, 1812, 232;
proposal to impose internal taxes, 234;
increased war duties, 234;
war budget for 1813, 235;
internal taxes, their history, 235;
reimposed by Congress, 236;
receipts from, 237;
public lands, receipts from, 238, 239;
administration of Treasury under
Gallatin, 244-246;
history of Bank of North America, 248-250;
of Bank of United States, 250-255;
panic of 1815, 262-264;
second United States Bank, 265-268;
resumption of specie payment, 267;
report of Gallatin on ratio of gold and silver, 268;
"Considerations on Currency and Banking," 268;
diminution of debt in 1832, 269;
removal of deposits from Bank of United States, 269, 270;
extinction of debt by Woodbury, 270, 271;
distribution of surplus among States, 271;
inflation in 1836, 272;
panic of 1837, 272, 273.
Findley, James, in Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention, 43;
represents Fayette County in legislature, 44.
Findley, William, describes Whiskey Insurrection, 71;
at Parkinson's Ferry meeting, 78;
describes Gallatin's speech, 83;
on threats of secession, 86;
takes resolutions to Washington urging him to stop march of troops,
89;
describes seizure of prisoners, 90.
Fish, Preserved, at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Fisheries, discussed in treaty of Ghent, 322, 323;
unfavorable settlement of question in 1818, 335.
Florida, question of its annexation, 285.
Forsyth, John, asks Gallatin's advice as to Smithson's bequest, 378.
Fox, C. J., his precocity compared to Gallatin's, 32.
France, sympathy of Republicans for, 116;
sends tricolor to Congress, 130;
its policy in Revolution, 131;
situation in 1796, 131;
endeavors to get aid of United States, 131;
determines to coerce it, 132;
refuses to receive Pinckney, 132;
policy of Adams toward, 137;
success in 1797, 139;
danger of war with, in 1798, 147;
question of war with, debated in Congress, 148-151;
non-intercourse with, 151, 159, 160;
adopts conciliatory measures, 160;
commercial convention with, 162;
adopts Milan decree, 229;
mission of Gallatin to, 331-341;
refuses to pay for seizures under Berlin and Milan decrees, 333;
urges peace with Spain, 336;
offers to mediate with United States between Spain and her colonies,
336;
conduct at Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle, 337;
Apollon case, 338;
commercial convention with, 340;
fails to settle claims, 340, 341;
Revolution of 1830 in, 370, 371, 372.
Franklin, Benjamin, gives Gallatin letter to Richard Bache, 11;
compared to Gallatin, 389.
Frederick, Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, friend of Madame Voltaire, 7;
sends her a portrait, 7;
sells troops to England in American war, 8;
called a tyrant by Gallatin, 8.
Free trade, advocated by Gallatin, 240;
becomes a party question in 1832, 240;
convention in favor of, 241;
Gallatin's memorial in behalf of, 241, 242;
subsequent history of, 242, 243.
French Revolution, premonitions of, in Europe, 6;
Gallatin's opinion of, in 1794, 56, 57;
its reaction on America, 57, 100;
attitude of parties toward, 101, 102;
its effect described by Gallatin, 327, 328.
Gallatin, Abraham, grandfather of Albert, 2;
lives at Pregny, 7;
friend of Voltaire, 7.
Gallatin, Albert, his place in United States history, 1;
birth and ancestry, 2;
adopted by Mlle. Pictet, 2;
his schooling and home training, 2, 3;
benefits from cosmopolitan society of Geneva, 4;
academic friendships, 4, 5;
restless, although not ambitious, 5;
discontented with political conditions, 6;
visits Voltaire, 7, 8;
refuses offer of commission in Hessian service, 8;
quarrels with grandmother, 8;
plans to find freedom in America, 9, 10;
leaves Geneva secretly, 9;
plans to rise by land speculation and commerce, 10;
at Nantes receives letters from family, 10, 11;
relations with guardian, 11;
invests money in tea, 12;
voyage to Boston, 12;
finds difficulty in selling tea, 12;
finds Boston bigoted and unfriendly, 13;
his walk to Blue Hill, 13;
encounter with inquisitive landlord, 13, 14;
persuaded by Madame De Lesdernier, makes trading voyage to Machias,
14;
frontier life there, 15, 16;
commands earthwork at Passamaquoddy, 16;
meets La Pérouse, 16;
returns to Boston and teaches French, 17;
recommended by Mlle. Pictet to Dr. Cooper, 17;
teaches French successfully in Harvard College, 17, 18;
glad to leave Boston at conclusion of war, 18;
visits New York, 18;
meets Savary, 19;
dissolves partnership with Serre, 19;
meets Pelatiah Webster at Philadelphia, 19;
accompanies Savary to Richmond, 19;
decides definitely not to return to Geneva, 20;
joins Savary in land speculations in West Virginia, 20, 21;
his aversion to debt, 21;
returns to Philadelphia and leads exploring party down Ohio, 21;
at George's Creek builds log-house and opens store, 22;
encounters Washington, 22;
declines Washington's offer to become land agent, 23;
enjoys a winter in Richmond society, 23;
his gratitude for hospitality and kindness, 24;
commissioned by Henry, locates lands in Western Virginia, 24;
interrupted by Indian troubles, 24;
takes oath of allegiance to Virginia, 25;
invites Badollet to join him from Geneva, 25, 26;
purchases Friendship Hill, 26;
rumor of his death causes inquiries from Geneva, 27;
attains majority and calls for property, 28;
difficulties of his life on frontier, 28;
not to be blamed for his choice of location, 28, 29;
offered place in office by Marshall, 29;
advised by Patrick Henry to begin in West, 29;
visits Richmond and Philadelphia, 29;
journey to Maine, 29, 30;
kindness towards Lesdernier, 30;
marries Sophie Allègre, her sudden death, 30;
disheartened, wishes to abandon Western lands, 30, 31;
his maturity in political thought, 32;
early an advocate of democracy, 32, 33;
probably dislikes the Federal Constitution, 34, 36;
an opponent of centralization, 34;
influences arguments of Smilie in Pennsylvania ratifying convention,
36;
represents Fayette County at convention of anti-Federalists, 37;
friendship with Smilie, 38;
drafts resolutions providing for vigorous organization against
Constitution, 38, 39.
_In Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention._
Elected a delegate from Fayette County, 40;
his opposition to alteration of form of government, 41;
advocates enlarged popular representation, manhood suffrage, easy
naturalization, 42;
takes minor part in convention, his high opinion of its ability, 42,
43;
after convention, falls into melancholy, 43;
wishes to leave America, 43;
reproached by Genevese friends with indolence, 43, 44.
_In Pennsylvania Legislature._
Elected to represent Fayette County, 44;
describes his legislative career, 45-47;
his influence and activity, 45;
advocates improved education, 45;
supports turnpike, 45;
gains reputation by report of Ways and Means Committee, 46;
advocates redemption of paper money and financial reform, 46;
reports a resolution for abolition of slavery, 47;
at first dislikes Philadelphia, later prefers it to New York for
democracy, 47, 48;
drafts resolutions condemning Hamilton's excise bill, 48;
takes part in public meeting in Washington County against the bill, 50;
secretary of convention of western counties at Pittsburgh, 52;
signs resolutions advocating resistance, 53;
draws petition to Congress, 53;
returns to Philadelphia to find cause damaged by action of counties,
54;
advises evasion of federal writs to arrest, 55;
in legislature proposes a township veto on taxation and popular
education, 55;
wishes to visit Geneva in 1793, 56, 57;
views on French Revolution, 56, 57;
elected senator in spite of insufficient residence, 58;
acquaintance with Dallas, 58;
on journey with him, meets Hannah Nicholson, 59;
marriage, 59;
his family connections by marriage, 59;
later business connections with brother-in-law, J. W. Nicholson, 60;
takes seat as United States senator, 60;
his election protested on ground of insufficient residence, 60, 61;
complains of membership of committee to consider case, 61;
his exact status, 62;
submits statement of facts to Senate, 62;
is declared disqualified by narrow majority, 62, 63;
his dignified conduct of case, 63;
pending the decision, introduces resolution calling upon Hamilton to
make a minutely itemized report, 64;
probably causes his own expulsion by thus irritating Federalists, 64,
65;
later obliged to answer a similar demand from Federalists, 65;
not cast down by exclusion, 65;
gains increased popularity in Pennsylvania, 65, 66.
_In Whiskey Insurrection._
Takes wife to Fayette County, 67;
at outbreak of violence advises distillers to submit to law, 69;
his estimate of numbers of insurgents in arms, 73;
remains at first aloof from excitement, 75;
determines to take control of movement, 75, 76;
alarmed at probable excesses of mob and danger of repression, 76;
delegate to convention at Parkinson's Ferry, 78;
confers with Marshall, 78;
chosen secretary, 79;
opposes resolution to resist by force, and moves reference of
resolutions to a committee, 80;
succeeds in modifying resolutions not to obey excise and trial laws,
80;
on committee on resolutions, 80;
on committee to confer with government commissioners, 81;
points out folly of resistance, 81;
counsels submission, 81;
his eloquent speech, 82, 83;
prevents anarchy, 82;
charged by J. C. Hamilton with cowardice, 84;
his real courage, 84;
hastens submission of Fayette County, 85;
secures adoption of declaration defending county's action, 85;
secretary of meeting at Parkinson's Ferry, which makes complete
submission, 89;
considered by Federalists to be chief instigator of the insurrection,
90;
describes conversation with Dallas, 92;
again chosen to legislature and also to Congress, 93;
his election to Assembly contested and declared void, 93, 94;
in his speech during debate admits error of his course, 94;
urges Badollet to secure reëlection of all Western assemblymen, 95;
re-elected to legislature, 95;
witness before grand jury in trial of prisoners, 96;
draws petition to Washington for pardon of offenders, 96;
his loyalty to constituents, 96.
_Member of Congress._
Moves appointment of committee on finance to control Treasury, 106;
appointed upon it, 106;
wishes to put appropriations on permanent footing, 107, 108;
refuses to devote military funds to establishing Indian trading posts,
108;
opposes habit of appropriating without debate, even to objects already
approved, 109;
supports resolutions calling for papers in Jay treaty, 110;
upholds power of House of Representatives, 111, 112;
denies that treaties override discretion of House, 112, 113;
appointed to carry call to Washington, 114;
claims right of House to participate in treaties, 114;
stands beside Madison as leader of debate, 115;
insists on separate consideration of treaties, 118;
objects to Federalists' threats of war with England, 118, 119;
complains of abandonment of "free ships" principle in Jay's treaty,
119;
low opinion of Indians, 122;
urges resistance to impressment, 122;
suggests plan for advantageous sale of public lands, 122;
and their use to pay debt, 122;
views on taxation, 123;
opposes military establishment and navy, 123, 124;
laments necessity of payment to United States Bank, 124;
attacked for participation in Whiskey Insurrection, 124;
makes no reply, 125;
criticises conduct of Treasury Department, 125;
opposes principle of a national debt, 125;
asserts a great increase in public debt, 126;
defends assertion against W. Smith, 126;
objects to adjournment to pay respects to Washington on birthday, 126;
recognized as leader of opposition by Federalists, 127;
does not expect or desire renomination, 127;
reëlected to Congress, 127;
becomes leader of Republicans in House, 128;
wishes House to compliment Washington personally on his retirement,
but not his administration, 129;
describes Andrew Jackson's appearance, 129 n.;
insists on payment of indebtedness of States to government, 129;
chairman of conference committee, 129;
opposes army and navy expenditure, 129, 130;
secures passage of bill confining treasury expenditures, 130;
in sympathy and confidence of Jefferson, 133;
deprecates debating foreign relations, 134;
wishes to treat France like other nations, 134;
opposes threatening France, 135;
joins moderate Republicans in voting with Federalists for address to
President, 136;
opposes appropriation for defense, 137;
objects to employment of frigates, 137;
favors defense of ports and harbors only, 137;
opposes salt duty, 137;
and excessive loans, 137;
points out method of impeachment in Blount case, 138;
describes his desire for moderation, 138;
calls Federalists aristocrats, 139;
votes against presenting answer to message in person, 140;
now acknowledged leader of Republicans, 140;
presents anti-slavery petitions from Pennsylvania, 140;
his opinion of use of foreign coins, 140;
estimate of specie in United States, 141;
opposes proposal to expel Lyon, 141;
on executive power of appointment, 142;
wishes to abandon foreign political intercourse, 143;
upholds power of House to check executive through appropriations, 143;
makes elaborate speech on checks of legislature on executive, 144-146;
and on necessity of abstention from European politics, 145;
practical drawbacks to his theory, 147;
his speech circulated by party, 147;
opposes war measures against France, 148;
supports call for papers of envoys to France, 148;
presents petition against authorizing private citizens to arm vessels,
149;
opposes bill to authorize President to arm convoys, 149;
prefers submission to French outrages rather than war, 150, 151;
attacked by Allen of Connecticut, his reply, 150, 151;
opposes non-intercourse with France, 151;
declares Sedition Bill unconstitutional, 152;
high words with Harper over Alien Bill, 152;
taunted by Harper, 152;
opposes declaration of state of relations by Congress, 153;
votes against abrogating treaty with France, 154;
continues to harass Wolcott in the Treasury, 154;
his even temper, 154;
opposes bill to punish correspondence with foreign princes, 155, 156;
opposes bill to incite French West Indies to revolt, 156, 157;
opposes authorization of President to suspend commerce in certain
cases, 157;
opposes building ships of the line, 157;
tries to defeat or ameliorate Alien and Sedition Laws, 157, 158;
aided in sixth Congress by Nicholas and Macon, 159;
votes with Federalists to suspend commercial intercourse with France,
159;
opposes proposal to amend Foreign Intercourse Act, 160, 161;
opposes bill requiring report from secretary of treasury, because
originating in Senate, 161;
opposes continuance of non-intercourse, 162;
his position in presidential contest in 1800, 164;
irritated by influence of S. Smith over Jefferson and Madison, 164;
reasons that attempt of Federalists to defeat an election by the House
is constitutional, 164, 165;
but any president pro tempore would be unconstitutional, 165;
suggests course of action for Republicans, 165;
probably expects to use violence against Federalists, 166;
review of his congressional career, 167;
leader of party, yet not a partisan, 167, 168;
one of Republican triumvirate, 168;
his departure leaves party without a legislative leader, 168.
_Secretary of the Treasury: Funding._
His place as financier in United States history, 170;
Jefferson's choice for secretary of treasury, 178, 179;
hated by Federalists in Senate, 178;
assigned to Treasury by public opinion, 179;
doubts his abilities and chances of confirmation by Senate, 180;
plans to move to New York, 180;
refuses to accept until confirmed by Senate, 181;
finally agrees to serve, 181;
brings family to Washington and enters on duties, 181, 182;
his thoroughness, 182;
exhausts himself by his energy, 182;
sketch of his financial career in Pennsylvania and in Congress, 183,
184;
his one principle the extinguishment of debt, 184;
publishes sketch of the finances in 1796, 184;
publishes in July, 1800, "Views of Public Debt," etc., 184, 185;
ability of these essays, 185;
outlines policy of expenditures and receipts to Jefferson, 186;
endeavors to systematize treasury statements, 186;
points out economic reasons for increase of revenue, 187;
urges specific appropriations by Congress and absence of departmental
discretion, 187;
urges reduction, both of debt and of taxes, 188;
unable to work with other departments because of Jefferson's habits,
188;
lack of elasticity in his plans, 189;
embarrassed by complications in department, 189;
his first report to Congress, 190;
denies existence of any surplus, 190;
explains plan for extinction of debt by 1817, 191;
given authority by Congress, 192;
table showing success of his measures, 192;
in spite of Louisiana purchase, reduces debt by one third, 192, 194;
dissatisfied with financial terms of Louisiana purchase, 193;
novelty of his distinction between place of payment of interest and
principal, 195;
arranges that Louisiana debt shall not retard payment of old debt, 196,
197;
his report of 1805, 107;
proposes funding of outstanding obligations in 1807, 198;
reports a full Treasury on occasion of threatened war with England,
198;
discusses application of surplus to war expenses, 199;
suggests methods of war taxation, 200;
prefers war to embargo, 201;
draws the embargo bill, 201;
discusses its financial effect, 201, 202;
confident attitude as to war loans, 202;
his policy supported by Jefferson, 203;
realizes that war will prevent reduction of debt, 203, 204;
relies on customs, tonnage dues, and land sales for revenue, 204;
reports deficiency owing to embargo, 204;
forced to borrow, 204;
reviews situation in 1811 with satisfaction, 205, 206;
asks for increase of revenue in case of war, 206;
proposes war loans, 207;
and interest-bearing treasury notes, 207;
insists on actual increased receipts, not apparent measures, 207, 208;
on necessity of upholding credit, 209;
receives authority from Congress, 209;
submits war budget, 209, 210;
his last annual statement in 1812, 211;
reports need of new loans, 212;
his personal friends, Parish, Girard, and Astor, save government credit,
213, 214;
fails to negotiate loan at par, 214;
failure of his hopes to extinguish debt, 215;
his policy vindicated by successors, 215;
charged with sacrificing defenses of country to reduction of debt, 216;
attempted defense of his course by "Democratic Review," 216;
his determination to follow financial principles and not a partisan
course, 216, 218;
does not invent new sources of revenue, 218;
his estimates follow those of Hamilton, 219;
estimates permanent revenue, 220;
unable to abandon internal revenue, 220;
does not protest against its abolition by Congress, 221;
does not alter estimates in spite of increase of revenue, 221;
proposes additional tax to meet war with Tripoli, 222;
applies surplus as far as possible to Louisiana purchase, 222;
political effect of his success during Jefferson's first term, 223;
in 1805 raises estimate of permanent revenue, 223;
impresses economy upon other departments, 223;
prepares scheme of internal improvements, 224;
after Chesapeake affair recommends borrowing, 224;
and doubling duties in case of war, 225;
receipts during his second term, 226;
his warning of diminished resources in future ignored by Jefferson,
226;
estimates for 1809, 228;
points out necessity of submitting to war or loss of foreign trade,
228, 229;
promises not to use internal taxes, 229;
reports diminished income and deficiency in 1809, 230;
declares for a strict enforcement or abandonment of embargo, 230;
disgusted at refusal of Congress to recharter United States Bank, 231;
tenders resignation to Madison, 231;
obliged to remain for lack of possible successor, 231;
continues to advocate increased customs, 232;
points out that, had his recommendations been followed in 1809, there
would have been a large surplus, 232, 233;
forces Congress to choose between a bank or internal taxes, 233, 234;
himself proposes internal taxes, 234;
his last report predicts deficiency and asks a loan, 235;
his recommendations of internal taxes disregarded, 235;
his previous use of Hamilton's internal taxes, 235;
his suggestions followed in 1813, 236;
connection with sale of public lands, 238;
unable fully to utilize this resource, 239;
earliest public advocate of free trade, 240;
later in career becomes leader of cause, 241;
his part in convention of 1831, 241;
draws memorial to Congress, 242;
his views followed in tariff of 1846, 242;
opposed to protection, 242;
violently attacked by Clay, who apologizes, 242;
introduces reforms in annual report, 245;
tries to induce Congress and departments to adopt scheme of minute
appropriations, 245, 246;
carries system into his own household, 246;
effects of his methods, 247;
on Jefferson's dislike of banks, 251;
his report of 1809 on Hamilton's bank, 252, 253;
suggests its renewal, with modifications, 253, 254;
his testimony as to its value, 255, 256;
estimate as to state banks in 1811, 258;
describes hostility of Astor to bank, 259;
left, by failure to renew bank charter, at mercy of capitalists, 260;
his opinion that absence of bank caused suspension of specie payments
in 1815, 262;
on Jefferson's proposal to issue paper money, 264;
his success a vindication of Federalist finance, 266;
opinion of services of second national bank, 266;
declines offer of secretaryship in 1816, 266, 267;
urges Madison to restore specie payment, 267;
declines position as president of Bank of United States in 1822, 268;
prepares statement of relative value of gold and silver, 268;
writes "Considerations on Currency and Banking," 268;
advocates use of specie and limited use of paper money, 268;
accepts presidency of National Bank of New York, 269;
his opinion of Jackson, 270;
his bank involved in panic of 1837, 272;
conducts resumption, 273;
chairman of committee of banks, 273;
submits reports, 275;
declines presidency of Bank of Commerce, 276;
resigns presidency of National Bank, 277;
publishes "Suggestions on Banks and Currency," 277;
condemns paper money, 277;
declines offer of Treasury Department from Tyler, 278;
in the cabinet, agrees with Republican leaders on all points except
bank, 279, 280;
prepares circular announcing disregard of party in appointments, 281;
and condemning political influence of officials, 281;
his policy opposed by Jefferson, 282;
obliged to follow cabinet in policy of partisan appointments, 282;
advises early preparation for campaign of 1804, 283;
wishes States divided into election districts, 283;
criticises annual messages of Jefferson, 283;
his proposal to appoint a woman to office condemned by Jefferson, 283;
suggests in vain regular cabinet consultations, 283, 284;
urges payment of tribute to Tripoli rather than war, 284;
opinion asked on points of constitutional law, 284;
holds inherent right of United States to acquire territory, 285;
disapproves of Texas annexation, 285;
advises Jefferson concerning Louisiana treaty, 285, 286;
attacked by Duane, for not turning out Federalists, 286;
absence of favoritism in his appointments, 286, 287;
supervises sale of lands, 287;
acquaintance with Chôteau, 278;
drafts promise of protection for Astor's fur trade, 288;
opposes vainly Jefferson's gunboat scheme, 289;
submits plan of defense against England, 289;
urges moderate tone in message, 290;
devises scheme of internal improvements, 290;
doubts success of a National University, 291;
opposes a permanent embargo, 291;
prepares Campbell's report urging resistance, 292;
receives authority from Congress to enforce non-intercourse, 293;
favors war, 293;
submits "Notes on Political Situation," 294;
opposes ordering out naval force in favor of letters of marque, 294;
his appointment as secretary of state prevented by Republican
opponents in Senate, 294, 295;
continues to advise Madison, 295;
his measures meet opposition in Senate, 295;
deserted by Madison in his attempt to secure re-chartering of bank,
296;
tenders resignation, 296;
bitterly attacked in "Aurora," 297;
accused of dominating Madison and of corruption, 297, 298;
considered by Jefferson ablest man in administration except Madison,
298;
unable to command support in Congress, submits to war policy, 298,
299;
asks leave of absence and appointment as minister to Russia, 299;
attempts made to alienate him from Jefferson and Madison, 299;
his high regard for Jefferson, 300;
continued good terms with Madison, 300.
_Minister to Russia; Treaty of Ghent._
His voyage with Bayard, 301;
visits Gottenburg and Copenhagen, 301;
at St. Petersburg meets J. Q. Adams, 302;
his knowledge of history, 302;
lack of diplomatic experience as compared with Adams, 302;
contrast in character with Adams, 303;
considers peace necessary because of inefficiency in conduct of war,
303;
abandons his former opposition to a navy, 303;
low opinion of English diplomacy, 304;
view of necessity of an English renunciation of impressment, 305;
writes to Barings, 305;
receives Baring's reply, 306, 307;
explains case to Romanzoff, 307;
assured by Moreau of imperial sympathy, 308;
warned by him of England's purposes, 308;
writes to Monroe asking instructions, 308, 309;
informs Baring of inability to negotiate except through Russia, 309;
writes to Moreau, 309, 310;
instructs Dallas as to duties in London, 310;
receives news of refusal of Senate to confirm his nomination, 310;
contemplates visit to London, 311;
hears that British government proposes to treat directly, 311;
unable to return home, 312;
journey to Amsterdam, 312;
not at first included in second commission, but later added, 312;
visits London, 313;
learns of arrival of Clay and Russell, 313;
urges Lafayette to mediate, 313;
wishes to change place of negotiation from Gottenburg, 314;
urges Crawford to secure interposition of emperor, 315;
receives letter from Lafayette through Humboldt, promising aid, 315;
makes official appeal to emperor, 315;
learns of refusal of England to admit intervention, 316;
warns Monroe of English preparations, 316;
visits Paris, 316;
meets British commissioners at Ghent, 316;
notifies Monroe of determination of England to dismember United States
and attack New Orleans, 317, 318;
despairs of peace, 318;
draws reply of commissioners rejecting British demands, 319;
explains reasons for willingness to discuss Indian article, 319, 320;
condemns burning of public buildings at Washington, 320;
expresses confidence in American securities, 320;
has difficulty in mediating between Clay and Adams on fisheries and
Mississippi navigation, 322, 323;
proposes engagement to abandon use of savages in future war, 323;
the credit of treaty due to him, 324;
his diplomatic skill, 324;
wins European admiration, 325;
visits Geneva, 325, 326;
sees Napoleon during Hundred Days, 326;
appointed minister to France, 326;
with Clay and Adams negotiates commercial convention, 326, 327;
friendly attitude of Castlereagh toward, 326;
on value of abolition of discriminating duties, 327;
returns to New York, 327;
withholds acceptance of French mission, 327;
describes to Jefferson European opinion of United States, 327;
describes condition of France after Revolution, 327, 328;
does not consider republican form of government suitable everywhere,
328;
weary of politics, declines nomination to Congress, 329;
declines French mission on ground of poverty, 329;
finally yields to Monroe's requests, 329;
refuses offer of Treasury Department, his reasons, 330;
rejoicings of Jefferson over his appointment, 331.
_Minister to France._
Received by Richelieu, 331;
discusses American sympathy for Bonaparte, 331, 332;
received by Louis XVIII., 332;
familiar relations with royal family, 332;
negotiates for indemnity for seizures, 332;
annoyed by French demand for dismissal of a disrespectful American
postmaster, 333;
advises Adams and Eustis in negotiations, 333;
returns to Paris, 334;
with Rush conducts negotiations with England, 334, 335;
tries to explain Jackson's occupation of Pensacola, 336;
refuses to mediate with France between Spain and revolted colonies,
336;
points out disadvantages of war with Spain, 337;
succeeds in pacifying French indignation at seizure of Apollon, 338;
does not adopt Adams's line of defense, 338;
Adams's opinion of, in diary, 338, 339;
his opinion of Adams, 329;
continues to negotiate with regard to commerce, 340;
loath to return without success, 340;
criticises Adams's terms of French treaty as unfavorable, but advises
signing, 340;
fails to secure satisfaction and returns to America, 341;
settles at Friendship Hill, 341;
pressed by Monroe to return to France, 341, 342;
declines mission to Panama Congress, 342.
_Minister to England._
Appointed envoy and minister, with liberty to return on completion of
negotiations, 342, 343;
secures modification of instructions, 343;
complains of peremptory character of instructions, 344;
his voyage, 344;
dislike of English and French diplomacy, 344;
learns of English resentment at tone of American ministers, 344, 345;
negotiates with Canning, 345;
asks for instructions as to renewal of convention of 1815, 345;
pleased with ability of Lawrence as _chargé d'affaires_, 346;
his threat of war quoted by Chateaubriand, 346;
warned by Adams to yield nothing, 346;
concludes negotiation with Goderich, 347;
thinks Canning meant to discuss impressment, 247;
returns to America, congratulated by Adams, 348;
his social life in London, 348;
ready to accept French mission in 1834, 349;
prepares argument in Northeastern boundary arbitration, 349;
publishes an account of facts in the case, 349;
visited by Ashburton, 350;
publishes pamphlet on Oregon question, 351;
presides at meeting to protest against annexation of Texas, 351;
condemns Mexican war, 352;
publishes pamphlet concerning it, 352;
condemns "manifest destiny" talk, 352, 353.
_Republican Leader._
His opinion of contemporary political leaders, 355, 356;
prefers Crawford to Adams, 356;
requests Macon to take
part in caucus for Crawford, 356;
thinks universal suffrage compensates for dangers of consolidation, 356;
accepts reluctantly nomination for vice-president, 357;
dislikes formality of nomination, 357;
withdraws to help ticket, 358;
considers the election to prove decease of Republican party, 359;
condemns Jackson's violations of law, 359;
favors an insignificant or weak executive, 359;
visits Washington in 1829, notes disappearance of old régime, 330.
_Society, Literature, Science._
His land speculations not profitable, 351;
plans Genevese Colonization Association, 361;
loses money through Morris's failure, 362;
speculates in Virginia military lands, 362;
estimates value of estates, 362, 363;
ill at ease in general society, 363;
his establishment at Washington described by Irving, 363;
house burned by British, 364;
builds at Friendship Hill, finds it lonely in winter, 364;
visited by Lafayette in 1825, 364, 365;
settles permanently in New York, 365;
frequent changes of residence, 365;
devotes last years to scientific studies, 366;
conversational ability, 366;
chosen member of "The Club," 366, 367;
leads conversation, 367;
described by Irving, 368;
wishes to establish free university in New York, 368;
presides over council of New York University, 369;
resigns, owing to clerical opposition, 370;
continued interest in French politics, 370;
letter of Lafayette to, on marriage of his daughter, 371;
assists Polish refugees, 372;
interested in Indian customs, 373, 374;
writes for Humboldt a synopsis of Indian tribes, 374;
publishes Indian vocabularies, 375;
issues circulars inviting information, 375;
correspondence with individuals, 375, 376;
republishes Synopsis, 377;
scientific character of his results, 377, 378;
his advice requested concerning Smithson's bequest, 378;
its publications submitted to him, 378, 379;
founds American Ethnological Society, 379;
defrays cost of publishing its transactions, 379;
essay on nations of Mexico and Central America, 380;
authorizes General Scott to purchase documents in Mexico, 380;
writes introduction to Hale's "Indians of Northwest America," 380;
gathers information regarding gold in America for Humboldt, 381;
describes his reasons for success, 381;
his caution in reasoning, 382;
fails to establish a literary periodical, 382;
chosen president of New York Historical Society, 382;
his inaugural address on course of United States History, 382-384;
opinion of Washington, 383, 384;
friendly greeting to Adams in 1844, 384;
eulogized by Adams, 384, 385;
his party career contrasted with that of Adams, 385;
personal appearance and portraits, 385, 386;
crushed by loss of wife, 387;
death, 387;
eulogized by Bradish before Historical Society, 388;
acknowledges indebtedness to Bentham, 388;
his brain, 389;
summary of character and services, 389.
_Characteristics._
General estimates, 1, 388, 389;
unfriendly views of, 90, 297, 338;
his own estimate, 381;
ambition, 5, 10, 58, 127, 180, 328;
business ability, 28, 60, 361, 362;
cosmopolitanism, 7, 389;
courage, 75, 76, 84;
debt, aversion to, 21;
diplomatic ability, 303, 324, 325, 330, 345;
financial ability, 45, 179, 185, 215;
friendliness, 24, 30, 300, 372;
geography, love of, 16;
history, love of, 3, 302;
indolence, 43;
leadership, 128, 133, 159, 167, 357;
literary interest, 382;
maturity, early, 31;
partisanship, 140, 147, 167;
personal appearance, 385, 386, 389;
political shrewdness, 76, 95, 128, 357;
social habits, 44, 348, 363, 367, 368;
temper, evenness of, 65, 152, 154, 303, 324;
thoroughness, 182, 381.
_Political Opinions._
Alien Bill, 152, 158;
appointments to office, 281, 282, 286, 359;
army, 108, 123, 129, 180, 303;
Bank of United States, 231, 252-256, 262, 266, 296;
banking, 256, 268, 273, 277;
cabinet, 188, 222, 245, 283;
coinage, 140, 268;
Congress, powers of, 109, 110, 112, 143, 144, 153, 161;
constitution of Pennsylvania, 41, 42;
debt, public, 45, 125, 126, 191, 203, 205, 208, 222, 269;
democracy, 6, 8, 10, 33, 34, 42, 48, 55, 126, 389;
education, 45, 291, 368-370;
election of 1800, 164-166;
embargo, 201, 206, 230, 291;
England, diplomacy of, 304, 344;
England, policy toward, 228, 292, 310, 327, 337, 343-347;
ethnology, 373-381;
excise, 53, 80; executive, 144-146, 359;
Federalist party, 119, 129, 139, 140, 164, 179;
financial measures of Hamilton, 184, 185;
foreign correspondence bill, 155;
foreign ministers, 142, 143, 145, 147;
France, diplomacy of, 304, 344;
France, policy toward, 134, 135, 148, 149, 157, 159, 167, 310, 332,
333, 338, 340;
free trade, 240-243;
French Revolution, 56, 76, 139, 328;
gunboat scheme, 289;
impeachment, 138;
Indians, 108, 122, 320, 323, 373-381;
internal improvements, 45, 224, 290;
Jacksonian democracy, 359;
Jay treaty, 119, 136;
manifest destiny, 352;
Mexican war, 352;
military matters, 137, 289;
money, relation to wealth, 260;
navy, 123, 124, 130, 137, 186, 303;
northeastern boundary, 347-349;
northwest boundary, 343, 347, 351;
panic of 1815, 262;
paper money, 46, 207, 264, 267, 268;
party management, 38, 41, 95, 128, 164, 359;
peace, 149, 150, 167, 284;
public lands, 46, 122, 238, 239;
Republican party, 355, 359;
revenue, internal, 221, 233, 234;
revenue, sources of, 187, 223, 232;
Sedition Act, 152, 158, 159;
slavery, 47, 140;
Spain, policy toward, 336, 337;
suffrage, 42;
surplus, use of, 206, 216;
taxation, 123, 199, 200;
Texas annexation, 351;
territory, constitutional power to acquire, 285;
Treasury, administration of, 64, 106-108, 125, 130, 154, 189, 205,
208, 217, 245-247;
treaty of Ghent, 317, 318, 319, 323;
treaty power, 114;
United States, history of, 382, 383;
war of 1812, 320;
war finances, 190, 200, 203, 207, 208, 222, 224, 229, 232, 234, 298;
Whiskey Insurrection, 94.
Gallatin family, 2;
prominence in Geneva, 2;
military reputation, 2;
interest in all its members, 8;
on oligarchic side in Genevese politics, 10;
alarmed at report of Gallatin's death, 27;
visited by Gallatin in 1814, 326;
claims Roman descent, 386 n.
Gallatin, Frances, marries B. K. Stevens, 371;
Lafayette's letter of congratulation to, 371;
considered "a beauty" at French court, 372.
Gallatin, James, accompanies his father to Europe, 301.
Gallatin, Jean, father of Albert Gallatin, 2;
his death, 2.
Gallatin, P. M., guardian of Albert, 10;
his kindness on Gallatin's departure for America, 11;
promises to aid him, and forwards letters of recommendation, 11.
Gallatin, Susanne Vaudenet, grandmother of Gallatin, her character, 7;
friend of Frederick of Hesse-Cassel and of Voltaire, 7;
controlling spirit of family, 8;
quarrels with Albert over his refusal of a Hessian commission, 8.
Gambier, Lord, on English peace commission, 316.
Gardner, John L., at free-trade convention, 241.
Genet, Edmond C., effect of his intemperance on parties, 57;
marries daughter of George Clinton, 102;
aids Democratic societies, 102;
condemned by Federalists, 134.
Geneva, place of Gallatin family in, 2;
education in, 2, 3;
religious spirit of, 3;
a resort of foreigners, 4;
political situation in, 6, 7, 10;
parties in, 10;
revolutions in, 20, 361;
government of, 33;
visited by Gallatin, 325, 326;
colonization from, planned by Gallatin, 361.
Geneva Academy, studies of Gallati in, 2, 3;
his friends at, 4, 5.
Germans, in Pennsylvania, oppose improvement of education, 45.
Gerry, Elbridge, on French mission, 139;
remains to negotiate loan, 152.
Gibbs, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Gilbert, Ezekiel, on Committee on Finance, 107.
Giles, William B., Republican leader in debate, his character, 100, 133;
bitterly opposes address to Washington, 128, 129;
in debate on relations with France, 135;
loses leadership to Gallatin, 140.
Gilman, Nicholas, on Committee on Finance, 106.
Girard, Stephen, assists Gallatin to float loan, 213, 214;
his reasons, 259.
Goderich, Lord, renews convention of 1815 with Gallatin, 347.
Goldberg, ----, Dutch commissioner to make commercial treaty, 334.
Goodhue, Jonathan, at free-trade convention of 1831, 241.
Goodhue, ----, member of "The Club," 367.
Goodrich, Chauncy, in Congress, 99;
in debate on foreign relations, 143;
on resolution to punish foreign correspondence, 156.
Goulburn, Henry, on English peace commission, 316;
informed of American request for instructions, 318;
told by Castlereagh and Liverpool to moderate his demands, 319;
protests against acceptance of Indian article, 321.
Grenville, Lord, sends Fauchet letter to Washington, 103;
connection with Jay treaty, 117, 350;
his proposition to Pinckney, 134.
Griswold, Roger, attacks Gallatin's account of sinking fund, 65;
leader of Federalists in House, 98, 133;
replies to Gallatin in debate on treaty power, 113;
his collision with Lyon, 141;
on doctrine of checks, 143;
on bill to punish foreign correspondence, 156;
on Senate bill to require annual financial reports, 161.
Gunboats, Jefferson's scheme for, 288;
origin of his idea, 288;
opposed by Gallatin, 289.
Gurney, ----, in Pennsylvania legislature, 183.
Hale, ----, introduction to his work on Indians written by Gallatin,
380.
Hamilton, Alexander, his career compared to that of Gallatin, 28, 32;
amends excise law, 52;
demands punishment of Pittsburgh leaders of opposition, 53, 54;
drafts proclamation against them, 54;
attacked by Gallatin in Senate, 64;
deprecates demand for minute information, 64, 65;
submits plan for crushing insurgents, 76, 77;
impatient at delay, writes as "Tully" advocating punishment, 87;
accompanies army to Pittsburgh, 88;
investigates insurrection, 90;
fails to find indictment against Gallatin, 90;
dissuades troops from violence, 92;
resigns from Treasury, 97;
continues to lead party, 99;
stoned in defending Jay treaty, 103;
letters of Wolcott to, complaining of Republican opposition, 126, 154;
attends Congress as general, 155;
his influence on government, 168, 169;
review of his career in the Treasury,
174-176;
his place in history, 176;
his enmity to Gallatin, 179;
attacks of Gallatin upon his system, 184, 185;
his revenue system maintained by Gallatin, 218, 234;
and reënacted by Democrats in 1813, 235;
his report on public lands, 237, 238;
his organization of Treasury Department, 243;
his financial reports, 245;
on Bank of North America, 249;
his report on national bank, 250, 251.
Hamilton, J. C., accuses Gallatin of cowardice in Whiskey Rebellion, 84.
Harper, Robert Goodloe, leader of Federalists in House, 98, 133;
denounces call for Jay treaty papers as unconstitutional, 111, 112;
closes argument on Federalist side, 114;
recognizes Gallatin as leader of Republicans, 115;
in debate on relations with France, 134, 135;
called a "bungler" by Gallatin, 140;
moves appropriation for foreign intercourse, 141;
his share in debate, 142, 146;
introduces bill to suspend intercourse with France, 151;
altercation with Gallatin over Alien Bill, 152;
on resolution to furnish foreign correspondence, 156;
on Senate bill to require annual financial reports, 161.
Harvard College, gives Gallatin permission to teach French, 17;
his connection with, 18;
gives Gallatin certificate, 18.
Hassler, Ferdinand Rudolph, superintendent of coast survey, 290.
Hawks, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Henry, Patrick, recommends Gallatin to county surveyor and commissions
him to locate lands, 24;
advises Gallatin to go West, predicts success, 29.
Henry, Prof. Joseph, letter of Gallatin to, on Squier and Davis's
"Ancient Monuments," 379.
Hillhouse, James, Federalist in Congress, 99;
on committee on finance, 107.
Holland, vain attempt to sign commercial treaty with, 334;
arbitrates northeast boundary, 347, 349;
its decision rejected, 349.
House of Representatives, leaders of, in 1795, 98-100;
debate in, over conduct of Washington's administration, 104-106;
appoints Committee on Finance, 106, 107;
debate in, on principle of appropriations, 108, 109;
motion of Livingston to call for papers in Jay treaty brings on debate
on treaty power, 109-114;
asserts right to withhold appropriations, 115;
considers foreign treaties separately, 118;
debates Jay treaty, 118-121;
votes to carry treaty into effect, 121;
but condemns it, 121;
refuses to adjourn on Washington's birthday, 126;
adopts address complimentary to Washington, 129;
new members in fifth Congress, 132;
debates President's message on relations with France, 133-136;
votes to support administration, 136;
considers measures of defense, 137;
impeaches Blount, 138;
entertained by Adams, 140;
encounter in, between Lyon and Griswold, 141;
debate in, on foreign missions, 141, 142;
on relation of executive to Congress, 142-147;
rejects amendment to abolish foreign missions, 147;
debates war with France, 148;
requests President to furnish correspondence of envoys to France, 148;
receives X Y Z dispatches, 149;
altercation in, between Gallatin and Allen, 150;
passes Alien Bill, 152;
message of Adams to, on resumption of diplomatic intercourse
with France, 152; passes bill abrogating treaty with France, 154;
debates and passes bill to punish foreign correspondence, 155, 156;
debates and passes bills to favor French West Indies, and punish Spanish
and Dutch ports, 156, 157;
refuses to repeal Sedition Act, 157;
new members in sixth Congress, 158;
replies to President's address, 158;
refuses to repeal Sedition Law, 159;
passes bill to suspend intercourse with France, 159, 160;
votes a medal to Truxton, 160;
refuses to amend Foreign Intercourse Act, 160, 161;
debates and passes Senate bill to require annual Treasury reports, 161;
refuses to continue non-intercourse, 162;
again rejects bill to amend Sedition Act, 162;
part played by Gallatin in, 167, 168;
investigates Wolcott's management of Treasury, 177.
Howell, Richard, leads New Jersey militia against Whiskey Rebellion, 88.
Humboldt, Baron Alexander von, aided in study of precious metals in
America by Gallatin, 278, 374, 381;
brings Lafayette's letter to Gallatin, 315;
meets Gallatin in Washington, 315;
speaks of Gallatin's "glory," 325;
letter to Gallatin, 381.
Husbands, Herman, on committee on resolutions of Parkinson's Ferry
meeting, 80.
Huskisson, William, on impressment, 347.
Impressment, Gallatin's opinion of, 122;
its abandonment by England insisted on by Monroe, 305;
refused consideration by England, 322, 327, 335, 347.
Indians, relations of Gallatin with, at Machias, 15;
trading posts with, opposed by Gallatin, 108;
Wayne's treaty with, 117, 118;
danger of war with, in 1795, 120, 121;
Gallatin's opinion of, 122;
influence of Chôteau over, 287;
fur trade of Astor with, 288;
proposals of England concerning, in treaty of Ghent, 317, 319, 321;
studies of Gallatin concerning, 373-378;
the Canadian Indians, 373;
tribes of, classified by Jefferson, 374;
"Synopsis of Indian Tribes" by Gallatin, 374;
vocabularies collected by Gallatin, 375, 376;
studies of Du Ponceau concerning, 377;
republication of Gallatin's "Synopsis," 377;
his essay on Indian civilization, 380;
his introduction to Hale's work on, 380.
Ingham, Samuel D., report of Gallatin to, on gold and silver, 268.
Internal improvements, Gallatin's scheme for, 224, 290;
urged by Jefferson, 226, 227, 290;
inconsistency of Jefferson, 227.
Irish, petition against Sedition Act, 157.
Irving, Washington, describes Mrs. Gallatin's manners and appearance,
363, 364;
describes Gallatin in old age, 368.
Jackson, Andrew, votes against complimentary address to Washington, 129;
his appearance described by Gallatin, 129 n.;
orders removal of deposits, 270;
Gallatin's opinion of, 270, 355;
occupies Pensacola, 336;
refuses to appoint Gallatin to French mission, 349;
candidate for president in 1824, 358;
defeated for president by Adams, 358;
his idea of party, 359;
Gallatin's opinion of, 359;
character of his presidency, 360.
Jackson, F. J., his mission to United States, 295.
Jay, John, asked by Jefferson for information concerning Gallatin, 27;
drafts letter for New York Convention calling for a new convention,
37 n.;
burnt in effigy after his treaty, 103;
his purpose in making treaty, 117;
said by Sheffield to have duped Grenville, 117;
his warning remark to Randolph during negotiations, 118;
attacked by Gallatin, 119.
Jay, William, member of "The Club," 366.
Jay treaty, ratified, 102;
made public by Mason, 103;
popular dissatisfaction with, 103, 116;
sent to House, 109;
condemned in England, 117;
debate over, 118-121.
Jefferson, Thomas, in behalf of Gallatin family writes to Jay for
information concerning Albert Gallatin, 27;
countersigns Washington's proclamation against excise rioters, 54;
retires from cabinet, 97, 99;
rupture with Hamilton, 99;
imbued with French principles, 102;
ridiculed as a sans-culotte, 104;
influence complained of by Wolcott, 127;
tries to moderate bitterness of Republicans, 128;
Gallatin known to be in his confidence, 133;
complains of weakness of Congress, 138;
unable to influence Senate, 139;
loses taste for French alliance, 139;
thinks Sedition Bill aimed at Gallatin, 152;
praises Gallatin's courage, 158;
receives tie vote with Burr, 163;
probably makes bargain with Federalists, 164;
his inexplicable submission to Smith, 164;
elected, 167;
in triumvirate with Madison and Gallatin, 168;
represents social equality, 169;
his suggestions on coinage, 172;
urges Gallatin to accept Treasury Department, 178-180;
letter to Macon, 182;
suggestions of Gallatin to, on financial policy, 186;
not a practical statesman, 188;
does not consult cabinet as a whole, 188;
letters of Gallatin to, on finances, 189, 193, 201, 203, 216;
summons Congress to ratify Louisiana purchase, 195;
reëlection helped by finances and Louisiana treaty, 197, 198, 223;
urges Gallatin to retain post until extinction of debt, 203;
wishes reduction of army and navy, 220;
advocates application of surplus to internal improvement, 226;
in so doing abandons his principles, 227;
detests bank, 233, 251, 280;
proposes impracticable economies in Treasury Department, 244;
suggests issue of paper money, 264;
an abandonment of republican principles, 266;
introduces new principles of administration into government, 279;
opposes Gallatin's civil service circular, 281;
proposes to fill one half of offices with partisans, 282;
submits draft of annual message to cabinet, 283;
objects to appointing a woman to office, 283;
lack of system in his cabinet, 284;
does not consult Gallatin on military matters, 284;
agrees with Gallatin's view on acquisition of territory, 285
advised by Gallatin concerning Louisiana treaty, 285;
unfortunate in choice of political methods, 286;
friendly with Duane, 286;
promises to protect Astor, 288;
his gunboat scheme, 288, 289;
origin of his views on gunboats, 288;
his plan of internal improvements, 290;
recommends national university, 291;
wishes amendments to Constitution, 291;
advised by Gallatin not to rely on "general welfare" clause of
Constitution, 291;
shirks responsibility of decision with regard to English policy, 291,
292;
urged by Gallatin to enforce non-intercourse, 293;
calls Gallatin ablest man in administration except Madison, 298;
regard of Gallatin for, 300;
his love for Gallatin, 300;
letters of Gallatin to, on reputation of United States in Europe, 327;
on France, 327, 328;
letter of Gallatin to, on difficulty of withdrawal from public service,
329;
rejoices in Gallatin's acceptance of French mission, 331;
his opinion of Louis XVIII., 331;
relations with de Tracy, 331;
supports Crawford for presidency, 356;
favors state rights, 356;
does not appreciate decay of his party, 358;
on non-sectarian education, 369;
his remarks on Indians in "Notes on Virginia," 374;
on Washington's strong passions, 383 n.
Johannot, ----, educated at Geneva, 4, 17.
Johnston, ----, member of "The Club," 366.
Jones, William, secretary of navy, 312.
Kent, Chancellor James, member of "The Club," 366.
King, Charles, member of "The Club," 367.
King, Rufus, resigns mission to England, 342;
tone of his correspondence, 345.
Kinloch, Francis, educated at Geneva, 4;
letter to, given by Mlle. Pictet to Gallatin, 11.
Kirkpatrick, Major, defends United States marshal in Whiskey
Insurrection, 68;
his farm burnt by rioters, 73.
Kittera, Thomas, moves hostile amendment to pro-French resolution, 135.
Knox, Henry, resigns from War Department, 97.
Kosciusko, his nephew helped by Gallatin, 372.
Kramer brothers, in business with Gallatin, 60.
Lands, public, in Pennsylvania, 46;
suggestions of Gallatin as to improved methods of sale, 122, 123;
how acquired, 237;
sales under Hamilton and successors, 238;
organization of sales by Gallatin, 238, 239, 287.
Land speculation, in Virginia, 20, 21, 24, 361;
in Ohio, 362.
Lafayette, Marquis de, his motives for aiding colonies, 9;
his imprisonment, 102;
saved by gunboats in 1781, 288, 289, 371;
urged by Gallatin to help mediate between England and United States,
313;
urges emperor of Russia to exert personal influence with England, 315;
sends letter to Gallatin, 315;
letter of Gallatin to, on French government, 328;
visits Pennsylvania, 364;
entertained by Lafayette at Friendship Hill, 365;
his part in Revolution of 1830, 370, 371, 372;
interested in marriage of Gallatin's daughter, 371;
letter to Gallatin, 371, 372.
La Pérouse, meets Gallatin at Machias, 16;
later meets him in Boston, 16.
Laurens, John, educated at Geneva, 4.
La Vengeance, captured by Constellation, 160.
Lawrence, William B., gives anecdote of Washington and Gallatin, 22;
accompanies Gallatin to England, 344;
his ability as secretary, 346;
presides at anniversary meeting of New York Historical Society, 384.
Lee, Henry, commands militia against Whiskey Rebellion, 88;
requires oath of allegiance, 89;
orders seizure of leaders, 90.
Lee, Thomas, founder of Ohio company, 20.
Legislature of Pennsylvania, calls Constitutional Convention, 40;
Gallatin's career in, 45-47, 55, 60;
rejects bill to improve education, 45;
discharges paper money and other debt, 46;
elects Gallatin senator, 47, 58;
adopts resolutions condemning excise, 48, 49;
protests against authorizing vessels to arm, 149;
divides electoral vote between Adams and Jefferson, 163;
Gallatin's financial report to, 183, 184;
offers to take two millions of United States bonds, 214;
interferes to regulate Bank of North America, 250;
charters Bank of United States, 271.
Leopard, captures Chesapeake, 224.
Lesdernier, M. de, flies from Nova Scotia to Machias, 14;
welcomes Gallatin, 14;
on good terms with Indians, 16;
attempt of Gallatin to obtain a pension for, 30;
letter of Gallatin to, 154;
introduces Gallatin to Indians, 373.
Lesdernier, Madame de, persuades Gallatin to visit Machias, 14.
Lieven, Count, Russian minister at London, 308;
his friendship with Gallatin, 348.
Lincoln, Levi, views on unconstitutionality of acquiring territory, 285.
Livermore, E. S., on committee to consider Gallatin's eligibility to
Senate, 61.
Liverpool, Lord, advised by Castlereagh to moderate his demands, 319;
does so for fear of healing American dissensions, 319;
accepts settlement of Indian question, 321;
resolves to prosecute war vigorously, 321;
abandons claim to territory and admits defeats, 322;
letter of Castlereagh to, 326;
death, 347.
Livingston, Edward, prominent Republican in Congress, 100;
his precocity, 100;
calls for instructions for Jay, 109, 110;
votes against complimentary address to Washington, 129;
attacks Adams's foreign policy, 135, 136;
presents petitions against Alien and Sedition Laws, 157.
Livingston, Robert R., arranges terms of Louisiana purchase, 193.
Lorillard, Jacob, at free trade convention, 1831, 241.
Loring, Captain, takes Gallatin to America, 11.
Louis XVI., executed, 56.
Louis XVIII., Jefferson's opinion of, 331;
gives audience to Gallatin, 332;
his intimacy with Gallatin and his sarcasm, 332.
Louisiana, financial effect of its purchase, 192, 193, 195, 196, 222;
effect of its acquisition on England, 224;
constitutional question involved, 285, 286;
occupation of, arranged by Gallatin, 286, 287.
Lynn, Mary, keeps boarding-house in Philadelphia, 19.
Lyon, Matthew, his collision with Griswold, 141;
defended by Gallatin, 141.
Machias, expedition of Gallatin to, 14, 15;
life at, 15, 16, 17.
Macon, Nathanael, votes against complimentary address to Washington,
129;
aids Gallatin in sixth Congress, 159;
moves repeal of Sedition Law, 159;
opposes non-intercourse with France, 159, 160;
letter of Jefferson to, 182;
letter to Nicholson, 293;
tries to pass Navigation Act against English and French decrees, 296;
on decay of democratic principles in 1824, 356, 358.
Madison, James, secures adoption of ten amendments, 40;
abandons Federalists through Jefferson's influence, 99;
leads Republicans in House, 100;
weakness in debate, 100;
drafts address to Washington, 105;
on Committee on Finance, 106;
advocates bill to establish trading posts with Indians, 108;
moves to amend call for Jay papers, 111;
interprets treaty power
in Constitution in Jay treaty debate, 113, 115;
attacks Jay treaty, 118;
influence complained of by Wolcott, 127;
not reëlected to Congress, 133;
his inexplicable submission to Smith, 164;
in triumvirate with Jefferson and Gallatin, 168;
his weakness as financier, 179;
summons Congress, 205;
anxious to evade responsibility for peace or war, 205;
communications on finance from Gallatin, 212, 259;
his indecision as to financial situation, 230;
does not accept Gallatin's resignation, 231;
realizes indispensableness of Gallatin to him, 231;
agrees with Gallatin as to minute appropriations, 245;
vetoes bill to incorporate national bank, 265;
signs a second bill, 265;
his inconsistency, 266;
urged by Gallatin to restore specie payment, 267;
opposes Gallatin's civil service circular, 281;
not superior on constitutional points to Gallatin, 284;
refuses to support Astor's plans, 288;
consults with Gallatin on inaugural address, 294;
forced by senators to abandon plan to make Gallatin secretary of
state, 294, 295;
unable to control party, 295;
favors England as against France, 295;
fails to support Gallatin, his inexcusable weakness, 296;
compelled to choose between Smith and Gallatin, 297;
efforts of Duane to poison his mind against Gallatin, 297;
not qualified to be a war president, 298, 299;
sends Gallatin on Russian mission with leave of absence, 299;
appoints Duane adjutant-general, 299;
continues on good terms with Gallatin, 300;
accepts English offer of direct negotiation, 312;
appoints a new commission, 312;
intends Gallatin for head of commission, 312;
names Gallatin minister to France, 326;
thanked by Gallatin, 327;
leaves him at liberty to decide, 329;
offers Gallatin secretaryship of treasury, 330;
favors Crawford for presidency, 356.
Malesherbes, C. G. de L. de, his courage compared to that of Gallatin,
84.
"Manifest Destiny," Gallatin's opinion of, 352, 353.
Marie Antoinette, executed, 56.
Marshall, James, represents Fayette County in anti-excise proceedings,
51, 52, 69;
joins Bradford in calling out militia, 70;
his resolutions at Parkinson's Ferry meeting disapproved by Gallatin,
78, 79;
withdraws them, 80;
on committee to confer with United States commissioners, 81.
Marshall, John, offers Gallatin a place in his office, 29;
on French mission, 139, 152;
elected to Congress, 158;
announces death of Washington, 158;
draws reply to Adams's address, 158.
Mason, S. T., makes Jay treaty public, 103.
Mathews, Rev. Mr., member of "The Club," 367.
Mayer, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
McClanachan, Blair, chairman of anti-Federalist Conference, 38;
his ultra-democratic remarks to Adams, 138.
McDuffie, George, estimates profits of bankers on state bank circulation,
263.
McKean, Thomas, in Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention, 43;
suggests sending a commission to confer with Whiskey insurgents, 77;
asked to prevent civil war in 1800, 166.
McLane, Louis, reports extinction of national debt, 269.
McVickar, ----, member of "The Club," 366.
Mexico, war with, Gallatin's opinion of, 352.
Middleton, Henry, at free trade convention of 1831, 241.
Mifflin, Thomas, in Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention, 43;
deprecates use of force against Whiskey Rebellion, 77;
summons legislature and obtains authority to employ militia, 88;
succeeds by personal influence in filling ranks, 88.
Mirabeau, Vicomte de, friend of Dumont, 5.
Mississippi navigation, discussed in treaty of Ghent, 322, 323;
in 1818, 335.
Mitchell, S. L., on committee to consider Gallatin's eligibility to
Senate, 61.
Monroe, James, presents flag to French Convention, 132;
arranges terms of Louisiana purchase, 193;
supplants Smith as secretary of state, 296, 298;
on necessity of renunciation of impressment in treaty of peace, 305;
asked by Gallatin for further instructions, 308;
receives proposals from England for direct negotiation, 311;
asked by commissioners for authority to treat in any place, 314;
warned by Gallatin of English war plans, 316, 317, 318;
communications of Gallatin to, during negotiations, 319;
urges Gallatin not to withdraw from public service, 329;
appoints Adams secretary of state, 334;
gives Gallatin leave of absence, 341;
urges him to return to France, 341.
Montgomery, John, connected by marriage with Gallatin, 59, 60.
Montmorenci, Vicomte, negotiates with Gallatin, 340;
succeeded by Chateaubriand, 340.
Moore, ----, member of "The Club," 366.
Moreau, General Jean Victor, career in America and France, 308;
assures Gallatin of emperor's friendliness and warns him of British
obstinacy, 308;
reply of Gallatin, 309;
his death, 310, 311.
Morgan, Daniel, leads militia against Whiskey Rebellion, 88, 93.
Morris, Gouverneur, snubbed by Washington for familiarity, 23;
his precocity compared to Gallatin's, 32;
suggests decimal system, 172.
Morris, Robert, receives drafts for Gallatin, 28;
in United States Senate announces intention of neutrality on question
of Gallatin's eligibility, 61;
but votes against it, 63 n.;
his rank as financier, 170-173;
plans Bank of North America, 248, 249;
buys land of Gallatin, 361;
settles with Gallatin, 362;
fails and is imprisoned, 362.
Morse, ----, member of "The Club," 367.
Morton, Dr., member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Muhlenberg, Frederick A., defeated for speaker by Dayton, 98;
gives casting vote in favor of Jay treaty appropriations, 121.
Müller, Johann von, teaches Gallatin history, 3.
Murray, William Vans, prominent Federalist in House, 99;
on finance committee, 106;
denies discretionary power of House over Jay treaty, 110.
Navy, opposed by Gallatin, 123, 124, 130, 137, 157, 186, 188;
his course defended, 216;
gunboat scheme, 288, 289.
Nesselrode, Count, leaves Russian foreign affairs in charge of
Romanzoff, 304;
inability of Crawford to secure audience with, 315.
New England, supports Adams in 1800, 163;
refuses to support popular loan, 212, 213;
plans disunion, 213;
hoards specie, 260, 261;
opposes embargo, 293;
its secession hoped for by England, 313.
New York, calls for a second Federal Convention, 36, 37;
Republican in 1800, 163.
New York city, first visit of Gallatin to, 18;
abandoned by Congress for Philadelphia, 47;
protests against Jay treaty, 103;
settlement of Gallatin in, 365, 366;
social life in, 366-368;
attempt of Gallatin to establish a university in, 368, 369.
New York Historical Society, presidency of Gallatin, 382;
his inaugural address to, 382-384;
celebration of its fortieth anniversary, 384;
honors Gallatin's memory, 388.
Nicholas, John, Republican leader in
House, 100;
on treaty power, 111;
supports Gallatin in advocating specific appropriations, 130;
moves amendment to Adams's message, 134;
in debate on French relations, 135;
desires to limit executive through power over appropriations, 143;
aids Gallatin in sixth Congress, 159;
opposes non-intercourse with France, 159;
resists supposed encroachment of Senate on House, 161;
confers with Jefferson and Gallatin on election of 1800, 164.
Nicholson family, connected by marriage with Gallatin, 59.
Nicholson, Hannah, marries Gallatin, 59;
described by him, 59;
her relations to her husband, 59;
letters of Gallatin to, 138, 180;
unhappy in Fayette County, 180;
her property, 363;
unfit for frontier life, 363;
her success in Washington society, 363, 364;
her death, 386, 387.
Nicholson, Commodore James, father-in-law of Gallatin, his family, 59;
visited by Gallatin after marriage, 60;
on Gallatin's political moderation, 138;
commands gunboats in Lafayette's campaign of 1781, 371.
Nicholson, James Witter, in business with Gallatin, 60.
Nicholson, Joseph H., letter of Gallatin to, on war revenue, 224;
furnished by Gallatin with questions to ask himself, 246;
letter of Macon to, 293.
Non-importation, difficulty of enforcement in 1774, 293;
enforced by Gallatin in 1808, 293.
Norris, Isaac W., at free trade convention, 241.
Odier, ----, takes shares in Gallatin's land scheme, 361.
Ohio Company, its formation and lands, 20.
Oregon question, discussion over, in 1818, 335;
discussed in 1826, 343;
determination of Adams not to give way in, 346;
joint occupation of, continued, 347;
views of Gallatin on, 351.
Otis, Harrison Gray, elected to Congress, 132;
denounces Gallatin for attacking Federalist administration, 136;
on resolution to punish foreign correspondence, 156;
reports investigation of Wolcott's management of Treasury, 177.
Panama Congress, its importance, 342;
mission to, declined by Gallatin, 342.
Paper money, its issue suggested by Jefferson, 264;
Gallatin's opinion of, 268, 277.
Parish, David, assists Gallatin to float loan, 213, 214;
his reasons, 259, 260.
Parker, Josiah, amends resolution to punish foreign correspondence, 156;
offers resolution to amend non-intercourse, 160.
Pasquier, M., negotiates with Gallatin, 337;
pacified by Gallatin after seizure of Apollon, 338.
Patton, John, on Committee on Finance, 107.
Peabody, George, at free trade convention of 1831, 241.
Pendleton Society of Virginia, adopts secession resolutions, 116.
Penn, John, letter to, given Gallatin by Lady Penn, 11.
Penn, Lady Juliana, gives Gallatin letter to John Penn, 11.
Penns, proprietors of Pennsylvania, educated at Geneva, 4.
Pennsylvania, ratifies federal Constitution, 35;
movement in, to call a second convention, 37-40;
education in, efforts of Gallatin to improve, 45;
opposition to excise in, 48-55;
Whiskey Rebellion in, 67-96;
popularity of Gallatin in, 65;
its law regarding slavery, 140;
petitions against Alien and Sedition Acts, 157.
Pensacola, its seizure by Jackson, 336.
Philadelphia, visit of Gallatin to, 19, 21;
removal of Congress to, 47;
society in, 47, 48;
angry feeling in, against Whiskey Insurrection, 92;
protests against Jay treaty, 103;
petitions legislature to repeal charter of Bank of North America, 250;
nominates Gallatin for Congress, 329.
Pickering, Timothy, in Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention, 43;
secretary of war and postmaster-general under Washington, 97.
Pickering, ---- member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Pictet, Mademoiselle, adopts Gallatin, her kindness, 2;
her nephew taught by Gallatin, 5;
regard of Gallatin for, 9;
pained at Gallatin's departure, 11;
gives him letter to Kinloch, 11;
sends him money and secures interest of Dr. Cooper, 17;
his ingratitude toward, regretted by Gallatin, 20;
supposes his failure to write due to misfortune, 27;
accuses Gallatin of indolence and ennui, 43, 44.
Pictet, ----, naturalist, relative of Gallatin, 5.
Pinckney, Charles C., refused reception as minister by France, 132;
on second mission, 139;
returns, 152;
attends Congress as general, 155.
Pinckney, Thomas, makes treaty with Spain, 117.
Pitt, William, his precocity compared to Gallatin's, 32.
Poles, in New York, befriended by Gallatin, 372.
Powell, William H., his portrait of Gallatin, 386.
Preston, William C., at free trade convention in 1831, 241.
Quakers, in Pennsylvania, oppose general education, 45;
petition against seizure of fugitive slaves, 140.
Randolph, Edmund, deprecates force against Whiskey Rebellion, on ground
that only Washington's influence prevents civil war, 77;
retires from cabinet, 97;
damages reputation by dealings with Fauchet, 103;
remark of Jay to, during negotiations with England, 118.
Randolph, John, elected to Congress, 158;
opposes non-intercourse with France, 159;
opposes giving a gold medal to Truxton, 160;
advocates abolition of internal duties, 221;
complains of want of system in Jefferson's cabinet, 284;
on Madison's weakness, 295;
unfitted to lead a party, 355.
Renwick, James, letter of Mrs. Irving to, on Mrs. Gallatin, 364;
member of "The Club," 366.
Republican party, its origin, 57;
its leaders in House of Representatives in 1795, 99, 100;
its attitude toward France and Revolution, 101, 102;
imitates Jacobins, 102;
opposes resolution complimenting Washington's administration, 104-106;
attacks administration of Treasury, 106;
asserts right of House to share in treaty power, 110-114;
leadership of Gallatin in, 115, 128, 133, 159;
attacks Jay treaty, 118-121;
objects to adjournment on Washington's birthday, 126;
attacks Washington, 128;
reluctant to affront France, 133-136;
opposes increase of foreign missions, 141-147;
attacks Alien and Sedition Laws, 159;
profits by popular dislike of England and of Alien and Sedition Laws,
163;
gives equal vote to Jefferson and Burr, 163;
its policy to resist any Federalist usurpation by force, 166;
success due to Gallatin's leadership, 167, 168;
its share in building country, 169;
opposes internal revenue, 221;
its principles violated by Jefferson in suggesting internal
improvements, 227;
refuses to renew charter of bank, 231, 254;
violates principles in chartering second bank, 265;
introduces new principles of administration into government, 279;
demands share of offices, 281, 282;
refuses to confirm Gallatin for secretary of state, 294;
factions in, under Madison, 295;
incompetent to manage war, 298;
lacks leaders after Gallatin, 355;
its condition in 1824, 356;
its caucus nominates Crawford and Gallatin, 357, 358;
new developments of, under Jackson, 358, 359, 360.
Revenue, 218-238. See Finances.
Richelieu, Duc de, seeks explanation from Gallatin of American sympathy
for Bonaparte, 331;
declares impossibility of making full compensation for captures under
Berlin and Milan decrees, 332;
angered at American refusal to dismiss an impudent postmaster, 333;
on Jackson's seizure of Pensacola, 336;
urges peace with Spain, 336.
Richmond, society in, 23, 24.
Robinson, Dr., associate of Gallatin in founding American Ethnological
Society, 379.
Rochefoucauld, D'Enville, Duc de, obtains letters for Gallatin from
Franklin, 11.
Rollaz, Sophie Albertine, mother of Gallatin, 2;
assumes husband's share in business, 2;
death, 2.
Romanzoff, Count, originates plan of Russian mediation, 304;
dealings of Gallatin with, 307;
renews offer of mediation, 308;
gives Dallas letter to Count Lieven, 310;
thanked by Gallatin, 312.
Ross, James, appeals to Whiskey insurgents not to use violence, 70;
on commission to confer with insurgents, 85.
Rousseau, J. J., Gallatin's opinion of, 6.
Ruggles, Benjamin, letter of Gallatin to, accepting nomination for
vice-president, 358.
Rush, Richard, introduced to public life by Gallatin, 334;
named minister to England, 334;
joined with Gallatin to negotiate concerning convention of 1815, 334,
335;
secretary of Treasury, 342;
tone of his correspondence, 345.
Russell, Jonathan, on peace commission, 312;
arrives at Gottenburg, 313.
Russia, offers to mediate between England and United States, 299;
mission of Gallatin and Bayard to, 299, 301-312;
refusal of England to accept its mediation, 306, 307;
dealings of Gallatin with Romanzoff, 307, 308;
renews its offer, 308, 315;
displeased with recognition of Spanish colonies, 337.
Rutherford, John, on committee to consider Gallatin's eligibility to
Senate, 61.
Rutledge, John, Jr., elected to Congress, 133.
Savary de Valcoulon, has claims against Virginia, 19;
meets Gallatin at Philadelphia and uses him as interpreter, 19;
goes with Gallatin to Richmond, 19;
interests him in land speculation, 21;
joins Gallatin in locating claims, 24.
Schoolcraft, Henry R., member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Scott, General Winfield, requested by Gallatin to aid in collecting
ethnological data in Mexico, 380.
Scott, Thomas, appeals to Whiskey insurgents, 70.
Sedgwick, Theodore, leader of Federalists in House, 98;
on committee to draft address to Washington, 105;
on Committee on Finance, 106;
offers resolution to execute four treaties, 118;
taunts Gallatin with instigating Whiskey Rebellion, 124;
elected speaker, 158;
at free trade convention of 1831, 241.
Sedition Law, condemned by Gallatin, 152;
petitions against, 157.
Senate of United States, election of Gallatin to, 58;
appoints committees to consider his eligibility, 61, 62;
votes to exclude him, 62, 63;
prejudiced against him by his actions, 64, 65;
ratifies Jay treaty, 102, 103;
yields to House regarding specific appropriations, 130;
controlled by Federalists, 139;
passes bill authorizing convoys, 149;
passes bill abrogating treaty with France, 154;
amends House Bill to suspend intercourse with France, 160;
debate over its bill to require annual treasury reports, 161;
ratifies commercial convention with France, 162;
still controlled by Federalists, 178;
its hostility to Gallatin, 181;
refuses to confirm his appointment as peace commissioner, 310.
Seney, Joshua, connected by marriage with Gallatin, 59.
Serre, Henri, friendship with Gallatin, 5;
sails with him for America, 9;
doings in Boston with Gallatin, 12-14;
at Machias, 14;
enjoys life in wilderness, 15, 17;
returns to Boston, 17;
teaches there, 19;
joins Gallatin and dissolves partnership, 19;
goes to Jamaica and dies, 19;
his debt subsequently paid, 19;
his letters to Badollet, 25.
Sewall, Samuel, elected to Congress, 132.
Shays's Rebellion, an argument for Federalist party, 101.
Sheffield, Lord, says Jay duped Grenville, 117.
Sherman, John, on accounting in Treasury Department, 247.
Sismondi, J. C. L. Simonde de, on paper money, 277;
praises Gallatin, 325;
letter of Gallatin to, 380.
Sitgreaves, Samuel, Federalist in Congress, 99;
on committee to draft address to Washington, 105.
Slavery, resolutions concerning, in Pennsylvania legislature, 47;
petitions concerning, in Congress, 140;
negotiations concerning slave trade in treaty of Ghent, 323;
at Congress of Aix la Chapelle, 337.
Smilie, John, represents Fayette County in Pennsylvania ratification
convention, 35;
leads opposition to Constitution, 36;
in anti-Federalist convention, 37;
his career and friendship with Gallatin, 37, 38;
in Pennsylvania Constitutional Convention, 43;
member of state Senate, 44, 54;
at anti-excise convention, 52;
advises submission to law, 69.
Smith, Isaac, on Committee on Finance, 107.
Smith, John Augustine, invites Gallatin to join "The Club," 366.
Smith, Robert, head of faction of "invisibles," 295;
leaves cabinet, 296, 297.
Smith, Samuel, leads Maryland troops against Whiskey Insurrection, 88;
moves to continue non-intercourse, 162;
probably makes bargain to secure election of Jefferson, 164;
his inexplicable power over Jefferson and Madison, 164.
Smith, William, educated at Geneva, 4;
Federalist in Congress, 99;
on Committee on Finance, 106;
controversy with Gallatin over increase of public debt, 126.
Smithson, John, his bequest to United States, 378.
Smithsonian Institution, connection of Gallatin with, 378, 379.
Southern States, Republican in 1800, 163;
refuse to support loan of 1813, 213.
Spain, Pinckney's treaty with, 117;
danger of war with, 335;
peace with, urged by France, 336;
negotiations over its revolted colonies, 336, 337;
rupture with France in 1823, 341.
Spurzheim, on Gallatin's brain, 389.
Squier, E. G., member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Staël, Madame de, interview of Lafayette with emperor at her house, 315;
letter of Gallatin to, 320;
expresses admiration for Gallatin, 325.
Stephens, ----, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Stevens, Byam Kerby, marries Frances Gallatin, 371;
interest of Lafayette in, 371;
meets Lafayette, 372.
Stevens, Colonel Ebenezer, Lafayette's chief of staff, 371.
Stevens, John A., at free trade convention of 1831, 241;
member of "The Club," 367.
Stokely, ----, appeals to Whiskey insurgents, 70.
Stuart, Gilbert, his portrait of Gallatin, 386.
Swanwick, John, on Jay treaty debate, 111.
Szelesegynski, ----, Polish refugee, helped by Gallatin, 372.
Tahon, ----, keeps French café in Boston, 12.
Talleyrand, Prince, demands bribe in X Y Z affair, 149;
makes overtures for reconciliation, 152, 153.
Taney, Roger B., removes deposits from bank, 269, 270;
appointed chief justice, 270;
his reasons for the removal, 270.
Texas, annexation of, protested against by Gallatin, 351.
Throop, Governor, recommends University for training teachers, 369.
Tracy, Destutt, his "Economie Politique" translated by Jefferson, 331.
Tracy, Uriah, leader of Federalists in House, 98;
taunts Gallatin with connection with Whiskey Rebellion, 119;
obliged to apologize, 120.
Treasury Department, Hamilton's management of, attacked by Gallatin, 64;
resigned by Hamilton, taken by Wolcott, 97;
management of, supervised by Committee of Finance, 106-108, 130;
condition of, deplored by Gallatin, 125;
charged with arbitrary action, 130, 154;
annual reports from, required by Congress, 161;
Morris's connection with, 171-173;
organization under Hamilton, 174, 243;
management by Wolcott, 176-178;
appointment of Gallatin to, 179, 181;
exalted idea of, held by Gallatin, 189;
difficulty of learning management of, 189, 190;
relieved of responsibility for other departments' expenditure, 223;
administration of, by Gallatin, 244-246;
reports from, 245;
efforts of Gallatin to secure precision in, 245, 246;
subsequent management of, 247;
damaged by failure to re-charter bank, 259;
in panic of 1815, 263;
declined by Gallatin in 1816, 266, 330;
in panic of 1837, 272-276;
sub-treasury system invented, 273;
aids resumption, 276;
declined by Gallatin in 1843, 278;
absence of partisanship in Gallatin's appointments to, 281, 282, 286,
287.
Treaty of Ghent, 316-325. See Diplomatic History.
Tripoli, war with, 222;
tribute to, preferred by Gallatin to war with, 284.
Trist, N. P., negotiates treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, 352.
Truxton, Captain, voted a medal by Congress, 160.
Turner, Professor, member of Ethnological Society, 379.
Tyler, John, as president, offers Treasury portfolio to Gallatin, 278.
University, National, proposed by Jefferson, 291;
attempt to start one in New York, 368, 369;
success prevented by clerical influence, 370.
Van Buren, Martin, told by Gallatin of willingness to accept French
mission, 349;
manages caucus of Republican Congresssmen, 357;
letter of Gallatin to, withdrawing from nomination, 358.
Van der Kemp, ----, Dutch commissioner to make commercial treaty, 334.
Verplanck, Gulian C., member of "The Club," 367.
Virginia, claims of Savary against, 19;
Gallatin's opinion of society in, 24;
movement in, to secure amendment of Constitution, 36;
disunion threats in, 116;
ready to attack Federalists by force in 1801, 166.
Voltaire, friendship with Gallatin family, 7;
writes verses for Madame Gallatin, 7;
influence over Albert Gallatin, 7, 8.
Wainwright, Rev. Dr., member of "The Club," 367.
War of 1812, estimates of Gallatin as to cost of operations in, 289,
290;
preparation for, advocated by Gallatin, 292;
events leading to, 295; questions at issue in, 305;
English hopes in, 313, 316;
sack of Washington, 320.
Ward, Samuel, member of "The Club," 367.
Washington, Augustine, founder of Ohio Company, 20.
Washington, George, his military inactivity in 1780, 12;
meets Gallatin in 1784, 22;
snubs him for forwardness, 23;
later wishes him to be his land agent, 23;
his election as president disconcerts anti-Federalists, 40;
unwilling to go to extremes against Whiskey Rebellion, 54;
issues proclamation, 54;
Randolph's opinion of his influence, 77;
combines conciliation with force, 77;
issues proclamation, calls out militia, and appoints commission to
confer, 77, 78;
accompanies army as far as Bedford, 88;
refuses to stop march of troops, 89;
dissuades troops from violence, 92;
pardons convicted offenders, 96;
reconstructs his cabinet, 97, 98; his influence, 102;
convenes Senate to ratify Jay treaty, 102;
attacked by Bache, 104;
addresses Congress, 104;
his administration criticised in debate over reply in House, 104-106;
refuses call of House for Jay treaty papers, 114;
refusal of House to adjourn on his birthday, 126;
obtains surrender of Western posts, 128;
issues Farewell Address, 128;
attacked by Giles, 128;
proposal of Gallatin concerning reply to his message, 129;
sends tricolor to Congress, 130, 132;
attends Congress as lieutenant-general, 155;
his death announced by Marshall, 158;
invites Wolcott to succeed Hamilton, 176;
Gallatin's opinion of his character, 383, 384;
and of his strong passions, 383 n.
Washington, Lawrence, founder of Ohio Company, 20.
Washington city, removal of Congress to, 161, 162;
sack of, by English, 320.
Washington County, Pennsylvania, in Whiskey Insurrection, 49, 50, 51,
70, 71, 78, 94, 96;
elects Gallatin to Congress, 93, 127.
Wayne, Anthony, makes treaty with Indians, 117.
Webster, Daniel, his speech on northeastern boundary published by
Gallatin, 349;
his manner of negotiating with Ashburton, 350.
Webster, Pelatiah, describes Gallatin at Philadelphia in 1783, 19.
Wellington, Lord, asked by cabinet to conquer a peace, 322;
advises cabinet not to insist on cession of territory, 322;
expresses friendly feelings, 335.
Wells, John, member of "The Club," 367.
Westmoreland County, in Whiskey Insurrection, 49, 51, 74, 78, 96.
Wheaton, Henry, requests Gallatin to furnish Humboldt with data on gold
in United States, 381.
Whiskey Insurrection, opposition to excise in Pennsylvania, 48, 49;
reasons for opposition, 49, 50;
first meetings against excise in Washington County, 50, 51;
combined meeting of four counties at Pittsburgh, 51;
violence against inspectors, 51;
modification of law, 52;
second convention at Pittsburgh, 52;
resolutions against collectors, 52, 53;
petition to Congress, 53;
proclamation issued by Washington and cabinet, 54;
arrests and riots, 55;
attempts to serve writs, 67, 68;
rioting, burning of Marshall's house, 68, 69;
flight of officers, 68;
meetings of distillers, 69;
efforts of Gallatin and others to prevent violence, 69, 70;
stoppage of mails, 69;
call for meeting of militia, 70;
leaders of, 70, 71;
meeting of militia at Parkinson's Ferry, 72, 73;
estimates of numbers, 72;
violence of feeling, 73, 74;
renewed outrages, 74;
use of liberty poles, 74;
attitude of Gallatin toward, 75, 76;
plans of Washington and Hamilton to suppress, 77;
proclamation against carrying arms, 77;
commissioners appointed, 77;
convention of distillers at Parkinson's Ferry, 78, 79;
proposals to raise troops, 79;
efforts of moderates, 80, 81;
committee of sixty appointed, 80;
arrival of commissioners, their offer, 81;
conference of committee at Red Stone Old Fort, 81, 82;
vote to accept terms, 83;
influence of Gallatin, 84;
meetings for submission in counties, 85;
apparent failure of terms of amnesty, 86;
threats of secession, 86;
Hamilton writes "Tully" letter, 87;
report of commissioners, 87;
proclamation calls out troops, 87;
march of militia, 88;
committee of sixty passes conciliatory resolutions, 88, 89;
refusal of Washington to turn back, 89;
final meeting at Parkinson's Ferry votes entire submission, 89;
occupation of western counties by troops, 89, 90;
arrest of rebels, 90, 91;
journey of prisoners to Philadelphia, 91, 92;
end of disturbances, 93;
return of army, 93;
confession of Gallatin, 94;
trial of prisoners, 96;
its effect on Federalist party, 101;
Gallatin taunted with participation in, 119, 124.
Wirt, William, letter of Jefferson to, 298.
Wolcott, Oliver, succeeds Hamilton in Treasury Department, 97;
his situation deplored by Gallatin, 125;
complains to Hamilton of Republican opposition, 126;
complains of Gallatin's purpose to break down department, 154;
his career as Hamilton's successor, 176-178;
his statement of a surplus denied by Gallatin, 190, 191.
Woodbury, Levi, reports extinction of debt, 270, 271;
then deplores its absence, 271;
alarmed at increase of circulation in 1836, 272;
begins sub-treasury system, 273;
promises to support resumption of payment by banks, 275.
X Y Z dispatches, 149.
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