LIBRARY OF CONGRESS DD017t.7H377 ...O A- -0^ \ " %.^^ 1 - '^ ^ T- <3 O ■" Q^ ". ^ - ' ^o ,^x^ - ■:/c ^ ^# ^ N^ M^^^ v\.v '^^. t, / - i N^ ■^^ ■""■ok /•»'' V -Cl' '' '^'■- /■-''' V ■^ aO^ 1 - t '- : ' _ ^;- -^ U 0^ r = ^^ «5 ^ "^t^C H > %. -e ^^ /^V;^,^ -V^ %, '^-^ ...o^A^ aO^ "lp<<^ .p. .^^ ^^. r.^^ ''i z '^'^'^ ^^^ . 0^ '.^^ i\_.__ ^^ ^1 ; "^^ ^j - 'Vc^ v^ ^ '/^ ^ m F THE CAPITOL THE LIVES OF JAMES MADISON AND JAMES MONHOE. FOURTH AND FIFTH PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES, BY JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. WITH HISTORICAL NOTICES OF THEIR ADMINISTRATIONS. BOSTON: PHILLIPS, SAMPSON fc CO. B U F F A L : PUBLISHERS GEO. H. DERBY AND CO. 1850. <^,. ^~''^- ''''•■.>:' \ I \ / J.'^^ 7 TO THE FRIENDS OF REPUBLICANISM, THESE LIVES OF ITS EARLY AND ABLE EXPOUNDERS, ITS MODEL EXEMPLIFIERS, AND ITS TRIUMPHANT ADVOCATES, ARE RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED. CONTENTS. PAGK. Life of James Madison, .... 9 Notices op his Administration, . . 106 Life op James Monroe, . , . .197 Notices of his Administration, . . 297 PREFACE. Now that John Quincy Adams — the sage, the phi- losopher, and the statesman — has been gathered to his fathers, an air of sanctity, never witnessed while he was in Yife, surronnds everything he wrote or ut- tered ; and the odor of nationaUty " rises gratefully, from the emanations of his brilliant genius, and the productions of his superior intellect." He, indeed, touched nothing that he did not adorn with the rich charms of the language he moulded at his will, or the mental treasures of his inexhaustible store. And no one, perhaps, among American states- men or men of letters, was better able than he to pronounce the eulogies of Madison and Monroe. In presenting to the public, these chef-d' ccuvres of a master hand, in a permanent form, the editor has not the vanity to suppose he can add a single additional charm. And yet, to the lover of history, and to the politician, the notices of the administrations of those two most eminent disciples of Thomas Jefferson, which accompany them, may not be withoutnnterest. VIU PREFACE. One consideration which, above all others, has in- duced the preparation of these notices, is, that we have nothing of a similar character, except what has proceeded from political opponents. THE EDITOR. New York, January, 1850. LIFE OP JAMES MADISON. * When the imperial despot of Persia surveyed the myriads of his vassals, whom he had assembled for the invasion and conquest of Greece, we are told by the father of profane history,! that the monarch's heart, at first, distended with pride, but immediately after- wards sunk within him, and turned to tears of anguish at the thought, that within one hundred years from that day, not one of all the countless numbers of his host would remain in the land of the living. The brevity of human life had afforded a melancholy contemplation to wiser and better men than Xerxes, in ages long before that of his own existence. It is still the subject of philosophical reflection or of Chris- tian resignation, to the Uving man of the present age. It will continue such, so long as the race of man shall exist upon earth. * Written in 1836, at the request of the two houses of Congress. t Herodotus. 1* 10 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. But it is the condition of our nature to look before and after : The Persian tyrant looked^, forward, and la- mented the shortness of life ; but in that century which bounded his nnental vision, he knew not what was to come to pass, for weal or woe, to the race whose tran- sitory nature he deplored, and his own purposes, hap- pily baffled by the elements which he with absurd pre- sumption would have chastised, were of the most odi- ous and detestable character. Reflections upon the shortness of time allotted to individual man upon this planet, may be turned to more useful account, by connecting them with ages past than with those that are to come. The family of man is placed upon this congregated ball to earn an im- proved condition hereafter by improving his own con- dition here — and this duty of improvement is not less a social than a selfish principle. We are bound to ex- ert all the faculties bestowed upon us by our Maker, to improve our own condition, by improving that of our fellow men ; and the precept that we should love our neierhbor as ourselves, and that we should do to others as we would that they should do unto us, are but examples of that duty of co-operation to the im- provement of his kind, which is the first law of God to man, unfolded alike in the volumes of nature and of inspiration. Let us look hack then for consolation from the thought of the shortness of human life, as urged upon us by the recent decease of James Madison, one of the pillars and ornaments of his country and of his age. LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 11 His time on earth was short, yet he died fall of years and of glory — less, far less than one hundred years have elapsed since the day of his birth — yet has he fulfilled, nobly fulfilled, his destinies as a man and a Christian. He has improved his ov^^n condition by im- proving that of his country and his kind. He was born in Orange County, in the British Colo- "'* ny of Virginia, on the 5th of March, 1750 ; or ac- cording to the Gregorian calendar, adopted the year after that of his birth, on the 16th of March, 1751, of a distinguished and opulent family ; and received the early elements of education partly at a public school under the charge of Donald Robertson, and afterwards in the paternal mansion under the private tuition of the Rev. Thomas Martin, by whose instructions he was ^ prepared for admission at Princeton College. There are three stages in the history of the North American Revolution — the first of which may be con- sidered as commencing with the order of the British Council for enforcing the acts of trade in 1760, and as having reached its crisis at the meeting of the first Congress fourteen years after at Philadelphia. It was a struggle for the preservation and recovery of the rights and liberties of the British Colonies. It termi- nated in a civil war, the character and object of which was changed by the Declaration of Independence. The second stage is that of the War of Indepen- dence, usually so called — but it began fifteen months before the Declaration, and was itself the immediate cause and not the effect of that event. It closed by 13 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. the preliminary Treaty of Peace concluded at Paris on the 30th of Novennber, 1782, The third is the formation of the Anglo-American People and Nation of North America. This event was completed by the meeting of the first Congress of the United States under their present Constitution, on the 4th of March, 1789, Thirty years is the usual computation for the duration of one generation of the human race. The space of time from 1760 to 1790 includes the generation with which the North Amer- ican Revolution began, passed through all its stages, and ended. The attention of the civilized European world, and perhaps an undue proportion of our own, has been drawn to the second of these three stages — to the con- test with Great Britain for Independence. It was an arduous and apparently a very unequal conflict. But it was not without example in the annals of mankind. It has often been remarked that the distinction between rebelhon and revolution consists only in the event, and is marked only by difference of success. But to a just estimate of human affairs there are other elementary materials of estimation. A revolution of government, to the leading minds by which it is undertaken, is an object to be accomplished. William Tell, Gustavus Vasa, William of Orange, had been the leaders of rev- olutions, the object of which had been the establish- ment or the recovery of popular liberties. But in neither of those cases had the part performed by those individuals been the result of deliberation or design. LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. " 13 The sphere of action in all those cases was incompara- bly more limited and confined — the geographical di- mensions of the scene narrow and contracted — the po- litical principles brought into collision of small com- pass — no foundation of the social compact to be laid — no people to be formed — the popular government of the American Revolution had been preceded by a foresee- ing and directing mind. I mean not to say by one mind ; but by a pervading mind, which in a preceding age had inspired the prophetic verses of Berkley, and which may be traced back to the first Puritan settlers of Plymouth and of Massachusetts Bay. "From the first institution of the Company of Massachusetts Bay," says Dr. Robertson, "its members seem to have been animated with a spirit of innovation in civil poli- cy as well as in religion ; and by the habit of rejecting established usages in the one, they were prepared for deviating from them in the other. They had applied for a royal charter, in order to give legal effect to their operations in England, as acts of a body politic ; but the persons whom they sent out to America, as soon as they landed there, considered themselves as individu- als, united together by voluntary association, possess- ing the natural right of men who form a society to adopt what mode of government and to enact what laws they deemed most conducive to general felicity." And such had continued to be the prevailing spirit of the people of New England from the period of their settlement to that of the revolution. The people of Virginia, too notwithstanding their primitive loyalty, 14 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. had been trained to revolutionary doctrines and to war- like habits ; by their frequent collision with Indian wars ; by the convulsions of Bacon's rebelUon, and by the wars with France, of which their own borders were the theatre, down to the close of the war which immediately preceded that of the revolution. The contemplation and the defiance of danger, a qualifica- tion for all great enterprise and achievement upon earth, was from the very condition of their existence, a property almost universal to the British Colonists in North America ; and hardihood of body, unfettered energy of intellect and intrepidity of spirit, fitted them for trials, which the feeble and enervated races of other ages and climes could never have gone through. For the three several stages of this new Epocha in the earthly condition of man, a superintending Provi- dence had ordained that there should arise from the native population of the soil, individuals with minds organized and with spirits trained to the exigencies of the times, and to the successive aspects of the social state. In the contest of principle which originated with the attempt of the British Government to burden their Colonies with taxation by act of Parliament, the natural rights of mankind found efficient defenders in James Otis, Patrick Henry, John Dickinson, Josiah Quincy, Benjamin Franklin, Arthur Lee and numerous other writers of inferior note. As the contest changed its character, Samuel and John Adams and Thomas Jeflferson were among the first who raised the standard of Independence and prepared the people for the con- LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. ' 15 flict through which they were to pass. For the con- test of physical force by arms, Washington, Charles Lee, Putnam, Green, Gates, and a graduation of others of inferior ranks had been prepared by the preceding wars — by the conquest of Canada and by the previous capture of Louisburg. From the beginning of the war, every action was disputed with the perseverance and tenacity of veteran combatants, and the minute men of Lexington and Bunker's Hill were as little pre- pared for flight at the onset as the Macedonian pha- lanx of Alexander or the tenth legion of Julius Caesar. But the great w^ork of the North American revolu tion was not in the maintenance of the rights of the British Colonies by argument, nor in the conflict of physical force by war. The Declaration of Indepen- dence annulled the national character of the American people. That character had been common to them all as subjects of one and the same sovereign, and that sovereign was a king. The dissolution of that tie was pronounced by one act common to them all, and it left them as members of distinct communities in the rela- tions towards each other, bound only by the obligations of the law of nature and of the Union, by which they had renounced their connexion with the mother coun- try. But what was to be the condition of their national existence 1 This was the problem of difficult solution for them ; and this was the opening of the new era in the science of government and in the history of man- kind. 16 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. Their municipal governments were founded upon the common law of England, modified by their respective charters ; by the Parliamentary law of England so far as it had been adopted hy their usages, and by the en- actments of their own Legislative assemblies. This was a complicated system of law, and has formed a subject of much internal perplexity to many of the States of the Union, and in several of them continues unadjusted to this day. By the common consent of all, however, this was reserved for the separate and ex- clusive regulation of each state within itself. As a member of the community of nations, it was also agreed that they should constitute one body — "E Pluribus Unum" was the device which they as- sumed as the motto for their common standard. And there was one great change from their former condi- tion, which they adopted with an unanimity so abso- lute, that no proposition of a different character was ever made before them. It was that all their govern- ments should be republican. They were determined not only to be separately republics, but to tolerate no other form of government as constituting a part of their community. A natural consequence of this determi- nation was that they should remain separate indepen- dencies, and the first suggestion which presented itself to them, was that their Union should be merely a con- federation. In the first and in the early part of the second stage of the revolution, the name of James Madison had not appeared. At the commencement of the contest lilFE OF JAMES MADISON. 17 he was but ten years of age. When the first blood was shed, here in the streets of Boston, he was a stu- dent in the process of his education at Princeton Col- lege, where the next year, 1771, he received the degree of Bachelor of Arts. He was even then so highly dis- tinguished by the power of application and the rapidity of his progress, that he performed all the exercises of the two senior Collegiate years in one — while at the same time his deportment was so exemplary, that Dr. Witherspoon, then at the head of that College, and af- terwards himself one of the most eminent Patriots and Sages of our revolution, always delighted in bearing testimony to the excellency of his character at that early stage of his career ; and said to Thomas Jefferson long afterwards, when they were all colleagues in the revolutionary Congress, that in the whole career of Mr. Madison at Princeton, he had never known him to say or do an indiscreet thing. Discretion in its influence upon the conduct of men is the parent of moderate and conciliatory counsels, and these were peculiarly indispensable to the perpetuation of the American Union, and to the prosperous advance- ment and termination of the revolution, precisely at the period when Mr. Madison was first introduced into public life. In 1775, among the earliest movements of the revo- lutionary contest, he was a member of the Committee of PubHc Safety of the County of Orange, and in 1776, of the Convention substituted for the ordinary Legis- lature of the Colony. By one of those transient ca- 18 I.IIi: or JAMES MADISON. prices of popular favour, wliich sometimes influence elections, he was not returned to the House of Dele- gates in 1777, but was immediately after elected by that body to the Executive Council, of which he con- tinued a leading member till the close of the year 1779, and was then transferred by the Legislature to the representation of the Commonwealth in the Conti- nental Congress. His first entrance into pubhc Ufe was signalized by the resolution of the Convention of the State, instructing their Delegates to vote for the Inde- pendence of the Colonies ; by the adoption of a de- claration of rights, and by their organization of a State government, which continued for more than half a cen- tury the Constitution of the Commonwealth before it underwent the revision of the people ; an event in which he was destined again to take a conspicuous part. On the 20th of March, 1780, he took his seat as a delegate in the Congress of the Confederation. It was then in the midst of the revolution, and under the influence of its most trying scenes, that his politi- cal character was formed ; and then it was that the virtue of discretion, the spirit of moderation, the con- ciliatory temper of compromise found room for exer- cise in its most comprehensive extent. One of the provisions in the articles of Confedera- tion most strongly marked with that same spirit of Liberty, the vital breath of the contest in which our fathers were engaged ; the true and undying conser- vative spirit by which we their children enjoy that Freedom which they achieved ; but which like all LIFE OF JAAIES MADISOINT. 19 Other pure and virtuous principles sometimes leads to error by its excess, was that no member of this om- nipotent Congress should hold that office more than three years in six. This provision, hov^^ever, was con- strued not to have commenced its operation until the final ratification of the articles by all the States on the first of March, 1781. Mr. Madison remained in Con gress nearly four years, from the 20th of March, 1780, till the first Monday in November, 1783. He was thus a member of that body during the last stages of the revolutionary war and for one year after the con- clusion of the Peace. He had, during that period, unceasing opportunities to observe the mortifying in- efficiency of the merely federative principle upon which the Union of the States had been organized, and had taken an active part in all the remedial meas- ures proposed by Congress for amending the Articles of Confederation, A Confederation is not a country. There is no magnet of attraction in any league of Sovereign and Independent States which causes the heart-strings of the individual man to vibrate in unison with those of his neighbor. Confederates are not Countrymen, as the tie of affinity by convention can never be so close as the tie of kindred by blood. The Confederation of the North American States was an e.xperiment of in- estimable value, even by its failure. It taught our fathers the lesson, that they had more, infinitely more to do than merely to achieve their Independence by war. That they must form their social compact upon 20 LIFE OF JAME8 MADISON. principles never before attempted upon earth. That the Achean league of ancient days, the Hanseatic league of the middle ages, the leagues of Switzerland or of the Netherlands of later times, furnished no precedent upon which they could safely build their la- bouring plan of State. The Confederation was per- haps as closely knit together as it was possible that such a form of poHty could be grappled ; but it was matured by the State Legislatures without consulta- tion with the People, and the jealousy of sectional collisions, and the distrust of all delegation of power, stamped every feature of the work with inefficiency. The deficiency of powers in the Confederation was immediately manifested in their inability to regulate the commerce of the country, and to raise revenue, indispensable for the discharge of the debt accumu- lated in the progress of the Revolution. Repeated efforts were made to supply this deficiency ; but al- ways without success. On the 3d of February, 1781, it was recommended to the several States as indispensably necessary that they should vest a power in Congress to levy for the use of the United States a duty of five per cent, ad valorem upon foreign importations, and all prize goods condemned in a Court of Admiralty ; the money arising from those duties to be appropriated to the discharge of the debts contracted for the support of the war. On the 18th of April, 1783, a new recommendation was adopted by Resolutions of nine States, as indis- LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 21 pensably necessary to the restoration of public credit, and to the punctual and honorable discharge of the public debt, to invest the Congress with a power to lay certain specific duties upon spirituous liquors, tea, sugar, coffee and cocoa, and five per cent, ad valorem upon all other imported articles of merchandise, to be exclusively appropriated to the payment of the principal or interest of the public debt. And that as a further provision for the payment of the interest of the debt, the States themselves should levy a revenue to furnish their respective quotas of an aggregate annual sum of one million five hundred thousand dollars. And that to provide a further guard for the pay- ment of the same debts, to hasten their extinguish- ment, and to establish the harmony of the United States, the several States should make liberal cessions to the Union of their territorial claims. With this act a Committee, consisting of Mr. Mad- ison, Mr, Ellsworth and Mr. Hamilton, was appoint- ed to prepare an address to the States, which on the 26th of the same month was adopted, and transmitted together with eight documentary papers, demonstra- ting the necessity that the measures recommended by the act should be adopted by the States. This address, one of those incomparable State pa- pers which more than all the deeds of arms immortal- ized the rise, progress and termination of the North American revolution, was the composition of James Madison. After compressing into a brief and lumin- 22 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. ous summary all the unanswerable arguments to in- duce the restoration and maintenance of the public faith, it concluded with the following solemn and pro- phetic admonition : " Let it be remembered, that it has ever been the pride and boast of America, that the rights for which she contended, were the rights of human nature. By the blessing of the Author of these rights on the means exerted for their defence, they have prevailed over all opposition, and form the basis of thirteen independent States. No instance has heretofore occurred, nor can any instance be expected hereafter to occur, in which the unadulterated forms of republican Government can pretend to so fair an opportunity of justifying themselves by their fruits. In this view the citizens of the United States are responsible for the greatest trust ever confided to a poUtical society. If justice, good faith, honor, gratitude and all other qualities which ennoble the character of a nation, and fulfil the ends of Government be the fruits of our establish- ments, the cause of Liberty will acquire a dignity and lustre which it has never yet enjoyed ; and an ex- ample will be set w^hich cannot but have the most favorable influence on the rights of mankind. If, on the other side, our Governments should be unfortu- nately blotted with the reverse of these cardinal and essential virtues, the great cause which we have en- gaged to vindicate will be dishonored and betrayed ; the last and fairest experiment in favor of the rights of human nature will be turned against them ; and LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 23 their patrons and friends exposed to be insulted and silenced by the votaries of tyranny and usurpation." My countrymen ! do not youi* hearts burn within you at the recital of these words, when the retrospect brings to your minds the time when, and the person by whom they were spoken 1 Compare them with the closing paragraphs of the address from the first Congress of 1774, to your forefathers, the people of the Colonies. " Your own salvation and that of your posterity now depends upon yourselves. Against the tempo- rary inconveniences you may suffer from a stoppage of Trade, you will weigh in the opposite balance the endless miseries you and your descendants must en- dure from an established arbitrary power. You will not forget the Honor of your Country that must, from your behavior, take its title in the estimation of the world to Glory or to Shame ; and you will with the deepest attention reflect, that if the peaceable mode of opposition recommended by us be broken and ren- dered ineffectual, you must inevitably be reduced to choose either a more dangerous contest, or a final ruinous and infamous submission. We think ourselves bound in duty to observe to you that the schemes agi- tated against these Colonies have been so conducted as to render it prudent that you should extend your views to mournful events and be in all respects pre- pared for every contingency." That was the trumpet of summons to the conflict of the revolution ; as the address of April, 1783 was 24 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. the note of triumph at its close. They were the first and the last words of the Spirit, which in the germ of the Colonial contest, brooded over its final fruit, the universal emancipation of civilized man. Compare them both with the opening and closing paragraphs of the Declaration of Independence, too deeply rivited in your memories to need the repetition of them by me ; and you have the unity of action es- sential to all heroic achievement for the benefit of mankind, and you have the character from its opening to its close ; the beginning, the middle and the end of that unexampled, and yet unimitated moral and pohti- cal agent, the Revolutionary North American Con- gress. But the Address of 1783 marks the commencement of one era in American History as well as the close of another. Madison, Ellsworth, Hamilton, were not of the Congress of 1774, nor yet of the Congress which declared Independence. They were of a suc- ceeding generation, men formed in and by the revolu- tion itself. They had imbibed the Spirit of the revo- lution, but the nature of their task was changed. Theirs was no longer the duty to call upon their coun- trymen to extend their views to mournful events, and to prepare themselves for every contingency. But more emphatically than even the Congress of 1774, were they required to warn their fellow citizens that their salvation and that of their posterity depended upon themselves. The warfare of self defence against foreign oppres- LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 25 sion was accomplished. Independence, unqualified, commercial and political, was acheived and recog- ' nised. But there was yet in substance no nation — no people — no country common to the Union. These had been self-formed in the heat of the common strug- gle for freedom ; and evaporated in the very success of the energies they had inspired. A Confederation of separate State Sovereignties, never sanctioned by the body of the people, could furnish no effective Government for the nation. A cold and lifeless indif- ference to the rights, the interests, and the duties of the Union had fallen like a palsy upon all -their facul- ties instead of that almost supernatural vigor which, at the origin of their contest, had inscribed upon their banners, and upon their hearts, "join or die." In November, 1783, Mr. Madison's constitutional term of service in Congress, as limited by the restric- tion in the articles of Confederation, expired. But his talents were not lost to his Country. He was elected the succeeding year a member of the Legisla- ture of his native State, and continued by annual elec- tion in that station till November, 1786, when having become re-eligible to Congress, he was again returned to that body, and on the 12th of February, 1787, re- sumed his seat among its members. In the Legislature of Virginia, his labors, during his absence of three years from the general councils of the Confederacy, were not less arduous and unre- mitting, nor less devoted to the great purposes of rev- olutionary legislation, than while he had been in Con- 26 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. gress. The colony of Virginia had been settled un- der the auspicies of the Episcopal Churh of England. It was there the established Church ; and all other religious denominations, there, as in England, were stigmatized with the name of dissenters. For the support of this Church, the Colonial laws prior to the revolution had subjected to taxation all the inhabitants of the Colony, and it had been endowed with grants of property by the Crown. The elfect of this had naturally been to render the Church establish- ment unpopular, and the clergy of that establishment generally unfriendly to the revolution. After the close of the War, in the year 1784, Mr. Jefferson in- troduced into the Legislature a Bill for the establish- ment of Religious Freedom. The principle of the Bill was the abohtion of all taxation for the support of Religion, or of its Ministers, and to place the freedom of all religious opinions wholly beyond the control of the Legislature. These purposes were avowed, and supported by a long argumentative pre- amble. The Bill failed however to obtain the assent of the Assembly, and instead of it they prepai-ed and caused to be printed a Bill establishing a provision for teachers of the Christian Religion. At the succeeding session of the Legislature, Mr. Jefferson was absent from the country, but Mr. Madison, as the champion of Religious Liberty, supplied his place. A memorial and Remonstrance against the Bill making provision for the teachers of the Christian Religion was com- posed by Mr. Madison, and signed by multitudes of LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 27 the citizens of the Commonwealth, and the Bill drafted by Mr. Jefierson, together with its preamble, was by the influence of his friend triumphantly carried against all opposition through the Legislature. The principle that religious opinions are altogether beyond the sphere of legislative control, is but one modification of a more extensive axiom, which includes the unhmited freedom of the press, of speech, and of the communication of thought in all its form.s. An authoritative provision by law for the support of teachers of the Christian Religion was prescribed by the third Article of the Bill of Rights in the Constitu- tion of this Commonwealth. An amendment recently adopted by the people has given their sanction to the opinions of Jefierson and Madison, and the substance of the Virginia Statute, for the establishment of Re- ligious Freedom, now forms a part of the Constitution of Massachusetts. That the freedom and communi- cation of thought is paramount to all legislative au- thority, is a sentiment becoming from day to day more prevalent throughout the civilized world, and which it is fervently to be hoped will henceforth remain invio- late by the legislative authorities not only of the Union but of all its confederated States. At the Session of 1785, a general revisal was made of the Statute Laws of Virginia, and the great burden of the task devolved upon Mr. Madison as chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the House. The ge- neral principle which pervaded this operation was the adaptation of the civil code of the Commonwealth, to 28 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. its republican and unfettered independence as a Sove- reign State, and he carried it through with that same spirit of hberty and HberaUty which had dictated the Act for the estabHshment of Rehgious Freedom. The untiring industry, the searching and penetrating ap- pHcation, the imperturbable patience, the moderation and gentleness of disposition, which smoothed his way over the ruggedest and most thorny paths of life, ac- companied him through this transaction as through all the rest. While a member of the Legislature of Vir- ginia, he had contributed more than any other person to the adjustment of that vital interest of the Union, the disposal of the Public Lands. It was the collision of opinions and of interests relating to them which had delayed the conclusion of the Articles of Confedera- tion ; and the cession afterwards made of the North Western Territory was encumbered with conditions which further delayed its acceptance. By the influ- ence of Mr. Madison, the terms of the cession were so modified, that in conformity with them the ordi- nance for the government of the North Western Ter- ritory was finally adopted and established by Congress on the 13th of July, 1787, in the midst of the labors of the Convention at Philadelphia, which two months later presented to the People of the United States for their acceptance, that Constitution of Government, thenceforth the polar star of their Union. The experience of four years in the Congress of the Confederation, had convinced Mr. Madison that the Union could not be preserved by means of that insti- LIFE OF.JAiMES MADISOiV. 29 tution. That its inherent infirmity was a deficiency of power in the federal head, and that an insurmount- able objection to the grant of further powers to Con- gress, always arose from the adverse prejudices and jealousy with which the demand of them was urged by that body itself. The difBculty of obtaining such grant of power, was aggravated by the consideration that it was to be invested in those by whom it was solicited, and was at the same time, and in the same degree, to abridge the power of those by whom it was to be granted. To avoid these obstacles it occurred to Mr. Madi- son that the agency of a distinct, delegated body, having" no invidious interest of its own, or of its mem- bers, npight be better adapted, deliberately to discuss the deficiencies of the federal compact, than the body itself by whom it was administered. The friends with whom he consulted in the Legislature of Virginia, concurred with him in these opinions, and the motion for the appointment of Commissioners to consider of the state of trade in the confederacy suggested by him, was made in the Legislature by his friend, Mr. Tyler, and carried by the weight of his opinions, and • the exertion of hi'fe influence, without opposition. This proposition was made and Commissioners were appointed by the Legislature of Virginia, on the 21st of January, 1786. The Governor of the Common- wealth, Edmund Randolph, was placed at the head of the delegation from the State. Mr. Madison and six others, men of the first character and influence in the 30 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. State, were the other Commissioners. The meeting was held at Annapolis in September, and two com- missioners from New York, three from New Jersey, one from Pennsylvania, three from Delaware, and three from Virginia, constituted the whole number of this Convention. Five States only were represented, and among them, Pennsylvania by a single member. Four States, among whom was Maryland, the very State within which the Assembly was held, had not even appointed Commissioners, and the deputies from four others, among whom was our own beloved, native Commonwealth, suffering, even then, the awful calamity of a civil war, generated by the imbecility of the federal compact of union, did not even think it worth while to give their attendance. Yet even in that Convention of Annapolis, was the germ of a better order of things. The Commission^ ers elected John Dickinson, of Delaware, their chair- man, and after a session of three days, agreed upon a report, doubtless drafted by Mr. Madison, — addressed to the Legislatures by which they had been ap- pointed, and copies of which were transmitted to the other State Legislatures and to Congress. In this report they availed themselves of a sugges- tion derived from the powers which the Legislature of New Jersey had conferred upon their Commission- ers, and which contemplated a more enlarged revision of the Articles of Confederation ; and they urgently recommended that a second convention of delegates, to which all the States should be invited to appoint LIFE OF JAMES 3IADISO>f. 31 Commissioners, should be held at Philadelphia, on the second Monday of the next May, for a general re- visal of the Constitution of the Federal Government, to render it adequate to the exigencies of the Union, and to report to Congress an act, which, when agreed to by them and confirmed by all the State Legisla- tures, should effectually provide for the same. In this report first occurred the use of the terms Consti- tution of the Federal Government as applied to the United States — and the sentiment was avowed that it should be made adequate to the exigencies of the Union. There was, however, yet no proposal for recurring to the great body of the people. The recommendation of Ihe report was repeated by Congress without direct reference to it, upon a reso- lution offered by the delegation of Massachusetts, founded upon a proviso in the Articles of Confede- ration and upon instructions from the State of New York to their delegates in Congress, and upon the suffo-estion of several States. The Convention as- sembled accordingly at Philadelphia, on the 9th of May, 1787. In most of the inspirations of genius, there is a simplicity, which, when they are familiarized to the general understanding of men by their effects, de- tracts from the opinion of their greatness. That the people qf the British Colonies, who, by their united counsels and energies had achieved their independence, should continue to be one people, and constitute a nation under the form of one or- 32 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. ganized government, was an idea, in itself so simple, and addressed itself at once so forcibly to the reason, to the imagination, and to the benevolent feelings of all, that it can scarcely be supposed to have escaped the mind of any reflecting man from Maine to Geor- gia. It w^as the dictate of nature. But no sooner was it conceived than it was met by obstacles in- numerable to tjie general mass of mankind. They resulted from the existing social institutions, diver- sified among the parties to the projected national union, and seeming to render it impracticable. There were chartered rights for the maintenance of which the war of the revolution itself had first been waged. There were State Sovereignties, corporate feudal baronies, tenacious of their own Uberty, impatient of a superor, and jealous and disdainful of a parainount Sovereign, even in the whole democracy of the nation. There were collisions of boundary and of proprietary right westward in the soil — southward, in its cultivator. In fine the diversities of interests, of opinions, of manners, of habits, and even of ex- traction were so great, that the plan of constituting them one People, appears not to have occurred to any of the members of the Convention before they were assembled together. It was earnestly contested in the Convention itself. A large proportion of the members adhered to the principle of merely revising the articles of the Con- federation and of vesting the powers of Government in the confederate Congress. A proposition to that LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 33 effect was made by Mr. Patterson of New Jersey, in a series of Resolutions, offered as a substitute for those of Mr. Randolph, immediately after the first discussions upon them. Nearly four months of anxious deUberation were employed by an assembly composed of the men who had been the most distinguished for their services civil and military, in conducting the country through the arduous struggles of the revolution — of jnen who _to_ the fire of genius added all the lights of ex- perience, and were stimulated by the impulses at once of ardent patriotism and of individual ambition, as- piring to that last and most arduous labor of con- stituting a nation destined in after times to present a model of Government for all the civilized nations of the earth. On the 17th of September, 1787, they reported. When the substance of their work was gone through, a Committee of five members, of whom Mr. Madison was one, was appointed to revise the style, and to arrange the Articles which had been agreed to by the Convention ; and this Committee was after- wards charged with the preparation of an address to the People of the United States. The address to the People was reported in the form of a letter from Washington, the President of the Convention, to the President of Congress; a Letter, admirable for the brevity and the force with which it presents the concentrated argument for the great change of their condition, which they called upon 2* 34 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. their fellow citizens to sanction. And this Letter, too-ether with an addition of two or three lines in the preamble, reported by the same Committee, did indeed comprise the most powerful appeal that could sway the heart of man, ever exhibited to the contem- plation and to the hopes of the human race. It did not escape the notice or the animadversion of the adversaries to this new national organization. They were at the time when the Constitution was promulgated, perhaps more numerous, and scarcely less respectable, than the adherents to the Consti- tution themselves. They had also, in the manage- ment of the discussion, almost all the popular side of the argument. Government in the first and most obvious aspect which it assumes, is a restraint upon human action, and as such, a restraint upon Liberty. The Constitu- tion of the United States was intended to be a government of great energy, and of course of ex- tensive restriction not only upon individual Liberty but upon the corporate action of States claiming to be Sovereign and Independent. The Convention had been aware that such restraints upon the People could be imposed by no earthly power other than the People themselves. They were aware that to induce the People to impose upon themselves such binding ligaments, motives not less cogent than those which form the basis of human association were indispensably necessary. That the first principle of politics must be indissolubly linked with the first LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 35 principles of morals. They assumed therefore the existence of a People of the United States, and made them declare the Constitution to be their own work — speaking in the first person and saying We, the People of the United States, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America — and then the allegation of motives — to form a more perfect union, to establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity. These are precisely the purposes for which it has pleased the Author of nature to make man a sociable being, and has blended mto one his happiness with that of his kind. So cogent were these motives and so forcibly were they compressed within the compass of this preamble, and in the Letter from President Washington to the President of Congress, that this body immediately and unanimously adopted the resolutions of the Convention, recommending that the projected Con- stitution should be transmitted to the Legislatures of the several States, to be by them submitted to Conventions of Delegates, to be chosen in each State by the People thereof, under the recommendation of its Legislature, for their assent and ratification. This unanimity of Congress is perhaps the strongest evidence ever manifested of the utter contempt into which the Articles of Confederation had fallen. The Congress which gave its unanimous sanction to the 36 LIFE OP JAMES MADISON. measure was itself to be annihilated by the Consti- tution thus proposed. The Articles of Confederation were to be annihilated with it. Yet all the members of the Congress so ready to sanction its dissolution, had been elected by virtue of those Articles of Con- federation — to them the faith of all the States had been pledged, and they had expressly prescribed that no alteration of them should be adopted, but by the unanimous consent of the States. Thus far the proposal first made by Mr. Madison in the Legislature of Virginia, for the new political organization of the Union, had been completely suc- cessful. A People of the United States was formed. A Government, Legislative, Executive and Judicial was prepared for them, and by a daring though unavoidable anticipation, had been declared by its authors to be the Ordinance of that people themselves. It could be made so only by their adoption. But the greatest labor still remained to be performed. The .people throughout the Union were suffering, but a vast proportion of them were unaware of the cause of the evil that was preying upon their vitals. A still greater number were bewildered in darkness in search of a remedy, and there were not wanting those among the most ardent and zealous votaries of Freedom who, instead of adding to the powers of the general Congress, inefficient and imbecile as they were, inclined rather to redeem the confederacy from the forlorn condition to which it was reduced, by stripping the Congress of the pittance of power which '^ LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 37 they possessed. In the indulgence of this spirit the Delegates from our own Commonwealth of INIassa- chusetts, by express instructions from their con- stituents, moved a Resolution that the election and acceptance of any person as a member of Congress should forever thereafter be deemed to disqualify such person from being elected by Congress to any office of trust or profit under the United States, for the term for which he should have been elected a member of that body. This morbid terror of patronage, this patriotic anxiety lest corruption should creep in by appoint- ments of members of Congress to office under the authorities of the Union, has often been reproduced down even to recent days under the present Go- vernment of the Union. Upon the theories or the practice of the present age, it is not the time or the place here to comment. But we cannot forbear to remark upon the solicitude of our venerable fore- fathers in this commonwealth, to remedy the imper- fection of the Articles of Confederation, the abuses of power, by the Congress of that day, and the avenues to corruption by the appointment of their members to office, when we consider that under the exclusions thus proposed, Washington could never have com- manded the armies of the United States : That neither Franklin, John Adams, Arthur Lee, John Jay, Henry Laurens, Thomas Jefferson, Robert Morris, nor Robert R. Livingston could have served them as ministers abroad, or in any ministerial capacity at 38 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. home — and when we reflect that two pubhc Ministers in Europe with their Secretaries, one Secretary of Foreign Affairs, one Secretary of War and three Commissioners of an empty Treasury, constituted the whole Hst of lucrative offices, civil and military, which they had to bestow. This incident may serve as an illustration of the difficulties which were yet to be encountered before the People of the United States could be prevailed upon to fix their seal of approbation upon a constitu- tion issued in their name, and which granted to a central Government, destined to rule over them all, powers of energy surpassing those of the most ab- solute monarchy, and forming, in the declared opinion of Jefferson, the strongest Government in the world. In a people inhabiting so great an extent of Ter- ritory, the difficulties to be surmounted before they could be persuaded to adopt this Constitution, were aggravated both by their dissensions and by their agreements — by the diversity of their interests and the community of their principles. The collision of interests strongly tended to alienate them from one another, and all were alike imbued with a deep aver- sion to any unnecessary grant of power. The Con- stitution was no sooner promulgated than it was as- sailed in the public journals from all quarters of the Union. The Convention was boldly and not unjustly charged with having transcended their powers, and the Congress of the Confederation, were censured in LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 39 no measured terms for having even referred it to the State Legislatures, tobe submitted to the consideration of Conventions of the People. The Congress of the Confederation were in session at New^ York. Several of its members had been at the same time members of the Convention at Phila- delphia — and among them were James Madison and Alexander Hamilton. John Jay was not then a member of Congress nor had he been a member of the Convention — but he was the Secretary of Con- gress for foreign affairs and had held that office, from the time of his return from Europe, immediately after the conclusion of the definitive Treaty of Peace. He had therefore felt in its most painful form the im- becility of the Confederacy of which he was the minister, equally incapable of contracting engage- ments with foreign powers with the consciousness of the power to fulfil them, or of energy to hold foreign nations to the responsibility of performing the engage- ments contracted on their part with the United States. New York, then the central point of the confederacy, was the spot whence the most effective impression could be made by cool, dispassionate argument on the public mind ; and in the midst of the tempest of excitement throughout the country occasioned by the sudden and unexpected promulgation of a system so totally different from that of the Confederation, these three persons undertook in concert, by a series of popular Essays published in the daily journals of the time, to review the system of the Confederation, to -f 40 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. demonstrate its inaptitude not only to all the functions of Government, but even to the preservation of the Union, and the necessity of an establishment at least as energetic as the proposed Constitution to the very existence of the United States as a Nation. The papers under the signature of Publius were addressed to the People of the State of New York, and the introductory Essay, written by Hamilton, declared the purpose to discuss all topics of interest connected with the adoption of the Constitution. The utility of the Union to the prosperity of the People : The insufficiency of the Confederation to preserve that Union : The necessity of an energetic Government : The conformity of the proposed Con- stitution to the true principles of a republican Go- vernment : Its analogy to the Constitution of the State of New York, and the additional security which its adoption would afford to the preservation of re- publican Government, to liberty and to property. The fulfilment of this purpose was accomplished in eighty-six numbers, frequently since republished, and now constituting a classical work in the EngUsh lan- guage, and a commentary upon the Constitution of the United States, of scarcely less authority than the Constitution itself. Written in separate numbers, and in very unequal proportions, it has not indeed that entire unity of design, or execution which might have been expected, had it been the production of a single mind. Nearly two-thirds of the papers were written by Mr. Hamilton. Nearly one third by Mr. Madison, and five numbers only by Mr. Jay. LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 41 In the distribution of the several subjects embraced in the plan of the work, the inducements to adopt the Constitution arising from the relations of the Union with foreign nations, were presented by Mr. Jay ; the defects of the Confederation in this respect were so obvious, and the evil consequences flowing from them, were so deeply and universally felt, that the task was of comparative ease, and brevity, with that of the oth- er two contributors. The defects of the Confedera- tion were indeed a copious theme for them all; and in the analysis of them, for the exposition of their bear- ing on the Legislation of the several States, the two principal writers treated the subject so as to interlace with each other. The 18th, 19th, and 20th numbers are the joint composition of both. In examining close- ly the points selected by these two great co-operators to a common cause, and their course of argument for its support, it is not difficult to perceive that diversity of genius and of character which afterwards separated them so widely from each other on questions of politi- cal interest, affecting the construction of the Constitu- tion which they so ably defended, and so strenuously urged their countrymen to adopt. The ninth and tenth numbers are devoted to the consideration of the utili- ty of the Union as a safeguard against domestic fac- tion and insurrection. They are rival dissertations up- on faction and its remedy. The propensity of all free governments to the convulsions of faction is admitted by both. The advantages of a confederated republic of extensive dimensions to control this admitted and 42 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. unavoidable evil, are insisted on with equal energy in both — but the ninth number, vi^ritten by Hamilton, draws its principal illustrations from the history of the Grecian Republics ; while the tenth, written by Mad- ison, searches for the disease and for its remedies in the nature and the faculties of Man. There is in each of these numbers a disquisition of critical and some- what metaphysical refinement. That of Hamilton, upon a distinction, which he pronounces more subtle than accurate, between a confederacy and consolidation of the States. That of Madison upon the difference between a Democracy and a Republic, as differently af- fected by Faction — meaning by a Democracy, a Gov- ernment administered by the People themselves, and by a Repubhc, a Government by elisctive representa- tion. These distinctions in both cases have, in our ex- perience of the administration of the general Govern- ment, assumed occasional importance, and formed the elements of warm and obstinate party collisions. The fourteenth number of the Federalist, the next in the series written by Mr. Madison, is an elaborate answer to an objection which had been urged against the Constitution, drawn from the extent of country then comprised within the United States. From the deep anxiety pervading the whole of this paper, and a most eloquent and patlietic appeal to the spirit of union, with which it concludes, it is apparent that the objection itself was in the mind of the writer, of the most formidable and plausible character. He en- counters it with all the acuteness of his intellect and LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 43 all the energy of his heart. His chief argument is a recurrence to his distinction hetween a Republic and a Democracy — and next to that by an accurate de- finition of the boundaries within which the United States were then comprised. The range between the 31st and 45th degree of North Latitude, the Atlantic and the Mississippi — he contends that such an extent of territory, with the great improvements which were to be expected in the facilities of communication between its remotest extremes, was not incompatible with the existence of a confederated republic — or at least that from the vital interest of the people of the Union, and of the Liberties of mankind in the success of the American Revolution, it was worthy of an experiment yet untried in the annals of the world. The question to what extent of territory a confede- rate Republic, under one general government may be adopted, without breaking into fragments by its own weight, or settling into a monarchy, subversive of the liberties of the people, is yet of transcendant interest, and of fearful portent to the people of the Union. The Constitution of the United States was formed for a people inhabiting a territory confined to narrow bounds, compared with those which can scarcely be said to confine them now. The acquisition of Loui- siana and of Florida have more than doubled our domain ; and our settlements and our treaties have already removed our Western boundaries from the Mississippi to the Pacific Ocean. A colonial es- tablishment of immense extent still hangs upon our 44 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. Northern borders, and another confederate RepubHc, seems to offer the most alluring spoils to our ambition and avarice at the South. The idea of embracing in one confederated government the v^hole continent of North America, has, at this day, nothing chimerical in its conception, and long before a lapse of time equal to that which has past since the 14th number of the FederaUst v^^as written, may require the invincible spirit and the uncompromising energy of our re- volutionary struggle for its solution. The other papers of the FederaUst, written by Mr. Madison, are from the 37th to the 58th number inclusive. They relate to the difficulties which the Convention had experienced in the formation of a proper plan. To its conformity with Republican prin- ciples, with an apologetic defence of the body for transcending their powers. To a general view of the powers vested by the plan in the general government, and a comparative estimate of the reciprocal influence of the general and of the State governments Math each other. They contain a laborious investigation of the maxims which require a separation of the departments of power, and a discussion of the means for giving to it practical efficacy — and they close with an examination, critical and philosophical, of the or- ganization of the House of Representatives in the Constitution of the United States — with reference to the qualifications of the electors and the elected — to the term of service of the members ; to the ratio of representation ; to the total number of the body ; and LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 45 to the expected su^psequent augmentation of the mem- bers — and here he met and refuted an objection to the plan founded upon its supposed tendency to ele- vate the few above the many. These were the topics discussed by James Madison, and in leaving to his illustrious associate the development of the other De- partments of the Senate, of the Executive, of the Judiciary, and the bearing of the whole system upon the militia, the commerce and revenues, the military and naval establishments, and to the public economy, it was doubtless because both from inclination and principle he preferred the consideration of those parts of the instrument which bore upon popular right, and the freedom of the citizens, to that of the aristocratic and monarchical elements of the whole fabric. The papers of the Federalist had a powerful, but limited inlluence upon the public mind. The Constitu- tion was successively submitted to the Conventions of the People, in each of the thirteen States, and in al- most every one of them was debated against opposi- tions of deep feeling, and strong party excitement. The authors of the Federalist were again called to buckle on their armour in defence of their plan. The Con- vention for the Commonwealth of Virginia, met in June, 1788, nine months after the Constitution had been promulgated. It had already been ratified by seven of the States, and New Hampshire, at an adjourned ses- sion of her Convention, adopted it while the Conven- tion of Virginia were in session. The assent of that State was therefore to complete the number of nine, \ 46 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. which the Constitution itself had provided should be sufficient for undertaking its execution between the ratifying States. A deeper interest was then involv- ed in the decision of Virginia, than in that of any oth- er member of the Confederacy, and in no State had the opposition to the plan been so deep, so extensive, so formidable as there. Two of her citizens, second only to Washington by the weight of their characters, the splendor of their public services and the reputa- tion of their genius and talents, Patrick Henry, the first herald of the Revolution in the South, as James Otis had been at the North, and Thomas Jefierson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, and the most intimate and confidential friend of Madison him- self, disapproved the Constitution. Jefierson was in- deed at that time absent from the State and the coun- try, as the representative of the United States at the Court of France. His objections to the Constitution were less fervent and radical. Patrick Henry's oppo- sition was to the whole plan, and to its fundamental principle the change from a confederation of Indepen- dent States, to a complicated government, partly fed- eral, and partly national. He was a member of the Virginia Convention ; and there it was that Mr. Mad- ison was destined to meet and encounter, and over- come the all but irresistible power of his eloquence, and the inexhaustible resources of his gigantic mind. The debates in the Virginia Convention furnish an exposition of the principles of the Constitution, and a Commentary upon its provisions not inferior to the pa- LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 47 pers of the Federalist. Patrick Henry pursued his hostility to the system into all its details; ohjecting not only to the Preamble and the first Article, but to the Senate, to the President, to the Judicial Power, to the treaty making power, to the control given to Con- gress over the mihtia, and especially to the omission of a Bill of Rights — seconded and sustained with great ability by George Mason, who had been a member of the Convention which formed the Constitution, by James Monroe and William Grayson, there was not a controvertible point, real or imaginary, in the whole instrument which escaped their embittered opposition; while upon every point Mr. Madison was prepared to meet them, with cogent argument, with intent and anx- ious feeling, and with mild, conciliatory gentleness of temper, disarming the adversary by the very act of seeming to decline contention with him. Mr. Madi- son devoted himself particularly to the task of an- swering and replying to the objections of Patrick Hen- ry, following him step by step, and meeting him at ev- ery turn. His principal coadjutors were Governor Randolph, Edmund Pendleton, the President of the Convention, John Marshall, George Nicholas, and Henry Lee of Westmoreland. Never was there as- sembled in Virginia a body of men, of more surpas- sing talent, of bolder energy, or of purer integrity than in that Convention. The volume of their de- bates should be the pocket and the pillow companion of every youthful American aspiring to the honor of rendering important service to his country; and there, 48 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. as he reads aud meditates, will he not fail to perceive the steady, unfaltering mind of James Madison, march- i-ng from victory to victory, over the dazzling but then beclouded genius and eloquence of Patrick Henry. The result was the unconditional ratification by a raajoritv of only eight votes, of the Constitution of the United States on the part of the Commonwealth of Virginia, together with resolutions, recommending sundry amendments to supply the omission of a Bill of Rights. The example for this had been first set by the Convention of Massachusetts, at the motion of John Hancock, and it was followed by several other of the State Conventions, and gave occasion to the first ten Articles, amendatory of the Constitution pre- pared by the first Congress of the United States and ratified by the competent number of the State Legis- latures, and which supply the place of a Bill of Rights. In the organization of the Government of the Uni- ted States, Washington, the leader of the armies of the revolution, the President of the Convention which had prepared the Constitution for the acceptance of the People — first in War, first in Peace, and first in the hearts of his Countrymen, was by their unanimous voice called to the first Presidency of the United States. For his assistance in the performance of the functions of the Executive power, after the institution by Congress of the chief Departments, he selected Alexander Hamilton for the olTice of Secretary of the Treasury, and Thomas Jefferson for that of Secreta- LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 49 ry of State. Mr. Madison was elected one of the members of the House of Representatives in the first Congress of the United States under the Constitution. The Treasury itself was to be organized. Public credit, prostrated by the impotence of the Confedera- tion, was to be restored, provision was to be made for the punctual payment of the public debt — taxes were to be levied — the manufactures, commerce and navi- gation of the Country were to be fostered and en- couraged ; and a system of conduct towards foreign powers was to be adopted and maintained. A Ju- diciary system was also to be instituted, accommodat- ed to the new and extraordinary character of the general Government. A permanent seat of Govern- ment was to be selected and subjected to the exclusive jurisdiction of Congress ; and the definite action of each of the Departments of the Government was to be settled and adjusted. In the councils of President Washington, divisions of opinion between Mr. Jeffer- son and Mr. Hamilton soon widened into coHisions of principle and produced mutual personal estrangement and irritation. In the formation of a general system of policy for the conduct of the Administration in National concerns at home and abroad, different views were taken by Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Hamil- ton, which Washington labored much, but with little success, to conciliate. Hamilton, charged by suc- cessive calls from the House of Representatives, for reports of plans for the restoration of public credit ; upon the protection and encouragement of Manufac- 3 50 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. tures, and upon a National Mint and Bank, ti-ansrnit- ted upon each of those subjects reports of consum- mate ability, and proposed plans most of which were adopted by Congress almost without alteration. The Secretary of State during the same period made re- ports to Congress, not less celebrated, on the Fish- eries, on the system of commercial regulations most proper to be established, and upon weights and mea- sures. Negotiations with foreign powers, which the inefficiency of the confederation had left in a lament- able and languishing condition, humiliating to the national honor and reputation, were resumed and rein- stituted, and by long and complicated correspondences with the Governments of Great Bi'itain, Spain and France, the National character was in the first term of the administration of Washington redeemed and exhibited to the world with a splendor never surpass- ed, and which gave to the tone of our national inter- course with the Sovereigns of the earth a dignity, a firmness, a candor and moderation, which shamed the blustering and trickish diplomacy of Europe at that day and shed a beam of unfading glory upon the name of republican America. But the National Con- stitution had not only operated as if by enchantment a most auspicious revolution in the character and re- putation of the newly independent American People ; it had opened new avenues to honor and power and fame, and new prospects to individual ambition. No sooner was the new Government organized than the eyes, the expectations and the interests and pas- LIFE OF JAMES MADISO.N. 51 sions of men turned to the designation of the succes- sion to the Presidency, when the official term of Washington should be completed. His own intention was to retire at the expiration of the first four years allotted to the service. The candidates of the North and South, supported by the geographical sympathies of their respective friends, were already giving rise to the agency of political combinations. The North- ern candidate was not yet distinctly designated, but before the expiration of the first Congress, Mr. Jeffer- son was the only intended candidate of the South. The Protection of Manufactures, the restoration of public credit, the recovery of the securities of the public debt from a state of depreciation little short of total debasement, and the facilities of exchange and of circulation furnished by the establishment of a National Bank, were of far deeper interest to the commercial and Atlantic than to the plantation States. Mr. Jefferson's distrust and jealousy of the powers granted by the Constitution followed him into office, and were perhaps sharpened by the successful exer- cise of them, under the auspices of a rival statesman ; he insisted upon a rigid construction of all the grants of power — he denied the Constitutional power of Congress to establish Corporations, and especially a National Bank. The question was discussed in the Cabinet Council of Washington, and written opinions of Mr. Jefferson and of Edmund Randolph, then At- torney General, against the Constitutional power of Congress to establish a Bank, were given. With 52 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. these opinions, Mr. Madison then concurred. Other questions of justice and expediency, connected with the funding system of Mr. Hamilton, gave rise to warm and acrimonious debates in Congress, and ming- ling with the sectional divisions of the Union, and with individual attachments to men, gave an impulse and direction to party spirit which has continued to this day, and however modified by changes of times, of circumstances, and of men, can never be wholly extinguished. Too happy should I be, if with a voice speaking from the last to the coming genera- tion of my country, I could effectually urge them to seek, in the temper and moderation of James Madi- son, that healing balm which assuages the malignity of the deepest seated political disease, redeems to life the rational mind, and restores to health the incorpo- rated union of our country, even from the brain fever of party spirit. To the sources of dissensions and the conflicts of opinion transmitted from the confederation, or genera- ted by the organization of the new Government, were soon added the confluent streams of the French revo- lution and its complication of European Wars. There were features in the French revolution closely resem- ling our own ; there were points of national interest in both countries well adapted to harmonize their rela- tions with each other, and a sentiment of gratitude rooted in the hearts of the American People, by the recent remembrance of the benefits derived from the alliance with France, and community of cause against LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 53 Britain, engaged all our sympathies in favor of the People of France, subverting their own Monarchy ; and when her War, first kindled with Austria and Prussia, spread its flames to Great Britain, the partial- ities of resentment and hatred, deepening the tide and stimulating the current of more kindly and benevolent affections, became so ardent and impetuous that there was imminent danger of the country's being immedi- ately involved in the War on the side of France — a danger greatly aggravated by the guaranty to France of her Islands in the West Indies. The subject im- mediately became a cause of deliberation in the Ex- ecutive Cabinet, and discordant opinions again disclos- ed themselves between the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of the Treasury. On the 18th of April, 1793, President Washington submitted to his Cabinet thirteen questions with regard to the measures to be taken by him in consequence of the revolution which had overthrown the French monarchy; of the new organization of a republic in that country; of the appointment of a minister from that republic to the United States, and of the war, declared by the National Convention of France against Great Britain. The first of these questions was, whether a proclamation should issue to prevent inter- ferences of the citizens of the United States in the War] Whether the proclamation should or should not contain a declaration of neutrality t The second was whether a minister from the republic of France should be received. Upon these two questions the 54 LIFE OF JA3IES MADISON. opinion of the cabinet was unanimous in the affirma- tive — that a Proclamation of neutrality should issue and that the minister from the French Republic should be received. But upon all the other questions, the opinions of the four heads of the Departments were equally divided. They were indeed questions of dif- ficulty and delicacy equal to their importance. No less than whether, after a revolution in France anni- hilating the Government with which the treaties of al- liance and of commerce had been contracted, the trea- ties themselves were to be considered binding as be- tween the nations; and particularly whether the stipu- lation of guaranty to France of her possessions in the West Indies, was binding upon the United States to the extent of imposing upon them the obligation of ta- kintj side with France in the War. As the members of the Cabinet disagreed in their opinions upon these questions, and as there was no immediate necessity for deciding them, the further consideration of them was postponed, and they were never afterwards resumed. While these discussions of the Cabinet of Washing- ton were held, the Minister Plenipotentiary from the French republic arrived in this country. He had been appointed by the National Convention of France wiiich had dethroned, and tried, and sentenced to death, and executed Louis the XVIth, abolished the Monarchy, and proclaimed a republic one and indi- visible, under the auspices of liberty, equality and fra- ternity, as thenceforth the Government of France. By all the rest of Europe, they were then considered LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 55 as revolted subjects in rebellion against their Sover- eign; and were not recognized as constituting an in- dependent Government. General Hamilton and General Knox were of opin- ion that the Minister from France should be condition- ally received, with the reservation of the question, whether the United States were still bound to fulfill the stipulations of the Treaties. They inchned to the opinion that the Treaties themselves were annulled by the revolution of the Government in France — an opui- ion to which the example of the Revolutionary Gov- ernment had given plausibility by declaring some of the Treaties made by the abolished Monarchy, no lon- ger binding upon the nation. Mr. Hamilton thought also, that France had no just claim to the fulfilment of the stipulation of guaranty, because that stipulation, and the whole Treaty of Alliance in which it was con- tained were professedly, and on the face of them, on- ly defensive, while the War which the French Conven- tion had declared against Great Britain, was on the part of France offensive, the first declaration having been issued by her — that the United States were at all events absolved from the obligation of the guar- anty by their inabihty to perform it, and that under the Constitution of the United States the interpreta- tion of Treaties, and the obligations resulting from them, were within the competency of the Executive Department, at least concurrently with the Legisla- ture. It does not appear that these opinions were de- bated or contested in the Cabinet. By their unani- 56 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. mous advice the Proclamation was issued, and Ed- mund Charles Genet was received as Minister Pleni potentiary of the French Republic. Thus the Execu- tive administration did assume and exercise the power of recognising a revolutionary foreign Government as a legitimate Sovereign with whom the ordinary diplo- matic relations were to be entertained. But the Pro- clamation contained no allusion whatever to the Trea- ties between the United States and France, nor of course to the Article of Guaranty or its obligations. Whatever doubts may have been entertained by a large portion of the people, of the right of the Exe- cutive to acknowledge a new and revolutionary go- vernment, not recognized by any other Sovereign State, or of the sound policy of receiving without waiting for the sanction of Congress, a minister from a republic which had commenced her career by put- ting to death the king whom she had dethroned, and which had rushed into war with almost all the rest of Europe, no manifestation of such doubts was publicly made. A current of popular favor sustained the French Revolution, at that stage of its progress, which nothing could resist, and far from indulging any question of the right of the President to recognize a new revolutionary government, by receiving from it the credentials which none but Sovereigns can grant, the American People would, at that moment, have scarcely endured an instant of hesitation on the part of the President, which should have delayed for an hour the reception of the minister from the Republic LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 57 of France. But the Proclamation enjoining neu- trality upon the people of the United States, in- directly counteracted the torrent of partiality in favor of France, and was immediately assailed with intem- perate violence in many of the public journals. The right of the Executive to issue any Proclamation of neutrahty was fiercely and pertinaciously denied, as a usurpation of Legislative authority, and in that par- ticular case it was charged with forestalling and pre- maturely deciding the question whether the United States were bound, by the guaranty to France of her West India possessions in the treaty of alliance, to take side in the war with her against Great Britain — and with deciding it against France. Mr. Jefferson had advised the Proclamation; but he had not considered it as deciding the question of the guaranty. The government of the French Re- public had not claimed and never did claim the per- formance of the guaranty. But so strenuously was the risfht of the President to issue the Proclamation contested, that Mr. Hamilton, the first adviser of the measure, deemed it necessary to defend it inofficially before the public. This he did in seven successive papers under the signature of Pacificus. But in defending the Proclamation, he appears to consider it as necessarily involving the decision against the obli- gation of the guaranty, and maintain the right of the Executive so to decide. Mr. Madison, perhaps in some degree influenced by the opinions and feelings of his long cherished and venerated friend, Jefferson, 3* 58 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. was already harboring suspicions of a formal design on the part of Hamilton, and of the federal party ge- nerally, to convert the government of the United States into a monarchy like that of Great Britain, and thought he perceived in these papers of Paciticus the assertion of a prerogative in the President of the United States to engage the nation in war. He there- fore entered the lists against Mr. Hamilton in the public journals, and in five papers under the signature of Helvidius, scrutinized the doctrines of Pacificus with an acuteness of intellect never perhaps surpassed, and with a severity scarcely congenial to his natural disposition, and never on any other occasion indulged. Mr. Hamilton did not reply ; nor in any of his papers did he notice the animadversions of Helvidius. But all the Presidents of the United States have from that time exercised the right of yielding and withholding the recognition of governments consequent upon re- volutions, though the example of issuing a Proclama- tion of neutrality has never been repeated. The re- spective powers of the President and Congress of the United States, in the case of war with foreign powers, are yet undetermined. Perhaps they can never be defined. The Constitution expressly gives to Congress the power of declaring war, and that act can of course never be performed by the President alone. But war is often made without being declared. War is a state in which nations are placed not alone by their own acts, but by the acts of other nations. The declaration of war is in its nature a legislative LIFE OF JAMES MADISOV. 59 act, but the conduct of war is and must be executive. However startled we may be at the idea that the Executive Chief Magistrate has the power of involv- ing the nation in war, even without consulting Con- gress, an experience of fifty years has proved that in numberless cases he has and must have exercised the power. In the case wiiich gave rise to this contro- versy, the recognition of the French Republic and the reception of her minister might iiave been regard- ed by the allied powers as acts of hostility to them, and they did actually interdict all neutral commerce with France. Defensive war must necessarily be among the duties of the Executive Chief Magistrate. The papers of PaciHcus and Helvidius are among the most ingenious and profound Commentaries on that most important part of the Constitution, the distribu- tion of the Legislative and Executive powers incident to war, and when considered as supplementary to the joint labors of Hamilton and Madison in the Federal- ist, thev possess a deep and monitory interest to the American philosophical Statesman. The Federalist exhibits the joint eftbrts of two powerful minds in promoting one great common object, the adoption of the Constitution of the United States. The papers of Pacificus and Helvidius present the same minds, in collision with each other, exerting all their energies in conflict upon the construction of the same instrument which they had so arduously labored to establish ; and it is remarkable that upon the points in the papers of Pacificus most keenly contested by his adversary, the 60 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. most forcible of his arguments are pointed with quo- tations from the papers of the Federalist, written by- Mr. Hamilton. But whether in conjunction with or in opposition to each other, the co-operation or the encounter of intel- lects thus exalted and refined, controlled by that mo- deration and humanity, which have hitherto character- ized the history of our Union, cannot but ultimately terminate in spreading light and promoting peace among men. Happy, thrice happy the people, whose political oppositions and conflicts have no ultimate ap- peal but to their own reason; of whose party feuds the only conquests are of argument, and whose only triumphs are of the mind. In other ages and in other regions than our own, the question of the respective powers of the Legislature and of the Executive with reference to war, might itself have been debated in blood, and sent numberless victims to their account on the battle-field or the scaflfold. So it was in the san- guinary annals of the French Revolution. So it has been and yet is in the successive revolutions of our South American neighbors. May that merciful Being who has hitherto overruled all our diversities of opin- ion, tempered our antagonizing passions, and concilia- ted our conflicting interests, still preside in all our councils, and in the tempests of our civil commotions still ride in the whirlwind and direct the storm. It was indeed at one of the most turbulent and tem- pestuous periods of human history that the Constitu- tion of the United States first went into operation LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 61 It was convulsed not only by the convulsions of the old world, but by tumultuary agitations of the most alarming character and tendency from within. Such were the dangers and the difficulties with which the Government of the United States, from the first mo- ment of its organization under Washington, was beset and surrounded, that they undoubtedly led him to the determination to withdraw from the charge and re- sponsibility of presiding over it, at as early a period as possible. It was with difficulty that he was pre- vailed upon to postj)one the execution of this design till the expiration of a second term of service; but so radically diffijrent were the opinions and the systems of policy of Washington's two principal advisers, es- pecially with reference to the external relations of the United States, that he was unable to retain beyond the limits of the first term their united assistance in his Cabinet. In the struggle to maintain the neutrality which he had proclaimed, and in the festering inflam- mation of interests and passions, gathering with the progress of the French revolution, he coincided more in judgment with the Secretary of the Treasury, than with the Secretary of State, and they successively retired from their offices, in which each of them had rendered the most important services, and contributed to raise the Country and its Government high in the estimation of the world, but unfortunately without be- ing able to harmonise, and finally even to co-operate with each other. Mr. Jefferson's retirement was first in order ; it 62 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. was voluntarv, but under circumstances of dissatis- faction at the prevalence of the Councils of his rival in the Cabinet — and under irritated prepossessions of a deliberate design, in Hamilton, and of all the leading supporters of Washington's administration, to shape the Government of the United States into a monarchy like that of Great Britain. This exasperated feeling, nourished by the political controversy then blazing in all its fury in the war between France and the mo- narchies of Europe, gradually became the main spring of the opposition to Washington's administration ; an opposition which from that time looked to Jefferson as their leader and head. This opposiiion, fomented by the unprincipled injustice of both the belligerent European powers, and especially by the abandoned profligacy of the directorial Government of France, continued and increased until in the last year of Washington's administration, a majority if not of the people of the United States, at least of their represen tatives in Congress, were associated with it. Of that opposition, Mr. Jetferson was the favored candidate for the succession to the Presidency, and by the result of a severely contested election, was placed in the chair of the Senate as Vice President of the United States. This was the effect of a provision in the Constitution, which has since been altered by an amendment. It was one of the new experiments in Government, attempted by the Constitution, and had then been received with an unusual degree of favor, by an anticipated expectation that its operation would MFK OF JAME8 MAl)l?!0\. 6S be to mitigate and conciliate party spirit, by causing two persons to be voted for, to fill the same ofijce of President, and by consoling the unsucessful candidate and his friends with the second oHice in the Govern- ment of the Union. The test of experience soon dis- abused the fallacious foresight of a benevolent theory, and disclosed springs of human action adverse to the device of placing either a political antagonist or co- adjator of the Chief Magistrate at the head of the Senate, and as contingently his successor. The principles of the administration of Washington were pursued by his immediate successor. The op- position to them was encouraged and fortified by the position of their leader in the second seat of power; and the Directory of France, wallowing in corruption and venality, was preparing the way for their own destruction at home, and setting up to sale the peace of their country with other nations, and especially with the United States. By their violence and fraud they compelled the Congress to annul the existing Treaties between the United States and France, and without an absolute declaration of war, to authorize defensive hostilities. In the controversy with France during this period, the executive administration was sustained by a vast majority of the People of the Union, and the elections both of the People and of the State Legislatures, re- turned decided majorities in both houses of Congress of corresponding opinions and policy. A powerful and inveterate opposition to all the measures both of 64 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON, Congress and of the administration was however con- stantly maintained with the countenance and co- operation of Mr. Jefferson, whose partiaUties in favor of France and the French revolution, though not extending to the justification of the secret Intrigues and open hostiUties of the Directory, still counteracted the operations of the American Government to resist and defeat them. The violence and pertinacity of the opposition pro- voked the ruling majority in Congress to the adoption of two measures which neither the exasperated spirit of the times, nor the deliberate judgment of after days could reconcile to the temper of the people. I allude to the two acts of Congress since generally known by the names of the Ahen and Sedition Laws. Of their merits or demerits this is not the time or the place to speak. They passed in Congress without vehement opposition, for Mr. Jefferson, then holding the office of Vice President of the United States, took no act- ing part against them as the presiding officer of the Senate, and Mr. Madison, at the close of the adminis- tration of Washington, had relinquished his seat in the House of Representatives of the Union. Devoted in friendship to the person, and in policy to the views of Mr. Jefferson, he participated with deference in his opinions to an extent which the deliberate convictions of his own judgment sometimes failed to confirm. The alien and sedition acts were intended to suppress the intrigues of foreign emissaries, employed by the pro- fligate Government of the French Directory, and who LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 65 abused the freedom of the press by traducing the characters of the Administration and its friends, and by instigating the resistance of the people against the Government and the laws of the Union. Among the eminent qualities of Mr. Jefferson, was a keen constant, and profound faculty of observation with regard to the action and reaction of the popular opinion upon the measures of government. He perceived imme- diately the operation of the alien and sedition acts, and he availed himself of them with equal sagacity and ardor for the furtherance of his own views of public policy and of personal advancement. In opposition to the alien and sedition acts, he deemed it advisable to bring into action, so far as it was practicable, the power of the State Legislatures against the Government of the Union. In the pursuit of this system it was his good fortune to obtain the aid and co-operation of Mr. Madi- son and of other friends equally devoted personally to him, and concurring more fully in his sentiments, then members of the Legislature of Kentucky. Assuming as first principles, that by the Constitution of the United States Congress possessed no authority to re- strain in any manner the freedom of the press, not even in self-defence against the most incendiary de- famation, and that the principles of the English Com- mon Law wei'e of no force under the Government of the United States he drafted, with his own hand, reso- lutions which w^ere adopted by the Legislature of Kentucky, declaring that each State had the right to judge for itself as well of infractions of the common 66 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. Constitution by the general government, as of the mode and measures of redress — that the alien and se- dition laws were, in their opinion, manifest and palpa- ble violations of the Constitution, and therefore null and void — and that a nullijication by the State Sove- reignties of all unauthorized acts done under color of the Constitution, is the rightful remedy for such in- fractions. The principles thus assumed, and particularly that of remedial nullification by state authority, have been more than once re-asserted by parties predominating in one or more of the confederated States, dissatisfied with particular acts of the general government. They have twice brought the Union itself to the verge of dissolution. To that result it must come, should it ev- er be the misfortune of the American People that they should obtain the support of a sufiicient portion of them to make them eflective by force. They never have yet been so supported. The alien and sedition acts were temporary Statutes, and expired by their own limitations. No attempt has been made to revive them, but in our most recent times, restrictions far more vigorous upon the freedom of the press, of speech and of personal liberty, than the alien and se- dition laws, have not only been deemed within the constitutional power of Congress, but even recom- mended by the Chief Magistrate of the Union, to en- counter the dangers and evils of incendiary publica- tions. The influence of Mr. Jefferson over the mind of LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 67 Mr. Madison, was composed of all that genius, talent, experience, splendid public services, exalted reputa- tion, added to congenial tempers, undivided friendship and habitual sympathies of interest and of feeling could inspire. Among the numerous blessings which it was the rare good fortune of Mr. Jetlerson's life to enjoy, was that of the uninterrupted, disinterested, and ellicient friendship of Madison. But it was the friendshij) of a mind not inferior in capacity, and tem- pered with a calmer sensibility and a cooler judgment than his own. With regard to the measures of Wash- ington's administration, from the time when the Coun- cils of Hamilton accjuired the ascendancy over those of Jetlurson, tlie opinions of .Mr. Madison generally coincided with those of his friend. He had resisted, on Constitutional grounds, the establishment of a Na- tional Bank — he had proposed, and with all his ability had urged important modifications of the funding sys- tem. He had written and published the papers of Hcl- vidius, and he had originated measures of commercial regulation against Great Britain, instead of which Washington had j)referred to institute the pacific and friendly mission of Mr. Jay. He had disapproved of the treaty concluded by that eminent, profound and incorruptible statesman, a measure the most rancor- ously contested of any of those of Washington's ad- ministration, and upon which public opinion has re- mained divided to this day. Mr. Madison concurred entirely with Mr. Jefterson in the policy of neu- trality to the European wars, but with a strong lean- 68 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. ing of favor to France and her revolution, which it was then impossible to hold without a leaning ap- proaching to hostility against Great Britain, her poli- cy and her Government. Mr. Madison therefore, at the earnest solicitation of Mr. Jefferson, introduced into the Legislature of Virginia the resolutions adop- ted on the 21st of December, 1798, declaring 1. That the Constitution of the United States was a compact, to which the States were parties, granting limited powers of Government. 2. That in case of a deliber- ate, palpable and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted by the compact, the States had the right to, and were in duty bound to interpose, for arresting the progress of the evils and for maintaining with- in their respective limits the authorities, rights and liberties appertaining to them. 3, That the alien and sedition acts were palpable and alarming in fractions of the Constitution. 4. That the State of Virginia, hav- ing by its Convention which ratified the federal Con- stitution, expressly declared that among other essen- tial rights the liberty of conscience and the press can- not be cancelled, abridged, restrained, or modified by any authority of the United States, and from its ex- treme anxiety to guard these rights from every possi- ble attack of sophistry and ambition, having with the other States recommended an amendment for that purpose, which amendment was in due time annexed to the Constitution, it would mark a reproachful incon- sistency and criminal degeneracy if an indifference were now shown to the most palpable violation of one LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. GO of the rights thus declared and secured, and to the establishment of a precedent which might be fatal to the other. 5. That the State of Virginia declared the alien and sedition laws inconstitutional, — solennily appealed to the like dispositions in the other States, in confidence that they would concur with her in that declaration, and that the necessary and proper mea- sures would be taken by each, for co-operating with her, in maintaining unimpaired the authorities rights and liberties reserved to the States respectively, or to the People. G. That the Governor should be desired to transmit a copy of these resolutions to the Executive authority of each of the other States, with a request that they should -be communicated to the respective State Legislatures, and that a copy should be fur- nished to each of the Senators and Representatives of Virginia in Congress. The resolutions did but in part carry into effect the principles and purposes of Mr. JelTerson. His original intention was that the alien and sedition acts should be declared by the State Legislatures, null and void — and that with the declaration that nullification by them was the rightful remedy for such usurpations of power by the federal Government, committees of correspond- ence and co-operation should be appointed by the Legislatures of the States concurring in the resolu- tions, for consultation with regard to further measures. Before the adoption of the Virginia resolutions, the Legislature of Kentucky had adopted others drafted by Mr. Jefferson himself and introduced by two of 70 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. his friends in that body. In those resolutions, the doctrines of nullification by the State Legislatures of acts of Congress, deemed by them unconstitutional, was first explicitly and unequivocally asserted. But even in Kentucky the Legislature was not quite pre- pared for consultation upon further measures of co- operation by committees of correspondence. The Virginia Resolutions were transmitted to the other States, with an address to the people in support of them, written by Mr. Madison. They were stronly disapproved by resolutions of all the Legisla- tures of the New England States, and by those of New York and Delaware. Thev were not, nor were those of the Legislature of Kentucky concurred in by any other State Legislature of the Union, but they contributed greatly to increase the unpopularity of the measures which they denounced, and sharpened the edge of every weapon wielded against the adminis- tration of the time. At the succeeding sessions of the Legislatures of Kentucky and of Virginia, they took into considera- tion the answers of the Legislatures of other States to their resolutions of 1798. The reply of Kentucky was in the form of a resolution re-assertincf the ria:ht of the separate States to judge of infractions, by the Government of the Union, of the Constitution of the United States, and expressly affirming that a nidhjica- tion by the State Sovereignties of all unauthorized acts done under color of that instrument, was the rightful remedy ; and complaining of the doctrines LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 71 and principles attempted to be maintained in all the answers, that of Virginia only excepted. In the Legislature of Virginia, a long, most able and elaborate re})ort was written by Mr. Madison, in replv to the answers received from the other States, and concluded with the following resolution : " That the General Assembly, having carefully and respectfully attended to the proceedings of a number of the States, in answer to the resolutions of Decem- ber 21, 1798, and having accurately and fully re- examined and re-considered the latter, find it to be their indispensable duty to adhere to the same, as founded in truth, as consonant with the Constitution, and as conducive to its preservation ; and more espe- cially to be their duty to renew as they do hereby renew their protest against the alien and sedition acts, as palpable and alarming infractions of the Constitu- tion." The report and resolution were adopted by the Le- gislature in February, 1800. The alien law expired by its own limitation, on the 25th of June of that year, and the sedition act on the 4th of March, 1801. The proceedings of the Legislatures of Kentucky and Virginia relating to the alien and sedition acts, gave to them an importance far beyond that which naturally belonged to them. The acts themselves, and the resolutions of the Legislatures concerning them, may now be considered merely as adversary 'party measures. The agency of Mr. Jefferson in originating the 72 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. measures of both the State Legislatures was at the time profoundly secret. It has been made known only since his decease, but in estimating the weight of the objections against the two laws on sound principles as well of morals as of politics, the fact as well as the manner of that agency are observable. The situation which he then held, and that to which he ascended by its operation, are considerations not to be overlooked in fixing the deliberate judgment of posterity upon the whole transaction. Mr. Madison's motives for the part which he acted in the drama, are not hable to the same scrutiny ; nor did his public station at the time, nor the principles which he asserted in the man- agement of the controversy, nor the measures which he proposed, recommended and accomplished, subject his posthumous reputation and character to the same animadversions. Standing here as the sincere and faithful organ of the sentiments of my fellow citizens to honor a great and illustrious benefactor of his coun- try, it would be as foreign from the honest and delibe- rate judgment of my soul as from the sense of my duties on this occasion to profess my assent to the reasoning of his report, or my acquiescence in the ap- plication of its unquestionable principles to the two acts of Congressional legislation which it arraigns. That because the States of this Union, as well as their people, are parties to the Constitutional compact of the federal Government, therefore the State Legislatures have the right to judge of infractions of the Constitu- t"on by the organized Government of the whole, and LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 73 to declare acts of Congress unconstitutional, is as ab- horrent to the conclusions of my judgment as to the feelings of my heart — but holding the converse of those propositions with a conviction as firm as an article of religious faith, I too clearly see to admit of denial, that minds of the highest order of intellect, and hearts of the purest integrity of purpose, have been brought to different conclusions. If Jefferson and Madison deemed the alien and sedition acts plain and palpable infractions of the Constitution, Washing- ton and Patrick Henry held them to be good and wholesome laws. These opinions were perhaps all formed under excitements and prepossessions which detract from the weight of the highest authority. The alien act was passed under feelings of honest in- dignation at the audacity with which foreign emis- saries were practising within the bosom of the country upon the passions of the people against their own Go- vernment. The sedition act was intended as a curb upon the publication of malicious and incendiary slan- der upon the President or the two Houses of Con- gress, or either of them. But they were restrictive upon the personal liberty of foreign emissaries, and upon the political licentiousness of the press. The alien act produced its effect by its mere enactment, in the departure from the country of the most obnoxious foreigners, and the power conferred by it upon the President was never exercised. The prosecutions under the sedition act did but aggravate the evil which they were intended to repress. Without believing 74 LIFE OF JAMES MAniSON. that either of those laws was an infraction of the Constitution, it naay be admitted without disparage- ment to the authority of Washington and Henry, or of the Congress which passed the acts, that they were not good and wholesome laws, inasmuch as they were , not suited to the temper of the people. Emergencies may arise in which the authority of Congress will be invoked by the portion of the people most aggrieved by the alien and sedition acts, for arbi- trary expulsion of foreign incendiaries, and for the suppression of incendiary publications at home, by measures far more rigorous and more palpably viola- tive of the Constitution than tiiose laws, and if the temper of that portion of the people which approved them, shall be, as it has recently been, and perhaps still is, attuned to endure the experiment, the Consti- tutional authority of Congress will be found amply sufficient for the enactment of statutes far more sharp and biting than they were. The question with regard to the constitutionality of those laws is however far different from that of the manner in which they were resisted. In that originated the doctrine of nullification. In this respect there appears to have been a very materia] difference between the opinions and purposes of Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madison. Concurring in the doctrine that the separate States have the right to interpose, in case of palpable infractions of the Consti- tution by the Government of the United States, and that the alien and sedition acts presented a case of such infraction, Mr. Jefferson considered them as ab- LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 75 solutely null and void, and thought the State Legisla- tures competent not only to declare, but to make them so ; to resist their execution within their respective borders by physical force ; and to secede and separate from the Union, rather than submit to them, if attempt- ed to be carried into execution by force. To these doc- trines Mr. Madison did not subscribe. He disclaimed them in the most explicit manner, at a very late period of his life, and in his last and most matured sentiments with regard to those laws, he considered them rather as unadvised acts, passed in contravention to the opinions and feelings of the community, than as more unconstitutional than many other acts of Congress which have generally accorded with the views of a majority of the States and of the people. Upon the change of the administration by the elec- tion of Mr. Jetierson as President of the United States in 1801, a new career was opened to the talents and wisdom of his friend, who thenceforth became his first assistant and his most confidential adviser in the ad- ministration of the Government. That administration was destined to pass through ordeals scarcely less severe than those which had tested tlie efiiciency of the Constitution of the United States under the Presidency of his predecessors. By a singular concurrence of good fortune, Mr. Jeflferson was immediately after his accession relieved from the pressure of all the important difficulties and menacing dangers which had so heavily weighed upon the administration of both his predecessors. The dif- 76 LIFE OF JA31ES MADISON, ferences between them both and the United States, which had during the twelve years of those adminis- trations kept the nation without intermission in the most imminent dangers of war, first with Great Brit- ain, and afterwards with France, had all been ad- justed by Treaties with both those nations. The re- volutionary violence of Republican France had al- ready subsided into a military Government. Still retaining the name of a republic, but rapidly ripening into a hereditary monarchy. The wars in Europe themselves were about to cease, for a short period indeed, and soon to blaze out with renewed and ag- gravated fury, but upon questions of mere conquest and aggrandizement between the belligerent powers. In the same year with the inauguration of Mr. Jeffer- son, the peace of Amiens had replaced France at the head of continental Europe, leaving G.reat Britain in the uncontested, if not undisputed dominion of the sea. The expenditures for the army and navy, already much reduced by the reduction of the former to a small peace establishment, admitted of further re- trenchments, and the very questionable policy of re- ducing also the latter, allowed a correspondmg reduc- tion of taxation, which gave the new administration the popular attraction of professed retrenchment and reform. For the naval armaments which the sharp collisions with both the belligerent nations had ren- dered necessary, although they had nobly sustained the glory of valor and skill upon the ocean acquired during the revolutionary war, and were destined to LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 77 deeds of yet more exalted fame in the administration of his successor, had necessarily occasioned heavy expense — had been among the measures most severe- ly censured by Mr, Jefferson, and were among his most favorite objects of reform. Reformed they ac- cordingly were, and dry-docks and gun-boats became for a time the cheap defences of the nation. The gallant spirit of the navy w^as itself discountenanced and discouraged, till a Tripolitan Cruiser, captured af- ter a desperate battle, was not even taken into posses- sion, upon a scruple of the victor's instructions wheth- er self-defence could give a right to the fruits of vic- tory, without a declaration of war by Congress. The reduction of the navy, while it lasted, deeply injurious both to the honor and the interests of the nation, gave however to the incipient administration the credit of reduced expenditures, retrenchment and reform: such was its first effect at home. Abroad its first fruit was the contempt of the Barbary powers — insult, outrage and war — a new armament, and new taxation under the denomination of a Mediterranean fund, took the place of retrenchment ; and w4ien the smothered flames of war burst forth anew between France and Britain, the impressment of our seamen. Orders in Council, Paper Blockades, Decrees of Ber- lin, of Milan, of Rambouillet, and finally the murder of our mariners within our own waters, and the wan- ton and savage attack upon the frigate Chesapeake, proved in the degradation of our national reputation, and in the cowering of that undaunted spirit which 78 I.IFK OF JAMES MADISON. rides upon the mountain wave, the short-sightedness of that pohcy, which trusted to gun-boats and dry- docks for the defence of the country upon the world of waters, and which had crippled the naval arm, and tamed the gallant spirit of the Union, for the glory of retrenchment and reform. On the other hand, the renewal of the European war, and the partialities of Mr. Jefferson in favor of France, enabled him to accomplish an object which greatly enlarged the territories of the Union — which removed a most formidable source of future dissen- sions with France — which exceedingly strengthened the relative influence and power of the State and section of the Union, to which he himself belonged, and which in its consequences changed the character of the Confederacy itself. This operation, by far the greatest that has been accomplished by any adminis- tration under the Constitution was consummated at the price of fifteen millions of dollars in money, and of a dii'ect, unqualified, admitted violation of the Con- stitution of the United States. According to the theo- ry of Mr. Jefferson, as applied by him to the alien and sedition acts, it was absolutelv null and void. It might have been nullified by the Legislature of any one State in the Union, and if persisted in, would have warranted and justified a combination of States, and their secession from the confederacy in resistance against it. That an amendment to the Constitution was neces- sary to legalize the annexation of Louisiana to the LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 79 Union, was the opinion both of Mr. Jefl'erson and of Mr. Madison. They finally acquiesced however in the latitudinous construction of that instrument, which holds the treaty-making powers, together with an act of Congress, sufficient for this operation. It was ac- cordingly thus consummated by Mr. Jetferson, and has been sanctioned by the acquiescence of the people. Upwards of thirty years have passed away since this great change was eflected. By a subsequent Treaty with Spain, by virtue of the same powers and authori- ty, the Floridas have been annexed also to the Union, and the boundaries of the United States have been extended from the Mississippi to the Pacific ocean. There is now nothing in the Constitution of the Uni- ted States to inhibit their extension to the two polar circles from the Straits of Hudson to the Straits of Magellan. Whether this very capacity of enlarge- ment of territory and multiplication of States by the constructive power of Congress, without check or control either by the States or by their people, will not finally terminate in the dissolution of the Union itself, time alone can determine. The cn.'dit of the acquisition of Louisiana, whether to be considered as a source of good or of evil, is perhaps due to Robert R. Livingston more than to any other man, but the merit of its accomplishment must ever remain as the great and imperishable memorial of the administration of Jefferson. In the interval between the Peace of Amiens, and the renewal of the wars of France with the rest of 80 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. Europe, the grasping spirit and gigantic genius of Napoleon had been revolving projects of personal ag- grandizement and of national ambition of which this western hemisphere was to be the scene. He had extorted from the languishing and nerveless dynasty of the Bourbons in Spain the retrocession of the pro- vince of Louisiana, with a description of boundary sufficiently indefinite, to raise questions of limits whenever it might suit his purpose to settle them by the intimation of his will. Here it had been his pur- pose to establish a military Colony, with the Mexican dominions of Spain on one side, and the United States of America and the continental colonies of Great Bri- tain on the other, in the centre of the western hemis- phere, the stand for a lever to wield at his pleasure the destinies of the world. This plan was discomposed by a petty squabble with Great Britain about the Island of Malta; and a project wilder if possible than his miUtary Colony of Louisiana — namely the Caesa- rian operation of conquering the British Islands them- selves by direct invasion. The transfer of Louisiana had been stipulated by a secret treaty, but possession had not been taken. Mr. Livingston was then the Minister of the United States in France. He had been made acquainted with the existence of the Trea- ty of retrocession of Louisiana, and by a memorial of great ability, had expostulated against it, urging as scarcely less essential to the interests of France than of the United States, that the Province should be ce- ded to them. This memorial when presented had LIFE OF JAMES MADISOxN. 81 met with little attention from Napoleon. His milita- ry Colony of twenty thousand men was on the point of embarkation, under the command of one of his Lieutenants, destined himself in after time to wear the crown of Gustavus-Adolphus, w^hen the Iron Crown of Lombardy and the imperial crown of France, after encircling the brows of Napoleon, should have melted before the leaden sceptre of the restored Bourbons. Napoleon was to rise to the summit of human great- ness, and to fall from it over another precipice, than that to which he was approaching with his military colony of Louisiana. When he determined to renew the war with England, still mistress of the seas, he could no longer risk the fortunes of his soldiers in a passage across the Atlantic, and unable as he was to cope with the thunders of Britain upon the ocean, he saw that Louisiana itself, if he should take possession of the Province, must inevitably fall an easy prey to the enemy with whom he was to contend. He therefore abandoned his project of conquests in Ameri- ca, and determined at once to sell his Colony of Lou- isiana to the United States. Never in the fortunes of mankind was there a more sudden, complete and propitious turn in the tide of events than this change in the purposes of Napoleon proved to the administration of Mr. Jefferson. The wrangling altercation wdth Spain for the navigation of the Mississippi, had been adjusted during the adminis- tration of Washington, by a treaty, which had con- ceded to them the right, and stipulated to make its 4* 82 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. enjoyment effective, of deposit at New Orleans. In repurchasing from Spain the Colony of Louisiana, Napoleon, to disencumber himself from the burden of this stipulation, and to hold in his hand a rod over the western section of this Union, had compelled the das- tardly and imbecile monarch of Spain to commit an act of perfidy, by withdrawing from the people of the United States this stipulated right of deposit before dehvering the possession of the Colony to France. The great artery of the commerce of the Union was thus choaked in its circulation. The sentiment of sur- prise, of alarm, of indignation, was instantaneous and universal among the people. The hardy and enter- prising settlers of the western country could h.axlly be restrained from pouring down the swelling floods of their population, to take possession of New Orleans itself, by the immediate exercise of the rights of war. A war with Spain must have been immediately fol- lowed by a war with France, which, however just the cause of the United States would have been, must necessarily give a direction to public affairs adverse to the whole system of Mr. Jefferson's policy, and in all probabihty prove fatal to the success of his adminis- tration. Instigations to immediate war, were at once attempted in Congress, and were strongly counte- nanced by the excited temper of the people. Mr. Jefferson instituted an extraordinary mission both to France and Spain, to remonstrate against the with- drawal of the right of deposit, and to propose anew the purchase of the Island of New Orleans. By one LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 83 of those coincidences in the course of human events. too rare to be numbered among the ordinary dispen- sations of Providence ; too common to be account- able upon the doctrine of unregulated chance, v^hen Mr. Jefferson's minister arrived at the seat of his first destination, his charge, and much more than his charge, was already performed. Napoleon had re- solved to sell to the United States the whole of Louis- iana, and Great Britain, under the influence of fears and jealousies of him, even deeper than those with which she pined at every prosperity of her alienated child, had declared her acquiescence in the transfer. The American negociators without hesitation trans- cended their powers, to obtain all Louisiana instead of Florida. Claims of indemnity to the citizens of the United States, for wrongs suffered from the preceding revolutionary Governments of France, were provided for by a separate Convention, and paid for with part of the purchase money for the Province, and the whole remnant of the fifteen millions was, in the midst of a raging wai', with the knowledge and assent of the British Government, furnished by English Bankers to be expended in preparations for the con- quest of England by invasion. It will be no detraction from the merits or services of Mr. Jefferson, or of his Secretary of State, to acknowledge that in all this transaction Fortune claims to herself the lion's share. To seize and turn to profit the precise instant of the turning tide, is itself among the eminent properties of a Statesman, 84 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. and if requiring less elevated virtue than the firmness and prudence that withstand adversity, or the mode- ration which adorns and dignifies prosperity, it is not less essential to the character of an accompHshed ruler of men. But Napoleon had transferred the acquisition which he had wrenched from the nerveless hand of Spain with its indefinite and equivocal boundary. He had also violated his faith, pledged to Spain when he took back the Province, once the Colony of France, that he would never cede it to the United States. Spain immediately complained, remonstrated, protested against the cession, the just reward of her own per- fidy, in withdrawing the stipulated right of deposit at New Orleans ; and although Napoleon soon silenced her complaints, and constrained her to withdraw her protest against the cession, yet on the question of boundary, he had contracted his province of Louisiana almost within the dimensions of the Island of New Orleans. Negotiations with Spain and France, soon complicated with the sharper collisions of neutral and belligerent rights, and with the war of extermination between France and Britain, called for all the talents and all the energies of the President, and of his friend and Minister in the Department of State. The dis- cussions respecting the boundaries of Louisiana were soon brought to a close. Spain contested the claims of the United States, both east and west of the Mis- sissippi. The United States, after an ineffectual at- tempt to obtain the Floridas from Spain, agreed to LIFE OF JAMES -MADISON. 85 leave both the questions of boundary to the decision of France, and Napoleon instantly decided it on both sides of the Mississippi against them. In the first wars of the French revolution Great Brit- ain had begun by straining the claim of belligerent, as against neutral rights, beyond all the theories of in- ternational jurisprudence, and even beyond her own ordinary practice. There is in all war a conflict be- tween the belligerent and the neutral right, which can in its nature be settled only by convention. And in addition to all the ordinary asperities of dissension between the nation at war and the nation at peace, she had asserted a right of man-stealing from the ves- sels of the United States. The claim of right was to take by force all sea-faring men, her own subjects, wherever they were found by her naval officers, to serve their king in his wars. And under color of this tyrant's right, her naval officers, down to the most beardless Midshipman, actually took from the Ameri- can merchant vessels which they visited, any seaman whom they chose to take for a British subject. After the Treaty of November, 1794, she had relaxed all her pretensions against the neutral rights, and had gradually abandoned the practice of impressment till she was on the point of renouncing it by a formal Treaty stipulation. At the renewal of the war, after the Peace of Amiens, it was at first urged with much respect for the rights of neutrality, but the practice ol impressment was soon renewed with aggravated severity, and the commerce of neutral -nations with 86 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. the Colonies of the adverse belligerent was wholly interdicted on the pretence of justification, because it had been forbidden by the enemy herself in the time of peace. This pretension had been first raised by Great Britain in the seven years' war, but she had been overawed by the armed neutrality from main- taining it in the war of the American revolution. In the midst of this war with Napoleon, she suddenly reasserted the principle, and by a secret order in Council, swept the ocean of nearly the whole mass of neutral commerce. Her war with France spread itself all over Europe, successively involving Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Prussia, Austria, Russia, Den- mark and Sweden. Not a single neutral power re- mained in Europe — and Great Britain, after annihi- lating at Trafalgar the united naval power of France and Spain, ruhng thenceforth with undisputed do- minion upon the ocean, conceived the project of en- grossing even the commerce with her enemy by in- tercepting all neutral navigation. These measures were met by corresponding acts of violence, and sophistical principles of National Law, promulgated by Napoleon, rising to the summit of his greatness, and preparing his dowafall by the abuse of his eleva- tion. Through this fiery ordeal the administration of Mr. Jefterson was to pass, and the severest of its tests were to be applied to Mr. Madison. His correspond- ence with the ministers of Great Britain, France and Spain, and with the ministers of the United States to those nations during the remainder of Mr. Jefferson's LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 87 administration, constitute the most important and most valuable materials of its history. His examination of the British doctrines relating to neutral trade, will hereafter be considered a standard Treatise on the Law of Nations ; not inferior to the works of any writer upon those subjects since the days of Grotius, and every way worthy of the author of Publius and Helvidius. There is indeed, in all the diplomatic papers of American Statesmen, justly celebrated as they have been, nothing superior to this Dissertation, which was not strictly otiicial. It was composed amidst the duties of the Department of State, never more arduous than at that lime — in the summer of 1806. It was published inonicially, and a copy of it was laid on the table of each member of Congress at the commencement of the session in December, 1806. The controversies of conflicting neutral and bellige- rent rights, continued through the whole of Mr. Jef- ferson's administration, during the latter part of which they were verging rapidly to war. He had carried the policy of peace perhaps to an extreme. His sys- tem of defence by commercial restrictions, dry-docks, gun-boats and embargoes, was stretched to its last hair's breadth of endurance. Far be it from me, my fellow citizens, to speak of this system or of its mo- tives with disrespect. If there be a duty, binding in chains more adamantine than all the rest the con- science of a Chief Magistrate of this Union, it is that of preserving peace with all mankind — peace with the other nations of the earth — peace among the several 88 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. States of this Union — peace in the hearts and temper of our own people. Yet must a President of the United States never cease to feel that his charge is to maintain the rights, the interests and the honor no less than the peace of his country — nor will he be permit- ted to forget that peace must be the offspi-ing of two concurring wills. That to seek peace is not always to ensure it. He must remember too, that a reliance upon the operation of measures, from their effect on the interests, however clear and unequivocal of na- tions, cannot be safe against a counter current of their passions. That nations, like individuals, sacrifice their peace to their pride, to their hatred, to their envy, to their jealousy, and even to the craft, which the cun- ning of hackneyed politicians not unfrequently mis- takes for policy. That nations, like individuals, have sometimes the misfortune of losing their senses, and that lunatic communities, which cannot be confined in hospitals, must be resisted in arms, as a single maniac is sometimes restored to reason by the scourge. That national madness is infectious, and that a paroxysm of it in one people, especially when generated by the Furies that preside over war, produces a counter paroxysm in their adverse party. Such is the melan- choly condition as yet of associated man. And while in the wise but mysterious dispensations of an over- ruling Providence, man shall so continue, the peace of every nation must depend not alone upon its own will, but upon that concurrently with the will of all others. And such was the condition of the two mightiest LIFE OF JAMES MADISON". 89 nations of ihc earth during the administration of Mr. Jetrerson. Frantic, in fits of mutual hatred, envy and jealousy against each other; meditating mutual inva- sion and conquest, and forcing the other nations of the four quarters of the globe to the alternative of joining them as allies or encountering them as foes. Mr. Jef- ferson met them with moral philosophy and commer- cial restrictions, with dry-docks and gun-boats — with non-intercourses, and embargoes, till the American na- tion were told that they could not be kicked into a war, and till they were taunted by a British Statesman in the Imperial Parliament of England, with their five fir frigates and their striped bunting. Mr. Jerterson jjursued his policy of peace till it brought the nation to the borders of internal war. An embargo of fourteen months duration was at last re- luctantly abandoned by him, when it had ceased to be obeyed by the people, and State Courts were ready to pronounce it unconstitutional. A non-intercourse was then substituted in its place, and the helm of State passed from the hands of Mr. Jeflerson to those of Mr. Madison, precisely at the moment of this perturbation of earth and sea threatened with war from abroad and at home, but with the prin- ciple definitively settled that in our intercourse with foreign nations, reason, justice and commercial re- strictions require live oak hearts and iron or brazen mouths to speak, that they may be distinctly heard, or attentively listened to, by the distant ear of foreign- ers, whether French or British, monarchical or repub- lican. J yO LIFE OF JAMES MADISON, The administration of Mr. Madison was with re- gard to its most essential principles, a continuation of that of Mr. Jefferson. He too was the friend of peace, and earnestly desirous of maintaining it. As a last resource for the preservation of it, an act of Congress prohibited all commercial intercourse with both bellige- rents, the prohibition to be withdrawn from either or both in the event of a repeal by either of the orders and decrees in violation of neutral rights. France ungraciously and equivocally withdrew her's. Brit- ain refused, hesitated, and at last conditionally with- drew her's when it was too late — after a formal de- claration of war had been issued by Congress at the recommendation of President Madison himself. Of the necessity, the policy or even the justice of this war, there are conflicting opinions, not yet, per- haps never to be, harmonized. This is not the time or the place to discuss them. The passions, the preju- dices and the partialities of that day have passed away. That it was emphatically a popular war, hav- ing reference to the whole people of the United States, will, I think, not be denied. That it was in a high degree unpopular in our own section of the Union, IS no doubt equally true; and that it was so, constitu- ted the greatest difliculties and prepared the most mortifying disasters in its prosecution. The war itself was an ordeal through which the Constitution of the United States, as the Government of a great nation, was to pass. Its trial in that respect was short but severe. In the intention of its founders, MFE OF JAMES MAUISOX. 91 and particularly of Mr. Madison, it was a constitu- tion essentially pacific in its character, and for a na- tion above all others, the lover of peace — yet its great and most vigorous energies, and all its most formida- ble powers, are reserved for the state of war — and war is the condition in which the functions allotted to the separate States sink into impotence compared with those of the general Government. The war was brought to a close without any defi- nitive adjustment of the controverted principles in which it had originated. It left the questions of neu- tral commerce with an enemy and his colonies, of bot- tom and cargo, of blockade and contraband of war, and even of impressment, precisely as they had been before the war. With the European war all the con- flicts between belligerent and neutral riorhts had ceas- ed. Great Britain, triumphant as she was after a struggle of more than twenty year's duration — against revolutionary, republican and imperial France, was in no temper to y-eld the principles for which in the heat of her contest she had defied the power of neutrality and the voice of justice. As little were the Govern- ment or people of the United States disposed to yield principles, upon which, if there had been any error in their previous intercourse with the belligerent powers it was that of faltering for the preservation of peace, in the defence of the rights of neutrality, and of con- ceding too much to the lawless pretensions of naval war. The extreme solicitude of the American Govern- 92 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. ment for the perpetuity of peace, especially with Great Britain, induced Mr. Madison to institute with her negotiations after the peace of Ghent, for the ad- justment of all these questions of maritime collisions between the warlike and the pacific nation. The claims of neutral right are all founded upon the pre- cepts of Christianity and the natural rights of man. The warring party's claim is founded upon the imme- morial usages of war, untempered and unmitigated by the chastening spirit of Christianity. They all rest upon the right of force — or upon what has been term- ed the ultimate argument of Kings. But since the whole Island of Albion has been united under one Government, her foreign wars have necessarily all been upon or beyond the seas. Her consolidation and her freedom have made her the first of Maratime States, and the first of humane, learned, intelligent, but warlike nations of modern days. At home, she is generous, beneficent, tender-hearted, and above all proud of her liberty and loyalty united as in one. Free as the air upon her mountains, she tyrannizes over one class of her people, and that the very class upon which she depends for the support of her free- dom. She proclaims that the foot, be it of a slave, by alighting on her soil, emancipates the man; and as if it were the exclusive right of her soil, the foot of her own mariner, by passing from it upon the deck of a ship, slips into the fetters of a slave. There is no writ of Habeas Corpus for a British sailor. The stimu- lant to his love of his king and country is the Press Gang. LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 93 This glaring inconsistency with the first principles of the British Constitution, is justified on the plea of necessity, which being above all law, claims equal ex- emption from responsibility to the tribunal ot reason. The efforts of Mr. Madison and of his successors to obtain an amicable adjustment of this great source of hostility between the kindred nations have hitherto proved equally unavailing. One short interval has occurred since the peace, during which a war broke .out between France and Spain, to which Britain was neutral, and the views of her ruling Statesmen were then favorable to the rights of neutrality. Had that war been of longer continuance, the prospects of a mitisration of the customs of maritimj? warfare might have been more propitious ; but we can now only in- dulge the hope that the glory of extinguishing the flames of war by land and sea is reserved for the fu- ture destinies of our confederated land. The peace with Great Britain was succeeded by a short war with Algiers, in which the first example was set of a peace with that piratical power purchased by chastisement substituted for tribute — and which set the last seal to the policy of maintaining the rights and interests of the United States by a permanent naval force. The revolutions in Spain, and in her Colonies of this hemisphere, complicated with questions of dispu- ted boundaries, and with claims of indemnity for dep- redations upon our commerce, formed subjects for im- portant negotiations during the war with Great Brit- 94 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. ain, and after its close. Never, since the institution of civil society, have there been within so short a time so many assumptions of sovereign powers. The crown of Spain was abdicated by Charles the Fourth, and then by his son Ferdinand, while a prisoner to Napoleon, at Bayon)ie, transferred to the house of Bonaparte, as the kingdom of Naples had been by conquest before. In Germany, the dissolution of the German empire had generated a kingdom of West- . phalia, and converted into kingdoms the electorates of Saxony, of Bavaria, of Wurtemburg and of Hanover. The kingdom of Portugal had been overshadowed by an empire of Brazil, and every petty province of Spain in this hemisphere, down to the Floridas and Amelia Island, constituted themselves into sovereign States, unfurled their flags and claimed their seats among the potentates of the earth. Under these cir- cumstances, it became often a question of great deli- cacy, who should be recognised as such, and with whom an exchange of diplomatic functionaries should be made. There was, during Mr. Madison's admin- istration, a period during which war was waged in Spain for the restoration of a Prince who had himself renounced his throne. A regency acting in his name was recognized by Great Britain, under whose auspi- ces he was finally restored. Napoleon had given the crown of Spain, wrested by fraud and violence from the Bourbons, to his brother, who was recognized as king of Spain by all the continental powers of Europe, and it was in the conflict between these two usurpers, LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 95 that tlie transatlantic Colonies of Spain in this hemis- phere, disclaiming allegiance to either of the conten- ding parties, asserted their own rights as independent communities. Mr. .Madison believed it to be the duty and the policy of the United States, while the fact re- mained to be decided bv the issue of war, to withhold the acknowledgment of sovereign power alike from them all. The reception of a minister appointed by the regency of Spain, was therefore delayed, until he was commissioned by Ferdinand himself after his res toration, and the total expulsion of his rival Joseph, Bonaparte. But most of the American Colonies of Spain, released from their bounds of subjection to a Eurojjean king, by the first dethronement and abdica- tion of Charles the Fourth, refused ever after all sub- mission to the monarchs of Sj)ain, and those on the American Continents which submitted for a time short- ly after, declared and have maintained their Indepen- dence, yet however unacknowledged by Spain. No general union of the several Colonics of Spain, analo- gous to that of the British Colonies in these United States, has been or is ever likely to be established. The several Vice Royalties have in their dissolution, melted into masses of confederated or consolidated Governments. They have been ravaged by incessant internal dissensions and civil war. As they attempt to unite in one, or as they separate into parts, new States present themselves, claiming the prerogatives of sovereignty, and the powers of Independent na- tions. The European kingdoms of France, Spain, 96 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. Portugal, the Netherlands and Greece have been in the same convulsionary State with contending claims of sovereign power, so that the question of recognition, in almost numberless cases, and under a multitude of forms has been before the Government of the United States for decision. The act of recognition, being an execution of the laws of nations, is an attribute of executive power, and has therefore been invariably performed under the present Constitution of the United States by their President. Mr. Madison withheld this recognition from the minister of the Spanish Regency, but yielded it to the same person, when commissioned by Ferdi- nand. He" left to his successors the obligation of with- holding and of conceding the acknowledgment, as the duties of this nation might from time to time forbid or enjoin; and a question of the deepest interest, under circumstances pregnant with unparalleled consequen- ces, is while I speak under the consideration, and sub- ject to the decision of the President of the United States. The severest trials of our country induced by the war with Great Britain were endured by the disorder of the national finances. The revenues of the Union until then had consisted almost exclusively in the pro- ceeds of taxation by impost on imported merchandize. Excises,' land taxes, and taxes upon stamps were re- sorted to during the war, but were always found more burdensome and less acceptable to the people. It is, however, a disadvantage, perhaps counterbalanced by LIFE OF JAMES .MADISO.X. 97 consequences more permanently beneficial in our po- litical system, that the revenue from impost, more ea- sily collected and more productive than any other in time of peace, must necessarily fail, almost entirelv, in war with a nation of superior maritime force. Our admirable system of settlement and disposal of the public lands had been long established, but was at that time and for many years since little known by its fruits. It is doubtful whether until the last year the proceeds of the sales have been sulFicient to defray the cost of the purchase, and the expenses of manage- ment. The prices at which they are sold have been reduced, while the wages of labor have risen, till the purchaser for settlement receives them upon terms nearly gratuitous. They are now an inestimable pource of a copious revenue, and if honestly and care- fully managed for the people to whom they belontr, may hereafter alleviate the bdrden of taxation in all its forms. But when the w ar with Great Britain was declared in 1812, the population of this Union was less than one half its numbers at the present day. It increases now at the average rate- of half a million of souls every year. For this state of unexampled pros- perity a tribute of gratitude and applause is due to the administration of Madison, for the wise and concilia- tory policy upon which it was conducted from the close of the war, until the end of his second Presidential term, in March 1817, when he voluntarily retired from pubhc life. From that day, for a period advancing upon its 98 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. twentieth year, he Hved in a happy retirement ; in the bosom of a family, and with a partner for Ufe ahke adapted to the repose and comfort of domestic priva- cy, as she had been to adorn and dignify the highest of pubhc stations. Between the occupations of agricul- ture, the amusements of literature, and the exercise of beneficence, the cultivation of the soil, of the mind and of the heart, the leisure of his latter days was di- vided. In 1829, a Convention was held in Virginia for the revisal of the Constitution of the Commonwealth, in which transaction the people of the State again en- joyed the benefit of his long experience and his calm and conciliatory counsels. The unanimous sense of that body would have deferred to him the honor of presiding over their deliberations, but the infirmities of age had already so far encroached upon the vigor of his constitution, that he declined in the most deli- cate manner the nomination, by proposing himself the election of his friend and successor to the Chief Mas- istracy of the Union, James Monroe. He was accor- dingly chosen without any other nomination, but was afterwards himself so severely indisposed, that he was compelled to resign both the Presidency and his seat in the Convention before they had concluded their labors. On one occasion of deep interest to the people of the State, on the question of the ratio of representa- tion in the two branches of the Legislature, Mr. Madi- son took ap active part, and made a speech the sub- stance of which has been preserved. LIFE OF JAMES MADISOA, 99 " Such in those moments as in all tiie past." This speech is so perfectly characteristic of the man, that it might itself be considered as an epitome of his hfe. Though delivered upon a question, which in a discussion upon a Constitution of this Commonwealth could not even be raised, it was upon a subject which probed to the deepest foundations the institution of civil society. It was upon the condition of the colored population of the Commonwealth, and upon their re- lations as persons and as property to the State. Every part of the speech is full of the spirit which animated him through life. Nor can I resist the temptation to repeat a few short passagf.'S from it, which may serve as samples of the whole. " It is sufficiently obvious, said Mr. Madison, that persons and property are the two great objects on which Governments are to act ; that the rio-hts of persons and the rights of property are the objects for the protection of which Government was instituted. These rights cannot well be separated. The personal right • to acquire property, which is a natural right, gives to property when acquired, a right to protec- tion, as a social right." " It is due to justice ; due to humanity ; due to truth ; to the sympathies of our nature in fine, to our character as a people, both abroad and at home ; that the colored part of our population should be consider- ed, as much as possible, in the light of human beings, and not as mere property. As such, they are acted upon by our laws, and have an interest in our laws." 100 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. "In framing a Constitution, great difficulties are necessarily to be overcome ; and nothing can ever overcome them but a spirit of compromise. Other nations are surprised at nothing so much as our having been able to form constitutions in the manner which has been exempUfied in this country. Even the union of so many States, is, in the eyes of the world, a wonder ; the harmonious establishment of a common Government over them all, a miracle. I cannot but flatter myself that without a miracle, we shall be able to arrange all difficulties. I never have despaired, notwithstanding all the threatening appearances we have passed through. I have now more than a hope — a consoling confidence — that we shall at last find that our labors have not been in vain." Mr. Madison was associated with his friend Jefter- son in the institution of the University of Virginia, and after his decease was placed at its head, under the modest and unassuming title of Rector. He was also the President of an Agricultural Society in the county of his residence, and in that capacity delivered an address, which the practical farmer and the classi- cal scholar may read with equal profit and delight. In the midst of these occupations the declining days of the Philosopher, the Statesman, and the Patriot were past, until the 28th day of June last, the anni- versary of the day on which the ratification of the Convention of Virginia in 1788 had affixed the seal of James Madison as the father of the Constitution of the United States, when his earthly part sunk without LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. 101 a struggle into the grave, and a spirit bright as the seraphim that surround the throne of omnipotence, ascended to the bosom of his God. This Constitution, my countrymen, is the great re- sult of the North American revolution. This is the giant stride in the improvement of the condition of the human race, consummated in a period of less than one hundred years. Of the signers of the address to George the Third in the Congress of 1774 — of the signers of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 — of the sif'ncrs of the Articles of Confederation in 1781, and of the signers of the federal and national Constitution of Government under which we live, with enjoyments never before allotted to man, not one remains in the land of the living. The last survivor of them all was he to honor whose memory we are here assembled at once with mourning and with joy. We reverse the order of sentiment and reflection of the ancient Persian king — we look hack on the cen- tury gone by — we look around with anxious and eager eye for one of that illustrious host of Patriots and heroes, under whose guidance the revolution of American Independence was begun, and continued and completed. We look around in vain. To them this crowded theatre, full of human life, in all its stages of existence, full of the glowing exultation of youth, of the steady maturity of manhood, the sparkling eyes of beauty, and the grey hairs of reverend age — all this to them is as the solitude of the sepulchre. We think of this and say, how short is 102 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. human life ! But then, then, we turn back our thoughts again, to the scene over which the falHng curtain has but now closed upon the drama of the day. From the saddening thought that they are no more, we call for comfort upon the memory of what they were, and our hearts leap for joy, that they were our fathers. We see them, true and faithful subjects of their sovereign, first meeting with firm but respect- ful remonstrance, the approach of usurpation upon their rights. We see them, fearless in their fortitude, and confident in the righteousness of their cause, bid defiance to the arm of power, and declare themselves Independent States. We see them, waging for seven years a war of desolation and of glory, in most un- equal contest with their own unnatural step-mother, the mistress of the seas, till under the sign manual of their king, their Independence was acknowledged — and last and best of all, we see them, toiling in war and in peace to form and perpetuate an union, under forms of Government intricately but skilfully adjusted so as to secure to themselves and their posterity the priceless blessings of inseparable liberty and law. Their days on earth are ended, and yet their cen- tury has not passed away. Their portion of the blessings which they thus labored to secure, they have enjoyed, and transmitted to us, their posterity. We enjoy them as an inheritance — won, not by our toils — watered, not with our tears — saddened, not by the shedding of any blood of ours. The gift of heaven through their sullerings and their achievements — but LIFE OF JAiMES MADISON. 103 not without a charge of corresponding duty mcum- bent upon ourselves. And what, my friends and fellow citizens— what is that duty of our own 1 Is it to remonstrate to the adder's ear of a king beyond the Atlantic wave, and claim from him the restoration of violated rights ? No. Is it to sever the ties of kindred and of blood with the people from whom we sprang? To cast away the precious name of Britons, and be no more the countrymen of Shakspeare and Milton— of New- ton and Locke— of Chatham and Burke ? Or more and worse, is it to meet their countrymen in the deadly conflict of a seven years' war ? No. Is it the last and greatest of the duties fulfilled by them 1 Is it to lay the foundations of the fairest Government and the mightiest nation that ever floated on the tide of time 1 No ! These awful and solemn duties were allotted to them ; and by them they were faithfully performed. What then is our duty ? Is it not to preserve, to cherish, to improve the in- heritance which they have left us— won by their toils —watered by their tears— saddened but fertilized by their blood? Are we the sons of worthy sires, and in the onward march of time have they achieved in the career of human improvement so much, only that our posterity and theirs may blush for the contrast be- tween their unexampled energies and our nerveless impotence? between their more than Herculean labors and our indolent repose? No, my fellow citizens, far be from us ; far be from you, for he who 104 LIFE OF JAMES MADISON. now addresses you has but a few short days before he shall be called to join the multitude of ages past — far be from you the reproach or the suspicion of such a degrading contrast. You too have the solemn duty to perform, of improving the condition of your species, by improving your own. Not in the great and strong wind of a revolution, which rent the moun- tains and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord — for the Lord is not in the wind — not in the earthquake of a revolutionary war, marching to the onset be- tween the battle field and the scaffold — for the Lord is not in the earthquake — not in the fire of civil dis- sension — in war between the members and the head — in nullification of the laws of the Union by the for- cible resistance of one refractory State — for the Lord is not in the fire ; and that fire was never kindled by your fathers ! No ! it is in the still small voice that succeeded the whirlwind, the earthquake and the fire. The voice that stills the raging of the waves and the tumults of the people — that spoke the words of peace — of harmony — of union. And for that voice, may you and your children's children, '' to the last syllable of recorded time," fix your eyes upon the memory, and Hsten with your ears to the life of James Madison. MADISON^S ADMINISTRATION. Long previous to the expiration of Mr. Jefferson's second presidential term, the general sentiment of the Republican party, particularly in the southern and western states, appeared to he in favor of Mr. Madi- son as his successor. It seemed peculiarly appropri- ate that he should be selected for that high office, in order that the delicate negotiations with Enjiland and France which he had so long conducted, — as was con- ceded on all hands, with masterly ability, — might be brought to a satisfactory termination under his imme- diate auspices. The New York Republicans, and es- pecially the Clinton family and their friends, had for some time looked forward with confidence, to the nomination of their distinguished leader and head, George Clinton, then filling the second office in the Nation ; and it is more than probable that their expec- tations would have been realized, had he been a younger and more active man, or had the foreign relations of the government been in a less complicated state. But at the caucus of the Republican members of Congress held just before the close of-the session, in the winter 5* 106 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. of 1808, Mr. Madison was the successful candidate, and Mr. Clinton was renominated for the Vice Presi- dency. Some little dissatisfaction was manifested by the friends of Mr. Clinton; and he himself hesitated about accepting the nomination, but did not decline in the end. The canvass terminated with the election of the candidates nominated in the caucus, by a very large majority, — Mr. Madison receiving one hundred and twenty-two of the one hundred and seventy-six elec- toral votes. On the 4th day of March, 1809, Mr. Madison took the oath of office, and delivered his inaugural address, in the capitol at Washington. Though the tone of the latter was pacificatory, its author held out no hope that the lowering aspect of affairs would soon be changed for the better, but plainly intimated that the honor and interests of the nation would be maintained at all hazards, and that, to render these secure, it might be necessary to resort to arms. With reference to the general principles which should govern him in the administration of the gov- ernment, he said : " To cherish peace and friendly in- tercourse with all nations having correspondent dispo- sitions ; to maintain sincere neutrality toward bellige- rent nations ; to prefer in all cases amicable discus- sion and reasonable accommodation of differences to a decision of them by an appeal to arms ; to exclude foreign intrigues and foreign partialities, so degrading to all countries and so baneful to free ones ; to foster Madison's ad.mimstration. 107 a spirit of independence too just to invade the rights of others, too proud to surrender our own, too liberal to indulge unworthy prejudices ourselves, and too ele- vated not to look down upon them in others ; to hold the union of the states as the basis of their peace and happiness ; to support the constitution, which is the cement of the union, as well in its limitations as in its authorities ; to respect the rights and authorities re- served to the states and to the people, as equally incor- porated with, and essential to the success of, the gen- eral system ; to avoid the slightest interference with the rights of conscience or the functions of religion, so wisely exempted from civil jurisdiction ; to preserve in their full energy the other salutary provisions in be- half of ])rivate and personal rights, and of the free- dom of the press ; to observe economy in pubhc ex- penditures ; to liberate the public resources by an hon- orable discharge of the public debts ; to keep within the requisite limits a standing military force, always remembering that an armed and trained militia is the firmest bulwark of republics — that without standing armies their liberties can never be in danger, nor with large ones safe ; to promote by authorized means, improvements friendly to agriculture, to manufactures, and to external as well as internal commerce ; to fa- vor in like manner the advancement of science and the diffusion of information as the best aliment to true liberty ; to carry on the benevolent plans which have been so meritoriously applied to the conversion of our aboriginal neighbors from the degradation and wretch- 108 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. edness of savage life to a participation of the improve ments of which the human mind and manners are susceptible in a civilized state ; as far as sentiments and intentions such as these can aid the fulfilment of my duty, they will be a resource which cannot fail me." As if to leave no room for doubt, that he cordially and heartily concurred in the views and opinions which had ever guided and controlled the public ca- reer of his distinguished predecessor, and which, at the recent election, had been a third time emphatical- ly endorsed and approved by the American people, he further remarked : — " It is my good fortune, moreover, to have the path in which I am to tread lighted by ex- amples of illustrious services, successfully rendered in the most trying difficulties by those who have marched before me. Of those of my immediate pre- decessor it might least become me here to speak. I may, however, be pardoned for not suppressing the sympathy with which my heart is full, in the rich re- ward he enjoys in the benedictions of a beloved coun- try, gratefully bestowed for exalted talents, zealously devoted, through a long career, to the advancement of its highest interest and happiness." Immediately after his inauguration, Mr. Madison or- ganized his cabinet by the promotion of Robert Smith, of Maryland, Secretary of the Navy under Mr. Jef- ferson, to the State Department. Albert Gallatin, of Pennsylvania, was continued in the office of Secreta- ry of the Treasury, and Ceesar A. Rodney, of Dela- Madison's administration. 109 ware, in that of attorney-general. William Eustis, of Massachusetts, was appointed Secretary of War, in the place of Henry Dearborn, transferred to the coUectorship of the port of Boston ; and the vacancy in the Navy Department was filled by the selection of Paul Hamilton, of South Carolina. Gideon Granger, of New York, was continued as postmaster general, not then a cabinet officer. Having completed the list of his advisers, when the new president turned to survey his position, he found that it was by no means an enviable one. The firm- ness, the unflinching determination, and the resolute and enthusiastic perseverance of Jefferson, Gallatin, Clinton, Livingston, and their coadjutors, had, indeed, been successful in restoring the ship of state to the republican track ; yet he had inherited, as a legacy, all the embarrassments and difficulties in the foreign relations of the government, which had originated du- ring the administration of Washington, and, from year to year, become more and more involved, and grown more and more perplexing, till it seemed as if the Gordian knot could be severed only by the sword. At home all might have been peace and prosperity ; but every thing that would otherwise have appeared bright and fair, rested in the dark shadow thrown from the other side of the Atlantic. " Many years elapsed after the conclusion of the treaty of peace in 1783, before Great Britain entirely abandoned her expectations of re-establishing, at some future, and not very remote day, her authority over 110 Madison's admlmstration. her revolted American colonies, it was customary for her writers and politicians to underrate the im- portance, and sneer at the pretensions of the young republic, till they saw, in the rapidly extending com- merce and growing prosperity which followed the restoration of peace and tranquiUty, unmistakable indications that the daughter would soon be no mean rival of the mother country in the race of nations. To check these germs of greatness ere they should bud and blossom, was now the favorite object of En- ghsh statesmen. As no pretext existed for open hos- tilities, resort was had to the low arts of diplomacy — to intrigue and cunning ; and amid the moral and poli- tical corruption which, at that era, polluted the atmo- sphere of St. James, plans were concocted whose atrocity must ever stand out in bold relief on the page of impartial history. " Disregarding the provisions of the treaty of 1783, the British authorities retained possession of the military posts northwest of the Ohio, and to these, and similar establishments in the Canadas, agents were sent to suborn and tamper with the savages on the northern frontiers of the American Union, and incite them to commit acts of hostility upon the persons and property of the settlers who had found their way into the rich valley of the Mississippi. It was the pohcy of Wash- ington, — and after him of Adams, Jefferson and Ma- dison, — to purchase the lands belonging to the Indian tribes, required by the increasing white population of the country, at a fair equivalent ; to furnish them the means of civilization ; to provide for ihem madison'8 administration. Ill the restraints of well-ordered and wholesome regula- tions ; to enkindle new desires, and impart new mo- tives in their breasts ; to enlighten their minds and christianize their hearts. England, on the contrary, forgetting the eloquent and indignant denunciations of her Chatham, and careless how she sullied the national escutcheon, already stained by many a foul blot, sup- plied them with arms and ammunition, — with blankets, tobacco and fire water, — not to induce them to culti- vate harmony and good will with their neighbors, the citizens of the United States ; but to minister to their most depraved appetites, and arouse the most vindic- tive passions of their natures. She asked them not to lay aside the implements of death, and engage in the pursuits of peace ; but invited them to continue their barbarous warfare, and glut their vengeance, to the full, with the tomahawk and scalping-knife ! " Under the auspices of Simcoe, and other agents of Great Britain, immediately after the peace, a com- bination was formed among the northwestern Indians, the object of which was to prevent the Americans from extending their settlements beyond the Allegha- nies. Th6 border inhabitants were constantly har- rassed by the irruptions of the savages ; scenes of bloodshed and murder were of frequent occurrence ; and when efforts were made to chastise the perpetra- tors of these outrages, they found in England a fast and firm friend, whose assistance, though not openly rendered, proved of essential service to her allies. Her influence was felt in the defeat of Harmar and 112 Madison's administration. St. Clair ; and when the mounted volunteers under the gallant Wayne, scattered the savages in confu- sion, on the banks of the Maumee, they fled for pro- tection beneath the guns of a fortress over which floated the red cross of St. George. " The defeat of the Indians by Wayne was a severe lesson, and it was long remembered. Fortunately, too, for our country, who needed only a season of peace, and reposed from ' war's alarms,' to advance with rapid strides to the high destiny before her — the revolutionary spirit had, at this time, crossed the At- lantic, and the watch fires of liberty were blazing on the continent cf Europe. Alarmed for the stability of her institutions at home, England had no time to spend in courting the favor of the North American savages ; even though her machinations promised to terminate in the restoration of ' the brightest jewel of her crown.' In November, 1794, three months after Wayne's victory, Mr. Jay concluded his commercial treaty, in which it was stipulated that the western posts should be surrendered by the first of June, 1796, which was accordingly done ; and in the summer of 1795, as we have seen, the treaty of Grenville was made with the Indian tribes. The quiet thus restored was deceitful and temporary in its duration. " The treaty of Mr. Jay provided, among other things, for compensation for British spoliations on Ame- rican commerce, growing out of the war with France ; yet the ratifications of that instrument had scarcely been exchanged, when outrages of the same charac- Madison's administration. 113 ter, but greater in degree, were committed. Taking advantage of the distracted state of afiairs on the continent, the enterprising citizens of America had extensively engaged in the carrying trade ; and their commerce "had increased with so much rapidity, that the jealousy of England was again awakened. Large quantities of American provisions were also shipped to Europe, and especially to France, and to her pos- sessions in the West Indies. The prices paid for which, owing to the continuance of hostilities, afforded handsome profits ; but this interfered, very materially, with the determination of England, by means of her maratime supremacy, to starve the French people into an abandonment of their republican notions ; and to prevent it, she caused blockades to be declared, which were enforced by no suitable naval power, and orders to be issued, in defiance of the law of nations, requir- ing neutral vessels to be seized though not carrying articles contraband of war. " Remonstrance on the part of the authorities of the United States, was of no avail. The example set by England was followed by France — every act of injustice on the one side being succeeded by a still more odious one on the other. The treaty of Amiens, in 1802, aiforded the Americans a brief respite ; but, on the renewal of the war, in the following year, sei- zures and condemnations of our vessels became more frequent than ever. England joined the coalition formed to establish continental despotism on a firmer basis, and restore the Bourbon dynasty to the throne 114 Madison's administration. which they had disgraced ; and she stopped at nothing to accomphsh her purposes. Not content with watch- ing the forts of France, she sent her privateers and vessels of war, under her pirate flag, to hover on our coast, and plunder our commerce. Her navy having been seriously reduced in men, by the long continued warfare in which she had been engaged, she likewise resorted to the impressment of American seamen, to fill up the complements of her crews. Large num- bers of sailors were taken from our merchantmen ; and, to conclude these high-handed offences, the fri- gate Chesapeake was despoiled of a portion of her crew, on the twenty-second day of June, 1807."* While these measures, designed and calculated to destroy the commerce, and cripple the prosperity of the American people, were being systematically pur- sued on the ocean, the emissaries of Great Britain were covertly at work among the northwestern sa- vages — poisoning their minds, souring their disposi- tions, inflaming their passions, and preparing them in every way for the resort to arms, which, they fore- saw, must eventually take place. The government of the United States had patiently endured many an act of injustice, during the adminis- tration of Washington, Adams and Jefi'erson. She suffered much in her weakness, which she would not now tolerate in her strength. Year ' after year she insisted, through her envoys, * Jenkins' " Generals of the Last War with Great Britain." Madison's ad.mimstratiox. 115 on " the suppression of impressments, and the defini- tion of blockades ;" and when, in 1804, the Bzitish minister at Washington, in the name and on the behaU' of his sovereign, distinctly recognized the legitimate principles of blockade, the hope was fondly indulged than an amicable arrangement of all existing diliicul- ties and disputes would soon be made. But this hope proved to be vain and delusive. Great Britain was determined on maintaining her naval su- periority, and monoj)ohzing the commerce of the world. She regarded no promise — she respected no obligation. Her plans were soon matured ; and she attempted, by one blow, to destroy the merchant ma- rine of the infant republic, then reaping a golden har- vest, and humble forever the power and pride of her great rival. In May, 1800, the famous " paper block- ade" was signed, closing the ports of France, from Brest to the Elbe, against the ships of neutral nations. No adequate naval force was stationed on the French coast to enforce the blockade ; but a fleet was des- patched to the shores of the United States, three thousand miles off, to capture every vessel suspected of a design to evade it. This act of aggression on our commerce, for such was its effect and such was its design, was the main moving cause of the war of 1812. No apology can, or need be offered, for the conduct of France. Yet the blockade of her ports was the excuse or justification, on which, as was natural, she relied, to defend the retaliatory decree promulgated 116 Madison's administration. at Berlin, in the following November. Patience and forbearance still continued to characterize the conduct of the American Government. Though the sanctity of her flag has been disregarded, though numbers of seamen had been impressed from her vessels, and though the national honor had been outraged and in- sulted by the attack on the Chesapeake, she content- ed herself with interdicting British armed vessels from entering her harbors. This mild and moderate policy but invited further aggression. On the 1 1 th of November, 1807, the British orders in council were issued ; and on the 17th of December in the same year, the French Emperor retaliated, by the Milan decree.* The United States were now " compelled to de- cide, either to withdraw their sea-faring citizens, and their commercial wealth from the ocean, or to leave the interests of the mariner and the merchant expos- ed to certain destruction ; or to engage in open and active war for the protection and defence of those in- terests. The principles and the habits of the Ameri- can government were still disposed to neutrality and peace. In weighing the nature and the amount of the aggressions which had been perpetrated, or which were threatened, if there were any preponderance to determine the balance against one of the belligerent *The Milan decree was not of course, known to have been issued, in the United States, when the Embargo act of the 22d December, 1807, was passed : but, nevertheless, France was not excepted from its pro- visions. Madison's admimstratiOxV. 117 powers rather than the other, as the object of a deo- laration of war, it was against Great Britain, at least upon the vital interest of impressment, and the obvi- ous superiority of her naval means of annoyance. The French decrees were, indeed, as obnoxious in their for- mation and design as the British orders ; but the gov- ernment of France claimed and exercised no right of impressment ; and the maritime spoliations of France were, comparatively restricted not only by her own weakness on the ocean, but by the constant and per- vading vigilance of the fleets of her enemy. The dilHculty of selection, the indiscretion of encounter- ing, at once, both of the offending powers ; and, above all, the hope of an early return of justice, under the dispensations of the ancient public law, prevailed in the councils of the American government ; and it was resolved to attempt the preservation of its neutrality and its peace, of its citizens and its resources, by a voluntary suspension of the commerce and navigation of the United States. It is true, that for the minor outrages committed under the pretext of the rule of war of 1756, the citizens of every denomination had demanded from their government, in the year 1805, protection and redress ; it is true, that for the unpar- alleled enormities of the year 1807, the citizens of every denomination again demanded from their gov- ernment protection and redress ; but it is, also, a truth, conclusively established by every manifestation of the sense of the American people, as well as of their government, that any honorable means of pro- 118 Madison's administration. tection and redress were preferred to the last resort of arms. The American' government might honora- bly retire, for a time, from the scene of conflict and collision ; but it could no longer, with honor, permit its flag to be insulted, its citizens to be enslaved, and its property to be plundered, on the highway of na- tions. " Under these impressions, the restrictive system of the United States was introduced. In December, 1807, an embargo was imposed upon all American vessels and merchandize, on principles similar to those which originated and regulated the embargo law, authorized to be laid by the President of the United States, in the year 1794 ; but soon afterwards, in the genuine spirit of the policy that prescribed the measure, it was de- clared by law, 'that in the event of such peace, or suspension of hostilities between the belHgerent pow- ers of Europe, or such changes in their measures af- fecting neutral commerce, as might render that of the United States safe, in the judgment of the President of the United States, he was authorized to suspend the embargo, in whole, or in part.' The pressure of the embargo was thought, however, so severe upon every part of the community, that the American government notwithstanding the neutral character of the measure, determined upon some relaxation ; and, accordingly, the embargo being raised, as to all other nations, a system of non-intercourse and non-importation was substituted, in March, 1809, as to Great Britain and France, which prohibited all voyages to the British MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. 119 or French dominions, and all trade in articles of Brit- ish or French product or manufacture.* But still ad- hering to the neutral and pacific policy of the govern- ment, it was declared, ' that the President of the Uni- ted States should be authorized, in case either France or Great Britain should so revoke or modify her edicts, as that they should cease to violate the neutral com- merce of the United States, to declare the same by proclamation, after which the trade of the United States might be renewed with the government so do- ing.' These appeals to the justice and the interests of the belligerent powers proving inefiectual, and the ne- cessities of the country increasing, it was finally re- solved by the American government to take the haz- ards of a war ; to revoke its restrictive system, and to exclude British and French armed vessels from the harbors and waters of the United States ; but, asain, emphatically to announce, * that in case either Great Britain or France should, before the 3d of March, 1811, so revoke or modify her edicts, as that they should cease to violate the neutral commerce of the United States ; and if the other nation should not, within three months thereafter, so revoke or modify her edicts, in like manner, the provisions of the non- intercourse and non-importation law should, at the ex- piration of three months, be revived against the na- *The non-intercourse law was passed on the 1st day of March, 1809, ihree days previous to the inauguration of Mr. Madison. 120 Madison's administration. tion refusing, or neglecting to revoke or modify its edict.'* "On the expiration of three months from the date of the president's proclamation, the non-intercourse and non-importation law was, of course, to be revived against Great Britain, unless, during that period, her orders in council should be revoked. The subject was, therefore most anxiously and most steadily press- ed upon the justice and the magnanimity of the Brit- ish government ; and even when the hope of success expired, by the lapse of the period prescribed in one act of Congress, the United States opened the door of reconciliation by another act, which, in the year 1811, again provided, that in case, at any time. Great Britain should so revoke or modify her edicts, as that they shall cease to violate the neutral commerce of the United States, the President of the United States should declare the fact by proclamation ; and that the restrictions, previously imposed, should, from the date of such proclamation, cease and be discontinued.'! But, unhappily, every appeal to the justice and mag- nanimity of Great Britain was now, as heretofore, fruitless and forlorn. She had, at this epoch, impress- ed from the crews of American merchant vessels, peaceably navigating the high seas, not less than six thousand mariners, who claimed to be citizens of the United States, and who were denied all opportunity to verify their claims. She had seized and confiscated •Act of Congress, May 1st, 1810. tAct of Congress, March 2d, 1811. Madison's administration. 121 r the commercial property of American citizens to an incalculable amount. She had united in the enormi- ties of France to declare a great proportion of the ter- raqueous globe in a state of blockade ; chasing the American merchant flag effectually from the ocean. She had contemptuously disregarded the neutrality of the American territory, and the jurisdiction of the American laws, within the waters and harbors of the United States. She was enjoVing the emoluments of a surreptitious trade, stained with every species of fraud and corruption, which gave to the belligerent powers the advantages of peace, while the neutral powers were involved in the evils of war. She had, in short, usurped and exercised on the water, a tyran- ny similar to that which her great antagonist had usurped and exercised upon the land. And, amidst all these proofs of ambition and avarice, she demanded that the victims of her usurpations and her violence should revere her as the sole defender of the rifhts and liberties of mankind. " When, therefore. Great Britain, in manifest viola- tion of her solemn promise, refused to follow the ex- ample of France, by the repeal of her orders in council, the American government was compelled to contemplate a resort to arms, as the only remaining course to be pursued for its honor, its independence, and its safety. Whatever depended upon the United States themselves, the United States had performed, for the preservation of peace, in resistance of the French decrees as well as of the British orders. 6 122 Madison's administratio.n. What had been required from France, in its relation to the neutral character of the United States, France had performed by the revocation of its Berhn and Milan decrees. But what depended upon Great Brit- ain, for the purposes of justice, in the repeal of her orders in council, was withheld, and new evasions were sought when the old were exhausted. It was, at one time, alleged that satisfactory proof was not afforded that France had repealed her decrees against the commerce of the United States, as if such proof alone were wanting to ensure the performance of the British promise. At another time it was insisted that the repeal of the French decrees in their operation against the United States, in order to authorize a de- mand for the performance of the British promise, must be total, applying equally to their internal and their external effects ; as if the United States had either the right or the power to impose upon France the law of her domestic institutions. And it was finally insisted, in a dispatch from Lord Castlereagh to the British minister residing at Washington, in the year 1812, which was officially communicated to the American government, ' that the decrees of Berlin and Milan must not be repealed singly and speciall}? in relation to the United States ; but must be repealed also' as to all other neutral nations ; and that in no less extent of a repeal of the French decrees, had the British government ever pledged itself to repeal the orders in Council ;'* as if it were incumbent on the * Correspondence between the American Secretary' and Mr. Foster the British minister, June, 1812. MADISON S ADMIMSl RATION. 123 United States not only to assert her own rights, but to become the coadjutor of the British government, in a gratuitous assertion of the rights of all other nations. '* The Congress of the United States could pause no longer. Under a deep and afflicting sense of the national wrongs and the national resentments, while they * postponed definite measures with respect to France, in the expectation that the result of unclosed discussions between the American minister at Paris and the French government, would speedily enable them to decide, with greater advantage, on the course due to the rights, the interests, and the honor of the country,'* they pronounced a deliberate and solemn declaration of war between Great Britain and the United States on the 18th of June, 1812. " But it is in the face of all the facts which have been displayed in the present narrative, that the prince regent, by his declaration of January, 1813, describes the United States as the aggressor in the war. If the act of declaring war constitutes, in all cases, the act of original aggression, the United States must submit to the severity of the reproach ; but if the act of declaring war may be more truly con- sidered as the result of long suftering and necessary self-defence, the American government will stand ac- quitted in the sight of Heaven and of the world. Have the United States, then, enslaved the subjects, confiscated the property, prostrated the commerce, * President's Message, June 1st, 1812, and report of the committee of Foreign Relations. 124 Madison's administration. insulted the flag, or violated the territorial sovereign- ty of Great Britain ? No ; but in all these respects the United States had suffered for a long period of years, previously to the declaration of war, the contumely and outrage of the British government. It has been said, too, as an aggravation of the im- puted aggression, that the United States chose a pe- riod for their declaration of war when Great Britain was struggling for her own existence against a power which threatened to overthrow the independence of all Europe ; but it might be more truly said, that the United States, not acting upon choice, but upon com- pulsion, delayed the declaration of war until the per- secutions of Great Britain had rendered further delay destructive and distrraceful. Great Britain had con- verted the commercial scenes of American opulence and prosperity into scenes of comparative poverty and distress. She had brought the existence of the United States, as an independent nation, into question ; and surely it must have been indifferent to the United States whether they ceased to exist as an independent nation, by her conduct, while she professed friend- ship, or by her conduct, when she avowed enmity and revenge. Nor is it true that the existence of Great Britain was in danger at the epoch of the declaration of war. The American government uniformly enter- tained an opposite opinion ; and, at all times, saw more to apprehend for the United States, from her maritime power, than from the territorial power of her enemy. The event has justified the opinion and MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. l'J5 apprehension. But what the United States asked, as essential to their welfare, and even as beneficial to the allies of Great Britain, in the European war, Great Britain, it is manifest, might have granted, without impairing the resources of her own strength or the splendor of her own sovereignty ; for her orders in council have been since revoked ; not, it is true, as the performance of her promise to follow, in this respect, the example of France, since she finally rested the obligation of that promise upon a repeal of the French decrees as to all nations ; and the repeal was only as to the United States ; nor as an act of national justice towards the United States ; but sim- ply as an act of domestic policy, for the special ad- vantage of her own people. " The British government has also described the war as a war of aggrandizement and conquest on the part of the United States ; but where is the foundation for the charge ? While the American government em- ployed every means to dissuade the Indians, even those who Uved within the territory, and were sup- plied by the bounty of the United States from taking any part in the war, the proofs were irresistible that the enemy pursued a very different course ; and that every precaution would be necessary to prevent the effects of an offensive alliance between the British troops and the savages throughout the northern fron- tier of the United States. The military occupation of Upper Canada was, therefore, deemed indispen- sable to the safety of that frontier in the earliest 126 MADI.-JONS ADMINISTRATION. movements of the war, independent of all views of extending the territorial boundary of the United States. Bat when war was declared, in resentment for injuries which had been suffered upon the Atlantic, what principle of public law, what modification of civ- ilized warfare, imposed upon the United States the duty of abstaining from the invasion of the Canadas 1 It was there alone that the United States could place themselves upon an equal footing of mihtary force with Great Britain ; and it was there that they might reasonably encourage the hope of being able, in the prosecution of a lawful retaliation, to restrain the violence of the enemy, and to retort upon him the evils of his own injustice. The proclamations issued by the American commanders on entering Upper Can- ada, have, however, been adduced by the British negotiators at Ghent, as the proofs of a spirit of am- bition and aggrandizement on the part of their go- vernment. In truth, the proclamations were not only unauthorized and disapproved, but were infractions of the positive instructions which had been given for the conduct of the war in Canada. When the general, commanding the northwestern army of the United States, received, on the 24th of June, 1812, his first authority to commence offensive preparations, he was especially told that *he must not consider himself au- thorized to pledge the government to the inhabitants of Canada further than assurances of protection in their persons, property and rights.' And on the en- suing 1st of August, it was emphatically declared to MADISOXS ADMINISTRATION. 1^7 him, * that it had become necessary that he should not lose sight of the instructions of the 24th of June, as any pledge beyond that was incompatible with tiie views of the government.' Such was the nature of the charge of American ambition and aggrandizement, and such the evidence to support it. " The conduct of the United States, from the moment of declaring the war, will serve, as well as their previ- ous conduct, to rescue them from the unjust reproaches of Great Britain. When war was declared, the or- ders in council had been maintained, with inexorable hostility, until a thousand American vessels and their cargoes had been seized and confiscated, under their operation ; the British minister at Washinj-rton had with peculiar solemnity, announced that the orders would not be repealed, but upon conditions, which the American government had not the right, nor the power, to fulHl ; and the European war, which had raged with little intermission for twenty years, threat- ened an indefinite c6ntinuance. Under these circum- stances, a repeal of the orders, and a cessation of the injuries which they produced, were events beyond all rational anticipation. It appears, however, that the orders, under the influence of a parliamentary inqui- ry into their effects upon the trade and manufactures of Great Britain, were provisionally repealed on the 23d of June, 1812, a few days subsequent to the American declaration of war. If this repeal had been made known to the United States, before their resort to arms, the repeal would have arrested it ; and that 128 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. cause of war being removed, the other essential cause, the practice of impressment, would have been the sub- ject of renewed negotiation, under the auspicious in- fluence of a partial, yet important, act of reconciha- tion. But the declaration of war, having announced the practice of impressment, as a principal cause, peace could only be the result of an express abandon- ment of the practice ; of a suspension of the prac- tice, for purposes of negotiation ; or of a cessation of actual sufferance, in consequence of a pacification in Europe, which would deprive Great Britain of every motive for continuing the practice. " The reluctance with which the United States had resorted to arms, was manifested by the steps takeii to arrest the progress of hostilities, and to hasten a res- toration of peace. On the 2Gth of June, 1812, the American charge d'affaires, at London, was instructed to make the proposal of an armistice to the British government, which might lead to an adjustment of all differences, on the single condition, in the event of the orders in council being repealed, that instructions should be issued, suspending the practice of impress- ment during the armistice. This proposal was soon followed by another, admitting, instead of positive in- structions, an informal understanding between the two governments on the subject. But both of these pro- posals were unhappily rejected. And when a third, which seemed to leave no plea for hesitation, as it re- quired no other preliminary than that the American minister, at London, should find in the British govern- MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. 129 ment a sincere disposition to accomodate the difference relative to impressment, on fair conditions, was eva- ded, it was obvious that neither a desire of peace nor a spirit of conciliation influenced the councils of Great Britain."* In followinnr the able and conclusive vindication of Mr. Dallas, — which could not be mutilated without impairing, if not altogether destroying, much of its beauty and force, — we have been led to deviate, in some degree, from strict chronological order. To re- turn, therefore, to the position of Mr. Madison at the outset of his administration : He found himself, as we have seen, embarrassed by altercations and disputes of long standing, with the two great powers of the world, — the one hostile in feeling as in conduct, and the other, though disposed to be friendly, compelled by the course of her adversary, to adopt measures of retaliation, as unjust to her ancient ally as they were injurious. During the administration of Mr. Jeffer- son, embargo had been tried in vain ; though suffer- ing much from the adoption of this measure, neither England nor France relented in anything ; and, on the other hand, our people who were engaged in com- merce, preferring to run the risk of evading the Euro- pean blockades, rather than to have their vessels lie rotting in their harbors, began to grow still more vio- lent in the utterance of their complaints. In order to alleviate, as far as was consistent with the preservation of the national dignity, the burdens *Dallas' Exposition. 6* 130 Madison's administration. which weighed so heavily, though necessary to be borne, upon the citizens of the eastern and Middle Atlantic states, the non-intercourse system was substi- tuted for the embargo, at the close of the session of Congress, in March, 1809. Trusting that this mani- festation of a concihatory spirit would be followed by the adoption of corresponding measures on the part of England, to whom all eyes were turned as the first ao-sressor in this series of outrages and insults ; but, at 'the same time,- fearing lest, notwithstanding their de- sire for peace, they might be compelled to take up arms in defence of their rights, provision was made by law, prior to the termination of the session, for a spe- cial meeting of the next Congress, to be held on the 22d day of May following. Accordingly, the members of the eleventh Congress assembled at the Capitol, at the time specified in the act ; and the House of Representatives was organi- zed, by the re-election of Joseph B. Varnum, a demo- cratic member from Massachusetts, to the office of Speaker. On the 23d instant, the President commu- nicated his message to the two houses, from which, and the accompanying documents, it appeared that in the month of April previous, an arrangement had been entered into with the British minister, Mr. Erskine, by virtue of which the commerce between England and t'he United States would be renewed, from and after the ensuing 10th day of June. By the repeal of the Embargo, and the substitution of a less obnoxious measure, a favorable opportunity Madison's administration. 131 had been afforded for the renewal of negotiations. Acting in accordance with the spirit, though not the letter, of his instructions, Mr. Erskine proposed to make satisfaction for the attack on the Chesapeake, and to withdraw the orders in Council, on the 10th of June, upon certain preliminary conditions, which were promptly complied with liy the American government; and on the 19th of April, the President had issued his proclamation in conformity with this arrangement. This favorable termination, as it was supposed of the* existing difliculties, produced a most happy elTect. The speedy revival of commerce was now looked for, and peace and prosperity seemed again to smile upon the land. It was under such auspicious circumstances that ('ongress came together. The session was ne- cessarily brief ; and after the passage of an act adopt- ing the commercial laws to the new arrangement with Great Britain, and some few others of minor importance, the members again separated. But this calm in the political atmosphere was of brief duration. The British Secretary for foreign af- fairs, Mr. Canning, was ambitious to become in the cabinet what Napoleon was in the field. His fiery and dashing counsels prevailed ; and the proceedings of Mr. Erskine were wholly disavowed. The latter had insisted, in his dispatches to his government, that his deviation from the orders he had received, had been occasioned by a thorough conviction on his part, that, by a too strict adherence to the letter of his in- structions, he might lose " the opportunity of promo- 132 MADISON'S ADMINISTRATION. ting essentially his Majesty's interests and wishes"; but the pacific temper and disposition of the minister were not reflected in the council chamber of St. James. So far from this, it was determined that America should be treated as an ungrateful dependent ; and that every overture should be spurned, till she sued as a suppliant for what she had hitherto demanded as a right. The offending envoy was recalled, and another sent in his place, who proved to be as ignorant of the courtesies . of international intercourse as he was desirous of urg- ing on hostihties between the two countries. Great occasion was now given to the federal oppo- sition for rejoicing, and they were prompt to avail themselves of it. It was said that Mr. Madison and his cabinet were aware, at the time of entering into the arrangement with Mr. Erskine, that the latter was exceeding his instructions ; and that the whole proceedings were a mere trick, the object of which was to affect the elections. There was, in truth, not the least foundation for this charge ; but it operated for a time prejudicially to the administration. A deep- rooted spirit of hostiUty towards the English nation, growing out of the feeling excited by the impressment of our seamen, and the continued aggressions on oui commerce, was rapidly gaining ground. A portion of the democratic party, neither few in numbers nor feeble in influence, began to doubt whether the policy of the executive was not too lukewarm and concila- tory ; and the federalists, or rather, the Hamiltonian branch of that party, though professedly opposed to a Madison's ad.mimstratiox. 133 collision with England zealously ''fanned the embers," and tauntingly declared that Mr. Madison could not be "kicked into a war." At first, the President doubted, whether the disa- vowal of the arrangement by virtue of which the or- ders in council were to be revoked, operated per se as a revival of the non-intercourse act ; but after delib- eration with his cabinet, the question was decided in the affirmative, and a second proclamation was issued, reciting the facts attending the suspension of the law, and announcing that it was again in full force. Irritated as were the American people by these re- peated acts of injustice of the British government, they were, in disposition at least, fully prepared for immediate hostilities and had the President but given the signal, war would at once have resulted, and that with the unquestioned approval of the great majority of his countrvmen. "Free trade and sailor's rights" was repeated from one extremity of the Union to the other ; impressment, and the violation of the neutral flag, were the topics of discussion at every public gathering ; and while old men gave utterance to their opinions in indignant language, the young stood by in silence, but with clenched hands and flashing eyes, and cheeks glowing with the fire of manly patriotism. Madison, however, was cool and sagacious, and not by any means disposed to precipitate the crisis which he foresaw, but hoped to avert. He still believed, that by persisting in the non-intercourse policy, Eng- land and France would eventually be brought to terms. 134 Madison's administration. It may be, that in his sincere anxiety for peace, he was over cautious ; but if he erred, it was for what, in him, was the most praisworthy of reasons ; and though the impartial historian may pronounce this to have been the great mistake of his administration, he will still do justice to the purity of his motives. Had Mr. Madison been less favorable to the policy which had been pursued, there were other reasons for prudence and hesitation. Though a period of nearly thirty years had elapsed since the revolution, during which time the country had been comparatively at peace, the memorable advice of Washington to " pre- pare for war," had been almost if not quite disregard- ed. Some thing had, indeed, been done towards the fortification of the sea-coast, yet a great deal more was required before it would be placed in a respectable state of defence ; and, judging from the past, but Httle reliance could be placed on the liberality of Congress in making appropriations for the future, — even upon those members who were the loudest and most vehe- ment in advocating an immoderate resort to arms. Of gunboats there were enough ; but their fitness for the object for which they were designed, was already more than doubted. The quotas of militia detached, under the act of March, 1808, had been discharged immediately after the arrangement had been entered into with Mr. Erskine. Some progi'ess had been made in raising and organizing the additional military force provided for by the act of April, 1808 ; but the offi- cers of our httle army were little practiced in "war's Madison's admimstratiox. 135 vast art," and the men, though brave and patriotic, in discipHne were far behind the trainbearers against whonn they were to tj.e opposed. Four additional frigates had been fitted for actual service, in pursu- ance of a law passed the session of 1808-9 ; yet what were these, in comparison with the oaken bulwarks of the proud mistress of the seas ! The geographical position of our country, also, with regard to one of the great powers against whom she had so much cause for complaint, was pecuHar. On the one side were the Canadas, the Colonial depen- dencies and possessions of England, where her troops were stationed and her munitions of war collected, inhabited by a people, one moiety of whom were firm in their loyalty, and the other moiety, though disposed to be friendly to us, prepared to manifest their predi- lictions only by remaining neutral. On the northwest and southwest, were hordes of ruthless savages, re- ceiving aid and encouragement, if not direct assistance, from British Agents and Emissaries. And on the south was Florida, belonging to and occupied by the troops of Spain ; who, inimical towards the United States on account of the purchase of Lousiana, and in close alliance with Great Britain, claimed, and had taken possession of a large tract on our southern bor- ders, between the Perdido and the Mississippi, upon the pretence that it was not included in the treaty of San Ildefonso. While the country was in a state of ferment and agitation, Mr. Jackson, the successor of Mr. Erskine, 138 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. f arrived at Washington. He was instructed to state tlie reasons which had influenced his government in disavowing the acts of its forj|ier representative ; but, as it appeared at the outset, he had no authority to make any proposals with respect to the orders in council ; and in regard to the attack on the Chesa- peake, the only proposition he made, was founded on the inadmissible presumption, that the first step to- wards an adjustment was due from the United States, and, while omitting all reference to the officer who had committed this high handed act of aggression, still asserted the odious doctrine of impressment. The new envoy was either unable, or unwilling, to imitate the mild and concihatory conduct of his predecessor, and, in his correspondence with the American Secre- tary, intimated that the President was aware that Mr. Erskine had exceeded his powers, when the arrange- ment was entered into with him. To such a charge, or rather insinuation, for its author had not the man- liness to make it directly and without qualification, there could be but one answer. The minister was allowed to hold no further communication with the government to which he was accredited, and the American minister at London was directed to announce the fact to the English Monarch, and acquaint him with the reasons which had led to this step, at the same time stating that any communications would be readily received if made through another channel. Our relations with Great Britain had just assumed this new phase, when Congress again assembled, at its Madison's administration. 137 regular session, on the 27th of November. The mem- bers were informed by the President, in his annua) message, of what had transpired during the recess : he also announced, that the fortifications on the maritime frontier were fast being completed ; that a supply of small arms sufficient for the public exigency would soon be provided ; and that the vessels-of-war had been fully equipped, as directed by the act of Con- gress. He likewise recommended such an oriraniza- tion of the militia as would be "best adapted to event- ual situations for which the United States ought to be prepared." In regard to the finances, he said, that although the current receipts, and the surplus pre- viously accumulated in the treasury, had enabled them to go through the past year without recurring to a loan, a deficiency for the ensuing year was to be ap- prehended, from the insecure condition of American commerce, and the consequent diminution of the pub- lic revenue. Shortly after the commencement of the session, a joint resolution was adopted approving of the course of the Executive in regard to the British minister, and declaring the willingness of Congress to call out the whole force of the nation, should it become necessary, to repel insults of so gross a character, and to assert and maintain the rights, honor, and interests of the United States. No action, in furtherance of the spirit of this resolution, was required, as, upon the repre- sentations of Mr. Pinkney, the American Plenipoten- tiary at the British court, Mr. Jackson was immedi- 138 Madison's administration. ately recalled, although he was neither censured, nor was any apology made for his conduct. Congress remained in session until the 1st of May, 1810. During this period, but few acts of general importance were passed. The law authorizing a de- tachment of one hundred thousand men from the militia expired by its own limitation, on the 30th of March, but was continued in foi-ce by another act. Acts were likewise passed at this session, providing for taking the decennial census, and for the creation of a loan for the payment of the public debt. In re- gard to our foreign relations, the legislation of Con- gress was characterized by the same spirit of forbear- ance which had hitherto governed their deliberations. On the 1st of May, an act was passed, known as the non-importation act, revoking the restrictive system, but excluding; British and French armed vessels from the waters of the United States, — and providing fur- ther, that if either Great Britain or France should revoke or modify her edicts, before the 3d of March, 1811, and the other nation should refuse or neglect to do the same, the non-importation law should, at the expiration of three months, be revived against the party so otfending. This was designed to be the ulti- matum of the American government ; and a declara- tion of war against whichsoever of the two nations failed to comply with its terms, was to be the only alternative. Accordingly, Messrs. Pinkney and Arm- strong, the respective ministers at the courts of Great Britain and France, were instructed to urge the M\I)IS(»\S AUAIIMSTRATIOX. 139 speedy repeal of the obnoxious orders and decrees. In reply to the communication of Mr. Armstrong, the French minister for foreign aflairs stated, in an official note, that the Berlin and Milan decrees were revoked, and would cease to have effect after the 1st of November ensuing, — upon the condition, however, that the English government should revoke their or- ders in council, and renounce the new principles of blockade which they had sought to establish, or, in default thereof, that the United States should cause their rights to be respected by Great Britain. Un- doubtedly, the French Emperor would, then have preferred a war between England and the United States, to a peaceable and amicable termination of the dispute ; but, under existing circumstances, and while Great Britain continued to adhere to her odious sys- tem of blockades, no liu'thcr concession could have been required of him by the American government. The proposition made by his minister fully complied with the terms of the act of May, 1810, and was therefore satisfactory to the Executive. On the receipt of General Armstrong's dispatches^ the President issued a proclamation dated the 2d of November, communicating the gratifying intelligence that one of the European belligerants had at length vielded to our demands ; and dcclarin": that the French decrees had been revoked, and that the non- intercourse law would be revived as against Great Britain, provided her orders in council were not re- pealed within three months from that date. 140 Madison's administration. Meanwhile, Mr. Pinkney labored to procure from the British ministry a revocation or modification of their orders, but it was all in vain. A direct reply to the able and convincing arguments, and the manly expostulations, of the American envoy, was for a long time evaded ; prevarication and sophistry were, how- ever, of little avail ; and when he finally forced them to take a determined stand, their answer, in its tenor and effect, was, that the United States should either persuade or compel France to take the iniative in re- tracing the aggressive course which both belligerants had pursued, when, so far as the former was concern- ed. Great Britain was herself the first who should have made reparation. To such a proposition the United States could not in justice or honor accede ; and after months spent in fruitless negotiation, Mr. Pinkney formally took leave of the Prince Regent on the 1st day of March, 1811. Previous to this time, the subject of our foreign relations had again received the consideration of the American Congress. That body commenced its ses- sion at Washington, on the 3d of December, 1810. On the 5th instant, the message of the President was received. After reviewing the condition of the pending negotiations with France and Great Britain, its author recommended a continuance of the defensive and pre- cautionary arrangements, and the adoption of further measures for the organization and discipline of the militia. The finances were represented to be in a flattering condition ; there being a balance remaining Madison's administration. 141 in the treasury, after the discharge of all liabilities, and the payment of the interest on the pubhc debt, together with a portion of the principal, of two mil- lions of dollars. One more effort was made for the settlement of the vexed questions in diiference with England, by the en- actment of a law, near the close of the session — on the 2d of March, 1811 — providing that, if Great Britain should revoke or modify her edicts, so that they ceased to violate the neutral commerce of the United States, the President should be authorized to declare the same by proclamation, and, from the date thereof, the pro- visions of the amended non-intercourse law should no longer remain in force. By the terms of its charter, the legal existence of the old Bank of the United States was to cease on the 4lli day of March, 1811. At the first session of the 10th Congress, memorials had been presented in both houses for a renewal of the charter. No definite action was had thereupon in the House of Represent- atives, but the Senate memorial was referred to the Secretary of the Treasury, to report upon the same at the ensuing session of Congress. The report of Mr. Gallatin was made on the 2d of March, 1809. He stated that the affairs of the bank appeared to have been wisely and skillfully managed ; and that, in his opinion, although there were some weighty objec- tions to the continuance of the institution, the public advantages to be derived from the renewal of the charter would more than counterbalance them. He 142 Madison's administration. also specified the conditions which, he thought, should be attached to the renewal. This session, the special session following, and the first session of the 11th Congress, passed off, however, without any final action on the subject. On the 18th of December, 1810, a petition of the stockholders of the bank, praying for the renewal of the charter of incorporation, was presented in the House of Representatives, and referred to a select committee, of which Mr. Burwell, of Virginia, was chairman. The committee reported a bill providing for the renewal, on the 4th of January, 1811, which was taken up on the 16th instant, when a motion was made by Mr. Burwell, in committee of the whole, to strike out the first section. The motion prevailed by a vote of 59 to 46 ; and on the 24th instant, after an animated debate, the subject was indefinitely post- poned, by a vote of 65 to 64. A number of able speeches were made in the progress of the discussion; the democratic speakers, in the main, treating the subject as a party one, and laying great stress on the arguments of Mr. Madison, contained in his speech delivered in 1791 against the original act of incorpo- ration. The principal speakers opposed to the renewal of the charter were William A. Burwell, and John W. Eppes — the latter the son-in-law of Mr. Jeffer- son — of Virginia ; Peter B. Porter, of New York ; Adam Seybert, of Pennsylvania ; Robert Wright, of Maryland ; Nathaniel Macon, of North Carolina ; and Wilham T. Barry, and Joseph Desha, of Kentucky. Madison's admimstration. I43 On the other side were WiJham Findlev, of Pennsvl- vania ; and Jonathan Fisk, of New York ; Benjamin Tahnadge, of Connecticut ; Phihp B. Key, of Mary- land ; David S. Garland, of \'irginia ; and Samuel McKee, of Kentucky. A similar petition presented in the Senate, shared a like fate. It was referred to a committee of which William H. Crawford, of Georgia, was chairman ; who, having fortified themselves with another report from Mr. Gallatin in favor of the renewal of the charter, introduced a bill providing therefor on the 5th day of February. A warm debate arose on a motion made by Mr. Anderson, of Tennessee, to strike out the first section. Mr. Crawford ably defended Ihe constitutionality and expediency of the measure, and indignantly repelled the charge of apostacy made against him by other democratic Senators. He was warmly supported by Richard Brent, of Virginia, and John Pope, of Kentucky, belonging to the same party; and by James Lloyd and Timothy Pickering, of Massachusetts, and John Taylor, of South Carolina. The ablest speeches in opposition to the re-charter were made by WiUiam B. Giles, of Virginia ; Henry Clay of Kentucky ; and Samuel Smith, of Maryland. The question was taken on the 20th of February, and resulted in a tie vote, of 17 to 17 ; Messrs. I-loyd, Pickering, an.d Brent, voting, in opposition to the instructions of the legislatures of Massachusetts and A'irginia, in favor of the bill. The Senate being thus equally divided, the Vice President, George Clinton, 144 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. gave the casting vote for striking out the first section of the bill. Great efforts had been made by the friends and agents of the bank to procure a renewal of the char- ter, and after the final rejection of the bill, propositions were introduced into both houses of Congress, extend- ing the provisions of the existing charter, for the purpose of enabling it to close up its affairs. Mr. Clay, as the chairman of the select committee in the Senate, to whom the proposition was referred, and Mr. P. B. Porter, at the head of a similar committee in the House of Representatives, reported against even this temporary renewal of the charter. It ex- pired, therefore, by its own limitation, on the 4th of March. On the 27 th of February, Joel Barlow, of Con- necticut, was appointed minister to France, in place of General Armstrong, who had been recalled, at his own request, the preceding autumn. After the return of Mr. Pinkney, the United States were represented at the English court by Jonathan Russell, of Rhode Island, as charge (V affairs. A collision, which took place on the 16th of May, between two vessels of war, belonging, respectively, to Great Britain and the United States, very much heightened the exasperation of feeling manifested by a great majority of the American people, and aroused their patriotism to the highest pitch. — The frigate President, under the command of Commodore Rodg- ers, while peaceably cruizing on the American coast, MADISON S AJL».MlMSTRATIO.\. 145 was unexpectedly fired upon by the British sloop of war, Little Belt. The fire was instantly returned with spirit and effect. Thirty two men were either killed, on wounded, or board the sloop, by the Ameri- can fire. Explanations were then made, — the British commander asserting that he had labored under a mistake, though it is quite probable he designed to perpetrate a similar outrage with that committed on the Chesapeake, — whereupon, the sloop, having been sufficiently punished for her temerity, was permitted to return to her harbor. Several months elapsed after the recall of Mr. Jackson, before the English government dispatched a new mmister to the United States. Mr. Foster was sent in that capacity, in the summer of 1811, and through him, in the month of November following, tardy reparation was at length made for the attack on the Chesapeake. In the winter of 1810—11, great numbers of Indian warriors visited the military posts in the Canadas, and obtained liberal supplies of arms and ammunition. It can scarcely be doubted that they were, at this time, prompted, or excited to hostilities, by British emissa- ries and agents, as, early in the spring they com- menced the work of devastation and butchery on the northwestern frontier. An ineffectual attempt at pacification having been made, in the summer, by Governor Harrison, of Indiana territory, he marched upon the towns of the savages lying on the upper waters of the Wabasn,'in October, with a large force. 146 SIADISON S ADMI.MSTRATION. On the morning of the 7th of Xovember he was attacked bv the enemy, while his men lav in bivouac, near the junction of the Tippecanoe and Wabash ; but he succeeded in repulsing them with great loss, and subsequently destroyed their villages, and laid waste the surroundhig district. This timely blow intimidated the Indians, and frustrated any ulterior plans they may have had in view, in anticipation of a war with England. The Congressional elections held in 1810-11, had resulted favorably to the administration, although there were symptoms of disaffection manifested in the democratic party in some portions of the Union, particularly in the State of Xew^ York, where the name of Dewitt Clinton was already mentioned in connection with the Presidency, by those of his polit- ical friends who were dissatisfied with the conciliatory policy of Mr. Madison, or who were really opposed to a war in the then comparatively defenceless state of the country. The 12th Congress assembled on the 4th of November, in pursuance of an executive proc- lamation. Henry Clay, of Kentucky, was chosen speaker of the House. This gentleman had now be- come one of the most prominent supporters of the administration in Congress ; and he was ablv sus- tained in the body over which he presided, by James Fisk, of Vermont ; Peter B. Porter and Samuel L. Mitchell, of Xew York ; Adam Seybert, of Pennsyl- vania ; Robert Wright, of Maryland ; Hugh jVelson, of Virginia ; Nathaniel Macon, of North Carolina ; Madison's administration. 147 John C. Calhoun, Langdon Cheves, and William Lowndes, of South Carolina ; William W. Bibb, and George M. Troup, of Georgia ; Felix Grundy, of Tennessee ; and William P. Duval, of Kentucky. On the opposition side, were Josiah Quincy, of Massa- chusetts ; and Timothy Pitkin, and Benjamin Tal- madge, of Connecticut. The federal leaders in the Senate were James Lloyd, of Massachusetts ; and James A. Bayard, of Delaware. The most prominent democratic Senators were Samuel Smith, of Mary- land ; William B. Giles, of Virginia ; William H. Crawford, of Georgia ; George W. Campbell, of Tennessee ; and George M. Bibb, of Kentucky. It was evident from the tone of the President's message, that all hope of conciliation was nearly abandoned. He stated that the period had arrived which claimed from the legislative guardians of the national rights, the amplest provisions for their main- tenance, and earnestly invoked them to put the coun- try "into an armor and an attitude demanded by the crisis." The finances were said to be in a favorable condition. The receipts into the treasury during the year had been over thirteen and a half millions of dollars, which had enabled the government to meet its current liabilities, including interest ; and to cancel more than five millions of dollars of the public debt. On the 25th day of November, James Monroe, of Virginia, was appointed Secretaay of State, in place of Mr. Smith, who had previously resigned ; and in the month of December, following, William Pinkney, 148 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. of Maryland, late minister to Great Britain, was ap- pointed attorney general, to fill the vacancy occasioned by the resignation of Mr. Rodney. A bolder and more defiant tone was now assumed by the democratic members of Congress, particularly by those from the southern and western states. The inactivity and indecision which had characterized the policy of the dominant party in former years were laid aside ; and warlike measures of the most decided stamp were promptly adopted. Bills were passed at this session, providing for the enlistment of twenty thousand men in the regular army, for repairing and equipping the frigates in ordinary and building new vessels, and authorizing the President to accept the services of fifty thousand volunteers, and to require of the executives of the several states and territories to hold their respective quotas of one hundred thous- and men, fully organised, armed and equipped, in read- iness to march at a moment's warning. Funds were also appropriated to enable the Executive to carry these provisions into ettect. It was with some reluctance, in view of the exposed condition of the country, and the lack of means for carrying on a war with one of the first powers in the world, that Mr Madison acquiesced in these measures though he saw their necessity. While he hesitated, he was waited upon by several of the leading democratic members, who assured him that the popular feeling was setting strongly in favour of a war ; that the friends of Mr Clinton were taking advantage of his timidity; Madison's administration. 149 and that if he desired to sustain himself, it was ne- cessary for him to take a bold and determined stand. Mr. Madison was by no means averse to the war, though a man of peace in principle and in practice ;' but he feared that Congress would either be unable or unwilling to provide him with the necessary supplies of money and men, to carry it on to a successful issue. Furthermore, his cabinet officers, though not undis- tinguished for talent, were hardly fitted for the emer- gency ; and some diversity of opinion likewise existed among them. Mr. Gallatin was openly and avowedly opposed to a war, and Mr. Pinkney believed it pre- nnature to hurry on hostilities while so little prepara- tion had been made. Mr. Granger was not opposed to a war, but was unfriendly to Mr. Madison, and secretly operating, in connection with Obadiah Ger- man, one of the democratic senators from New York, for the elevation of Mr. Clinton to the Presidency! ' Mr. Monroe was the only military man in the cabinet, and his experience had been limited. The secretaries of war and the navy were estimable men, but not at all calculated for directing the operations of armies and fleets in a state of war. As for the President himself, he did not profess to have any acquaintance with military matters. On the 9th of March, 1812, the President sent a special message communicating certain documents, being the revelations of one John Henry, from which It appeared that he had been selected as a confidential agent, by the governor of Canada, to visit the New 150 Madison's administration. England States, and sound the disaffected federal pol- iticians in that quarter, in regard to forming a con- nection with Great Britain. The sum of fifty thous- and dollars was paid out of the secret service fund for these disclosures, but they do not appear to have been a very desirable bargain. The British minister at Washington solemnly disclaimed any knowledge on his part touching the matter, though, even admitting this, it was never shown that the Canadian governor did not dispatch Henry to the United States for the purpose represented. Still, nothing appeared to cast suspicion on any one, even the most bitter federalists of the Eastern States, of having had any treasonable intercourse or understanding with him. In the meantime, the French Emperor, after much delay and prevarication, — in which he showed a spirit, and manifested feelings, towards his " American pre- fect," as the federalists termed Mr. Madison, far from being of that friendly character which they would have had the public infer, — had finally, on the 28th of April, 1811, definitely revoked 'the Berlin and Milan decrees, to date from November 1st, 1810, though it was intimated that no indemnification would be made for spoliations committed subsequent to that date. A powerful eftbrt had also been made in the British parliament, by the Marquis of Lansdowne and Mr. Brougham, at the instigation of the merchants and manufacturers of England, whose business was rapidly declining, to procure the repeal of the orders in council. The movement was strongly resisted by Madison's administration. 151 the ministers, who declared, with the utmost arrogance and assurance, that England could not deviate I'rom her course, nor listen to the petty grievances of neu- tral nations, when her rights and interests were at stake. Previous to this time, Mr. Russell, the Amer- ican charge cf affairs, had informed Mr. Monroe, in a dispatch dated the 14th of February, 1812, that he could discover no evidence of an intention, on the part of tlic British government, to repeal their orders ; whereupon, the President, in a special confidential message, on the 1st of April, recommended an Em- bargo on all vessels then in port, and thereafter arriv- ing, for the period of sixty days ; and on the 4th in- stant. Congress pessed a law in conformity with such recommendation. In a subsequent dispatch, dated the 4th of March, 1812, communicating the substance of the discussions in parliament, Mr. Russell remarked, at its close, " I no longer entertain a hope that we can honorably avoid war." By an act of Congress, passed on the 8th day of April, the territory of Lousiana was admitted into the Union as a state, or rather the southern portion of it, and the name of Missouri territory was given to the remaining portion. George CHnton, the venerable Vice President, for so many years the leader of the republican party in the State of New York, died at Washington, on the 20th of April, at the age of seventy-three. His place as presiding otiicer of the Senate had been previously X52 MADISOM S ADMINISTRATIOIV. filled by the election of William H. Crawford as president j9ro. tern. Mr. Russell's prophetic anticipation proved to be correct. On the 30th of May, 1812, Mr. Foster addressed a lengthy letter to Mr. Monroe, reviewing the vv'hole controversy betw^een Great Britain and the United States ; defending the course of the former in regard to the blockades and orders in council ; and closing with tiie explicit assurance, that the same course would be steadily pursued, while France con- tinued to maintain and act upon the principles she had done. This was appropriately regai'ded as the final answer of Great Britain to the urgent and often re- peated remonstrances of the American government : — she would not be content with the repeal of the French decrees, so far as they affected the United States, but her measures should not be relinquished, till such re- peal took effect as to all neutral nations. The decree of the French Emperor, of the 28th of April, 1811, before alluded to, was not known to be in existence, at this time, by the parties to the correspondence, as it had long been kept secret, though it had been exhib- ited to Mr. Barlow, the American minister at the French court, a few days previous. Had this decree been known, however, it is not probable that the in- structions of Lord Castlereah, under which Mr. Fos- ter acted, would have been different, inasmuch as the policy of the existing ministry was not eventually changed, till a revolution was threatened in the man- ufacturing districts of England. MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. 153 It now became necessary to adopt some decisive measures looking to the maintenance of our rights as a free people, and the vindication of the national honor. Great Britain had, after years of delay and negotiation, emphatically and authoritively announced, that she would not abandon her position : if France could be injured, in the least, by her orders and block- ades, she cared not though that injury was aggra- vated, in a tenfold degree, to other, and neutral nations. President Madison did not hesitate at this critical junction. On the 1st day of June, he transmitted a confidential message to Congress, in which, though he did not withhold just and deserved censure from France, he commented, in strong and eloquent lan- guage, upon the long series of outrages and insults committed by the government of Great Britain, or under its auspices. In concluding his able review of the origin, progress, and development, of this system of aggressions, he said : "Such is the spectacle of injuries and indignities which have been heaped on our country ; and such the crisis which its unexampled forbearance and con- ciliatory efforts have not been able to avert. It might at least have been expected that an enlightened na- tion, if less urged by moral obligations or invited by friendly disposition on the part of the United States, would have found, in its true interest alone, a sufficient motive to respect their rights and their tranquility on the high seas ; that an enlarged policy would have 7* 154 MABISOX 8 ADMLNISTBATIOX. favored that free and general circulation of commerce in which the British nation is at all times interested, and which in times of war is the best alleviation of its calamities to herself, as well as to other belligerents ; and more especially, that the British cabinet would not, for the sake of a precarious and surreptitious in- tercourse with hostile markets, have persevered in a course of measures which necessarily put at hazard the invaluable market of a great and growing coun- try, disposed to cultivate the mutual advantages of an active commerce. " Other counsels have prevailed. Our moderation and concdiation have had no other effect than to en- courage perseverance and to enlarge pretensions. We behold our seafaring citizens still the daily victims of lawless violence, committed on the great and common highwav of nations, even within si^ht of the country which owes them protection. We behold our vessels, freighted with the products of our soil and industrv, or returning ■with the honest proceeds of them, wrest- ed from their lawful destinations, confiscated by prize courts, no longer the organs of pubUc law, but the instruments of arbitrary edicts, and their unfortunate crews dispersed and lost, or forced or inveigled in British ports into British fleets, while arguments are employed in support of these aggressions, which have no foundation but in a principle equal] v supporting a claim to regulate our external commerce in all cases whatsoever. " We behold, in fine, on the side of Great Britain, MADISO.VS ADMIMSTRATIOV. ] 55 a state of war against the United States ; and on the side of the United States, a state of peace toward Great Britain. " Whether the United States shall continue passive under these progressive usurpations and accumulatinff wrongs, or, opposing force to force, in defence of their national rights, shall commit a just cause into the hands of the Almighty Disposer of events, avoiding all connections which might entangle it in the contests or views of other powers, and preserving a constant readiness to concur in an honorable rcestablishment of peace and friendship, is a solemn question, which the constitution wisely confides to the ' ive de- partment of the government. In recom:i.e:iU;ng it to their early deliberations, I am happy in the assurance that the decision will be worthy the enlightened and patriotic councils of a virtuous, free, and a powerful nation.'' The message was immediately referred, in the House of Representatives, to the committee on foreign relations, who reported, on the 3rd day of June, a manifesto, setting forth the reasons which required, in their opinion, an immediate appeal to arms. These were : — the impressment of American seamen ; the British doctrine and system of blockade ; and the continuance of the orders in council The delibera- tKMis of CkmgTess on this important question were "conducted with closed doors. At first it was doaht- ful, whether a majority of the members could be in- duced to vote for a declaration of war. A biU drawn 156 Madison's administration. up for that purpose, by Mr. Pinkney, the attorney general — in brief, terse, and sententious language — was reported, however, by Mr. Calhoun, from the committee on foreign relations. The act contained but a single section, and, exclusive of its title, was in these words : " Be it enacted, S^c, That war be, and the same is hereby declared to exist between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and the dependencies thereof, and the United States of America and their territories ; and the President of the United States is hereby authorized to use the whole land and naval force of the United States to carry the same into etfect, and to issue to private armed vessels of the United States commissions, or letters of n)arque and general reprisal, in such form as he shall think proper, and under the seal of the United States, against the government of the said United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and the subjects thereof." Notwithstanding the federal members opposed the passage of the bill, it was rapidly pushed through the forms of legislation, and, by a final vote of 79 to 49, sent to the Senate for concurrence. It here encoun- tered a still more violent opposition. The democratic friends of Dewitt Clinton united with the federalists in the attempt to defeat the bill ; and Mr. German, one of the New York senators, made a speech as well as voted against it. It finally passed, however, by a vote of 19 to 13, on the 17th of July, and, on the 18th instant was signed and approved by the President. Madison's administration. 157 On the following day he issued his proclamation, an- nouncing the existance of war and the causes which had led to it, as set forth in the manifesto of the com- mittee on foreign relations, and calling upon the people of the United States to sustain the public au- thorities in their efforts to obtain a speedy, a just, and an honorable peace. " The members from New Hampshire, most of those from Massachusetts, then including Maine, those of Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Jersey, and Delaware, with several from New York, some from Virginia and North Carolina, one from Pennsylvania, and three from Maryland opposed the war. The members from Vermont, some from New York, all but one from Pennsylvania, most from Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina, all from South Carohna, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio, and Louisiana, supported it."* Mr. CHnton's friends, numbering among them a majority of the democratic delegation from New York, for the most part insisted that they were not opposed to the war, but they deemed the declaration at this time premature. Some of them afterwards joined what was called the peace party, composed of federalists and disaffected democrats ; but most of the seceders eventually returned to their " first love." Pursuant to a custom which many now began to condemn, a caucus of eighty-two republican members * Ingersoll'a History of the war. 158 Madison's administration. of Congress had been held on the 18th day of May, at which Mr. Madison was unanimously nominated for re-election. John Langdon, of New Hampshire, was put in nomination for the Vice Presidency, but he declined on account of his advanced age ; where- upon, the nomination was conferred on Elbridge Gerry, at a subsequent meeting held on the 8th of June. Dewitt Clinton was nominated as an opposing candidate for the Presidency, on the 29th of May, by a majority of the republican members of the New York legislature, but against the urgent remonstrances of the minority. The federalists took no steps to- wards bringing forward a candidate, till the month of September, when they held a convention in the city of New York, at which they resolved to support Mr. Clinton, in order, as they affirmed, to defeat Mr. Madison. Jared Ingersoll, of Pennsylvania, was se- lected as their candidate for Vice President. On the 26th of June, an act was passed by Congress respecting letters of marque, prizes, and prize goods. Among the otheF important acts passed at this session, were those prohibiting the exportation of goods, wares, or merchandize, during the continuance of the embargo ; authorizing the establishment of a gen- eral land office ; providing for the survey of the bounty lands ; authorizing the issue of treasury notes to the amount of five millions of dollars ; imposing one hun- dred per cent, additional duties on imports ; and pro- viding for the apportionment of representatives in accordance with the census of 1810. The session Madison's administration. 159 terminated on the 6th of July ; Congress having previously adopted a resolution requesting the Presi- dent to recommend a day of public humiliation and prayer, to be observed, by the people of the United States, in oflering up supplications to Almighty God for the safety and welfare of the states, his blessing on their arms, and the speedy restoration of peace. The third Thursday in August was accordingly selected by the Executive, and it was generally observed. Party spirit and party feeling ran high throughout the Union, and the declaration of war was very dif- ferently received in different sections of the Union. In the city of Boston, in full view of the old Temple of Liberty, the flags of the shipping were hoisted at half mast, in token of mourning ; while at Baltimore, a federal editor was mobbed, his office in great part de- molished, one of his friends killed, and he, with others, including Henry Lee, a distinguished officer of the revolution, but a most bitter and vindictive federal partisan, seriously injured, for having the hardihood to utter his sentiments through the columns of his paper. In the eastern states the opposition to the war was marked and virulent. Every one who dared to speak in defence of the administration, was de- nounced in the most unmeasured terms, and curses and anathemas were liberally hurled from the pulpit on the heads of all those who aided, directly or indi- rectly, in carrying on the war. In the middle and southern states, public opinion was divided, though a large majority aporoved the measures adopted by L 160 Madison's administration. Congress. But in the west there was only one senti jnent : — love of country sparkled in every eye, and animated every heart. The importing merchants, the lawyers in the principal cities, some planters, and the clergy for the most part, were numbered in the ranks of the opposition ; and the war found its most ardent and enthusiastic advoates, among the farmers and planters, the mechanics, the mariners, and the laboring men. Most of the prominent officers of the revolution were either dead or superannuated, and in making his selections for the leaders of the forces about to take the field, Mr. Madison naturally preferred, as he might have felt himself compelled to do, those who had occupied subordinate positions in the war of inde- pendence. He at first designed to place Henry Clay at the head of the army. That gentleman was not a soldier by profession or education, indeed knew but httle of the miUtary art ; yet he had genius, talents, force, decision, energy. These were needed at that crisis, and had the President followed his own coun- sel, in all probabihty, the disasters of 1812 and 1813 would not have been witnessed. Mr. Gallatin, though not very friendly to Mr. Clay, concurred, with the President in opinion ; but others thought, or affected to think, that the eloquent Kentuckian could not be spared from the House of Representatives. Mr. Mad- ison allowed himself to be overruled, and appointed Henry Dearborn, a major in the revolution, and sec- retary of war during the administration of Jefferson, Madison's administration. 161 the senior major general of the army. Under him were Major Generals James Wilkinson, of Maryland, and Wade Hampton, of South Carolina, then belong- ing to the regular army ; and Major Generals William Hull, also governor of Michigan territory, and Thomas Pinckney, of South Carolina, both appointed by Pres- ident Madison. Mr. Pinckney was a prominent fed- eralist, but a man of tried and sterhng patriotism, who never allowed the ties of party to move him from the faithful discharge of his duty to his country. In anticipation of hostilities, a large additional force had been placed under the command of General Hull, in order that he might be enabled, at the very outset, to cut off the communication between the North wes- tern Indians and the British posts in the Canadas. This design was prevented, in part, by the remissness of the war department or its messengers, in convey- ing the intelhgenco of the declaration of war to the frontier posts ; — the first intimation of the fact receiv- ed by the commanding officer at Mackinaw, being a summons to surrender to a large British force that suddenly appeared before the fort on the 4th of Au- gust, with which he was obliged to comply ; and it was completely frustrated by the cowardice, or, at least, the indecision, of General Hull, who invaded Canada in July, but subsequently retired to Detroit, and, on the 17th of August, surrendered the post, with his whole force, to an inferior British army command- ed by General Brock. Immediately after the declaration of war, a project 162 Madison's administration. was laid before the war department for the capture of Hahfax, the principal naval depot of the enemy, and, indeed, the only one of any importance, on this side the Atlantic. Mr. Madison, ignorant as he was of military matters, relied, perhaps too much, on his secretary. Doctor Eustis, who, though possessing many estimable qualities, lacked the spirit and energy necessary at such a crisis. The project was not deemed feasible, though this was certainly a gross er- ror, inasmuch as the declaration took the English gov- ernment, and its representatives and officers every- where, with surprise ; and a mistake, equally preju- dicial in its results, was committed by General Dear- born, then commanding on the northern frontier, in consenting to an armistice with Sir George Prevost, governor general of Canada, suspending all military operations till the President's pleasure should be ascer- tained. This armistice was entered into in July, and, by its terms, the force under General Hull, was expressly excepted. President Madison promptly refused to confirm the arrangement ; but it was too late to avert the fatal consequences. The conclusion of the armistice left Sir George Prevost at liberty to dispatch a large force to Maiden and its vicinity, which movement was speedily followed, as he may have foreseen, by the surrender of Hull. Disasters like these could not be corrected, yet they were compensated, in some measure, by the brillant achievements of our gallant navy. On the 18th of August, the Constitution, Captain Hull, Madison's ad.mimstratiox. 163 captured tlie British frigate Guerriere, and on the 17th of October, the brig FroHc surrendered to the American sloop-of-war Wasp, commanded by Captain Jones. These successes were followed by the sur- render of the British frigate Macedonian to the United States, Captain Decatur, on the 25th of October, and the capture and destruction of the Java, off San Sal- vador by the Constitution, then under the command of Commodore Bainbridgc, on the 30th of December. Early in the autumn of 1812, a considerable force, of regulars and volunteers, was assembled on the Ni- agara frontier, under General Van Rennselacr, of the New York militia ; and in the month of October, another unsuccessful attempt at the invasion of Cana- da was made in this quarter, with the loss of over one thousand men, killed, wounded, and prisoners. When the year closed, therefore, the reverses sustained by the army contrasted sadly with the glorious victories achieved by our little navy. During the two prece- ding administrations, the democrats, as a party, had opposed the augmentation of the naval establishment; but now that its practical utility and importance had been so signally mamfested, they cordially united with the federalists in its laudation, and gave their support to the various propositions for its increase and sup- port. Meanwhile, the efforts of the merchants and manu- facturers of England, to procure a repeal of the or- ders in council, had been attended with success. The repeal was made on the 23d day of June ; but the 164 Madison's administration. declaration of war had already been promulgated to the world; and although this step, if taken but one month previous, would undoubtedly have prevented a collis- ion, there were other questions, which, though of mi- nor importance, now that a resort to arms had been made, must, nece-ssarily be first disposed of, before hostilities could cease. On the 26th of June, Mr. Monroe informed the American charge, Mr. Russell, of the declaration of war ; and at the same time au- thorised him to propose an armistice to the British government, conditioned, in the event of the repeal of the orders in council, that instructions should be issued suspending the practice of impressment during its con- tinuance ; and on the 27th of July, Mr. Russell was further empowered to consent to an informal under- standing on the subject. It was also proposed, that an act of Congress should be passed, excluding British seamen, and natives of Great Britain, from American vessels, provided that a similar step should be taken by the British government. Both these amicable overtures were contemptuous- ly rejected by the British ministrv, whereupon, Mr. Russell demanded his passports, and left England. Admiral Warren, the commander of the British naval force operating on the American coast, arrived at Halifax, however, in the month of September; and, on the 30th inst., he addressed a note to the Secreta- ry of State, proposing, by authority of his govern- ment, the immediate cessation of hostilities, as pre- liminary to an arrangement for the revocation of the Madison's administratiox. 165 laws interdicting British commerce and vessels of war from entering the harbors and waters of the United States. He added, nevertheless, that, if such revoca- tion was not promptly made, the orders in council would be revived and rigidly enforced. Mr. Monroe replied, on the 27th of October, in a most friendly tone, consenting, without hesitation to a provisional accommodation, but with the understand- ing that impressment should be suspended. The war on the continent was now growing more earnest and exciting, and Great Britain was required to put forth all her exertions to maintain her pretensions to the maritime supremacy in the world. She could not have the hardihood to insist upon continuing the prac- tice of impressment, as a right ; but she wanted sail- ors to man her vessels, and she would take them. While such a disposition reigned in her councils, it was not surprising that this attempt at negotiation, like all former ones, proved entirely fruitless. The presidential contest was unusually animated in the eastern, and in some of the middle states ; but in the south and west, only a feeble opposition was of- fered to the administration electoral tickets. Mr. Madison received 128 electoral votes and Mr. Gerry 131 ; Mr. Clinton received 89, including the vote of New York, where he was supported by a great por- tion of the democratic party, and Mr. Ingersoll, 86. The federalists gained a number of members for the 13th Congress, — being successful in electing twenty out of thirty representatives, from New York, in 166 Madison's administration. consequence of the divisions among the democrats in that State. Congress re-assembled, for the short session, on the 2d day of November. The president made no attempt in his message to conceal the disasters experienced on the Canadian frontier. After referring to these in appropriate terms, and calhng attention to the grati- fying resuhs of the naval w^arfare, he invoked Con- gress to pass all needful laws, and to make, with promptitude, the necessary appropriations for the sup- port of the army and navy, and for fortifications and works of defence, in order that the republic might be prepared, under all circumstances, to assert and main- tain her rights and her dignity. He also adverted to the want of patriotism evinced by the respective gov- ernors of Massachusetts and Connecticut, in their re- fusal to furnish the required detachments of militia for the defence of the maritime frontier. In rcirard to the finances he stated that the I'eceipts into the treasury, during the year ending on the 30th of Sep- tember previous, had exceeded sixteen and a half mil- lions of dollars, including the moneys received on ac- count of loans authorized by Congress. The session continued until the 3d of March, 1813, when the terms of members expired. Various laws were enacted relating to the army and navy, and pro- viding for the means requisite to carry on the war. Four ships of the lincj six frigates, and six sloops of war, were authorized to be constructed. On the 8th of February a law was passed, providing for a loan MAUISO.x's Ar.MIMSTRATION. 167 of sixteen millions of dollars ; and authority was sub- sequently given to issue five millions in treasurj' notes, making altogether, including the loan of eleven mil- lions authorized by the act of March 14th, 1812, and the five millions of treasury notes issued by the act of the 30th of June in the same year, the gross sum of thirty seven millions of dollars borrowed by this Congress for the prosecution of hostilities, without providing for the redemption of the debt, by the im- position of additional taxes, as desired by Mr. Cheves, chairman of the committee of ways and means, and other proper advocates of the war. The loan of six- teen millions was promptly taken, on the most favora- ble terms : seven millions of the sum were subscribed by Stephen Girard and David Parish, and two millions by John Jacob Astor, all three of whom were adop- ted citizens ; and the remaining seven millions were taken by banks and individuals, mostly in Philadelphia and New York. The federalists exerted themselves, for the most part successfully, to prevent any portion of the loan from being taken in the New England States. Laws were likewise passed at this session for the increase of the army, and its more eftective organiza- ~ tion ; and for the encouragement of vaccination, generally, among the people, in order to prevent the ravages of small pox in the army. The olive branch of peace was again tendered to Great Britain, by the passage of an act prohibiting the employment of any seamen, other than citizens of the 1G8 MADISON^S ADMINISTRATION. United States, or native persons of color, on board the public or private armed vessels of the United States, after the close of the war. Among the other bills passed was one giving the president the power of retaliation for any violation of the usages of civilized warfare committed by British officers or their Indian coadjutors. A law was also enacted remitting the forfeiture incurred by American merchants, who, during the continuance of the non- importation act, had accumulated a large amount of property abroad, and when they found war to be in- evitable, had ordered it to be brought home. Mr- Gallatin proposed to remit the forfeiture, but insisted, as a consideration therefor, that the owners should loan the government an amount equal to the value of the property. He was sustained by a majority of the democratic members, but the bill finally passed, by a vote of 64 to 61. During the winter several changes took place in the cabinet. Numerous complaints had been made in re- gard to the unfitness or inefficiency of the Secretaries of the war and navy departments, in consequence of which they sent in their resignations. These were accepted ; and on the 12th of January, 1813, William Jones, of Pennsylvania, recently of the navy, was appointed in the place of Mr. Hamilton. On the 19th instant, General Armstrong, late minister to France, and at that time a brigadier general in the regular army, succeeded Doctor Eustis at the head of the war department. MADISO.\'s AD.MIMSTRATIOX. 169 Previous to the adjournment of Congress, a law was passed authorizing an extra session to be held on the 24th day of May, 1813. On. the following day— the 4th of March — President Madison again took the oath of oflice, and delivered his inaugural address. Though a party to the great anti-French coalition, Russia suffered considerable injury from the interrup- tion of American commerce during the continuance of the war ; and on the 8th of March, 1813, her minister at Washingion, Mr. Daschkolf, in pursuance of his instructions, offered the m'ediation of the Em- peror Alexander, between Great Britain and the United States, stating, in addition, in his olhcial note, that the latter power had done everything that was possible to prevent a rupture. President Madison accepted the offer, in due form, on the 11th of March; and on the 17th of April, John Quincy Adams, then minister to Russia, Albert Gallatin, and James A. Bayard, were appointed envoys extraordinary and ministers plenipotentiary, to conclude a treaty of peace, under the auspices of the Russian autocrat. Messrs. Gallatin and Bayard embarked at an early day, and having joined Mr. Adams at St. Petersburgh, they proceeded together to the Baltic, where they arrived in the month of June. But Great Britain was not yet prepared to abandon her unjustifiable pretensions, either by word or deed ; and in September of the same year, she declined the proffered mediation. On the 4th of November, how- ever, Lord Castlereagh, the British secretary for 8 170 Madison's administration. foreign affairs, informed the American government that his country was both ready and willing to enter upon a direct negotiation for peace. This proposition, too, was cordially accepted by President Madison, and Lord Castlereagh was informed, in reply, that envoys would be immediately sent to Gottenburg, in order to carry it into effect. Mr. Barlow, the minister to France, died at Czar- novitch, whither he had followed the Emperor Napo- leon, on the 26th of December, 1812. The vacant mission was filled by the appointment of William H. Crawford, of Georgia, on the 9th of April, 1813. The 13th, or, as it is sometimes called, the war Con- gress, assembled on the appointed day. Henry Clay was re-elected speaker, by a majority of thirty-five votes, over Timothy Pitkin, the opposing federal can- didate. Among the new democratic members were John W. Taylor, of New York ; Charles J. Ingersoll and Samuel D. Ingham, of Pennsylvania ; John W. Eppes, of Virginia ; John Forsyth, of Georgia ; and William P. Duval, of Kentucky. The federalists re- ceived a great accession of intellectual strength, in the appearance of Jeremiah Mason, from the state of New Hampshire and Rufus King, of New York, as senators ; and of Daniel Webster, of New Hampshire; Cyrus King and Timothy Pickering, of Massachusetts; Thomas P. Grosvenor, and Thomas J. Oakley, of New York ; Richard Stockton, of New Jersey ; Alexander C. Hanson, of Maryland ; and William Gaston, of North Carolina, as representatives. MADISON S AD.MIMSTRATION. 171 Notwithstanding the numerical iriajority of the adnainistration, in the two houses of Congress, was so large, was not always to be counted on ; for the rea- son, that the democratic friends of Mr. Clinton were so deeply chagrined on account of the result of the late Presidential election, that they labored, either by opposing the nominations, or otherwise, to embarrass the proceedings of the Executive. Messrs. Adams and Bayard were promptly confirmed, but a vigorous opposition was made to Mr. Gallatin, on the ground that the olHces of secretary of the treasury and envoy extraordinary could not be united in the same person. He was at first rejected, by a vote of eighteen to seventeen, but having subsequently resigned the sec- retaryship, he was confirmed. Captain Jones, of the navy department, performed the duties of secretary of the treasury, in connection with those rightfully devolving upon him, till the 9th day of February, 1814, when George W. Campbell, of Tennessee, was appointed secretary of the treasury, in the place of Mr. Gallatin. Several other nominations made by President Madi- son were rejected at this session, by the votes of the Clintonian and federal senators. Among others, was that of Jonathan Russell, as minister to Sweden, which was negatived on the most absurd pretences ; the declaration of war being attributed to his counsel and advice. During the whole controversy he stood firmly by his country, it is true ; but he ever mani- fested a conciliatory spirit when consistent with the reouiremcnts of patriotism. 172 Madison's administration. Most of the time of Congress, at the extra session, was spent in perfecting and passing laws for the pur- pose of relieving the national finances from embar- rassment. Measures, which, it was feared, would not be popular, and, therefore, were not urged during the presidential canvass, were now from necessity adopt- ed. The existing duties on imports were doubled, and the assessment and collection of direct taxes and internal duties were also provided for. Extraordinary expenses were incurred in preparing for the campaign of 1813, and, more particularly, in equipping the militia, who were at first, with few exceptions, miser- ably appointed. All the banks south of New England had suspended specie payments; the country was flooded with their discredited paper ; and government was obliged to make use of them as depositories of the public moneys. It seems to have been the poHcy of the federalists in Congress, or rather, of the New England federal- ists, to oppose the appropriation bills for the support of the army and navy, in the hope that by embarrass- ing the administration they would render it unpopular with its friends, or compel it to conclude a peace. The sequel will show, that, however sincere they may have been in the views they entertained, and in accordance with which they acted, they could scarcely have passed a course better calculated to destroy the party. The more moderate federalists, such as followed the lead of Rufus King, after the war had once been de- clared, refused to take any part in withholding the MADISOX'S ADMIMSTRATION. 173 necessary supplies, and many of them ultimately joined the democratic party ; ^but the Masons, and Picker- ings, and Wcbsters, of the 13th Congress, wholly mistook the genius and character of the American people, and the mistake proved fatal to them as poli- ticians. With all their firmness and independence, and their high-toned integrity and sense of honor, proba- bly no class of men in our country, no partisans, were ever more prejudiced and bigotted in their political sympathies, or more bitter and vindictive in their en- mities, than the federalists of 1812. A numerous and powerful minority opposed the war throughout, but the majority stood manfully by the side of the country, and enabled the government to maintain the struggle, not without reverses and mis- fortunes, indeed, but with more than tolerable success, against one of the first powers in the world. The war, in 1813, was conducted with various for- tune. The recapture of Detroit was the first project in contemplation. An ill-advised movement, with this object in view, by General Winchester, terminated in the terrible defeat and massacre on the Raisin ; but the yeomen of the west rallied once more, with alacrity and enthusiasm, around the star-spangled banner. At Sandusky and Fort Meigs the enemy were repulsed. Commodore Perry swept the British naval force from Lake Erie in September, and ere the thundering echoes of this contest had died away, Harrison was in full pursuit of the flying Proctor. Maiden and Detroit were hastily abandoned, and the 174 Madison's administration. valley of the Thames soon witnessed the fit chastise- ment of the marauders and savages whom the British commander had gathered round him. On the Niagara frontier the campaign opened au- spiciously ; although a grievous mistake was commit- ted at the outset in this quarter, in neglecting to strike a blow at Kingston, or gain a foothold at Prescott, in order to cut off the communication between the two Canadian Provinces, and then attack the posts in de- tail, as circumstances favored. York and Fort George were captured, and the Americans, under General Dearborn, established themselves in the peninsula. A long period of inactivity followed ; the enemy were successful in one or two skirmishes • and complaints were frequently heard. General Dearborn was inca- pacitated, by reason of the infirmities of age, for the proper fulfilment of his duties. He therefore resigned his commission, and was succeeded in the command of the army by General Wilkinson. Two columns were now concentrated, at Grenadier island and Plattsburgh, respectively commanded by Generals Wilkinson and Hampton, for the invasion of Canada and the capture of Montreal. The expedi- tion down the St. Lawrence, and the corresponding movement from Plattsburg, both ended in disaster and disgrace. The army then retired into winter quar- ters, scarcely consoled for their ill success, by the vic- tories of Harrison in the early part of the campaign, and the glorious intelhgence soon received from the southern frontier, where Jackson and his brave troops Madison's administration. 175 had gallantly routed, and almost exterminated, the Creek warriors, who had dug up the hatchet at the instigation of British agents, and the Spanish officers in Florida. Outrages and depredations, of the most barbarous and revolting character, were committed on the sea coast by Admiral Cockburn and others ; and on the ocean, our flag did not always ride triumphant. The losses of American commerce were great, but exceed- ed by very httle, if at all, those previously sustained from English seizures and sequestrations, and French depredations. Hundreds of British merchant vessels, however, were captured this year by American pri- vateers ; and the frigates President, Captain Rodgers, Congress, Captain Smith, and Essex, Captain Porter, carried terror into every sea. In February, the Brit- ish brig Peacock surrendered to the Hornet, Captain Lawrence ; but on the 1st of June following, the same officer lost his hfe in the vain attempt to defend the frigate Chesapeake. On the 14th of June, a similar disaster was experienced in the capture of the Argus, Captain Allen, by the British sloop-of-war Pelican. But the successes of Rodgers, Smith, and Porter, more than compensated for these losses ; and the tide of victory again turned, in September, when the British brig Boxer was captured by the enterprise, Lieuten- ant Burrows. Congress adjourned on the 2d of August, and re- assembled, for the regular session, on the 6th of De- cember. On the 18th of January, 1814, Jonathan 176 Madison's administration. Russell and Henry Clay were added to the commis- sioners previously appointed to treat with Great Brit- ain. There being a vacancy in the office of Speaker, Felix Grundy was supported by the majority of the democratic members as Mr. Clay's successor ; but the choice of the house fell upon Langdon Cheves, who received the votes of the federalists, and of a portion of the democratic representatives. A most stringent embargo and non-intercourse law was adopted, soon after the meeting of Congress, in accordance with the recommendation of President Madison ; but, upon the urgent remonstrances of all parties in the eastern states, it was repealed on the 14th of April following. A loan of twenty-five millions of dollars, in addition to previous loans, was authorized to be created in order to carry on the war. Laws were also passed for the augmentation of the army and navy, and provision was made for the payment of bounties and pensions. On the 19th of February, Mr. Taylor, of New York, from the committee of ways and means, report- ed a bill for the establishment of a National Bank in the District of Columbia, wath a capital of thirty mil- lions of dollars. The principle of this bill was approv- ed by Mr. Cheves, Mr. Calhoun and Mr. Grundy, but opposed by Mr. Eppes and Mr. Seybert. There were others, too, who did not favor it, for the reason that it contained no provision for the establishment of branches in the states. A motion to engraft this fea- ture upon the bill, made by Mr. Fisk, of New York, received but thirty-six votes, after which there was MADTSOX S ADMIMSTRATIOX. 177 no further action had upon it. But the public credit was daily depreciating ; treasury notes were seven- teen per cent., and government stocks thirty per cent, below par ; and, influenced by these considerations, many of the democratic members appeared disposed to waive the constitutional scruples they had before entertained in regard to the incorporation of a bank. Accordingly, on the 2d of April, Mr. Grundy, with the advice of President Madison, as it is supposed, in- troduced a resolution authorizing the appointment of a committee to inquire into the expediency of estab- lishing a National Bunk. The federalists, and a num- ber of democratic members, among whom were Mr. Eppes and Mr. Ingersoll, opposed the resolution, and voted in favor of a motion to postpone it indefinitely. The democrats, generally, voted against the postpone- ment, and a committee was appointed, of which Mr. Grundy was chairman. But within four days after their appointment, they were discharged, on motion of Mr. Grundy, from all further consideration of the sub- ject. " During the session a very interesting subject was submitted to the consideration of Congress. Twenty three American soldiers, taken at the battle of Queens- town in the autumn of 1812, were detained in close confinement on the charge of being native-born Brit- ish subjects, and afterwards sent to England to under- go a trial for high treason. On this being made known to our government, orders were given to General Dearborn to confine a like number of British prison- 8* 178 Madison's administration. ers taken at Fort George, and to keep them as hosta- ges for the safety of the Americans ; instructions which were carried into effect, and soon after made known to the governor of Canada. The British gov- ernment was no sooner informed of this, than Gover- nor Prevost was ordered to place forty-six American commissioned and non-commissioned officers in con- finement. * * *. General Wilkinson soon after informed Governor Prevost, that, in consequence of orders he had received from his government, he had put forty-six British officers in confinement, to be there detained until it should be known that the American officers were released. On the receipt of this intelli- gence, the Canadian governor ordered all the Ameri- can prisoners into close confinement ; and a similar step was soon after taken by our government." * The course of the British government in denying the right of expatriation, and her claim to the perpet- ual allegiance of her subjects — made, too, when her practice, on the continent, was directly the reverse, and when Moreau and Bernadotte, were leading the allied forces against the armies of their native land — found many advocates on the floor of Congress ; and Mr. Hauson, the editor of the federal newspaper at Baltimore whose office had been mobbed, with others of the same party, made able speeches on that side of the question ; but the democratic members, and some of the federalists, scouted an idea which, as they regarded it, was wholly at variance with the genius and spirit of our free institutions. *Brackenridge'9 Historj- of the war of 1812. •"i Madison's administration. 179 After fixing upon a day in advance of the regular time, for the commencement of the ensuing session, Congress adjourned on the 18th of April, 1814. The brillant successes achieved by the British in the Spanish peninsula, and the comparative pacification of that portion of the continent, enabled the enemy to increase her naval force on our seaboard, and to send out large numbers of additional troops. Vigorous preparations, too, were made to prosecute the war with greater vijior. But, on the other side, the Americans redoubled their exertions. The depreda- tions committed on the Atlantic coast, and the rejec- tion of the Russian mediation, had created hosts of friends for tiie administration, and the elections that took place this year were decidedly more favorable. Some of the ultra federalists in the Eastern States endeavored to stem the current, and the Hartford Convention, in the autumn of 1814, was designed to give expression to their views, and to concoct plans for compelling the executive to terminate the war. A cloud of mystery still enshrouds the doings of this body, and the designs of its movers have never been fully divulged. It is not probable that they contem- plated any overt act of hostility to the general gov- ernment, though they may have favored a secession of the New England states from the confederacy. They intended, doubtless, to stop just short of treason; and such has long since been the deliberate judgment of the American people. Early in July, one column of the American army. 180 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. now officered by younger and more active and enter- prising men crossed the Niagara, and took possession of Fort Erie. Tlie well-fouglit battles of Chippewa and Niagara, if not productive of any decisive re- sults, while they crowned the brows of the gallant Brown, and Scott, and their associates, with unfading laurels, vindicated, in addition, the military reputation of the country. Lai'ge reinforcements having joined the British general, the Americans now under General Gaines, were besieged in Fort Erie ; but they de- fended themselves with spirit and bravery, and main- tained their position in the peninsula, until the neces- sity of going into winter quarters compelled them to recross the river. After making extensive preparations. Sir George Pi'evost penetrated into New York, by the way of Lake Champlain, with an immense land force, suppor- ted by a considerable fleet under Commodore Downie. The issue of this expedition was decided on the lake, where Commodore Macdonough, in command of the American naval force, nearly annihilated the British flotilla. A few indecisive skirmishes took place be- tween the British army and the American troops at Plattsburg and its vicinity, under General Macomb ; but after the defeat of Commodore Downie, Sir George Pre vest retired into Canada, with the shat- tered remnants of his army, in great haste and dis- order. In the month of August, a powerful English squad- ron, under Sir Alexander Cochrane, having on board Madison's administration. 181 a large body of troops commanded by General Ross, entered Chesapeake Bay, and proceeded up the Pa- tuxent to Marlborough, where they landed without opposition. Through the negligence of the secretary of war, suitable preparations had not been made to receive the enemy ; and the indecision, and want of energy, of General Winder, who commanded the American troops hastily collected together, enabled them to achieve an easy victory over him, at Bla- densburg. The British commander then proceeded to Washington, where the dock-yards and shipping, and the pacific edifices of the government, including the capitol with the valuable library of Congress, and the President's house, were destroyed, on the 24th of August, under his orders. Having completed this barbarous and unjustifiable work of destruction, he retired to his shipping, and again descended the river to the Chesapeake. In September General Ross as- cended the bay with his forces, in the expectation of effecting the capture of Baltimore. A spirited and successful defence was made, however ; the British commander was killed ; and, as the country had now become fully aroused, the English squadron, fearing for its own safety, descended the bay, and sailed for Pensacola, where large reinforcements, under General Pakenham, a relative and favorite lieutenant of Well- ington, shortly after arrived. The attack and capture of New Orleans, known to be in a defenceless state, was now projected by the united forces. President Madison, and the secretaries of state, 182 Madison's administration. war, and the navy, were eye-witnesses of the untoward result of the contest at Bladensburg, Returning to Washington, the public archives were partially se- cured, and the President then retired into Virginia, from whence he issued a proclamation, on the 1st of September, calling upon the people to rally in defence of the country, and encouraging them to persevere in maintaining the contest. On the ocean our arms sustained a great reverse in the early part of the year, in the capture of the frigate Essex, in the harbor of Valparaiso, by two British vessels, on the 28th of March. Later in the season, the navy met with better fortune. The British sloop- of-war Epervier was captured by the Peacock, in the gulf of Mexico ; and the American sloop-of-war Wasp, Captain Blakeley, made prizes, successively, of two vessels of similar force with herself, in the EngUsh channel. Congress had adjourned to meet on the last Monday in October, but it was called together on the 19th of September, by a proclamation of the Executive, in consequence of the threatened attack on New Orleans, and the embarrassing condition of the finances. It appeared from the President's message, that the sum of thirty two millions of dollars had been received into the treasury during the nine months ending on the 30th of June previous, eleven millions of which were the proceeds of the public revenue and the re- mainder the avails of the loans authorized by Con- gress. The disbursments during the same period had Madison's AnMrxiSTRATioN. 183 exceeded thirty-four millions, and it was necessary to provide large sums, in addition, to meet the expenses incident to a continuance of hostilities. The Presi- dent informed Congress, that, as the English orders in council had been repealed, and the general pacifi- cation in Europe had withdrawn the occasion for the practice of impressment, peace and amity would probably be soon established by the commissioners of the two belligerents, who had assembled at Ghent, in the month of August, instead of at Gottenburg as had been first proposed. General Armstrong was severely censured for the disastrous capture of Washington, and the President seemed it his duty to request him to retire from Washington for a short time, in order that the ex- citement might subside. The secretary constructed this into an affront, and resigned his office on the 20lh of September. Mr. Monroe then took charge of the war department. It was designed that he should re- sign the office of Secretary of State, and it was ten- dered to Daniel D. Tompkins, governor of New York, who had rendered the most efficient services to the ad- ministration in carrying on the war. Mr. Tompkins, how^ever, declined the appointment, and Mr. Monroe continued to discharge the duties of both offices, till the 2d of March. 1816, when William H. Crawford, of Georgia, was appointed Secretary of war. Other changes had been made in the cabinet previ- ous to this time. Mr. Pinckney resigned the office of attorney general, and was succeeded by Richard Rush, 184 Madison's administration. of Pennsylvania, on the 10th of February, 1814. Mr. Granger continued to manifest so much hostility to the administration, that the President removed him from office, and, on the 17th of March, 1814, appoint- ed Return Jonathan Meigs, governor of the State of Ohio, postmaster general, in his place. Ill health compelled Mr. Campbell to resign the of- fice of Secretary of the Treasury, towards the close of September, 1814, and, on the 6th of October, Al- exander J. Dallas, of Pennsylvania, was appointed to succeed him. Among the measures, adopted by the 13th congress, at its last session, was one imposing a new direct tax of six millions of dollars ; another imposing addition- al internal duties, and increasing the rates of postage fifty per cent. A violent opposition was made to these proceedings, but withcjpt success, by the federal members. A bill was also introduced authorizing the president to call out the militia of any state, if the governor thereof refused so to do : it was carried through the House, by dint of great exertions, but defeated in the Senate by one vote. Mr. Monroe, the acting Secretary of war, made a report on the 17th of October, in favor of increasing the rank and file of the army, to one hundred thousand men, by draft- ing the requisite number from the free male popula- tion of the United States. A similar proposition for the augmentation of the naval force, was made by the Secretary of the navy, Mr. Jones, who was sue- Madison's administration. 185 ceeded in his office, on the 19th of December, 1814, by Benjamin W. Crowninshield, of Massachusetts. The cry of conscription and impressment was forth- with raised by the opponents of the administration, and Congress hesitated in adopting the recommenda- tions of the cabinet officers. Mr. Monroe soon dis- covered that nothing hke the prompt action he desired, and which was absolutely necessary, could be antici- pated. Orders were therefore given to the militia of the western states to hasten to the defence of New Orleans ; Mr. Monroe pledged his individual credit in order to raise the funds required for that purpose, on account which he was embarrassed, in his pecuniary circumstances, during the remainder of his life ; and thus General Jackson was enabled to achieve the bril- liant victory on the plains of Chalmette, which closed the war in a blaze of glory. Fortunately, these stringent measures for the in- crease of the army and navy, were not rendered ne- cessary, in consequence of the conclusion of a treaty of peace, at Ghent, on the 24th of December, 1814. Intelligence of this event was received in the United States, in the month of February, and communicated to Congress officially, by the President, on the 20th inst. The British commissioners had at one time as- sumed a highly offensive and arrogant tone ; but the victories of Brown and Scott, the defeat of Commo- dore Downie, and the inglorious retreat of Sir George Prevost, soon moderated their demands. They at iirst insisted that the Indian tribes witliin the limits of the 186 jMadisom's administration. union should forever enjoy a separate and independent sovereignty. This was instantly rejected by the American commissioners. As the orders in council had been repealed, and the British government had discontinued the practice of impressment, there were not, however, many obstacles in the way of the con- clusion of the treaty which was ultimately signed. By the terms of the treaty, a mutual restoration of all places and possessions taken during the war, or that might be taken after its signature, was stipulated, and the boundaries between the United States and the British possessions on the north, were more satisfac- torily adjusted. In regard to the practice of impress- ment the treaty was silent ; for the reason, as stated by the American to the British commissioners, under instructions from the secretary of State, that Great Britain had abandoned it. The causes of the war had been entirely removed ; the orders in council had been revoked, and impressment was no longer prac- ticed ; hence, everything for which the United States engaged in the contest, had either directly or tacitly been conceded; and they could, without any sacrifice of honor, join in a pacification, even though the trea- ty was silent in regard to those measures which had originally led to hostilities. Various propositions for the charter of a Bank of the United States, were brought forward at the ses- sion of 1814 — 15. At length, after much discussion, a bill passed the Senate, on the 9th of December, 1814, providing for the incorporation of a bank with Madison's administration. 187 a capital of fifty millions of dollars. The vote stood 17 to 14 ; the federal members opposing the bill in consequence of their disapprobation of some ot its details, in connection with those democrats who be- lieved it to be unconstitutional. In the House the bill was amended so as to reduce the capital stock to thir- ty milhons of dollars, and in some other features al- terations were made. It was then pressed to a final vote on the 7th of January, 1815. The result was, 120 in favor of the bill, to 37 against it. Messrs. Calhoun, Forsyth, IngersoU, and Lowndes, of the democratic party, supported the bill, together with Messrs. Oakley, Pickering, Pitkin, and Webster, of the opposition. Messrs. Grosvenor and King, promi- nent federalists, voted against it, as did also, Messrs. Eppes, Fisk, of New York, Macon, and Seybert. The senate having concurred in the amendments of the House, the bill was sent to the President for his signature on the 21st day of January. On the 30th instant, the President returned the bill with his objec- tions. He expressly waived the question of the con- stitutional power to charter such an institution, as being precluded, by repeated recognitions, on former occasions, of its validity ; but his objections were, that the hank proposed to be incorporated by the bill, would not, in his judgment, revive the public credit, or provide a circulating medium, or furnish the necessary loans, in time of war. The bill being then reconsidered in the senate, but fifteen voted in favor of its passage, to nineteen against it, wherefore 188 MADISON S ADMINISTRATION. it was declared lost. Other attempts to procure a charter were made at this session, but all failed of success. On the 23rd of November, 1814, the vice president of the United States, had died suddenly in his carriage, while on his way to the capitol. During the remain- der of the session, John Gaillard, of South Carolina, officiated as president p^o. tern, in the Senate. Before the adjournment of Congress, which took place on the 3rd of March, 1815, the army was re- duced to a peace establishment, and the non-inter- course law was repealed. An act was also passed authorizing the President to dispatch a squadron to the Mediterranean to chastise the Algerines, whose cruisers had committed serious depredations on Amer- ican commerce. The force ordered upon this service was placed under the command of Commodore De- catur, who soon captured and destroyed all the prin- cipal vessels of the enemy, and dictated to them terms of peace at the cannon's mouth. The 14th Congress assembled at Washington, for their first regular session, on the 4th of December, and continued in session till the 30th of April 1816. The democrats had about fifty majority, and as Mr. Clay had been returned to this Congress, he was once more elected speaker, without serious opposition. At this session reduced rates of postage were established, and a great reduction in the duties and taxes was made. A new tariff' of duties on importations, de- signed to be moderately protective to American man- Madison's admimstratio.v. 159 utacturers, was adopted, with the concurrence and approbation of Messrs. Clay, Calhoun, Lowndes, and other prominent members of the democratic party. Shortly after the opening of the session, a com- mittee on a national currency, of which Mr. Calhoun was chairman, was appointed. Having obtained from the Secretary of the Treasury a plan for a national bank, adapted, as was said, to the pressing emergen- cies of the country, Mr. Calhoun reported a bill of incorporation from the committee, on the 8th of Janu- ary, 1815. By this bill a bank was proposed to be chartered with a capital of thirty-five millions of dol- lars, seven millions of which was to be taken by the United States, to be located in the city of Philadephia. The bill finally passed the House on the 14th of March, by a vote of 80 to 71 ; and on the 3d of April was sustained in the Senate, by a vote of 22 to 12. The bill was subsequently approved by Mr. Madison, and went into operation, with Langdon Cheves, of South Carolina, late speaker of the house of representatives, as its first president. The last session of Congress held during the ad- ministration of Mr. Madison, commenced on the 2d of December, 1816, and terminated on the 3d day of March, 1817. The President congratulated the mem- bers of the two houses, in his annual message, on the prosperous condition of the country, since the return of the peace, and the promise aflbrded of a steady advancement, in the future, along the bright career which destiny had marked out for her. One of the 196 Madison's administration. most important acts passed at this session was that providing for the payment of the public debt, which now exceeded one hundred and twenty millions of dollars, though the indefatigable exertions of its au- thor, Mr. Lowndes, chairman of the committee of ways and means. The navigation laws were revised, and an act was passed regulating the territories, and authorizing them to be represented in Congress, by a single delegate each. Indiana was admitted into the Union as a state on the 11th of December, 1816. Shortly before the close of the session, the bonus to be paid by the bank of the United States for its charter, was appropriated by act of Congress to purposes of internal improve- ment ; but the bill was vetoed by the President, and, consequently, did not become a law. With the third day of March, 1817, the administra- tion of President Madison expired. It was his fortune to conduct the aftairs of state in a most trying period of our country's history ; but she passed in safety through the perils that beset her ; and when he re- tired to the peaceful shades of Montpelier, he left his countrymen in the enjoyment of an unusual degree of tranquility, prosperity and happiness, — he left " a government," to quote the language of his last annual message, " which avoids intrusion on the internal re- pose of other nations, and repels them from its own ; which does justice to all nations w4th a readiness equal to the firmness with which it requires justice from them ; and which, while it refines its domestic MADISO.X S ADMINISTRATION. 191 code from every ingredient not congenial with the precepts of an enlightened age, and the sentiments of a virtuous people, seeks by appeals to reason and by its liberal examples, to infuse into the law which gov- erns the civihzed world a spirit which may diminish the frequency, or circumscribe the calamities of war, and meliorate the social and beneficient relations of peace : a government, in a word, whose conduct, within and without, may bespeak the most noble of all ambitions — that of promoting peace on earth, and good will to man." LIFE OF JAMES MONROE, BY JOHN QUINCY ADAMS LIFE OF JAMES MONROE: Among the peculiarities affecting the condition of human existence, in a community formed within the period allotted to the life of man, is the state of being exclusively belonging to the individuals who assisted in the formation of that community. Three thousand years have elapsed since the Monarch of Israel, who, from that time, has borne the reputation of the wisest of men, declared that there was no 7iew thing under the sun. And then, as now, the assertion, confined to the operations of nature, to the instincts of animal hfe, to the primary purposes, and innate passions of human kind, was, and is, strictly true. Of all the il- lustrations of the sentiment given by him, the course is now as it was then. One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh. To the superficial observation of the human eye, the Sun still ariseth •Eulogy delivered before the Corporation of Boston, 1831. 198 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. and goeth down ; the wind whirleth about continual- ly ; all rivers run into the sea, which yet is not full ; and all things are full of labor, which man cannot ut- ter : yet, although the thing that hath been is that which shall be, and that which is done is that which shall be done, — still the eye is not satisfied with see- ing, nor the ear filled with hearing : and this affords the solution to all the rest. The aspirations of man to a better condition than that which he enjoys, are at once the pledges of his immortality, and the privi- leges of his existence upon earth ; they combine for his enjoyment the still freshening charms of novelty with the immutable laws of creation, and intertwine the ever-varying felicities of his condition with the unchangeable monotony of nature. Thus, a thousand years after Solomon had ceased to exist upon earth, when his kingdom had been ex- tinguished, and his nation carried into captivity, there arose among his own descendants, a Redeemer of the human race from the thraldom of sin ; the Mediator of a new covenant between God and man. From that time, though all remained unchanged in the phenome- na of creation, all was new in the condition of human life. In the rise and fall of successive empires, other novelties succeed each other from age to age. New planets are discovered in the heavens, and new conti- nents are revealed upon earth. New pursuits are opened to industry ; new comforts to enjoyment ; new prospects to hope. The secrets of the physical and intellectual world are gradually disclosed ; the pow- MFE OF JAMES MONROE. l[)9 ers of man are from time to time enlarged : but the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. The tendency of the magnet to the pole, and its application to the purposes of navigation ; the composition of gunpowder, and its application to the purposes of war ; the invention of printing, and its application to all the purposes of man in peace and war,— to the wants of the body, and the expansion of the mind,— the gift as it were, of a new earth to re- plenish and subdue, by the disclosure of a new hemis- phere, to the enterprise and capacities of man ; all these things are new in the records of the human spe- cies. Each of these things diverted into a new chan- nel the current of human affairs, and furnished for the lord of the creation a new system of occupations in his progress from the cradle to the grave. But of all the changes efTected, and all the novel- ties introduced into the condition of human beings, since the promulgation of the gospel of Christ, none has been more considerable than that, the develop- ment of which began with the severance of the Brit- ish colonies in North America from the parent stock. The immediate collision of rights, interests, and pas- sions, which produced the confiict between the par- ties, and ended in sundering the two portions of the empire engaged, occupied and absorbed the agency and the powers of the actors on that memorable thea- tre. An English poet has declared it praise enough to fill the ambition of a common man, that he was the countryman of Wolfe, and spoke the language of 200 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. Chatham. The colonists who achieved the indepen- dence of North America, were the countrymen of Wolfe, and Chatham's language was their mother- tongue. But of what avail for praise would this have been to them, had they not possessed souls, inspired with the same principles, and hearts endowed with higher energies than those which conducted those il- lustrious names to the pinnacle of glory. Never would the object of the North American Revolution have been accomplished but by men, in whose bosoms the love of liberty had been implanted from their birth and imbibed from the maternal breast. Considered in itself, the independence of our coun- try was only the splitting up of one civilized nation into two — caused by usurpation ; consummated by war. As such, it constituted one great element in the history of civilized man during its continuance ; but that was short and transient. From the Stamp Act to the definite Treaty of Peace, concluded at Paris, on the third of September, 1783, a term of less than twenty years intervened, — a term scarcely sufficient for the action of one of the dramas of Shakspeare. It was not even equal to the duration of one age of man. We have already lived since the close of that momentous struggle nearly thrice the extent of time, in which it passed through all its stages, and there are yet among the living those whose birth preceded even that of the questions upon which hinged our indepen- dent existence as a nation. Among these was the distinguished person, whoso LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 201 earthly career terminated on the fifty-fifth Anniversa- ry of our National Independence. James Monroe was born in September, 1759, in the County of Westmoreland, in the then Colony of Vir- ginia ; and at the time of the declaration of Indepen- dence, was in the process of completing his education at the college of William and Mary. He was then seventeen years of age, and at the first formation of the American army entered it as a cadet. Had he been born ten years before, it can scarcely be doubted that he would have been one of the members of the first Congress, and that his name would have gone down to posterity among those of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Among the blessings conferred by a beneficent Providence upon this coun- try in the series of events which composed that Revo- lution, was its influence in the formation of individual and of national character. The controversy which preceded the Revolutionary war, necessarily formed by a practical education the race of statesmen, by whom it was conducted to its close. The nature of the controversy itself, turning upon the elementary principles of civil society, upon the natural rights of man, and the foundations of government, pointed the attention of men to the investigation of those princi- ples ; exercised all the intellectual faculties of the most ardent and meditative souls, and led to discover- ies in the theory of government which have changed the face of the world. The conflict of mind preceded that of matter. The 202 LIFE OF J^M£S MONROE. question at issue, between Great Britain and her col- onies, was purely a question of right. On one side, a pretension to authority, on the other a claim of free- dom. It was a lawsuit between the British King and Parliament of the one part, and the people of the colonies, of the other, pleaded before the tribunal of the human race. It was an advantage to the cause of the colonies in that contest, that it reposed exclu- sively upon the basis of right. " Authority," says a keen observer of human nature, " Authority, though it err like others, Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself That skins the vice on the top." In the preluding struggle to the war of Indepen- dence, British authority was constantly administering this self-healing medicine to her own wrongs. The first assertion of her right, was an act of Parliament to levy a tax. When she found its execution imprac- ticable, she repealed the tax, but declared the right of Parliament to make laws for the colonies, in all cases whatsover. To this mere declaration, the colonies could make no resistance. It sldnned the vice on the top. With the next act of taxation she sent fleets and armies for the healing medicine to her en-ors. She dissolved the colonial Assemblies, revoked the colonial charters, sealed up the port of Boston, an- nihilated the colonial fisheries, and proclaimed the province of Massachusetts bay in rebellion. These were the healing medicines of British authority ; while the only pretence of right that she could allege LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 203 for all these acts, was the sovereignty of the British ParHamcnt. To contend against this array of power, the only defence of the colonies at the outset was the right and justice of their cause. From the first promulgation of the Stamp Act, the spirit of resistance, with the speed of a sunbeam, flashed instantaneous through all the colonies; kindled every heart and raised every arm. But this spirit of resistance, and this unanimity, would have been transitory and evanescent, had it not been sustained, invigorated, and made iirv'incible, by the basis of eternal and immutable justice in the cause. It engrossed, it absorbed all the faculties of the soul. It inspired the eloquence which poured itself forth in the colonial Assemblies, in the instruc- tions from the inhabitants of many of the towns to their Representatives, and even in newspaper essays, and occasional pamphlets by individuals. The gen- eral contest gave rise to frequent incidental controver- sies between the royal Governors, and the colonial Legislatures, in which the collision of principles, stimulated the energies, directed the researches, and expanded the faculties of those who maintained the rights of their country. The profoundest philosophi- cal statesman of the British empire, at that period, noticed the operation of these causes, in one of his admirable speeches to the House of Commons. He remarked the natural tendency and etfect of the study and practice of the law, to quicken the intellect, and to sharpen the reasoning powers of men. He observ- 9* 204 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. ed the preponderant portion of lawyers in the colonial Legislatures, and in the Continental Congress, and the influence of their oratory and their argument upon the understanding and the will of their countrymen. Yet that same clear sighted and penetrating statesman, long after the Declaration of Independence, penned with his own hand an address to the people of the United States, urging them to return to their British allegiance, and assuring them that their struggle against the colossal power of Great Britain, must be fruitless and vain. Chatham himself, the most eloquent orator of England — whose language it is the boast of honest pride to speak — Chatham, a peer of the British realm, in the sanctury of her legislation, declared his appro- bation of the American cause, his disclaimer of all right in Parliament to tax the colonies, and his joy, that the people of the colonies had resisted the pre- tension. Yet that same Chatham, not only after the declaration, but after the conclusion of solemn treaties of alliance between the United States and France, sacrificed the remnant of his days, and wasted his ex- piring breath, in feeble and fruitless protestations against the irrevocable sentence to which his country was doomed — the acknowledgment of American Inde- pendence. It has been said, that men's judgments are a parcel of their fortunes ; and they who believe in a superintending Providence have constant occasion to remark the wisdom from above, which unfolds the purposes of signal improvement in the condition of man, by preparing, and maturing in advance, the in- LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 205 struments by which they are ultimately to be accom- plished. The intellectual conflict, which, for a term of twelve years, had preceded the Declaration of In- dependence, had formed a race of men, of whom the signers of that instrument were the selected and faith- ful representatives. Their constituents were like themselves. Life, fortune, and sacred honor were staked upon the maintenance of that declaration. Not alone the life, fortune, and sacred honor of the individ- uals who signed their names, but with little exception, of the people whom they represented. One spirit an- imated the mass, and that spirit was invincible. It is a striking circumstance to remark, that in the island of Great Britain, not a single mind existed capable of comprehending this spirit and its power. — Deeper and more capacious minds, bolder and more ardent hearts, than Burke and Chatham, have seldom, in any age of the world, and in any region of the earth, appeared upon the stage of action. Yet we have here unques- tionable demonstration that neither of them had form- ed a conception of the power, physical, moral and in- tellectual, of that unextinguishable flame which per- vaded every particle of the man, soul and body, of the self declared independent American. It is an easy resource of vulgar controversy to transfer the stress of her argument from the cause, to the motive of her adversary, and the rottenness of any cause, will gen- erally be found proportioned to the propensity mani- fested by its supporters, to resort to this expedient. On the question which bred the revolution of indepen- 206 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. dence, the taxation of the colonies by Parliament, all the great and leading minds of the British islands, all who have left a name on which the memory of pos- terity will repose, Mansfield and Johnson excepted, were on the American side. Burke, Chatham, Cam- den, Fox, Sheridan, Rockingham, Dunning, Barre, Lansdown, all recorded their constant, deep and sol- emn protestations, against the system of measures which forced upon the colonies the blessing of Inde- pendence. But when Chatham and Camden raised in vain their voices to arrest the uplifted arm of oppres- sion, George Grenville and his abettors knew, or deemed so little of the spirit and argument of the Americans, that they affirmed it was all furnished for them by Chatham and Camden, and that their only motive was to supplant the Chancellor of the Exche- quer. Adam Smith, the penetrating searcher into the cause of the wealth of nations, whose book was published about a year after the Declaration of Inde- pendence, without deigning to spend a word upon the cause of America, with deep sagacity of face and gravity of muscle, assures his readers, that they are very weak, who imagine that the Amei'icans will easily be conquered — for that the Continential Con- gress consists of men, who from shopkeepers, trades- men and attornies, are become statesmen and legisla- tors. That they are employed in contriving a new form of government, for an extensive empire, which they justly flatter themselves will become one of the greatest and most formidable that ever was in the LIFE OF JAMES JIONROE. 207 world. That if the Americans should be subdued, all these men would lose their importance — and the remedy that he proposes is, to start a new object for their am- bition, by forming a union of the colonies with Great Britain, and admitting some of the leading Americans into Parliament. Yet this man was the author of a Theory of Moral Sentiments in which he resolved all moral principle into sympathy. True it was, that the shopkeepers, tradesmen and attornies, were occupied in contriving a new form of government, for an extensive empire, which they might reasonably flatter themselves would become the greatest and most glorious that the world has ever seen. They were at the same time employed in rais- ing, organizing, training and disciplining fleets and armies to maintain the cause of freedom, and of their country, against all Britannia's thunders. And they were employed in maintaining by reason and argu- ment before the tribunal of mankind, and in the face of heaven, the eternal justice of their cause. Thus they were employed. Thus had been employed the members of the Continental Congress, and thousands of their constituents, from the time when the princes and nobles of Britain had imposed these employments upon them, by the visitation of the Stamp Act. And now is it not matter of curious speculation, does it not open new views of human nature, to observe, that while the shopkeepers, tradesmen and attornies of British North America were thus employed, Adam Smith, the profound theorist of moral sentiment, the 203 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. illustrious discoverer of the sources of the wealth of nations, could in the depth and compass of his mighty mind, imagine no operative impulse to the conduct of men thus employed, but a paltry gratification of van- ity, in their individual importance, from which they might easily be weaned, by the superior and irresisti - ble allurement of a seat in the British House of Commons 1 More than half a century has now passed away ; the fruits of the employment of these shopkeepers, tradesmen and attornies, transformed into statesmen and legislators, now form the most instructive, as well as the most splendid chapter in the history of man- kind. They did contrive a new form of government for an extensive empire, which nothing under the canopy of heaven, but the basest degeneracy of their posterity can prevent from becoming the greatest and the most formidable that the world ever saw. They did maintain before earth and heaven, the justice of their cause. They did defend their country against all the thunders of Britain, and compelled her mon- arch, her nobles, and her people, to acknowledge the Independence which they had declared, and to receive their confederated republic among the sovereign po- tentates of the world. Of the shopkeepers, trades- men and attornies, who composed the Congress of Independence, the career on earth has closed. They sleep with their fathers. Have they lost their indi- vidual importance 1. Say, ye who venerate as an angel upon earth, the solitary remnant of that assem- LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. 209 bly, yet lingering upon the verge of eternity. Give me tiie rule of proportion, between a seat, from old Sarum, in the House of Commons, and the name of Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, at the foot of the Declaration of Independence 1 Was honest fame, one of the motives to action in the human heart, excluded from the philosophical estimate of Adam Smith ? Did he suppose patrotism, the love of liberty, benevolence and ardor for the welfare and improvement of human kind, inaccessible to the bosoms of the shopkeepers, statesman, and attorney legislators ? I forbear to pursue the inquiry further, though more ample illus- tration might easily be adduced to confirm the position which I would submit to your meditations : that the conflict for our national Independence, and the con- troversy of twelve years which preceded it, did, in the natural course of events, and by the ordinary dis- pensations of Providence, produce and form a race of men, of moral and intellectual power, adapted to the times and circumstances in which they lived, and with characters and motives to action, not only differing from those which predominate in other ages and cUmes, but of which men accustomed only to the common place impulses of human nature, are no more able to form a conception, than blindness, of the col- ors of the rainbow. Of this race of men, James Monroe was one — not of those who did, or could take a part in the prelim- inary controversy, or in the Declaration of Indepen- dence. He may be said almost to have been born 210 LIFE OF JAM-ES MONROE. with the question, for at the date of the Stamp Act, he was m the fifth year of his age ; but he was bred in the school of the prophets, and nurtured in the detes- tation of tyranny. His patriotism out-stripped the fingering march of time, and at the dawn of manhood, he joined the standard of his country. It was at the very period of the Declaration of Independence, issu- ed as you know at the hour of severest trial to our country, when every aspect of her cause was unpro- pitious and gloomy. Mr. Monroe commenced his military career, as his country did that of her Inde- pendence, with adversity. He joined her standard when others were deserting it. He repaired to the head-quarters of Washington at New York, precisely at the time when Britain was pouring her thousands of native and foreign mercenaries upon our shores ; when in proportion as the battalions of invading armies thickened and multipfied, those of the heroic chieftain of our defence were dwindling to the verge of disso- lution. When the disastrous days of Flatbush, Hser- lem Heights and White Plains, were followed by the successive evacuation of Long Island, and New York, the surrender of Fort Washington, and the retreat through the Jersies ; till on the day devoted to cele- brate the birth of the Saviour of mankind, of the same year on which Independence was proclaimed, Washington, with the houseless heads, and unshod feet, of three thousand new and undisciplined levies, stood on the western bank of the Delaware, to con- tend in arms with the British Lion, and to baffle the LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 211 skill and energy of the chosen champions of Britain, with ten times the number of his shivering and ema- ciate host ; the stream of the Delaware, forming the only barrier between the proud array of thirty thou- sand veteran Britons, cind the scanty remnant of his dissolving bands. Then it was that the glorious lead- er of our forces struck the blow which decided the issue of the war. Then it was that the myriads of Britain's warriors were arrested in their career of victory, by the hundreds of our gallant defenders, as the sling of the shepherd of Israel prostrated the Philistine, who defied the armies of the living God. And in this career both of adverse and of prosperous fortune, James Monroe was one of that little Spartan band, scarcely more numerous, though in the event more prosperous, than they who fell at Thermopylae. At the Heights of Hairlem, at the White Plains, at Trenton he was present, and in leading the vanguard, at Trenton, received a ball, which sealed his patriotic devotion to his country's freedom with his blood. The superintending Providence which had decreed that on that, and a swiftly succeeding day, Mercer, and Hase- let, and Porter, and Neal, and Fleming, and Shippen, should join the roll of warlike dead, martyrs to the cause of liberty, reserved Monroe for higher services, and for a long and illustrious career, in war and in peace. Recovered from his wound, and promoted in rank, as a reward for his gallantry and suffering in the field, he soon returned to the Army, and served in the 212 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. character of Aid-de-Camp to Lord Sterling, through the campaigns of 1777 and 1778 : during which, he was present and distinguished in the actions of Bran- dywine, Germantown and Monmouth. But, having by this been superseded in his Ifheal rank in the Army, he withdrew from it, and faiUng, from the exhausted state of the country, in the effort to raise a regiment, for which, at the recommendation of Washington, he had been authorized by the Legislature of Virginia, he resumed the study of the law, under the friendly direction of the illustrious Jefferson, then Governor of that Commonwealth. In the succeeding years, he served occasionally as a volunteer, in defence of the State, against the distressing invasions with which it was visited, and once, after the fall of Charleston, South Carolina, in 1780, at the request of Governor Jeflferson, repaired, as a military commissioner, to collect and report information with regard to the con- dition and prospects of the southern Army and States; a trust, which he discharged to the entire satisfaction of the Governor and Executive, by whom it had been committed to him. In 1782, he was elected a member of the Legisla- ture of Virginia, and, by them, a member of the Executive Council. On the 9th of June, 1783, he was chosen a member of the Congress of the United States ; and, on the thirteenth of December, of the same year, took his seat in that body, at Annapolis, where his first act was, to sit as one of those repre- sentatives of the nation into whose hands the victorious LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 213 leader of the American Armies surrendered his com- mission. Mr. MoNUOE was now twenty-four years of age, and had already performed that, in the service of his country, which would have sufficed for the illustration of an ordinary life. The first fruits of his youth had been given to her defence in war ; the vigor and maturity of his man- hood was now to be devoted to her welfare in council. The war of Independence closed as it had begun, by a transaction new under the sun. The fourth of July, 1776, had witnessed the social compact of a self-con- stituted nation, formed by Peace and Union, in the midst of a calamitous and desolating war. To carry that nation through this war, the sole object of which, thenceforward, was the perpetual establishment of that self-proclaimed Independence, a Standing Army became indispensable. Temporary levies of undisci- pKned militia, and enlistments for a few weeks, or months, were soon found inadequate for defence against the veteran legions of the invader. — Enlist- ments for three years, were finally succeeded by per- manent engagements of service during the war. These forces were disbanded at the peace. Successive bands of warriors had maintained a conflict of seven years' duration, but Washington had been the commander of them all. His commission, issued twelve months before the Declaration of Independence, had been commensurate with the war. He was the great mili- tary leader of the cause ; and so emphatically did he exemplify the position I have assumed,^ that Providence 214 LIFE OF JAMBS MONROE. prepares the characters of men, adapted to the emer- gencies in which they are to be placed, that, were it possible for the creative power of imagination to con- centrate in one human individual person, the cause of American Independence, in all its moral grandeur and subUmity, that person would be no other than Wash- ington. His career of public service was now at an end. The military leaders of other ages had not so terminated their public lives. Gustavus Vasa, William of Orange, the Duke of Braganza, from chieftains of popular revolt, had settled into hereditary rulers over those whom they had contributed to emancipate. The habit of command takes root so deep in the human heart, that Washington is perhaps the only example in human annals of one in which it was wholly extir- pated. In all other records of humanity, the heroes of patriotism have sunk into hereditary Princes. Glo- rious achievements have claimed always magnificent rewards. Washington, receiving from his country the mandate to fight the battles of her freedom, assumes the task at once with deep humility, and undaunted confidence, disclaiming in advance all reward of profit, which it might be in her power to bestow. After eight years of unexampled perils, labors and achieve- ments, the warfare is accomplished ; the cause in which he had drawn his sword, is triumphant ; the in- dependence of his country is established ; her union cemented by a bond of confederation, the imperfection of which had not yet been disclosed ; he comes to the source whence he first derived his authority, and, LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 215 in the face of mankind, surrenders the truncheon of command, restores the commission, the object of which had been so gloriously accomplished, and returns to mingle with the mass of his fellow citizens, in the retirement of private life, and the bosom of domestic felicity. Three years, from 1783 to 1786. Mr. Monroe con- tinued a member of the Confederate Congress, and had continual opportunity of observing the utter in- etliciency of that Compact for the preservation and welfare of the Union. The union of the North American Colonies, may be aptly compared to the poetical creation of the world : From Harmony — from Heavenly Harmony This universal frame began ; When Nature, underneath an heap Of jarring atoms lay. And could not heave her head — The tuneful voice was heard from high Arise, ye more than dead. Then cold and hot, and moist and drj'. In order to their stations leap, ' And Music's power obey. Such with more than poetical truth, was the creation of the American Union. When on the fifth of September, 1774, a numbei of the delegates chosen and appointed by the several colonies and provinces in North America, to meet and hold a Congress at Philadelphia, assembled at the Carpenter's Hall, — on that same day, a new nation was created ; then, indeed, it was but in embryo. 216 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE, Neither Independence, nor self-government, nor per- manent confederation, were of the purposes for which that Congress was convened. It was to draw up and exhibit statements of the common grievances : to consult and confer upon the common violated rights ; to address their fellow-subjects of Great Britain, and of the colonies, with complaint oi^ wrongs endured, and humbly to petition his most excellent majesty, their most gracious sovereign, for redress. These purposes were performed, and totally failed of suc- cess ; but the Union was formed ; the seed of Inde- pendence was sown ; and the Congress, after a session of seven weeks, on the twenty-sixth of October, dis- solved. When the second Congress met, on the 10th of May 1775, the war had already commenced : blood had flowed in streams at Concord and Lexington ; and scarcely had they been a month in session, when the fires of Charlestown ascended to an avenging heaven; and Warren fell a martyr to the cause of the Union before that of Independence was even born. Still, the powers and instructions of the delegates extend- ed only to concert, agree upon, direct, and order such further measures as should, to them, appear to be best calculated for the recovery and establishment of American rights and liberties, and for restoring har- mony between Great Britain and the colonies. These objects were pursued with steadiness, perse- verance, and sincerity, till the people, whom they rep- resented, sickened at the humiliations to which they ].]IE OF JAMES MONROE. 217 submitled ; till insult heaped upon injury, and injury superadded to insult, aggravated the burden to a point beyond endurance : the decree of the people went forth : the whole people of the United Colonies de- clared them Independent States : the nation was born; like the first of the human race, issuing, full grown and perfect, from the hands of his Maker. But while this Independence, thus declared, was to be maintained bv a war, — of the successful issue of which, all spirit, but that of heroic martyrdom, might well despair — all the institutions of organized author- ty were to be created. By an act of primitive sov- ereignty, the people of the colonies annihilated all the civil authorities by which they had been governed : as one corporate body, they declared themselves a mem- ber of the community of civilized, but independent nations, — acknowledging the Christian Code of natu- ral and conventional laws, — united, already, by sol- emn compact, but without organized government, either for the Union, or for the separate members ; also, corporate and associated bodies, of which it was composed. The position of the people of these colonies on that day, was a new thing under the sun. The nature and character of the war was totally changed. Their re- lations, individual and collective, towards one another, towards the government and people of Great Britain, towards all the rest of mankind, were changed ; they were men in society, and yet had reverted to the state of nature ; they had no government, no fundamental 218 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. laws. Inhabiting a territory more extensive than all Europe, previously divided into thirteen communities, Uttle sympathizing with one another, and actuated by principles more of mutual repulsion, than attraction, with elements for legislation not only various, but hos- tile to each other, they were called at one and the same time to wage a war of unparalleled difficulty and danger. To transfer their duties of allegiance, and their rights of protection from the Sovereign of their birth to the new republic of their own creation ; and to rebuild the superstructure of civil society, by a complicated government, adequate to their wants ; a firm, compact and energetic whole, composed of thirteen entire independent parts. The first and most urgent of their duties, because in its nature it admit- ted of no delay, was to provide for the maintenance and conduct of the war ; but with all its difficulties, that was the least ardous of their duties. To organ- ize the government of a mighty empire, was a task which had never before been performed by man. The undertaking formed an era in the annals of the human race ; an era far surpassing in importance all others since the appearance of the Saviour upon earth. There were fortunately a few fundamental princi- ples upon which there was among the proclaimers of Independence, a perfect unanimity of opinion. The first of these was that the Union already formed be- tween the Colonies should be permanent — perpetual — indissoluble. The second, that it should be a con- federated Union, of which each Colony should be an LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 219 independent State. Self governed by its own muni- cipal Code — but of which each citizen, should be also a citizen of the whole. The third, that the whole confederation, and each of its members, should be re- publican ; without hereditary monarch, without privi- leged orders. On the tenth of May, preceding the Declaration of Independence, Congress had passed a resolution, recommending to the several Colonies to adopt such government as should, in the opinion of the Representatives of the people, best conduce to the happiness and safety of their constituents in par- ticular, and America in general ; and in the preamble tb this Resolution, adopted five days later, they assign- ed as the reason for it the necessity that the exercise of every kind of authority under the crown of Great Britain, should be totally suppressed, and all the pow- ers of government exercised under the authority of the PEOPLE of the Colonies. And on the eleventh of June, 1776, the same day upon which the Committee was appointed to report the Declaration of Independence, it was resolved to appoint another Committee to prepare and digest the form of a confederation to be entered into between the colonies, and a third Committee to prepare a plan of treaties to be proposed to foreign powers. Thus far there had been no diversity of opinion among those whose minds were made up for the Dec- laration of Independence. The people of each colony were to construct their own form of Government : a form of Confederation was to be prepared for the 10 220 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. whole. The history of mankind, ancient and modern presented several examples of confederated StateSy not one of a confederated Gomrnment ; and even of former confederations there was not one which ex- tended over a territory equal to that of one member of the American Union. For a confederated Govern- ment, the people of the colonies were utterly unpre- pared. The constitutions of the States were formed without much difficulty, and, after more than half a century, although we have witnessed frequent and numerous changes in their organization, there have been scarcely any of important principle. The great features of the political system upon which American Independence was declat'ed, remained unchanged — bright in immortal youth. For Union, for Indepen- dence, for self-government, the elements were all at hand, and they were homogeneous. There was no seed of discord and of strife among them. For the structure of the confederacy it was not so. There was first a general spirit of distrust and jealousy against the investment of the federal head with pow- er. There were then local and sectional prejudices, interests, and passions, tending to reciprocal discon- tents and enmities. There were diversities in the tenure and character of property in the different States, not altogether harmonizing with the cause of Independence itself. There were controversies of boundaries between many of the contiguous colonies, and questions of deeper vitality, to whom the extra- territorial lands, without the bounds of the colonial LIFE OF JAMES MOAROE. 221 charters, but within the compass of the federative domain, would belong 1 So powerfully did these causes of discord operate, even in the midst of the struggle for Independence, that nearly five years elapsed after the Declaration, before the consent of the States could be obtained to the Articles of Con- federation. This experiment, as is well known, proved a total failure. The Articles of Confederation were ratified by ten of the States as early as July, 1778. Mary- land withheld her assent to them until March, 1781, when it first went into operation : and even then one of its principal defects was so generally perceived and foreseen, that on the preceding third of February, Congress had adopted a resolution, declaring it indis- pensably necessary that they should be vested with a power to levy an impost duty of five per cent, to pay the public debt. Even this power some of the States refused to grant. In December, 1783, when Mr. Monroe took his seat in Congress, the first act of that body should have been to ratify the definitive treaty of peace with Great Britain, w^hich had been signed at Paris on the preceding third of September. That treaty was the transaction which closed the revolutionary war, and settled forever the question of American Indepen- dence. It was stipulated that its ratifications should be exchanged within six months from the day of its signature ; and we can now scarcely believe it pos- sible, that but for a mere accident, the faith of the 222 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. nation would have been violated, and the treaty itself cancelled, for want of a power in Congress to pass it through the mere formalities of ratification. By the articles of confederation, no treaty could be concluded without the assent of nine States. — Against the rati- fication there was not a voice throughout the Union ; but only seven States were assembled in Congress. Then came a captious debate, whether the act of rati- fication was a mere formality for which seven States were as competent as nine, or whether it was the very medullary substance of a Treaty, which, unless ^ assented to by nine States, would be null and void — ^a monstrous and tyrannical usurpation. All the powers of government, in free countries, emanate from the people : all organized and operative power exists by delegation from the people. Upon these two pillars is erected the whole fabric of our freedom. That all exercise of organized power should be for the benefit of the people, is the first maxim of government ; and in the delegation of power to the government, the problem to be solved is the most ex- tensive possible grant of power to be exercised for the common good ; with the most effective possible guard against its abuse to the injury of any one. Our fathers, who formed the confederation, witnesses to the recent abuse of organized power, and sufferers by it, mistook the terms of the problem before them, and thought that the only security against the abuse of power, was stinginess of grant jn its organization : not duly considering that power not delegated, cannot be LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 223 exercised for the common good, and that the denial of it, to their government, is equivalent to the abdica- tion of it by themselves. All impotence of the gov- ernment, therefore, thus becomes the impotence of the people who formed it ; and in its result places the nation itself on a footing of inferiority, compared with others in the community of independent nations. Nor did they sufficiently foresee that this excessive cau- tion to withhold beneficent power in the organic frame of government, necessarily and unavoidably leads to usurpation of it. The ordinance for the Government of the North-western Territory, was a signal exam- ple of this course of things under the Articles of Con- federation. A perusal of the journals of Congress, public and secret, from the year 1778, when the Arti- cles of Confederation were completed, and partially adopted, till 1789, when they were superseded by the present Constitution of the United States, will give the liveliest and most perfect idea of the character of the Confederation, and of the condition of the Union under it. Among the mischievous consequences of the inability of Congress to administer the affairs of the Union, was the waste of time and talents of the most eminent patriots of the country, in captious, ir- ritating and fruitless debates. The commerce, the public debt, the fiscal concerns, the foreign relations, the public lands, the obligations to the revolutionary veterans, the intercourse of war and peace with the Indian tribes, were all subjects upon which the benefi- cent action of Congress was necessary ; while at ev- 224 lilFE OF JAMES MONROE. ery step, and upon every subject, they were met by the same insurmountable barriers of interdicted or undelegated power. These observations may be deem- ed not inappropriate to the apology for Mr. Monroe, and for all the distinguished patriots associated with him during his three years of service m the Congress of the Confederation, in contemplating the slender re- sults of benefit to the public in all the service which it was possible for them, thus cramped and crippled, to render. Within the appropriate sphere of action, however, to which the powers of Congress were competent Mr. Monroe took a distinguished part. That body often resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole, to de- liberate upon an empty Treasury, upon accumulating debts, and clamorous creditors ; upon urgent recom- mendations to the State Legislatures, which some of them would adopt, simply, and some conditionally ; others, indefinite!}'" postpone ; some, leave without answer ; and others, sturdily reject. This Commit- tee of the Whole referred every knotty subject to a Select Committee, from whom they would in due time receive an able, and thoroughly reasoned Re- port, which they would debate by paragraphs, and fi- nally reject for some other debatable substitute, or adopt with numerous amendments, and after many a weary record of yeas and nays. On the eighteenth of April, 1783, the Resolution of Congress had passed, declaring it absolutely ne- cessary that they should be vested with a power to LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 225 levy an impost of five per cent. On the thirteenth of April, 1784, another Resolution was adopted, re- commending to the Legislature of the States to grant to Congress the power of regulating commerce. And on the 13th of July, 1785, Congress debated the Re- port of a Committee of which Mr. Monroe was the Chairman, combining the objects of both those prior resolutions, and proposing such alteration of the Ar- ticles of the Confederation, as was necessary to vest Congress with the power both to regulate commerce, and to levy an impost duty. These measures were not abortive, inasmuch as they were progressive steps in the march towards bettor things. They led first to the partial convention of delegates from five States, at Annapolis, in September 1786 ; and then to the general convention at Philadelphia, in 1787, which prepared and proposed the Constitution of the United States. Whoever contributed to that event, is justly entitled to the gratitude of the present age, as a pub- lic benefactor ; and among them the name of Monroe should be conspicuously enrolled. Among the very few powers which, by the Arti- cles of Confederation, had been vested in Congress, was that of constituting a Court of Commissioners, selected from its own body, to decide upon any dis- puted question of boundary jurisdiction, or any other cause whatever, between any two States in the Union. These Commissioners were in the first in- stance, to be chosen, with mutual consent, by the agents of the two States, parties to the controversy ; 226 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. the final determination of which was submitted to them. Such a controversy had taken place between the States of Massachusetts and New York, the agents of which attending in Congress in December, 1784, agreed upon nine persons, to constitute the federal court, to decide the question between the parties. Of these nine persons, James Monroe was one : a dis- tinction, in the 26th year of his age, indicating the high estimation in which he was already held through- out the Union. The subsequent history of this con- troversy to its final and friendly settlement, aflbrds an illustration coinciding with numberless others, of the imbecility of the confederacy. On the twenty-first of March, 1785, Congress were informed by a letter from Mr. Monroe, that he accepted the appointment of one of the Judges of the Federal Court, to decide the controversy. On the 9th of June following, the agents from the contending States reported to Con- gress that they had agreed upon three persons, whom they named, as Judges of the federal Court, instead of three of those who had been appointed the prece- ding December, but had declined accepting their ap- pointment : and the agents requested that a commis- sion might be issued to the Court, as finally constituted to meet at Williamsburg, in Virginia, on the third Tuesday of November, then next, to hear and deter- mine the controversy. On the second of November, of the same year, a representation was made by the agents of the two LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 227 States to Congress, that such had been the difficulties and delays in obtaining answers from several of the Judges, that the parties were left in suspense even to that hour ; a hearing had thus been prevented, and further procrastination was unavoidable. They peti- tioned, therefore, that the hearing should be remitted to such a day as the parties should agree upon, and thereafter certify to Congress — and a Resolution pass- ed accordingly. On the fifteenth of May, 1780, a letter was receiv- ed by Congress from Mr. Monroe, informing them that some circumstances would put it out of his power to act as a Judge for the decision of this controversy, and resigning his commission. On the twenty-seventh of September following. Congress were informed by the agents of the parties, that they had agreed upon a person to be a Judge, in the place of Mr. Monroe, and they requested that a new commission might be issued to the Court. The Court never met, for on the sixteenth of December, 1786, the litigating parties, by their respective agents at Hartford, in Connecticut, settled the controversy by agreement, between themselves, and to their mu- tual satisfaction. Of this the agents gave notice to Congress on the eighth of October. 1787, and they moved that the attested copy of the agreement be- tween the two States, which they laid before Con- gress, should be filed in the Secretary's office — which was refused ; that body declining even to keep upon their files the evidence of an accord between two 10* 228 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. members of the Union, concluded otherwise than as the Articles of Confederation had prescribed. Mr. Monroe did not assign, in his letter to Congress, his reasons for resigning the trust which he had pre- viously consented to assume. They were probably motives of deUcacy, highly creditable to his charac- ter : motives, flowing from a source " Beyond the fix'd and settled rules Of vice and virtue in the schools : " motives, eminating from a deep and conscientious morality, of which men of coarser minds are denied the perception, and which, while exerting unresisted sway over the conduct actuated by them, retire into the self-conviction of their own purity. Between the period when Mr. Monroe had accepted, and that when he withdrew from the office of a Judge between the States of Massachusetts and New York, discus- sions had arisen in Congress, relating to a negotiation with Spain, in the progress of which, varying views of public policy were sharpened and stimulated by varying sectional interests, to a point of painful col- lision. After the conclusion of the general peace at Paris, in 1783, Spain, then a feeble and superannuated mon- archy, governed by corrupt, profligate and perfidious councils, possessed with other colonies of stupendous territorial extent, the mouths of the Mississippi, and both the shores of that father of the floods, from his first entrance into this continent, to a considerable ex- l.IPE OF JAMES MONROE. 229 tent inland. Above the thirty-first degree of latitude, the territorial settlements of the United States were spreading in their incipient but gigantic infancy, along his eastern banks and on both shores of the mighty rivers, which contribute to his stream. Spain, by virtue of a conventional, long settled, but abusive principle of international law, disavowed by the law of nature, interdicted the downward navigation of the Mississippi to the borders upon the shores above her line ; on the bare plea that both sides of the river were within her domain at the mouth. And well knowing that the navigation was equivalent almost to a necessary of life to the American settlers above, she formed the project at once of dallying negotiation with the new American Republic, to purchase by some commercial privilege, her assent to a temporary exclusion from the navigation of the Mississippi, and of tampering with the same American settlers, to seduce them from their allegiance to their own country, by the prospect of enjoying under her dominion as Span- ish subjects, the navigation of the river, from which they were excluded as citizens of the United States. In the collision between the claim of the United States of right to navigate the Mississippi by the laws of nature, and the treaty of peace with Great Britain, and the actual interdiction of that navigation by Spain, founded upon the usages of nations, hostilities between the two nations had already taken place. A citizen of the United States descending the Mississippi, had been seized and imprisoned at Natchez ; and a 230 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. retalitory seizure of the Spanish post at Vincennes had been effected by citizens of the United States, According to all appearances, an immediate war with Spain, for the navigation of the Mississippi, or a com- promise of the question by negotiation, was the only alternative which Congress had before them, and here again appeared a melancholy manifestation of the imbecihty of the Union under the Articles of Confed- eration. A diplomatic agent of the lowest order, under the title of Encai-gardo de JVegocios, had been appointed by the king of Spain to reside in the United States, and had been with much formality received by Con- gress, in July, 1785. Though possessed of full pow- ers to conclude a treaty, he had not the rank of a Minister Plenipotentiary, and his title, otherwise un- exampled in European diplomacy, was significant of the estimation in which his Catholic Majesty held the new American Republic. Immediately after his re- ception, the Secretary of Congress for Foreign Af- fairs, John Jay, of New York, was commissioned to negotiate with the Spanish Encargardo ; but instruct- ed, previously to his making propositions to the Span- iard, or agreeing with him on any article, compact or convention, to communicate the same to Congress. On the 25th of August ensuing, this instruction was repealed, and another substituted in its place, directing him in his plan of treaty, particularly to stipulate the rir^ht of the United States to their territorial bounds and the free navigation of the Mississippi, from the LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 231 source to the ocean, as established in their treaties with Great Britain ; and to conclude no treaty, com- pact or convention with Mr. Gardoqui, without pre- viously communicating it to Congress, and receiving their approbation. The navigation of the Mississippi soon proved an insurmountable bar to the progress of the negotiation. It was, de facto, interdicted by Spain. The right to it could be enforced only by war, and violence on both sides had already taken place. Spain denied the right of the people of the United States to navigate the Mississippi as pertinaciously and in as lofty a tone as Great Britain denies to us, on the same pretence, to this day, the right of navigating the St. Lawrence. After many ineffectual conferences with the Spanish negotiator, the Secretary of Foreign Affairs request- ed further instructions from Congress, and in a per- sonal address to that body, recommended to them a compromise with Spain, by the proposal of a com- mercial treaty in which for an adequate equivalent of commercial advantages to the United States, they, without renouncing the right to the navigation of the Mississippi, should stipulate a forbearance of the exer- cise of that right for a term of twenty-five or thirty years, to which the duration of the treaty should be limited. This proposal excited the most acrimonious and irritated struggle between the delegations from the Northern and Southern divisions of the Union, which had ever occurred. The representation from the 232 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. seven Northern States, unanimously agreeing to au- thorize the stipulation recommended by the Secre- tary, and the five Southern States, with the exception of one member, being equally earnest for rejecting it. The State of Delaware was not then represented. In the animated and passionate debates, on a series of questions originating in this inauspicious controversy, the delegates from Massachusetts, and among them especially Rufus King, took a warm and distinguished part in favor of the proposition of the Secretary, while the opposition to it was maintained with an ear- nestness equally intense, and with ability not less powerful by the delegation from Virginia, and among them, pre-eminently, by Mr. Monroe. In reviewing at this distance of time the whole subject, a candid and impartial observer cannot fail to perceive that much of the bitterness which mingled itself unavoid- ably in the contest, arose from the nature of the Con- federacy, and the predominant obligation under which each delegate felt himself to maintain the interests of his own State and section of the Union. The adverse interests and opposite views of poUcy brought into conflict by these transactions, produced a coldness and mutual alieniation between the Northern and Southern divisions of the Union, which is not extin- guished to this day. It gave rise to rankling jealousies and festering prejudices, not only of the North and South against each other, but of each section against the ablest and most virtuous patriots of the other. As by the Articles of Confederation, no treaty could LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 233 be concluded but with the concurrence of nine States, the authority to make the proposal recommended by the Secretary was not given. The negotiation with Spain was transferred to the Government of the Uni- ted States, as org^anized by the present National Con- stitution. The right of navigating the Mississippi from its source to the ocean, with a deposit at New Orleans, was within seven years thereafter, conceded to the United States by Spain, in a solemn treaty, and within twenty years from the negotiation with the Encargardo, the Mississippi himself with all his waters and all his shores, had passed from the dominion of Spain, and become part of the United States. In all the proceedings relating to the navigation of the Mississippi, from the reception of Mr. Gardoqui, till the acquisition of Louisiana and its annexation to the United States, the agency of Mr. Monroe was conspicuous above all others. He took the lead in the opposition to the recommendation of Mr. Jay. He signed, in conjunction with another eminent citi- zen of the State of New York, Robert R. Livingston, the Treaty which gave us Louisiana : and during his administration, as President of the United States, the cession of the Floridas was consummated. His sys- tem of poHcy, relating to this great interest, was ulti- mately crowned with complete success. That which he opposed, might have severed or dismembered the Union. Far be it from me ; far, I know, would it be from the heart of Mr. Monroe himself, to speak it, in censure of those illustrious statesmen, who, in the 234 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. infancy of the nation, and in the helplessness of the Confederation, preferred a temporary forbearance of a merely potential and interdicted right, to the ap- parent and imminent prospect of unavoidable war. Let those who would censure them look to the cir- cumstances of the times, and to the honest partialities of their own bosoms, and then extend to the memory of those deceased benefactors of their country that candor, in the construction of conduct and imputation of motives, which they will hereafter assuredly need themselves. It was in the heat of the temper, kindled by this cause of discord, in the federal councils, that Mr. Monroe resigned his commission as a judge between the States of Massachusetts and New York. The opinions of both those States, indeed coincided togeth- er, in variance from that which he entertained upon the absorbing interest of the right to navigate the Mississippi. But he beheld their co-untenance — " that it was not toward him as before," He felt there was no longer the same confidence in the dispositions of North arid South to each other, which had existed when the selection of him had been made ; and he withdrew from the invidious duty of deciding be- tween parties, with either of whom he no longer en- joyed the satisfaction of a cordial harmony. By the Articles of Confederation no delegate in Congress was eligible to serve more than three years in six. Towards the close of 1786, the term of Mr. Monroe's service in that capacity expired. During LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 235 that term, and while Congress were in session at New York, he formed a matrimonial connexion with Miss Kortright, daughter of Mr. L. Kortright of an an- cient and respectable family of that state. This lady, of whose personal attractions and accomplishments it were impossible to speak in terms of exaggeration, was, for a period little short of half a century, the cherished and affectionate partner of his life and for- tunes. She accompanied him in all his journeyings through this world of care, from which, by the dis- pensation of Providence, she had been removed on- ly a few months before himself. The companion of his youth was the solace of his declining years, and to the close of life enjoyed the testimonial of his af- fection, that with the external beauty and elegance of deportment, conspicuous to all who were honored with her acquaintance, she united the more precious and endearing qualities which mark the fulfilment of all the social duties, and adorn with grace, and fill with enjoyment, the tender relations of domestic life. After his retirement from service in the Confedera- tion Congress, assuming, with a view to practice at the bar, a temporary residence at Fredericksburgh, he was almost immediately elected to a seat in the Legislature of Virginia ; and the ensuing year, to the Convention, summoned in that Commonwealth, to discuss and decide upon the Constitution of the Uni- ted States. Mr. Monroe was deeply penetrated with the con- 236 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. viction that a great and radical change, in the Articles of Confederation, was indispensable, even for the preservation of the Union. But, in common with Patrick Henry, George Mason, and many other patri- archs of the Revolution, his mind was not altogether prepared for that which was, in truth, a revolution far greater than the severance of the United Ameri- can Colonies from Great Britain : a revolution accom- plishing that which the Declaration of Independence had only conceived and proclaimed : substituting a Constitution of Government for a people, instead of a mere Confederation of States. So great and momen- tous was this change, so powerful the mass of patriot- ism and wisdom, as well as of interest, prejudice and passion, arrayed against it, that we should hazard lit- tle, in considering the final adoption and establishment of the Constitution, as the greatest triumph of pure and peaceful intellect, recorded in the annals of the human race. By the Declaration of Independence the people of the United States had assumed and an- nounced to the world their united personality as a Na- tion, consisting of thirteen Independent States. They had thereby assumed the exercise of primitive sover- eign power : that is to say, the sovereignty of the people. The administrative power of such a people, could, however, be exercised only by delegation. Their first attempt was to exercise it by confining the powers of government to the separate members of the Union, and delegating only the powers of a con- federacy to the collective body. This experiment LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 237 was deliberately and thoroughly made and totally fail- ed. In other ages and other climes the consequences of that failure would have been anarchy : complicated and long continued wars : perhaps, ultimately, one consolidated military monarchy — elective or heredita- ry : perhaps two or three confederacies — always mil- itant ; with border wars, occasionally intermitted, with barrier treaties, impregnable fortresses, rivers hermetically sealed, and the close sea of a Pacific Ocean. One Standing Army would have bred its an- tagonist, and between thetn they would have engen- dered a third, to sit like chaos at the gates of Hell, " Umpire of the strife, And, by decision, more embroil the fray." Not so did the people of the North American Union. They adhered to their first experiment of Confedera- cy, till it was falling to pieces, in its immedicable weak- ness. After frequent, long and patient ineffectual struggles to sustain and strengthen it, a small and se- lect body of them, by authority of a few of the State Legislatures, convened together to confer upon the evils which the country was suffering, and to consult upon the remedy to be proposed. This body advised the Assembly of a Convention, in which all the States should be represented. Eleven of them did so as- semble, with Washington at their head ; with Frank- lin, Madison, Hamilton, King, Langdon, Sherman, John Rutledge, and compeers of fame, scarcely less resplendent, for members. They immediately per- 238 l-IFE OF JAMES MONROE. ceived that the Union, and a mere Confederacy, were incompatible things. They proposed, prepared and presented, for acceptance, a Constitution of Govern- ment for the whole people : a plan, retaining so much of the federative character, as to preserve, unimpair- ed, the independent and wholesome action of the sep- arate State Governments ; and infusing into the whole body the vital energy necessary for free and efficient action upon all subjects of common interest and na- tional concernment. This plan was then submitted to the examination, scrutiny and final judgment of the people, assembled by Representative Conventions, in every State of the Confederacy. To the small portion of my auditory, whose memory can retrace the path of lime back to that eventful period, I appeal for the firm belief that, when that plan was first exhibited to the solemn consideration of the people, though presen- ted by a body of men, enjoying a mass of public con- fidence far greater than any other, of equal numbers,^ then living, could have possessed, it was yet, by a con- siderable, not to say a large numerical majority, of the whole people, sincerely, honestly and heartily dis- approved. It was disapproved, not only by all those who perseveringly adhered to the rejection of it, but by great numbers of those who reluctantly voted for accepting it ; considering it then as the only alterna- tive to a dissolution of the union : and of those who voted for it, of its most ardent and anxious supporters, it may, with equal confidence be affirmed, that no one ever permitted his imagination to anticipate, or his LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 239 hopes to conceive the extent of the contrast in the condition of the North American people under that new social compact, with what it had been under the Confederation which it was to supersede. It was, doubtless, among the dispensations of a wise and beneficent Providence, that the severe and perti- nacious investigation of this Constitution, as a whole, and in all its minutest parts, by the Convention of all the States, and in the admirable papers of the Feder- alist, should precede its adoption and establishment. It may be truly said to have passed through an ordeal of more than burning ploughshares. Never, in the action of a whole people, was obtained so signal a tri- umph of cool and deliberate judgment, over ardent feeling, and honest prejudices : and never was a peo- ple more signally rewarded for so splendid an exam- ple of popular self-control. That Mr. Monroe, then, was one of those enlight- ened, faithful and virtuous patriots, who opposed the adoption of the Constitution, can no more detract from the eminence of his talents, or the soundness of his principles, than the project for the temporary aban- donment of the right to navigate the Mississippi, can impair those of the eminent citizens of New York and Massachusetts, by whom that measure was pro- posed. During a Statesman's life, an estimate of his motives will necessarily mingle itself with every judgment upon his conduct, and that judgment will often be swayed more by the concurring or adverse passions of the observer, than by reason, or even by 240 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. the merits of the cause. Candor, in the estimate of motives, is rarely the virtue of an adversary ; but it is an indispensable duty before the definitive tribunal of posthumous renovi^n. When in the Legislature of Virginia, the question was discussed of the propriety of calling a State Con- vention to decide upon the Constitution of the United States, Mr. Monroe took no part in the debate. He then doubted of the course which it would be most advisable to pursue. — Whether to adopt the Constitu- tion in the hope that certain amendments which he deemed necessary, would afterwards be obtained, or to suspend the decision upon the Constiution itself, until those amendments should have been secured. When elected to the Convention, he expressed those doubts to his constituents assembled at the polls ; but his opinion having afterwards and before the meeting of the Convention, settled into a conviction, that the amendments should precede the acceptance of the Constitution, he addressed to his constituents a letter, stating his objections to that instrument, which letter was imperfectly printed, and copies of it were sent by him to several distinguished characters, among whom were General Washington, Mr. Jefferson, and Mr. Madison, who viewed it with liberality and candor. In the Convention, Mr. Monroe took part in the de- bate, and in one of his speeches entered fully into the merits of the subject. He was decidedly for a change, and a very important one, in the- then existing sys- tem ; but the Constitution reported, had in his opinion LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 241 defects requiring amendment, which should be made before its adoption. The Convention, however, by a majority of less than ten votes of one hundred and seventy, resolved to adopt the Constitution, with a proposal of amend- ments to be engrafted upon it. Such too, was the definitive conclusion in all the other States, although two of them lingered one or two years after it was in full operation by authority of all the rest, before their acquiescence in the decision. By the course which Mr. Monroe had pursued on this great occasion, although it left him for a short time in the minority, yet he lost not the confidence either of the people or of the Legislature of Virginia. At the organization of the government of the United States, the first Senators from that State, were Rich- ard Henry Lee and William Grayson. The decease of the latter in December, 1789, made a vacancy which was immediately supplied by the election of Mr. Monroe ; and in that capacity he served until May, 1794 when he was appointed, at the nomination of President Washington, Minister Plenipotentiary to the Republic of France. The two great parties which so long divided the feelings and the councils of our common country, un- der the denominations of Federal and anti-Federal, orisinated with the Union. — The Union itself had been formed by the impulse of an attraction irresistable as the adamant of the magnet and scarcely less mystical. It was an union however of subject colonies, then 242 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. making no claim or pretension to sovereign power. But from the hour of the Declaration of Indepen- dence, it became necessary to provide for the perpe- tuity of the Union, and to organize the administration of its affairs. The extent of power to be conferred on the representative body of the Union, became from that instant an object of primary magnitude, dividing opinions and feelings. Union was desired by all — but many were averse even to a confederacy. They would have had a league or alliance, offensive and de- fensive, but not even a permanent cenfederacy or Congress. It was the party which anxiously urged the adoption of the Articles of Confederation, who thereby acquired the appellation of Federalists, as their adversaries were known by the name of Anti- Federalists. To show the influence of names over things, we may remark that M^hen the Constitution of the United States was debated, it formed the first great and direct issue between the parties^ which retained their names, but had in reality completely changed sides. The Federalists of the Confederacy had abandoned that sinking ship. They might then with much more propriety have been called National- ists. The real Federalists were the opposers of the Constitution ; for they adhered to the principle, and most of them would have been willing to amend the Articles of Confederation. This incongruity of nan->e shortly afterwards became so glaring, that the Anti- Federalists laid theirs aside, and assumed the name sometimes of Repubhcans and sometimes of Demo- LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 243 crats. The name of Republicans is not a suitable denomination of a party of the United States, because it impHes an offensive and unjust imputation upon their opponents, as if they were not also Republicans. The truth is, as it was declared by Thomas Jefferson, all are, and from the Declaration of Independence have been, Republicans. Speculative opinions in favor of a more energetic government on one side, and of a broader range of Democratic rule on the other, have doubtless been entertained by individuals, but both parties have been disposed to exercise the full measure of their authority when in power, and both have been equally refractory to the mandates of authority when out. In the primitive principles of the parties, the Federahsts were disposed to consider the first princi- ple of Society to be the preservation of order ; while their opponents viewed the benefit above all others in the enjoyment of liberty. The first explosion of the French Revolution, was cotemporaneous with the first organization of the government of the United States ; and France and Great Britain shortly after- wards involved in a war of unparalleled violence and fury. It was a war of opinions ; in which France assumed the attitude of champion for freedom, and Britain that of social order throughout the civflized world. While under these pretences, all sense of justice was banished from the councils and conduct of both ; and both gave loose to the frenzy of bound- less ambition, rapacity and national hatred and re- venge. The foundations of the great deep were 11 244 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. broken up. The two elementary principles of human society were arrayed in conflict with each other, and not yet, not at this hour is that warfare accomplished. Freedom and order were also the elementary princi- ples of the parties in the American Union, and as they respectively predominated, each party sympa- thized with one or the other of the great European combatants. And thus the party movements in our own country became complicated with the sweeping hurricane of European politics and wars. The divis- ion was deeply seated in the cabinet of Washington. — It separated his two principal advisers, and he en- deavored without success, to hold an even balance between them. It pervaded the councils of the Union, the two Houses of Congress, the Legislatures of the States, and the people throughout the land. The first partialities of the nation were in favor of France ; prompted both by the remembrances of the recent war for American Independence, and by the impression then almost universal, that her cause was identified with that which had so lately been our own. But when Revolutionary France became one great army ; when the first commentary upon her procla- mations of freedom, and her disclaimer of conquest, was the annexation of Belgium to her territories ; when the blood of her fallen monarch was but a drop of the fountains that spouted from her scafiblds ; when the goddess of liberty, in her solemn processions, was a prostitute ; when open atheism was avowed and argued in her hall of legislation, and the existence of LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 245 an Omnipotent God was among the Decrees of her National Convention, then horror and disgust took the place of admiration and hope in the minds of the American Federalists. Then France became to them an object of terror and dismay, and Britain, as her great and steadfast antagonist, the solitary anchor of their hope — the venerated bulwark of their religion. At the threshold of the war, Washington, not with- out a sharp and portentous struggle in his cabinet, followed by sympathetic and convulsive throes, throughout the Union, issued a Proclamation of neu- trality. Neutrality was the policy of his administra- tion, but neutrality was not in the heart of any por- tion of the American people. They had taken their sides, and the Republicans and the Federalists had now become, each at least in the view of the other, a French and a British faction. Nor was the neutrality of Washington more re- spected by the combatants in Europe, than it was con- genial to the feelings of his countrymen. The cham- pion oi freedom and the champion of order were alike regardless of the rights of others. They trampled upon all neutrality from the outset. The press-gang, the rule of war of 1756, and the order in council, combined to sweep all neutral commerce from the ocean. The requisition, the embargo, and the maxi- mum left scarcely a tatter of unplundered neutral property in France. Britain, without a blush, inter- dicted all neutral commerce with her enemy. France, under the dove-like banners of fraternity, sent an 246 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. envoy to Washington, with the fraternal kiss upon his Hps, and the piratical commission in his sleeve ; w^ith the pectoral of righteousness on his breast, and the trumpet of sedition in his mouth. Within one year from the breaking out of hostilities between Bri- tain and France, the outrages of both parties upon the peaceful citizens of this Union, were such as would have amply justified war against either, and left to the government of Washington no alternative, but that or reparation. At the commencement of the war, the United States were represented in France and England by two of their most distinguished citi- zens, both, though in different shades, of the Fedeval school; by Thomas Pinckney at London, and by Governeur Morris in France. The remonstrance of Mr. Pinckney against the frantic and reckless injustice of the British government, were faithful, earnest and indefatigable ; but they were totally disregarded. Mr. Morris had given irremissible offence to all the revo- lutionary parties in France, and his recall -had been formally demanded. From a variety of causes, the popular resentments in America ran with a much stron- ger current against Britain than against France, and movements tending directly to war, were in quick succession following each other in Congress. Wash- ington arrested them by the institution of a special mission to Great Britain. To give it at once a con- ciliatory character, and to impress upon the British government a due sense of its importance, the person LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. 247 selected for this mission was John Jay, then Chief Jus- tice of the United States. James Monroe was shortly afterwards appointed Minister Plenipotentiary to the Republic of France. In the selection of him, the same principle of concilia- tion to the government near which he was accredited had been observed. But Washington was actuated also by a further motive of holding the balance be- tween the parties at home by this appointment. Mr. Jay was of the Federal party, with a bias of inclina- tion favorable to Britain ; Mr. Monroe, of the party which then began to call itself the Republican party, inclining to favor the cause of Republican France. This party was then in ardent opposition to the gen- eral course of Washington's administration — and that of Mr. Monroe in the Senate had not been inactive. To conciliate that party too, was an object of Wash- ington's most earnest solicitude. From among them he determined that the successor of Mr. Morris, in France, should be chosen, and the members of the Senate of that party were by him informally consul- ted to designate who of their number would, by re- ceiving the appointment, secure for it their most cor- dial satisfaction. Their first indication was of anoth- er person. Him, Washington, from a distrust of in- dividual character, declined to appoint. But he nomi- nated Mr. Monroe, and the concurrence of the Sen- ate in his appointment was unanimous. This incident, hitherto unknown to the public, has been followed by many consequences, some of them perhaps little sus- 248 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. pected, in our history. The discrimination of charac- ter in the judgment of the first President of the Uni- ted States, is alike creditable to him and Mr. Monroe. It was not without hesitation that he availed himself of the preference in his fav^or, nor without the entire approbation of the party with whom he had acted, including even the individual who had been rejected by the prophetic prepossession of Washington. The cotemporaneous missions of Mr. Jay to Great Britain, and of Mr. Monroe to France, are among the most memorable events in the history of this Union. There are in the annals of all nations occasions, when wisdom and patriotism, and the brightest candor and the profoundest sagacity, are alike unavailing for suc- cess. There are sometimes elements of discord, in the social relations of men, which no human virtue or skill can reconcile. Mr. Jay and Mr. Monroe, each within his own sphere of action, executed with equal ability the trust committed to him, in the spirit of his appointment and of his instructions. But neutrality was the duty and inclination of the American ad- ministration, and neutrality was what neither of the great European combatants might endure. In the long history of national animosities and hatreds be- tween the French and British nations, there never was a period when they were tinged with deeper in- fusions of the wormwood and the gall, than at that precise point of time. Each of the parties believed herself contending for her national existence ; each proclaimed, perhaps be- LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 249 lieved, herself the last and only barrier, Britain against the subversion of social order, France against the sub- version of freedom throughout the world. Mr. Jay, in the fulfilment of his commission, con- cluded a Treaty with Great Britain, which established on immovable foundations, the neutrality proclaimed by Washington ; it reserved the faithful performance of all the previous engagements of the United Slates with France ; some of which were, in their operation at that time, not consonant with entire neutrality : but, in return for great concessions on the British side it yielded some points, also, which bore as little the aspect of neutrality in their operation upon France. Mr. Monroe, himself, favored the cause of France. Both Houses of Congress had passed Resolutions, s(!arcely consistent, at least, with impartiality, and Washington, under advice, perhaps over-swayed by the current of popular feeling, afterwards answered an address of the Minister of France, in words of like sympathy with her cause. Arriving in France, at the precise moment when the excesses of the revo- lutionary parties were on the turning spring tide of their highest flood, Mr. Monroe was received, with splendid formality, in the bosom of the National Con- vention, when not another civilized nation upon earth, had a recognized representative in France. He there declared. in~ perfect consistency with his instructions, the fraternal friendship of his country and her gov- ernment, for the French people, and their devoted at- tachment to her cause, as the cause of freedom. The 250 LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. President of the Convention answered him in lan- guage of equal kindness and cordiality ; though even then so little of real benevolence towards the United States, was there in the Committee of Public Safetv, then the executive power of France, that it was to cut short their protracted deliberations, whether Mr. Monroe should be received at all, that he had address- ed himself, in the face of the world, for an answer to that inquiry to the National Convention itself. Strong expressions of kindness are the ordinary common- places of the diplomatic intercourse between nations ; and, like the customary civilities of epistolary corres- pondence between individuals, they are never under- stood according to the full import of their meaning ; but extreme jealousy and suspicion at that time perva- ded all the public councils of France. She professed to be willing that the United States should preserve their neutrality, but she neither re- spected it herself nor acquiesced in the measures which it dictated. They were no sooner informed that Mr. Jay had signed a Treaty with Lord Grenville, than they began to press Mr. Monroe with importu nities to be informed, even before it had been submit- ted to the American Government, of all its con- tents. There is, perhaps, no position more awkward and dis- tressing, than that of being compelled to reject an un- reasonable request from those whose friendship it is important to retain ; for unreasonable requests are precisely those which will be urged with the greatest LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 251 pertinacity. To enable Mr. Monroe to decline indulg- ing the Comnnittee with a copy of the Treaty, before it was ratified, he was under the necessity of declin- ing to receive a confidential communication of its contents from Mr. Jay. The difficulties of his situation became much greater after the Treaty had been rati- fied, and was made public. The people of the United States were so equally divided, with regard to the merits of the Treaty, that it became the principal ob- ject of contention between the parties, and they were bitterly exasperated against each other. The French Government, which, during the progress of these events, had passed from a frantic Committee of Pub- lic Safety, to a profligate Executive Directory, took advantage of these dissensions in the American Union. They suspended the operation of the Treaties existing between the United States and France ; they issued orders for capturing all American vessels, bound to British ports, or having property of their enemies on board ; their diplomatic correspondence exhibited a series of measures, ahke injurious and insulting to the American Government ; and they recalled their Min- ister from the United States, without appointing a successor. It was, perhaps, rather the misfortnne of all, than the fault of any one, that the views of Mr. Monroe, with regard to the policy of the Ameri- can Administration, did not accord with those of Pres- ident Washington. He thought that France had just cause of complaint ; and, called to the painful and in- vidious task of defending and justifying that which he 11* 252 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. personally disapproved, although he never, for a mo- ment, forgot the duties of his station, it was, perhaps, not possible that he should perform them entirely to the satisfaction of his Government. He was recalled, towards the close of Washington's administration, and Charles Cotesworth Pinckney was appointed in his place. To the history of our subsequent controversies with France, until the peace of Amiens, it will not be necessary for me to advert. Upon Mr. Monroe's return to the United States, the administration had passed from the hands of President Washington, into those of his successor. In vindication of his own character, Mr. Monroe felt himself obliged to go be- fore the tribunal of the public, and published his "View of the conduct of the Executive in the For- eign affairs of the United States, connected with the mission to the French Republic, during the years 1794, '95 and '90; Upon the propriety of this step, as well as with re- gard to the execution of the work, opinions were, at the time, and have continued, various. The policy of Washington, in that portentous crisis in human af- fairs, is, in the main, now placed beyond the reach of criticism. It is sanctioned by the nearly unanimous voice of posterity. It will abide, in unfading lustre, the test of after ages. Nor will the well-earned fame of Mr. Monroe, for distinguished ability, or pure in- tegrity, suffer from the part which he acted in these transactions. In the fervor of pohtical contentions, LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. 253 personal animosities belong more to the infirmities of man's nature than to individual wrong, and they are unhappily sharpened in proportion to the sincerity with which conflicting opinions are avowed. It is the property of wise and honorable minds, to lay aside these resentments, and the prejudices flowing from them, when the conflicts, which gave rise to them, have passed away. Thus it was that the great orator, statesman, and moralist, of antiquity, when reproached for reconciliation with a bitter antagonist, declared that he wished his enemies to be transient, and his friendships immortal. Thus it was, that the congenial mind of James Monroe, at the zenith of his public honors, and in the retirement of his latest days, cast off, like the suppuration of a wound, all the feel- ings of unkindness, and all the severities of judgment, which might have intruded upon his better nature, in the ardor of civil dissension. In veneration for the character of Washington, he harmonized with the now unanimous voice of his country ; and he has left recorded, with his own hand, a warm and un- qualified testimonial to the pure patriotism, the pre- eminent ability and the spotless integrity of John Jay. That neither the recall of Mr. Monroe, from his mission to France, nor the publication of his volume, had any effect to weaken the confidence reposed in him by his fellow citizens, was manifested by his im- mediate election to the Legislature, and soon after- wards to the office of Governor of Virginia, in which 254 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. he served for the term, limited by the Constitution, of three years. In the mean time, the Directory of France, with its Council of Five Hundred, and its Council of Elders, had been made to vanish from the scene, by the magic talisman of a soldier's sword. The Government of France, in point of form, was administered by a Triad of Consuls : in point of fact, by a successful warrior, then Consul for life : here- ditary Emperor and King of Italy ; with a forehead, burning for a diadem ; a soul inflated by victory ; and an imagination, fired with visions of crowns and sceptres, in prospect. before him. — He had extorted, from the prostrate imbecility of Spain, the province of Louisiana, and compelled her, before the delivery of the territory to him, to revoke the solemnly stipu- lated privilege, to the citizens of the United States, of a deposit at New Orleans. A military colony was to be settled in Louisiana, and the materials, for an early rupture with the United States, were industri- ously collected. The triumph of the Republican party, here, had been marked by the election of Thomas Jefferson to the Presidency : just before which, our previous controversies with France had been adjusted by a Treaty of Amity and Commerce, and shortly after which, a suspension of arms, between France and Britain, had been concluded, under the fallacious name of a Peace at Amiens. The restless spirit of Napoleon, inflamed, at the age of most active energy in human life, by the gain of fifty battles, dazzling with a splendor, then unrivalled but by the renown LIFE OF JAMKS MONROE. 255 of Caesar, breathing, for a moment, in the midway- path of his career, the conqueror of Egypt, the victor of Lodi, and of Marengo, the trampler upon the neck of his country, her people, her legislators, and her constitution, was about to bring his veteran legions, in formidable proximity to this Union. The transfer of Louisiana to France, the projected military colony, and the occlusion, at that precise moment, of the port of New Orleans, operated like an electric shock, in this country. The pulse of the West beat, instanta- neously, for M^ar : and the antagonists of Mr. Jetfer- son, in Congress, sounded the trumpet of vindication to the rights of the nation ; and, as they perhaps flattered themselves, of downfall to his administra- tion. In this crisis, Mr. Jefferson, following the ex- ample of his first predecessor, on a similar occasion, instituted a special and extraordinary mission to France ; for which, in the name of his country, and of the highest of human duties, he commanded, rather than invited, the services and self devotion of Mr. Monroe. Nor did he hesitate to accept the perilous, and, at that time, most unpromising charge. He was joined, in the Commission Extraordinary, with Robert R. Livingston, then resident Minister Plenipotentiary, from the United States, in France, well known as one of the most eminent leaders of our Revolution. Mr. Monroe's appointment was made on the eleventh of January, 1803 ; and, as Louisiana was still in the pos- session of Spain, he was appointed also, jointly with Charles Pinckney, then Minister Plenipotentiary of 256 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. the United States at Madrid, to an Extraordinary Mission to negotiate, if necessary, concerning the same interest there. The intended object of these negotiations was to acquire, by purchase, the island of New Orleans, and the Spanish territory, east of the Mississippi. Mr. Livingston had, many months before, presented to the French Government a very able memorial, showing, by conclusive arguments, that the cession of the Province to the United States, would be a measure of wise and sound policy, condu- cive not less to the true interests of France than to those of the Federal Union. At that time, however, the memoir was too widely variant from the wild and gigantic project of Napoleon. How often are we called, in this world of vicissi- tudes, to testify that " There's a Divinity, who shapes our ends, Rough hew them how we will." When Mr. Monroe arrived in France, all was changed in the Councils of the Tuileries. The vol- canic crater was re-blazing to the skies. The war between France and Britain was rekindling, and the article of most immediate urgency to the necessities of the first consul was money. The military colony of twenty thousand veterans already assembled at Helovet-Sluys to embark for Louisiana, received an- other destination. The continent of America w^as relieved from the imminent prospect of a conflict with the modern Alexander, and Mr. Monroe had scarcely LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 257 reached Paris, when he and his colleague were in- formed that the French Government had resolved, for an adequate compensation in money, to cede to the United States the whole of Louisiana. The acquisi- tion, and the sum demanded for it, transcended the powers of the American Plenipotentiaries, and the amount of the funds at their disposal ; but they hesi- tated not to accept the offer. The negotiation was concluded in a fortnight. The ratification of the treaty, with those of a convention appropriating part of the funds created by it to the adjustment of certain claims of citizens of the United States upon France, were within six months exchanged at Washington, and the majestic valley of the Mississippi, and the Rocky Mountains, and the shores of the Pacific Ocean became integral parts of the North American Union. From France, immediately after the conclusion of the treaties, Mr. Monroe proceeded to England, where he was commissioned as the successor of Rufus King in the character of Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States. Mr. King was, at his own re- quest, returning to his own country, after a mission of seven years, in which he had enjoyed the rare ad- vantage of giving satisfaction alike to his own gov- ernment, and to that to which he was accredited. Mr. Monroe carried with him the same dispositions, and had the temper of the British government contin- ued to be marked with the same good humor and moderation which had prevailed during the mission 258 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. of Mr. King, that of Mr. Monroe would have been equally successful. But with the renewal of the war revived the injustice of belligerent pretensions, fol- lowed by the violence of belligerent outrages upon neutrality. After the conclusion of the treaty with Mr. Jay, and especially towards the close of the pre- . ceding war, the British government had gradually abstained from the exercise of those outrages which had brought them to the verge of a war with the United States, and at the issue of a correspondence with Mr. King, had disclaimed the right of inter- ference with the trade between neutral ports and the colonies of her enemies. Just before the departure of Mr. King, a convention had been proposed by him in which Britain abandoned the pretension of right to impress seamen, which failed only by a captious ex- ception for the narrow seas, suggested by a naval of- ficer, then at the head of the admiralty. But after the war recommenced, the odious pretensions and op- pressive practices of unlicensed rapine returned in its train. In the midst of his discussions with the British government on these topics, Mr. Monroe was called away to the discharge of his extraordinary mission to Spain. In the retrocession of Louisiana, by France to Spain, no limits of the province had been defined. It was retroceded with a reference to its original boun- daries as possessed by France, but those boundaries had been a subject of altercation between France and Spain, from the time when Louis the 14th had made LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 259 a grant of Louisiana to Crozat. Napoleon took this retrocession of tiie province, well aware of the gor- dian knot with which it was bound, and fully deter- nnined to sever it with his accustomed solvent, the sword. His own cession of the province to the Uni- ted States, however, relieved him from the necessity of resorting to this expedient, and proportionably contracted in his mind the dimensions of the prov- ince. — He ceded Louisiana to the United States with- out waiting for the delivery of possession to himself, and used with regard to the boundary in his grant, the very words of the conveyance to him by Spain. The Spanish Government solemnly protested against the cession of Louisiana to the United States, alleging that in the very treaty by which France had reac- quired the province, she had stipulated never to cede it away from herself. Soon admonished, however, of her own helpless condition, and encouraged to transfer her objections from the cession to the boun- dary, she withdrew her protest against the whole transaction, and took ground upon the disputed extent of the province. The original claim of France had been from the Perdido East to the Rio Bravo West of the Mississippi. Mobile had been originally a French settlement, and all West Florida, was as dis- tinctly within the claim of France, as the mouth of the Mississippi first discovered by La Salle. Such was the understanding of the American Plenipoten- tiaries, and of Congress, who accordingly authorized President Jefierson to establish a collection district on 260 I-IFE OF JAMKS MONROE. the shores, waters and inlets of the bay and river Mobile, and of rivers both East and West of the same. But Spain on her part reduced the province of Louisi- ana to httle more than the Island of New Orleans. She assumed an attitude menacing immediate war ; refused to ratify a convention made under the eye of her own Government at Madrid, for indemnifying cit- izens of the United States, plundered under her au- thority during the preceding war ; harassed and ran- somed the citizens of the Union and their property on the waters of Mobile ; and marched military forces to the borders of the Sabine, where they were met by troops of the United States, with whom a conflict was spared only by a temporary military convention between the respective commanders. It was at this emergency that Mr. Monroe proceeded from London to Madrid to negotiate together with Mr. Pinckney, upon this boundary, and for the purchase of the rem- nant of Spain's title to the territory of Florida. He passed through Paris on his way, precisely at the time to witness the venerable Pontiff of the Roman Church invest the brows of Napoleon with the here- ditary imperial Crown of France, in the Cathedral of Notre Dame. While in Paris, Mr. Monroe addressed to the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, Talleyrand, a letter reminding him of -a promise somewhat indefi- nite, at the time of the cession of Louisiana, that the good offices of France, in aid of a negotiation with Spain for the acquisition of Florida should be yielded: stating that he was on his way to Madrid to enter LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 261 upon that negotiation, and claiming the fulfilment of that promise of France. He also presented the view taken by the government of the United States, that the limits of Louisiana as ceded by France to them extended from the Perdido to the Rio Bravo. — This letter w^as promptly answered by the Minister Talley- rand, with an earnest argument in behalf of the Spanish claim of boundary Eastward of the Missis- sippi, but expressing no opinion with regard to her pretensions Westward of that river. His Imperial Majesty had discovered, not only that West Florida formed no part of the Territory of Louisiana ; but that he never had entertained such an idea, nor imag- ined that a retrocession of the province as it had been possessed by France, could include the District of Mobile. This argument was pressed with so much apparent candor and sincerity, that it may give inter- est to the anecdote which I am about to relate as a commentary upon it. It happened that a member of the Senate of the Ujiited States was at New Orleans, when the Commissioner of Napoleon authorized to receive possession of the province arrived there, and before the cession to the United States. This Com- missioner in conversation with the American Senator, told him that the military colony from France might be soon expected. That there was perpaps some dif- ference of opinion between the French and Spanish governments as to the boundary ; but that when the colony arrived, his orders were quietly to take pos- session to the Perdido and leave the diversities of 262 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. opinion to be afterwards disscussed in the Cabinet. This anecdote was related on the floor of the Senate of the United States, by the member of that body who had been a party to the conversation. But with this forgetful change of opinion in the new crowned head of the Imperial Republic, there was little prospect of success for the mission of Mr. Mon- roe at Madrid ; to which place he proceeded. There in the space of five months, together with his col- league Charles Pinckncy, he unfolded the principles, and discussed the justice of his country's claim, in cor- respondence and conferences with the Prince of the Peace, and Don Pedro Cevallos, with great ability, but without immediate effect. The questions which Napoleon would have settled by the march of a de- tachment from his mihtary colony, was to abide their issue by the more lingering, and more deliberate march of time. The state papers which passed at that stage of the great controversy with Spain, re- mained many years buried in the archives of the gov- ernments respectively parties to it. They have since been published at Washington ; but so little of attrac- tion have diplomatic documents of antiquated date, even to the wakeful lovers of reading, that in this en- lightened auditory how many — might I not with more propriety inquire how few there are, by whom they have ever been perused 1 It is nevertheless due to the memory of Mr. Monroe and of his colleague to say that among the creditable state papers of this nation they will rank in the highest order : — that they de- - LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 263 serve the close and scrutinizing attention of every American statesman, and will remain solid, however unornamented, monuments of intellectual power ap- plied to national claims of right, in the land of our fathers and the age which has now passed away. In June, 1805, Mr. Monroe returned to his post at London, where new and yet more arduous labors awaited him. A new ministry, at the head of which Mr. Pitt returned to power, had succeeded the mild but feeble administration of Mr. Addington, and Lord Mulgrave as Minister for Foreign Affairs, had taken the place of the Earl of Harrowby. The war be- tween French and British ambition was spreading over Europe, and Napoleon, by threats and preparations, and demonstrations of a purposed invasion of Great Britain, had aroused the spirit of that island to the highest pitch of exasperation. Conscious of their in- ability to contend with him upon the continent of Eu- rope, confident in their unquestionable but not then unquestioned supremacy over him upon the ocean, the British government saw with an evil eye, the advan- tages which the neutral nations were deriving from their commercial intercourse with France and her al- lies. Little observant of any principle but that of her own interest, British policy then conceived the project of substituting a forced commerce between her own subjects and their enemies, by annihilating the same commerce enjoyed by her enemies through the privi- leged medium of the neutral flag. In her purposes of manifesting for her own benefit the superiority of her 264 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. power upon the seas, British policy, has, as her occa- sions serve, a choice of expedients. In the present instance, for the space of two full years, she had suf- fered neutral navigation to enjoy the benefit of princi- ples in the law of nations, formerly recognized by herself, in the correspondence between Mr. King and Lord Hawkesbury, shortly before the close of the preceding war. In the confidence of this recognition, the commerce and navigation of the United States had grown and flourished beyond all former example, and the ocean whitened with their canvas. Suddenly, as if by a concerted signal throughout the world of waters which encompass the globe, our hardy and peaceful, though intrepid mariners, found themselves arrested in their career of industry and skill ; seized by the British cruizers ; their vessels and cargoes con- ducted into British ports, and by the spontaneous and sympathetic illumination of British Courts of Vice Admiralty, adjudicated to the captors, because they were engaged in a trade with the enemies of Britain to which they had not usually been admitted in time of peace. Mr. Monroe had scarcely reached London when he received a report fi'om the Consul of the United States, at that place, announcing that about twenty of their vessels, had, within a few weeks, been brought into the British ports on the Channel, and that by the condemnation of more than one of them, the Admirality Court had settled the principle. And thus was revived the stubborn contest between neutral rights and belligerent pretensions, which had LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. 265 sown, for so many years, thickets of thorns in the path of the preceding administrations ; which Washington had with infinite difficulty avoided, and which his sue- cesser had scarcely been fortunate enough to avoid. And from that day to the peace of Ghent, the biogra- phy of James Monroe is the history of that struggle, and in a great degree the history of this nation — an eventful period in the annals of mankind ; a deeply momentous crisis in the affairs of our Union. A rapid sketch of the agency of Mr. Monroe in several sue- cessive and important stations, through the series of vicissitudes, is all that the occasion will permit, and more, I fear, than the time accorded by the indul- gence of my auditory will allow. The controversy was opened by a note of mild, but indignant remon- strance from Mr. Monroe to the Earl of Mulgrave, answered by that nobleman verbally, with excuse, apology, qualified avowal, equivocation, and a promise of written discussion, which never came. Mr. Pitt died ; his ministry was dissolved, and he was succeed- ed as the head of the administration, by -the great ri- val and competitor of his fame, Charles Fox. In the meantime the navies of France and Spain had been annihilated at Trafalgar, and the imperial crowns of Muscovy and of Austria, had cowered under the blos- soming sceptre of the soldier of fortune at Austerlitz. Mr. Fox, liberal in l;is principles, but trammelled by the passions, prejudices, and terrors of his country- men and his colleagues, disavowed the new practice of capturing neutrals, and the new principles in the 266 LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. Admirality Courts which had so simultaneously made their appearance : but Mr. Fox issued a paper block- ade of the whole coast, from the Elbe to Brest. He revoked the orders under which the British cruizers had swept the seas, and released the vessels already captured, upon which the sentence of the Admirality had not been passed, but he demurred to the claim of indemnity for adjudications already consummated. Of the excitement and agitation, raised in our country by this inroad upon the laws of nations and upon neutral commerce, an adequate idea can now scarcely be con- ceived. The complaints, the remonstrances, the ap- peals for protections to Congress, from the plundered merchants, rung throughout the Union. A fire spread- ing from Portland to New Orleans, would have scarce- ly been more destructive. Memorial upon memorial, from all the cities of the land, loaded the tables of the Legislative Halls, with the cry of distress and the call upon the national arm for defence, restitution and in- demnity. Mr. Jefferson instituted again a special and extraordinary mission to London, in which William Pinckney, perhaps the most eloquent of our citizens then living, was united with Mr. Monroe. Had Mr. Fox lived, their negotiation might have been ultimate- ly successful. While he lived, the cruizers upon the seas, and the Admirality Courts upon the shores, sus- pended their concert of depredation upon the Ameri- can commerce, and a treaty was concluded between the Ministers of our country, and Plenipotentiaries selected by Mr. Fox, which, with subsequent modifi- LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 267 cations, just and reasonable, suggested on our part, might have restored peace and harmony, so far as it can subsist, between emulous and rival nations. As transmitted to this country, how^ever, the treaty was deemed by Mr. Jefferson not to have sufficiently pro- vided against the odious impressment of our seamen, and it was clogged with the declaration of the British Plenipotentiaries, delivered after the signature of the treaty, suspending the obligation upon an extraneous and inadmissible condition. Mr. Jefferson sent back the treaty for revisal, but the mature and conciliatory spirit of Fox, was no longer to be found in the coun- cils of Britain. It had been succeeded by the dashing and flashy spirit of George Canning. He refused to resume the negotiation. Under the auspices, not of positive orders, but of the well known temper of his administration, Berkley committed the unparalleled outrage upon the Chesapeake — disavowed, but never punished. Then came the orders in council of No- vember, 1807 : the proclamation to sanction man- stealing from American merchantmen by royal au- thority ; and the mockery of an olive branch in the hai>ds of George Rose — our embargo ; the liberal and healing arrangement of David Erskine, disavowed by his government as soon as known — but not unpunish- ed ; a minister fresh from Copenhagen, sent to ad- minister the healing medicine for Erskine's eiTor, in the shape of insolence and defiance. Insult and inju- ry followed each other in foul succession, till the smil- ing visage of Peace herself flushed with resentment, 12 268 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. and the Representatives of the nation responded to the loud and indignant call of their country for war. When the British gocernnient refused to resume the negotiation of the treaty, the Extraordinary Mission in which Monroe and Pinckney had been joined, was at an end. Mr. Monroe, even before the commence- ment of that negotiation, had solicited and obtained permission to return home — a determination, the exe- cution of which had by that special joint mission been postponed. He suffered a further short detention, in consequence of the exploit of Admiral Berkley upon the Chesapeake and returned to the United States at the close of the year 1807. After a short interval passed in the retirement of private life, he was again elected Governor of Virginia, and upon the resigna- tion of Robert Smith, was, in the spring of 1811, ap- pointed by President Madison, Secretary of State. This office he continued to hold during the remainder of the double Presidential term of Mr. Madison, with the exception of about six months at the close of the late war with Great Britain, when he discharged the then still more arduous duties of the War Department. On the return of peace he was restored to the Depart- ment of State ; and on the retirement of Mr. Madi- son in 1817, he was elected President of the United States — re-elected without opposition in 1821. On the third of March, 1825, he retired to his residence in Loudon county, Virginia. Subsequent to that pe- riod, he discharged the ordinary judicial functions of a magistrate of the county, and of curator of the LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. 269 University of Virginia. In the winter of 1829 and 1830, he served as a member of the Convention called to revise the Constitution of that Commonwealth ; and took an active part in their deliberations, over which he was unanimously chosen to preside. From this station, he was, however, compelled, before the close of the labors of the Convention, by severe ill- ness, to retire. The succeeding summer, he was, in the short compass of a week, visited by the bereave- ment of the beloved partner of his life, and of another near, affectionate and respected relative. Soon after these deep and trying afflictions, he removed his resi- dence to the city of New York ; where, surrounded by filial solicitude and tenderness, the flickering lamp of life held its lingering flame, as if to await the day of the nation's birth and glory ; when the soldier of the Revolution, the statesman of the Confederacy, the chosen chieftain of the constituted nation, sunk into the arms of slumber, to awake no more upon earth, and yielded his pure and gallant spirit to receive the sentence of his Maker. Of the twenty years, which intervened between his first appointment, as Secretary of State, and his decease, to give even a summary, would be to encroach beyond endurance upon your time. He came to the Department of State at a time when war, between the United States and Great Britain, was impending and unavoidable. It was a crisis in the affairs of this Union full of difficulty and danger. The Constitution had never before been subjected to the trial of a for- 270 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. midable foreign war ; and one of the greatest misfor- tunes, which attended it, was the want of unanimity in the country for its support. This is not the occa- sion to revive the dissensions which then agitated the pubUc mind. It may suffice to say that, until the war broke out, and during its continuance, the duties of the offices held by Mr. Monroe, at the head, succes- sively, of the Departments of State and War, were performed with untiring assiduity, with universally ac- knowledged abihty, and, with a zeal of patriotism, which counted health, fortune, and. life itself, for noth- ing, in the ardor of self devotion to the cause of his country. It is a tribute of justice to his memory to say, that he was invariably the adviser of energetic counsels ; nor is the conjecture hazardous, that, had his appointment to the Department of war, preceded, by six months, its actual date, the heaviest disaster of the war, heaviest, because its remembrance must be coupled with the blush of shame, would have been spared as a blotted page in the annals of our Union. It should have been remembered, that, in war, heed- less security, on one side, stimulates desperate expe- dients on the other ; and that the enterprise, surely fa- tal to the undertaker, when encountered by precau- tion, becomes successful achievment over the help- lessness of neglected preparation. Such had been the uniform lesson of experience in former ages : such had it, emphatically, been in our own Revolutionary War. Strange, indeed, would it appear, had it been forgotten by one who had so gloriously and so dearly LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. 271 purchased it at Trenton. By him it was not forgot- ten : nor had it escaped the calm and dehberate fore- sight of the venerable patriot, who then presided in the executive chair ; and, at this casual and unpre- meditated remembrance of him, bear with me, my fellow citizens, if, pausing for a moment from the con- templation of the kindred virtues of his successor, co- patriot, and friend, I indulge the effusion of gratitude, and of pubhc veneration, to share in your gladness, that he yet lives — lives to impart to you, and to your children, the priceless jewel of his instruction : lives in the hour of darkness, and of danger, gathering over you, as if from the portals of eternity, to enlight- en, and to guide. Among the severest trials of the war, was the defi- ciency of adequate funds to sustain it, and the progres- sive degradation of the national credit. By an unpro- pitious combination of rival interests, and of pohtical prejudices, the first Bank of the United States, at the very outset of the war, had been denied the renewal of its charter : a heavier blow of illusive and contrac- ted policy, could scarcely have befallen the Union. The polar star of public credit, and of commercial confidence, was abstracted from the firmament, and the needle of the compass wandered at random to the four quarters of the heavens. From the root of the fallen trunk, sprang up a thicket of perishable suckers — never destined to bear fruit : the offspring of sum- mer vegetation, withering at the touch of the first winter's frost. Yet, upon them was our country 272 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. doomed to rely : it was her only substitute for the shade and shelter of the parent tree. The currency soon fell into frightful disorder : Banks, with fictitious capital, swarmed throughout the land, and spunged the purse of the people, often for the use of their own money, with more than usurious extortion. The solid Banks, even of this metropolis, were enabled to maintain their integrity, only by contracting their ope- rations to an extent ruinous to their debtors, and to themselves. A balance of trade, operating like uni- versal fraud, vitiated the channels of intercourse be- tween North and South : and the Treasury of the Union was replenished only with countless millions of silken tatters, and unavailable funds : chartered corporations, bankrupt, under the gentle name of sus- pended specie payments, and without a dollar of capi- tal to pay their debts, sold, at enormous discounts, the very evidence of those debts ; and passed off, upon the Government of their country, at par, their rags — purchasable, in open market, at depreciations of thirty and forty per cent. In the meantime, so degraded was the credit of the nation, and so empty their Treasury, that Mr. Monroe, to raise the funds indis- pensable for the defence of New Orleans, could ob- tain them only by pledging his private individual credit, as subsidiary to that of the nation. This he did without an instant of hesitation, nor was he less ready to sacrifice the prospects of laudable ambition, than the objects of personal interest, to the suffering cause of his country. LIFE OP JAMES MONROE. 273 Mr. Monroe was appointed to the Department of War, towards the close of the campaign of 1814. Among the first of his duties, was that of preparing a general plan of military operations for the succeed- ing year : a task rendered doubly arduous by the pe- culiar circumstances of the time. When the war, between the United States and Britain, had first kin- dled into f^ame, Britain, herself, was in the convulsive pangs of a struggle, which had often threatened her existence as an independent nation — in the twentieth year of a war, waged with agonizing exertions, which had strained, to the vital point of endurance, all the sinews of her power, and absorbed the resources, not only of her people then on the theatre of life, but of their posterity, for long after-ages. In the short in- terval of two years, from the commencement of her war with America, in a series of those vicissitudes by which a mysterioas Providence rescues its impenetra- ble decrees from the presumptuous foresight of man, Britain had transformed the mightiest monarchies of Europe, from inveterate enemies into devoted allies ; and, in the metropolis of her most dreaded, and most detested foe, was dictating to him terms of humilia- tion, and lessons of political morality. The war had terminated in her complete and unqualified triumph ; her numerous victorious veteran legions, flushed with the glory, and stung with the ambition of long-con- tested, and hard-earned, success, were turned back upon her hands, without occupation for their enter- prise, eager for new fields of battle, and new rewards 274 LIFE OF JAMES MONROE. of achievement. Ten thousand of these selected wamors had already been detached from her multi- tudes in arms, commanded by a favorite lieutenant, and relative of Wellington, to share in the beauty and booty of New Orleans, and to acquire, for a time which her after-consideration and interest were to determine, the mastery of the Mississippi, his waters, and his shores. The fate of this gallant host, sealed in the decrees of heaven, had not then been consum- mated upon earth. They had not matched their for- ces with the planters and ploughmen of the western wilds — nor learnt the difference between a struggle with the servile and mercenary squadrons of a mili- tary conqueror, and a conflict with the freeborn de- fenders of their firesides, their children, and their wives. Besides that number of ten thousand, she had myriads more at her disposal — burdens at once upon her gratitude and her revenues, and to whom she could furnish employment and support, only by transporting them to gather new laurels, and rise to more exalted renown upon the ruins of our Union. Such was the state of affairs, and such the pros- pects of the coming year, when immediately after the successful enterprise of the enemy upon the metrop- olis, Congress was convened upon the smoking ruins of the Capitol, and Mr. Monroe was called, without retiring from the duties of the Department of State, to assume in addition to them, those of presiding over the Department of War. Such was the emer- gency for which it became his duty to prepare and LIPE OF JAMES MONROE. 275 mature plans of military operations. It is obvious that they must be far beyond the range of the ordinary means and resources on which the government of the Union had been accustomed to rely. They were such as to call forth not only the voluntary but the unwil- ling and reluctant hand of the citizen to defend his country. They summoned the Legislative voice of the Union to command the service of her sons. The army, already authorized by Acts of Congress had risen in numbers to upwards of sixtj'- thousand men : Mr. Monroe proposed to increase it to one hundred thousand, besides auxiliary military force ; and, in ad- dition to all the usual allurements to enlistment, to levy all deficiencies of effective numbers, by drafts upon the whole body of the people. This resort, though familiar to the usages of our own revolution- ary war, was now in the clamors of political opposi- tion, assimilated to the conscriptions of revolutionary France, and of Napoleon. It was obnoxious not only to the censure of all those who disapproved the war, but to the indolent, the lukewarm and the weak. It sent the recruting officer to ruffle the repose of do- mestic retirement. It authorized him ahke to unfold the gates to the magnificent mansion of the wealthy, and to lift the latch of the cottage upon the moun- tains. It sounded the trumpet in the nursery. It rang " to arms " in the bed-chamber. Mr. Monroe was perfectly aware that the recommendation to Congress of such a plan, must at least for a time deeply affect the personal popularity of the proposer. 12* 276 lifp: of james monroe. He believed it to be necessary, and indispensable to the triumph of the cause. The time for the people to prepare their minds for fixing the succession to the presidential chair was approaching. Mr. Monroe was already prominent among the names upon which the public sentiment was now concentrating itself as a suitable candidate for the trust. It was foreseen by him, that the purpose of defeating the plan, would connect itself with the prospects of the ensuing presi- dential election, and that the friends of rival candi- dates, otherwise devoted to the most energetic prose- cution of the war, might take a direction adverse to the adoption of the plan, not from the intrinsic objec- tions against it, but from the popular disfavor which it might shed upon its author. After consultation with some of his confidential friends, he resolved in the event of the continuance of the war, to withdraw his name at once from the complicated conflicts of the canvass, by publicly declining to stand a candi- date for election to the presidency. He had already authorized one or more persons distinguished in the councils of the Union, to announce this as his inten- tion, which would have been carried into execution, but that the motives by which it was dictated, were suspended by the conclusion of the peace. That event was the era of a new system of policy, and new divisions of parties in our federal Union. It relieved us from many of the most inflamatIO\ROF,'s AHMIMSTRATION. 419 expansion may be carried to very great extent, and with perfect safety. It must be obvious to all, that the further the expansion is carried, provided it be not beyond the just limit, the greater will be the free- dom of action to both governments, and the more per- fect their security ; and in all other respects, the better the effect will be to the whole American people. Ex- tent of territory, whether it be great or small, gives to a nation many of its characteristics. It marks the extent of its resources, of its population, of its physi- cal force. It marks, in short, the difference between a great and a small power. "To what extent it may be proper to expand our system of government, is a question which does not press for a decision at this time. At the end of the revolutionary war, in 1783, we had, as we contended and believed, a right to the free navigation of the Mississippi, but it was not until after the expiration of twelve years, in 1795, that that right was acknow- ledged and enjoyed. Further difficulties occurred, in the bustling of a contentious world, when, at the expi- ration of eight years more, the United States, sustain- ing the strength and energy of their character, acquired the province of Louisiana, with the free navigation of the river, from its source to the ocean, and a liberal boundary on the western side. To this, Florida has since been added, so that we now possess all the territory in which the original states had any interest, or in which the existing states can be said, either in a national or local point of view, to be in any 18* 420 Monroe's administration. way interested. A range of states on the western side of the Mississippi, which already is provided for, puts us essentially at ease. Whether it will be wise to go further, will turn on other considerations than those which have dictated the course heretofore pur- sued. At whatever point we may stop, whether it be at a single range of states beyond the Mississippi, or by taking a greater scope, the advantage of such im- provements is deemed of the highest importance. It is so, on the present scale. The further we go, the greater will be the necessity for them. "It can not be doubted, that improvements for great national purposes would be better made by the national government, than by the governments of the several states. Our experience, prior to the adoption of the constitution, demonstrated, that in the exercise by the individual states of most of the powers granted to the United States, a contracted rivalry of interests, and misapplied jealousy of each other, had an important influence on all their measures, to the great injury of the whole. This was particularly exemplified by the regulations which they severally made, of their com- merce with foreign nations, and with each other. It was this utter incapacity in the state governments, proceeding from these and other causes, to act as a nation, and to perform all the duties which the nation owed to itself, under any system which left the gene- ral government dependent on the states, which pro- duced the transfer of these powers to the United States, by the establishment of the present constitu- Monroe's administration. 421 tion.— The reasoning which was applicable to the grant of any of the powers now vested in Congress, is hkewise so, at least to a certain extent, to that in question. It is natural that the states, individually, in making improvements, should look to their particu- lar and local interests. The members composing their respective legislatures represent the people of each state, only, and might not feel themselves at liberty to look to objects, in these respects, beyond that limit. If the resources of the Union were to be brought into operation under the direction of the state assemblies, or in concert with them, it inay be apprehended that every measure would become the object of negotia- lion, of bargain and barter, much to the disadvantage of the system, as well as discredit to both govern- ments. But Congress would look to the whole, and make improvements to promote the welfare of the whole. It is the peculiar felicity of the proposed amendment, that while it will enable the United States to accompHsh every national object, the improvements made with that view will eminently promote the wel- fare of the individual states, who may also add such others as their own particular interests may require. "The situation of the Cumberland road requires the particular and early attention of Congress. Being formed over very lofty mountains, and in many in- stances over deep and wide streams, across which valuable bridges have been erected, which are sus- tained by stone walls, as are many other parts of the road, all these works are subject to decay, have de- 422 Monroe's ADMmisTRATioN. cayed, and will decay rapidly, unless timely and effec- tual measures are adopted to prevent it. " The declivities from the mountains, and all the heights, must sufter from the frequent and heavy falls of vi^ater, and its descent to the valleys, as also from the deep congelations during our severe w^inters. Other injuries have also been experienced on this road, such as the displacing the capping of the walls, and other works, committed by worthless people, either from a desire to render the road impassable, or to have the transportation in another direction, or from a spirit of wantonness to create employment for idlers. These considerations show, that an active and strict police ought to be established over the whole road, with power to make repairs when necessary ; to establish turnpikes and tolls, as the moans of raising money to make them ; and to prosecute and punish those who commit waste and other injuries. "Should the United States be willing to abandon this road to the states through which it passes, would they take charge of it, each of that portion within its limits, and keep it in repair] It is not to be presumed that they would, since the advantages attending it are exclusively national, by connecting, as it does, the Atlantic with the western states, and in a line with the seat of the national government. The most ex- pensive parts of this road lie within Pennsylvania and Virginia, very near the confines of each state, and in a route not essentially connected with the commerce of either. MONROE S ADMINISTRATION. 423 "If it is thought proper to vest this power in the United States, the only mode in which it can be done is, by an amendment of the constitution. The states, individually, can not transfer the power to the United States, nor can the United States receive it. The constitution forms an equal and the sole relation be- tween the general government and the several states ; and it recognises no change in it, which shall not, in hke manner apply to all. If it is once admitted, that the general government may form compacts with individual states, not common to the others, and which the others might even disapprove, into what perni- cious consequences might it not lead I Such compacts are utterly repugnant to the principles of the consti- tution, and of the most dangerous tendency. The states, through which this road passes, have given their sanction only to the route, and to the acquisition of the soil by the United States — a right very different from that of jurisdiction, which can not be granted without an amendment to the constitution, and which need not be granted for the purposes of this system, except in the limited manner heretofore stated. On full consideration, therefore, of the whole subject, I am of opinion that such an amendment ought to be recommended to the several states for their adoption. "I have now essentially executed that part of the task which I imposed on myself, of examining the right of Congress to adopt and execute a system of internal improvement, and I presume have shown that it does not exist. It is, I think, equally manifest, that such a 424 Monroe's administratiox. power vested in Congress, and wisely executed, would have the happiest effect, on all the great interests of our Union. It is, however, my opinion that the power should be confined to great national works only, since, if it were unlimited, it would be liable to abuse, and might be productive of evil. For all minor improve- ments,, the resources of the states individually, would be fully adequate, and by the states such improvements might be made with greater advantage than by the Union ; as they would understand better such as their more immediate and local interests required." Congress finally closed its session on the 8th day of May, and re-assembled again on the 2nd day of De- cember following. Samuel D. Ingham appeared at this session from Pennsylvania, having been elected to fill a vacancy. The president, in his annual message, stated that the receipts from customs during the year 1822, would probably amount to twenty-three millions of dollars. In regard to the Cumberland Road, he repeated the general principles set forth in his expo- sition of the 4lh of May previous, drawing a distinc- tion, however, as he had formerly done, between the right to make appropriations, and the right of exercis- ing jurisdiction and sovereignty on the line of the route. With respect to the manufacturing interest, he again recommended it to the fostering care of Congress, but enjoined upon them the necessity of proceeding with the greatest caution in making changes in existing enactments. Few acts of general interest were passed at this Monroe's administration. 425 session. An additional naval force was authorized to be employed for the suppression of piracy. A bill to increase the duty on woolen goods was introduced, and discussed for some time, but it failed to receive a favorable vote. Various propositions for the survey of canal routes, across Cape Cod, from the Raritan to the Delaware, from Ihe Delaware to Chesapeake Bay, from the Chesapeake to Albemarle Sound, and from Lake Erie to the Ohio river, were brought forward ; but none of them received the sanction of Congress. As the president had intimated, in his message, his willingness to sign a bill providing for the repair of the Cumberland road, without assuming the questioned right of sovereignty, an appropriation was made for that purpose. In 1822, a treaty of navigation and commerce with France, negotiations for which had long been pending, was at length concluded. It was submitted to the Senate, and duly ratified, at this session, which came to a close on the 3d day of March, 1823. The question of the succession to the presidential office affected the elections for the eighteenth Congress to a certain extent. All the candidates were still in the field, with the exception of Mr. Lowndes, who died in 1822. Mr. Calhoun, too, was subsequently withdrawn, and by nearly general consent adopted as the candidate for the vice-presidency of all the fac- tions, except the friends of Mr. Crawford. Still, it was anticipated that, on account of the number of candidates, the election would ultimately devolve on 4^6 Monroe's administration. the House of Representatives ; and the friends of each contestant labored to secure as many members as possible. Congress assembled for its regular session on the 1st day of December, 1823, and did not adjourn until the 26th of May, 1824. Mr. Clay being again returned from Kentucky, he was elected Speaker of the House, over Mr. P. P. Barbour, the presiding officer of that body in the previous Congress, by a large majority. Messrs. R. King, Van Buren, Dickerson, Southard, Lowrie, S. Smith, J. Barbour, Macon, W. R. King, Brown, and Benton, still retained their seats in the Senate. Among the new senators who were conspic- uous, were John Branch, of North Carolina ; Robert Y. Hayne, of South Carolina; and Andrew Jackson, of Tennessee. Messrs, J. W. Taylor, P. P. Barbour, Mallary, Cambrel ing, Ingham, McLane, Floyd, Mer- cer, Randolph, Saunders, McDuffie, and Poinsett, were all re-elected. Samuel A. Foot was once more re- turned from Connecticut ; and Daniel Webster, who had been a prominent federal member from New Hampshire during the war, now appeared from the state of Massachusetts. John Forsyth, of Georgia, William C. Rives, of Virginia, and Edward Living- ston, of Louisiana, all leading republicans, were elect- ed from their respective states. Mr. Southard resigned his seat in the Senate on the 9th of December, in consequence of his receiving the appointment of Secretary of the Navy, in the place of Smith Thompson, appointed one of the associate MONROE S ADMINISTRATION. 427 Justices of the Supreme Co rt of the United States. On the same day John McLean, of Ohio, was appointed postmaster general, in the place of Mr. Meigs, who had resigned the office. From the annilal message of President Monroe, it appeared that measures had been taken to determine by amicable negotiation, the respective rights and interests of the United States on the one part, and the governments of Russia and Great Britain on the other, upon the northwest coast of the American continent. In referring to this subject, the president made use of the following language, which, by the successive reiterations of subsequent chief magistrates, has come to be regarded as embodying the settled policy of this government : — " In the discussions," said he, " to which this interest has given rise, and in the arrangements by which they may terminate, the occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers." The public finances were represented by the Execu- tive to be in a highly favorable condition ; it being estimated that there would remain a surplus of nearly nine millions of dollars in the treasury, on the 1st day of January, 1824. He likewise recommended the construction of a canal, to connect the waters of the 428 Monroe's administration. Chesapeake with those of the Ohio, as a great national work ; provided, however, that the jurisdiction should remain with the states through which the canal would pass. With regard to the amendment of the tariff, he repeated the recommendations of former messages, and suggested that additional protection should be afforded to those articles we were prepared to manu- facture, or which were immediately connected with the defence and independence of the country. In accordance with the recommendations of the president, a tariff act was passed at this session, though not without strenuous opposition, raising the duties on imported goods. In the senate the majority in favor of the bill was four, and in the House only five. A general law was also enacted, appropriating the sum of thirty thousand dollars, for the survey of routes for such roads and canals as the president might deem of national importance. As this bill did not come in con- flict with the constitutional scruples of the Executive, concerning an interference with state jurisdiction, it received his approbation and signature. But the question of the succession to the presidency absorbed almost every topic, and engrossed nearly the whole attention of the members of Congress at this session. It was ascertained, shortly after they first came together, that a decided plurality of the whole number were in favor of the nomination of Mr. Craw- ford, the then Secretary of the Treasury, who had been almost successful in defeating Mr. Monroe in the caucus held in 1816. After various projects had been Monroe's ADMmigTii^yioj!!. 429 alternately adopted and rejected, it was finally tacitly understood between the friends of the other candidates, that they would not go into a caucus. The friends of Mr. Crawford, however, headed by Mr. Van Buren, Mr. Forsyth, and Mr. Dickerson, caused a call to be issued, according to the former usage of the republi- can party ; but the caucus, which proved to be the last of a similar character, was attended by only sixty- six members, embracing, however, nearly all the lead- ing politicians of the old republican party. On the ballot which was had, Mr. Crawford received sixty- four votes, and was declared nominated. Mr. Galla- tin was put in nomination for the vice-presidency, but subsequently declined. The other candidates were supported by their respective friends in the different sections of the Union, without the intervention of any caucus or convention. Neither party succeeded in obtaining a majority of the electoral votes, — General Jackson receiving ninety- nine, Mr. Adams eighty-four, Mr. Crawford forty- one, and Mr. Clay thirty-seven. It was therefore left for the eighteenth Congress, which assembled for the short session on the 6th of December, 1824, to make the selection from the three highest on the list. The influence of Mr. Clay being now thrown in favor of Mr. Adams, he was duly elected. Mr. Calhoun received one hundred and eighty-two electoral votes, which secured his election as vice-president. The president gave a flattering review of the for- 430 Monroe's administration. eign relations and the domestic interests of the coun- try, in his last annual message. He stated that the public debt had been reduced to eighty-six millions of dollars, and that the current revenue was amply suffi- cient to meet all the liabilities of the government, including the sum of ten millions appropriated to the sinking fund. He also adverted to the fortifications which had been constructed, and the military and naval armaments which had been provided for the defence of the country, and concluded with an earnest expression of his grateful thanks for the kindness and favor of his countrymen, manifested, on repeated occasions, during his long career in public life. Very little business of especial importance was trans- acted at this session. Mr. King offered a resolution in the Senate, proposing that, after the payment of the national debt, the proceeds of the public lands should be applied to the emancipation of slaves, and the removal of free persons of color to some territory without the United States. A majority of the sena- tors, however, could not be induced to sanction Mr. King's proposition, and it was consequently defeated. On the 3d day of March, the term of service of the members of the eighteenth Congress expired. The administration of Mr. Monroe also came to an end ; and on the following day he surrendered up the exe- cutive power, which he had wielded so long and so worthily, into the hands of his successor. In yielding up his trust, he could look back upon the past without Monroe's administration. 431 regret, and in the future hopefully count on the endu- ring gratitude of his countrymen. It has been erroneously said of Mr. Monroe's admin- istration, that during its continuance the lines of party were entirely obliterated. This is certainly erroneous. From the beginning to the end, he was a republican of the old Jeffersonian school ; and it is very evident that he never approved of a protective tariff, for the sake of protection merely, but primarily for the sake of revenue, the former being only the incidental ob- ject — and, furthermore, it is equally plain that he never waived his opposition to the exercise of jurisdic- tion or sovereignty in the states, without their con- sent, in order to carry on a system of internal im- provement, in the absence of an amendment to the federal constitution expressly conferring the power. To the last moment of his administration, he remained the uncompromising opponent of the federalism of 1798 and 1812, and in his appointments, neither ap- proved, nor encouraged, nor favored it. His administration was, indeed, "the era of good feeling." The rank and file of the old federal opposi- tion changed their ground, but the leaders remained true to their instincts. The fires of party, therefore, only slumbered for the time, to burst forth again with increased fury. By his mild and conciliatory policy, peace was maintained with other governments, and by his benign and moderate counsels, tranquillity was secured at 432 Monroe's administration. home. A large and valuable acquisition of territory was made ; the foundations for national prosperity and greatness were laid ; and when he retired to pri- vate life, the American Union was advancing, with the vigor and stride of a giant, on its path to true glory and fame. THE END. MAY9 7iqAa -r-^ ^v^v/ .-0, .^^^ <- ' ^ <, •V •r.-^' ^..ss O '% ,^^ CP" V^ * Q^/". "^-..** ^ ' " " ' ^ . V • , N^. - .rsV . V « ^ v^ -~ .^ 9<. '. n ^ ' ft « '^ \V V"'-- ^ .«,v' ^^ °^ ,..//o^^ ?:^ 9^ >%.^ ' ft o ■^ ' A^ ^ ,4 9<, ^ . "^^0^ \^ / .s?^ ^^ // 0^ , sX ?:^ 9^ N^^ %^^^^^^^N)^ v^^ ^^ Q ft o , "^^.._ '^ ^^^'"^ CL '// %. 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