1. THE SITUATION PRIOR TO 1798
Party history in New England, as elsewhere throughout the Union, began with the inauguration of the new government in 1789.[224] Such differences of opinion concerning matters of public policy as had previously existed were confined to unorganized groups whose leaders depended chiefly on the devotion of their personal following to mould popular opinion. But the setting up of the Federal government and the fixing of national standards brought to light issues which challenged fundamental conceptions and interests, and a definite rift in public sentiment was not long in appearing. By 1793 the main line of political cleavage was plainly visible. The Federalists, who stood for the importance of a strong central government, found themselves confronted with an organized opposition to which in time the terms Anti-Federalists, Republicans, and Democrats were applied.[225]
In 1793 the war between England and France came into American politics, providing issues for party controversy for years to come. The sympathies of the Federalists, who numbered in their ranks the conservative and aristocratic elements in the population, inclined strongly toward England; whereas the sympathies of Republicans, who attracted to their standard the radicals of the country concerned in the democratization of government, were disposed with equal warmth toward France.
The promulgation of the Neutrality Proclamation[226] of President Washington, April 22, 1793, seemed to settle the question of foreign alliances before the matter had become acute. On the whole, the response which New England gave to the President’s proclamation was gratifying. Messages of cordial approval came pouring in from many quarters.[227] The majority of the people rejoiced in the course of prudence and foresight which the national government had been led to pursue.
Still New England was not wholly satisfied. The sentiments of all her people had not been served. An opposition of respectable proportions developed. The columns of the public press carried numerous articles[228] voicing various degrees of hostility to the President’s cause of neutrality and affording ample evidence that instead of solidifying the sentiments of the people on the subject of foreign alliances, the proclamation had the effect of widening the breach between the political forces of the country.
This aspect of the case was much aggravated by two important circumstances, one of which developed simultaneously with the publication of the proclamation of neutrality, and the other came to light soon after. These two circumstances were the coming of Genet and the rise of the Democratic Societies.
In no part of the country was the news of the arrival of the French minister received with less suspicion than in New England.[229] Republican newspapers were, of course, loud in their exclamations of satisfaction over the word that came out of the south concerning the arrival and subsequent activities of the amazing French diplomat, so young, so ardent, so eloquent, and so absurd. Editors of Federalist journals, while in no mood to be swept off their feet by the latest excitement of the hour, yet showed no disposition to cavil or express distrust.
Such, however, were the exceptional performances of this altogether exceptional diplomat, who insisted on comporting himself more like a ruler of the people of this nation than an accredited representative to their government, that the day of revulsion and deep resentment could not long be postponed.[230]
The stir created by the activities of Genet, great as it was, soon was swallowed up in the excitement produced by the sudden emergence of a new factor in American politics; viz., indigenous political organizations that were secret. Coincident with the arrival of Genet, and with a view to capitalizing the state of public feeling that his arrival and reception brought to a head, there sprang up in various parts of the country a group of organizations devoted to the propagation of ultra-democratic ideals. These Democratic Societies, or Clubs, were destined to exert a degree of baneful influence upon political feeling out of all proportion to their actual number and weight.[231] Needless to say, the excited state of public feeling, together with the total unfamiliarity of American citizens with political agencies of a secret character, were responsible for this result. The embarrassments under which the French cause in America momentarily suffered on account of reports concerning the multiplied atrocities of the Reign of Terror and the swelling tide of popular resentment because of the indiscretions of Minister Genet, might induce the judgment that the times were unpropitious for the development of organizations whose sympathy for the principles of the French Revolution was notorious.[232] But there was another side to the situation. The heated public discussions provoked by Madison’s Commercial Resolutions, Clark’s Non-Intercourse Resolution, and the appointment of John Jay as Minister Extraordinary to Great Britain, set free such a torrent of anti-British feeling that the spirit of republicanism lifted its head with renewed vigor and stimulated a public sentiment decidedly favorable to the rapid formation and spread of the new organizations. From the day that the first of these sinister Societies was established, and its statement of principles blazoned forth in a multitude of newspapers throughout the country,[233] the public mind found itself wrought upon by a new species of excitement, by suggestions of tricks and plots, by appeals to passion and unreasoning fear, all conspiring to inject into the national spirit an element of haunting suspicion from which it was not soon to be cleared.
The fact that at least five of these Democratic Societies were located in New England strongly suggests the immediate concern which the people of that section were bound to have because of these unexpected and ominous secret political associations.[234] The creation of the Boston Society became at once the occasion of virulent opposition and infuriated comment. Organized in the late fall of 1793[235] under the innocent title, the Constitutional Club, the principles and alliances of the organization became quickly known, with the result that the already agitated waters of local party feeling were disturbed beyond all previous experience. Citizens whose sympathies were fully with the conduct of affairs under the Federalist régime were quick to believe that henceforth they might expect to be threatened, brow-beaten, and checkmated in a ruthless and scandalous fashion because of the activities of this pernicious Club.[236] They anticipated an amount of secret and dastardly political interference on the part of the Club, because of which the lives of their public officials would be filled with distraction and the minds of decent men aspiring to public office would be thrown into a state of disinclination and repugnance.
Nor in this did they prove to be false prophets. Newspaper innuendoes, sharp and poisonous as deadly arrows, were let fly with abandon; town meetings were disturbed and the opponents of democracy and French republicanism put to rout; the public mind was so altered that Democrats who sought to deprive Federalists of their hold upon the “Boston Seat” in the legislature were completely successful in their efforts. In these and similar ways the citizens of Boston were given tangible proofs of how effective an instrument of political action such an organization as the Constitutional Club could be.[237]
The address which President Washington delivered before both houses of Congress, November 19, 1794, wherein he traced a causal connection between the Democratic Societies and the Whiskey Rebellion, characterizing the former as “self-created societies” which had “assumed a tone of condemnation” of measures adopted by the government, being actuated by “a belief that, by a more formal concert” they would be able to defeat those measures,[238] proved to be a mortal blow to these secret organizations, and in New England, as elsewhere throughout the country, had consequences beyond the disappearance of the Clubs. Eagerly and with unconcealed joy, Federalist editors and orators seized upon the President’s denunciation and turned it to immediate political account.[239] A flood of condemnation and answering vituperation was instantly released. The champions of Federalism were at pains to secure publication of the discussions which took place in the national congress respecting the precise character of the response to be made to the President’s address, with special reference to his condemnation of the Democratic Clubs.[240] They were at equal pains, also, to lay hold of the President’s pregnant phrase, “self-created societies,” and turn it to account: that phrase should be regarded as a designation equally applicable to the odious Jacobin Clubs of France.[241] Henceforth the whole democratic faction might reasonably be expected to work under cover “to unhinge the whole order of government, and introduce confusion, so that union, the constitution, the laws, public order and private right would be all the sport of violence or chance.”[242]
Mortified and discomfited Republican editors made such response as they could. The members of the Clubs were declared to be independent citizens who were acting within their rights in so banding together. They were “proceeding in the paths of patriotic virtue with a composure and dignity which become men engaged in such important and timely services”;[243] whereas their opponents were men who hungered for the loaves and fishes of the government and who shared the secret fear that they would be discovered or have their plans deranged.[244]
The continual harping of the Federalist press on the phrase “self-created societies” particularly touched the raw. Was not the Society of the Cincinnati self-created? And are not many of the members of that organization war-worn soldiers of the American Republic? In a state of society in which we see such veterans toiling for their daily sustenance, while other men, enjoying the hard-earned property of the former, riot in all the luxuries of life, how can one but exclaim, O Tempora! O Mores![245] The national congress, moreover, might well be expected to be engaged in much more serious and timely business than to be burdening its sessions with discussions respecting the affairs of private societies.[246]
The hostile attitude that the Federalist clergy took toward the Democratic Societies gave special irritation to the editors of the Independent Chronicle. Because he ventured in his thanksgiving sermon of November 20 (1794) to denounce all Constitutional Societies, the rector of the Episcopal congregation in Boston was held up to ridicule in the columns of the Chronicle as a “ci-devant lawyer” and “a certain Episcopalian ‘thumper of the pulpit drum,’” whose pastoral care many of his substantial members had already renounced because of his injection of political discussion into the sacred sphere of the pulpit; while others had given evidence of their disposition to follow the example of the more courageous members of the flock, “if virulence is to take the place of religion.”[247] But the Reverend David Osgood, Medford’s “monk,” on account of his more extended and violent treatment of the Democratic Societies in his thanksgiving day sermon,[248] gave much deeper offence. That he should have represented these organizations as controlled by the same principles as the incendiary French Jacobin Clubs, and as set to watch the Federal government and plot its overthrow through the support of pernicious and inveterate faction, was more than ardent democratic patriots could endure. “A Friend to the Clergy and an Enemy to Ecclesiastical Presumption,” together with “A Friend of Decency and Free Inquiry,” sought entrance to the willing columns of the Chronicle in order to express their contempt for “a Rev. gentleman” who could lend himself to the peddling of such illiberal sentiments and could show himself capable of acting in a manner unbecoming the character of a Christian and a gentleman, and also in order to draw conclusions derogatory to his reputation as a scholar.[249] The castigations of “Stentor” were not less caustic. The red-hot anathemas of the Reverend Parson Osgood, whining preacher of politics that he was, had no other effect than to singe and sear the reputation of their author. “On the Constitutional Society their influence has been as small as though they had been issued in the form of a BULL from the Chancery of the Pope.”[250]
Thus were protracted for a time the frantic efforts of Democratic editors and scribblers to repair the damage which “the clownish Bishop of Medford”[251] and his clerical confederates were supposed to have effected.[252] But the main injury had by no means come from that quarter. Such was the veneration for the name and person of the great Washington throughout New England that few men had the hardihood to launch their resentment and abuse against him; yet it was his hand, and none other, that wrote the word Ichabod across the brow of these secret political associations. From the day that his address reproaching them was made, their doom was sealed. That doom might tarry for a season, but it could not long be averted. The apologists and defenders of these organizations which the presidential censure had made odious, might fiercely exert themselves to show how innocent they were of the offences charged and how unimpaired in usefulness they remained after the thrust had been made. This was but whistling to keep up their courage. The prestige of the Societies had been effectually destroyed by the President’s denunciation; in a surprisingly short time these ambitious and troublemaking organizations sank into desuetude and were lost to view.
The deep impression they had made upon the public mind was, however, much less readily effaced. That impression resolved itself into a memory most unpleasant and disturbing. For us the significance of these organizations is found chiefly in the fact that, appearing at a time when the two great opposing political parties were developing, and having vehemently espoused the cause of France in a rabidly democratic spirit, they consequently added enormously to the passion and the suspicion of the day. To the Federalists they were dangerous intruders, groups of unprincipled demagogues organized for unpatriotic purposes, working in the dark, ashamed to stoop at nothing in the way of duplicity and subterfuge, of deception and intrigue, if by any means the vicious designs of their hearts could be furthered. Thus they not only helped to make the strife of parties vituperative and bitter; in addition they made familiar to the thought of a great body of citizens in America the idea that the intrigues of secret organizations must needs be reckoned with as one of the constant perils of the times. Henceforth it would be easier to fill the public mind with uneasiness and gloomy forebodings on account of the supposed presence of hidden hostile forces working beneath the surface of the nation’s life. Should inexperienced and unsuspecting souls profess their incredulity, the appeal to the example of the Democratic Societies might be expected to go far toward dissolving all indifference and trusting unconcern.[253]
To trace in detail the increasingly bitter party strife in New England would not only call for the canvassing of material already well known, but would lead us far afield from the special object of this investigation. Only the main features of the case need to be noted.
The temporary check the Democrats suffered on account of the suppression of the secret political clubs was soon removed by the wave of anti-British sentiment that swept the country upon the publication of the treaty which John Jay negotiated between Great Britain and the United States, late in the autumn of 1794.[254]
The truth is, nothing less than a howl of rage went up from the throats of the people of the United States, and the voices of the men of New England were by no means lost in the chorus.[255] Nothing that could have been said to inflame the blind and passionate anger of the people was omitted. The United States, it was asserted, had been resolved back into the colonies of Great Britain.[256] The Senate had bargained away the blood-bought privileges of the people for less than the proverbial mess of pottage. It had signed the death-warrant of the country’s trade and entailed beggary on its inhabitants and their posterity forever.[257] The people’s cause had been most perfidiously betrayed. The trading class, whose pecuniary interests would be jeopardized if England were to be left free to prey upon our commerce, especially if the way should remain open for the two countries to drift into actual war, might show itself disposed to make a choice of the lesser of two evils and accept the treaty; but the great mass of the people were indignantly hostile, it must be added, to the point of unreason.[258]
The promulgation of the treaty by Washington, February 29, 1796, as the law of the land, had the effect of bringing to a close a period of agitation which deeply affected the national life.[259] For one thing, the violence of party spirit had been so augmented that henceforth there were to be no limits to which men would not go in the expression of their antipathies and prejudices. Even the great Washington had not been able to escape the venom of the tongue of the partisan in the controversy which had raged over the treaty.[260] A condition of the public mind which not only permitted but supported the burning in effigy of its public servants; which consented to brutal campaigns of newspaper calumniation, so unrestrained and indecent that the reader looks back upon them with shame; to the circulation of incendiary handbills and scurrilous pamphlets; to participation in lawless gatherings in which riotous utterances of the most violent character were freely made and disgraceful actions taken[261]—this could not possibly make for a wholesome discipline of the passions of the people.[262]
For another thing, the spirit of devotion to the cause of France had been greatly refreshed and quickened by the agitation over the treaty. From the moment that information concerning the nature of the treaty began to circulate, the cry of “British faction” was taken up by the Democrats and used with telling effect. That the treaty was an infamous instrument arranged for no other purpose than to injure the French cause was generally believed.[263] From beginning to end, Democrats could find nothing in the treaty which had not been directly inspired by hostility to France. Apart from the damage that would ensue to American commerce, the treaty would work for the elevation of monarchical and the undoing of republican principles.[264] Once again George the Third had become the master of the citizens of America, and thus the great accomplishments of the American Revolution had been made to count for nought. British gold had succeeded in effecting the betrayal of the republican cause in this country, and thus had worked itself into a strategic position where it could more easily strangle the life out of the spirit of republicanism in Europe, now so sorely beset in France.[265]
One other by-product of the agitation that arose over the treaty has been dwelt upon at length in another connection, but it should be adverted to briefly here. It was inevitable that a discussion so vital, so heated, and so protracted as that of which we have just been taking account, should draw into it those guardians of morals and mentors of public spirit in New England, the Federalist clergy.[266] The disturbance of the public mind over the treaty had been marked by two features full of grave import in the clerical view: vicious attacks upon the officers and measures of the existing government, and a reinvigorated crying-up of French political and religious notions.
The offices of government were all, or nearly all, in the hands of Federalists. This being the case, their occupants were doomed to be the chief targets of resentment and villification by men who found such a measure of government as Jay’s Treaty obnoxious in the extreme. But if officers of government were to be pilloried in the stocks of public slander and abuse, how then was the government itself to command the respect and obedience of its citizens? The Federalist clergy of New England saw the pathway of duty shining clear: they must hold up the hands of government at any hazard. Hence it happened that the outcry against “political preaching” grew rapidly in volume from 1795 on.[267]
As for the renewed zeal of the Democrats in the interests of French revolutionary ideals, that found a special point of interest and concern for the Federalist clergy in the prominence which the rapid growth of republicanism secured for Thomas Jefferson. An ardent friend of the French Revolution, a lover of French philosophy, the enemy of religious intolerance, in personal faith a deist—were not these sufficient to damn the man as an unbeliever and an atheist in the eyes of New England clergymen, to whom the faintest breath of rationalism was abhorrent and the very notion of toleration suspect? Accordingly the New England clergy launched a fierce attack upon him as the arch-apostle of the cause of irreligion and free-thought.[268] In language carefully guarded, his name usually being omitted, Jefferson was pointed out as the leader of the hosts of infidelity whose object was the extermination of the institutions of religion and the inauguration of an era wherein every man should think and do that which was right in his own eyes.[269]