When, in 1804, Burr ran for Governor of New York, Hamilton again attacked him. It was for one of Hamilton's assaults upon him during this campaign that Burr challenged him. (See Parton: Life and Times of Aaron Burr, 339 et seq.; also Adams: U.S. ii, 185 et seq.; and Private Journal of Aaron Burr, reprinted from manuscript in the library of W. K. Bixby, Introduction, iv-vi.) So prevalent was dueling that, but for Hamilton's incalculable services in founding the Nation and the lack of similar constructive work by Burr, the hatred of Burr's political enemies and the fatal result of the duel, there certainly would have been no greater outcry over the encounter than over any of the similar meetings between public men during that period.
[757] Dueling continued for more than half a century. Many of the most eminent of Americans, such as Clay, Randolph, Jackson, and Benton, fought on "the field of honor." In 1820 a resolution against dueling, offered in the Senate by Senator Morrill of New Hampshire, was laid on the table. (Annals, 16th Cong. 1st Sess. 630, 636.)
[758] McCaleb: Aaron Burr Conspiracy, 19; Parton: Burr, 382.
[759] Vol. ii, 545, of this work.
[760] Adams: U.S. i, 331.
[761] "His official conduct in the Senate ... has fully met my approbation," testifies the super-critical Plumer in a letter to his wife March 2, 1805. (Plumer, 331.)
[762] "Burr is completely an insulated man." (Sedgwick to King, Feb. 20, 1802, King, iv, 74.)
"Burr has lost ground very much with Jefferson's sect during the present session of Congress.... He has been not a little abused ... in the democratic prints." (Troup to King, April 9, 1802, King, iv, 103.)
Also see supra, chap. ii; Adams: U.S. i, 280; and Parton: Burr, 309.
[763] Adams: U.S. i, 230-33; Channing: Jeff. System, 17-19.