Marshall's "wavering and irresolute spirit" manifested throughout the trial had disgusted everybody. His attempt to make his rulings "palatable to all parties" had "so often wrapt them in obscurity" that it was hard "to understand on which side the court had decided." His conduct had been inspired by "power illicitly obtained." And think of his encouragement to Burr's counsel to indulge in "unbounded ... slander and vilification" of the President! Callender's libel on Adams was insipid compared with Martin's vulgar billingsgate toward Jefferson! But that "awful tribunal"—the people—would try Marshall; before it "evidence will neither be perverted nor suppressed.... The character of the Chief Justice awaits the issue."[1333]
Another attack soon followed. Marshall's disgraceful conduct "has proved that the Judges are too independent of the people." Let them be made removable by the President on the address of Congress. The Chase trial had shown that impeachment could not be relied on to cleanse the bench of a judge no matter how "noxious," "ridiculous," "contemptible," or "immoral" he might be. But "shall an imposter be suffered to preside on the bench of justice?... Are we to be eternally pestered with that most ridiculous and dangerous cant; that the people ... are incompetent to their own government: and that masters must be set over them and that barriers are to be raised up to protect those masters from the vengeance of the people?"[1334]
Next came a series of "Letters to John Marshall," which appeared simultaneously in the Aurora and the Enquirer. They were written by William Thompson under the nom de guerre of "Lucius"; he undoubtedly was also the author of the earlier attacks on the Chief Justice in the Enquirer. They were widely copied in the Republican press of the country, and were a veracious expression of public sentiment.
"Your country, sir, owes you a debt of gratitude for former favors," which cannot be paid because "the whole stock of national indignation and contempt would be exhausted, before the half of your just claim could be discharged." Marshall had earned "infamy and detestation" by his efforts to erect "tyranny upon the tomb of freedom." His skill "in conducting the manouvres of a political party," his "crafty cunning" as a diplomat, had been perpetuated by the "genius" of John Thompson, whose "literary glory ... will shine when even the splendour of your talents and your crimes shall have faded forever. When your volumes of apology for British insolence and cruelty[1335] shall be buried in oblivion, the 'Letters of Curtius'[1336] will ... 'damn you to everlasting fame.'" Marshall's entire life, according to Lucius, had been that of a sly, bigoted politician who had always worked against the people. He might have become "one of the boasted patriots of Virginia," but now he was "a disgrace to the bench of justice." He was a Jeffreys, a Bromley, a Mansfield.[1337]
Quickly appeared a second letter to Marshall, accusing him of having "prostrated the dignity of the chief justice of the United States." Lucius goes into a lengthy analysis of Marshall's numerous opinions in the Burr trials. A just review of the proceedings, he said, demonstrates that the Chief Justice had "exhibited a culpable partiality towards the accused, and a shameless solicitude ... to implicate the government ... as negligent of their duty"—something that "a less malicious magistrate" never would have dared to display.[1338] A third letter continued the castigation of Marshall and the defense of Jefferson. Closing an extended argument on this joint theme, Lucius addressed Marshall thus: "Common sense, and violated justice, cry aloud against such conduct; and demand against you the enforcement of these laws, which you refuse to administer."[1339]
All these arraignments of Marshall had, as we have seen,[1340] been submitted to Jefferson. They rose in the final letter to a climax of vituperation: "Could I be instrumental in removing you from the elevation which you have dishonored by ... your crimes, I would still trace you ... for screening a criminal and degrading a judge" by the "juggle of a judicial farce." Marshall and Burr were alike "morally guilty," alike "traitors in heart and in fact.... Such a criminal and such a judge, few countries ever produced.... You are forever doomed to blot the fair page of American history, to be held up, as examples of infamy and disgrace, of perverted talents and unpunished criminality, of foes to liberty and traitors to your country."[1341]
Incited by similar attacks in the Republican press of Baltimore,[1342] the more ardent patriots of that place resolved publicly to execute Marshall in effigy, along with Burr, Blennerhassett, and Martin, On the morning of November 3, satirical handbills, announcing this act of public justice, were scattered over the city:
"AWFUL!!!
"The public are hereby notified that four 'choice spirits' are this afternoon, at 3 o'clock, to be marshaled for execution by the hangman, on Gallows Hill, in consequence of the sentence pronounced against them by the unanimous voice of every honest man in the community.
"The respective crimes for which they suffer are thus stated in the record: