No State suffered more from the paper-money aberration than Rhode Island. Under pressure from the radical elements the legislature passed an act for the emission of bills of credit which were to be issued to any freeholder who would offer as security real estate of any sort to double the amount of the loan. "Many from all parts of the State made haste to avail themselves of their good fortune, and mortgaged fields strewn thick with stones and covered with cedars and stunted pines for sums such as could not have been obtained for the richest pastures." But when they sought their creditors, not a merchant nor a shop-keeper could be found. Nobody fished to have a just debt discharged in such currency. Not to be thwarted in their purpose, the radicals then enacted a law which threatened with a summary trial and a heavy fine any one who refused to accept paper money in payment of debt.
Under this Force Act, one John Weeden, a butcher, was brought to trial for refusing to receive the paper offered by a customer in payment for meat. To the discomfiture of the legislature the court refused to enforce the law in this instance, on the ground that the statute was contrary to the constitution of Rhode Island; and when summoned before the legislature to answer for their defiance, the judges boldly stood their ground. The case of Trevett v. Weeden was not without its lesson to those who were casting about for ways and means to defend property from the assaults of popular majorities. In Virginia, too, the highest state court, in the case of Commonwealth v. Caton, boldly asserted the right of the judiciary to declare void such acts of the legislature as were repugnant to the constitution.
Meantime the debtor and creditor classes in Massachusetts were locked in a struggle which menaced the peace of the country. Here as elsewhere hard times had forced the small farmers of the interior counties to the wall. No doubt their difficulties were caused in part by their own improvidence, but they were increased by the prevailing scarcity of money. So dire was the want of a medium of exchange that many communities resorted to barter. The editor of a Worcester paper advertised that he would accept Indian corn, rye, wheat, wood, or flaxseed, in payment of debts owed to him, up to the amount of twenty shillings. It seemed to the ignorant farmer that his creditors were taking an unfair advantage of circumstances in demanding currency to settle debts which had been contracted when money was abundant. The law, however, favored the creditor. The jails were filled to overflowing with men imprisoned for debt; the courts were overwhelmed with actions. In Worcester County, with a population of less than fifty thousand people, there were in 1784 two thousand cases on the docket of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas. In this age of litigation only one class appeared to thrive—the lawyers. The anger of the poor debtors, inflamed by attachments and foreclosures, vented itself upon the ostensible cause of their misfortunes. The excessive costs of courts and the immoderate fees of lawyers are grievances which bulk large in every indictment drawn by town meeting or county convention. Young John Quincy Adams, then a senior in Harvard College, was so affected by the odium which had fallen upon the practice of law that he was almost ready to abandon the career which he had chosen.
The adjournment of the General Court in July, 1786, without authorizing an issue of paper money or passing a legal-tender act or fixing the fees of lawyers and the costs of courts, contributed to the unrest which was now assuming a threatening aspect. During August and September riotous mobs prevented the courts from sitting at Northampton, Worcester, Great Barrington, and Concord. Alarmed by these disorders Governor Bowdoin convened the legislature in special session and summoned the militia to the protection of the capital. While the legislature was devising ways and means of allaying the public excitement, another demonstration occurred at Worcester which resulted in the dispersion of the Court of General Sessions by a force of armed men. From Worcester the disorders spread into adjoining counties; and something like a concerted movement upon Boston and Cambridge seemed to be preparing. The prompt action of the state authorities however, balked the plans of the insurgents. The main body of insurgents under Shays scattered; but a month later they rallied around Springfield to prevent the holding of court. Governor Bowdoin then dispatched troops, four thousand strong, under the command of General Lincoln, to the assistance and protection of the civil authorities. A civil war seemed imminent. Shays had planned an attack upon the national arsenal at Springfield, but he could not bring his rustics to act together. Before the determined resistance of the local militia his undisciplined troops broke and fled. The arrival of the state militia under Lincoln completed the demoralization of Shays' army. Retreating through the hilly country of Hampshire, they wore finally overtaken and routed at Petersham. Some of the insurgents went to their homes, completely humbled and subdued; others fled across the border to await better times; and still others, unrepentant and unsubdued, continued to harass the countryside. It was not until the following September that Governor Bowdoin ventured to disband the militia.
To these disturbances in Massachusetts, Congress had not remained indifferent. Aside from the direct interest that all members were bound to take in a rebellion which seemed to threaten the very foundations of a sister State and which might easily recur in their own, Congress was concerned for the fate of the national arsenal at Springfield. But no forces were available for the protection of the property of the Confederation. The few hundred men who comprised the army were scattered in garrisons along the western frontier. Acting as intermediary between Congress and Governor Bowdoin, General Knox as Secretary of War made what provision he could for the defense of the arsenal by local militia; but these measures were confessedly inadequate. Upon his report Congress was finally moved to increase the army, ostensibly for the protection of the frontier, where in truth Indian hostilities required the presence of additional troops. As these forces would be raised chiefly in New England, they could be employed first to protect Springfield. Any open avowal of this plan was avoided, however, lest the insurgents should take alarm and immediately attack the arsenal. But these plans were wrecked on the reef of financial bankruptcy. Congress could only supplicate the States for money and borrow what it might on its expectations. Recruiting went on so slowly that the rebellion was practically over when two companies of artillery, numbering seventy-three men each, which had been raised in Massachusetts, were finally marched to Springfield. All the other recruits were dismissed. The inefficiency of Congress and its want of moral influence were self-confessed.
In his famous circular letter of 1783, Washington had spoken of the times as a period of "political probation." The moment had come for the United States to determine, said he, "whether they will be respectable and prosperous, or contemptible and miserable, as a nation." Three years had now passed and the period of probation seemed to have ended in the ruin of national hopes. The events of the years 1786 made a profound impression upon the minds of all responsible and conservative men. In undisguised alarm, Washington wrote: "There are combustibles in every State which a spark might set fire to.... I feel ... infinitely more than I can express to you, for the disorders which have arisen in these States. Good God! Who, besides a Tory, could have foreseen, or a Briton, predicted them?" Rightly or wrongly, men of the upper classes believed that the foundations of society were threatened and that the State Governments would fall a prey to the radical and unpropertied elements, unless a stronger Federal Government were created. "With this idea, they are thinking, very seriously," wrote an interested observer at the seat of Federal Government in New York, "in what manner to effect the most easy and natural change of the present form of the Federal Government to one more energetic, that will, at the same time, create respect, and secure properly life, liberty, and property. It is, therefore, not uncommon to hear the principles of government stated in common conversation. Emperors, kings, stadtholders, governors-general, with a senate or house of lords, and house of commons, are frequently the topics of conversation." There were those who frankly advocated a monarchical government as the only way of escape from the ills under which American society was laboring. There is reason to believe that a project was on foot to invite Prince Henry of Prussia to become the head of a new consolidated government. The influence of the Order of the Cincinnati was much feared by friends of republican institutions. Individually members of the order did not hesitate to express their impatience with popular government. What was to come out of this political chaos, no man could tell.
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
The two most extensive histories dealing with the period of the Confederation are George Bancroft's History of the Formation of the Constitution of the United States of America (2 vols., 1882) and G. T. Curtis's History of the Origin, Formation, and Adoption of the Constitution of the United States (2 vols., 1854). In the fourth volume of Hildreth's History of the United States (6 vols., 1849-52), a concise but rather dry account of the Confederation may be found. More entertaining is John Fiske's The Critical Period of American History, 1783-1789 (1888). Valuable information bearing on the social as well as the political history of the times is contained in the first volume of J. B. McMaster's History of the People of the United States from the Revolution to the Civil War (7 vols., 1883-1913). More recent histories of the period are A. C. McLaughlin's The Confederation and the Constitution, 1783-1789 (in The American Nation, vol. 10, 1905), and Edward Channing's History of the United States, vol. III (3 vols., 1905- ). A vigorous narrative of the exploits of the pioneers beyond the Alleghanies has been written by Theodore Roosevelt, Winning of the West (4 vols., 1889-96). A more restrained account of the beginnings of Western settlement is B. A. Hinsdale's The Old Northwest, the Beginnings of our Colonial System (1899).