Briefly and baldly, this provided that on the opening and reading of the certificates of the electoral votes in the presence of Congress, the papers should be turned over to a grand committee consisting of six members of each branch of Congress, with the Chief Justice as presiding officer. The members of the House and Senate committees should be elected by ballot. These, with the Chief Justice, were to go into secret session behind locked doors. They were to have the power to send for persons and papers, to pass on the qualifications of electors, and the manner in which they had cast their votes; to investigate charges that bribery, intimidation, persuasion, or force had been employed; and finally, to decide which votes should be counted and which cast out. This decision was to be final. In other words, it was a criminal scheme and an unconstitutional plot to steal the election. It had the support of the great majority of the best minds in the Federalist Party.
In keeping with the sinister nature of this monstrous measure, it was proposed to withhold it carefully from the public until the consummation of the crime. Happily there were members of Congress who did not consider themselves bound in honor to protect dishonor from the light, and almost immediately three copies of the bill found their way to the office of Duane. Two of these were personally delivered with permission to print and disclose the donors; one was mailed under cover.[1698] The bill was immediately printed in full in ‘The Aurora’ with appropriate comments, and the conspirators were dragged into the light. ‘The new electoral council or college may be very fitly compared with the secret Council of Ten at Venice of old,’ wrote the editor.[1699] Out of this exposure grew the proceedings culminating in the prosecution for sedition against Duane.
With the Federalists in control of both branches of Congress, it did not appear at first to matter much. The leaders of the party had never greatly concerned themselves with public opinion. They mustered their men in the Senate for a vote, leaving a discussion of the measure to the opposition. Behind the sorry smoke screen of the Duane prosecution they marched unblushingly to their purpose. The final protest was made by Charles Pinckney, the brilliant new leader of the Democrats in the Senate, in a powerful constitutional argument that no one cared to meet.[1700] ‘Equal in eloquence and strength of reasoning to anything ever heard within the walls of Congress,’ said ‘The Aurora.’[1701] He sat down. No one rose to reply. The question was taken on the passage of the bill and it passed by a strict party vote of 16 to 12.
Meanwhile, the publicity given the rather brazen plan to steal the election was having its reactions on the people, and Federalist members of the House began to protest. There was no one in a more rebellious mood than Marshall, who thought the situation too serious to permit him to leave for home on the birth of his fifth child.[1702] With a more far-reaching vision and a greater respect for public opinion than the veteran leaders of his party, he made his objections audible. On the floor of the House, on the street, at the boarding-house, he talked boldly and incessantly against the measure. The Federalists were amazed, disgusted. Some of the leaders who appreciated his ability observed his insubordination with sorrow. They had doubted his ‘political judgment,’ but had counted on swaying him to their views because of his companionable temperament. They took note of his ‘very affectionate disposition,’ his attachment to pleasures, his conviviality, his seeming ‘indolence,’ and they cultivated him on the side of his weaknesses. But they found him a difficult psychological problem. He had a timidity due to his tendency to ‘feel the public pulse,’ was disposed to ‘erotic refinement,’ and, worse still, to ‘express great respect for the sovereign people.’ With all this he possessed a persuasive power that worked with fatal effect on ‘more feeble minds,’ and he was exerting this power among the members with disastrous results.
Theodore Sedgwick, ponderous and pompous, and in politics insinuating, was apparently delegated to coax Marshall into the conspiracy. A number of heart-to-heart talks with the rebel followed. The Virginian doubted the constitutional ‘power of the legislature to delegate such authority to a Committee.’ After a long talk he ‘confessed himself ... to be convinced,’ but shifted, according to Sedgwick, to the ground that the people had authorized the members to decide, each for himself, in the case of election disputes. In its nature this power was ‘too delicate to be delegated.’ To Sedgwick this was ‘so attenuated and unsubstantial’ as to be beyond his comprehension, and Marshall was persuaded to abandon this ground too. But ‘in the meantime he had dwelt so much in conversation on these subjects that he had dissipated our majority,’ Sedgwick wrote King.[1703]
When the discussions opened in the House, Marshall questioned the propriety of the Senate naming the chairman of the committee and of making the decision final, and offered an amendment.[1704] This was followed by other amendments and ultimately by the revamping of the whole measure. The Senate refused to accept the amendments, and thus the measure died between the two houses. Duane was jubilant. Here was evidence of the value of a free press. The ‘odious bill was introduced for party purposes,’ and a party in the Senate ‘sought to overwhelm by terror and oppression the men who dared to publish the bill, which even after numerous amendments was found too abominable to be countenanced by the House of Representatives.’[1705] The Federalists were downcast and indignant. Senator Tracy, who had no political scruples, declared that ‘Marshall has spoiled all the fair hopes founded on Mr. Ross’s bill.’[1706] Thus Marshall saved the country from revolution and Jefferson from defeat regardless of the vote—as Hamilton was to save him later.
II
The campaign was now on, but from this time we shall hear little of the activities of Jefferson. His work was done. Back to his beloved hilltop he hurried on the adjournment of Congress, and there he remained, apparently less concerned with politics than with potatoes. But he had already created the machinery, trained the mechanicians, supplied the munitions of victory, found means for financing the enterprise—and he left the work with his lieutenants.
In the leadership of his party Jefferson had no rival, and he was the idol of his followers, ‘the people’s friend.’ The persecution he had met had but endeared him more to his supporters. He was their Messiah. On New Year’s Eve in 1799, a company of Democrats spent the evening in conversation and songs until the new year came. Then, headed by a regimental band, they marched through the dark streets of Philadelphia, past the homes of the rich and fashionable blazing with light, to pay their respects to Jefferson at his lodgings. On the way, they encountered another large group, who, unknown to the first, had conceived the same plan for declaring their allegiance. The two crowds fraternized and marched on together. With cheers and shouts they summoned their leader to the door. When the tall, familiar figure appeared, the welkin rang, the band played, and a song, written for the occasion, was sung.[1707] The incident is significant of the common recognition of Jefferson’s leadership.
During the two preceding years the consummate political genius of Jefferson had been planning the programme for the struggle of 1800. The congressional strategy of his party had been his work, and night after night he had gathered his lieutenants about him at the dinner table of the Indian Queen and given his orders for the morrow. If the party platform had not then been conceived, he had his programme, which met the purpose. Writing Madison in January, 1799, he proposed that all possible emphasis be put upon the Alien and Sedition Laws, the direct tax, the army and navy, ‘the usurious loan to set these follies on foot,’ and on the picture of ‘recruiting officers lounging at every court-house and decoying the laborer from his plough.’[1708] About the same time he was expanding this programme in a letter to Gerry: The constitutional rights of the States should be asserted. The right of Congress to ‘its constitutional share in the division of power’ should be maintained. The Government should be ‘rigorously frugal’ and all possible savings should be applied to the discharge of the public debt. The multiplication of offices should be stopped. A standing army in time of peace should be attacked. Free commerce should be maintained with all nations, and there should be ‘political connections with none.’ The liberty of speech and the freedom of the press should be preserved.[1709]