Jefferson and Hamilton

by Claude G. Bowers

The same conclusion had been reached by Jefferson before. Just after the passage of the bill, he was writing a friend of his fears of the effect of the policies of the Treasury upon the people. Even though they were right, ‘more attention should be paid to the general opinion.’ The excise had passed—the Bank Bill would pass. Perhaps the only corrective for ‘what is corrupt in our present form of government’ would be an increase in the membership of the House ‘so as to grant a more agricultural representation which may put that interest above that of the stock jobbers.’[293]

Jefferson had reached the end of his patience, and was preparing to challenge the pretensions, policies, and power of his ardent and dictatorial young colleague.

III

It was inevitable that a national bank should be a feature of Hamilton’s financial system. Long before a national government loomed large as a probability, he had conceived the plan, and with the temerity of youthful audacity had solemnly outlined it in letters to Robert Morris.[294] With the opportunity before him, he moved with confident strides to his purpose, and the day after his recommendation of an excise reached Congress, his ‘Report on the Bank’ was read. His rare familiarity with the principles of finance, the history of banking, and the banking experiences of nations made his ‘Report’ a persuasive document.[295] Its adoption was as inevitable as its submission. He was on the very peak of his power. Commerce and wealth in all the cities were saluting him, for his policies were in their interest, and the professional and intellectual class had been won by the dazzling success of his daring undertakings. In House and Senate he numbered among the registers of his will the greater part of the strong and the brilliant. Somehow, too, the impression was prevalent that he was the favorite instrument through which Washington wrought his plans. If the small farmers and the mechanics seemed acquiescent, it only meant that they were inarticulate—but inarticulate they were as this dashing figure moved on from triumph to triumph with a shouting multitude of merchants, lawyers, politicians, and speculators in his wake.

Thus, when the Bank Bill reached the Senate, Maclay expressed the general feeling in the comment that ‘it is totally in vain to oppose this bill.’[296] Ten days later, he was all the more convinced at a dinner where he met Morris and sat between two ‘merchants of considerable note,’ and observed, on mentioning the Bank, that they were ‘magnetically drawn to the contemplation of the moneyed interest.’[297]

If the bill passed the Senate without a conflict, it was not to get through the House without a skirmish which was to mark, as some historians think, the definite commencement of party warfare.

The House debate was brief but sharp, though pitched upon a higher plane than some preceding discussions. There was some questioning of the necessity of a bank; some criticism of the monopolistic features of the bank proposed; but Madison, who spoke at the beginning, furnished the dominant theme in his challenge to the constitutionality of such an institution. There was certainly no specific authorization of congressional power in the Constitution. This was conceded by Hamilton, who boldly evoked the doctrine of implied powers. It required no abnormal perspicacity to foresee the unlimited possibilities of these. Here was something read into the Constitution that would, rightly or wrongly, have made its ratification impossible had it provided a specific grant of such power. Hamilton and many of his lieutenants had been frankly dissatisfied with the powers that had been conceded by the people; and here was an opening for the acquisition of power that the people would have refused. This to-day—what to-morrow?

When Madison rose to oppose the Bank, we may be sure that it was after many intimate conversations with Jefferson. He spoke in low tones and with his customary dignity and precision and without abuse, and his argument was not susceptible to an easy assault. After all, ‘the Father of the Constitution’ knew something about his child.

‘The doctrine of implication is always a tender one,’ he said. ‘The danger of it has been felt by other governments. The delicacy was felt in the adoption of our own; the danger may also be felt if we do not keep close to our chartered authorities.... If implications thus remote and thus multiplied may be linked together, a chain may be formed that will reach every object of legislation, every object within the whole compass of political economy.’ More than that—‘It takes from our constituents the opportunity of deliberating on the untried measure, although their hands are also to be tied by the same terms.’ More still—‘it involves a monopoly which affects the equal rights of every citizen.’[298]

On the next day Fisher Ames made his defense of the doctrine of implied powers. The argument of Madison had impressed him as ‘a great speech,’ but steeped in ‘casuistry and sophistry.’ He thought Madison had wasted his time, however, in reading the debates on constitutional powers in the various State ratifying conventions—not at all to the purpose. ‘No man would pretend to give Congress the power,’ he wrote, ‘against a fair construction of the Constitution.’[299]