The avowal that experience had shown the error of the principle adopted by the nation in 1801 was not confined to President Madison. Monroe spoke even more plainly. In a letter to the military committee, February 24, Monroe urged that an army of twenty thousand men should be retained on the peace establishment. Each soldier of the rank-and-file was supposed to cost in peace about two hundred dollars a year, and Monroe’s proposal involved an annual expense of more than five million dollars.
As far as concerned Madison and Monroe the repudiation of old Republican principles seemed complete; but the people had moved less rapidly than their leaders. Had Congress, while debating the subject February 25, known that Napoleon was then quitting Elba to seize once more the control of France, and to rouse another European convulsion with all its possible perils to neutrals, the President’s views might have been adopted without serious dispute; but in the absence of evident danger, an army of twenty thousand men seemed unnecessary. The finances warranted no such extravagance. Dallas wrote to Eppes, the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, a letter[103] dated February 20, sketching a temporary financial scheme for the coming year. He proposed to fund at seven per cent the outstanding Treasury notes, amounting to $18,637,000; and even after thus sweeping the field clear of pressing claims, he still required the extravagant war-taxes in order to meet expenses, and depended on a further issue of Treasury notes, or a loan, to support the peace establishments of the army and navy. The state of the currency was desperate, and the revenue for the year 1815 was estimated at $18,200,000 in the notes of State banks,—a sum little in excess of the estimated civil necessities.
The military committee of the House showed no sympathy with the new principles urged upon Congress by the Executive. Troup of Georgia reported a bill, February 22, fixing the peace establishment at ten thousand men, with two major-generals and four brigadiers. In submitting this proposal, Troup urged the House, February 25, to accept the reduction to ten thousand as the lowest possible standard, requiring only the expense of two and a half millions; but no sooner did he take his seat than Desha of Kentucky moved to substitute “six” for “ten,” and a vigorous debate followed, ending in the adoption of Desha’s amendment in committee by a majority of nineteen votes. The war leaders were greatly annoyed by this new triumph of the peace party. As a matter of principle, the vote on Desha’s amendment affirmed Jefferson’s pacific system and condemned the Federalist heresies of Madison and Monroe. The war leaders could not acquiesce in such a decision, and rallying for another effort, February 27, they remonstrated hotly. Forsyth of Georgia was particularly emphatic in defining the issue:[104]—
“He had hoped that the spirit of calculation falsely styled economy, whose contracted view was fixed upon present expense, and was incapable of enlarging it to permanent and eventual advantage, had been laid forever by the powerful exorcisms of reason and experience. It would seem however that it had been only lulled by the presence of a more powerful demon. Since the potent spell of necessity had been broken, the troubled spirit of petty calculation was again awakened to vex the counsels and destroy the best hopes of the country.”
For three years the friends of strong government, under the pressure of war, had been able to drive Congress more or less in their own direction; but at the announcement of peace their power was greatly lessened, and their unwilling associates were no longer disposed to follow their lead or to tolerate their assumptions of superiority. Desha retaliated in the tone of 1798:—
“Do they suppose that the House do not understand the subject; or do they suppose that by this great flow of eloquence they can make the substantial part of the House change the opinions in so short a time? When I speak of the substantial part of the House, I mean those who think much and speak but little; who make common-sense their guide, and not theoretical or visionary projects.... Some gentlemen advocate ten thousand and others twenty thousand of a standing army. The policy is easy to be seen through. The advocates of a perpetual system of taxation discover that if they cannot retain a considerable standing army, they will have no good plea for riveting the present taxes on the people.”
In the process of national growth, public opinion had advanced since 1801 several stages in its development; but the speeches of Forsyth, Calhoun, and Lowndes on one side, like that of Desha on the other, left still in doubt the amount of change. While Forsyth admitted that he had under-estimated the strength of the economical spirit, Desha certainly over-estimated the force of the men “who think much and speak but little.” With Federalist assistance, Desha’s friends passed the bill for an army of six thousand men by a vote of seventy-five to sixty-five; but the Senate, by a more decided vote of eighteen to ten, substituted “fifteen” for “six.” With this amendment the bill was returned to the House March 2, which by an almost unanimous vote refused to concur. The bill was sent to a conference committee, which reported the original plan of ten thousand men; and in the last hours of the session, March 3, the House yielded. By a vote of seventy to thirty-eight the peace establishment was fixed at ten thousand men.
The movement of public opinion was more evident in regard to the navy. Instead of repeating the experiments of 1801, Congress maintained the whole war establishment, and appropriated four million dollars chiefly for the support of frigates and ships-of-the-line. The vessels on the Lakes were dismantled and laid up; the gunboats, by an Act approved February 27, were ordered to be sold; but the sum of two hundred thousand dollars was appropriated for the annual purchase of ship-timber during the next three years, and the whole navy thenceforward consisted of cruisers, which were to be kept as far as possible in active service. As the first task of the new ships, an Act, approved March 3, authorized hostilities against the Dey of Algiers, who had indulged in the plunder of American commerce.
These hasty arrangements for the two services, coupled with an equally hasty financial makeshift, completed the career of the Thirteenth Congress, which expired March 4, as little admired or regretted as the least popular of its predecessors. Not upon Congress but upon the Executive Departments fell the burden of peace as of war, and on the Executive the new situation brought many embarrassments.
The first and most delicate task of the Government was the reduction of the army. No one could greatly blame Monroe for shrinking from the invidious duty of dismissing two thirds of the small force which had sustained so well and with so little support the character of the country; but the haste which he showed in leaving the War Department suggested also how keenly he must have suffered under its burdens. His name was sent to the Senate, February 27, as Secretary of State; no Secretary of War was nominated, but Dallas, with the courage that marked his character, undertook to manage the War Department as well as the Treasury until the necessary arrangements for the new army should be made.