Washington and his colleagues; a chronicle of the rise and fall of federalism

by Henry Jones Ford

Acquiescence in Washington's candidacy made it practically impossible for the Republican party to manifest its true strength. The compliment of Republican support was awarded to Governor Clinton of New York, who together with Washington received all the electoral votes of Virginia, New York, North Carolina, and Georgia. A stray electoral vote from Pennsylvania brought Clinton's total up to 50, whereas John Adams received 77 votes which re-elected him as vice-president. Jefferson received only four electoral votes, all from Kentucky, but his poor showing in this election was wholly due to the intricacy of the electoral system, and his party meanwhile developed so much strength that when the Third Congress met on December 2, 1793, the Republicans were strong enough to elect the speaker.

Undeterred by this circumstance, Hamilton forced the fighting. The Jeffersonians had been excusing the defeat they had received in attacking Hamilton in the previous Congress on the ground that the House had acted without allowing sufficient time for due examination of the evidence. This plea supplied to Hamilton an occasion for prompt action. Exactly two weeks after the meeting of Congress he addressed a letter to the Speaker, in which he declared: "Unwilling to leave the matter on such a footing, I have concluded to request of the House of Representatives, as I now do, that a new inquiry may be, without delay, instituted in some mode, most effectual for an accurate and thorough investigation; and I will add, that the more comprehensive it is, the more agreeable it will be to me."

Giles promptly took up the challenge, and moved the appointment of a committee to examine the state of the Treasury Department in all its particulars. Pending action by the House, a new complication was introduced, which, though meant as a blow at Hamilton, resulted in a signal triumph for him. His enemies got hold of a discharged clerk of the Treasury Department by means of whom they now tried to counteract the effect of Hamilton's challenge. Two days after Hamilton's letter to the Speaker, a memorial from Andrew G. Fraunces was laid before the House making charges which amounted to this: that there was a combination between Hamilton and other officers of the Treasury Department to evade payment of warrants so that they could be bought up for speculative purposes. Hamilton's request for an investigation was allowed to lie on the table, but the memorial from Fraunces was referred to a select committee of which Giles was a member. This circumstance turned out to be much to Hamilton's advantage. Giles was an erect, bold, manly foe; he could not stomach the sort of testimony upon which depended the charges against Hamilton's personal integrity, and he concurred in a report on Hamilton finding that the evidence was "fully sufficient to justify his conduct; and that in the whole course of this transaction the Secretary and other officers of the Treasury have acted a meritorious part towards the public."

Giles, while exonerating Hamilton of the charge of dishonesty, did not desist from pressing his motion for further investigation of the Treasury Department. But he admitted that imputations upon the Secretary's integrity had been quite removed, and he now urged that "the primary object of the resolution is to ascertain the boundaries of discretion and authority between the Legislature and the Treasury Department." In thus shifting his ground he presented a new issue in which the House—and indeed Giles's own party associates—took little interest. The fact was that the attack on Hamilton had failed, that the purpose of showing him to be unworthy of Washington's confidence had been abandoned as impracticable, and that all that remained was a proposal that the House should again engage in a laborious investigation of the desirability of attempting a new delimitation of the functions of the Treasury Department and of Congress. But this, of course, did not concern Hamilton. He had acted under existing laws and with responsibilities which were defined by them. If Congress saw fit to make new laws, the consequences would fall upon his successor in office, not upon him since he was about to retire. If Congress made fetters for the Secretary, it might even be that some member of Giles's own party would have to wear them. Thus, however Giles's latest proposal might be viewed, it was not attractive. Moreover, it was presented at a time when the House had much more urgent matters to consider. The country was wild with excitement over the retaliating orders and decrees of Great Britain and France, which subjected American interests to injury from both sides. Giles and Page appear to have been the only speakers on the resolution when it was taken up for consideration on February 24, 1794, and both disclaimed any intention of reflecting upon Hamilton. The resolution received decent interment by reference to a committee, with no one objecting. The practical conclusion of the matter was that Hamilton had beaten his enemies once more and beaten them thoroughly.

Before resigning his office, Hamilton added still another great achievement to his record of illustrious service in establishing public authority. The violent agitation against the excise act promoted by the Jeffersonians naturally tended to forcible resistance. One of the counts of Jefferson's indictment of Hamilton's policy which had been presented to Washington was that the excise law was "of odious character … committing the authority of the Government in parts where resistance is most probable and coercion least practicable." The parts thus referred to were the mountains of western Pennsylvania. The popular discontent which arose there from the imposition of taxes upon their principal staple—distilled spirits—naturally coalesced with the agitation carried on against Washington's neutrality policy. At a meeting of delegates from the election districts of Allegheny county held at Pittsburgh, resolutions were adopted attributing the policy of the Government "to the pernicious influence of stockholders." This was an echo of Jefferson's views. But the resolutions went on to declare: "Our minds feel this with so much indignancy, that we are almost ready to wish for a state of revolution and the guillotine of France, for a short space, in order to inflict punishment on the miscreants that enervate and disgrace our Government." This was an echo of the talk in the political clubs that had been formed throughout the country. The original model was apparently the Jacobin club of Paris. The Philadelphia club with which the movement started, soon after Genet's arrival, adopted the Jacobin style of utterance. It declared its object to be the preservation of a freedom whose existence was menaced by a "European confederacy transcendent in power and unparalleled in iniquity," and also by "the pride of wealth and arrogance of power" displayed in the United States. Writing to Governor Lee of Virginia, Washington said that he considered "this insurrection as the first formidable fruit of the Democratic Societies."

Hamilton moved warily, doing whatever lay in his power to smooth the practical working of the system in the hope of "attaining the object of the laws by means short of force." But such was the inflamed state of feeling in western Pennsylvania that no course was acceptable short of abandonment by the Government of efforts to enforce the internal revenue laws. During 1793, there were several outrageous attacks on agents of the Government, and the execution of warrants for the arrest of rioters was refused by local authority. People who showed a disposition to side with the Government had their barns burned. A revenue inspector was tarred and feathered, and was run out of the district. The patience with which the Government endured insults to its authority encouraged the mob spirit. On July 16, 1794, the house of Inspector Neville was attacked by a mob, and, when he appealed to the local authorities for protection, he was notified that there was such a general combination of the people that the laws could not be executed. Neville, a revolutionary veteran of tried valor, was able to obtain the help of an officer and eleven soldiers from Fort Pitt, but the mob was too numerous and too well-armed to be withstood by so weak a force. After a skirmish in which the mob fired the buildings and the place became untenable, the troops had to surrender. Soon after this affair, a convention of delegates from the four western counties of Pennsylvania was called to meet on August 14 to concert measures for united action. Organized insurrection had, in fact, begun.

"The Government," said Washington, "could no longer remain a passive spectator of the contempt with which the laws were treated." But when he called for Cabinet opinions, the old variance at once showed itself. Randolph thought that calm consideration of the situation "banishes every idea of calling the militia into immediate action." He pointed out that the disaffected region had more than fifteen thousand white males above the age of sixteen, and that sympathy with the insurgents was active in "several counties in Virginia having a strong militia." There was also the risk that the insurgents might seek British aid, in which case a severance of the Union might result. Randolph also enlarged upon the expense that would attend military operations and questioned whether the funds could be obtained. He advised a proclamation and the appointment of commissioners to treat with the insurgents. Should such means fail, and should it appear that the judiciary authority was withstood, then at last military force might be employed.

Hamilton held that "a competent force of militia should be called forth and employed to suppress the insurrection, and support the civil authority." It appeared to him that "the very existence of the Government demands this course." He urged that the force employed ought "to be an imposing one, such, if practicable, as will deter from opposition, save the effusion of the blood of the citizens, and serve the object to be accomplished." He proposed a force of twelve thousand men, of whom three thousand were to be cavalry, and he advised that, in addition to the Pennsylvania militia, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia should each contribute a quota.

All the members of the Cabinet except Randolph concurred in Hamilton's opinion. The practical execution of the measures was entrusted to Hamilton, who acted with great sagacity. Some appearance of timidity and inertia in Pennsylvania state authority was indirectly but effectually counteracted by measures which showed that the military expedition would move even if Pennsylvania held back. Although some troops were to gather at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, others were to meet at Cumberland Fort, Virginia. The business was so shrewdly managed that Pennsylvania state authority fell obediently into line, and the insurgents were so cowed by the determined action of the Government that they submitted without a struggle. Washington thought that this event would react upon the clubs and "effectuate their annihilation sooner than it might otherwise have happened." A general collapse among them certainly followed, and they disappeared from the political scene.

It is in the nature of precaution that the more successful it is the less necessary it appears to have been, and thus the complete success of Hamilton's management furnished his enemies with a new argument against him of which they afterwards made great use. The costly military expedition that had no fighting to do was continually held up to public ridicule. That the expense was trifling in comparison with the objects achieved must deeply impress any one who examines the records of the times. A mistake might have been fatal to the existence of the Government. It has become so powerful and massive since that time, that we can hardly realize what a rickety structure it then was, and how readily, in less capable hands, it might have collapsed.