It having been deemed adviseable that the executive of the state should act in concert with that of the United States, Governor Mifflin also issued a proclamation, and appointed commissioners to act with those of the general government.
Meanwhile, the insurgents omitted nothing which might enlarge the circle of disaffection. Attempts were made to embark the adjacent counties of Virginia in their cause, and their violence was extended to Morgantown, at which place an inspector resided, who saved himself by flight, and protected his property by advertising on his own door that he had resigned his office. They also made similar excursions into the contiguous counties of Pennsylvania, lying east of the Alleghany mountains, where numbers were ready to join them. These deluded men, giving too much faith to the publications of democratic societies, and to the furious sentiments of general hostility to the administration, and particularly to the internal taxes, with which the papers in the opposition abounded, seem to have entertained the opinion, that the great body of the people were ready to take up arms against their government, and that the resistance commenced by them would spread throughout the union, and terminate in a revolution.
The convention at Parkinson's ferry had appointed a committee of safety consisting of sixty members, who chose fifteen of their body to confer with the commissioners of the United States, and of the state of Pennsylvania. This committee of conference was not empowered to conclude on any thing. They could only receive and report the propositions which might be made to them.
Men of property and intelligence, who had contributed to kindle the flame under the common error of being able to regulate its heat, now trembled at the extent of the conflagration. It had passed the limits they had assigned to it, and was no longer subject to their control.
The committee of conference expressed themselves unanimously in favour of accepting the terms offered by the government, and exerted themselves in the committee of safety to obtain a decision to the same effect. In that committee, the question whether they would submit peaceably to the execution of the law, retaining expressly the privilege of using all constitutional means to effect its repeal, was debated with great zeal. The less violent party carried it by a small majority; but, not thinking themselves authorized to decide for their constituents on so momentous a question, they afterwards resolved that it should be referred to the people.
This reference resulted in demonstrating that, though many were disposed to demean themselves peaceably, yet a vast mass of opposition remained, determined to obstruct the re-establishment of civil authority.
From some causes, among which was disaffection to the particular service, the prospect of bringing the quota of troops required from Pennsylvania into the field, was at first unpromising. But the assembly, which had been summoned by the governor to meet on the first of September, expressed in strong terms its abhorrence of this daring attempt to resist the laws, and to subvert the government of the country; and a degree of ardour and unanimity was displayed by the people of other states, which exceeded the hopes of the most sanguine friends of the administration. Some feeble attempts were indeed made to produce a disobedience to the requisition of the President, by declaring that the people would never be made the instruments of the secretary of the treasury to shed the blood of their fellow citizens; that the representatives of the people ought to be assembled before a civil war was commenced; and by avowing the extravagant opinion that the President could not lawfully call forth the militia of any other state, until actual experiment had ascertained the insufficiency of that of Pennsylvania. But these insidious suggestions were silenced by the general sense of the nation, which loudly and strongly proclaimed that the government and laws must be supported. The officers displayed an unexampled activity; and intelligence from every quarter gave full assurance that, with respect to both numbers and time, the requisitions of the President would be punctually observed.
The governor of Pennsylvania compensated for the defects in the militia law of that state by his personal exertions. From some inadvertence, as was said, on the part of the brigade inspectors, the militia could not be drafted, and consequently the quota of Pennsylvania could be completed only by volunteers. The governor, who was endowed with a high degree of popular elocution, made a circuit through the lower counties of the state, and publicly addressed the militia, at different places where he had caused them to be assembled, on the crisis in the affairs of their country. So successful were these animating exhortations, that Pennsylvania was not behind her sister states in furnishing the quota required from her.
On the 25th of September, the President issued a second proclamation, describing in terms of great energy the obstinate and perverse spirit with which the lenient propositions of the government had been received; and declaring his fixed determination, in obedience to the high and irresistible duty consigned to him by the constitution, "to take care that the laws be faithfully executed," to reduce the refractory to obedience.
The troops of New Jersey and Pennsylvania were directed to rendezvous at Bedford, and those of Maryland and Virginia at Cumberland, on the Potomac.[28] The command of the expedition had been conferred on Governor Lee of Virginia; and the governors of New Jersey and Pennsylvania commanded the militia of their respective states under him.