[4] Valued by a speaker in this debate at £5000 sterling, and afterwards given to the Washington College, Lexington, Va.
[5] Afterwards General and President. This was his first appearance in the national councils—and characteristically—defending with his voice those Western settlers whose defence, with the sword, was afterwards the foundation of his national fame and political elevation.
[6] This is the true ground on which the United States becomes liable to a State for its expenses in suppressing or repulsing Indian hostilities. It turns upon the idea of an actual invasion, or such imminent danger of it as not to admit of delay: then the contingency happens in which the State may engage in war, and all the acts of Congress, and the Government orders give way before a constitutional right. Tennessee, like other new countries in the United States, was settled without law, and against law. Its early settlers not only had no protection from the Federal Government, but were under legal disabilities to pursue the enemy. This arose from the policy of the Government to preserve peace on the frontiers by restraining the advance of settlements, and curbing the disposition of the people to war. The history of all the new settlements, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, is the same: people go without law, and against law; and when they can neither be stopped by the Government, nor driven back by the Indians, then the Government gives them protection.
[7] The committee reported in favor of paying the brigade of General Sevier, (300 infantry and two troops of horse,) amounting to the sum of $22,816 and 25 cents—a very small sum for a remote expedition into the country of a formidable Indian tribe, and so efficiently conducted as to secure tranquillity to the frontier. It deserves to be remembered for its promptitude, efficiency and cheapness.
[8] The solution of the enigma was, that those who voted against taxing slaves were opposed to any direct tax whatever, and the members from the slave States who supported the tax, did so because the taxation of lands and slaves went together in the slave States—the people were used to the association—and to omit slaves in the direct tax would be unjust and unpopular, as sparing the rich and making the tax fall heavier upon persons of less property.
[9] Yeas and nays not taken.
[10] The great naval powers of Europe show themselves sensible of this, by proposing to the United States to abolish privateering.
[11] The whole expense of procuring peace from Algiers, and forbearance to prey upon our citizens and commerce, and to redeem the captives, was then about one million of dollars; and the alternative was between paying that amount and carrying on war against her. War preparations had begun, and six frigates had been authorized to be built. A war with Algiers, then a formidable power, (and of course with the rest of the Barbary States,) was a very serious undertaking to the United States at that time—the cost great and certain—the issue uncertain. The greatest powers of Europe paid tribute to these barbaric pirates: it was no disgrace to the infant United States to do the same: and the redemption of the captives was a further inducement, founded in humanity: so that the price of peace became a question of economy.
[12] She was compensated accordingly.
[13] The resolution offered by Mr. Harper contemplated an official interposition in behalf of Lafayette—a grave proceeding, which President Washington had well considered beforehand, and maturely decided against. But unofficially he had been exerting himself to procure the release, or to mitigate the fate of the illustrious captive. A confidential person had been sent to Berlin to solicit his discharge, his first captivity being in Prussia; but before the arrival of the messenger the well-guarded prisoner had been turned over to the Emperor of Germany. Mr. Thomas Pinckney, the American Minister in London, had been instructed to make known the wishes of the President to the Austrian Minister at that place, and the British Ministry had been solicited to take an interest in the application: but all in vain. As a last attempt, and at the moment of ceasing to be President, he addressed a private letter to the Emperor of Austria, couched in noble and feeling terms, in which he solicited that Lafayette might be allowed to come to the United States. The letter said: "I forbear to enlarge upon this delicate subject. Permit me only to submit to your majesty's consideration, whether his long imprisonment, and the confiscation of his estate, and the indigence and dispersion of his family, and the painful anxieties incident to all these circumstances, do not form an assemblage of sufferings which recommend him to the mediation of humanity? Allow me, sir, on this occasion to be its organ; and to entreat that he may be permitted to come to this country on such conditions, and under such restrictions as your majesty may deem it expedient to prescribe." This touching appeal remained without effect; and the romantic effort of Dr. Bollman having failed to save Lafayette, after snatching him from the dungeon of Olmutz, it remained for the glittering sword of the conqueror of Italy to command what the noble letter of Washington failed to obtain. After the Treaty of Campo Formio, an aid-de-camp of the then young General Buonaparte proceeded to Vienna—asked the release of Lafayette—and obtained it. The Emperor, Francis the Second, might have appeared more gracefully in the transaction, if he had yielded the release to the letter of Washington.