Did they take possession of the body of this officer by an inquiry into his conduct? Did they interfere with the court of inquiry now on foot, but totally incompetent to the object? Gentlemen, indeed, had said, that if that court did not possess the power of compelling the attendance of witnesses, we might clothe it with that power. In expressing this opinion, the gentleman from Massachusetts had not been more considerate than in expressing his first opinion. Could any one conceive a more dreadful or terrible instrument of persecution than a military court, clothed with the power to coerce the evidence, and the production of papers of private citizens? Clothe them with this power, and there is not a man in the United States who may not be compelled to go, at whatsoever season, to the remotest garrison, on whatsoever trifling occasion, at the will of a court martial, or a court of inquiry, leading to the establishment of a court martial.
In the course of the present year, Mr. R. said it had been his lot to receive, from no dubious or suspicious source, information touching, not, to be sure, the immediate subject on which an inquiry had been moved by the gentleman from Kentucky, but one intimately and closely connected with it. He meant the project, through the instrumentality of the Army of the United States, to dismember the Union; and he had no hesitation in saying—and it had been the opinion of a large majority, if not of every one of those of whom he had been a colleague—that the Army of the United States was tainted with that disease; and that, so far from the Army of the United States having the credit of suppressing that project, the moment it was found that the courage of that Army had failed, the project was abandoned by those who had undertaken it, because the agency of the army was the whole pivot on which that plot had turned! This was in evidence before the grand jury, who had the subject in cognizance last spring. He said that these conspirators were caressed at the different posts of the United States, in their way down the river, and by officers of no small rank, that they received arms from them, and the principal part of the arms these men had with them was taken from the public stores; and under a knowledge of these circumstances, was he not justified in the belief that the whole Army of the United States was connected in the project? He did not mean every individual, for there were some who could not be trusted, and some who were at posts too far distant to be reached. That those who were confidants of the Commander-in-chief were interested in the conspiracy, no man who knew any thing of the circumstances could doubt. He, therefore, thought that the resolution moved by the gentleman from Kentucky was every way reasonable. Indeed, he did not know whether the resolution should not be so varied as to embrace not only a charge of that nature, but all whatsoever.
Before he sat down, he should have it in his power to give to the House something certainly very much resembling evidence in support of the justice of his suspicions on this subject. On the 26th of January last, the House would perceive by the Journals, a Message was received from the President of the United States, “transmitting further information touching an illegal combination,” &c., printed by order of the House, and which he now held in his hand. In this Message is contained the following affidavit:
“I, James Wilkinson, Brigadier General and Commander-in-chief of the Army of the United States, to warrant the arrest of Samuel Swartwout, James Alexander, Esq., and Peter V. Ogden, on a charge of treason, misprision of treason, or such other offence against the Government and laws of the United States, as the following facts may legally charge them with, on the honor of a soldier, and on the Holy Evangelists of Almighty God, do declare and swear, that in the beginning of the month of October last, when in command at Natchitoches, a stranger was introduced to me by Colonel Cushing, by the name of Swartwout, who, a few minutes after the Colonel retired from the room, slipped into my hand a letter of formal introduction from Colonel Burr, of which the following is a correct copy:
“‘Philadelphia, 25th July, 1806.
“‘Dear Sir: Mr. Swartwout, the brother of Colonel S., of New York, being on his way down the Mississippi, and presuming that he may pass you at some post on the river, has requested of me a letter of introduction, which I give with pleasure, as he is a most amiable young man, and highly respectable from his character and connections. I pray you to afford him any friendly offices which his situation may require, and beg you to pardon the trouble which this may give you.
“‘With entire respect, your friend and obedient servant,
A. BURR.
“‘His Exc’y Gen. Wilkinson.’
“Together with a packet, which he informed me he was charged by the same person to deliver me in private. This packet contained a letter in cipher from Colonel Burr, of which the following is, substantially, as fair an interpretation as I have heretofore been able to make, the original of which I hold in my possession.”