[277] Morison, The Life and Letters of Harrison Gray Otis, vol. i, p. 69.
[278] The Works of John Adams, vol. viii, pp. 615, 620. President Adams was fully persuaded that French notions of domination “comprehended all America, both north and south”. (Ibid.) Cf. also Annals of Congress, vol. vii, p. 1147, speech of Otis on Foreign Intercourse; American Historical Association Report for 1896, p. 807, Higginson’s letter to Pickering.
[279] One of the pamphlets of the day, frequently referred to, much quoted in the newspapers, and evidently much read, bore the horrific title: The Cannibals’ Progress; or the Dreadful Horrors of French Invasion, as displayed by the Republican Officers and Soldiers, in their Perfidy, rapacity, ferociousness & brutality, exercised towards the Innocent inhabitants of Germany. Translated from the German, by Anthony Aufrer(e), Esq. … The Connecticut Courant, in announcing a new edition of this work as just off the press, offered the following description of its character: “This work contains a circumstantial account of the excesses committed by the French Army in Suabia. At the present moment, when our country is in danger of being overrun by the same nation, our people ought to be prepared for those things, which they must expect, in case such an event should happen. The pamphlet should be owned by every man, and read in every family. They will there find, from an authentic source, that the consequences of being conquered by France, or even subjected to their government, are more dreadful than the heart of man can conceive. Murder, robbery, burning of towns, and the violation of female chastity, in forms too dreadful to relate, in instances too numerous to be counted, are among them. Five thousand copies of this work were sold in Philadelphia in a few days, and another edition of ten thousand is now in the press in that city.” Cf. the issue of the Courant for July 2, 1798. Another book of horrors which deserves mention in this connection, although it came to public attention in America a little later, was the following: The History of the Destruction of the Helvetic Union and Liberty. By J. Mallet Du Pan. This work was first printed in England in 1798, and the following March was reprinted in Boston. A sentence or two taken from the author’s preface will convey a fair notion of its nature: “In the Helvetic History, every Government may read its own destiny, and learn its duty. If there be yet one that flatters itself that its existence is reconcilable with that of the French Republic, let it study this dreadful monument of their friendship. Here every man may see how much weight treaties, alliances, benefactions, rights of neutrality, and even submission itself, retain in the scales of that Directory, who hunt justice from the earth, and whose sanguinary rapacity seeks plunder and spreads ruin alike on the Nile as on the Rhine, in Republican Congresses as well as in the heart of Monarchies.” Like The Cannibals’ Progress, this work was much quoted in the newspapers and caught the sympathetic eye of many clergyman, Jedediah Morse among the number. July 29, 1799, Chauncey Goodrich, of Hartford, Connecticut, wrote Oliver Wolcott to the effect that “the facts … in Du Pan, Robinson, Barruel, have got into every farm house; they wont go out, till the stories of the indian tomahawk & war dances around their prisoners do.” (Wolcott Papers, vol. v, 77.) Nathaniel Ames did not think highly of the veracity of The Cannibals’ Progress, yet he paid tribute to its influence in the following fashion: “July 31, 1798. Judge Metcalf with his cockade on came down to see Gen. Washington expecting to get a Commission to fight the French & infatuated at the slanders of the Progress of the Cannibals that the French skin Americans, to make boots for their Army, &c.” (Dedham Historical Register, vol. ix: Diary of Ames, p. 24.)
[280] Channing, History of the United States, vol. iv, pp. 176 et seq., gives a brief but entertaining account of the political jockeying on the part of our government which lay back of Monroe’s recall and the despatch of Pinckney to France.
[281] Gibbs, Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams, vol. ii, pp. 15 et seq. Cf. McMaster, History of the People of the United States, vol. ii, pp. 368 et seq.
[282] Cf. Works of Fisher Ames, vol. i, p. 225, letter of Ames to H. G. Otis. Ames’ comment on the discomfiture of the Democrats was characteristically vigorous: “The late communications [i. e., the X. Y. Z. despatches] have only smothered their rage; it is now a coal-pit, lately it was an open fire. Thacher would say, the effect of the despatches is only like a sermon in hell to awaken conscience in those whose day of probation is over, to sharpen pangs which cannot be soothed by hope.”
[283] The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol. vii, p. 228, Jefferson’s letter to Edmund Pendleton.
[284] The elation of Jedediah Morse over the turn affairs seemed to be taking was great. Under date of May 21, 1798, he wrote Wolcott, dilating on “the wonderful and happy change in the public mind. Opposition is shrinking into its proper insignificance, stripped of the support of its deluded honest friends. I now feel it is an honour to be an American.” (Wolcott Papers, vol. viii, 23.)
[285] Jedediah Morse was far from comfortable over the unwillingness of the President to proceed with vigor in handling affairs with France. An ill-concealed vein of impatience is discoverable in the following letter which he wrote to Wolcott, under date of July 13, 1798: “He [Washington] will unite all honest men among us. It gladdens the hearts of some at least, to my knowledge, of our deluded, warm democrats. They say, ‘Washington is a good man—an American, & we will rally round his standard!’ … The rising & unexpected spread of the American spirit has dispelled all gloom from my mind, respecting our country. I rejoyce at the crisis, because I believe, the issue will be, the extinction of French influence among us, & if this can be effected, treasure & even blood, will not be spilt in vain.—The government is strengthening every day, by the confidence and assertions of the people.—We are waiting with almost impatience to have war declared agt. France, that we may distinguish more decidedly between friends & foes among ourselves. I believe there is energy enough in government to silence, & if necessary exterminate its obstinate & dangerous enemies.” (Wolcott Papers, vol. viii, 27.) Eleven months later Morse expressed to Wolcott his grave fears on account of the disposition of the national government to reciprocate the “pacific overtures of the French govt.” (Wolcott Papers, vol. viii, 24.) It is not French arms, but their “principles” which he holds in dread. (Cf. ibid.) Back of the fire-eating spirit of this New England clergyman was a genuine moral and religious concern.
[286] The texts of these various acts may be found in United States Statutes at Large, vol. i, pp. 566–569, 570–572, 577–578, 596–597. The Naturalization Act extended from five to nineteen years the period of residence necessary for aliens who wished to become naturalized; that is to say, fourteen years of residence, to be followed by an additional five years of residence after the declaration of intention to become a citizen had been filed. It is obvious that this measure was intended to defeat the process by which the Democrats had been absorbing the foreign vote. The Act Concerning Aliens empowered the President “to order all such aliens as he should judge dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States, or should have reasonable grounds to suspect were concerned in any treasonable or secret machinations against the government thereof, to depart out of the territory of the United States within such a time as should be expressed in such order.” Penalties in the form of heavy imprisonment and the withdrawal of the opportunity to become citizens were attached. The Act Respecting Alien Enemies gave the president power when the country was in a state of war to cause the subjects of the nation at war with the United States “to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as alien enemies.” The Sedition Act, not only in point of time but in sinister significance as well, stood at the apex of this body of legislation. It provided that fines and imprisonments were to be imposed upon men who were found guilty of unlawfully combining or conspiring for opposition to measures of government, or for impeding the operation of any law in the United States, or for intimidating an officer in the performance of his duty. The penalty was to be a fine not exceeding five thousand dollars, and imprisonment not exceeding five years. Penalties were also provided for publishing false, scandalous, and malicious writings against the government.