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TESTIMONY OF THE PRESIDENTS.

[CHAP. XIV.

has been driving with such furious zeal to a dissolution of the Union-combined with an alliance, offensive and defensive, with Great Britain.

"The last half of this volume might be denominated, the political bible of the junto.' If there be a reflecting man in any of our sister States, not infected with the scab of this political leprosy, who has any doubt what the junto principles really are, let him attentively read that part of this volume which has never before been published. Here he will find those principles which they have heretofore circulated in whispers among themselves, and denied when charged with them in public; which in their secret conclaves they profess as articles of faith, and which in their public manifestoes they repel with indignation as slanderous aspersions.

"The floods of sarcasm and invective which have gushed upon him [Jefferson], for his repeated references to the umpirage of reason, are universally known; and this sagacious mirth might be indulged as harmless, were it not inseparably connected with a political system."

"Had these been merely the errors of Mr. Ames, I would have lamented in silence the indiscretion of his friends, in exposing them to the world, and suffered them to perish by the natural decays of their own absurdity. But they are not the wanderings of Mr. Ames's imagination. They are the principles of a faction which has succeeded in obtaining the management of this commonwealth, and which aspired to the government of the Union. Defeated in this last object of their ambition, and sensible that the engines by which they have attained the mastery of the State are not sufficiently comprehensive, nor enough within their control to wield the machinery of the nation, their next resort was to dismember what they could not sway, and to form a new confederacy, to be under the glorious shelter of British protection. To prepare the public mind for changes so abhorrent to the temper and character of our people, the doctrines with which this volume teems were to be ushered into public view whenever a prospect for their favorable reception might appear."

Equally pointed asseverations, by President Adams, of a monarchical party as much in design as in theory, might be extended over pages.

The seventh President, General Jackson, wrote Mr. Monroe, January 6th, 1817, in answer to that letter of the latter which we have already quoted:

"I have read with much satisfaction that part of your letter on the rise, progress, and policy of the Federalists It is, in my opinion, a just exposition. I am free to declare, had I commanded the military department where the Hartford Convention met, if it had been the last act of my life, I should have punished the three principal leaders of the party. I am certain an independent court-martial would have condemned them under the 2d section of the act establishing rules and regulations for the government of the army of the United States. These kind of men, although called Federalists, are really monarchists and traitors to the constituted government. But I am of opinion that there are men called

1 Mr. Adams thus charactered the Ultra Federal leaders of Massachusetts.

CHAP. XIV.]

TESTIMONY OF THE PRESIDENTS.

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Federalists that are honest, virtuous, and really attached to our government, and, although they differ in many respects and opinions with the Republicans, still they will risk everything in its defence."

It is not claimed that this array of coinciding testimony and belief (which might be swelled to volumes), impairs any one's right to question the soundness of Jefferson's opinions. Men have the legal right, we suppose, to disbelieve everything, even to the admissions of accused men! But it may at least be hoped that henceforth the impression will not be conveyed, either by direct false statements, or by omissions as false in their object, that Jefferson exhibited eccentricity of views, temper, or conduct, in any particular, in regard to this subject.

VOL. I.-38

CHAPTER XV.

1790-1791.

Construction of the President's Cabinet-Colonel Hamilton-General Knox-Edmund Randolph-Cabinet politically "balanced "-How far otherwise balanced-Its Mode of doing Business-Washington's Motives in balancing between Parties-Plan worked smoothly for a Time-The Funding Bill-Madison's Course-Consequences of the Funding Bill-The Assumption-How forced through-The Public Loss by it-Jefferson's Letters to France-Views on the French Constitution-Reports and Cabinet Opinions Illness-Bill to protect Virginia and North Carolina Soldiers-Swindling-Free Commerce a Natural Right-Threatened Rupture between England and Spain-Jefferson's Instructions to our Spanish Minister-To our French Minister-Conduct of Spain towards the United States-Instructions to our English Diplomatic Agent Jefferson's Report to Congress-Uniformity of the Coinage, Weights and Measures-Accompanies President to Rhode Island-Cabinet Questions in regard to Lord Dorchester-Jefferson's Answer-Hamilton's-President concurred with Jefferson-Jefferson visits Home-Nine Letters to his Daughters-Energetic Advice to President on English Affairs-His Advice adopted-Import and Excise Bill-Symptoms of Public Dissatisfaction-Madison's Course and Motives-United States Bank Bill passed-Cabinet Opinions on it-President's Motives for signing it-Came near vetoing it-Jefferson's Letter to Mason-His Account of the Division of Parties-His Opinions of Hamilton and Adams-Sources of Difference between Jefferson and Hamilton-Manners-Interference in Congressional Affairs -Hamilton's present Success-His different Classes of Adherents-The Bank Mania— Adulation-Ames to Hamilton-Hamilton the Dispenser-His Freedom from VenalityJefferson declares him a Monarchist-That he favored a Government "bottomed on Corruption "What was meant by the Last Charge-" Corruptions of British Constitution "-Character of Hamilton's Mind-His Lack of Originality-Copied his entire System from England-Not a Wise Man in Practice-All his Structures have perishedDefeated his own Ends by Overaction-Could have preserved a Moderately Consolidated Government-Was a Theorist and a Projector-Was an able Executive Man-The Qualities which conspired to produce this-He was earnest and honest in his Principles -Comparative Frequency of such men as Jefferson and Hamilton.

WHEN Mr. Jefferson took his place in President Washington's Cabinet, in March 1790, as Secretary of State, he found the following colleagues already acting in the other departments :— Colonel Alexander Hamilton, of New York, Secretary of the Treasury; General Henry Knox, of Massachusetts, Secretary of War; Edmund Randolph, of Virginia, Attorney-General.'

1 These, we hardly need to say, were all the Executive departments then created, except the Postmaster-General's, and he was not then included in the Cabinet.

CHAP. XV.]

THE PRESIDENT'S CABINET.

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President Washington had taken the oath of office and entered upon his duties April 30th, 1789. In selecting his Cabinet, he evidently aimed at the establishment of a balance between parties, or rather between the holders of those conflicting political theories which had disclosed themselves before and in the federal Convention, and which were ultimately to form the grounds of party divisions.

Colonel Hamilton was a West Indian, having been born in the island of Nevis, in 1757, of parents on the father's side Scotch, and on the mother's French, in descent. The indigence of his family threw him at an early age upon the bounty of maternal relatives. His family biographer (from whom we shall draw all these early details) mentions that he attended a school kept by a Jewess; that his education before leaving the West Indies probably embraced little more than the rudiments of the English and French languages; but that he early became a lover of books, and devoted much time to miscellaneous reading. In 1769, he was placed in the counting-house of a Santa Cruz merchant. He betrayed equal precocity in talents and ambition. During his twelfth year he wrote a youthful friend "that he contemned the grovelling condition of a clerk, or the like". that he "would willingly risk his life, though not his character, to exalt his station "-that "youth excluded him from any hopes of immediate preferiment, nor did he desire it, but he meant to prepare the way for futurity." "He should conclude by saying he wished there was a war!”1

An article he wrote in a newspaper attracted notice. The governor and some of the principal persons of the island determined that he should be sent to New York to complete his education. He reached that city in 1772, provided with "ample funds" by "his relations." He joined a celebrated grammar school at Elizabethtown, where he remained for a short period' studying intensely, and then entered King's (now Columbia) College, in New York, being "received as a private student, and not attached to any particular class." He, to use his own words, entertained in politics, "strong prejudices on the ministerial side, until he became convinced by the superior force of

Hamilton's Life, by his son, vol. i. p. 5.

We infer from the statements in his biography, less than a year, though all the particulars of his early life are so vaguely given, that it is difficult to settle upon anything with certainty.

596

THE PRESIDENT'S CABINET.

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[CHAP. XV. the arguments in favor of the colonial claims." This abandonment of loyalism seems to have occurred during, or by reason of, a visit to Boston towards the close of 1773, or in the beginning of 1774, and in his seventeenth year; and he soon signalized it, by making an eloquent address at a popular meeting held to denounce the Boston Port Bill. He then became a frequent newspaper writer on the Whig side, and, soon after, an able and efficient pamphleteer, in which capacity he attracted much notice. In 1775, he joined a volunteer corps of militia, and applied himself to the study of arms. On the 14th of March, 1776, he was made captain of a provincial company of artillery, and took an honorable part in the military affairs of the day, until March, 1777, when he was appointed an aid-decamp, by General Washington, with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. His published correspondence commences immediately after this period, and is marked with the same characteristics of mind which distinguished it through life."

He was now an advocate of the broadest representative democracy, believing that "from the records of history it would be found that the fluctuations of governments in which the popular principle had borne a considerable sway, had proceeded from its being compounded with other principles, from its being made to operate in an improper channel."

He remained in the military family of the Commander-inChief, serving with credit, until 1781, when a "breach" occurred between them, under circumstances which are detailed in a letter written by Hamilton to General Schuyler, February 18th, 1781; and Hamilton rejecting the overture, made by the General, to an accommodation, declined longer to retain his position.*

Life of Hamilton, vol. i. p. 25.

2 Namely, ability, clearness, and unbounded self esteem. His first letters are addressed to Governeur Morris, Robert Livingston, and Allison (collectively), and seem to have been in answer to an invitation from those gentlemen to correspond with the New York Convention through them. The way in which he signifies to them that his "sentiments are never to be considered as an echo of those of the General," in his first letter, and in which, in his second, he must beg leave to repeat what he had before observed, that whenever he gave opinions, they were merely his own, and would probably, so far from being a transcript of those of the General, differ widely from them in many respects," are amusing illustrations of self-complacency in a young gentleman of twenty! There was a manifest propriety, certainly, in cautioning his correspondents that General Washington was not to be held in anywise responsible for the views of his Aid; but the repetition of these cautions, and the phraseology of them, furnish characteristic hints.

9 Hamilton's Works, vol. vi. pp. 581-2.

For this letter, see Hamilton's Life, vol. i. p. 333; or his Works, vol. i. p. 211. Those who would study carefully the character and temper of Hamilton (and judge how far the lapse of years affected his estimate of himself), should turn to this letter

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