Volume I Part 45 (1/2)
Randolph then reviewed the state of the country under the Confederation: Congress powerless, public credit ruined, treaties violated, prices falling, trade paralyzed, ”and justice trampled under foot.” The world looks upon Americans ”as little wanton bees, who had played for liberty, but had no sufficient solidity or wisdom” to keep it. True, the Federal Convention had exceeded its authority, but there was nothing else to be done. And why not use the expression ”We, the people”? Was the new Government not for them? The Union is now at stake, and, exclaimed he, ”I am a friend to the Union.”[1173]
The secret was out, at last; the Const.i.tutionalists' _coup_ was revealed. His speech placed Randolph openly and unreservedly on their side. ”The Governor has ... thrown himself fully into the federal scale,” gleefully reported the anxious Madison to the supreme Nationalist chieftain at Mount Vernon.[1174] ”The G[overno]r exhibited a curious spectacle to view. Having refused to sign the paper [the Const.i.tution] everybody supposed him against it,” was Jefferson's comment on Randolph's change of front.[1175] Was.h.i.+ngton, perfectly informed, wrote Jay in New York that ”Mr. Randolph's declaration will have considerable effect with those who had hitherto been wavering.”[1176] Theodoric Bland wrote bitterly to Arthur Lee that, ”Our chief magistrate has at length taken his party and appears to be reprobated by the honest of both sides.... He has openly declared for posterior amendments, or in other words, unconditional submission.”[1177]
All of Randolph's influence, popularity, and prestige of family were to be counted for the Const.i.tution without previous amendment; and this was a far weightier force, in the practical business of getting votes for ratification, than oratory or argument.[1178] So ”the sanguine friends of the Const.i.tution counted upon a majority of twenty ... which number they imagine will be greatly increased.”[1179]
Randolph's sensational about-face saved the Const.i.tution. Nothing that its advocates did during these seething three weeks of able discussion and skillful planning accomplished half so much to secure ratification.
Was.h.i.+ngton's tremendous influence, aggressive as it was tactful, which, as Monroe truly said, ”carried” the new National plan, was not so practically effective as his work in winning Randolph. For, aside from his uncloaked support, the Virginia Governor at that moment had a doc.u.ment under lock and key which, had even rumor of it got abroad, surely would have doomed the Const.i.tution, ended the debate abruptly, and resulted in another Federal Convention to deal anew with the Articles of Confederation.
By now the Anti-Const.i.tutionalists, or Republicans as they had already begun to call themselves, also were acting in concert throughout the country. Their tactics were c.u.mbersome and tardy compared with the prompt celerity of the well-managed Const.i.tutionalists; but they were just as earnest and determined. The Society of the Federal Republicans had been formed in New York to defeat the proposed National Government and to call a second Federal Convention. It opened correspondence in most of the States and had agents and officers in many of them.
New York was overwhelmingly against the Const.i.tution, and her Governor, George Clinton, was the most stubborn and resourceful of its foes. On December 27, 1787, Governor Randolph, under the formal direction of Virginia's Legislature, had sent the Governors of the other States a copy of the act providing for Virginia's Convention, which included the clause for conferring with her sister Commonwealths upon the calling of a new Federal Convention. The one to Clinton of New York was delayed in the mails for exactly two months and eleven days, just long enough to prevent New York's Legislature from acting on it.[1180]
After pondering over it for a month, the New York leader of the Anti-Const.i.tutionalist forces wrote Governor Randolph, more than three weeks before the Virginia Convention a.s.sembled, the now famous letter stating that Clinton was sure that the New York Convention, to be held June 17, ”will, with great cordiality, hold a communication with any sister State on the important subject [a new Federal Convention] and especially with one so respectable in point of importance, ability, and patriotism as Virginia”; and Clinton a.s.sumed that the Virginia Convention would ”commence the measures for holding such communications.”[1181]
When Clinton thus wrote to Randolph, he supposed, of course, that the Virginia Governor was against the Const.i.tution. Had the New York Executive known that Randolph had been proselyted by the Const.i.tutionalists, Clinton would have written to Henry, or Mason, or taken some other means of getting his letter before the Virginia Convention. Randolph kept all knowledge of Clinton's fatal communication from everybody excepting his Executive Council. He did not make it public until after the long, hard struggle was ended; when, for the first time, too late to be of any effect, he laid the New York communication before the Virginia Legislature which a.s.sembled just as the Convention was adjourning.[1182]
Weighty as were the arguments and brilliant the oratory that made the Virginia debate one of the n.o.blest displays of intellect and emotion which the world ever has seen, yet nothing can be plainer than that other practices on both sides of that immortal struggle were more decisive of the result than the amazing forensic duel that took place on the floor of the Convention hall.
When one reflects that although the weight of fact and reason was decisively in favor of the Const.i.tutionalists; that their forces were better organized and more ably led; that they had on the ground to help them the most astute politicians from other States as well as from Virginia; that Was.h.i.+ngton aggressively supported them with all his incalculable moral influence; that, if the new National Government were established, this herculean man surely would be President with all the practical power of that office, of which patronage was not the least--when one considers that, notwithstanding all of these and many other crus.h.i.+ng advantages possessed by the Const.i.tutionalists, their majority, when the test vote finally came, was only eight out of a total vote of one hundred and sixty-eight; when one takes into account the fact that, to make up even this slender majority, one or two members violated their instructions and several others voted against the known will of their const.i.tuents, it becomes plain how vitally necessary to their cause was the Const.i.tutionalists' capture of the Virginia Governor.[1183]
The opponents of the proposed National Government never forgave him nor was his reputation ever entirely reestablished. Mason thereafter scathingly referred to Randolph as ”young A[rno]ld.”[1184]
Answering Randolph, Mason went to the heart of the subject. ”Whether the Const.i.tution be good or bad,” said he, ”it is a national government and no longer a Confederation ... that the new plan provides for.” The power of direct taxation alone ”is calculated to annihilate totally the state governments.” It means, said Mason, individual taxation ”by two different and distinct powers” which ”cannot exist long together; the one will destroy the other.” One National Government is not fitted for an extensive country. ”Popular governments can only exist in small territories.” A consolidated government ”is one of the worst curses that can possibly befall a nation.” Clear as this now was, when the Convention came to consider the Judiciary clause, everybody would, Mason thought, ”be more convinced that this government will terminate in the annihilation of the state governments.”
But here again the author of Virginia's Bill of Rights made a tactical mistake from the standpoint of the management of the fight, although it was big-hearted and statesmanlike in itself. ”If,” said he, ”such amendments be introduced as shall exclude danger ... I shall most heartily make the greatest concessions ... to obtain ... conciliation and unanimity.”[1185] No grindstone, this, to sharpen activity--no hammer and anvil, this, to shape and harden an unorganized opposition into a single fighting blade, wielded to bring victory or even to force honorable compromise. The suggestion of conciliation before the first skirmish was over was not the way to arouse the blood of combat in the loose, undisciplined ranks of the opposition.
Swift as any hawk, the Const.i.tutionalists pounced upon Mason's error, but they seized it gently as a dove. ”It would give me great pleasure,”
cooed Madison, ”to concur with my honorable colleague in any conciliatory plan.” But the hour was now late, and he would postpone further remarks for the time being.[1186]
So the Convention adjourned and the day ended with the Const.i.tutionalists in high spirits.[1187] Madison wrote to Was.h.i.+ngton that ”Henry & Mason made a lame figure & appeared to take different and awkward ground. The Federalists [Const.i.tutionalists][1188] are a good deal elated by the existing prospect.” Nevertheless, the timid Madison fluttered with fear. ”I dare not,” wrote he, ”speak with certainty as to the decision. Kentucky has been extremely tainted and is supposed to be generally adverse, and every possible piece of address is going on privately to work on the local interests & prejudices of that & other quarters.”[1189]
The next day the building of the New Academy, where the Convention met, was packed with an eager throng. Everybody expected Madison to engage both Henry and Mason as he had intimated that he would do. But once more the excellent management of the Const.i.tutionalists was displayed.
Madison, personally, was not popular,[1190] he was physically unimpressive, and strong only in his superb intellect. The time to discharge the artillery of that powerful mind had not yet come. Madison was not the man for this particular moment. But Pendleton was, and so was ”Light-Horse Harry” Lee. The Const.i.tutionalists combined the ermine and the sword. Virginia's most venerated jurist and her most das.h.i.+ng soldier were ordered to the front. In them there was an appeal to much that the Old Dominion still reverenced and loved, in spite of the ”levelling spirit” manifest there as well as in Ma.s.sachusetts and other States. So when all eyes were turned on Madison's seat, they beheld it vacant. Madison had stayed away. Had he been present, he could not have avoided speaking.
Dramatic, indeed, appeared the white-haired, crippled jurist, as, struggling to his feet, he finally stood upon his crutches and faced the Convention. He had been unused to public debate for many years, and was thought to be so infirm that no one expected him to do more than make or decide points of order and give his vote. Yet there the feeble old man stood to answer the resistless Henry and the learned Mason. His ancient friend and brother justice, Wythe, leaned forward from his chair to catch the tones of the beloved voice. Tears rolled down the cheeks of some of the oldest members who for decades had been Pendleton's friends.[1191] The Const.i.tutionalists had set the stage to catch the emotions which they affected to despise, with the very character whose strength was in that pure reasoning on which they pretended solely to rely.
Without wasting a word, Pendleton came to the point. Henry, he said, had declared that all was well before ”this Federal system was thought of.”
Was that accurate? In a few short sentences he showed that it was not.
There was, said Pendleton, ”no quarrel between government and liberty; the former is s.h.i.+eld and protector of the latter. The war is between government and licentiousness, faction, turbulence, and other violations of the rules of society to preserve liberty.” Why are the words ”We, the people,” improper? ”Who but the people have a right to form government?... What have the state governments to do with it?” Had the Federal Convention exceeded its powers? No. Because those powers were ”to propose, not to determine.”
”Suppose,” asked the venerable Pendleton, ”the paper on your table [the Const.i.tution] dropped from one of the planets; the people found it, and sent us here to consider whether it was proper for their adoption; must we not obey them?” Of course. ”Then the question must be between this government and the Confederation,” which ”is no government at all.” The Confederation did not carry us through the war; ”common danger and the spirit of America” did that. The cry ”United we stand--divided we fall,”
which ”echoed and reechoed through America--from Congress to the drunken carpenter”--saved us in that dark hour. And Pendleton clearly, briefly, solidly, answered every objection which Mason and Henry had made.
Nothing could have been more practically effective than his close. He was of no party, Pendleton avowed; and his ”age and situation” proved that nothing but the general good influenced him.[1192]
The smouldering fires in Henry's blood now burned fiercely. This was the same Pendleton who had fought Henry in his immortal resolution on the Stamp Act in 1765 and in every other of those epochal battles for liberty and human rights which Henry had led and won.[1193] But the Const.i.tutionalists gave the old war horse no chance to charge upon his lifelong opponent. A young man, thirty-two years of age, rose, and, standing within a few feet of the chair, was recognized. Six feet tall, beautiful of face, with the resounding and fearless voice of a warrior, Henry Lee looked the part which reputation a.s.signed him. Descended from one of the oldest and most honorable families in the colony, a graduate of Princeton College, one of the most daring, picturesque, and attractive officers of the Revolution, in which by sheer gallantry and military genius he had become commander of a famous cavalry command, the gallant Lee was a perfect contrast to the venerable Pendleton.[1194]
Lee paid tribute to Henry's s.h.i.+ning talents; but, said he, ”I trust that he [Henry] is come to judge, and not to alarm.” Henry had praised Was.h.i.+ngton; yet Was.h.i.+ngton was for the Const.i.tution. What was there wrong with the expression ”We, the people,” since upon the people ”it is to operate, if adopted”? Like every Const.i.tutionalist speaker, Lee painted in somber and forbidding colors the condition of the country, ”all owing to the imbecility of the Confederation.”[1195]
At last Henry secured the floor. At once he struck the major note of the opposition. ”The question turns,” said he, ”on that poor little thing--the expression, 'We, the _people_; instead of the _states_.'” It was an ”alarming transition ... a revolution[1196] as radical as that which separated us from Great Britain.... Sovereignty of the states ...