Volume II Part 9 (1/2)

[190] ”Opinion as to the Const.i.tutionality of the Bank of the United States”; _Works_: Lodge, iii, 445-93. Was.h.i.+ngton was sorely perplexed by the controversy and was on the point of vetoing the Bank Bill. (See Rives, iii, 170-71.)

[191] Marshall, ii, 206-07.

[192] Ames to Dwight, Jan. 23, 1792; _Works_: Ames, i, 110-11.

[193] ”A Candid State of Parties”--_National Gazette_, Sept. 26, 1792.

[194] ”I was no party man myself and the first wish of my heart was, if parties did exist, to reconcile them.” (Was.h.i.+ngton to Jefferson, July 6, 1796; _Writings_: Ford, xiii, 230.)

CHAPTER III

LEADING THE VIRGINIA FEDERALISTS

I think nothing better could be done than to make him [Marshall] a judge. (Jefferson to Madison, June 29, 1792.)

To doubt the holiness of the French cause was the certain road to odium and proscription. (Alexander Graydon.)

The trouble and perplexities have worn away my mind. (Was.h.i.+ngton.)

In Richmond, Marshall was growing ever stronger in his belief in Nationalism. Hamilton's immortal plea for a vital interpretation of the fundamental law of the Nation and his demonstration of the const.i.tutionality of extensive implied powers was a clear, compact statement of what Marshall himself had been thinking. The time was coming when he would announce it in language still more lucid, expressive of a reasoning even more convincing. Upon Hamilton's const.i.tutional doctrine John Marshall was to place the seal of finality.[195]

But Marshall did not delay until that great hour to declare his Nationalist opinions. Not only did he fight for them in the House of Delegates; but in his club at Farmicola's Tavern, on the street corners, riding the circuit, he argued for the const.i.tutionality and wisdom of those measures of Was.h.i.+ngton's Administration which strengthened and broadened the powers of the National Government.[196]

Although he spoke his mind, in and out of season, for a cause increasingly unpopular, Marshall, as yet, lost little favor with the people. At a time when political controversy severed friends.h.i.+p and interrupted social relations,[197] his personality still held sway over his a.s.sociates regardless of their political convictions. Even Mason, the ultra-radical foe of broad National powers, wrote, at this heated juncture, that Marshall ”is an intimate friend of mine.”[198]

His winning frankness, easy manner, and warm-heartedness saved him from that dislike which his bold views otherwise would have created.

”Independent principles, talents, and integrity are denounced [in Virginia] as badges of aristocracy; but if you add to these good manners and a decent appearance, his political death is decreed without the benefit of a hearing,” testifies Francis Corbin.[199]

”Independent principles, talents, and integrity” Marshall possessed in fullest measure, as all admitted; but his manners were far from those which men like the modish Corbin called ”good,” and his appearance would not have pa.s.sed muster under the critical eye of that fastidious and disgruntled young Federalist. We shall soon hear Jefferson denouncing Marshall's deportment as the artifice of a cunning and hypocritical craft. As yet, however, Jefferson saw in Marshall only an extremely popular young man who was fast becoming the most effective supporter in Virginia of the National Government.

In the year of the Bank Act, Jefferson and Madison went on their eventful ”vacation,” swinging up the Hudson and through New England.

During this journey Jefferson drew around Madison ”the magic circle”

of his compelling charm and won entirely to the extreme Republican cause[200] the invaluable aid of that superb intellect. In agreement as to common warfare upon the Nationalist measures of the Administration,[201] the two undoubtedly talked over the Virginia Federalists.[202]

Marshall's repeated successes at the polls with a const.i.tuency hostile to the young lawyer's views particularly impressed them. Might not Marshall become a candidate for Congress? If elected, here would be a skillful, dauntless, and captivating supporter of all Nationalist measures in the House of Representatives. What should be done to avert this misfortune?

Jefferson's dexterous intellect devised the idea of getting rid of Marshall, politically, by depositing him on the innocuous heights of the State bench. Better, far better, to make Marshall a Virginia judge than to permit him to become a Virginia Representative in Congress. So, upon his return, Jefferson wrote to Madison:--

”I learn that he [Hamilton] has expressed the strongest desire that Marshall should come into Congress from Richmond, declaring that there is no man in Virginia whom he wishes so much to see there; and I am told that Marshall has expressed half a mind to come. Hence I conclude that Hamilton has plyed him well with flattery & sollicitation and I think nothing better could be done than to make him a judge.”[203]

Hamilton's ”plying” Marshall with ”flattery & solicitation” occurred only in Jefferson's teeming, but abnormally suspicious, mind. Marshall was in Virginia all this time, as his Account Book proves, while Hamilton was in New York, and no letters seem to have pa.s.sed between them.[204] But Jefferson's information that his fellow Secretary wished the Nationalist Richmond attorney in Congress was probably correct.

Accounts of Marshall's striking ability and of his fearless zeal in support of the Administration's measures had undoubtedly reached Hamilton, perhaps through Was.h.i.+ngton himself; and so st.u.r.dy and capable a Federalist in Congress from Virginia would have been of great strategic value.

But Jefferson might have spared his pains to dispose of Marshall by cloistering him on the State bench. Nothing could have induced the busy lawyer to go to Congress at this period. It would have been fatal to his law practice[205] which he had built up until it was the largest in Richmond and upon the returns from which his increasing family depended for support. Six years later, Was.h.i.+ngton himself labored with Marshall for four days before he could persuade him to stand for the National House, and Marshall then yielded to his adored leader only as a matter of duty, at one of the Nation's most critical hours, when war was on the horizon.[206]

The break-up of Was.h.i.+ngton's Cabinet was now approaching. Jefferson was keeping pace with the Anti-Nationalist sentiment of the ma.s.ses--drilling his followers into a sternly ordered political force. ”The discipline of the [Republican] party,” wrote Ames, ”is as severe as the Prussian.”[207] Jefferson and Madison had secured an organ in the ”National Gazette,”[208] edited by Freneau, whom Jefferson employed as translator in the State Department. Through this paper Jefferson attacked Hamilton without mercy. The spirited Secretary of the Treasury keenly resented the opposition of his Cabinet a.s.sociate which was at once covert and open.

In vain the President pathetically begged Jefferson for harmony and peace.[209] Jefferson responded with a bitter attack on Hamilton. ”I was duped,” said he, ”by the Secretary of the Treasury and made a tool for forwarding his schemes, not then sufficiently understood by me.”[210] To somewhat, but not much, better purpose did Was.h.i.+ngton ask Hamilton for ”mutual forbearances.”[211] Hamilton replied with spirit, yet pledged his honor that he would ”not, directly or indirectly, say or do a thing that shall endanger a feud.”[212]

The immense speculation, which had unavoidably grown out of the a.s.sumption and Funding Acts, inflamed popular resentment against the whole financial statesmans.h.i.+p of the Federalists.[213] More material, this, for the hands of the artificer who was fas.h.i.+oning the Republican Party into a capacious vessel into which the people might pour all their discontent, all their fears, all their woes and all their hopes. And Jefferson, with practical skill, used for that purpose whatever material he could find.