Volume III Part 67 (1/2)
A committee, appointed to devise a method for destroying the records, immediately reported that this should be done by cutting out of the books the leaves containing them. As to the enrolled bill containing the ”usurped act,” an elaborate performance was directed to be held: ”A fire shall be made in front of the State House door, and a line formed by the members of both branches around the same. The Secretary of State[1407] ... shall then produce the enrolled bill and usurped act from among the archives of the State and deliver the same to the President of the Senate, who shall examine the same, and shall then deliver the same to the Speaker of the House of Representatives for like examination; and the Speaker shall then deliver them to the Clerk of the House of Representatives, who shall read aloud the t.i.tle to the same, and shall then deliver them to Messenger of the House, who shall then p.r.o.nounce--'G.o.d SAVE THE STATE!! AND LONG PRESERVE HER RIGHTS!! AND MAY EVERY ATTEMPT TO INJURE THEM PERISH AS THESE CORRUPT ACTS NOW DO!!!!'”[1408]
Every detail of this play was carried out with all theatrical effect.
Indeed, so highly wrought were the imaginations of actors and onlookers that, at the last moment, a final dash of color was added. Some one gifted with dramatic genius suggested that the funeral pyre of such unholy legislation should not be lighted by earthly hands, but by fire from Heaven. A sun-gla.s.s was produced; Senator Jackson held it above the f.a.gots and the pile was kindled from ”the burning rays of the lidless eye of justice.”[1409]
While the State was still in convulsions of anger, a talented young Virginian of impressionable temperament went to Georgia upon a visit to a college friend, Joseph Bryan, and was so profoundly moved by accounts of the attempt to plunder the State, that a hatred of the corrupt plot and of all connected with it became an obsession that lasted as long as he lived.[1410] Thus was planted in the soul of John Randolph that determination which later, when a member of Congress, caused him to attack the Administration of Thomas Jefferson.[1411]
Swift as was the action of the people and legislature of Georgia in attempting to recover the Yazoo lands, it was not so speedy as that of the speculators in disposing of them to purchasers in other States. Most of these investors bought in entire good faith and were ”innocent purchasers.” Some, however, must have been thoroughly familiar with the fraud.[1412] The most numerous sales were made in the Middle States and in New England. The land companies issued a prospectus,[1413] setting out their t.i.tle, which appeared to be, and indeed really was, legally perfect. Thousands of copies of this pamphlet were scattered among provident and moneyed people. Agents of the companies truthfully described the Yazoo country to be rich, the climate mild and healthful, and the land certain of large and rapid rise in value.
Three of the companies[1414] opened an office in Boston, where the spirit of speculation was rampant. Then ensued an epidemic of investment. Throngs of purchasers gathered at the promoters' offices.
Each day prices rose and the excitement increased. Buying and selling of land became the one absorbing business of those who had either money or credit. Some of the most prominent and responsible men in New England acquired large tracts.[1415] The companies received payment partly in cash, but chiefly in notes which were speedily sold in the market for commercial paper. Sales were made in other Northern cities, and many foreigners became purchasers. The average price received was fourteen cents an acre.[1416]
Some New Englanders were suspicious. ”The Georgia land speculation calls for vigor in Congress. Near fifty millions acres sold ... for a song,”
wrote Fisher Ames.[1417] But such cautious men as Ames were few in number and most of them were silent. By the time reports reached Boston that the Legislature of Georgia was about to repeal the act under which the companies had bought the lands, numerous sales, great and small, had been made. In that city alone more than two millions of dollars had been invested, and this had been paid or pledged by ”every cla.s.s of men, even watch-makers, hair-dressers, and mechanics.” The Georgia Company conveyed eleven million acres on the very day that the Legislature of Georgia pa.s.sed the bill declaring the ”usurped act” to be null and void and a.s.serting the t.i.tle of the whole territory still to be in the State.[1418]
Three weeks later, the news of the enactment of the rescinding law was published in the New England metropolis. Anger and apprehension seized the investors. If this legislation were valid, all would lose heavily; some would be financially ruined. So a large number of the purchasers organized the New England Mississippi Company for the purpose of defending their interests. A written opinion upon the validity of their t.i.tles was procured from Alexander Hamilton, who was then practicing law in New York and directing the Federalist Party throughout the Nation.
He was still regarded by most Federalists, and by nearly all moneyed men, as the soundest lawyer, as well as the ablest statesman, in America.
Hamilton's opinion was brief, simple, convincing, and ideally constructed for perusal by investors. It stated the facts of the enactment of the sale law, the fulfillment of the conditions of it by the purchasers, and the pa.s.sage of the rescinding act. Hamilton declared this latter act to be invalid because it plainly violated the contract clause of the Const.i.tution. ”Every grant ... whether [from] ... a state or an individual, is virtually a contract.” The rescinding act was therefore null, and ”the courts of the United States ... will be likely to p.r.o.nounce it so.”[1419]
Soon after its pa.s.sage, President Was.h.i.+ngton had received a copy of the Georgia land sale act. He transmitted it to Congress with a short Message,[1420] stating that the interests of the United States were involved. His princ.i.p.al concern, however, and that of Congress also, was about the Indians. It was feared that depredations by whites would cause another outbreak of the natives. A resolution was adopted authorizing the President to obtain from Georgia the cession of her ”claim to the whole or any part of the land within the ... Indian boundaries,” and recommending that he prevent the making of treaties by individuals or States ”for the extinguishment of the Indian t.i.tle.” But not a word was said in Was.h.i.+ngton's Message, or in the debate in Congress, about the invalidity of the Georgia sale law or the corrupt methods employed to secure the enactment of it.[1421]
Two bills to protect the Indians failed of pa.s.sage.[1422] Just before adjournment the House adopted a Senate resolution which had been offered by Senator Rufus King of New York, requesting that the Attorney-General report to the Senate all data bearing on Georgia's t.i.tle to the territory sold to the land companies; but again the invalidity of the sale law was not even suggested, and the corruption of the Georgia Legislature was not so much as referred to.[1423]
A year later, Charles Lee, Was.h.i.+ngton's Attorney-General, transmitted to Congress an exhaustive report containing all facts.[1424] This report was referred to a special committee, headed by Senator Aaron Burr of New York, who, on May 20, 1796, reported a resolution authorizing the President to treat with Georgia for the cession of the territory.[1425]
Once more no attention was paid to the fraud in the sale act, or to the rescinding act of the Georgia Legislature.
But when the public finally learned of the ”Yazoo Fraud” and of the repudiation by the Georgia Legislature of the corrupt law, the whole country was deeply stirred. A war of pamphlets broke out and was waged by both sides with vigor and ability. Abraham Bishop of New Haven, Connecticut, wrote a comprehensive answer to the prospectus of the land companies, and copies of this pamphlet, which appeared in four parts, were widely circulated.[1426] Georgia had no fee in the lands, said Bishop.[1427] Sales to ”innocent purchasers” could not give them what Georgia had no right to sell. Neither could such a device validate fraud. Much litigation had already grown out of the swindle, and the Georgia rescinding act had ”brought ... matters to a crisis, and one decision of the supreme court of the United States may probably influence the decisions of lower courts.”[1428] Bishop discussed brilliantly, and at length, every possible question involved. The power of the State to pa.s.s and repeal laws was ”wholly uncontrolable,”[1429]
he a.s.serted. The history of other dishonest and imprudent speculations was examined--the South Sea Bubble, the Mississippi Bubble,[1430] and the interposition of the legislative power of Great Britain in the one case and of France in the other. Should like power be denied in America?
Georgia's rescinding act ”nipt in the bud a number of aspiring swindlers.”[1431] Courts could not overthrow such legislation. The ”sacredness of contracts” was the favorite cloak of fraud. Bishop urged buyers to resist the recovery of money pledged in their purchase notes and, by so doing, to restore ”millions of dollars ... to the channels of industry.”[1432]
Hard upon the publication of the first number of Bishop's pamphlet followed one for the land companies and investors. This had been written by Robert Goodloe Harper of Maryland a few months after Hamilton had rendered his opinion that the Georgia grant was inviolable.[1433] It was an able and learned performance. The t.i.tle of Georgia to the lands was carefully examined and held to be indefeasible. The sale of 1795 was set forth and the fact disclosed that Georgia had appropriated one hundred thousand dollars of the purchase money immediately upon the receipt of it.[1434] It was pointed out that the rescinding act ignored this fact.[1435]
Harper argued that only the courts could determine the validity and meaning of a law, and that no Legislature could annul a grant made by a previous one. To the Judiciary alone belonged that power.[1436] The sale law was a contract, fully executed; one party to it could not break that compact.[1437] If Georgia thought the sale act unconst.i.tutional, she should have brought suit in the United States Court to determine that purely judicial question. The same was true as to the allegations of fraud and corruption in the pa.s.sage of the measure. If any power could do so, the courts and they alone could decide the effect of fraud in procuring the enactment of a law. But even the courts were barred from investigating that question: if laws could be invalidated because of the motives of members of lawmaking bodies, ”what a door would be opened to fraud and uncertainty of every kind!”[1438]
Finally, after a long altercation that lasted for nearly three years, Congress enacted a law authorizing the appointment of commissioners to settle the disputes between the National Government and Georgia, and also to secure from that truculent sovereignty the cession to the Nation of the lands claimed by the State.[1439] In the somewhat extended debate over the bill but little was said about the invalidity of the Yazoo sale, and the corruption of the Legislature that directed it to be made was not mentioned.[1440]
Under this act of Congress, Georgia ceded her rights over the disputed territory for one million, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars; provided, however, that the Nation should extinguish the Indian t.i.tles, settle British and Spanish claims, ultimately admit the vast domain as a State of the Union, and reserve five million acres for the purpose of quieting all other demands. A later law[1441] directed the National commissioners, who had negotiated this arrangement with Georgia, to investigate and report upon the claims of individuals and companies to lands within the territory thus ceded to the United States.
At once the purchasers from the land companies, especially the New England investors, besieged Congress to devote part of this five million acres to the salvage of their imperiled money. The report of the commissioners[1442] was wise, just, and statesmanlike. It was laid before the House on February 16, 1803. Although the t.i.tles of the claimants could ”not be supported,” still, because most of the t.i.tles had been acquired in good faith, and because it would be injurious to everybody, including the Nation, to leave the matter unsettled, the report recommended the accommodation of the dispute on terms that would save innocent purchasers at least a part of the money they had paid or legally engaged to pay.[1443]
When a bill to carry out the recommendations of the commission for the payment of the Yazoo claimants came before the House, John Randolph offered a resolution that went directly to the heart of the controversy and of all subsequent ones of like nature. It declared that ”when the governors of any people shall have betrayed” their public trust for their own corrupt advantage, it is the ”inalienable right” of that people ”to abrogate the act thus endeavoring to betray them.”
Accordingly the Legislature of Georgia had pa.s.sed the rescinding act.
This was entirely legal and const.i.tutional because ”a subsequent Legislature of an individual State has an undoubted right to repeal any act of a preceding Legislature, provided such repeal be not forbidden by the const.i.tution of such State, or of the United States.” Neither the fundamental law of Georgia nor of the Nation forbade the repeal of the corrupt law of 1795. Claims under this nullified and ”usurped” law were not recognized by the compact of cession between Georgia and the United States, ”nor by any act of the Federal Government.” Therefore, declared Randolph's resolution, ”no part of the five millions of acres reserved for satisfying and quieting claims ... shall be appropriated to quiet or compensate any claims” derived under the corrupt legislation of the Georgia Legislature of 1795.[1444] After a hot fight, consideration of the resolutions was postponed until the next session; but the bill authorizing the commissioners to compromise with the Yazoo claimants also went over.[1445]
The matter next came up for consideration in the House, just before the trial in the Senate of the impeachment of Justice Samuel Chase. A strong and influential lobby was pressing the compromise. The legislative agents of the New England Mississippi Company[1446]
presented its case with uncommon ability. In a memorial to Congress[1447] they set forth their repeated applications to President, Congress, and the commissioners for protection. They were, they said, ”constantly a.s.sured” that the rights of the claimants would be respected; and that it was expressly for this purpose that the five million acres had been reserved. For years they had attended sittings of the commissioners and sessions of Congress ”at great cost and heavy expense.”