Part 18 (1/2)

[Sidenote: Suppression.]

As this violence was directed against the revenue laws, Hamilton made it his special task to suppress it. On September 25 the President called out the militia from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia.

Hamilton himself accompanied the troops, fifteen thousand in number; they marched over the mountains, and reached the disaffected country at the end of October. The insurgents made no stand in the field, and the troops returned, after making a few arrests.

The matter now went to the courts. Six persons were indicted for treason, of whom two, Vigol and Mitch.e.l.l, were convicted. They were rough and ignorant men, who had been led into the outbreak without understanding their own responsibility, and Was.h.i.+ngton pardoned them both. In July, 1795, a general amnesty was proclaimed.

[Sidenote: Effect.]

The effect of the whole movement was to make it evident throughout the nation that the United States had at its disposal a military force sufficient to put down any ordinary insurrection. In his message on the subject on Nov. 19, 1794, Was.h.i.+ngton alluded to ”combinations of men who have disseminated suspicions, jealousies, and accusations of the whole government.” The Senate applied these words to ”self-created societies.”

The allusion was to the Democratic clubs, founded in 1793 when Genet came to the country (-- 84), and still in existence. The effect of Was.h.i.+ngton's criticism was to break down the societies and to check a movement which looked toward resistance to all const.i.tuted government. The opposition were compelled to take a less objectionable party name, and began to call themselves Republicans.

87. ELECTION OF JOHN ADAMS (1796).

[Sidenote: Was.h.i.+ngton retires.]

[Sidenote: Nominations.]

On Sept. 17, 1796, Was.h.i.+ngton, in a public address, announced that he should not accept a re-election. The presidency had been irksome to Was.h.i.+ngton, and the personal attacks upon himself had grieved him; but he retired with the admiration and respect of the whole country. The selection of a successor at once became a party question. Jefferson, who had resigned the office of Secretary of State at the end of 1793, was the natural leader of the Republicans. John Adams, then Vice-President, had the largest Federalist following; but Hamilton hoped, by an electoral trick, to bring T. Pinckney, the candidate for Vice-President, in over his head. Adams candidly expressed his opinion of this intrigue: ”That must be a sordid people indeed, a people dest.i.tute of a sense of honor, equity, and character, that could submit to be governed and see hundreds of its most meritorious public men governed by a Pinckney under an elective government.”

[Sidenote: Adams and Jefferson.]

The danger was not, however, from Pinckney, but from Jefferson. When the votes were counted it was found that Adams had received the vote of the Northern States, with Delaware and a part of Maryland; but that Jefferson had received almost the whole vote of the South and of Pennsylvania. Adams became President by a vote of seventy-one, and Jefferson Vice-President by a vote of sixty-eight. The two men had been a.s.sociated in early years, and were not unfriendly to each other. There was even a hint that Jefferson was to be taken into the cabinet. As soon as the administration began, all confidence between them was at an end. The same set of elections decided the members.h.i.+p of Congress to serve from 1797 to 1799; the Senate remained decidedly Federalist; in the House the balance of power was held by a few moderate Republicans.

[Sidenote: Adams's cabinet.]

Adams considered himself the successor to the policy of Was.h.i.+ngton, and committed the serious mistake of taking over his predecessor's cabinet.

Hamilton retired in 1795; he had been replaced by his friend and admirer, Oliver Wolcott; the Secretary of State was Timothy Pickering of Pennsylvania: both these men looked upon Hamilton as their party chief.

The administration began, therefore, with divided counsels, and with jealousy in the President's official household.

88. BREACH WITH FRANCE (1795-1798).

[Sidenote: Monroe's mission.]

While the war-cloud with England was gathering and disappearing, new complications had arisen with France. The Jay treaty was received by that power as an insult, partly because it was favorable to her rival, partly because it removed the danger of war between England and the United States. In 1795 the first period of the Revolution was over, and an efficient government was const.i.tuted, with an executive directory of five.

James Monroe, appointed minister to France, had begun his mission in September, 1794, just after the fall of Robespierre; he appeared in the National Convention, and the president of that body adjured him to ”let this spectacle complete the annihilation of an impious coalition of tyrants.” During Jay's negotiations he continued to a.s.sure the French of the friends.h.i.+p of America, although the Directory speedily declared that Jay's treaty had released France from the treaty of 1778. As Monroe made no effort to push the American claims for captured vessels, he was recalled in disgrace in 1796, and C. C. Pinckney was appointed as his successor.

[Sidenote: Pinckney rebuffed.]

Three weeks after his inauguration Adams received a despatch from Pinckney announcing that he had been treated as a suspected foreigner, and that official notice had been given that the Directory would not receive another minister from the United States until the French grievances had been redressed. A special session of Congress was at once summoned, and the President declared that ”the action of France ought to be repelled with a decision which shall convince France and the world that we are not a degraded people, humiliated under a colonial spirit of fear and sense of inferiority.” Headstrong behavior on the President's part would have immediately brought on war; but he had already made up his mind to send a special mission to France. In June, 1797, John Marshall and Elbridge Gerry, a Republican, but a personal friend of the President, were sent out to join Pinckney in a final representation.

[Sidenote: X. Y. Z. affair.]

It was nearly a year before news of the result was received. On April 2, 1798, the President communicated the despatches revealing the so-called ”X. Y. Z. affair.” It appeared that the envoys on reaching Paris, in October, 1797, had been denied an official interview, but that three persons, whose names were clouded under the initials X. Y. Z., had approached them with vague suggestions of loans and advances; these were finally crystallized into a demand for fifty thousand pounds ”for the pockets of the Directory.” The despatch described one conversation.

”'Gentlemen,' said X., 'you do not speak to the point. It is money. It is expected that you will offer money.' We said that we had spoken to that point very explicitly, that we had given an answer. 'No,' he replied, 'you have not. What is your answer?' We replied, 'It is No, no, no; not a sixpence.'” The President concluded with a ringing paragraph which summed up the indignation of the American people at this insult. ”I will never send another minister to France without a.s.surances that he will be received, respected, and honored as the representative of a great, free, powerful, and independent nation.”

[Sidenote: Naval war with France.]

The Republican opposition in Congress was overwhelmed and almost silenced.