Volume I Part 9 (1/2)
[Footnote 108: _Jefferson's Diary_, Feb. 14, 1801.]
[Footnote 109: James Parton, _Life of Aaron Burr_, p. 272.]
[Footnote 110: _Ibid._, 272.]
[Footnote 111: _Ibid._, 275.]
As the campaign proceeded it became evident to Burr that Republicans were needed as well as Federalists, and a bright young man, William P.
Van Ness, who had accompanied Burr to Albany as a favourite companion, wrote Edward Livingston, the brilliant New York congressman, that ”it is the sense of the Republicans in this State that, after some trials in the House, Mr. Jefferson should be given up for Mr. Burr.”[112]
This was wholly conjectural, and Burr and his young friend knew it; but it was a part of the game, since Burr, so Hamilton wrote Morris, ”perfectly understands himself with Edward Livingston, who will be his agent at the seat of government,” adding that Burr had volunteered the further information ”that the Federalists might proceed in the certainty that, upon a second ballot New York and Tennessee would join him.”[113] There is no doubt Burr believed then, and for some time afterward, that Edward Livingston was his friend, but he did not know that Jefferson had offered the secretarys.h.i.+p of the navy to Edward's brother, the powerful Chancellor,[114] or that the Chancellor's young brother was filling Jefferson's diary with the doings and sayings of those who were interested in Burr's election. Edward got a United States attorneys.h.i.+p for his treachery, and soon after became a defaulter for thirty thousand dollars under circ.u.mstances of culpable carelessness, as the Treasury thought.[115]
[Footnote 112: William P. Van Ness, _Examination of Charges against Aaron Burr_, p. 61.]
[Footnote 113: _Hamilton's Works_ (Lodge), Vol. 8, p. 586.]
[Footnote 114: Jefferson to Livingston, Feb. 24, 1801; _Jefferson's Works_, Vol. 4, p. 360.]
[Footnote 115: Henry Adams, _History of the United States_, Vol. 2, p.
173. _Ibid._, Vol. 1, p. 113.]
The voting began on February 11. On the first ballot eight States voted for Jefferson and six for Burr, Vermont and Maryland being neutralised by an even party division. In this manner the voting continued for six days, through thirty-five ballots, the House taking recesses to give members rest, caucuses opportunity to meet, and the sick time to be brought in on their beds. Finally, on the thirty-sixth ballot, the Vermont Federalist withdrew, and the four Maryland Federalists, with Bayard of Delaware, put in blanks, giving Jefferson ten States and Burr five.
Burr had played his game with the skill of a master. The tactics that elected him to the United States Senate in 1791 and made him a gubernatorial possibility in 1792 were repeated on a larger scale and shrouded in deeper mystery. He had appeared to disavow any intention of supplanting Jefferson, and yet had played for Federalist and Republican support so cleverly that Jefferson p.r.o.nounced his conduct ”honourable and decisive, and greatly embarra.s.sing” to those who tried to ”debauch him from his good faith.” In the evening of the inauguration, President and Vice President received together the congratulations of their countrymen at the presidential mansion. At Albany banqueting Republicans drank the health of ”Aaron Burr, Vice President of the United States; his uniform and patriotic exertions in favour of Republicanism eclipsed only by his late disinterested conduct.”
But when soberer thoughts came the Republican mind was disturbed with the question why Burr, after the Federalists had openly resolved to support him, did not proclaim on the housetop what he had written to Samuel Smith before the tie was known. Gradually the truth began to dawn as men talked and compared notes, and before three months had elapsed Jefferson's estimate of Burr's character corresponded with Hamilton's. It is of record that from 1790 to 1800 Jefferson considered him ”for sale,” and when the Virginians, after twice refusing to vote for him, finally sustained him for Vice President, they did so repenting their act.[116]
[Footnote 116: Henry Adams, _History of the United States_, Vol. 1, p.
229. Jefferson's _Anas_; _Works_, Vol. 9, p. 207.]
It is not easy to indicate the source of Burr's inherent badness. His father, a clergyman of rare scholars.h.i.+p and culture, became, at the age of thirty-two, the second president of Princeton College, while Jonathan Edwards, his maternal grandfather, whose ”Freedom of the Will” made him an intellectual world-force, became its third president; but if one may accept contemporary judgment, Aaron Burr had scarcely one good or great quality of heart. Like Lord Chesterfield, his favourite author, he had intellect without truth or virtue; like Chesterfield, too, he was small in stature and slender.[117] Here, however, the comparison must end if Lord Hervey's description of Chesterfield be accepted, for instead of broad, rough features, and an ugly face, Burr's personal appearance, suggested by the delicately chiselled features in the marble, was the gift of a mother noted for beauty as well as for the inheritance of her father's great intellectuality. Writers never forget the large black eyes, keen and penetrating, so irresistible to gifted and beautiful women. They came from the Edwards side; but from whence came the absence of honour that distinguished this son and grandson of the Princeton presidents, tradition does not inform us.
[Footnote 117: ”When the Senate met at ten o'clock on the morning of March 4, 1801, Aaron Burr stood at the desk, and having duly sworn to support the Const.i.tution took his seat in the chair as Vice President.
This quiet, gentlemanly and rather dignified figure, hardly taller than Madison, and dressed in much the same manner, impressed with favour all who first met him. An aristocrat imbued in the morality of Lord Chesterfield and Napoleon Bonaparte, Colonel Burr was the chosen head of Northern democracy, idol of the wards of New York City, and aspirant to the highest offices he could reach by means legal or beyond the law; for, as he pleased himself with saying after the manner of the First Consul of the French Republic, 'great souls care little for small morals.'”--Henry Adams, _History of the United States_, Vol. 1, p. 195.]
CHAPTER X
JOHN JAY AND DeWITT CLINTON
1800
The election that decided the contest for Jefferson, returned DeWitt Clinton to the State Senate, and a Republican majority to the a.s.sembly. As soon as the Legislature met, therefore, Clinton proposed a new Council of Appointment. Federalists shrieked in amazement at such a suggestion, since the existing Council had served little more than half its term. To this Republicans replied, good naturedly, that although party conditions were reversed, arguments remained the same, and reminded them that in 1794, when an anti-Federalist Council had served only a portion of its term, the Federalists compelled an immediate change. Whatever was fair for Federalists then, they argued, could not be unfair for Republicans now. If it was preposterous, as Josiah Ogden Hoffman had a.s.serted, for a Council to serve out its full term in 1794, it was preposterous for the Council of 1800 to serve out its full term; if Schuyler was right that it was a dangerous and unconst.i.tutional usurpation of power for the anti-Federalist Council to continue its sittings, it was a dangerous and unconst.i.tutional usurpation of power for the Federalist Council of 1800 to continue its sittings. Of course Federalists were wrong in 1794, and Republicans were wrong in 1800, but there was as much poetic justice in the situation as a Republican could desire. As soon as the a.s.sembly had organised, therefore, DeWitt Clinton, Ambrose Spencer, Robert Roseboom, and John Sanders became the Council of Appointment. Sanders was a Federalist, but Roseboom was a Republican, whose pliancy and weakness made him the tool of Clinton and Spencer.
DeWitt Clinton had at last come to his own. Until now his life had been uncheckered by important incident and unmarked by political achievement. He had run rapidly through the grammar school of Little Britain, his native town; through the academy at Kingston, the only one then in the State; through Columbia College, which he entered as a junior at fifteen and from which he graduated at the head of his cla.s.s; and through his law studies with Samuel Jones. In 1789 came an appointment as private secretary to his uncle, George Clinton. When Governor Jay sought the a.s.sistance of another in 1795, Clinton resumed the law; but he continued to practise politics for a living, and at last found himself in the a.s.sembly of 1797. He was then twenty-eight, strong, handsome, and well equipped for any struggle. He had devoted his leisure moments to reading, for which he had a pa.s.sion that lasted him all his lifetime. He was especially fond of scientific studies, and of the active-minded Samuel L. Mitchill, six years his senior, who gave scientific reputation to the whole State.
In spite of his love for science, DeWitt Clinton was a born politician, with all the characteristic incongruities incident to such a life. He had the selfishness of Livingston, the inconsistency of Spencer, the imperiousness of Root, and the ability of a statesman.
Unlike most other men of his party, he did not rely wholly upon discipline and organisation, or upon party fealty and courtesy.
Hamilton had cherished the hope that Clinton might become a Federalist, not because he was a trimmer, or would seek a party in power simply for the spoils in sight, but because he had the breadth and liberality of enlightened opinions, the prophetic instinct, and the force of character to make things go his way, without drifting into success by a fortunate turn in tide and wind. He was not a mere day-dreamer, a theorist, a philosopher, a scholar, although he possessed the gifts of each. He was, rather, a man of action--self-willed, self-reliant, independent--as ambitious as Burr without his slippery ways, and as determined as Hamilton with all his ability to criticise an opponent. Clinton relied not more upon men than upon measures, and in the end the one thing that made him superior to all his contemporaries of the nineteenth century was a never-failing belief in the possibility of success along lines marked out for his life's work.