each other; and instead of those wounding suspicions, and irritating charges with which some of our gazettes are so strongly impregnated, and which cannot fail, if persevered in, of pushing matters to extremity, and thereby tearing the machine asunder, that there might be mutual forbearance and temporising yieldings on all sides. Without these, I do not see how the reins of government are to be managed, or how the union of the states can be much longer preserved.

"How unfortunate would it be if a fabric so goodly, erected under so many providential circumstances, after acquiring in its first stages, so much respectability, should from diversity of sentiment, or internal obstructions to some of the acts of government (for I cannot prevail on myself to believe that these measures are as yet the acts of a determined party) be brought to the verge of dissolution. Melancholy thought! But while it shows the consequences of diversified opinions, where pushed with too much tenacity, it exhibits evidence also of the necessity of accommodation, and of the propriety of adopting such healing measures as may restore harmony to the discordant members of the union, and the governing powers of it.

"I do not mean to apply this advice to any measures which are passed, or to any particular character. I have given it, in the same general terms, to other officers of the government. My earnest wish is that balm may be poured into all the wounds which have been given, to prevent them from gangrening, and to avoid those fatal consequences which the community may sustain if it is withheld. The friends of the union must wish this: those who are not, but who wish to see it rended, will be disappointed; and all things I hope will go well."

NOTE, N. VI....See page 387.

The gazettes of the day contain ample proofs on this subject. All the bitterness of party spirit had poured itself out in the most severe invectives against the heads of the state and treasury departments.

The secretary of the treasury was represented as the advocate of "aristocracy, monarchy, hereditary succession, a titled order of nobility, and all the other mock pageantry of kingly government." He was arraigned at the bar of the public for holding principles unfavourable to the sovereignty of the people, and with inculcating doctrines insinuating their inability to rule themselves. The theory of the British monarchy was said to have furnished his model for a perfect constitution; and all his systems of finance, which were represented as servile imitations of those previously adopted by England, were held up to public execration as being intended to promote the favourite project of assimilating the government of the United States to that of Great Britain. With this view, he had entailed upon the nation a heavy debt, and perpetual taxes; had created an artificial monied interest which had corrupted, and would continue to corrupt the legislature; and was endeavouring to prostrate the local authorities as a necessary step towards erecting that great consolidated monarchy which he contemplated.

To support some of these charges, sentences and parts of sentences were selected from his reports, which expressed the valuable purposes to which a funded debt might be applied, and were alleged to affirm, as an abstract principle, "that a public debt was a public blessing." He was, it was added, the inveterate enemy of Mr. Jefferson, because, in the republican principles of that gentleman, he perceived an invincible obstacle to his views.

If the counter charges exhibited against the secretary of state were less capable of alarming the fears of the public for liberty, and of directing the resentments of the people against that officer as the enemy of their rights, they were not less calculated to irritate his personal friends, and to wound his own feelings.

The adversaries of this gentleman said, that he had been originally hostile to the constitution of the United States, and adverse to its adoption; and " that his avowed opinions tended to national disunion, national insignificance, public disorder, and discredit." Under the garb of democratic simplicity, and

modest retiring philosophy, he covered an inordinate ambition which grasped unceasingly at power, and sought to gra tify itself, by professions of excessive attachment to liberty, and by traducing and lessening in the public esteem, every man in whom he could discern a rival. To this aspiring temper they ascribed, not only "those pestilent whispers which, clandestinely circulating through the country, had, as far as was practicable, contaminated some of its fairest and worthi est characters," but also certain publications affecting the reputation of prominent individuals whom he might consider as competitors with himself for the highest office in the state. A letter written by Mr. Jefferson to a printer, transmitting for publication the first part of " the rights of man," which letter was prefixed to the American edition of that pamphlet, contained allusions to certain "political heresies" of the day, which were understood to imply a serious censure on the opinions of the vice president: and the great object of the national gazette, a paper known to be edited by a clerk in the department of state, was "to calumniate and blacken public characters, and, particularly, to destroy the public confidence in the secretary of the treasury, who was to be hunted down for the unpardonable sin of having been the steady and invariable friend of broad principles of national government." It was also said that his connections with this paper, and the patronage he afforded it, authorized the opinion that it might fairly be considered "the mirror of his views," and thence was adduced an accusation not less serious in its nature than that which has been already stated.

The national gazette was replete with continual and malignant strictures on the great leading measures of the administration, especially those which were connected with the finances. "If Mr. Jefferson's opposition to these measures had ceased when they had received the sanction of law, nothing more could have been said than that he had transgressed the rules of official decorum in entering the lists with the head of another department, and had been culpable in pursuing a line of conduct which was calculated to sow the seeds of discord in the executive branch of the government in the infancy

of its existence. But when his opposition extended beyond that point, when it was apparent that he wished to render odious, and of course to subvert (for in a popular government these are convertible terms) all those deliberate and solemn acts of the legislature which had become the pillars of the public credit, his conduct deserved to be regarded with a still severer eye." It was also said to be peculiarly unfit for a person remaining at the head of one of the great executive departments, openly to employ all his influence in exciting the public rage against the laws and the legislature of the union, and in giving circulation to calumnies against his colleagues in office, from the contamination of which the chief magistrate himself could not hope entirely to escape.

1

NOTE, NO. VII....See page 403.

The following are copies of these interesting questions, and of the letter, which enclosed them.

Sir,

Philadelphia, 18th April, 1793.

"The posture of affairs in Europe, particularly between France and Great Britain, place the United States in a deli cate situation, and require much consideration of the mea sures which will be proper for them to observe in the war between those powers. With a view to forming a general plan of conduct for the executive, I have stated and enclosed sundry questions to be considered preparatory to a meeting at my house to-morrow, where I shall expect to see you at 9 o'clock, and to receive the result of your reflections thereon.

Ques. I. Shall a proclamation issue for the purpose of pre venting interferences of the citizens of the United States in the war between France and Great Britain, &c.? shall it contain a declaration of neutrality or not? what shall it contain? Ques. II. Shall a minister from the republic of France be received?

Ques. III. If received, shall it be absolutely or with quali fications; and if with qualifications, of what kind?

VOL. V.

Ques. IV. Are the United States obliged by good faith to consider the treaties heretofore made with France as applying to the present situation of the parties? may they either renounce them or hold them suspended until the government of France shall be established?

Ques. V. If they have the right, is it expedient to do either? and which?

Ques. VI. If they have an option, would it be a breach of neutrality to consider the treaties still in operation?

Ques. VII. If the treaties are to be considered as now in operation, is the guarantee in the treaty of alliance applicable to a defensive war only, or to war, either offensive or defensive?

Ques. VIII. Does the war in which France is engaged appear to be offensive or defensive on her part? or of a mixed and equivocal character?

Ques. IX. If of a mixed and equivocal character, does the guarantee in any event apply to such a war?

Ques. X. What is the effect of a guarantee, such as that to be found in the treaty of alliance between the United States and France?

Ques. XII. Does any article in either of the treaties prevent ships of war, other than privateers, of the powers opposed to France, from coming into the ports of the United States to act as convoys to their own merchantmen? or does it lay any other restraints upon them more than would apply to the ships of war of France?

Ques. XII. Should the future regent of France send a minister to the United States, ought he to be received?

Ques. XIII. Is it necessary or advisable to call together the two houses of congress with a view to the present posture of European affairs? if it is, what should be the particular objects of such a call?"

NOTE, NO. VIII....See page 409.

The official letter notifying to the convention the appointment of Mr. Genet, contained a communication of a very de