The Critical Period of American History
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Title: The Critical Period of American History
Author: John Fiske
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Transcriber's Note
The punctuation and spelling from the original text have been faithfully
preserved. Only obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
THE CRITICAL PERIOD OF
AMERICAN HISTORY
1783-1789
BY
JOHN FISKE
"I am uneasy and apprehensive, more so than during the war."
JAY TO WASHINGTON, _June_ 27, 1786.
[Illustration]
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
Copyright, 1888,
BY JOHN FISKE.
_All rights reserved._
_The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A._ Electrotyped and Printed
by H.O. Houghton & Co.
To
MY DEAR CLASSMATES,
FRANCIS LEE HIGGINSON
AND
CHARLES CABOT JACKSON,
_I DEDICATE THIS BOOK._
PREFACE.
This book contains the substance of the course of lectures given in the
Old South Meeting-House in Boston in December, 1884, at the Washington
University in St. Louis in May, 1885, and in the theatre of the
University Club in New York in March, 1886. In its present shape it may
serve as a sketch of the political history of the United States from the
end of the Revolutionary War to the adoption of the Federal
Constitution. It makes no pretensions to completeness, either as a
summary of the events of that period or as a discussion of the political
questions involved in them. I have aimed especially at grouping facts in
such a way as to bring out and emphasize their causal sequence, and it
is accordingly hoped that the book may prove useful to the student of
American history.
My title was suggested by the fact of Thomas Paine's stopping the
publication of the "Crisis," on hearing the news of the treaty of 1783,
with the remark, "The times that tried men's souls are over." Commenting
upon this, on page 55 of the present work, I observed that so far from
the crisis being over in 1783, the next five years were to be the most
critical time of all. I had not then seen Mr. Trescot's "Diplomatic
History of the Administrations of Washington and Adams," on page 9 of
which he uses almost the same words: "It must not be supposed that the
treaty of peace secured the national life. Indeed, it would be more
correct to say that the most critical period of the country's history
embraced the time between 1783 and the adoption of the Constitution in
1788."
That period was preëminently the turning-point in the development of
political society in the western hemisphere. Though small in their mere
dimensions, the events here summarized were in a remarkable degree
germinal events, fraught with more tremendous alternatives of future
welfare or misery for mankind than it is easy for the imagination to
grasp. As we now stand upon the threshold of that mighty future, in the
light of which all events of the past are clearly destined to seem
dwindled in dimensions and significant only in the ratio of their
potency as causes; as we discern how large a part of that future must be
the outcome of the creative work, for good or ill, of men of English
speech; we are put into the proper mood for estimating the significance
of the causes which determined a century ago that the continent of North
America should be dominated by a single powerful and pacific federal
nation instead of being parcelled out among forty or fifty small
communities, wasting their strength and lowering their moral tone by
perpetual warfare, like the states of ancient Greece, or by perpetual
preparation for warfare, like the nations of modern Europe. In my book
entitled "American Political Ideas, viewed from the Standpoint of
Universal History," I have tried to indicate the pacific influence
likely to be exerted upon the world by the creation and maintenance of
such a political structure as our Federal Union. The present narrative
may serve as a commentary upon what I had in mind on page 133 of that
book, in speaking of the work of our Federal Convention as "the finest
specimen of constructive statesmanship that the world has ever seen." On
such a point it is pleasant to find one's self in accord with a
statesman so wise and noble as Mr. Gladstone, whose opinion is here
quoted on page 223.
To some persons it may seem as if the years 1861-65 were of more
cardinal importance than the years 1783-89. Our civil war was indeed an
event of prodigious magnitude, as measured by any standard that history
affords; and there can be little doubt as to its decisiveness. The
measure of that decisiveness is to be found in the completeness of the
reconciliation that has already, despite the feeble wails of
unscrupulous place-hunters and unteachable bigots, cemented the Federal
Union so powerfully that all likelihood of its disruption may be said to
have disappeared forever. When we consider this wonderful harmony which
so soon has followed the deadly struggle, we may well believe it to be
the index of such a stride toward the ultimate pacification of mankind
as was never made before. But it was the work done in the years 1783-89
that created a federal nation capable of enduring the storm and stress
of the years 1861-65. It was in the earlier crisis that the pliant twig
was bent; and as it was bent, so has it grown; until it has become
indeed a goodly and a sturdy tree.
CAMBRIDGE, October 10, 1888.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
RESULTS OF YORKTOWN. PAGE
Fall of Lord North's ministry 1
Sympathy between British Whigs and the revolutionary
party in America 2
It weakened the Whig party in England 3
Character of Lord Shelburne 4
Political instability of the Rockingham ministry 5, 6
Obstacles in the way of a treaty of peace 7, 8
Oswald talks with Franklin 9-11
Grenville has an interview with Vergennes 12
Effects of Rodney's victory 13
Misunderstanding between Fox and Shelburne 14
Fall of the Rockingham ministry 15
Shelburne becomes prime minister 16
Defeat of the Spaniards and French at Gibraltar 17
French policy opposed to American interests 18
The valley of the Mississippi; Aranda's prophecy 19
The Newfoundland fisheries 20
Jay detects the schemes of Vergennes 21
And sends Dr Vaughan to visit Shelburne 22
John Adams arrives in Paris and joins with Jay in insisting
upon a separate negotiation with England 23, 24
The separate American treaty, as agreed upon:
1. Boundaries 25
2. Fisheries; commercial intercourse 26
3. Private debts 27
4. Compensation of loyalists 28-32
Secret article relating to the Yazoo boundary 33
Vergennes does not like the way in which it has been done 33
On the part of the Americans it was a great diplomatic
victory 34
Which the commissioners won by disregarding the instructions
of Congress and acting on their own responsibility 35
The Spanish treaty 36
The French treaty 37
Coalition of Fox with North 38-42
They attack the American treaty in Parliament 43
And compel Shelburne to resign 44
Which leaves England without a government, while for
several weeks the king is too angry to appoint ministers 44
Until at length he succumbs to the coalition, which presently
adopts and ratifies the American treaty 45
The coalition ministry is wrecked upon Fox's India Bill 46
Constitutional crisis ends in the overwhelming victory of
Pitt in the elections of May, 1784 47
And this, although apparently a triumph for the king, was
really a death-blow to his system of personal government 48, 49
CHAPTER II.
THE THIRTEEN COMMONWEALTHS.
Cessation of hostilities in America 50
Departure of the British troops 51
Washington resigns his command 52
And goes home to Mount Vernon 53
His "legacy" to the American people 54
The next five years were the most critical years in American
history 55
Absence of a sentiment of union, and consequent danger of
anarchy 56, 57
European statesmen, whether hostile or friendly, had little
faith in the stability of the Union 58
False historic analogies 59
Influence of railroad and telegraph upon the perpetuity of
the Union 60
Difficulty of travelling a hundred years ago 61
Local jealousies and antipathies, an inheritance from primeval
savagery 62, 63
Conservative character of the American Revolution 64
State governments remodelled; assemblies continued from
colonial times 65
Origin of the senates in the governor's council of assistants 66
Governors viewed with suspicion 67
Analogies with British institutions 68
The judiciary 69
Restrictions upon suffrage 70
Abolition of primogeniture, entails, and manorial privileges 71
Steps toward the abolition of slavery and the slave-trade 72-75
Progress toward religious freedom 76, 77
Church and state in Virginia 78, 79
Persecution of dissenters 80
Madison and the Religions Freedom Act 81
Temporary overthrow of the church 82
Difficulties in regard to ordination; the case of Mason Weems 83
Ordination of Samuel Seabury by non-jurors at Aberdeen 84
Francis Asbury and the Methodists 85
Presbyterians and Congregationalists 86
Roman Catholics 87
Except in the instance of slavery, all the changes described
in this chapter were favourable to the union of the states 88
But while the state governments, in all these changes, are
seen working smoothly, we have next to observe, by
contrast, the clumsiness and inefficiency of the federal government 89
CHAPTER III.
THE LEAGUE OF FRIENDSHIP.
The several states have never enjoyed complete sovereignty 90
But in the very act of severing their connection with Great
Britain, they entered into some sort of union 91
Anomalous character of the Continental Congress 92
The articles of confederation; they sought to establish a
"league of friendship" between the states 93-97
But failed to create a federal government endowed with real
sovereignty 98-100
Military weakness of the government 101-103
Extreme difficulty of obtaining a revenue 104, 105
Congress, being unable to pay the army, was afraid of it 106
Supposed scheme for making Washington king 107
Greene's experience in South Carolina 108
Gates's staff officers and the Newburgh address 109
The danger averted by Washington 110, 111
Congress driven from Philadelphia by mutinous soldiers 112
The Commutation Act denounced in New England 113
Order of the Cincinnati 114-117
Reasons for the dread which it inspired 118
Congress finds itself unable to carry out the provisions of
the treaty with Great Britain 119
Persecution of the loyalists 120, 121
It was especially severe in New York 122
Trespass Act of 1784 directed against the loyalists 123
Character and early career of Alexander Hamilton 124-126
The case of Rutgers _v._ Waddington 127, 128
Wholesale emigration of Tories 129, 130
Congress unable to enforce payment of debts to British creditors 131
England retaliates by refusing to surrender the fortresses
on the northwestern frontier 132, 133
CHAPTER IV.
DRIFTING TOWARD ANARCHY.
The barbarous superstitions of the Middle Ages concerning
trade were still rife in the eighteenth century 134
The old theory of the uses of a colony 135
Pitt's unsuccessful attempt to secure free trade between
Great Britain and the United States 136
Ship-building in New England 137
British navigation acts and orders in council directed against
American commerce 138
John Adams tried in vain to negotiate a commercial treaty
with Great Britain 139, 140
And could see no escape from the difficulties except in systematic
reprisal 141
But any such reprisal was impracticable, for the several
states imposed conflicting duties 142
Attempts to give Congress the power of regulating commerce
were unsuccessful 143, 144
And the several states began to make commercial war upon one another 145
Attempts of New York to oppress New Jersey and Connecticut 146
Retaliatory measures of the two latter states 147
The quarrel between Connecticut and Pennsylvania over the
possession of the valley of Wyoming 148-150
The quarrel between New York and New Hampshire over
the possession of the Green Mountains 151-153
Failure of American diplomacy because European states
could not tell whether they were dealing with one nation
or with thirteen 154, 155
Failure of American credit; John Adams begging in Holland 156, 157
The Barbary pirates 158
American citizens kidnapped and sold into slavery 159
Lord Sheffield's outrageous pamphlet 160
Tripoli's demand for blackmail 161
Congress unable to protect American citizens 162
Financial distress after the Revolutionary War 163, 164
State of the coinage 165
Cost of the war in money 166
Robert Morris and his immense services 167
The craze for paper money 168
Agitation in the southern and middle states 169-171
Distress in New England 172
Imprisonment for debt 173
Rag-money victorious in Rhode Island; the "Know Ye" measures 174-176
Rag-money defeated in Massachusetts; the Shays insurrection 177-181
The insurrection suppressed by state troops 182
Conduct of the neighbouring states 183
The rebels pardoned 184
Timidity of Congress 185, 186
CHAPTER V.
GERMS OF NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY.
Creation of a national domain beyond the Alleghanies 187, 188
Conflicting claims to the western territory 189
Claims of Massachusetts and Connecticut 189, 190
Claims of New York 190
Virginia's claims 191
Maryland's novel and beneficent suggestion 192
The several states yield their claims in favour of the United
States 193, 194
Magnanimity of Virginia 195
Jefferson proposes a scheme of government for the northwestern
territory 196
Names of the proposed ten states 197
Jefferson wishes to prohibit slavery in the national domain 198
North Carolina's cession of western lands 199
John Sevier and the state of Franklin 200, 201
The northwestern territory 202
Origin of the Ohio company 203
The Ordinance of 1787 204-206
Theory of folkland upon which the ordinance was based 207
Spain, hearing of the secret article in the treaty of 1783,
loses her temper and threatens to shut up the Mississippi
River 208, 209
Gardoqui and Jay 210
Threats of secession in Kentucky and New England 211
Washington's views on the political importance of canals
between east and west 212
His far-sighted genius and self-devotion 213
Maryland confers with Virginia regarding the navigation of
the Potomac 214
The Madison-Tyler motion in the Virginia legislature 215
Convention at Annapolis, Sept 11, 1786 216
Hamilton's address calling for a convention at Philadelphia 217
The impost amendment defeated by the action of New
York; last ounce upon the camel's back 218-220
Sudden changes in popular sentiment 221
The Federal Convention meets at Philadelphia, May, 1787 222
Mr. Gladstone's opinion of the work of the convention 223
The men who were assembled there 224, 225
Character of James Madison 226, 227
The other leading members 228
Washington chosen president of the convention 229
CHAPTER VI.
THE FEDERAL CONVENTION.
Why the proceedings of the convention were kept secret for
so many years 230
Difficulty of the problem to be solved 231
Symptoms of cowardice repressed by Washington's impassioned
speech 232
The root of all the difficulties; the edicts of the federal
government had operated only upon states, not upon
individuals, and therefore could not be enforced without
danger of war 233-233
The Virginia plan, of which Madison was the chief author,
offered a radical cure 236
And was felt to be revolutionary in its character 237-239
Fundamental features of the Virginia plan 240, 241
How it was at first received 242
The House of Representatives must be directly elected by
the people 243
Question as to the representation of states brings out the
antagonism between large and small states 244
William Paterson presents the New Jersey plan; not a
radical cure, but a feeble palliative 245
Straggle between the Virginia and New Jersey plans 246-249
The Connecticut compromise, according to which the national
principle is to prevail in the House of Representatives,
and the federal principle in the Senate,
meets at first with fierce opposition 250, 251
But is at length adopted 252
And proves a decisive victory for Madison and his methods 253
A few irreconcilable members go home in dudgeon 254
But the small states, having been propitiated, are suddenly
converted to Federalism, and make the victory complete 255
Vague dread of the future west 255
The struggle between pro-slavery and anti-slavery parties
began in the convention, and was quieted by two compromises 256
Should representation be proportioned to wealth or to population? 257
Were slaves to be reckoned as persons or as chattels? 258
Attitude of the Virginia statesmen 259
It was absolutely necessary to satisfy South Carolina 260
The three fifths compromise, suggested by Madison, was a
genuine English solution, if ever there was one 261
There was neither rhyme nor reason in it, but for all that,
it was the best solution attainable at the time 262
The next compromise was between New England and South
Carolina as to the foreign slave-trade and the power of
the federal government over commerce 263
George Mason calls the slave-trade an "infernal traffic" 264
And the compromise offends and alarms Virginia 265
Belief in the moribund condition of slavery 266
The foundations of the Constitution were laid in compromise 267
Powers granted to the federal government 268
Use of federal troops in suppressing insurrections 269
Various federal powers 270
Provision for a federal city under federal jurisdiction 271
The Federal Congress might compel the attendance of members 272
Powers denied to the several states 272
Should the federal government he allowed to make its
promissory notes a legal tender in payment of debts?
powerful speech of Gouverneur Morris 273
Emphatic and unmistakable condemnation of paper money
by all the leading delegates 274
The convention refused to grant to the federal government
the power of issuing inconvertible paper, but did not
think an express prohibition necessary 275
If they could have foreseen some recent judgments of the
supreme court, they would doubtless have made the
prohibition explicit and absolute 276
Debates as to the federal executive 277
Sherman's suggestion as to the true relation of the executive
to the legislature 278
There was to be a single chief magistrate, but how should
he be chosen? 279
Objections to an election by Congress 280
Ellsworth and King suggest the device of an electoral college,
which is at first rejected 281
But afterwards adopted 282
Provisions for an election by Congress in the case of a failure
of choice by the electoral college 283
Provisions for counting the electoral votes 284
It was not intended to leave anything to be decided by the
president of the Senate 285
The convention foresaw imaginary dangers, but not the real
ones 286
Hamilton's opinion of the electoral scheme 287
How it has actually worked 288
In this part of its work the convention tried to copy from
the British Constitution 289
In which they supposed the legislative and executive departments
to be distinct and separate 290
Here they were misled by Montesquieu and Blackstone 291
What our government would be if it were really like that
of Great Britain 292-294
In the British government the executive department is not
separated from the legislative 295
Circumstances which obscured the true aspect of the case a
century ago 296-298
The American cabinet is analogous, not to the British cabinet,
but to the privy council 299
The federal judiciary, and its remarkable character 300-301
Provisions for amending the Constitution 302
The document is signed by all but three of the delegates 303
And the convention breaks up 304
With a pleasant remark from Franklin 305
CHAPTER VII.
CROWNING THE WORK.
Franklin lays the Constitution before the legislature of
Pennsylvania 306
It is submitted to Congress, which refers it to the legislatures
of the thirteen states, to be ratified or rejected by
the people in conventions 307
First American parties, Federalists and Antifederalists 308, 309
The contest in Pennsylvania 310
How to make a quorum 311
A war of pamphlets and newspaper squibs 312, 313
Ending in the ratification of the Constitution by Delaware,
Pennsylvania, and New Jersey 314
Rejoicings and mutterings 315
Georgia and Connecticut ratify 316
The outlook in Massachusetts 317, 318
The Massachusetts convention meets 319
And overhauls the Constitution clause by clause 320
On the subject of an army Mr. Nason waxes eloquent 321
The clergymen oppose a religious test 322
And Rev. Samuel West argues on the assumption that all
men are not totally depraved 323
Feeling of distrust in the mountain districts 324
Timely speech of a Berkshire farmer 325, 326
Attitude of Samuel Adams 326, 327
Meeting of mechanics at the Green Dragon 327
Charges of bribery 328
Washington's fruitful suggestion 329
Massachusetts ratifies, but proposes amendments 330
The Long Lane has a turning and becomes Federal Street 331
New Hampshire hesitates, but Maryland ratifies, and all
eyes are turned upon South Carolina 332
Objections of Rawlins Lowndes answered by Cotesworth
Pinckney 333
South Carolina ratifies the Constitution 334
Important effect upon Virginia, where thoughts of a southern
confederacy had been entertained 335, 336
Madison and Marshall prevail in the Virginia convention,
and it ratifies the Constitution 337
New Hampshire had ratified four days before 338
Rejoicings at Philadelphia; riots at Providence and Albany 339
The struggle in New York 340
Origin of the "Federalist" 341-343
Hamilton wins the victory, and New York ratifies 344
All serious anxiety is now at an end; the laggard states,
North Carolina and Rhode Island 345
First presidential election, January 7, 1789; Washington is
unanimously chosen 346
Why Samuel Adams was not selected for vice-president 347
Selection of John Adams 348
Washington's journey to New York, April 16-23 349
His inauguration 350
THE CRITICAL PERIOD OF AMERICAN HISTORY.
CHAPTER I.
RESULTS OF YORKTOWN.
[Sidenote: Sympathy between British Whigs and the revolutionary party in
America.]
The 20th of March, 1782, the day which witnessed the fall of Lord
North's ministry, was a day of good omen for men of English race on both
sides of the Atlantic. Within two years from this time, the treaty which
established the independence of the United States was successfully
negotiated at Paris; and at the same time, as part of the series of
events which resulted in the treaty, there went on in England a rapid
dissolution and reorganization of parties, which ended in the
overwhelming defeat of the king's attempt to make the forms of the
constitution subservient to his selfish purposes, and established the
liberty of the people upon a broader and sounder basis than it had ever
occupied before. Great indignation was expressed at the time, and has
sometimes been echoed by British historians, over the conduct of those
Whigs who never lost an opportunity of expressing their approval of the
American revolt. The Duke of Richmond, at the beginning of the contest,
expressed a hope that the Americans might succeed, because they were in
the right. Charles Fox spoke of General Howe's first victory as "the
terrible news from Long Island." Wraxall says that the celebrated buff
and blue colours of the Whig party were adopted by Fox in imitation of
the Continental uniform; but his unsupported statement is open to
question. It is certain, however, that in the House of Commons the Whigs
habitually alluded to Washington's army as "our army," and to the
American cause as "the cause of liberty;" and Burke, with characteristic
vehemence, declared that he would rather be a prisoner in the Tower with
Mr. Laurens than enjoy the blessings of freedom in company with the men
who were seeking to enslave America. Still more, the Whigs did all in
their power to discourage enlistments, and in various ways so thwarted
and vexed the government that the success of the Americans was by many
people ascribed to their assistance. A few days before Lord North's
resignation, George Onslow, in an able defence of the prime minister,
exclaimed, "Why have we failed so miserably in this war against America,
if not from the support and countenance given to rebellion in this very
House?"
[Sidenote: It weakened the Whigs in England.]
[Sidenote: Character of Lord Shelburne.]
Now the violence of party leaders like Burke and Fox owed much of its
strength, no doubt, to mere rancorousness of party spirit. But, after
making due allowance for this, we must admit that it was essentially
based upon the intensity of their conviction that the cause of English
liberty was inseparably bound up with the defeat of the king's attempt
upon the liberties of America. Looking beyond the quarrels of the
moment, they preferred to have freedom guaranteed, even at the cost of
temporary defeat and partial loss of empire. Time has shown that they
were right in this, but the majority of the people could hardly be
expected to comprehend their attitude. It seemed to many that the great
Whig leaders were forgetting their true character as English statesmen,
and there is no doubt that for many years this was the chief source of
the weakness of the Whig party. Sir Gilbert Elliot said, with truth,
that if the Whigs had not thus to a considerable extent arrayed the
national feeling against themselves, Lord North's ministry would have
fallen some years sooner than it did. The king thoroughly understood the
advantage which accrued to him from this state of things; and with that
short-sighted shrewdness of the mere political wire-puller, in which few
modern politicians have excelled him, he had from the outset preferred
to fight his battle on constitutional questions in America rather than
in England, in order that the national feeling of Englishmen might be
arrayed on his side. He was at length thoroughly beaten on his own
ground, and as the fatal day approached he raved and stormed as he had
not stormed since the spring of 1778, when he had been asked to entrust
the government to Lord Chatham. Like the child who refuses to play when
he sees the game going against him, George threatened to abdicate the
throne and go over to Hanover, leaving his son to get along with the
Whig statesmen. But presently he took heart again, and began to resort
to the same kind of political management which had served him so well in
the earlier years of his reign. Among the Whig statesmen, the Marquis of
Buckingham had the largest political following. He represented the old
Whig aristocracy, his section of the party had been first to urge the
recognition of American independence, and his principal followers were
Fox and Burke. For all these reasons he was especially obnoxious to the
king. On the other hand, the Earl of Shelburne was, in a certain sense,
the political heir of Lord Chatham, and represented principles far more
liberal than those of the Old Whigs. Shelburne was one of the most
enlightened statesmen of his time. He was an earnest advocate of
parliamentary reform and of free trade. He had paid especial attention
to political economy, and looked with disgust upon the whole barbaric
system of discriminative duties and commercial monopolies which had been
so largely instrumental in bringing about the American Revolution. But
being in these respects in advance of his age, Lord Shelburne had but
few followers. Moreover, although a man of undoubted integrity, quite
exempt from sordid or selfish ambition, there was a cynical harshness
about him which made him generally disliked and distrusted. He was so
suspicious of other men that other men were suspicious of him; so that,
in spite of many admirable qualities, he was extremely ill adapted for
the work of a party manager.
It was doubtless for these reasons that the king, when it became clear
that a new government must be formed, made up his mind that Lord
Shelburne would be the safest man to conduct it. In his hands the Whig
power would not be likely to grow too strong, and dissensions would be
sure to arise, from which the king might hope to profit. The first place
in the treasury was accordingly offered to Shelburne; and when he
refused it, and the king found himself forced to appeal to Lord
Rockingham, the manner in which the bitter pill was taken was quite
characteristic of George III. He refused to meet Rockingham in person,
but sent all his communications to him through Shelburne, who, thus
conspicuously singled out as the object of royal preference, was certain
to incur the distrust of his fellow ministers.
[Sidenote: Political instability of the Rockingham ministry.]
The structure of the new cabinet was unstable enough, however, to have
satisfied even such an enemy as the king. Beside Rockingham himself,
Lord John Cavendish, Charles Fox, Lord Keppel, and the Duke of Richmond
were all Old Whigs. To offset these five there were five New Whigs, the
Duke of Grafton, Lords Shelburne, Camden, and Ashburton, and General
Conway; while the eleventh member was none other than the Tory
chancellor, Lord Thurlow, who was kept over from Lord North's ministry.
Burke was made paymaster of the forces, but had no seat in the cabinet.
In this curiously constructed cabinet, the prime minister, Lord
Rockingham, counted for little. Though a good party leader, he was below
mediocrity as a statesman, and his health was failing, so that he could
not attend to business. The master spirits were the two secretaries of
state, Fox and Shelburne, and they wrangled perpetually, while Thurlow
carried the news of all their quarrels to the king, and in cabinet
meetings usually voted with Shelburne. The ministry had not lasted five
weeks when Fox began to predict its downfall. On the great question of
parliamentary reform, which was brought up in May by the young William
Pitt, the government was hopelessly divided. Shelburne's party was in
favour of reform, and this time Fox was found upon the same side, as
well as the Duke of Richmond, who went so far as to advocate universal
suffrage. On the other hand, the Whig aristocracy, led by Rockingham,
were as bitterly opposed as the king himself to any change in the method
of electing parliaments; and, incredible as it may seem, even such a man
as Burke maintained that the old system, rotten boroughs and all, was a
sacred part of the British Constitution, which none could handle rudely
without endangering the country! But in this moment of reaction against
the evil influences which had brought about the loss of the American
colonies, there was a strong feeling in favour of reform, and Pitt's
motion was only lost by a minority of twenty in a total vote of three
hundred. Half a century was to elapse before the reformers were again to
come so near to victory.
But Lord Rockingham's weak and short-lived ministry was nevertheless
remarkable for the amount of good work it did in spite of the king's
dogged opposition. It contained great administrative talent, which made
itself felt in the most adverse circumstances. To add to the
difficulty, the ministry came into office at the critical moment of a
great agitation in Ireland. In less than three months, not only was the
trouble successfully removed, but the important bills for disfranchising
revenue officers and excluding contractors from the House of Commons
were carried, and a tremendous blow was thus struck at the corrupt
influence of the crown upon elections. Burke's great scheme of
economical reform was also put into operation, cutting down the pension
list and diminishing the secret service fund, and thus destroying many
sources of corruption. At no time, perhaps, since the expulsion of the
Stuarts, had so much been done toward purifying English political life
as during the spring of 1782. But during the progress of these important
measures, the jealousies and bickerings in the cabinet became more and
more painfully apparent, and as the question of peace with America came
into the foreground, these difficulties hastened to a crisis.
[Sidenote: Obstacles in the way of a treaty of peace.]
From the policy which George III. pursued with regard to Lord Shelburne
at this time, one would suppose that in his secret heart the king
wished, by foul means since all others had failed, to defeat the
negotiations for peace and to prolong the war. Seldom has there been a
more oddly complicated situation. Peace was to be made with America,
France, Spain, and Holland. Of these powers, America and France were
leagued together by one treaty of alliance, and France and Spain by
another, and these treaties in some respects conflicted with one another
in the duties which they entailed upon the combatants. Spain, though at
war with England for purposes of her own, was bitterly hostile to the
United States; and France, thus leagued with two allies which pulled in
opposite directions, felt bound to satisfy both, while pursuing her own
ends against England. To deal with such a chaotic state of things, an
orderly and harmonious government in England should have seemed
indispensably necessary. Yet on the part of England the negotiation of a
treaty of peace was to be the work of two secretaries of state who were
both politically and personally hostile to each other. Fox, as secretary
of state for foreign affairs, had to superintend the negotiations with
France, Spain, and Holland. Shelburne was secretary of state for home
and colonial affairs; and as the United States were still officially
regarded as colonies, the American negotiations belonged to his
department. With such a complication of conflicting interests, George
III. might well hope that no treaty could be made.
[Sidenote: Oswald talks with Franklin.]
The views of Fox and Shelburne as to the best method of conceding
American independence were very different. Fox understood that France
was really in need of peace, and he believed that she would not make
further demands upon England if American independence should once be
recognized. Accordingly, Fox would have made this concession at once as
a preliminary to the negotiation. On the other hand, Shelburne felt sure
that France would insist upon further concessions, and he thought it
best to hold in reserve the recognition of independence as a
consideration to be bargained for. Informal negotiations began between
Shelburne and Franklin, who for many years had been warm friends. In
view of the impending change of government, Franklin had in March sent a
letter to Shelburne, expressing a hope that peace might soon be
restored. When the letter reached London the new ministry had already
been formed, and Shelburne, with the consent of the cabinet, answered it
by sending over to Paris an agent, to talk with Franklin informally, and
ascertain the terms upon which the Americans would make peace. The
person chosen for this purpose was Richard Oswald, a Scotch merchant,
who owned large estates in America,--a man of very frank disposition and
liberal views, and a friend of Adam Smith. In April, Oswald had several
conversations with Franklin. In one of these conversations Franklin
suggested that, in order to make a durable peace, it was desirable to
remove all occasion for future quarrel; that the line of frontier
between New York and Canada was inhabited by a lawless set of men, who
in time of peace would be likely to breed trouble between their
respective governments; and that therefore it would be well for England
to cede Canada to the United States. A similar reasoning would apply to
Nova Scotia. By ceding these countries to the United States it would be
possible, from the sale of unappropriated lands, to indemnify the
Americans for all losses of private property during the war, and also to
make reparation to the Tories, whose estates had been confiscated. By
pursuing such a policy, England, which had made war on America
unjustly, and had wantonly done it great injuries, would achieve not
merely peace, but reconciliation, with America; and reconciliation, said
Franklin, is "a sweet word." No doubt this was a bold tone for Franklin
to take, and perhaps it was rather cool in him to ask for Canada and
Nova Scotia; but he knew that almost every member of the Whig ministry
had publicly expressed the opinion that the war against America was an
unjust and wanton war; and being, moreover, a shrewd hand at a bargain,
he began by setting his terms high. Oswald doubtless looked at the
matter very much from Franklin's point of view, for on the suggestion of
the cession of Canada he expressed neither surprise nor reluctance.
Franklin had written on a sheet of paper the main points of his
conversation, and, at Oswald's request, he allowed him to take the paper
to London to show to Lord Shelburne, first writing upon it a note
expressly declaring its informal character. Franklin also sent a letter
to Shelburne, describing Oswald as a gentleman with whom he found it
very pleasant to deal. On Oswald's arrival in London, Shelburne did not
show the notes of the conversation to any of his colleagues, except Lord
Ashburton. He kept the paper over one night, and then returned it to
Franklin without any formal answer. But the letter he showed to the
cabinet, and on the 23d of April it was decided to send Oswald back to
Paris, to represent to Franklin that, on being restored to the same
situation in which she was left by the treaty of 1763, Great Britain
would be willing to recognize the independence of the United States.
Fox was authorized to make a similar representation to the French
government, and the person whom he sent to Paris for this purpose was
Thomas Grenville, son of the author of the Stamp Act.
As all British subjects were prohibited from entering into negotiations
with the revolted colonies, it was impossible for Oswald to take any
decisive step until an enabling act should be carried through
Parliament. But while waiting for this he might still talk informally
with Franklin. Fox thought that Oswald's presence in Paris indicated a
desire on Shelburne's part to interfere with the negotiations with the
French government; and indeed, the king, out of his hatred of Fox and
his inborn love of intrigue, suggested to Shelburne that Oswald "might
be a useful check on that part of the negotiation which was in other
hands." But Shelburne paid no heed to this crooked advice, and there is
nothing to show that he had the least desire to intrigue against Fox. If
he had, he would certainly have selected some other agent than Oswald,
who was the most straightforward of men, and scarcely close-mouthed
enough for a diplomatist. He told Oswald to impress it upon Franklin
that if America was to be independent at all she must be independent of
the whole world, and must not enter into any secret arrangement with
France which might limit her entire freedom of action in the future. To
the private memorandum which desired the cession of Canada for three
reasons, his answers were as follows: "1. _By way of
reparation._--Answer. No reparation can be heard of. 2. _To prevent
future wars._--Answer. It is to be hoped that some more friendly method
will be found. 3. _As a fund of indemnification to loyalists._--Answer.
No independence to be acknowledged without their being taken care of."
Besides, added Shelburne, the Americans would be expected to make some
compensation for the surrender of Charleston, Savannah, and the city of
New York, still held by British troops. From this it appears that
Shelburne, as well as Franklin, knew how to begin by asking more than he
was likely to get.
[Sidenote: Grenville has an interview with Vergennes.]
While Oswald submitted these answers to Franklin, Grenville had his
interview with Vergennes, and told him that, if England recognized the
independence of the United States, she should expect France to restore
the islands of the West Indies which she had taken from England. Why
not, since the independence of the United States was the sole avowed
object for which France had gone to war? Now this was on the 8th of May,
and the news of the destruction of the French fleet in the West Indies,
nearly four weeks ago, had not yet reached Europe. Flushed with the
victories of Grasse, and exulting in the prowess of the most formidable
naval force that France had ever sent out, Vergennes not only expected
to keep the islands which he had got, but was waiting eagerly for the
news that he had acquired Jamaica into the bargain. In this mood he
returned a haughty answer to Grenville. He reminded him that nations
often went to war for a specified object, and yet seized twice as much
if favoured by fortune; and, recurring to the instance which rankled
most deeply in the memories of Frenchmen, he cited the events of the
last war. In 1756 England went to war with France over the disputed
right to some lands on the Ohio River and the Maine frontier. After
seven years of fighting she not only kept these lands, but all of
Canada, Louisiana, and Florida, and ousted the French from India into
the bargain. No, said Vergennes, he would not rest content with the
independence of America. He would not even regard such an offer as a
concession to France in any way, or as a price in return for which
France was to make a treaty favourable to England. As regards the
recognition of independence, England must treat directly with America.
[Sidenote: Effects of Rodney's victory.]
[Sidenote: Fall of the Rockingham ministry, July 1, 1782.]
Grenville was disappointed and chagrined by this answer, and the
ministry made up their minds that there would be no use in trying to get
an honourable peace with France for the present. Accordingly, it seemed
better to take Vergennes at his word, though not in the sense in which
he meant it, and, by granting all that the Americans could reasonably
desire, to detach them from the French alliance as soon as possible. On
the 18th of May there came the news of the stupendous victory of Rodney
over Grasse, and all England rang with jubilee. Again it had been shown
that "Britannia rules the wave;" and it seemed that, if America could be
separately pacified, the House of Bourbon might be successfully defied.
Accordingly, on the 23d, five days after the news of victory, the
ministry decided "to propose the independence of America in the first
instance, instead of making it the condition of a general treaty." Upon
this Fox rather hastily maintained that the United States were put at
once into the position of an independent and foreign power, so that the
business of negotiating with them passed from Shelburne's department
into his own. Shelburne, on the other hand, argued that, as the
recognition of independence could not take effect until a treaty of
peace should be concluded, the negotiation with America still belonged
to him, as secretary for the colonies. Following Fox's instructions,
Grenville now claimed the right of negotiating with Franklin as well as
with Vergennes; but as his written credentials only authorized him to
treat with France, the French minister suspected foul play, and turned a
cold shoulder to Grenville. For the same reason, Grenville found
Franklin very reserved and indisposed to talk on the subject of the
treaty. While Grenville was thus rebuffed and irritated he had a talk
with Oswald, in the course of which he got from that simple and
high-minded gentleman the story of the private paper relating to the
cession of Canada, which Franklin had permitted Lord Shelburne to see.
Grenville immediately took offence; he made up his mind that something
underhanded was going on, and that this was the reason for the coldness
of Franklin and Vergennes; and he wrote an indignant letter about it to
Fox. From the wording of this letter, Fox got the impression that
Franklin's proposal was much more serious than it really was. It
naturally puzzled him and made him angry, for the attitude of America
implied in the request for a cession of Canada was far different from
the attitude presumed by the theory that the mere offer of independence
would be enough to detach her from her alliance with France. The plan of
the ministry seemed imperilled. Fox showed Grenville's letter to
Rockingham, Richmond, and Cavendish; and they all inferred that
Shelburne was playing a secret part, for purposes of his own. This was
doubtless unjust to Shelburne. Perhaps his keeping the matter to himself
was simply one more illustration of his want of confidence in Fox; or,
perhaps he did not think it worth while to stir up the cabinet over a
question which seemed too preposterous ever to come to anything. Fox,
however, cried out against Shelburne's alleged duplicity, and made up
his mind at all events to get the American negotiations transferred to
his own department. To this end he moved in the cabinet, on the last day
of June, that the independence of the United States should be
unconditionally acknowledged, so that England might treat as with a
foreign power. The motion was lost, and Fox announced that he should
resign his office. His resignation would probably of itself have broken
up the ministry, but, by a curious coincidence, on the next day Lord
Rockingham died; and so the first British government begotten of
Washington's victory at Yorktown came prematurely to an end.
[Sidenote: Shelburne prime minister.]
The Old Whigs now found some difficulty in choosing a leader. Burke was
the greatest statesman in the party, but he had not the qualities of a
party leader, and his connections were not sufficiently aristocratic.
Fox was distrusted by many people for his gross vices, and because of
his waywardness in politics. In the dissipated gambler, who cast in his
lot first with one party and then with the other, and who had shamefully
used his matchless eloquence in defending some of the worst abuses of
the time, there seemed as yet but little promise of the great reformer
of later years, the Charles Fox who came to be loved and idolized by all
enlightened Englishmen. Next to Fox, the ablest leader in the party was
the Duke of Richmond, but his advanced views on parliamentary reform put
him out of sympathy with the majority of the party. In this
embarrassment, the choice fell upon the Duke of Portland, a man of great
wealth and small talent, concerning whom Horace Walpole observed, "It is
very entertaining that two or three great families should persuade
themselves that they have a hereditary and exclusive right of giving us
a head without a tongue!" The choice was a weak one, and played directly
into the hands of the king. When urged to make the Duke of Portland his
prime minister, the king replied that he had already offered that
position to Lord Shelburne. Hereupon Fox and Cavendish resigned, but
Richmond remained in office, thus virtually breaking his connection with
the Old Whigs. Lord Keppel also remained. Many members of the party
followed Richmond and went over to Shelburne. William Pitt, now
twenty-three years old, succeeded Cavendish as chancellor of the
exchequer; Thomas Townshend became secretary of state for home and
colonies, and Lord Grantham became foreign secretary. The closing days
of Parliament were marked by altercations which showed how wide the
breach had grown between the two sections of the Whig party. Fox and
Burke believed that Shelburne was not only playing a false part, but was
really as subservient to the king as Lord North had been. In a speech
ridiculous for its furious invective, Burke compared the new prime
minister with Borgia and Catiline. And so Parliament was adjourned on
the 11th of July, and did not meet again until December.
[Sidenote: French policy opposed to American interests.]
The task of making a treaty of peace was simplified both by this change
of ministry and by the total defeat of the Spaniards and French at
Gibraltar in September. Six months before, England had seemed worsted in
every quarter. Now England, though defeated in America, was victorious
as regarded France and Spain. The avowed object for which France had
entered into alliance with the Americans was to secure the independence
of the United States, and this point was now substantially gained. The
chief object for which Spain had entered into alliance with France was
to drive the English from Gibraltar, and this point was now decidedly
lost. France had bound herself not to desist from the war until Spain
should recover Gibraltar; but now there was little hope of accomplishing
this, except by some fortunate bargain in the treaty, and Vergennes
tried to persuade England to cede the great stronghold in exchange for
West Florida, which Spain had lately conquered, or for Oran or
Guadaloupe. Failing in this, he adopted a plan for satisfying Spain at
the expense of the United States; and he did this the more willingly as
he had no love for the Americans, and did not wish to see them become
too powerful. France had strictly kept her pledges; she had given us
valuable and timely aid in gaining our independence; and the sympathies
of the French people were entirely with the American cause. But the
object of the French government had been simply to humiliate England,
and this end was sufficiently accomplished by depriving her of her
thirteen colonies.
[Sidenote: The valley of the Mississippi; Aranda's prophecy.]
The immense territory extending from the Alleghany Mountains to the
Mississippi River, and from the border of "West Florida to the Great
Lakes, had passed from the hands of France into those of England at the
peace of 1763; and by the Quebec Act of 1774 England had declared the
southern boundary of Canada to be the Ohio River. At present the whole
territory, from Lake Superior down to the southern boundary of what is
now Kentucky, belonged to the state of Virginia, whose backwoodsmen had
conquered it from England in 1779. In December, 1780, Virginia had
provisionally ceded the portion north of the Ohio to the United States,
but the cession was not yet completed. The region which is now Tennessee
belonged to North Carolina, which had begun to make settlements there as
long ago as 1758. The trackless forests included between Tennessee and
West Florida were still in the hands of wild tribes of Cherokees and
Choctaws, Chickasaws and Creeks. Several thousand pioneers from North
Carolina and Virginia had already settled beyond the mountains, and the
white population was rapidly increasing. This territory the French
government was very unwilling to leave in American hands. The
possibility of enormous expansion which it would afford to the new
nation was distinctly foreseen by sagacious men. Count Aranda, the
representative of Spain in these negotiations, wrote a letter to his
king just after the treaty was concluded, in which he uttered this
notable prophecy: "This federal republic is born a pygmy. A day will
come when it will be a giant, even a colossus, formidable in these
countries. Liberty of conscience, the facility for establishing a new
population on immense lands, as well as the advantages of the new
government, will draw thither farmers and artisans from all the nations.
In a few years we shall watch with grief the tyrannical existence of
this same colossus." The letter went on to predict that the Americans
would presently get possession of Florida and attack Mexico. Similar
arguments were doubtless used by Aranda in his interviews with
Vergennes, and France, as well as Spain, sought to prevent the growth of
the dreaded colossus. To this end Vergennes maintained that the
Americans ought to recognize the Quebec Act, and give up to England all
the territory north of the Ohio River. The region south of this limit
should, he thought, be made an Indian territory, and placed under the
protection of Spain and the United States. A line was to be drawn from
the mouth of the Cumberland River, following that stream about as far
as the site of Nashville, thence running southward to the Tennessee,
thence curving eastward nearly to the Alleghanies, and descending
through what is now eastern Alabama to the Florida line. The territory
to the east of this irregular line was to be under the protection of the
United States; the territory to the west of it was to be under the
protection of Spain. In this division, the settlers beyond the mountains
would retain their connection with the United States, which would not
touch the Mississippi River at any point. Vergennes held that this was
all the Americans could reasonably demand, and he agreed with Aranda
that they had as yet gained no foothold upon the eastern bank of the
great river, unmindful of the fact that at that very moment the
fortresses at Cahokia and Kaskaskia were occupied by American garrisons.
[Illustration: MAP OF NORTH AMERICA,
Showing the Boundaries of the UNITED STATES, CANADA, and the SPANISH
POSSESSIONS, according to the proposals of the Court of France in
1782.]
[Sidenote: The Newfoundland fisheries.]
Upon another important point the views of the French government were
directly opposed to American interests. The right to catch fish on the
banks of Newfoundland had been shared by treaty between France and
England; and the New England fishermen, as subjects of the king of Great
Britain, had participated in this privilege. The matter was of very
great importance, not only to New England, but to the United States in
general. Not only were the fisheries a source of lucrative trade to the
New England people, but they were the training-school of a splendid race
of seamen, the nursery of naval heroes whose exploits were by and by to
astonish the world. To deprive the Americans of their share in these
fisheries was to strike a serious blow at the strength and resources of
the new nation. The British government was not inclined to grant the
privilege, and on this point Vergennes took sides with England, in order
to establish a claim upon her for concessions advantageous to France in
some other quarter. With these views, Vergennes secretly aimed at
delaying the negotiations; for as long as hostilities were kept up, he
might hope to extort from his American allies a recognition of the
Spanish claims and a renouncement of the fisheries, simply by
threatening to send them no further assistance in men or money. In order
to retard the proceedings, he refused to take any steps whatever until
the independence of the United States should first be irrevocably
acknowledged by Great Britain, without reference to the final settlement
of the rest of the treaty. In this Vergennes was supported by Franklin,
as well as by Jay, who had lately arrived in Paris to take part in the
negotiations. But the reasons of the American commissioners were very
different from those of Vergennes. They feared that, if they began to
treat before independence was acknowledged, they would be unfairly dealt
with by France and Spain, and unable to gain from England the
concessions upon which they were determined.
[Sidenote: Jay detects the schemes of Vergennes.]
Jay soon began to suspect the designs of the French minister. He found
that he was sending M. de Rayneval as a secret emissary to Lord
Shelburne under an assumed name; he ascertained that the right of the
United States to the Mississippi valley was to be denied; and he got
hold of a dispatch from Marbois, the French secretary of legation at
Philadelphia, to Vergennes, opposing the American claim to the
Newfoundland fisheries. As soon as Jay learned these facts, he sent his
friend Dr. Benjamin Vaughan to Lord Shelburne to put him on his guard,
and while reminding him that it was greatly for the interest of England
to dissolve the alliance between America and France, he declared himself
ready to begin the negotiations without waiting for the recognition of
independence, provided that Oswald's commission should speak of the
thirteen United States of America, instead of calling them colonies and
naming them separately. This decisive step was taken by Jay on his own
responsibility, and without the knowledge of Franklin, who had been
averse to anything like a separate negotiation with England. It served
to set the ball rolling at once. After meeting the messengers from Jay
and Vergennes, Lord Shelburne at once perceived the antagonism that had
arisen between the allies, and promptly took advantage of it. A new
commission was made out for Oswald, in which the British government
first described our country as the United States; and early in October
negotiations were begun and proceeded rapidly. On the part of England,
the affair was conducted by Oswald, assisted by Strachey and
Fitzherbert, who had succeeded Grenville. In the course of the month
John Adams arrived in Paris, and a few weeks later Henry Laurens, who
had been exchanged for Lord Cornwallis and released from the Tower, was
added to the company. Adams had a holy horror of Frenchmen in general,
and of Count Vergennes in particular. He shared that common but mistaken
view of Frenchmen which regards them as shallow, frivolous, and
insincere; and he was indignant at the position taken by Vergennes on
the question of the fisheries. In this, John Adams felt as all New
Englanders felt, and he realized the importance of the question from a
national point of view, as became the man who in later years was to earn
lasting renown as one of the chief founders of the American navy. His
behaviour on reaching Paris was characteristic. It is said that he left
Count Vergennes to learn of his arrival through the newspapers. It was
certainly some time before he called upon him, and he took occasion,
besides, to express his opinions about republics and monarchies in terms
which courtly Frenchmen thought very rude.
[Sidenote: Franklin overruled by Jay and Adams.]
The arrival of Adams fully decided the matter as to a separate
negotiation with England. He agreed with Jay that Vergennes should be
kept as far as possible in the dark until everything was cut and dried,
and Franklin was reluctantly obliged to yield. The treaty of alliance
between France and the United States had expressly stipulated that
neither power should ever make peace without the consent of the other,
and in view of this Franklin was loth to do anything which might seem
like abandoning the ally whose timely interposition had alone enabled
Washington to achieve the crowning triumph of Yorktown. In justice to
Vergennes, it should be borne in mind that he had kept strict faith
with us in regard to every point that had been expressly stipulated; and
Franklin, who felt that he understood Frenchmen better than his
colleagues, was naturally unwilling to seem behindhand in this respect.
At the same time, in regard to matters not expressly stipulated,
Vergennes was clearly playing a sharp game against us; and it is
undeniable that, without departing technically from the obligations of
the alliance, Jay and Adams--two men as honourable as ever lived--played
a very sharp defensive game against him. The traditional French subtlety
was no match for Yankee shrewdness. The treaty with England was not
concluded until the consent of France had been obtained, and thus the
express stipulation was respected; but a thorough and detailed agreement
was reached as to what the purport of the treaty should be, while our
not too friendly ally was kept in the dark. The annals of modern
diplomacy have afforded few stranger spectacles. With the indispensable
aid of France we had just got the better of England in fight, and now we
proceeded amicably to divide territory and commercial privileges with
the enemy, and to make arrangements in which the ally was virtually
ignored. It ceases to be a paradox, however, when we remember that with
the change of government in England some essential conditions of the
case were changed. The England against which we had fought was the
hostile England of Lord North; the England with which we were now
dealing was the friendly England of Shelburne and Pitt. For the moment,
the English race, on both sides of the Atlantic, was united in its main
purpose and divided only by questions of detail, while the rival
colonizing power, which sought to work in a direction contrary to the
general interests of English-speaking people, was in great measure
disregarded.
[Sidenote: The separate American treaty, as agreed upon: 1. Boundaries;]
As soon as the problem was thus virtually reduced to a negotiation
between the American commissioners and Lord Shelburne's ministry, the
air was cleared in a moment. The principal questions had already been
discussed between Franklin and Oswald. Independence being first
acknowledged, the question of boundaries came up for settlement. England
had little interest in regaining the territory between the Alleghanies
and the Mississippi, the forts in which were already held by American
soldiers, and she relinquished all claim upon it. The Mississippi River
thus became the dividing line between the United States and the Spanish
possessions, and its navigation was made free alike to British and
American ships. Franklin's suggestion of a cession of Canada and Nova
Scotia was abandoned without discussion. It was agreed that the boundary
line should start at the mouth of the river St. Croix, and, running to a
point near Lake Madawaska in the highlands separating the Atlantic
watershed from that of the St. Lawrence, should follow these highlands
to the head of the Connecticut River, and then descend the middle of the
river to the forty-fifth parallel, thence running westward and through
the centre of the water communications of the Great Lakes to the Lake of
the Woods, thence to the source of the Mississippi, which was supposed
to be west of this lake. This line was marked in red ink by Oswald on
one of Mitchell's maps of North America, to serve as a memorandum
establishing the precise meaning of the words used in the description.
It ought to have been accurately fixed in its details by surveys made
upon the spot; but no commissioners were appointed for this purpose. The
language relating to the northeastern portion of the boundary contained
some inaccuracies which were revealed by later surveys, and the map used
by Oswald was lost. Hence a further question arose between Great Britain
and the United States, which was finally settled by the Ashburton treaty
in 1842.
[Sidenote: 2. Fisheries; commercial intercourse;]
The Americans retained the right of catching fish on the banks of
Newfoundland and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but lost the right of
drying their fish on the Newfoundland coast. On the other hand, no
permission was given to British subjects to fish on the coasts of the
United States. As regarded commercial intercourse, Jay sought to
establish complete reciprocal freedom between the two countries, and a
clause was proposed to the effect that "all British merchants and
merchant ships, on the one hand, shall enjoy in the United States, and
in all places belonging to them, the same protection and commercial
privileges, and be liable only to the same charges and duties as their
own merchants and merchant ships; and, on the other hand, the merchants
and merchant ships of the United States shall enjoy in all places
belonging to his Britannic Majesty the same protection and commercial
privileges, and be liable only to the same charges and duties as British
merchants and merchant ships, saving always to the chartered trading
companies of Great Britain such exclusive use and trade, and the
respective ports and establishments, as neither the other subjects of
Great Britain nor any the most favoured nation participate in."
Unfortunately for both countries, this liberal provision was rejected on
the ground that the ministry had no authority to interfere with the
Navigation Act.
[Sidenote: 3. Private debts;]
Only two questions were now left to be disposed of,--the question of
paying private debts, and that of compensating the American loyalists
for the loss of property and general rough treatment which they had
suffered. There were many old debts outstanding from American to British
merchants. These had been for the most part incurred before 1775, and
while many honest debtors, impoverished during the war, felt unable to
pay, there were doubtless many others who were ready to take advantage
of circumstances and refuse the payment which they were perfectly able
to make. It was scarcely creditable to us that any such question should
have arisen. Franklin, indeed, argued that these debts were more than
fully offset by damages done to private property by British soldiers:
as, for example, in the wanton raids on the coasts of Connecticut and
Virginia in 1779, or in Prevost's buccaneering march against Charleston.
To cite these atrocities, however, as a reason for the non-payment of
debts legitimately owed to innocent merchants in London and Glasgow was
to argue as if two wrongs could make a right. The strong sense of John
Adams struck at once to the root of the matter. He declared "he had no
notion of cheating anybody. The questions of paying debts and
compensating Tories were two." This terse statement carried the day, and
it was finally decided that all private debts on either side, whether
incurred before or after 1775, remained still binding, and must be
discharged at their full value in sterling money.
[Sidenote: 4. Compensation of loyalists.]
The last question of all was the one most difficult to settle. There
were many loyalists in the United States who had sacrificed everything
in the support of the British cause, and it was unquestionably the duty
of the British government to make every possible effort to insure them
against further injury, and, if practicable, to make good their losses
already incurred. From Virginia and the New England states, where they
were few in number, they had mostly fled, and their estates had been
confiscated. In New York and South Carolina, where they remained in
great numbers, they were still waging a desultory war with the patriots,
which far exceeded in cruelty and bitterness the struggle between the
regular armies. In many cases they had, at the solicitation of the
British government, joined the invading army, and been organized into
companies and regiments. The regular troops defeated at King's Mountain,
and those whom Arnold took with him to Virginia, were nearly all
American loyalists. Lord Shelburne felt that it would be wrong to
abandon these unfortunate men to the vengeance of their fellow
countrymen, and he insisted that the treaty should contain an amnesty
clause providing for the restoration of the Tories to their civil
rights, with compensation for their confiscated property. However
disagreeable such a course might seem to the victorious Americans, there
were many precedents for it in European history. It had indeed come to
be customary at the close of civil wars, and the effect of such a policy
had invariably been good. Cromwell, in his hour of triumph, inflicted no
disabilities upon his political enemies; and when Charles II. was
restored to the throne the healing effect of the amnesty act then passed
was so great that historians sometimes ask what in the world had become
of that Puritan party which a moment before had seemed supreme in the
land. At the close of the war of the Spanish Succession, the rebellious
people of Catalonia were indemnified for their losses, at the request of
England, and with a similar good effect. In view of such European
precedents, Vergennes agreed with Shelburne as to the propriety of
securing compensation and further immunity for the Tories in America.
John Adams insinuated that the French minister took this course because
he foresaw that the presence of the Tories in the United States would
keep the people perpetually divided into a French party and an English
party; but such a suspicion was quite uncalled for. There is no reason
to suppose that in this instance Vergennes had anything at heart but the
interests of humanity and justice.
On the other hand, the Americans brought forward very strong reasons why
the Tories should not be indemnified by Congress. First, as Franklin
urged, many of them had, by their misrepresentations to the British
government, helped to stir up the disputes which led to the war; and as
they had made their bed, so they must lie in it. Secondly, such of them
as had been concerned in burning and plundering defenceless villages,
and wielding the tomahawk in concert with bloodthirsty Indians, deserved
no compassion. It was rather for them to make compensation for the
misery they had wrought. Thirdly, the confiscated Tory property had
passed into the hands of purchasers who had bought it in good faith and
could not now be dispossessed, and in many cases it had been distributed
here and there and lost sight of. An estimate of the gross amount might
be made, and a corresponding sum appropriated for indemnification. But,
fourthly, the country was so impoverished by the war that its own
soldiers, the brave men whose heroic exertions had won the independence
of the United States, were at this moment in sore distress for the want
of the pay which Congress could not give them, but to which its honour
was sacredly pledged. The American government was clearly bound to pay
its just debts to the friends who had suffered so much in its behalf
before it should proceed to entertain a chimerical scheme for satisfying
its enemies. For, fifthly, any such scheme was in the present instance
clearly chimerical. The acts under which Tory property had been
confiscated were acts of state legislatures, and Congress had no
jurisdiction over such a matter. If restitution was to be made, it must
be made by the separate states. The question could not for a moment be
entertained by the general government or its agents.
Upon these points the American commissioners were united and inexorable.
Various suggestions were offered in vain by the British. Their troops
still held the city of New York, and it was doubtful whether the
Americans could hope to capture it in another campaign. It was urged
that England might fairly claim in exchange for New York a round sum of
money wherewith the Tories might be indemnified. It was further urged
that certain unappropriated lands in the Mississippi valley might be
sold for the same purpose. But the Americans would not hear of buying
one of their own cities, whose independence was already acknowledged by
the first article of the treaty which recognized the independence of the
United States and as for the western lands, they were wanted as a means
of paying our own war debts and providing for our veteran soldiers.
Several times Shelburne sent word to Paris that he would break off the
negotiation unless the loyalist claims were in some way recognized. But
the Americans were obdurate. They had one advantage, and knew it.
Parliament was soon to meet, and it was doubtful whether Lord Shelburne
could command a sufficient majority to remain long in office. He was,
accordingly, very anxious to complete the treaty of peace, or at least
to detach America from the French alliance, as soon as possible. The
American commissioners were also eager to conclude the treaty. They had
secured very favourable terms, and were loth to run any risk of
spoiling what had been done. Accordingly, they made a proposal in the
form of a compromise, which nevertheless settled the point in their
favour. The matter, they said, was beyond the jurisdiction of Congress,
but they agreed that Congress should _recommend_ to the several states
to desist from further proceedings against the Tories, and to reconsider
their laws on this subject; it should further recommend that persons
with claims upon confiscated lands might be authorized to use legal
means of recovering them, and to this end might be allowed to pass to
and fro without personal risk for the term of one year. The British
commissioners accepted this compromise, unsatisfactory as it was,
because it was really impossible to obtain anything better without
throwing the whole negotiation overboard. The constitutional difficulty
was a real one indeed. As Adams told Oswald, if the point were further
insisted upon, Congress would be obliged to refer it to the several
states, and no one could tell how long it might be before any decisive
result could be reached in this way. Meanwhile, the state of war would
continue, and it would be cheaper for England to indemnify the loyalists
herself than to pay the war bills for a single month. Franklin added
that, if the loyalists were to be indemnified, it would be necessary
also to reckon up the damage they had done in burning houses and
kidnapping slaves, and then strike a balance between the two accounts;
and he gravely suggested that a special commission might be appointed
for this purpose. At the prospect of endless discussion which this
suggestion involved, the British commissioners gave way and accepted the
American terms, although they were frankly told that too much must not
be expected from the recommendation of Congress. The articles were
signed on the 30th of November, six days before the meeting of
Parliament. Hostilities in America were to cease at once, and upon the
completion of the treaty the British fleets and armies were to be
immediately withdrawn from every place which they held within the limits
of the United States. A supplementary and secret article provided that
if England, on making peace with Spain, should recover West Florida, the
northern boundary of that province should be a line running due east
from the mouth of the Yazoo River to the Chattahoochee.
[Sidenote: Vergennes does not like the way in which it has been done.]
Thus by skilful diplomacy the Americans had gained all that could
reasonably be asked, while the work of making a general peace was
greatly simplified. It was declared in the preamble that the articles
here signed were provisional, and that the treaty was not to take effect
until terms of peace should be agreed on between England and France.
Without delay, Franklin laid the whole matter, except the secret
article, before Vergennes, who forthwith accused the Americans of
ingratitude and bad faith. Franklin's reply, that at the worst they
could only be charged with want of diplomatic courtesy, has sometimes
been condemned as insincere, but on inadequate grounds. He had consented
with reluctance to the separate negotiation, because he did not wish to
give France any possible ground for complaint, whether real or
ostensible. There does not seem, however, to have been sufficient
justification for so grave a charge as was made by Vergennes. If the
French negotiations had failed until after the overthrow of the
Shelburne ministry; if Fox, on coming into power, had taken advantage of
the American treaty to continue the war against France; and if under
such circumstances the Americans had abandoned their ally, then
undoubtedly they would have become guilty of ingratitude and treachery.
There is no reason for supposing that they would ever have done so, had
the circumstances arisen. Their preamble made it impossible for them
honourably to abandon France until a full peace should be made, and more
than this France could not reasonably demand. The Americans had kept to
the strict letter of their contract, as Vergennes had kept to the strict
letter of his, and beyond this they meted out exactly the same measure
of frankness which they received. To say that our debt of gratitude to
France was such as to require us to acquiesce in her scheme for
enriching our enemy Spain at our expense is simply childish. Franklin
was undoubtedly right. The commissioners may have been guilty of a
breach of diplomatic courtesy, but nothing more. Vergennes might be
sarcastic about it for the moment, but the cordial relations between
France and America remained undisturbed.
[Sidenote: A great diplomatic victory.]
On the part of the Americans the treaty of Paris was one of the most
brilliant triumphs in the whole history of modern diplomacy. Had the
affair been managed by men of ordinary ability, some of the greatest
results of the Revolutionary War would probably have been lost; the new
republic would have been cooped up between the Atlantic Ocean and the
Alleghany Mountains; our westward expansion would have been impossible
without further warfare in which European powers would have been
involved; and the formation of our Federal Union would doubtless have
been effectively hindered, if not, indeed, altogether prevented. To the
grand triumph the varied talents of Franklin, Adams, and Jay alike
contributed. To the latter is due the credit of detecting and baffling
the sinister designs of France; but without the tact of Franklin this
probably could not have been accomplished without offending France in
such wise as to spoil everything. It is, however, to the rare
discernment and boldness of Jay, admirably seconded by the sturdy Adams,
that the chief praise is due. The turning-point of the whole affair was
the visit of Dr. Vaughan to Lord Shelburne. The foundation of success
was the separate negotiation with England, and here there had stood in
the way a more formidable obstacle than the mere reluctance of Franklin.
The chevalier Luzerne and his secretary Marbois had been busy with
Congress, and that body had sent well-meant but silly and pusillanimous
instructions to its commissioners at Paris to be guided in all things by
the wishes of the French court. To disregard such instructions required
all the lofty courage for which Jay and Adams were noted, and for the
moment it brought upon them something like a rebuke from Congress,
conveyed in a letter from Robert Livingston. As Adams said, in his
vehement way, "Congress surrendered their own sovereignty into the hands
of a French minister. Blush! blush! ye guilty records! blush and perish!
It is glory to have broken such infamous orders." True enough; the
commissioners knew that in diplomacy, as in warfare, to the agent at a
distance from his principal some discretionary power must be allowed.
They assumed great responsibility, and won a victory of incalculable
grandeur.
[Sidenote: The Spanish treaty.]
The course of the Americans produced no effect upon the terms obtained
by France, but it seriously modified the case with Spain. Unable to
obtain Gibraltar by arms, that power hoped to get it by diplomacy; and
with the support of France she seemed disposed to make the cession of
the great fortress an ultimatum, without which the war must go on.
Shelburne, on his part, was willing to exchange Gibraltar for an island
in the West Indies; but it was difficult to get the cabinet to agree on
the matter, and the scheme was violently opposed by the people, for the
heroic defence of the stronghold had invested it with a halo of romance
and endeared it to every one. Nevertheless, so persistent was Spain, and
so great the desire for peace on the part of the ministry, that they had
resolved to exchange Gibraltar for Guadaloupe, when the news arrived of
the treaty with America. The ministers now took a bold stand, and
refused to hear another word about giving up Gibraltar. Spain scolded,
and threatened a renewal of hostilities, but France was unwilling to
give further assistance, and the matter was settled by England's
surrendering East Florida, and allowing the Spaniards to keep West
Florida and Minorca, which were already in their hands.
[Sidenote: The French treaty.]
By the treaty with France, the West India islands of Grenada, St.
Vincent, St. Christopher, Dominica, Nevis, and Montserrat were restored
to England, which in turn restored St. Lucia and ceded Tobago to France.
The French were allowed to fortify Dunkirk, and received some slight
concessions in India and Africa; they retained their share in the
Newfoundland fisheries, and recovered the little neighbouring islands of
St. Pierre and Miquelon. For the fourteen hundred million francs which
France had expended in the war, she had the satisfaction of detaching
the American colonies from England, thus inflicting a blow which it was
confidently hoped would prove fatal to the maritime power of her ancient
rival; but beyond this short-lived satisfaction, the fallaciousness of
which events were soon to show, she obtained very little. On the 20th of
January, 1783, the preliminaries of peace were signed between England,
on the one hand, and France and Spain, on the other. A truce was at the
same time concluded with Holland, which was soon followed by a peace, in
which most of the conquests on either side were restored.
[Sidenote: Coalition of Fox with North.]
A second English ministry was now about to be wrecked on the rock of
this group of treaties. Lord Shelburne's government had at no time been
a strong one. He had made many enemies by his liberal and reforming
measures, and he had alienated most of his colleagues by his reserved
demeanour and seeming want of confidence in them. In December several
of the ministers resigned. The strength of parties in the House of
Commons was thus quaintly reckoned by Gibbon: "Minister 140; Reynard 90;
Boreas 120; the rest unknown or uncertain." But "Reynard" and "Boreas"
were now about to join forces in one of the strangest coalitions ever
known in the history of politics. No statesman ever attacked another
more ferociously than Fox had attacked North during the past ten years.
He had showered abuse upon him; accused him of "treachery and
falsehood," of "public perfidy," and "breach of a solemn specific
promise;" and had even gone so far as to declare to his face a hope that
he would be called upon to expiate his abominable crimes upon the
scaffold. Within a twelvemonth he had thus spoken of Lord North and his
colleagues: "From the moment when I shall make any terms with one of
them, I will rest satisfied to be called the most infamous of mankind. I
would not for an instant think of a coalition with men who, in every
public and private transaction as ministers, have shown themselves void
of every principle of honour and honesty. In the hands of such men I
would not trust my honour even for a moment." Still more recently, when
at a loss for words strong enough to express his belief in the
wickedness of Shelburne, he declared that he had no better opinion of
that man than to deem him capable of forming an alliance with North. We
may judge, then, of the general amazement when, in the middle of
February, it turned out that Fox had himself done this very thing. An
"ill-omened marriage," William Pitt called it in the House of Commons.
"If this ill-omened marriage is not already solemnized, I know a just
and lawful impediment, and in the name of the public safety I here
forbid the banns." Throughout the country the indignation was great.
Many people had blamed Fox for not following up his charges by actually
bringing articles of impeachment against Lord North. That the two
enemies should thus suddenly become leagued in friendship seemed utterly
monstrous. It injured Fox extremely in the opinion of the country, and
it injured North still more, for it seemed like a betrayal of the king
on his part, and his forgiveness of so many insults looked
mean-spirited. It does not appear, however, that there was really any
strong personal animosity between North and Fox. They were both men of
very amiable character, and almost incapable of cherishing resentment.
The language of parliamentary orators was habitually violent, and the
huge quantities of wine which gentlemen in those days used to drink may
have helped to make it extravagant. The excessive vehemence of political
invective often deprived it of half its effect. One day, after Fox had
exhausted his vocabulary of abuse upon Lord George Germaine, Lord North
said to him, "You were in very high feather to-day, Charles, and I am
glad you did not fall upon me." On another occasion, it is said that
while Fox was thundering against North's unexampled turpitude, the
object of his furious tirade cosily dropped off to sleep. Gibbon, who
was the friend of both statesmen, expressly declares that they bore
each other no ill will. But while thus alike indisposed to harbour
bitter thoughts, there was one man for whom both Fox and North felt an
abiding distrust and dislike; and that man was Lord Shelburne, the prime
minister.
As a political pupil of Burke, Fox shared that statesman's distrust of
the whole school of Lord Chatham, to which Shelburne belonged. In many
respects these statesmen were far more advanced than Burke, but they did
not sufficiently realize the importance of checking the crown by means
of a united and powerful ministry. Fox thoroughly understood that much
of the mischief of the past twenty years, including the loss of America,
had come from the system of weak and divided ministries, which gave the
king such great opportunity for wreaking his evil will. He had himself
been a member of such a ministry, which had fallen seven months ago.
When the king singled out Shelburne for his confidence, Fox naturally
concluded that Shelburne was to be made to play the royal game, as North
had been made to play it for so many years. This was very unjust to
Shelburne, but there is no doubt that Fox was perfectly honest in his
belief. It seemed to him that the present state of things must be
brought to an end, at whatever cost. A ministry strong enough to curb
the king could be formed only by a coalescence of two out of the three
existing parties. A coalescence of Old and New Whigs had been tried last
spring, and failed. It only remained now to try the effect of a
coalescence of Old Whigs and Tories.
Such was doubtless the chief motive of Fox in this extraordinary move.
The conduct of North seems harder to explain, but it was probably due to
a reaction of feeling on his part. He had done violence to his own
convictions out of weak compassion for George III., and had carried on
the American war for four years after he had been thoroughly convinced
that peace ought to be made. Remorse for this is said to have haunted
him to the end of his life. When in his old age he became blind, he bore
this misfortune with his customary lightness of heart; and one day,
meeting the veteran Barré, who had also lost his eyesight, he exclaimed,
with his unfailing wit, "Well, colonel, in spite of all our differences,
I suppose there are no two men in England who would be gladder to _see_
each other than you and I." But while Lord North could jest about his
blindness, the memory of his ill-judged subservience to the king was
something that he could not laugh away, and among his nearest friends he
was sometimes heard to reproach himself bitterly. When, therefore, in
1783, he told Fox that he fully agreed with him in thinking that the
royal power ought to be curbed, he was doubtless speaking the truth. No
man had a better right to such an opinion than he had gained through
sore experience. In his own ministry, as he said to Fox, he took the
system as he found it, and had not vigour and resolution enough to put
an end to it; but he was now quite convinced that in such a country as
England, while the king should be treated with all outward show of
respect, he ought on no account to be allowed to exercise any real
power.
Now this was in 1783 the paramount political question in England, just
as much as the question of secession was paramount in the United States
in 1861. Other questions could be postponed; the question of curbing the
king could not. Upon this all-important point North had come to agree
with Fox; and as the principal motive of their coalition may be thus
explained, the historian is not called upon to lay too much stress upon
the lower motives assigned in profusion by their political enemies. This
explanation, however, does not quite cover the case. The mass of the
Tories would never follow North in an avowed attempt to curb the king,
but they agreed with the followers of Fox, though not with Fox himself,
in holy horror of parliamentary reform, and were alarmed by a recent
declaration of Shelburne that the suffrage must be extended so as to
admit a hundred new county members. Thus while the two leaders were
urged to coalescence by one motive, their followers were largely swayed
by another, and this added much to the mystery and general
unintelligibleness of the movement. In taking this step Fox made the
mistake which was characteristic of the Old Whig party. He gave too
little heed to the great public outside the walls of the House of
Commons. The coalition, once made, was very strong in Parliament, but it
mystified and scandalized the people, and this popular disapproval by
and by made it easy for the king to overthrow it.
[Sidenote: Fall of Shelburne's ministry.]
It was agreed to choose the treaty as the occasion for the combined
attack upon the Shelburne ministry. North, as the minister who had
conducted the unsuccessful war, was bound to oppose the treaty, in any
case. It would not do for him to admit that better terms could not have
been made. The treaty was also very unpopular with Fox's party, and with
the nation at large. It was thought that too much territory had been
conceded to the Americans, and fault was found with the article on the
fisheries. But the point which excited most indignation was the virtual
abandonment of the loyalists, for here the honour of England was felt to
be at stake. On this ground the treaty was emphatically condemned by
Burke, Sheridan, and Wilberforce, no less than by North. It was ably
defended in the Commons by Pitt, and in the Lords by Shelburne himself,
who argued that he had but the alternative of accepting the terms as
they stood, or continuing the war; and since it had come to this, he
said, without spilling a drop of blood, or incurring one fifth of the
expense of a year's campaign, the comfort and happiness of the American
loyalists could be easily secured. By this he meant that, should America
fail to make good their losses, it was far better for England to
indemnify them herself than to prolong indefinitely a bloody and ruinous
struggle. As we shall hereafter see, this liberal and enlightened policy
was the one which England really pursued, so far as practicable, and her
honour was completely saved. That Shelburne and Pitt were quite right
there can now be little doubt. But argument was of no avail against the
resistless power of the coalition. On the 17th of February Lord John
Cavendish moved an amendment to the ministerial address on the treaty,
refusing to approve it. On the 21st he moved a further amendment
condemning the treaty. Both motions were carried, and on the 24th Lord
Shelburne resigned. He did not dissolve Parliament and appeal to the
country, partly because he was aware of his personal unpopularity, and
partly because, in spite of the general disgust at the coalition, there
was little doubt that on the particular question of the treaty the
public opinion agreed with the majority in Parliament, and not with the
ministry. For this reason, Pitt, though personally popular, saw that it
was no time for him to take the first place in the government, and when
the king proceeded to offer it to him he declined.
[Sidenote: The king's wrath.]
[Sidenote: The treaty is adopted, after all, by the coalition ministry,
which presently falls.]
For more than five weeks, while the treasury was nearly empty, and the
question of peace or war still hung in the balance, England was without
a regular government, while the angry king went hunting for some one who
would consent to be his prime minister. He was determined not to submit
to the coalition. He was naturally enraged at Lord North for turning
against him. Meeting one day North's father, Lord Guilford, he went up
to him, tragically wringing his hands, and exclaimed in accents of woe,
"Did I ever think, my Lord Guilford, that your son would thus have
betrayed me into the hands of Mr. Fox?" He appealed in vain to Lord
Gower, and then to Lord Temple, to form a ministry. Lord Gower suggested
that perhaps Thomas Pitt, cousin of William, might be willing to serve.
"I desired him," said the king, "to apply to Mr. Thomas Pitt, or Mr.
Thomas anybody." It was of no use. By the 2d of April Parliament had
become furious at the delay, and George was obliged to yield. The Duke
of Portland was brought in as nominal prime minister, with Fox as
foreign secretary, North as secretary for home and colonies, Cavendish
as chancellor of the exchequer, and Keppel as first lord of the
admiralty. The only Tory in the cabinet, excepting North, was Lord
Stormont, who became president of the council. The commissioners,
Fitzherbert and Oswald, were recalled from Paris, and the Duke of
Manchester and David Hartley, son of the great philosopher, were
appointed in their stead. Negotiations continued through the spring and
summer. Attempts were made to change some of the articles, especially
the obnoxious article concerning the loyalists, but all to no purpose.
Hartley's attempt to negotiate a mutually advantageous commercial treaty
with America also came to nothing. The definitive treaty which was
finally signed on the 3d of September, 1783, was an exact transcript of
the treaty which Shelburne had made, and for making which the present
ministers had succeeded in turning him out of office. No more emphatic
justification of Shelburne's conduct of this business could possibly
have been obtained.
The coalition ministry did not long survive the final signing of the
treaty. The events of the next few months are curiously instructive as
showing the quiet and stealthy way in which a political revolution may
be consummated in a thoroughly conservative and constitutional country.
Early in the winter session of Parliament Fox brought in his famous bill
for organizing the government of the great empire which Clive and
Hastings had built up in India. Popular indignation at the ministry had
been strengthened by its adopting the same treaty of peace for the
making of which it had assaulted Shelburne; and now, on the passage of
the India Bill by the House of Commons, there was a great outcry. Many
provisions of the bill were exceedingly unpopular, and its chief object
was alleged to be the concentration of the immense patronage of India
into the hands of the old Whig families. With the popular feeling thus
warmly enlisted against the ministry, George III. was now emboldened to
make war on it by violent means; and, accordingly, when the bill came up
in the House of Lords, he caused it to be announced, by Lord Temple,
that any peer who should vote in its favour would be regarded as an
enemy by the king. Four days later the House of Commons, by a vote of
153 to 80, resolved that "to report any opinion, or pretended opinion,
of his majesty upon any bill or other proceeding depending in either
house of Parliament, with a view to influence the votes of the members,
is a high crime and misdemeanour, derogatory to the honour of the crown,
a breach of the fundamental privileges of Parliament, and subversive of
the constitution of this country." A more explicit or emphatic defiance
to the king would have been hard to frame. Two days afterward the Lords
rejected the India Bill, and on the next day, the 18th of December,
George turned the ministers out of office.
[Sidenote: Constitutional crisis, ending in the overwhelming victory of
Pitt, May, 1784.]
In this grave constitutional crisis the king invited William Pitt to
form a government, and this young statesman, who had consistently
opposed the coalition, now saw that his hour was come. He was more than
any one else the favourite of the people. Fox's political reputation was
eclipsed, and North's was destroyed, by their unseemly alliance. People
were sick of the whole state of things which had accompanied the
American war. Pitt, who had only come into Parliament in 1780, was free
from these unpleasant associations. The unblemished purity of his life,
his incorruptible integrity, his rare disinterestedness, and his
transcendent ability in debate were known to every one. As the worthy
son of Lord Chatham, whose name was associated with the most glorious
moment of English history, he was peculiarly dear to the people. His
position, however, on taking supreme office at the instance of a king
who had just committed an outrageous breach of the constitution, was
extremely critical, and only the most consummate skill could have won
from the chaos such a victory as he was about to win. When he became
first lord of the treasury and chancellor of the exchequer, in December,
1783, he had barely completed his twenty-fifth year. All his colleagues
in the new cabinet were peers, so that he had to fight single-handed in
the Commons against the united talents of Burke and Sheridan, Fox and
North; and there was a heavy majority against him, besides. In view of
this adverse majority, it was Pitt's constitutional duty to dissolve
Parliament and appeal to the country. But Fox, unwilling to imperil his
great majority by a new election, now made the fatal mistake of opposing
a dissolution; thus showing his distrust of the people and his dread of
their verdict. With consummate tact, Pitt allowed the debates to go on
till March, and then, when the popular feeling in his favour had grown
into wild enthusiasm, he dissolved Parliament. In the general election
which followed, 160 members of the coalition lost their seats, and Pitt
obtained the greatest majority that has ever been given to an English
minister.
[Sidenote: Overthrow of George III.'s system of personal government.]
Thus was completed the political revolution in England which was set on
foot by the American victory at Yorktown. Its full significance was only
gradually realized. For the moment it might seem that it was the king
who had triumphed. He had shattered the alliance which had been formed
for the purpose of curbing him, and the result of the election had
virtually condoned his breach of the constitution. This apparent
victory, however, had been won only by a direct appeal to the people,
and all its advantages accrued to the people, and not to George III. His
ingenious system of weak and divided ministries, with himself for
balance-wheel, was destroyed. For the next seventeen years the real
ruler of England was not George III., but William Pitt, who, with his
great popular following, wielded such a power as no English sovereign
had possessed since the days of Elizabeth. The political atmosphere was
cleared of intrigue; and Fox, in the legitimate attitude of leader of
the new opposition, entered upon the glorious part of his career. There
was now set in motion that great work of reform which, hindered for a
while by the reaction against the French revolutionists, won its
decisive victory in 1832. Down to the very moment at which American and
British history begin to flow in distinct and separate channels, it is
interesting to observe how closely they are implicated with each other.
The victory of the Americans not only set on foot the British revolution
here described, but it figured most prominently in each of the political
changes that we have witnessed, down to the very eve of the overthrow of
the coalition. The system which George III. had sought to fasten upon
America, in order that he might fasten it upon England, was shaken off
and shattered by the good people of both countries at almost the same
moment of time.
CHAPTER II.
THE THIRTEEN COMMONWEALTHS.
[Sidenote: Departure of the British troops, Nov. 25, 1783.]
[Sidenote: Washington resigns his command, Dec. 23.]
"The times that tried men's souls are over," said Thomas Paine in the
last number of the "Crisis," which he published after hearing that the
negotiations for a treaty of peace had been concluded. The preliminary
articles had been signed at Paris on the 20th of January, 1783. The news
arrived in America on the 23d of March, in a letter to the president of
Congress from Lafayette, who had returned to France soon after the
victory at Yorktown. A few days later Sir Guy Carleton received his
orders from the ministry to proclaim a cessation of hostilities by land
and sea. A similar proclamation made by Congress was formally
communicated to the army by Washington on the 19th of April, the eighth
anniversary of the first bloodshed on Lexington green. Since Wayne had
driven the British from Georgia, early in the preceding year, there had
been no military operations between the regular armies. Guerrilla
warfare between Whig and Tory had been kept up in parts of South
Carolina and on the frontier of New York, where Thayendanegea was still
alert and defiant; while beyond the mountains the tomahawk and
scalping-knife had been busy, and Washington's old friend and comrade,
Colonel Crawford, had been scorched to death by the firebrands of the
red demons; but the armies had sat still, awaiting the peace which every
one felt sure must speedily come. After Cornwallis's surrender,
Washington marched his army back to the Hudson, and established his
headquarters at Newburgh. Rochambeau followed somewhat later, and in
September joined the Americans on the Hudson; but in December the French
army marched to Boston, and there embarked for France. After the formal
cessation of hostilities on the 19th of April, 1783, Washington granted
furloughs to most of his soldiers; and these weather-beaten veterans
trudged homeward in all directions, in little groups of four or five,
depending largely for their subsistence on the hospitality of the
farm-houses along the road. Arrived at home, their muskets were hung
over the chimney-piece as trophies for grandchildren to be proud of, the
stories of their exploits and their sufferings became household legends,
and they turned the furrows and drove the cattle to pasture just as in
the "old colony times." Their furloughs were equivalent to a full
discharge, for on the 3d of September the definitive treaty was signed,
and the country was at peace. On the 3d of November the army was
formally disbanded, and on the 25th of that month Sir Guy Carleton's
army embarked from New York. Small British garrisons still remained in
the frontier posts of Ogdensburg, Oswego, Niagara, Erie, Sandusky,
Detroit, and Mackinaw, but by the terms of the treaty these places were
to be promptly surrendered to the United States. On the 4th of December
a barge waited at the South Ferry in New York to carry General
Washington across the river to Paulus Hook. He was going to Annapolis,
where Congress was in session, in order to resign his command. At
Fraunces's Tavern, near the ferry, he took leave of the officers who so
long had shared his labours. One after another they embraced their
beloved commander, while there were few dry eyes in the company. They
followed him to the ferry, and watched the departing boat with hearts
too full for words, and then in solemn silence returned up the street.
At Philadelphia he handed to the comptroller of the treasury a neatly
written manuscript, containing an accurate statement of his expenses in
the public service since the day when he took command of the army. The
sums which Washington had thus spent out of his private fortune amounted
to $64,315. For his personal services he declined to take any pay. At
noon of the 23d, in the presence of Congress and of a throng of ladies
and gentlemen at Annapolis, the great general gave up his command, and
requested as an "indulgence" to be allowed to retire into private life.
General Mifflin, who during the winter of Valley Forge had conspired
with Gates to undermine the confidence of the people in Washington, was
now president of Congress, and it was for him to make the reply. "You
retire," said Mifflin, "from the theatre of action with the blessings of
your fellow-citizens, but the glory of your virtues will not terminate
with your military command; it will continue to animate remotest ages."
The next morning Washington hurried away to spend Christmas at his
pleasant home at Mount Vernon, which, save for a few hours in the autumn
of 1781, he had not set eyes on for more than eight years. His estate
had suffered from his long absence, and his highest ambition was to
devote himself to its simple interests. To his friends he offered
unpretentious hospitality. "My manner of living is plain," he said, "and
I do not mean to be put out of it. A glass of wine and a bit of mutton
are always ready, and such as will be content to partake of them are
always welcome. Those who expect more will be disappointed." To
Lafayette he wrote that he was now about to solace himself with those
tranquil enjoyments of which the anxious soldier and the weary statesman
know but little. "I have not only retired from all public employments,
but I am retiring within myself, and shall be able to view the solitary
walk and tread the paths of private life with heartfelt satisfaction.
Envious of none, I am determined to be pleased with all; and this, my
dear friend, being the order of my march, I will move gently down the
stream of life until I sleep with my fathers."
[Sidenote: His "legacy" to the American people, June 8, 1783.]
In these hopes Washington was to be disappointed. "All the world is
touched by his republican virtues," wrote Luzerne to Vergennes, "but it
will be useless for him to try to hide himself and live the life of a
private man: he will always be the first citizen of the United States."
It indeed required no prophet to foretell that the American people could
not long dispense with the services of this greatest of citizens.
Washington had already put himself most explicitly on record as the
leader of the men who were urging the people of the United States toward
the formation of a more perfect union. The great lesson of the war had
not been lost on him. Bitter experience of the evils attendant upon the
weak government of the Continental Congress had impressed upon his mind
the urgent necessity of an immediate and thorough reform. On the 8th of
June, in view of the approaching disbandment of the army, he had
addressed to the governors and presidents of the several states a
circular letter, which he wished to have regarded as his legacy to the
American people. In this letter he insisted upon four things as
essential to the very existence of the United States as an independent
power. First, there must be an indissoluble union of all the states
under a single federal government, which must possess the power of
enforcing its decrees; for without such authority it would be a
government only in name. Secondly, the debts incurred by Congress for
the purpose of carrying on the war and securing independence must be
paid to the uttermost farthing. Thirdly, the militia system must be
organized throughout the thirteen states on uniform principles.
Fourthly, the people must be willing to sacrifice, if need be, some of
their local interests to the common weal; they must discard their local
prejudices, and regard one another as fellow-citizens of a common
country, with interests in the deepest and truest sense identical.
[Sidenote: Absence of a sentiment of union, and consequent danger of
anarchy.]
The unparalleled grandeur of Washington's character, his heroic
services, and his utter disinterestedness had given him such a hold upon
the people as scarcely any other statesman known to history, save
perhaps William the Silent, has ever possessed. The noble and sensible
words of his circular letter were treasured up in the minds of all the
best people in the country, and when the time for reforming the weak and
disorderly government had come it was again to Washington that men
looked as their leader and guide. But that time had not yet come. Only
through the discipline of perplexity and tribulation could the people be
brought to realize the indispensable necessity of that indissoluble
union of which Washington had spoken. Thomas Paine was sadly mistaken
when, in the moment of exultation over the peace, he declared that the
trying time was ended. The most trying time of all was just beginning.
It is not too much to say that the period of five years following the
peace of 1783 was the most critical moment in all the history of the
American people. The dangers from which we were saved in 1788 were even
greater than the dangers from which we were saved in 1865. In the War of
Secession the love of union had come to be so strong that thousands of
men gave up their lives for it as cheerfully and triumphantly as the
martyrs of older times, who sang their hymns of praise even while their
flesh was withering in the relentless flames. In 1783 the love of union,
as a sentiment for which men would fight, had scarcely come into
existence among the people of these states. The souls of the men of
that day had not been thrilled by the immortal eloquence of Webster, nor
had they gained the historic experience which gave to Webster's words
their meaning and their charm. They had not gained control of all the
fairest part of the continent, with domains stretching more than three
thousand miles from ocean to ocean, and so situated in geographical
configuration and commercial relations as to make the very idea of
disunion absurd, save for men in whose minds fanaticism for the moment
usurped the place of sound judgment. The men of 1783 dwelt in a long,
straggling series of republics, fringing the Atlantic coast, bordered on
the north and south and west by two European powers whose hostility they
had some reason to dread. But nine years had elapsed since, in the first
Continental Congress, they had begun to act consistently and
independently in common, under the severe pressure of a common fear and
an immediate necessity of action. Even under such circumstances the war
had languished and come nigh to failure simply through the difficulty of
insuring concerted action. Had there been such a government that the
whole power of the thirteen states could have been swiftly and
vigorously wielded as a unit, the British, fighting at such disadvantage
as they did, might have been driven to their ships in less than a year.
The length of the war and its worst hardships had been chiefly due to
want of organization. Congress had steadily declined in power and in
respectability; it was much weaker at the end of the war than at the
beginning; and there was reason to fear that as soon as the common
pressure was removed the need for concerted action would quite cease to
be felt, and the scarcely formed Union would break into pieces. There
was the greater reason for such a fear in that, while no strong
sentiment had as yet grown up in favour of union, there was an intensely
powerful sentiment in favour of local self-government. This feeling was
scarcely less strong as between states like Connecticut and Rhode
Island, or Maryland and Virginia, than it was between Athens and Megara,
Argos and Sparta, in the great days of Grecian history. A most wholesome
feeling it was, and one which needed not so much to be curbed as to be
guided in the right direction. It was a feeling which was shared by some
of the foremost Revolutionary leaders, such as Samuel Adams and Richard
Henry Lee. But unless the most profound and delicate statesmanship
should be forthcoming, to take this sentiment under its guidance, there
was much reason to fear that the release from the common adhesion to
Great Britain would end in setting up thirteen little republics, ripe
for endless squabbling, like the republics of ancient Greece and
mediæval Italy, and ready to become the prey of England and Spain, even
as Greece became the prey of Macedonia.
[Sidenote: False historic analogies.]
As such a lamentable result was dreaded by Washington, so by statesmen
in Europe it was generally expected, and by our enemies it was eagerly
hoped for. Josiah Tucker, Dean of Gloucester, was a far-sighted man in
many things; but he said, "As to the future grandeur of America, and
its being a rising empire under one head, whether republican or
monarchical, it is one of the idlest and most visionary notions that
ever was conceived even by writers of romance. The mutual antipathies
and clashing interests of the Americans, their difference of
governments, habitudes, and manners, indicate that they will have no
centre of union and no common interest. They never can be united into
one compact empire under any species of government whatever; a disunited
people till the end of time, suspicious and distrustful of each other,
they will be divided and subdivided into little commonwealths or
principalities, according to natural boundaries, by great bays of the
sea, and by vast rivers, lakes, and ridges of mountains." Such were the
views of a liberal-minded philosopher who bore us no ill-will. George
III. said officially that he hoped the Americans would not suffer from
the evils which in history had always followed the throwing off of
monarchical government: which meant, of course, that he hoped they
_would_ suffer from such evils. He believed we should get into such a
snarl that the several states, one after another, would repent and beg
on their knees to be taken back into the British empire. Frederick of
Prussia, though friendly to the Americans, argued that the mere extent
of country from Maine to Georgia would suffice either to break up the
Union, or to make a monarchy necessary. No republic, he said, had ever
long existed on so great a scale. The Roman republic had been
transformed into a despotism mainly by the excessive enlargement of its
area. It was only little states, like Venice, Switzerland, and Holland,
that could maintain a republican government. Such arguments were common
enough a century ago, but they overlooked three essential differences
between the Roman republic and the United States. The Roman republic in
Cæsar's time comprised peoples differing widely in blood, in speech, and
in degree of civilization; it was perpetually threatened on all its
frontiers by powerful enemies; and representative assemblies were
unknown to it. The only free government of which the Roman knew anything
was that of the primary assembly or town meeting. On the other hand, the
people of the United States were all English in speech, and mainly
English in blood. The differences in degree of civilization between such
states as Massachusetts and North Carolina were considerable, but in
comparison with such differences as those between Attika and Lusitania
they might well be called slight. The attacks of savages on the frontier
were cruel and annoying, but never since the time of King Philip had
they seemed to threaten the existence of the white man. A very small
military establishment was quite enough to deal with the Indians. And to
crown all, the American people were thoroughly familiar with the
principle of representation, having practised it on a grand scale for
four centuries in England, and for more than a century in America. The
governments of the thirteen states were all similar, and the political
ideas of one were perfectly intelligible to all the others. It was
essentially fallacious, therefore, to liken the case of the United
States to that of ancient Rome.
[Sidenote: Influence of railroad and telegraph upon perpetuity of the
American Union.]
But there was another feature of the case which was quite hidden from
the men of 1783. Just before the assembling of the first Continental
Congress James Watt had completed his steam-engine; in the summer of
1787, while the Federal Convention was sitting at Philadelphia, John
Fitch launched his first steamboat on the Delaware River; and
Stephenson's invention of the locomotive was to follow in less than half
a century. Even with all other conditions favourable, it is doubtful if
the American Union could have been preserved to the present time without
the railroad. But for the military aid of railroads our government would
hardly have succeeded in putting down the rebellion of the southern
states. In the debates on the Oregon Bill in the United States Senate in
1843, the idea that we could ever have an interest in so remote a
country as Oregon was loudly ridiculed by some of the members. It would
take ten months--said George McDuffie, the very able senator from South
Carolina--for representatives to get from that territory to the District
of Columbia and back again. Yet since the building of railroads to the
Pacific coast, we can go from Boston to the capital of Oregon in much
less time than it took John Hancock to make the journey from Boston to
Philadelphia. Railroads and telegraphs have made our vast country, both
for political and for social purposes, more snug and compact than little
Switzerland was in the Middle Ages or New England a century ago.
[Sidenote: Difficulty of travelling a hundred years ago.]
At the time of our Revolution the difficulties of travelling formed an
important social obstacle to the union of the states. In our time the
persons who pass in a single day between New York and Boston by six or
seven distinct lines of railroad and steamboat are numbered by
thousands. In 1783 two stage-coaches were enough for all the travellers,
and nearly all the freight besides, that went between these two cities,
except such large freight as went by sea around Cape Cod. The journey
began at three o'clock in the morning. Horses were changed every twenty
miles, and if the roads were in good condition some forty miles would be
made by ten o'clock in the evening. In bad weather, when the passengers
had to get down and lift the clumsy wheels out of deep ruts, the
progress was much slower. The loss of life from accidents, in proportion
to the number of travellers, was much greater than it has ever been on
the railway. Broad rivers like the Connecticut and Housatonic had no
bridges. To drive across them in winter, when they were solidly frozen
over, was easy; and in pleasant summer weather to cross in a row-boat
was not a dangerous undertaking. But squalls at some seasons and
floating ice at others were things to be feared. More than one instance
is recorded where boats were crushed and passengers drowned, or saved
only by scrambling upon ice-floes. After a week or ten days of
discomfort and danger the jolted and jaded traveller reached New York.
Such was a journey in the most highly civilized part of the United
States. The case was still worse in the South, and it was not so very
much better in England and France. In one respect the traveller in the
United States fared better than the traveller in Europe: the danger from
highwaymen was but slight.
[Sidenote: Local jealousies and antipathies, an inheritance from
primeval savagery.]
Such being the difficulty of travelling, people never made long journeys
save for very important reasons. Except in the case of the soldiers,
most people lived and died without ever having seen any state but their
own. And as the mails were irregular and uncertain, and the rates of
postage very high, people heard from one another but seldom. Commercial
dealings between the different states were inconsiderable. The
occupation of the people was chiefly agriculture. Cities were few and
small, and each little district for the most part supported itself.
Under such circumstances the different parts of the country knew very
little about each other, and local prejudices were intense. It was not
simply free Massachusetts and slave-holding South Carolina, or English
Connecticut and Dutch New York, that misunderstood and ridiculed each
the other; but even between such neighbouring states as Connecticut and
Massachusetts, both of them thoroughly English and Puritan, and in all
their social conditions almost exactly alike, it used often to be said
that there was no love lost. These unspeakably stupid and contemptible
local antipathies are inherited by civilized men from that far-off time
when the clan system prevailed over the face of the earth, and the hand
of every clan was raised against its neighbours. They are pale and
evanescent survivals from the universal primitive warfare, and the
sooner they die out from human society the better for every one. They
should be stigmatized and frowned down upon every fit occasion, just as
we frown upon swearing as a symbol of anger and contention. But the only
thing which can finally destroy them is the widespread and unrestrained
intercourse of different groups of people in peaceful social and
commercial relations. The rapidity with which this process is now going
on is the most encouraging of all the symptoms of our modern
civilization. But a century ago the progress made in this direction had
been relatively small, and it was a very critical moment for the
American people.
[Sidenote: Conservative character of the Revolution.]
The thirteen states, as already observed, had worked in concert for only
nine years, during which their coöperation had been feeble and halting.
But the several state governments had been in operation since the first
settlement of the country, and were regarded with intense loyalty by the
people of the states. Under the royal governors the local political life
of each state had been vigorous and often stormy, as befitted
communities of the sturdy descendants of English freemen. The
legislative assembly of each state had stoutly defended its liberties
against the encroachments of the governor. In the eyes of the people it
was the only power on earth competent to lay taxes upon them, it was as
supreme in its own sphere as the British Parliament itself, and in
behalf of this rooted conviction the people had gone to war and won
their independence from England. During the war the people of all the
states, except Connecticut and Rhode Island, had carefully remodelled
their governments, and in the performance of this work had withdrawn
many of their ablest statesmen from the Continental Congress; but except
for the expulsion of the royal and proprietary governors, the work had
in no instance been revolutionary in its character. It was not so much
that the American people gained an increase of freedom by their
separation from England, as that they kept the freedom they had always
enjoyed, that freedom which was the inalienable birthright of
Englishmen, but which George III. had foolishly sought to impair. The
American Revolution was therefore in no respect destructive. It was the
most conservative revolution known to history, thoroughly English in
conception from beginning to end. It had no likeness whatever to the
terrible popular convulsion which soon after took place in France. The
mischievous doctrines of Rousseau had found few readers and fewer
admirers among the Americans. The principles upon which their revolution
was conducted were those of Sidney, Harrington, and Locke. In
remodelling the state governments, as in planning the union of the
states, the precedents followed and the principles applied were almost
purely English. We must now pass in review the principal changes wrought
in the several states, and we shall then be ready to consider the
general structure of the Confederation, and to describe the remarkable
series of events which led to the adoption of our Federal Constitution.
[Sidenote: State governments remodelled; assemblies continued from
colonial times.]
It will be remembered that at the time of the Declaration of
Independence there were three kinds of government in the colonies.
Connecticut and Rhode Island had always been true republics, with
governors and legislative assemblies elected by the people.
Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland presented the appearance of limited
hereditary monarchies. Their assemblies were chosen by the people, but
the lords proprietary appointed their governors, or in some instances
acted as governors themselves. In Maryland the office of lord
proprietary was hereditary in the Calvert family; in Delaware and
Pennsylvania, which, though distinct commonwealths with separate
legislatures, had the same executive head, it was hereditary in the Penn
family. The other eight colonies were viceroyalties, with governors
appointed by the king, while in all alike the people elected the
legislatures. Accordingly in Connecticut and Rhode Island no change was
made necessary by the Revolution, beyond the mere omission of the king's
name from legal documents; and their charters, which dated from the
middle of the seventeenth century, continued to do duty as state
constitutions till far into the nineteenth. During the Revolutionary War
all the other states framed new constitutions, but in most essential
respects they took the old colonial charters for their model. The
popular legislative body remained unchanged even in its name. In North
Carolina its supreme dignity was vindicated in its title of the House of
Commons; in Virginia it was called the House of Burgesses; in most of
the states the House of Representatives. The members were chosen each
year, except in South Carolina, where they served for two years. In the
New England states they represented the townships, in other states the
counties. In all the states except Pennsylvania a property qualification
was required of them.
[Sidenote: Origin of the senates.]
In addition to this House of Representatives all the legislatures except
those of Pennsylvania and Georgia contained a second or upper house
known as the Senate. The origin of the senate is to be found in the
governor's council of colonial times, just as the House of Lords is
descended from the Witenagemot or council of great barons summoned by
the Old-English kings. The Americans had been used to having the acts of
their popular assemblies reviewed by a council, and so they retained
this revisory body as an upper house. A higher property qualification
was required than for membership of the lower house, and, except in New
Hampshire, Massachusetts, and South Carolina, the term of service was
longer. In Maryland senators sat for five years, in Virginia and New
York for four years, elsewhere for two years. In some states they were
chosen by the people, in others by the lower house. In Maryland they
were chosen by a college of electors, thus affording a precedent for the
method of electing the chief magistrate of the union under the Federal
Constitution.
[Sidenote: Governors viewed with suspicion.]
Governors were unpopular in those days. There was too much flavour of
royalty and high prerogative about them. Except in the two republics of
Rhode Island and Connecticut, American political history during the
eighteenth century was chiefly the record of interminable squabbles
between governors and legislatures, down to the moment when the detested
agents of royalty were clapped into jail, or took refuge behind the
bulwarks of a British seventy-four. Accordingly the new constitutions
were very chary of the powers to be exercised by the governor. In
Pennsylvania and Delaware, in New Hampshire and Massachusetts, the
governor was at first replaced by an executive council, and the
president of this council was first magistrate and titular ruler of the
state. His dignity was imposing enough, but his authority was merely
that of a chairman. The other states had governors chosen by the
legislatures, except in New York where the governor was elected by the
people. No one was eligible to the office of governor who did not
possess a specified amount of property. In most of the states the
governor could not be reëlected, he had no veto upon the acts of the
legislature, nor any power of appointing officers. In 1780, in a new
constitution drawn up by James Bowdoin and the two Adamses,
Massachusetts led the way in the construction of a more efficient
executive department. The president was replaced by a governor elected
annually by the people, and endowed with the power of appointment and a
suspensory veto. The first governor elected under this constitution was
John Hancock. In 1783 New Hampshire adopted a similar constitution. In
1790 Pennsylvania added an upper house to its legislature, and vested
the executive power in a governor elected by the people for a term of
three years, and twice reëligible. He was intrusted with the power of
appointment to offices, with a suspensory veto, and with the royal
prerogative of reprieving or pardoning criminals. In 1792 similar
changes were made in Delaware. In 1789 Georgia added the upper house to
its legislature, and about the same time in several states the
governor's powers were enlarged.
Thus the various state governments were repetitions on a small scale of
what was then supposed to be the triplex government of England, with its
King, Lords, and Commons. The governor answered to the king with his
dignity curtailed by election for a short period, and by narrowly
limited prerogatives. The senate answered to the House of Lords, except
in being a representative and not a hereditary body. It was supposed to
represent more especially that part of the community which was possessed
of most wealth and consideration; and in several states the senators
were apportioned with some reference to the amount of taxes paid by
different parts of the state. The senate of New York, in direct
imitation of the House of Lords, was made a supreme court of errors. On
the other hand, the assembly answered to the House of Commons, save that
its power was really limited by the senate as the power of the House of
Commons is not really limited by the House of Lords. But this
peculiarity of the British Constitution was not well understood a
century ago; and the misunderstanding, as we shall hereafter see,
exerted a very serious influence upon the form of our federal
government, as well as upon the constitutions of the several states.
[Sidenote: The judiciary.]
In all the thirteen states the common law of England remained in force,
as it does to this day save where modified by statute. British and
colonial statutes made prior to the Revolution continued also in force
unless expressly repealed. The system of civil and criminal courts, the
remedies in common law and equity, the forms of writs, the functions of
justices of the peace, the courts of probate, all remained substantially
unchanged. In Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey, the judges held
office for a term of seven years; in all the other states they held
office for life or during good behaviour. In all the states save Georgia
they were appointed either by the governor or by the legislature. It was
Georgia that in 1812 first set the pernicious example of electing judges
for short terms by the people,[1]--a practice which is responsible for
much of the degradation that the courts have suffered in many of our
states, and which will have to be abandoned before a proper
administration of justice can ever be secured.
[Sidenote: The limited suffrage.]
In bestowing the suffrage, the new constitutions were as conservative as
in all other respects. The general state of opinion in America at that
time, with regard to universal suffrage, was far more advanced than the
general state of opinion in England, but it was less advanced than the
opinions of such statesmen as Pitt and Shelburne and the Duke of
Richmond. There was a truly English irregularity in the provisions which
were made on this subject. In New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Delaware,
and South Carolina, all resident freemen who paid taxes could vote. In
North Carolina all such persons could vote for members of the lower
house, but in order to vote for senators a freehold of fifty acres was
required. In Virginia none could vote save those who possessed such a
freehold of fifty acres. To vote for governor or for senators in New
York, one must possess a freehold of $250, clear of mortgage, and to
vote for assemblymen one must either have a freehold of $50, or pay a
yearly rent of $10. The pettiness of these sums was in keeping with the
time when two daily coaches sufficed for the traffic between our two
greatest commercial cities. In Rhode Island an unincumbered freehold
worth $134 was required; but in Rhode Island and Pennsylvania the eldest
sons of qualified freemen could vote without payment of taxes. In all
the other states the possession of a small amount of property, either
real or personal, varying from $33 to $200, was the necessary
qualification for voting. Thus slowly and irregularly did the states
drift toward universal suffrage; but although the impediments in the way
of voting were more serious than they seem to us in these days when the
community is more prosperous and money less scarce, they were still not
very great, and in the opinion of conservative people they barely
sufficed to exclude from the suffrage such shiftless persons as had no
visible interest in keeping down the taxes.
[Sidenote: Abolition of primogeniture, entails, and manorial
privileges.]
At the time of the Revolution the succession to property was regulated
in New York and the southern states by the English rule of
primogeniture. The eldest son took all. In New Jersey, Pennsylvania,
Delaware, and the four New England states, the eldest son took a double
share. It was Georgia that led the way in decreeing the equal
distribution of intestate property, both real and personal; and between
1784 and 1796 the example was followed by all the other states. At the
same time entails were either definitely abolished, or the obstacles to
cutting them off were removed. In New York the manorial privileges of
the great patroons were swept away. In Maryland the old manorial system
had long been dying a natural death through the encroachments of the
patriarchal system of slavery. The ownership of all ungranted lands
within the limits of the thirteen states passed from the crown not to
the Confederacy, but to the several state governments. In Pennsylvania
and Maryland such ungranted lands had belonged to the lords proprietary.
They were now forfeited to the state. The Penn family was indemnified by
Pennsylvania to the amount of half a million dollars; but Maryland made
no compensation to the Calverts, inasmuch as their claim was presented
by an illegitimate descendant of the last Lord Baltimore.
[Sidenote: Steps toward the abolition of slavery and the slave-trade.]
The success of the American Revolution made it possible for the
different states to take measures for the gradual abolition of slavery
and the immediate abolition of the foreign slave-trade. On this great
question the state of public opinion in America was more advanced than
in England. So great a thinker as Edmund Burke, who devoted much
thought to the subject, came to the conclusion that slavery was an
incurable evil, and that there was not the slightest hope that the trade
in slaves could be stopped. The most that he thought could be done by
judicious legislation was to mitigate the horrors which the poor negroes
endured on board ship, or to prevent wives from being sold away from
their husbands or children from their parents. Such was the outlook to
one of the greatest political philosophers of modern times just
eighty-two years before the immortal proclamation of President Lincoln!
But how vast was the distance between Burke and Bossuet, who had
declared about eighty years earlier that "to condemn slavery was to
condemn the Holy Ghost!" It was equally vast between Burke and his
contemporary Thurlow, who in 1799 poured out the vials of his wrath upon
"the altogether miserable and contemptible" proposal to abolish the
slave-trade. George III. agreed with his chancellor, and resisted the
movement for abolition with all the obstinacy of which his hard and
narrow nature was capable. In 1769 the Virginia legislature had enacted
that the further importation of negroes, to be sold into slavery, should
be prohibited. But George III. commanded the governor to veto this act,
and it was vetoed. In Jefferson's first-draft of the Declaration of
Independence, this action of the king was made the occasion of a fierce
denunciation of slavery, but in deference to the prejudices of South
Carolina and Georgia the clause was struck out by Congress. When George
III. and his vetoes had been eliminated from the case, it became
possible for the states to legislate freely on the subject. In 1776
negro slaves were held in all the thirteen states, but in all except
South Carolina and Georgia there was a strong sentiment in favour of
emancipation. In North Carolina, which contained a large Quaker
population, and in which estates were small and were often cultivated by
free labour, the pro-slavery feeling was never so strong as in the
southernmost states. In Virginia all the foremost statesmen--Washington,
Jefferson, Lee, Randolph, Henry, Madison, and Mason--were opposed to the
continuance of slavery; and their opinions were shared by many of the
largest planters. For tobacco-culture slavery did not seem so
indispensable as for the raising of rice and indigo; and in Virginia the
negroes, half-civilized by kindly treatment, were not regarded with
horror by their masters, like the ill-treated and ferocious blacks of
South Carolina and Georgia. After 1808 the policy and the sentiments of
Virginia underwent a marked change. The invention of the cotton-gin,
taken in connection with the sudden and prodigious development of
manufactures in England, greatly stimulated the growth of cotton in the
ever-enlarging area of the Gulf states, and created an immense demand
for slave-labour, just at the time when the importation of negroes from
Africa came to an end. The breeding of slaves, to be sold to the
planters of the Gulf states, then became such a profitable occupation in
Virginia as entirely to change the popular feeling about slavery. But
until 1808 Virginia sympathized with the anti-slavery sentiment which
was growing up in the northern states; and the same was true of
Maryland. Emancipation was, however, much more easy to accomplish in the
north, because the number of slaves was small, and economic
circumstances distinctly favoured free labour. In the work of gradual
emancipation the little state of Delaware led the way. In its new
constitution of 1776 the further introduction of slaves was prohibited,
all restraints upon emancipation having already been removed. In the
assembly of Virginia in 1778 a bill prohibiting the further introduction
of slaves was moved and carried by Thomas Jefferson, and the same
measure was passed in Maryland in 1783, while both these states removed
all restraints upon emancipation. North Carolina was not ready to go
quite so far, but in 1786 she sought to discourage the slave-trade by
putting a duty of £5 per head on all negroes thereafter imported. New
Jersey followed the example of Maryland and Virginia. Pennsylvania went
farther. In 1780 its assembly enacted that no more slaves should be
brought in, and that all children of slaves born after that date should
be free. The same provisions were made by New Hampshire in its new
constitution of 1783, and by the assemblies of Connecticut and Rhode
Island in 1784. New York went farther still, and in 1785 enacted that
all children of slaves thereafter born should not only be free, but
should be admitted to vote on the same conditions as other freemen. In
1788 Virginia, which contained many free negroes, enacted that any
person convicted of kidnapping or selling into slavery any free person
should suffer death on the gallows. Summing up all these facts, we see
that within two years after the independence of the United States had
been acknowledged by England, while the two southernmost states had done
nothing to check the growth of slavery, North Carolina had discouraged
the importation of slaves; Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and New Jersey
had stopped such importation and removed all restraint upon
emancipation; and all the remaining states, except Massachusetts, had
made gradual emancipation compulsory. Massachusetts had gone still
farther. Before the Revolution the anti-slavery feeling had been
stronger there than in any other state, and cases brought into court for
the purpose of testing the legality of slavery had been decided in
favour of those who were opposed to the continuance of that barbarous
institution. In 1777 an American cruiser brought into the port of Salem
a captured British ship with slaves on board, and these slaves were
advertised for sale, but on complaint being made before the legislature
they were set free. The new constitution of 1780 contained a declaration
of rights which asserted that all men are born free and have an equal
and inalienable right to defend their lives and liberties, to acquire
property, and to seek and obtain safety and happiness. The supreme court
presently decided that this clause worked the abolition of slavery, and
accordingly Massachusetts was the first of American states, within the
limits of the Union, to become in the full sense of the words a free
commonwealth. Of the negro inhabitants, not more than six thousand in
number, a large proportion had already for a long time enjoyed freedom;
and all were now admitted to the suffrage on the same terms as other
citizens.
[Sidenote: Progress toward freedom in religion.]
By the revolutionary legislation of the states some progress was also
effected in the direction of a more complete religious freedom.
Pennsylvania and Delaware were the only states in which all Christian
sects stood socially and politically on an equal footing. In Rhode
Island all Protestants enjoyed equal privileges, but Catholics were
debarred from voting. In Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Connecticut,
the old Puritan Congregationalism was the established religion. The
Congregational church was supported by taxes, and the minister, once
chosen, kept his place for life or during good behaviour. He could not
be got rid of unless formally investigated and dismissed by an
ecclesiastical council. Laws against blasphemy, which were virtually
laws against heresy, were in force in these three states. In
Massachusetts, Catholic priests were liable to imprisonment for life.
Any one who should dare to speculate too freely about the nature of
Christ, or the philosophy of the plan of salvation, or to express a
doubt as to the plenary inspiration of every word between the two covers
of the Bible, was subject to fine and imprisonment. The tithing-man
still arrested Sabbath-breakers and shut them up in the town-cage in the
market-place; he stopped all unnecessary riding or driving on Sunday,
and haled people off to the meeting-house whether they would or not.
Such restraints upon liberty were still endured by people who had dared
and suffered so much for liberty's sake. The men of Boston strove hard
to secure the repeal of these barbarous laws and the disestablishment of
the Congregational church; but they were outvoted by the delegates from
the rural towns. The most that could be accomplished was the provision
that dissenters might escape the church-rate by supporting a church of
their own. The nineteenth century was to arrive before church and state
were finally separated in Massachusetts. The new constitution of New
Hampshire was similarly illiberal, and in Connecticut no change was
made. Rhode Island nobly distinguished herself by contrast when in 1784
she extended the franchise to Catholics.
In the six states just mentioned the British government had been
hindered by charter, and by the overwhelming opposition of the people,
from seriously trying to establish the Episcopal church. The sure fate
of any such mad experiment had been well illustrated in the time of
Andros. In the other seven states there were no such insuperable
obstacles. The Church of England was maintained with languid
acquiescence in New York. By the Quakers and Presbyterians of New Jersey
and North Carolina, as well as in half-Catholic, half-Puritan Maryland,
its supremacy was unwillingly endured; in the turbulent frontier
commonwealth of Georgia it was accepted with easy contempt. Only in
South Carolina and Virginia had the Church of England ever possessed any
real hold upon the people. The Episcopal clergy of South Carolina, men
of learning and high character, elected by their own congregations
instead of being appointed to their livings by a patron, were thoroughly
independent, and in the late war their powerful influence had been
mainly exerted in behalf of the patriot cause. Hence, while they
retained their influence after the close of the war, there was no
difficulty in disestablishing the church. It felt itself able to stand
without government support. As soon as the political separation from
England was effected, the Episcopal church was accordingly separated
from the state, not only in South Carolina, but in all the states in
which it had hitherto been upheld by the authority of the British
government; and in the constitutions of New Jersey, Georgia, and the two
Carolinas, no less than in those of Delaware and Pennsylvania, it was
explicitly provided that no man should be obliged to pay any church rate
or attend any religious service save according to his own free and
unhampered will.
[Sidenote: Church and state in Virginia.]
The case of Virginia was peculiar. At first the Church of England had
taken deep root there because of the considerable immigration of members
of the Cavalier party after the downfall of Charles I. Most of the great
statesmen of Virginia in the Revolution--such as Washington, Madison,
Mason, Jefferson, Pendleton, Henry, the Lees, and the Randolphs--were
descendants of Cavaliers and members of the Church of England. But for a
long time the Episcopal clergy had been falling into discredit. Many of
them were appointed by the British government and ordained by the
Bishop of London, and they were affected by the irreligious
listlessness and low moral tone of the English church in the eighteenth
century. The Virginia legislature thought it necessary to pass special
laws prohibiting these clergymen from drunkenness and riotous living. It
was said that they spent more time in hunting foxes and betting on
race-horses than in conducting religious services or visiting the sick;
and according to Bishop Meade, many dissolute parsons, discarded from
the church in England as unworthy, were yet thought fit to be presented
with livings in Virginia. To this general character of the clergy there
were many exceptions. There were many excellent clergymen, especially
among the native Virginians, whose appointment depended to some extent
upon the repute in which they were held by their neighbours. But on the
whole the system was such as to illustrate all the worst vices of a
church supported by the temporal power. The Revolution achieved the
discomfiture of a clergy already thus deservedly discredited. The
parsons mostly embraced the cause of the crown, but failed to carry
their congregations with them, and thus they found themselves arrayed in
hopeless antagonism to popular sentiment in a state which contained
perhaps fewer Tories in proportion to its population than any other of
the thirteen.
[Sidenote: Madison and the Religious Freedom Act, 1785.]
At the same time the Episcopal church itself had gradually come to be a
minority in the commonwealth. For more than half a century Scotch and
Welsh Presbyterians, German Lutherans, English Quakers, and Baptists,
had been working their way southward from Pennsylvania and New Jersey,
and had settled in the fertile country west of the Blue Ridge. Daniel
Morgan, who had won the most brilliant battle of the Revolution, was one
of these men, and sturdiness was a chief characteristic of most of them.
So long as these frontier settlers served as a much-needed bulwark
against the Indians, the church saw fit to ignore them and let them
build meeting-houses and carry on religious services as they pleased.
But when the peril of Indian attack had been thrust westward into the
Ohio valley, and these dissenting communities had waxed strong and
prosperous, the ecclesiastical party in the state undertook to lay taxes
on them for the support of the Church of England, and to compel them to
receive Episcopal clergymen to preach for them, to bless them in
marriage, and to bury their dead. The immediate consequence was a revolt
which not only overthrew the established church in Virginia, but nearly
effected its ruin. The troubles began in 1768, when the Baptists had
made their way into the centre of the state, and three of their
preachers were arrested by the sheriff of Spottsylvania. As the
indictment was read against these men for "preaching the gospel contrary
to law," a deep and solemn voice interrupted the proceedings. Patrick
Henry had come on horseback many a mile over roughest roads to listen to
the trial, and this phrase, which savoured of the religious despotisms
of old, was quite too much for him. "May it please your worships," he
exclaimed, "what did I hear read? Did I hear an expression that these
men, whom your worships are about to try for misdemeanour, are charged
with preaching the gospel of the Son of God!" The shamefast silence and
confusion which ensued was of ill omen for the success of an undertaking
so unwelcome to the growing liberalism of the time. The zeal of the
persecuted Baptists was presently reinforced by the learning and the
dialectic skill of the Presbyterian ministers. Unlike the Puritans of
New England, the Presbyterians were in favour of the total separation of
church from state. It was one of their cardinal principles that the
civil magistrate had no right to interfere in any way with matters of
religion. By taking this broad ground they secured the powerful aid of
Thomas Jefferson, and afterwards of Madison and Mason. The controversy
went on through all the years of the Revolutionary War, while all
Virginia, from the sea to the mountains, rang with fulminations and
arguments. In 1776 Jefferson and Mason succeeded in carrying a bill
which released all dissenters from parish rates and legalized all forms
of worship. At last in 1785 Madison won the crowning victory in the
Religious Freedom Act, by which the Church of England was disestablished
and all parish rates abolished, and still more, all religious tests were
done away with. In this last respect Virginia came to the front among
all the American states, as Massachusetts had come to the front in the
abolition of negro slavery. Nearly all the states still imposed
religious tests upon civil office-holders, from simply declaring a
general belief in the infallibleness of the Bible to accepting the
doctrine of the Trinity. The Virginia statute, which declared that
"opinion in matters of religion shall in nowise diminish, enlarge, or
affect civil capacities," was translated into French and Italian, and
was widely read and commented on in Europe.
It is the historian's unpleasant duty to add that the victory thus
happily won was ungenerously followed up. Theological and political
odium combined to overwhelm the Episcopal church in Virginia. The
persecuted became persecutors. It was contended that the property of the
church, having been largely created by unjustifiable taxation, ought to
be forfeited. In 1802 its parsonages and glebe lands were sold, its
parishes wiped out, and its clergy left without a calling. "A reckless
sensualist," said Dr. Hawks, "administered the morning dram to his
guests from the silver cup" used in the communion service. But in all
this there is a manifest historic lesson. That it should have been
possible thus to deal with the Episcopal church in Virginia shows
forcibly the moribund condition into which it had been brought through
dependence upon the extraneous aid of a political sovereignty from which
the people of Virginia were severing their allegiance. The lesson is
most vividly enhanced by the contrast with the church of South Carolina
which, rooted in its own soil, was quite able to stand alone when
government aid was withdrawn. In Virginia the church in which George
Washington was reared had so nearly vanished by the year 1830 that Chief
Justice Marshall said it was folly to dream of reviving so dead a
thing. Nevertheless, under the noble ministration of its great bishop,
William Meade, the Episcopal church in Virginia, no longer relying upon
state aid, but trusting in the divine persuasive power of spiritual
truth, was even then entering upon a new life and beginning to exercise
a most wholesome influence.
[Sidenote: Mason Weems and Samuel Seabury.]
[Sidenote: November 14, 1784.]
The separation of the English church in America from the English crown
was the occasion of a curious difficulty with regard to the ordination
of bishops. Until after the Revolution there were no bishops of that
church in America, and between 1783 and 1785 it was not clear how
candidates for holy orders could receive the necessary consecration. In
1784 a young divinity student from Maryland, named Mason Weems, who had
been studying for some time in England, applied to the Bishop of London
for admission to holy orders, but was rudely refused. Weems then had
recourse to Watson, Bishop of Llandaff, author of the famous reply to
Gibbon. Watson treated him kindly and advised him to get a letter of
recommendation from the governor of Maryland, but after this had been
obtained he referred him to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who said that
nothing could be done without the consent of Parliament. As the law
stood, no one could be admitted into the ranks of the English clergy
without taking the oath of allegiance and acknowledging the king of
England as the head of the church. Weems then wrote to John Adams at the
Hague, and to Franklin at Paris, to see if there were any Protestant
bishops on the Continent from whom he could obtain consecration. A
rather amusing diplomatic correspondence ensued, and finally the king of
Denmark, after taking theological advice, kindly offered the services of
a Danish bishop, who was to perform the ceremony in Latin. Weems does
not seem to have availed himself of this permission, probably because
the question soon reached a more satisfactory solution.[2] About the
same time the Episcopal church in Connecticut sent one of its ministers,
Samuel Seabury of New London, to England, to be ordained as bishop. The
oaths of allegiance and supremacy stood as much in the way of the
learned and famous minister as in that of the young and obscure student.
Seabury accordingly appealed to the non-juring Jacobite bishops of the
Episcopal church of Scotland, and at length was duly ordained at
Aberdeen as bishop of the diocese of Connecticut. While Seabury was in
England, the churches in the various states chose delegates to a
general convention, which framed a constitution for the "Protestant
Episcopal Church of the United States of America." Advowsons were
abolished, some parts of the liturgy were dropped, and the tenure of
ministers, even of bishops, was to be during good behaviour. At the same
time a friendly letter was sent to the bishops of England, urging them
to secure, if possible, an act of Parliament whereby American clergymen
might be ordained without taking the oaths of allegiance and supremacy.
Such an act was obtained without much difficulty, and three American
bishops were accordingly consecrated in due form. The peculiar
ordination of Seabury was also recognized as valid by the general
convention, and thus the Episcopal church in America was fairly started
on its independent career.
[Sidenote: Francis Asbury and the Methodists.]
This foundation of a separate episcopacy west of the Atlantic was
accompanied by the further separation of the Methodists as a distinct
religious society. Although John Wesley regarded the notion of an
apostolical succession as superstitious, he had made no attempt to
separate his followers from the national church. He translated the
titles of "bishop" and "priest" from Greek into Latin and English,
calling them "superintendent" and "elder," but he did not deny the
king's headship. Meanwhile during the long period of his preaching there
had begun to grow up a Methodist church in America. George Whitefield
had come over and preached in Georgia in 1737, and in Massachusetts in
1744, where he encountered much opposition on the part of the Puritan
clergy. But the first Methodist church in America was founded in the
city of New York in 1766. In 1772 Wesley sent over Francis Asbury, a man
of shrewd sense and deep religious feeling, to act as his assistant and
representative in this country. At that time there were not more than a
thousand Methodists, with six preachers, and all these were in the
middle and southern colonies; but within five years, largely owing to
the zeal and eloquence of Asbury, these numbers had increased sevenfold.
At the end of the war, seeing the American Methodists cut loose from the
English establishment, Wesley in his own house at Bristol, with the aid
of two presbyters, proceeded to ordain ministers enough to make a
presbytery, and thereupon set apart Thomas Coke to be "superintendent"
or bishop for America. On the same day of November, 1784, on which
Seabury was consecrated by the non-jurors at Aberdeen, Coke began
preaching and baptizing in Maryland, in rude chapels built of logs or
under the shade of forest trees. On Christmas Eve a conference assembled
at Baltimore, at which Asbury was chosen bishop by some sixty ministers
present, and ordained by Coke, and the constitution of the Methodist
church in America was organized. Among the poor white people of the
southern states, and among the negroes, the new church rapidly obtained
great sway; and at a somewhat later date it began to assume considerable
proportions in the north.
[Sidenote: Presbyterians; Roman Catholics.]
Four years after this the Presbyterians, who were most numerous in the
middle states, organized their government in a general assembly, which
was also attended by Congregationalist delegates from New England in the
capacity of simple advisers. The theological difference between these
two sects was so slight that an alliance grew up between them, and in
Connecticut some fifty years later their names were often inaccurately
used as if synonymous. Such a difference seemed to vanish when
confronted with the newer differences that began to spring up soon after
the close of the Revolution. The revolt against the doctrine of eternal
punishment was already beginning in New England, and among the learned
and thoughtful clergy of Massachusetts the seeds of Unitarianism were
germinating. The gloomy intolerance of an older time was beginning to
yield to more enlightened views. In 1789 the first Roman Catholic church
in New England was dedicated in Boston. So great had been the prejudice
against this sect that in 1784 there were only 600 Catholics in all New
England. In the four southernmost states, on the other hand, there were
2,500; in New York and New Jersey there were 1,700; in Delaware and
Pennsylvania there were 7,700; in Maryland there were 20,000; while
among the French settlements along the eastern bank of the Mississippi
there were supposed to be nearly 12,000. In 1786 John Carroll, a cousin
of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, was selected by the Pope as his
apostolic vicar, and was afterward successively made bishop of Baltimore
and archbishop of the United States. By 1789 all obstacles to the
Catholic worship had been done away with in all the states.
[Sidenote: Except in the instance of slavery, all these changes were
favourable to union.]
In this brief survey of the principal changes wrought in the several
states by the separation from England, one cannot fail to be struck with
their conservative character. Things proceeded just as they had done
from time immemorial with the English race. Forms of government were
modified just far enough to adapt them to the new situation and no
farther. The abolition of entails, of primogeniture, and of such few
manorial privileges as existed, were useful reforms of far less sweeping
character than similar changes would have been in England; and they were
accordingly effected with ease. Even the abolition of slavery in the
northern states, where negroes were few in number and chiefly employed
in domestic service, wrought nothing in the remotest degree resembling a
social revolution. But nowhere was this constitutionally cautious and
precedent-loving mode of proceeding more thoroughly exemplified than in
the measures just related, whereby the Episcopal and Methodist churches
were separated from the English establishment and placed upon an
independent footing in the new world. From another point of view it may
be observed that all these changes, except in the instance of slavery,
tended to assimilate the states to one another in their political and
social condition. So far as they went, these changes were favourable to
union, and this was perhaps especially true in the case of the
ecclesiastical bodies, which brought citizens of different states into
coöperation in pursuit of specific ends in common.
At the same time this survey most forcibly reminds us how completely
the legislation which immediately affected the daily domestic life of
the citizen was the legislation of the single state in which he lived.
In the various reforms just passed in review the United States
government took no part, and could not from the nature of the case. Even
to-day our national government has no power over such matters, and it is
to be hoped it never will have. But at the present day our national
government performs many important functions of common concern, which a
century ago were scarcely performed at all. The organization of the
single state was old in principle and well understood by everybody. It
therefore worked easily, and such changes as those above described were
brought about with little friction. On the other hand, the principles
upon which the various relations of the states to each other were to be
adjusted were not well understood. There was wide disagreement upon the
subject, and the attempt to compromise between opposing views was not at
first successful. Hence, in the management of affairs which concerned
the United States as a nation, we shall not find the central machinery
working smoothly or quietly. We are about to traverse a period of
uncertainty and confusion, in which it required all the political
sagacity and all the good temper of the people to save the half-built
ship of state from going to pieces on the rocks of civil contention.
CHAPTER III.
THE LEAGUE OF FRIENDSHIP.
[Sidenote: The several states have never enjoyed complete sovereignty.]
That some kind of union existed between the states was doubted by no
one. Ever since the assembling of the first Continental Congress in 1774
the thirteen commonwealths had acted in concert, and sometimes most
generously, as when Maryland and South Carolina had joined in the
Declaration of Independence without any crying grievances of their own,
from a feeling that the cause of one should be the cause of all. It has
sometimes been said that the Union was in its origin a league of
sovereign states, each of which surrendered a specific portion of its
sovereignty to the federal government for the sake of the common
welfare. Grave political arguments have been based upon this alleged
fact, but such an account of the matter is not historically true. There
never was a time when Massachusetts or Virginia was an absolutely
sovereign state like Holland or France. Sovereign over their own
internal affairs they are to-day as they were at the time of the
Revolution, but there was never a time when they presented themselves
before other nations as sovereign, or were recognized as such. Under the
government of England before the Revolution the thirteen commonwealths
were independent of one another, and were held together, juxtaposed
rather than united, only through their allegiance to the British crown.
Had that allegiance been maintained there is no telling how long they
might have gone on thus disunited; and this, it seems, should be one of
our chief reasons for rejoicing that the political connection with
England was dissolved when it was. A permanent redress of grievances,
and even virtual independence such as Canada now enjoys, we might
perhaps have gained had we listened to Lord North's proposals after the
surrender of Burgoyne; but the formation of the Federal Union would
certainly have been long postponed, and when we realize the grandeur of
the work which we are now doing in the world through the simple fact of
such a union, we cannot fail to see that such an issue would have been
extremely unfortunate. However this may be, it is clear that until the
connection with England was severed the thirteen commonwealths were not
united, nor were they sovereign. It is also clear that in the very act
of severing their connection with England these commonwealths entered
into some sort of union which was incompatible with their absolute
sovereignty taken severally. It was not the people of New Hampshire,
Massachusetts, and so on through the list, that declared their
independence of Great Britain, but it was the representatives of the
United States in Congress assembled, and speaking as a single body in
the name of the whole. Three weeks before this declaration was adopted,
Congress appointed a committee to draw up the "articles of
confederation and perpetual union," by which the sovereignty of the
several states was expressly limited and curtailed in many important
particulars. This committee had finished its work by the 12th of July,
but the articles were not adopted by Congress until the autumn of 1777,
and they were not finally put into operation until the spring of 1781.
During this inchoate period of union the action of the United States was
that of a confederation in which some portion of the several
sovereignties was understood to be surrendered to the whole. It was the
business of the articles to define the precise nature and extent of this
surrendered sovereignty which no state by itself ever exercised. In the
mean time this sovereignty, undefined in nature and extent, was
exercised, as well as circumstances permitted, by the Continental
Congress.
[Sidenote: The Continental Congress; its extraordinary character.]
A most remarkable body was this Continental Congress. For the
vicissitudes through which it passed, there is perhaps no other
revolutionary body, save the Long Parliament, which can be compared with
it. For its origin we must look back to the committees of correspondence
devised by Jonathan Mayhew, Samuel Adams, and Dabney Carr. First
assembled in 1774 to meet an emergency which was generally believed to
be only temporary, it continued to sit for nearly seven years before its
powers were ever clearly defined; and during those seven years it
exercised some of the highest functions of sovereignty which are
possible to any governing body. It declared the independence of the
United States; it contracted an offensive and defensive alliance with
France; it raised and organized a Continental army; it borrowed large
sums of money, and pledged what the lenders understood to be the
national credit for their repayment; it issued an inconvertible paper
currency, granted letters of marque, and built a navy. All this it did
in the exercise of what in later times would have been called "implied
war powers," and its authority rested upon the general acquiescence in
the purposes for which it acted and in the measures which it adopted.
Under such circumstances its functions were very inefficiently
performed. But the articles of confederation, which in 1781 defined its
powers, served at the same time to limit them; so that for the remaining
eight years of its existence the Continental Congress grew weaker and
weaker, until it was swept away to make room for a more efficient
government.
[Sidenote: The articles of confederation.]
John Dickinson is supposed to have been the principal author of the
articles of confederation; but as the work of the committee was done in
secret and has never been reported, the point cannot be determined. In
November, 1777, Congress sent the articles to the several state
legislatures, with a circular letter recommending them as containing the
only plan of union at all likely to be adopted. In the course of the
next fifteen months the articles were ratified by all the states except
Maryland, which refused to sign until the states laying claim to the
northwestern lands, and especially Virginia, should surrender their
claims to the confederation. We shall by and by see, when we come to
explain this point in detail, that from this action of Maryland there
flowed beneficent consequences that were little dreamed of. It was first
in the great chain of events which led directly to the formation of the
Federal Union. Having carried her point, Maryland ratified the articles
on the first day of March, 1781; and thus in the last and most brilliant
period of the war, while Greene was leading Cornwallis on his fatal
chase across North Carolina, the confederation proposed at the time of
the Declaration of Independence was finally consummated.
According to the language of the articles, the states entered into a
firm league of friendship with each other; and in order to secure and
perpetuate such friendship, the freemen of each state were entitled to
all the privileges and immunities of freemen in all the other states.
Mutual extradition of criminals was established, and in each state full
faith and credit was to be given to the records, acts, and judicial
proceedings of every other state. This universal intercitizenship was
what gave reality to the nascent and feeble Union. In all the common
business relations of life, the man of New Hampshire could deal with the
man of Georgia on an equal footing before the law. But this was almost
the only effectively cohesive provision in the whole instrument.
Throughout the remainder of the articles its language was largely
devoted to reconciling the theory that the states were severally
sovereign with the visible fact that they were already merged to some
extent in a larger political body. The sovereignty of this larger body
was vested in the Congress of delegates appointed yearly by the states.
No state was to be represented by less than two or more than seven
members; no one could be a delegate for more than three years out of
every six; and no delegate could hold any salaried office under the
United States. As in colonial times the states had, to preserve their
self-government, insisted upon paying their governors and judges,
instead of allowing them to be paid out of the royal treasury, so now
the delegates in Congress were paid by their own states. In determining
questions in Congress, each state had one vote, without regard to
population; but a bare majority was not enough to carry any important
measure. Not only for such extraordinary matters as wars and treaties,
but even for the regular and ordinary business of raising money to carry
on the government, not a single step could be taken without the consent
of at least nine of the thirteen states; and this provision well-nigh
sufficed of itself to block the wheels of federal legislation. The
Congress assembled each year on the first Monday of November, and could
not adjourn for a longer period than six months. During its recess the
continuity of government was preserved by an executive committee,
consisting of one delegate from each state, and known as the "committee
of the states." Saving such matters of warfare or treaty as the public
interest might require to be kept secret, all the proceedings of
Congress were entered in a journal, to be published monthly; and the
yeas and nays must be entered should any delegate request it. The
executive departments of war, finance, and so forth were intrusted at
first to committees, until experience soon showed the necessity of
single heads. There was a president of Congress, who, as representing
the dignity of the United States, was, in a certain sense, the foremost
person in the country, but he had no more power than any other delegate.
Of the fourteen presidents between 1774 and 1789, perhaps only Randolph,
Hancock, and Laurens are popularly remembered in that capacity; Jay, St.
Clair, Mifflin, and Lee are remembered for other things; Hanson,
Griffin, and Boudinot are scarcely remembered at all, save by the
student of American history.
Between the Congress thus constituted and the several state governments
the attributes of sovereignty were shared in such a way as to produce a
minimum of result with a maximum of effort. The states were prohibited
from keeping up any naval or military force, except militia, or from
entering into any treaty or alliance, either with a foreign power or
between themselves, without the consent of Congress. No state could
engage in war except by way of defence against a sudden Indian attack.
Congress had the sole right of determining on peace and war, of sending
and receiving ambassadors, of making treaties, of adjudicating all
disputes between the states, of managing Indian affairs, and of
regulating the value of coin and fixing the standard of weights and
measures. Congress took control of the post-office on condition that no
more revenue should be raised from postage than should suffice to
discharge the expenses of the service. Congress controlled the army,
but was provided with no means of raising soldiers save through
requisitions upon the states, and it could only appoint officers above
the rank of colonel; the organization of regiments was left entirely in
the hands of the states. The traditional and wholesome dread of a
standing army was great, but there was no such deep-seated jealousy of a
navy, and Congress was accordingly allowed not only to appoint all naval
officers, but also to establish courts of admiralty.
[Sidenote: The articles failed to create a federal government endowed
with real sovereignty.]
Several essential attributes of sovereignty were thus withheld from the
states; and by assuming all debts contracted by Congress prior to the
adoption of the articles, and solemnly pledging the public faith for
their payment, it was implicitly declared that the sovereignty here
accorded to Congress was substantially the same as that which it had
asserted and exercised ever since the severing of the connection with
England. The articles simply defined the relations of the states to the
Confederation as they had already shaped themselves. Indeed, the
articles, though not finally ratified till 1781, had been known to
Congress and to the people ever since 1776 as their expected
constitution, and political action had been shaped in general accordance
with the theory on which they had been drawn up. They show that
political action was at no time based on the view of the states as
absolutely sovereign, but they also show that the share of sovereignty
accorded to Congress was very inadequate even to the purposes of an
effective confederation. The position in which they left Congress was
hardly more than that of the deliberative head of a league. For the
most fundamental of all the attributes of sovereignty--the power of
taxation--was not given to Congress. It could neither raise taxes
through an excise nor through custom-house duties; it could only make
requisitions upon the thirteen members of the confederacy in proportion
to the assessed value of their real estate, and it was not provided with
any means of enforcing these requisitions. On this point the articles
contained nothing beyond the vague promise of the states to obey. The
power of levying taxes was thus retained entirely by the states. They
not only imposed direct taxes, as they do to-day, but they laid duties
on exports and imports, each according to its own narrow view of its
local interests. The only restriction upon this was that such
state-imposed duties must not interfere with the stipulations of any
foreign treaties such as Congress might make in pursuance of treaties
already proposed to the courts of France and Spain. Besides all this,
the states shared with Congress the powers of coining money, of emitting
bills of credit, and of making their promissory notes a legal tender for
debts.
Such was the constitution under which the United States had begun to
drift toward anarchy even before the close of the Revolutionary War, but
which could only be amended by the unanimous consent of all the thirteen
states. The historian cannot but regard this difficulty of amendment as
a fortunate circumstance; for in the troubles which presently arose it
led the distressed people to seek some other method of relief, and thus
prepared the way for the Convention of 1787, which destroyed the whole
vicious scheme, and gave us a form of government under which we have
just completed a century unparalleled for peace and prosperity. Besides
this extreme difficulty of amendment, the fatal defects of the
Confederation were three in number. The first defect was the two thirds
vote necessary for any important legislation in Congress; under this
rule any five of the states--as, for example, the four southernmost
states with Maryland, or the four New England states with New
Jersey--could defeat the most sorely needed measures. The second defect
was the impossibility of presenting a united front to foreign countries
in respect to commerce. The third and greatest defect was the lack of
any means, on the part of Congress, of enforcing obedience. Not only was
there no federal executive or judiciary worthy of the name, but the
central government operated only upon states, and not upon individuals.
Congress could call for troops and for money in strict conformity with
the articles; but should any state prove delinquent in furnishing its
quota, there were no constitutional means of compelling it to obey the
call. This defect was seen and deplored at the outset by such men as
Washington and Madison, but the only remedy which at first occurred to
them was one more likely to kill than to cure. Only six weeks after the
ratification of the articles, Madison proposed an amendment "to give to
the United States full authority to employ their force, as well by sea
as by land, to compel any delinquent state to fulfil its federal
engagements." Washington approved of this measure, hoping, as he said,
that "a knowledge that this power was lodged in Congress might be the
means to prevent its ever being exercised, and the more readily induce
obedience. Indeed," added Washington, "if Congress were unquestionably
possessed of the power, nothing should induce the display of it but
obstinate disobedience and the urgency of the general welfare." Madison
argued that in the very nature of the Confederation such a right of
coercion was necessarily implied, though not expressed in the articles,
and much might have been said in behalf of this opinion. The
Confederation explicitly declared itself to be perpetual, yet how could
it perpetuate itself for a dozen years without the right to coerce its
refractory members? Practically, however, the remedy was one which could
never have been applied without breaking the Confederation into
fragments. To use the army or navy in coercing a state meant nothing
less than civil war. The local yeomanry would have turned out against
the Continental army with as high a spirit as that with which they
swarmed about the British enemy at Lexington or King's Mountain. A
government which could not collect the taxes for its yearly budget
without firing upon citizens or blockading two or three harbours would
have been the absurdest political anomaly imaginable. No such idea could
have entered the mind of a statesman save from the hope that if one
state should prove refractory, all the others would immediately frown
upon it and uphold Congress in overawing it. In such case the knowledge
that Congress had the power would doubtless have been enough to make its
exercise unnecessary. But in fact this hope was disappointed, for the
delinquency of each state simply set an example of disobedience for all
the others to follow; and the amendment, had it been carried, would
merely have armed Congress with a threat which everybody would have
laughed at. So manifestly hopeless was the case to Pelatiah Webster that
as early as May, 1781, he published an able pamphlet, urging the
necessity for a federal convention for overhauling the whole scheme of
government from beginning to end.
[Sidenote: Military weakness of the government.]
The military weakness due to this imperfect governmental organization
may be illustrated by comparing the number of regular troops which
Congress was able to keep in the field during the Revolutionary War with
the number maintained by the United States government during the War of
Secession. A rough estimate, obtained from averages, will suffice to
show the broad contrast. In 1863, the middle year of the War of
Secession, the total population of the loyal states was about
23,491,600, of whom about one fifth, or 4,698,320, were adult males of
military age. Supposing one adult male out of every five to have been
under arms at one time, the number would have been 939,664. Now the
total number of troops enlisted in the northern army during the four
years of the war, reduced to a uniform standard, was 2,320,272, or an
average of 580,068 under arms in any single year. In point of fact,
this average was reached before the middle of the war, and the numbers
went on increasing, until at the end there were more than a million men
under arms,--at least one out of every five adult males in the northern
states. On the other hand, in 1779, the middle year of the Revolutionary
War, the white population of the United States was about 2,175,000, of
whom 435,000 were adult males of military age. Supposing one out of
every five of these to have been under arms at once, the number would
have been 87,000. Now in the spring of 1777, when the Continental
Congress was at the highest point of authority which it ever reached,
when France was willing to lend it money freely, when its paper currency
was not yet discredited and it could make liberal offers of bounties, a
demand was made upon the states for 80,000 men, or nearly one fifth of
the adult male population, to serve for three years or during the war.
Only 34,820 were obtained. The total number of men in the field in that
most critical year, including the swarms of militia who came to the
rescue at Ridgefield and Bennington and Oriskany, and the Pennsylvania
militia who turned out while their state was invaded, was 68,720. In
1781, when the credit of Congress was greatly impaired, although
military activity again rose to a maximum and it was necessary for the
people to strain every nerve, the total number of men in the field,
militia and all, was only 29,340, of whom only 13,292 were Continentals;
and it was left for the genius of Washington and Greene, working with
desperate energy and most pitiful resources, to save the country. A
more impressive contrast to the readiness with which the demands of the
government were met in the War of Secession can hardly be imagined. Had
the country put forth its strength in 1781 as it did in 1864, an army of
90,000 men might have overwhelmed Clinton at the north and Cornwallis at
the south, without asking any favours of the French fleet. Had it put
forth its full strength in 1777, four years of active warfare might have
been spared. Mr. Lecky explains this difference by his favourite
hypothesis that the American Revolution was the work of a few
ultra-radical leaders, with whom the people were not generally in
sympathy; and he thinks we could not expect to see great heroism or
self-sacrifice manifested by a people who went to war over what he calls
a "money dispute."[3] But there is no reason for supposing that the
loyalists represented the general sentiment of the country in the
Revolutionary War any more than the peace party represented the general
sentiment of the northern states in the War of Secession. There is no
reason for supposing that the people were less at heart in 1781 in
fighting for the priceless treasure of self-government than they were in
1864 when they fought for the maintenance of the pacific principles
underlying our Federal Union. The differences in the organization of the
government, and in its power of operating directly upon the people, are
quite enough to explain the difference between the languid conduct of
the earlier war and the energetic conduct of the later.
[Sidenote: Extreme difficulty of obtaining a revenue.]
Impossible as Congress found it to fill the quotas of the army, the task
of raising a revenue by requisitions upon the states was even more
discouraging. Every state had its own war-debt, and several were
applicants for foreign loans not easy to obtain, so that none could
without the greatest difficulty raise a surplus to hand over to
Congress. The Continental rag-money had ceased to circulate by the end
of 1780, and our foreign credit was nearly ruined. The French government
began to complain of the heavy demands which the Americans made upon its
exchequer, and Vergennes, in sending over a new loan in the fall of
1782, warned Franklin that no more must be expected. To save American
credit from destruction, it was at least necessary that the interest on
the public debt should be paid. For this purpose Congress in 1781 asked
permission to levy a five per cent. duty on imports. The modest request
was the signal for a year of angry discussion. Again and again it was
asked, If taxes could thus be levied by any power outside the state, why
had we ever opposed the Stamp Act or the tea duties? The question was
indeed a serious one, and as an instance of reasoning from analogy
seemed plausible enough. After more than a year Massachusetts consented,
by a bare majority of two in the House and one in the Senate, reserving
to herself the right of appointing the collectors. The bill was then
vetoed by Governor Hancock, though one day too late, and so it was
saved. But Rhode Island flatly refused her consent, and so did Virginia,
though Madison earnestly pleaded the cause of the public credit. For
the current expenses of the government in that same year $9,000,000 were
needed. It was calculated that $4,000,000 might be raised by a loan, and
the other $5,000,000 were demanded of the states. At the end of the year
$422,000 had been collected, not a cent of which came from Georgia, the
Carolinas, or Delaware. Rhode Island, which paid $38,000, did the best
of all according to its resources. Of the Continental taxes assessed in
1783, only one-fifth part had been paid by the middle of 1785. And the
worst of it was that no one could point to a remedy for this state of
things, or assign any probable end to it.
[Sidenote: Dread of the army.]
[Sidenote: Supposed scheme for making Washington king.]
Under such circumstances the public credit sank at home as well as
abroad. Foreign creditors--even France, who had been nothing if not
generous with her loans--might be made to wait; but there were creditors
at home who, should they prove ugly, could not be so easily put off. The
disbandment of the army in the summer of 1783, before the British troops
had evacuated New York, was hastened by the impossibility of paying the
soldiers and the dread of what they might do under such provocation.
Though peace had been officially announced, Hamilton and Livingston
urged that, for the sake of appearances if for no other reason, the army
should be kept together so long as the British remained in New York, if
not until they should have surrendered the western frontier posts. But
Congress could not pay the army, and was afraid of it,--and not without
some reason. Discouraged at the length of time which had passed since
they had received any money, the soldiers had begun to fear lest, now
that their services were no longer needed, their honest claims would be
set aside. Among the officers, too, there was grave discontent. In the
spring of 1778, after the dreadful winter at Valley Forge, several
officers had thrown up their commissions, and others threatened to do
likewise. To avert the danger, Washington had urged Congress to promise
half-pay for life to such officers as should serve to the end of the
war. It was only with great difficulty that he succeeded in obtaining a
promise of half-pay for seven years, and even this raised an outcry
throughout the country, which seemed to dread its natural defenders only
less than its enemies. In the fall of 1780, however, in the general
depression which followed upon the disasters at Charleston and Camden,
the collapse of the paper money, and the discovery of Arnold's treason,
there was serious danger that the army would fall to pieces. At this
critical moment Washington had earnestly appealed to Congress, and
against the strenuous opposition of Samuel Adams had at length extorted
the promise of half-pay for life. In the spring of 1782, seeing the
utter inability of Congress to discharge its pecuniary obligations, many
officers began to doubt whether the promise would ever be kept. It had
been made before the articles of confederation, which required the
assent of nine states to any such measure, had been finally ratified. It
was well known that nine states had never been found to favour the
measure, and it was now feared that it might be repealed or repudiated,
so loud was the popular clamour against it. All this comes o
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