The Life of John Marshall, Volume 1: Frontiersman, soldier, lawmaker, 1755-1788

705

Journal, H.D. (1st Sess., 1784), 25.

706

Madison to Jefferson, Jan. 9, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii, 114.

707

See Madison's vivid description of this incident; ib., 116; also Henry, ii, 233.

708

Ib.

709

Marshall to Monroe, Dec. 2, 1784; MS., Monroe Papers, Lib. Cong.

710

Madison to Monroe, Dec. 24, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii, 205.

"Being convinced myself that nothing can be now done that will not extremely dishonor us, and embarass Congṣ my wish is that the report may not be called for at all. In the course of the debates no pains were spared to disparage the Treaty by insinuations agṣṭ Congṣ, the Eastern States, and the negociators of the Treaty, particularly J. Adams. These insinuations & artifices explain perhaps one of the motives from which the augmention of the foederal powers & respectability has been opposed." (Madison to Monroe, Dec. 30, 1785; ib., 211.)

711

Curiously enough, it fell to Jefferson as Secretary of State to report upon, explain, and defend the measures of Virginia and other States which violated the Treaty of Peace. (See Jefferson to the British Minister, May 29, 1792; Works: Ford, vii, 3-99.) This masterful statement is one of the finest argumentative products of Jefferson's brilliant mind.

712

Journal, H.D. (1787), 51.

713

Ib., 52.

714

Ib. James Monroe was a member of the House at this session and voted against the first amendment and for the second. On the contrary, Patrick Henry voted for the first and against the second amendment. George Mason voted against both amendments. So did Daniel Boone, who was, with Thomas Marshall, then a member of the Virginia Legislature from the District of Kentucky. On the passage of the resolution, James Monroe and Patrick Henry again swerved around, the former voting for and the latter against it.

715

Journal, H.D. (1787), 52.

716

Journal, H.D. (1787), 79.

717

"If we are now to pay the debts due to the British merchants, what have we been fighting for all this while?" was the question the people "sometimes" asked, testifies George Mason. (Henry, ii, 187.) But the fact is that this question generally was asked by the people. Nothing explains the struggle over this subject except that the people found it a bitter hardship to pay the debts, as, indeed, was the case; and the idea of not paying them at all grew into a hope and then a policy.

718

Journal, H.D. (1787), 80.

719

Hening, xii, 528. Richard Henry Lee thought that both countries were to blame. (Lee to Henry, Feb. 14, 1785; quoted in Henry, iii, 279.)

720

For an excellent statement regarding payment of British debts, see letter of George Mason to Patrick Henry, May 6, 1783, as quoted in Henry, ii, 186-87. But Mason came to put it on the ground that Great Britain would renew the war if these debts were not paid.

721

Story, in Dillon, iii, 338.

722

Hening, x, chaps. ii and ix, 409-51.

723

For a general review of the state of the country see infra, chaps. VII and VIII.

724

Hening, xi, chap. xlii, 171.

725

Ib., chap. xxxi, 350.

726

Journal, H.D., 52.

727

In order to group subjects such as British debts, extradition, and so forth, it is, unfortunately, essential to bring widely separated dates under one head.

728

Journal, H.D. (1st Sess., 1784), 11-12.

729

Journal, H.D. (1st Sess., 1784), 37.

730

Ib., 81; also, Hening, xi, 388.

731

"The white people who inhabited the frontier, from the constant state of warfare in which they lived with the Indians, had imbibed much of their character; and learned to delight so highly in scenes of crafty, bloody, and desperate conflict, that they as often gave as they received the provocation to hostilities. Hunting, which was their occupation, became dull and tiresome, unless diversified occasionally by the more animated and piquant amusement of an Indian skirmish." (Wirt, 257.)

732

Madison to Jefferson, Jan. 9, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii, 110-11.

733

Jay to Jefferson, Dec. 14, 1786; Jay: Johnston, iii, 224.

734

Hening, xi, 471; and Henry, ii, 217.

735

Madison to Jefferson, Jan. 9, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii. 111.

736

Article VIII, Constitution of Virginia, 1776.

737

Madison to Jefferson, Jan. 9, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii, 111.

738

Ib.

739

Journal, H.D. (2d Sess., 1784), 34-41.

740

"The measure was warmly patronized by Mr. Henry." (Madison to Jefferson, Jan. 9, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii, 111.) The reason of Henry's support of this extradition bill was not its Nationalist spirit, but his friendship for the Indians and his pet plan to insure peace between the white man and the red and to produce a better race of human beings; all of which Henry thought could be done by intermarriages between the whites and the Indians. He presented this scheme to the House at this same session and actually carried it by the "irresistible earnestness and eloquence" with which he supported it. (Wirt, 258.)

The bill provided that every white man who married an Indian woman should be paid ten pounds and five pounds more for each child born of such marriage; and that if any white woman marry an Indian they should be entitled to ten pounds with which the County Court should buy live stock for them; that once each year the Indian husband to this white woman should be entitled to three pounds with which the County Court should buy clothes for him; that every child born of this Indian man and white woman should be educated by the State between the age of ten and twenty-one years, etc., etc. (Ib.)

This amazing bill actually passed the House on its first and second reading and there seems to be no doubt that it would have become a law had not Henry at that time been elected Governor, which took him "out of the way," to use Madison's curt phrase. John Marshall favored this bill.

741

Journal, H.D. (2d Sess., 1784), 41.

742

Ib.

743

See note 5, p. 239, ante.

744

Marshall to Monroe, Dec., 1784; MS. Monroe Papers, Lib. Cong.; also partly quoted in Henry, ii, 219.

745

See infra, chap. IX.

746

One of the curious popular errors concerning our public men is that which pictures Washington as a calm person. On the contrary, he was hot-tempered and, at times, violent in speech and action. It was with the greatest difficulty that he trained himself to an appearance of calmness and reserve.

747

Story, in Dillon, iii, 338, 343.

748

Journal, H.D. (Oct. Sess., 1787), 7.

749

Ib., 11, 15.

750

Pennsylvania Packet, Nov. 10, 1787: Pa. Hist. Soc.

751

Infra, chaps. XI and XII.

752

Pennsylvania Packet, Nov. 10, 1787; also see in Rowland, ii, 176.

753

Infra, chaps. IX, XII; and also Washington to Lafayette, Feb. 7, 1788; Writings: Ford, xi, 220.

754

Pennsylvania Packet, Nov. 10, 1787; Pa. Hist. Soc.

755

Journal, H.D. (Oct. Sess., 1787), 15.

756

Ib.

757

Ib., 95.

758

Ib. (Dec., 1787), 143, 177.

759

Hening, xii, 462-63.

760

Weld, i, 37-38; also, Morris, ii, 393-94.

761

Weld, i, 38.

762

Baily's Journal (1796-97), 108.

763

Ib., 109-10.

764

Professor Beard, in his exposition of the economic origins of the Constitution, shows that nearly all of the men who framed it were wealthy or allied with property interests and that many of them turned up as holders of Government securities. (Beard: Econ. I. C., chap. v.) As a matter of fact, none but such men could have gone to the Federal Convention at Philadelphia, so great were the difficulties and so heavy the expenses of travel, even if the people had been minded to choose poorer and humbler persons to represent them; at any rate, they did not elect representatives of their own class until the Constitution was to be ratified and then, of course, only to State Conventions which were accessible.

765

Weld, i, 47-48.

766

Johnston to Iredell, Jan. 30, 1790; McRee, ii, 279.

767

"Letters of a Federal Farmer," no. 2; Ford: P. on C., 292.

768

Ib., no. 3, 302.

769

De Warville made a record trip from Boston to New York in less than five days. (De Warville, 122.) But such speed was infrequent.

770

Josiah Quincy's description of his journey from Boston to New York in 1794. (Quincy: Figures of the Past, 47-48.)

771

De Warville, 138-39.

772

Watson, 266.

773

"The road is execrable; one is perpetually mounting and descending and always on the most rugged roads." (Chastellux, 20.)

774

Elliott, ii, 21-22.

775

"In December last, the roads were so intollerably bad that the country people could not bring their forage to market, though actually offered the cash on delivery." (Pickering to Hodgdon; Pickering: Pickering, i, 392.)

776

Cooper, 1875-86, as quoted in Hart, iii, 98.

777

Ib.

778

Watson, 270. Along one of the principal roads of New York, as late as 1804, President Dwight discovered only "a few lonely plantations" and he "occasionally found a cottage and heard a distant sound of an axe and of a human voice. All else was grandeur, gloom, and solitude." (Halsey: Old New York Frontier, 384.)

779

Hart, iii, 116.

780

Mag. Western Hist., i, 530.

781

Justice Cushing to Chief Justice Jay, Oct. 23, 1792; Jay: Johnston, iii, 450.

782

Memoirs of Talleyrand: Broglie's ed., i, 176-77.

783

Washington to Jay, Nov. 19, 1790; Jay: Johnston, iii, 409.

784

Jefferson to Washington, March 27, 1791; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 366.

785

Washington's Diary: Lossing, Feb. 25, 1791.

786

Washington to Jay, Dec. 13, 1789; Jay: Johnston, iii, 381.

787

Jefferson to T. M. Randolph, March 28, 1790; Works: Ford, vi, 36.

788

Weld, i, 91.

789

Bayard to Rodney, Jan. 5, 1801; Bayard Papers: Donnan, ii, 118.

790

Schoepf, ii, 46.

791

Ib., 78.

792

Ib., 45.

793

Grigsby, i, 26.

794

Weld, i, 170.

795

Watson, 60.

796

Davis, 372.

797

Schoepf, ii, 95.

798

Wilkinson: Memoirs, i, 9-10. The distance which General Wilkinson's mother thought "so far away" was only forty miles.

799

Schoepf, ii, 53.

800

Zachariah Johnson, in Elliott, iii, 647.

801

Journal, H.D. (1790), 13.

802

Madison to Lee, July 7, 1785; Writings: Hunt, ii, 149-51.

803

Ib.

804

Boston was not a "city" in the legal interpretation until 1822.

805

Chastellux, 225. "The difficulty of finding the road in many parts of America is not to be conceived except by those strangers who have travelled in that country. The roads, which are through the woods, not being kept in repair, as soon as one is in bad order, another is made in the same manner, that is, merely by felling trees, and the whole interior parts are so covered that without a compass it is impossible to have the least idea of the course you are steering. The distances, too, are so uncertain as in every county where they are not measured, that no two accounts resemble each other. In the back parts of Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, I have frequently travelled thirty miles for ten, though frequently set right by passengers and negroes." (Ib. Translator's note.)

806

Smyth, Tour of the United States, i, 102-103.

807

Watson, 40. "Towards the close of the day I found myself entangled among swamps amid an utter wilderness, and my horse almost exhausted in my efforts to overtake Harwood. As night closed upon me I was totally bewildered and without a vestige of a road to guide me. Knowing the impossibility of retracing my steps in the dark, through the mazes I had traversed, I felt the necessity of passing the night in this solitary desert … in no trifling apprehension of falling a prey to wild beasts before morning." (Ib.)

808

Ib.

809

"I waited at Baltimore near a week before I could proceed on my journey the roads being rendered impassable." (Baily's Journal (1796-97), 107.)

810

Memoirs of Talleyrand: Broglie's ed., i, 177.

811

Madison to Jefferson, Dec. 21, 1794; Writings: Hunt, vi, 227.

812

Madison to Jefferson, Jan. 26, 1795; ib., 230.

813

"Your favor of July 6 having been addressd to Williamsburg, instead of Orange C. Ho[u]se, did not come to hand till two days ago." (Madison to Livingston, Aug. 10, 1795; ib., vi, 234.)

814

Lee to Henry, May 28, 1789; Henry, iii, 387.

815

Lee to Henry, Sept. 27, 1789; Henry, iii, 402.

816

Ephraim Douglass to Gen. James Irvine, 1784; Pa. Mag. Hist. and Biog., i, 50.

817

Madison to Washington, Feb. 15, 1788; and King to Madison, Feb. 6, 1788; Writings: Hunt, v, footnote to p. 100.

818

Madison to Washington, Feb. 11, 1788: Writings: Hunt, v, 99.

819

Madison to Washington, Feb. 15, 1788; ib., 100.

820

The Randolph-Clinton Correspondence; see infra, chap. x.

821

Jay to Wolcott, mailed June 23, and received by Wolcott Aug. 16, 1794; Gibbs, i, 157.

822

Ib., 160.

823

Jefferson to Short, Nov. 21, 1789; Works: Ford, vi, 20.

824

So notorious was this practice that important parts of the correspondence of the more prominent politicians and statesmen of the day always were written in cipher. Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe appear to have been especially careful to take this precaution. (See Washington's complaint of this tampering with the mails in a letter to Fairfax, June 25, 1786; Writings: Sparks, ix, 175.) Habitual violation of the mails by postmasters continued into the first decades of the nineteenth century.

825

Washington to Lafayette, Feb. 7, 1788; Writings: Ford, xi, 218.

826

Kettell, in Eighty Years' Progress, ii, 174.

827

Pa. Mag. Hist. and Biog., ix, 444.

828

Am. Ant. Soc. Pubs., xxiii, Part ii, 254-330.

829

Goodrich, i, 61.

830

Schoepf, ii, 61; see note, ib. Even this journal died for want of subscribers.

831

Salem Gazette, Sept. 13, 1791; Hist. Col., Topsfield (Mass.) Hist. Soc., iii, 10.

832

Washington to Humphreys, Dec. 26, 1786; Writings: Ford, xi, 98-103.

833

Washington to General Knox, Dec. 26, 1786; ib., 103-05.

834

Writings: Smyth, x, 36 et seq. This arraignment of the press by America's first journalist was written when Franklin was eighty-three years old and when he was the most honored and beloved man in America, Washington only excepted. It serves not only to illuminate the period of the beginning of our Government, but to measure the vast progress during the century and a quarter since that time.

835

Jefferson to Mrs. Adams, Paris, Sept. 25, 1785; Works: Ford, iv, 465.

836

"Country Printer," in Freneau, iii, 60. Freneau thus describes the country editor of that day: —

"Three times a week, by nimble geldings drawn,A stage arrives; but scarcely deigns to stop.Unless the driver, far in liquor gone,Has made some business for the black-smith-shop;Then comes this printer's harvest-time of news,Welcome alike from Christians, Turks, or Jews."Each passenger he eyes with curious glance,And, if his phiz be mark'd of courteous kind,To conversation, straight, he makes advance,Hoping, from thence, some paragraph to find,Some odd adventure, something new and rare,To set the town a-gape, and make it stare."All is not Truth ('tis said) that travellers tell —So much the better for this man of news;For hence the country round, that know him well,Will, if he prints some lies, his lies excuse.Earthquakes, and battles, shipwrecks, myriads slain —If false or true – alike to him are gain."Ask you what matter fills his various page?A mere farrago 'tis, of mingled things;Whate'er is done on Madam Terra's stageHe to the knowledge of his townsmen brings:One while, he tells of monarchs run away;And now, of witches drown'd in Buzzard's bay."Some miracles he makes, and some he steals;Half Nature's works are giants in his eyes;Much, very much, in wonderment he deals, —New-Hampshire apples grown to pumpkin size,Pumpkins almost as large as country inns,And ladies bearing, each, – three lovely twins."

Freneau was himself a country printer in New Jersey, after editing the National Gazette in Philadelphia. Thus the above description was from his personal experience and in a town in a thickly settled part, on the main road between New York and Philadelphia.

837

Goodrich, i, 38.

838

A letter from Salem Town about 1786-87; in American Journal of Education, xiii, 738.

839

Van Santvoord: Memoirs of Eliphalet Nott, 19.

840

Davis, 333.

841

"Many cannot read or write, and many that can, know nothing of geography and other branches. The country is too thinly settled to carry out a system of common schools." (Howe, 153, speaking of western Virginia about 1830.)

842

Weld, i, 168. But President Tyler says that the boys Weld saw were grammar-school pupils.

843

Watson, 269.

844

Chastellux, 319-20.

845

De Warville, 126-27.

846

Ib., 145 and 450.

847

Ib., 145. All travelers agree as to the wretched condition of Rhode Island; and that State appears to have acted as badly as it looked. "The … infamous [scenes] in Rhode Island have done inexpressable injury to the Republican character," etc. (Madison to Pendleton, Feb. 24, 1787; Writings: Hunt, ii, 319.)

848

De Warville, 132.

849

Weld, i, 113.

850

De Warville, 186-87.

851

De Warville, 186 and 332. See La Rochefoucauld's description of this same type of settler as it was several years after De Warville wrote. "The Dwellings of the new settlers … consist of huts, with roofs and walls which are made of bark and in which the husband, wife and children pass the winter wrapped up in blankets… Salt pork and beef are the usual food of the new settlers; their drink is water and whiskey." (La Rochefoucauld, i, 293-96.)

852

Freneau, iii, 74.

853

Knox to Washington, Feb. 10, 1788; Writings: Ford, xi, footnote to 229. And see infra, chap. VIII.

854

De Warville, 187. In 1797, La Rochefoucauld speaks of "the credulity and ignorance of the half-savage sort of people who inhabit the back settlements." (La Rochefoucauld, i, 293.)

855

"A relaxation is observable among all orders of society. Drunkenness is the prevailing vice, and with few exceptions, the source of all other evils. A spirit, or rather a habit, of equality is diffused among this people as far as it possibly can go… The inhabitants exhibit to strangers striking instances both of the utmost cleanliness and excessive nastiness," (La Rochefoucauld, i, 125.)

During Washington's second term as President, La Rochefoucauld thus describes manners in western Pennsylvania: "They are much surprised at a refusal to sleep with one, two, or more men, in the same bed, or between dirty sheets, or to drink after ten other persons out of the same dirty glass… Whiskey mixed with water is the common drink in the country." (Ib.)

856

Ib., i, 293-96. See infra, note 4, pp. 281-82.