The Life of John Marshall (Volume 2 of 4)

Warville. See Brissot de Warville.

Washington, Bushrod. See Virginia. Law Reports.

Washington, George. Diary from 1789 to 1791. Edited by Benson J. Lossing. New York. 1860. (Washington's Diary: Lossing.)

– Writings. Edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford. 14 vols. New York. 1889-93. (Writings: Ford.)

– Writings. Edited by Jared Sparks. 12 vols. Boston. 1834-37. (Writings: Sparks.)

And Lodge, Henry Cabot. George Washington.

Also Marshall, John. Life of George Washington.

Also see Paulding, James K. Life of Washington.

Washington, H. A., editor. See Jefferson, Thomas. Writings.

Watson, John Fanning. Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, In the Olden Time. 3 vols. Philadelphia. 1877-79. (Watson: Annals of Philadelphia.)

Weld, Isaac. Travels Through the States of North America, and the Provinces of Upper and Lower Canada During the Years 1795, 1796, and 1797. [3d Edition.] 2 vols. London. 1800. (Weld.)

Wharton, Francis. See United States. State Trials.

Wirt, William. The Letters of the British Spy. [9th Edition.] Baltimore. 1831. (Wirt: British Spy.)

– Sketches of the Life and Character of Patrick Henry. Philadelphia. 1818. (Wirt.)

See Kennedy, John P. Memoirs of William Wirt.

Wise, John Sergeant. The End of An Era. Boston. 1899. (Wise: The End of An Era.)

Wolcott, Oliver. Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams. Edited from the papers of Oliver Wolcott, by George Gibbs. 2 vols. New York. 1846. (Gibbs.)

Wood, John. History of Administration of John Adams, Esq. Late President of the United States. New York. 1802. (Wood.)

1

"That the principles of America opened the Bastille is not to be doubted." (Thomas Paine to Washington, May 1, 1790; Cor. Rev.2: Sparks, iv, 328.) "The principles of it [the French Revolution] were copied from America." (Paine to Citizens of the United States, Nov. 15, 1802; Writings: Conway, iii, 381.)

"Did not the American Revolution produce the French Revolution? And did not the French Revolution produce all the Calamities and Desolations to the human Race and the whole Globe ever since?" (Adams to Rush, Aug. 28, 1811; Old Family Letters, 352.)

"Many of … the leaders [of the French Revolution] have imbibed their principles in America, and all have been fired by our example." (Gouverneur Morris to Washington, Paris, April 29, 1789; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 256.)

"All the friends of freedom on this side the Atlantic are now rejoicing for an event which … has been accelerated by the American Revolution… You have been the means of raising that spirit in Europe which … will … extinguish every remain of that barbarous servitude under which all the European nations, in a less … degree, have so long been subject." (Catharine M. Graham to Washington, Berks (England), Oct. 1789; ib., 284; and see Cobbett, i, 97.)

2

See vol. i, chap. viii, of this work.

3

Marshall, ii, 155. "The mad harangues of the [French] National Convention were all translated and circulated through the States. The enthusiasm they excited it is impossible for me to describe." (Cobbett in "Summary View"; Cobbett, i, 98.)

4

Jefferson to Humphreys, March 18, 1789; Works: Ford, v, 467.

5

Jefferson to Madison, Aug. 28, 1789; ib., 490.

6

Boston Gazette, Sept. 7 and Nov. 30, 1789; as quoted in Hazen; and see Hazen, 142-43.

7

Gouverneur Morris to Washington, Paris, April 29, 1789; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 256. Even Jefferson had doubted French capacity for self-government because of what he described as French light-mindedness. (Jefferson to Mrs. Adams, Feb. 22, 1787; Works: Ford, v, 263; also see vol. i, chap. viii, of this work.)

8

Morris to Washington, July 31, 1789; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 270.

9

Lafayette to Washington, May 25, 1788; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 216. Lafayette's letters to Washington, from the beginning of the French Revolution down to his humiliating expulsion from France, constitute a thermometer of French temperature, all the more trustworthy because his letters are so naïve. For example, in March, 1790: "Our revolution is getting on as well as it can, with a nation that has swallowed liberty at once, and is still liable to mistake licentiousness for freedom." Or, in August of the same year: "I have lately lost some of my favor with the mob, and displeased the frantic lovers of licentiousness, as I am bent on establishing a legal subordination." Or, six months later: "I still am tossed about in the ocean of factions and commotions of every kind." Or, two months afterwards: "There appears a kind of phenomenon in my situation; all parties against me, and a national popularity which, in spite of every effort, has been unshakable." (Lafayette to Washington, March 17, 1790; ib., 321; Aug. 28, ib., 345; March 7, 1791, ib., 361; May 3, 1791, ib., 372.)

10

G. Morris to R. Morris, Dec. 24, 1792; Morris, ii, 15.

11

Ib., i, 582-84.

12

Louis Otto to De Montmorin, March 10, 1792; Writings: Conway, iii, 153.

13

Ib., 154-56.

14

Morris associated with the nobility in France and accepted the aristocratic view. (Ib.; and see A. Esmein, Membre de l'Institut: Gouverneur Morris, un témoin américain de la révolution française, Paris, 1906.)

15

Marshall, ii, note xvi, p. 17.

16

Recent investigation establishes the fact that the inmates of the Bastille generally found themselves very well off indeed. The records of this celebrated prison show that even prisoners of mean station, when incarcerated for so grave a crime as conspiracy against the King's life, had, in addition to remarkably abundant meals, an astonishing amount of extra viands and refreshments including comfortable quantities of wine, brandy, and beer. Prisoners of higher station fared still more generously, of course. (Funck-Brentano: Legends of the Bastille, 85-113; see also ib., introduction.) It should be said, however, that the lettres de cachet were a chief cause of complaint, although the stories, generally exaggerated, concerning the cruel treatment of prisoners came to be the principal count of the public indictment of the Bastille.

17

Lafayette to Washington, March 17, 1790; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 322.

18

Washington to Lafayette, August 11, 1790; Writings: Ford, xi, 493.

19

Paine to Washington, May 1, 1790; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 328. Paine did not, personally, bring the key, but forwarded it from London.

20

Burke in the House of Commons; Works: Burke, i, 451-53.

21

Ib.

22

Reflections on the Revolution in France; ib., i, 489. Jefferson well stated the American radical opinion of Burke: "The Revolution of France does not astonish me so much as the Revolution of Mr. Burke… How mortifying that this evidence of the rottenness of his mind must oblige us now to ascribe to wicked motives those actions of his life which were the mark of virtue & patriotism." (Jefferson to Vaughan, May 11, 1791; Works: Ford, vi, 260.)

23

Paine had not yet lost his immense popularity in the United States. While, later, he came to be looked upon with horror by great numbers of people, he enjoyed the regard and admiration of nearly everybody in America at the time his Rights of Man appeared.

24

Writings: Conway, ii, 272.

25

Writings: Conway, ii, 406. At this very moment the sympathizers with the French Revolution in America were saying exactly the reverse.

26

Writings: Conway, ii, 278-79, 407, 408, 413, 910.

27

Compare with Jefferson's celebrated letter to Mazzei (infra, chap. vii). Jefferson was now, however, in Washington's Cabinet.

28

Jefferson to Paine, June 19, 1792; Works: Ford, vii, 121-22; and see Hazen, 157-60. Jefferson had, two years before, expressed precisely the views set forth in Paine's Rights of Man. Indeed, he stated them in even more startling terms. (See Jefferson to Madison, Sept. 6, 1789; ib., vi, 1-11.)

29

Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 65-110. John Quincy Adams wrote these admirable essays when he was twenty-four years old. Their logic, wit, and style suggest the writer's incomparable mother. Madison, who remarked their quality, wrote to Jefferson: "There is more of method … in the arguments, and much less of clumsiness & heaviness in the style, than characterizes his [John Adams's] writings." (Madison to Jefferson, July 13, 1791; Writings: Hunt, vi, 56.)

The sagacious industry of Mr. Worthington C. Ford has made these and all the other invaluable papers of the younger Adams accessible, in his Writings of John Quincy Adams now issuing.

30

Jefferson to Adams, July 17, 1791; Works: Ford, vi, 283, and footnote; also see Jefferson to Washington, May 8, 1791; ib., 255-56.

Jefferson wrote Washington and the elder Adams, trying to evade his patronage of Paine's pamphlet; but, as Mr. Ford moderately remarks, "the explanation was somewhat lame." (Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 65; and see Hazen, 156-57.) Later Jefferson avowed that "Mr. Paine's principles … were the principles of the citizens of the U. S." (Jefferson to Adams, Aug. 30, 1791; Works: Ford, vi, 314.) To his intimate friend, Monroe, Jefferson wrote that "Publicola, in attacking all Paine's principles, is very desirous of involving me in the same censure with the author. I certainly merit the same, for I profess the same principles." (Jefferson to Monroe, July 10, 1791; ib., 280.)

Jefferson at this time was just on the threshold of his discovery of and campaign against the "deep-laid plans" of Hamilton and the Nationalists to transform the newborn Republic into a monarchy and to deliver the hard-won "liberties" of the people into the rapacious hands of "monocrats," "stockjobbers," and other "plunderers" of the public. (See next chapter.)

31

Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 65-66.

32

Although John Quincy Adams had just been admitted to the bar, he was still a student in the law office of Theophilus Parsons at the time he wrote the Publicola papers.

33

Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 65-110.

34

Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, footnote to 107.

"As soon as Publicola attacked Paine, swarms appeared in his defense… Instantly a host of writers attacked Publicola in support of those [Paine's] principles." (Jefferson to Adams, Aug. 30, 1791; Works: Ford, vi, 314; and see Jefferson to Madison, July 10, 1791; ib., 279.)

35

Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 110.

36

Madison to Jefferson, July 13, 1791; Writings; Hunt, vi, 56; and see Monroe to Jefferson, July 25, 1791; Monroe's Writings: Hamilton, i, 225-26.

37

A verse of a song by French Revolutionary enthusiasts at a Boston "Civic Festival in commemoration of the Successes of their French brethren in their glorious enterprise for the Establishment of Equal Liberty," as a newspaper describes the meeting, expresses in reserved and moderate fashion the popular feeling: —

"See the bright flame arise,In yonder Eastern skiesSpreading in veins;'T is pure DemocracySetting all Nations freeMelting their chains."

At this celebration an ox with gilded horns, one bearing the French flag and the other the American; carts of bread and two or three hogsheads of rum; and other devices of fancy and provisions for good cheer were the material evidence of the radical spirit. (See Columbian Centinel, Jan. 26, 1793.)

38

It is certain that Madison could not possibly have continued in public life if he had remained a conservative and a Nationalist. (See next chapter.)

39

Marshall, ii, 239.

40

Jefferson to Martha Jefferson Randolph, May 26, 1793; Works: Ford, vii, 345.

41

Marshall, ii, 249-51.

42

Marshall, ii, 251-52.

43

Jefferson to T. M. Randolph, Jan. 7, 1793; Works: Ford, vii, 207.

44

Mass. Hist. Collections (7th Series), i, 138.

45

Typical excerpts from Short's reports to Jefferson are: July 20, 1792: "Those mad & corrupted people in France who under the name of liberty have destroyed their own government [French Constitution of 1791] & disgusted all … men of honesty & property… All the rights of humanity … are daily violated with impunity … universal anarchy prevails… There is no succour … against mobs & factions which have assumed despotic power."

July 31: "The factions which have lately determined the system … for violating all the bonds of civil society … have disgusted all, except the sans culottes … with the present order of things … the most perfect & universal disorder that ever reigned in any country. Those who from the beginning took part in the revolution … have been disgusted, by the follies, injustice, & atrocities of the Jacobins… All power [is] in the hands of the most mad, wicked & atrocious assembly that ever was collected in any country."

August 15: "The Swiss guards have been massacred by the people & … streets literally are red with blood."

October 12: "Their [French] successes abroad are unquestionably evils for humanity. The spirit which they will propagate is so destructive of all order … so subversive of all ideas of justice – the system they aim at so absolutely visionary & impracticable – that their efforts can end in nothing but despotism after having bewildered the unfortunate people, whom they render free in their way, in violence & crimes, & wearied them with sacrifices of blood, which alone they consider worthy of the furies whom they worship under the names of Liberté & Egalité!"

August 24: "I shḍ not be at all surprized to hear of the present leaders being hung by the people. Such has been the moral of this revolution from the beginning. The people have gone farther than their leaders… We may expect … to hear of such proceedings, under the cloak of liberty, égalité & patriotism as would disgrace any chambre ardente that has ever created in humanity shudders at the idea." (Short MSS., Lib. Cong.)

These are examples of the statements to which Jefferson's letter, quoted in the text following, was the reply. Short's most valuable letters are from The Hague, to which he had been transferred. They are all the more important, as coming from a young radical whom events in France had changed into a conservative. And Jefferson's letter is conclusive of American popular sentiment, which he seldom opposed.

46

Almost at the same time Thomas Paine was writing to Jefferson from Paris of "the Jacobins who act without either prudence or morality." (Paine to Jefferson, April 20, 1793; Writings: Conway, iii, 132.)

47

Jefferson to Short, Jan. 3, 1793; Works: Ford, vii, 202-05. Short had written Jefferson that Morris, then in Paris, would inform him of French conditions. Morris had done so. For instance, he wrote officially to Jefferson, nearly four months before the latter's letter to Short quoted in the text, that: "We have had one week of unchecked murders, in which some thousands have perished in this city [Paris]. It began with between two and three hundred of the clergy, who would not take the oath prescribed by law. Thence these executors of speedy justice went to the Abbaye, where the prisoners were confined who were at Court on the 10th. Madame de Lamballe … was beheaded and disembowelled; the head and entrails paraded on pikes through the street, and the body dragged after them," etc., etc. (Morris to Jefferson, Sept. 10, 1792; Morris, i, 583-84.)

48

Madison to Jefferson, June 17, 1793; Writings: Hunt, vi, 133.

49

Paine to Danton, May 6, 1793; Writings: Conway, iii, 135-38.

50

"Truth," in the General Advertiser (Philadelphia), May 8, 1793. "Truth" denied that Louis XVI had aided us in our Revolution and insisted that it was the French Nation that had come to our assistance. Such was the disregard of the times for even the greatest of historic facts, and facts within the personal knowledge of nine tenths of the people then living.

51

See Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 151.

52

Jefferson to Madison, April 28, 1793; Works: Ford, vii, 301.

53

For examples of these, see Hazen, 220-45.

54

Graydon, 363.

55

Freneau's National Gazette defended the execution of the King and the excesses of the Terror. (Hazen, 256; and see Cobbett, iii, 4.) While Cobbett, an Englishman, was a fanatic against the whole democratic movement, and while his opinions are violently prejudiced, his statements of fact are generally trustworthy. "I have seen a bundle of Gazettes published all by the same man, wherein Mirabeau, Fayette, Brissot, Danton, Robespierre, and Barras, are all panegyrized and execrated in due succession." (Ib., i, 116.) Cobbett did his best to turn the radical tide, but to no purpose. "Alas!" he exclaimed, "what can a straggling pamphlet … do against a hundred thousand volumes of miscellaneous falsehood in folio?" (Ib., iii, 5.)

56

See next chapter.

57

Fenno to Hamilton, Nov. 9, 1793; King, i, 501-02. "The hand of benevolence & patriotism" was extended, it appears: "If you can … raise 1000 Dollars in New York, I will endeavor to raise another Thousand at Philadelphia. If this cannot be done, we must lose his [Fenno's and the Gazette of the United States] services & he will be the Victim of his honest public spirit." (Hamilton to King, Nov. 11, 1793; King, i, 502.)

58

Cobbett, i, footnote to 114. Curiously enough Louis XVI had believed that he was leading the French people in the reform movement. Thomas Paine, who was then in Paris, records that "The King … prides himself on being the head of the revolution." (Paine to Washington, May 1, 1790; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 328.)

59

Cobbett, i, 113-14; and see Hazen, 258. For other accounts of the "feasts" in honor of liberté, égalité, et fraternité, in America, see ib., 165-73.

60

Cobbett, i, 113.

61

For instance, the younger Adams wrote that the French Revolution had "contributed more to … Vandalic ignorance than whole centuries can retrieve… The myrmidons of Robespierre were as ready to burn libraries as the followers of Omar; and if the principle is finally to prevail which puts the sceptre of Sovereignty in the hands of European Sans Culottes, they will soon reduce everything to the level of their own ignorance." (John Quincy Adams to his father, July 27, 1795; Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 389.)

And James A. Bayard wrote that: "The Barbarians who inundated the Roman Empire and broke to pieces the institutions of the civilized world, in my opinion innovated the state of things not more than the French revolution." (Bayard to Bassett, Dec. 30, 1797; Bayard Papers: Donnan, 47.)

62

Freneau, iii, 86.

63

Marshall, ii, 387.

64

Austria.

65

Marshall, ii, 387.

66

"They have long considered the Mis de lafayette as really the firmest supporter of the principles of liberty in France – & as they are for the most part no friends to these principles anywhere, they cannot conceal the pleasure they [the aristocracy at The Hague] feel at their [principles of liberty] supporters' being thus expelled from the country where he laboured to establish them." (Short to Jefferson, Aug. 24, 1792; Short MSS., Lib. Cong.)

67

Cobbett, i, 112.

68

Ib. When the corporation of New York City thus took all monarchy out of its streets, Noah Webster suggested that, logically, the city ought to get rid of "this vile aristocratical name New York"; and, why not, inquired he, change the name of Kings County, Queens County, and Orange County? "Nay," exclaimed the sarcastic savant, "what will become of the people named King? Alas for the liberties of such people!" (Hazen, 216.)

69

Hazen, 218.

70

J. Q. Adams, to T. B. Adams, Feb. 1, 1792; Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 111-13.

71

Stuart to Washington, July 14, 1789; Cor. Rev.: Sparks, iv, 265-66; and see Randolph to Madison, May 19, 1789; Conway, 124.

72

See Hazen, 209-15.

73

Ib., 213.

74

See Hazen, 215.

75

Cobbett, i, 111.

76

For an impartial and comprehensive account of these clubs see Hazen, 188-208; also, Marshall, ii, 269 et seq. At first many excellent and prominent men were members; but these withdrew when the clubs fell under the control of less unselfish and high-minded persons.

77

Washington to Thruston, Aug. 10, 1794; Writings: Ford, xii, 451.

78

Washington to Randolph, Oct. 16, 1794; ib., 475; and see Washington to Lee, Aug. 26, 1794; ib., 455.

79

Cabot to Parsons, Aug. 12, 1794; Lodge: Cabot, 79.

80

J. Q. Adams to John Adams, Oct. 19, 1790; Writings, J. Q. A.: Ford, i, 64.

81

Jefferson to Rutledge, Aug. 29, 1791; Works: Ford, vi, 309.

82

See Hazen, 203-07.

83

September 18, 1794.

84

Ames to Dwight, Sept. 11, 1794; Works: Ames, i, 150.

85

Cabot to King, July 25, 1795; Lodge: Cabot, 80.

86

Ames to Gore, March 26, 1794; Works: Ames, i, 139.

87

Ames to Minot, Feb. 20, 1793; ib., 128.

88

Ames to Gore, Jan. 28, 1794; ib., 134.

89

Ames to Dwight, Sept. 3, 1794; ib., 148.

90

Henry to Washington, Oct. 16, 1795; Henry, ii, 559.

91

Ib., 576.

92

Marshall, ii, 353.

93

Ib., 269.

94

Marshall, ii, 353-54.

95

Marshall, ii, 150-51. "The agitation had been too great to be suddenly calmed; and for the active opponents of the system [Constitution] to become suddenly its friends, or even indifferent to its fate, would have been a victory of reason over passion." (Ib.; and see Beard: Econ. O. J. D., 85, 101, 102-07.)

96

"The effort was made to fill the legislature with the declared enemies of the government, and thus to commit it, in its infancy, to the custody of its foes." (Marshall, ii, 151.)