The Jeffersonian Cyclopedia

85. ADAMS (John), Political Principles of. --

Mr Adams had originally been a republican. The glare of royalty and nobility, during his mission to England, had made him believe their fascination a necessary ingredient in government; and Shays's rebellion, not sufficiently understood where he then was, seemed to prove that the absence of want and oppression, was not a sufficient guarantee of order. His book on the “ American Constitutions” having made known his political bias, he was taken up by monarchical Federalists, in his absence, and on his return to the United States, he was by them made to believe that the general disposition of our citizens was favorable to monarchy. He then wrote his “Davila,” as a supplement to the former work, and his election to the Presidency confirmed him in his errors. Innumerable addresses, too, artfully and industriously poured in upon him, deceived him into a confidence that he was on the pinnacle of popularity, when a gulf was yawning at his feet, which was to swallow up him and his deceivers. For, when General Washington was withdrawn, these energumeni of royalism. kept in check hitherto by the dread of his

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small | large [Col 1] honesty, his firmness, his patriotism, and the authority of his name, now mounted on the car of state and free from control, like Phäeton on that of the sun, drove headlong and wild, looking neither to right nor left, nor regarding anything but the objects they were driving at; until, displaying these fully, the eyes of the nation were opened, and a general disbandment of them from the public councils took place. Mr. Adams, I am sure, has been long since convinced of the treacheries with which he was surrounded during his administration. He has since thoroughly seen that his constituents were devoted to republican government, and whether his judgment is resettled on its ancient basis, or not, he is conformed as a good citizen to the will of the majority, and would now, I am persuaded, maintain its republican structure with the zeal and fidelity belonging to his character. For even an enemy has said, “he is always an honest man, and often a great one.” But in the fervor of the fever and follies of those who made him their stalking horse, no man who did not witness it, can form an idea of their unbridled madness, and the terrorism with which they surrounded themselves. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 97.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 166.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

86. ADAMS (John), Political Principles of. -- [continued] .

Adams was for two hereditary [legislative] branches and an honest elective one. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 96.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 166.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

178. AFFLICTION, Consolation in. --

Tried myself in the school of affliction, by the loss of every form of connection which can rive the human heart, I know well, and feel what you have lost, what you have suffered, are suffering, and have yet to endure. The same trials have taught me that for ills so immeasurable, time and silence are the only medicine. I will not, therefore, by useless condolences, open afresh the sluices of your [Col 2] grief, nor, although mingling sincerely my tears with yours, will I say a word more where words are vain. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 107.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 114.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

194. AGE, Oppressed by. -- [Further continued] .

The epistolary industry [* * *] is gone from me. The aversion has been growing on me for a considerable time, and now, near the close of seventyfive, is become almost insuperable. I am much debilitated in body, and my memory sensibly on the wane. Still, however, I enjoy good health and spirits, and am as industrious a reader as when a student at college. Not of newspapers. These I have discarded. I relinquish, as I ought to do, all intermeddling with public affairs, committing myself cheerfully to the watch and care of those for whom, in my turn, I have watched and cared. --

TITLE: To Benjamin Waterhouse.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 100.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 103.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

325. ALLIANCES, Insufficiency of. --

Treaties of alliance are generally insufficient to enforce compliance with their mutual stipulations.

TITLE: -- The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 88.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 157.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

589. ASSUMPTION OF STATE DEBTS, Review of. --

The game [Funding the debt] was over, and another was on the carpet at the moment of my arrival ³⁷ [in New York in 1790] , and to this I was most ignorantly and innocently made to hold the candle. This fiscal maneuvre is well known by the name of the Assumption. Independently of the debts of Congress, the States had, during the war, contracted separate and heavy debts; and Massachusetts particularly in an absurd attempt, absurdly conducted, on the British post of Penobscott; and the more debt Hamilton could rake up the more plunder for his mercenaries. This money, whether wisely or foolishly spent, was pretended to have been spent for general purposes, and ought, therefore, to be paid from

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small | large [Col 1] the general purse. But it was objected that nobody knew what these debts were, what their amount, or what their proofs. No matter; we will guess them to be twenty millions. But of these twenty millions, we do not know how much should be reimbursed to one State, nor how much to another. No matter; we will guess. And so another scramble was set on foot among the several States, and some got much, some little, some nothing. But the main object was attained, the phalanx of the treasury was reinforced by additional recruits. This measure produced the most bitter and angry contests ever known in Congress, before or since the Union of the States. I arrived in the midst of it. But a stranger to the ground, a stranger to the actors on it, so long absent [in France] as to have lost all familiarity with the subject, and as yet unaware of its object, I took no concern in it. The great and trying question, however, was lost in the House of Representatives. So high were the feuds excited by this subject, that on its rejection business was suspended. Congress met and adjourned from day to day without doing anything, the parties being too much out of temper to do business together. The Eastern members particularly, who, with Smith from South Carolina, were the principal gamblers in these scenes, threatened a secession and dissolution. Hamilton was in despair. As I was going to the President's one day, I met him in the street. He walked me backwards and forwards before the President's door for half an hour. He painted pathetically the temper into which the Legislature had been wrought; the disgust of those who were called the creditor States; the danger of the secession of their members, and the separation of the States. He observed that the members of the administration ought to act in concert; that though this question was not one of my department, yet a common duty should make it a common concern; that the President was the centre on which all administrative questions ultimately rested, and that all of us should rally around him, and support, with joint efforts, measures approved by him; and that the question having been lost by a small majority only, it was probable that an appeal from me to the judgment and discretion of some of my friends might effect a change in the vote, and the machine of government, now suspended, might be again set into motion. I told him that I was really a stranger to the whole subject; that not having yet informed myself of the system of finance adopted, I knew not how far this was a necessary sequence; that undoubtedly, if its rejection endangered a dissolution of our Union at this incipient stage, I should deem that the most unfortunate of all consequences, to avert which all partial and temporary evils should be yielded. I proposed to him, however, to dine with me the next day, and I would invite another friend or two, to bring them into conference together, and I thought it impossible that reasonable men, consulting together coolly, could fail, by some mutual sacrifices of opinion, to form a compromise which was to save the Union. The discussion took place. I could take no part in it, but an exhortatory one, because I was a stranger to the circumstances which should govern it. But it was finally agreed that, whatever importance had been attached to the rejection of this proposition, the preservation of the Union, and of [concord] among the States was more important, and that therefore, it would be better that the vote of rejection should be rescinded, to effect which some members should change their votes. But it was observed that this bill would be [Col 2] peculiarly bitter to the Southern States, and that some concomitant measure should be adopted, to sweeten it a little to them. There had before been proposals to fix the seat of government either at Philadelphia, or at Georgetown on the Potomac; and it was thought that by giving it to Philadelphia for ten years, and to Georgetown permanently afterwards, this might, as an anodyne, calm in some degree the ferment which might be excited by the other measure alone. So two of the Potomac members ( [Alexander] White and [Richard Bland] Lee but White with a revulsion of stomach almost convulsive), agreed to change their votes, and Hamilton undertook to carry the other point. In doing this the influence he had established over the Eastern members, with the agency of Robert Morris with those of the middle States effected his side of the engagement, and so the Assumption was passed, and twenty millions of stock divided among the favored States, and thrown in as pabulum to the stock-jobbing herd. This added to the number of votaries to the Treasury, and made its Chief the master of every vote in the Legislature which might give to the government the directions suited to his political views. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 92.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 161.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

663. BANK (U. S.), Beginning of. --

A division, not very unequal, had [* * *] taken place in the honest part of [* * *] [Congress in 1791] between the parties styled republican and federal. The latter, being monarchists in principle, adhered to [Alexander] Hamilton of course, as their leader in that principle, and this mercenary phalanx, ³⁹ added to them, ensured him always a majority in both Houses; so that the whole action of the Legislature was now under the direction of the Treasury. Still the machine was not complete. The effect of the Funding system, and of the Assumption [of the State debts] , would be temporary. It would be lost with the loss of the individual members whom it had enriched, and some engine of influence more permanent must be [Col 2] contrived while these myrmidons were yet in place to carry it through all opposition. This engine was the Bank of the United States. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 95.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 164.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

665. BANK (U. S.), Directors of. --

While the Government remained at Philadelphia, a selection of members of both Houses were constantly kept as directors, who, on every question interesting to that institution, or to the views of the federal head, voted at the will of that head; and, together with the stockholding members, could always make the federal vote that of the majority. By this combination, legislative expositions were given to the Constitution, and all the administrative laws were shaped on the model of England, and so passed. And from this influence we were not relieved, until the removal from the precincts of the Bank, to Washington. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 95.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 164.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

1192. CHARACTER, Rational. --

Like the rest of mankind, General Washington was disgusted with atrocities of the French Revolution, and was not sufficiently aware of the difference between the rabble who were used as instruments of their perpetration, and the steady and rational character of the American people, in which he had not sufficient confidence. --

TITLE: Introduction to Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 99.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 168.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

1430. COMMERCE, Vices of. --

Our greediness for wealth, and fantastical expense, have degraded, and will degrade, the minds of our maritime citizens. These are the peculiar vices of commerce. --

TITLE: To John Admas.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 104.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 107.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

1525. CONGRESS, Corruption and. -- [Further continued] .

Alexander Hamilton avowed the opinion that man could be governed by one of two motives only, force or interest. Force, he observed, in this country was out of the question; and the interests, therefore, of the members must be laid hold of to keep the Legislature in unison with the Executive. And with grief and shame it must be acknowledged that his machine was not without effect; that even in this, the birth of our government, some members were found sordid enough to bend their duty to their interests, and to look after personal rather than public good. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 160.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

1778. CONVENTION (Federal), Call for. --

The want of some authority which should procure justice to the public creditors, and an observance of treaties with foreign nations, produced the call of a convention of the States at Annapolis. ¹⁰⁵ --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 89.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 158.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

1830. CORRUPTION, Congress. -- [continued] .

With grief and shame it must be acknowledged that his [Alexander Hamilton's] [financial] machine was not without effect; that even in this, the birth of our government, some members were found sordid enough to bend their duty to their interests and to look after personal rather than public good. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 160.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

1959. DANCING, Women and. --

Dancing is a necessary accomplishment, although of short use; for the French rule is wise, that no lady dances after marriage. This is founded in solid physical reasons. --

TITLE: To N. Burwell.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 102.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 105.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2115. DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, Opposition to. -- [continued] .

When the Declaration of Independence was under the consideration of Congress, there were two or three unlucky expressions in it which gave offence to some members. The words “Scotch and other foreign auxiliaries.” excited the ire of a gentleman or [Col 2] two of that country. Severe strictures on the conduct of the British King, in negativing our repeated repeals of the law which permitted the importation of slaves, were disapproved by some Southern gentlemen whose reflections were not yet matured to the full abhorrence of that traffic. Although the offensive expressions were immediately yielded, these gentlemen continued their depredations on other parts of the instrument. I was sitting by Dr. Franklin who perceived that I was not insensible to these mutilations. “I have made it a rule,” said he, “whenever in my power, to avoid becoming the draftsman of papers to be reviewed by a public body. I took my lesson from an incident which I will relate to you. When I was a journeyman printer, one of my companions, an apprentice hatter, having served out his time, was about to open shop for himself. His first concern was to have a handsome signboard, with a proper inscription. He composed it in these words: John Thompson, Hatter, makes and sells hats for ready money,” with a figure of a hat subjoined. But he thought he would submit to his friends for their amendments. The first he showed it to thought the word “hatter” tautologous, because followed by the words, “makes hats,” which show he was a hatter. It was struck out. The next observed that the word “makes” might as well be omitted, because his customers would not care who made the hats. If good and to their mind, they would buy by whomsoever made. He struck it out. A third said he thought the words “for ready money,” were useless as it was not the custom of the place to sell on credit. Everyone who purchased expected to pay. They were parted with, and the inscription now stood, “John Thompson sells hats.” “Sells hats,” says his next friend? Why nobody will expect you to give them away. What, then, is the use of that word? It was stricken out, and “hats” followed it, -- the rather as there was one painted on the board. So his inscription was reduced ultimately to “John Thompson” with the figure of a hat subjoined --

TITLE: Anecdotes of Dr. Franklin.
EDITION: Washington ed. viii, 500.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 119.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2353. ECONOMY, Domestic. -- [continued] .

In household economy, the mothers of our country are generally skilled, and generally careful to instruct their daughters. We all know its value, and that diligence and dexterity in all its processes are inestimable treasures. The order and economy of a house are as honorable to the mistress as those of the farm to the master, and if either be neglected, ruin follows, and children destitute of the means of living. --

TITLE: To N. Burwell.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 103.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 106.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2360. ECONOMY, Ignorance of Political. --

I transmit for M. Tracy [* * *] a translation of his Economie Politique, which we have made and published here in the hope of advancing our countrymen somewhat in that science; the most profound ignorance of which threatened irreparable disaster during the late war, and by the parasite institutions of banks is now consuming the public industry. --

TITLE: To Albert Gallatin.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 116.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2386. EDUCATION, Amelioration of mankind. --

If the condition of man is to be progressively ameliorated, as we fondly hope and believe, education is to be the chief instrument in effecting it. --

TITLE: To M. Jullien.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 106.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2388. EDUCATION, Devotion to. --

A system of general instruction, which shall reach every description of our citizens from the richest to the poorest, as it was the earliest, so will it be the latest of all the public concerns in which I shall permit myself to take an interest. Nor am I tenacious of the form in which it shall be introduced. Be that what it may, our descendants will be as wise as we are, and will know how to amend and amend it, until it shall suit their circumstances. Give it to us then in any shape, and receive for the inestimable boon the thanks of the young and the blessings of the old, who are past all other services but prayers for the prosperity of their country, and blessings for those who promote it. --

TITLE: To Joseph C. Cabell.
EDITION: Ford ed., x. 102.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2390. EDUCATION, Female. --

A plan of female education has never been a subject of systematic contemplation with me. It has occupied my attention so far only as the education of my own daughters occasionally required. Considering that they would be placed in a country situation, wher little aid could be obtained from abroad, I thought it essential to give them a solid education, which might enable them, when become mothers, to educate their own daughters, and even to direct the course for sons, should their fathers be lost, or incapable, or inattentive. [* * *] A great obstacle to good education is the ordinate passion prevalent for novels, and the time lost in that reading which should be instructively employed. When this poison infects the mind. it destroys its tone and revolts it against wholesome reading. Reason and fact, plain and unadorned, are rejected. Nothing can engage attention unless dressed in all the figments of fancy, and nothing so bedecked comes amiss. The result is a bloated imagination, sickly judgment, and disgust towards all the real businesses of life. This mass of trash, however is not without some distinction; some few modelling their narratives, although fictitious, on the incidents of real life, have been able to make them interesting and useful vehicles of a sound morality. Such, I think, are Marmontel's new Moral Tales, but not his old ones, which are really immoral. Such are the writings of Miss Edgeworth, and some of those of Madame Genlis. For a like reason, too, [Col 2] much poetry should not be indulged. Some is useful for forming style and taste. Pope, Dryden, Thomson, Shakespeare, and of the French Molière, Racine, the Corneilles, May be read with pleasure and improvement. The French language, become that of the general intercourse of nations, and from their extraordinary advances, now the depository of all science, is an indispensable part of education for both sexes. [* * *] The ornaments, too, and the amusements of life, are entitled to their portion of attention. These, for a female, are dancing, drawing, and music. The first is a healthy exercise, elegant and very attractive for young people. Every affectionate parent would be pleased to see his daughter qualified to participate with her companions, and without awkwardness at least, in the circles of festivity, of which she occasionally becomes a part. It is a necessary accomplishment, therefore, although of short use; for the French rule is wise, that no lady dances after marriage. This is founded in solid physical reasons, gestation and nursing leaving little time to a married lady when this exercise can be either safe or innocent. Drawing is thought less of in this country than in Europe. It is an innocent and engaging amusement, often useful, and a qualification not to be neglected in one who is to become a mother and an instructor. Music is invaluable where a person has an ear. Where they have not, it should not be attempted. It furnishes a delightful recreation for the hours of respite from the cares of the day, and lasts us through life. The taste of this country, too, calls for this accomplishment more strongly than for either of the others. I need say nothing of household economy, in which the mothers of our country are generally skilled, and generally careful to instruct their daughters. We all know its value, and that diligence and dexterity in all its processes are inestimable treasures. The order and economy of a house are as honorable to the mistress as those of the farm to the master, and if either be neglected, ruin follows, and children destitute of the means of living. --

TITLE: To N. Burwell.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 101.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 104.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2406. EDUCATION, Neglect of. --

If the children [* * *] are untaught, their ignorance and vices will, in future life cost us much dearer in their consequences, than it would have done, in their correction, by a good education. --

TITLE: To Joseph C. Cabell.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 99.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

2426. EDUCATION, The Wealthy and. --

What will be the retribution of the wealthy individual [for his support of general education] ?

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small | large [Col 1] 1. The peopling of his neighborhood with honest, useful and enlightened citizens, understanding their own rights and firm in their perpetuation. 2. When his own descendants become poor, which they generally do within three generations (no law of primogeniture now perpetuating wealth in the same families), their children will be educated by the then rich, and the little advance he now makes to poverty, while rich himself, will be repaid by the then rich, to his descendants when become poor, and thus give them a chance of rising again. This is a solid consideration, and should go home to the bosom of every parent. This will be seed sowed in fertile ground. It is a provision for his family looking to distant times, and far in duration beyond what he has now in hand for them. Let every man count backward in his own family, and see how many generations he can go, before he comes to the ancestor who made the fortune he now holds. Most will be stopped at the first generation, many at the second, few will reach the third, and not one in the State [of Virginia] go beyond the fifth. --

TITLE: To Joseph C. Cabell.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 100.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2607. ENEMIES, Political. -- [continued] .

Dr. Franklin had many political enemies, as every character must, which, with decision enough to have opinions, has energy and talent to give them effect on the feelings of the adversary opinion. --

TITLE: To Robert Walsh.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 108.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 116.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

2986. FEDERALISTS, Terrorism and treason. --

When General Washington was withdrawn, these energumeni of royalism, [the federal leaders] , kept in check hitherto by the dread of his honesty, his firmness, his patriotism, and the authority of his name, now mounted on the car of State and free from control, like Phäeton on that of the sun, drove headlong and wild, looking neither to right nor left, nor regarding anything but the objects they were driving at; until, displaying these fully, the eyes of the nation were opened, and a general disbandment of them from the public councils took place. [* * *] But no man who did not witness it can form an idea of their unbridled madness, and the terrorism with which they surrounded themselves. The horrors of the French Revolution, then raging, aided them mainly, and

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small | large [Col 1] using that as a rawhead and bloody-bones, they were enabled by their stratagems of X. Y. Z. i n which this historian [Judge Marshall] was a leading mountebank. their tales of tub-plots, ocean massacres, bloody buoys, and pulpit lyings, and slanderings, and maniacal ravings of their Gardiners, their Osgoods and Parishes, to spread alarm into all but the firmest breasts. Their AttorneyGeneral had the impudence to say to a republican member, that deportation must be resorted to, of which, said he, “you republicans have set the example,” thus daring to identify us with the murderous Jacobins of France. These transactions, now [1818] recollected, but as dreams of the night, were then sad realities; and nothing rescued us from their liberticide effect, but the unyielding opposition of those firm spirits who sternly maintained their post, in defiance of terror, until their fellow citizens could be aroused to their own danger, and rally, and rescue the standard of the Constitution. This has been happily done. Federalism and monarchism have languished from that moment until their treasonable combinations with the enemies of their country during the late war, their plots of dismembering the Union, and their Hartford Convention, have consigned them to the tomb of the dead; and I fondly hope we May now truly say, “we are all republicans, all federalists, ” and that the motto of the standard to which our country will forever rally, will be “Federal Union and Republican Government ”; and sure I am we may say that, we are indebted for the preservation of this point of ralliance, to that opposition of which so injurious an idea is so artfully insinuated and excited in this history [Marshall's Life of Washington] . --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 97.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 166.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

2993. FICTION, Education and. --

A great obstacle to good education is the inordinate passion prevalent for novels, and the time lost in that reading which should be instructively employed. When this poison infects the mind, it destroys its tone and revolts it against wholesome reading. Reason and fact, plain and unadorned, are rejected. Nothing can engage attention unless dressed in all the figments of fancy, and nothing so bedecked comes amiss. The result is a bloated imagination, sickly judgment, and disgust towards all the real businesses of life. ¹⁹¹ --

TITLE: To N. Burwell.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 102.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 104.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3015. FISHERIES, Preservation of. --

As to the fisheries, England was urgent to retain them exclusively, France neutral, and I believe, that had they been ultimately made a sine quâ non, our commissioners (Mr. Adams excepted) would have relinquished them, rather than have broken off the treaty. [Of peace with Great Britain.] To Mr. Adams's perseverance alone, on that point, I have always understood we were indebted for their reservation. --

TITLE: To Robert Walsh.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 108.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 117.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3146. FRANCE, Gratitude to. --

Every American owes her gratitude, as our sole ally during the war of Independence. --

TITLE: To M. de Neuville.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 110.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3176. FRANCE, Restoration of. -- [Further continued] .

In the desolation of Europe, to gratify the atrocious caprices of Bonaparte, France sinned much; but she has suffered more than retaliation. Once relieved from the incubus of her late oppression, she will rise like a giant from her slumbers. Her soil and climate, her arts and eminent sciences, her central position and free constitution, will soon make her greater than she ever was. --

TITLE: To M. de Neuville,
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 109.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3196. FRANKLIN (Benjamin), Defence of. -- [continued] .

As to the charge of subservience to France, besides the evidence of his friendly colleagues [Silas Deane and Mr. Laurens] , two years of my own service with

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small | large [Col 1] him at Paris, daily visits, and the most friendly and confidential conversation convince me it had not a shadow of foundation. --

TITLE: To Robert Walsh.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 109.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 117.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3197. FRANKLIN (Benjamin), Diplomatic methods. --

He possessed the confidence of the French government in the highest degree, insomuch, that it may truly be said, that they were more under his influence, than he under theirs. The fact is, that his temper was so amiable and conciliatory, his conduct so rational, never urging impossibilities, or even things unreasonably inconvenient to them, in short, so moderate and attentive to their difficulties, as well as our own, that what his enemies called subserviency, I saw was only that reasonable disposition, which, sensible that advantages are not all to be on one side, yielding what is just and liberal, is the more certain of obtaining liberality and justice. Mutual confidence produces, of course, mutual influence, and this was all which subsisted between Dr. Franklin and the government of France. --

TITLE: To Robert Walsh.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 109.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 117.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3207. FRANKLIN (Benjamin), Loyalty. --

That Dr. Franklin would have waived the formal recognition of our Independence, I never heard on any authority worthy notice. --

TITLE: To Robert Walsh.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 108.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 117.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3211. FRANKLIN (Benjamin), Respected. --

Mr. Jay, Silas Deane, Mr. Laurens, his colleagues also, ever maintained towards him unlimited confidence and respect. --

TITLE: To Robert Walsh.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 108.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 117.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3338. FUTURE LIFE, Felicity of. -- [continued] .

But these are speculations which we may as will deliver over to those who are to see their development. We shall only be lookers on, from the clouds above, as now we look down on the laborers, the hurry and bustle of the ants and bees. Perhaps in that super-mundane region, we may be amused with seeing the fallacy of our own guesses, and even the nothingness of those labors, which have filled and agitated our own time here. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 105.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 109.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3488. GOVERNMENT, Consent of governed. -- [Further continued] .

There is only one passage in President Monroe's message which I disapprove, and which I trust will not be approved by our Legislature. It is that which proposes to subject the Indians to our laws without their consent. A little patience and a little money are so rapidly producing their voluntary removal across the Mississippi, that I hope this immorality will not be permitted to stain our history. He has certainly been surprised into this proposition, so little in concord with our principles of government. --

TITLE: To Albert Gallatin.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 115.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: Nov. 1818

3618. HAMILTON (Alexander), Corruption and. --

Hamilton was indeed a singular character. Of acute understanding, disinterested, honest, and honorable in all private transactions, amiable in society, and duly valuing virtue in private life, yet so bewitched and perverted by the British example, as to be under thorough conviction that corruption was essential to the government of a nation. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 97.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 166.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

3621. HAMILTON (Alexander), Funding jobbery. --

It is well known that, during the [Revolutionary] war, the greatest difficulty we encountered was the want of money or means to pay our soldiers who fought, or our farmers, manufacturers and merchants, who furnished the necessary supplies of food and clothing for them. After the expedient of paper money had exhausted itself, certificates of debt were given to the individual creditors, with assurance of payment, so soon as the United States should be able. But the distresses of the people often obliged them to part with these for the half, the fifth, and even a tenth of their value; and speculators had made a trade of cozening them from the holders by the most fraudulent practices, and persuasions that they would never be paid. In the bill for funding and paying these, Hamilton made no difference between the original holders and the fraudulent purchasers of this paper. Great and just repugnance arose at putting these two classes of creditors on the same footing, and great exertions were used to pay the former the full value, and to the latter, the price only which they had paid, with interest. But this would have prevented the game which was to be played, and for which the minds of greedy members were already tutored and prepared. When the trial of strength on these several efforts had indicated the form in which the bill would finally pass, this being known within doors sooner than without, and especially, than to those who were in distant parts of the Union, the base scramble began. Couriers and relay horses by land, and swift-sailing pilot boats by sea, were flying in all directions. Active partners and agents were associated and employed in every State, town and country neighborhood, and this paper was bought up at five shillings, and often as low as two shillings in the pound, before the holder knew that Congress had already provided for its redemption at par. Immense sums were thus filched from the poor and ignorant, and fortunes accumulated by those who had themselves been poor enough before. Men thus enriched by the dexterity of a leader, would follow of course the chief who was leading them to fortune, and become the zealous instruments of all his enterprises. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 160.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

3629. HAMILTON (Alexander), Treasury management. -- [Further continued] .

Hamilton's financial system [* * *] had two objects: first, as a puzzle, to exclude popular understanding and inquiry; secondly, as a machine for the corruption of the Legislature. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 160.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818
See Assumption of State Debts and Bank.

3846. IMMORTALITY, Belief in. --

The term is not very distant, at which we are to deposit in the same cerement, our sorrows and suffering bodies, and to ascend in essence to an ecstatic meeting with the friends we have loved and lost, and whom we shall still love and never lose again. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 108.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 114.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

3993. INTEREST, Government and. --

Alexander Hamilton avowed the opinion that man could be governed by one of two motives only, -- force or interest. Force, he observed, in this country was out of the question; and the interests, therefore, of the members must be laid hold of to keep the Legislature in unison with the Executive. And with grief and shame it must be acknowledged that his machine was not without effect; that even in this, the birth of our government, some members were found sordid enough to bend their duty to their interests, and to look after personal rather than public good. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 160.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

4296. KOSCIUSKO (General), Emancipation for slaves. --

The brave auxiliary of my country in its struggle for liberty, and from the year 1797, when our particular acquaintance began, my most intimate and much beloved friend. On his last departure from the United States in 1798, he left in my hands an instrument appropriating after his death all the property he had in our public funds, the price of his military services here, to the education and emancipation of as many of the children of bondage in this country as it should be adequate to. --

TITLE: To M. Julien.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 107.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

4297. KOSCIUSKO (General), Emancipation for slaves. -- [continued] .

You have seen the death of General Kosciusko announced in the papers. He had in the funds of the United States a very considerable sum of money on the interest of which he depended for subsistence. On his leaving the United States, in 1798, he placed it under my direction by a power of attorney which I executed entirely through Mr. Barnes, who regularly remitted his interest. But he left also in my hands an autograph will, disposing of his funds in a particular course of charity, and making me his executor. --

TITLE: To William Wirt.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 98.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 96.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

4433. LANGUAGE (French), Indispensable. --

The French language is an indispensable part of education for both sexes. --

TITLE: To N. Burwell.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 102.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 105.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

5341. MONARCHY, The Federal Convention and. --

The want of some authority which should procure justice to the public creditors, and an observance of treaties with foreign nations, produced [* * *] the call of a convention of the States at Annapolis. Although, at this meeting, a difference of opinion was evident on the question of a republican or kingly government, yet, so generally through the States was the sentiment in favor of the former, that the friends of the latter confined themselves to a course of obstruction only, and delay, to everything proposed. They hoped, that nothing being done, and all things going from bad to worse, a kingly government might be usurped, and submitted to by the people, as better than anarchy and wars, internal and external, the certain consequences of the present want of a general government. The effect of their man œuvres, with the defective attendance of deputies from the States, resulted in the measure of calling a more general convention, to be held at Philadelphia. At this, the same party exhibited the same practices, and with the same views of preventing a government of concord, which they foresaw would be republican, and of forcing through anarchy their way to monarchy. But the mass of that convention was too honest, too wise, and too steady, to be baffled or misled by their manœuvres. One of these was a form of government proposed by Colonel Hamilton, which would have been in fact a compromise between the two parties of royalism and republicanism. According to this, the Executive and one branch of the Legislature were to be during good behavior, i. e. for life, and the governors of the States were to be named by these two prominent organs. This, however, was rejected; on which Hamilton left the Convention, as desperate, and never returned again, until near its conclusion. These opinions and efforts, secret or avowed, of the advocates for monarchy, had begotten great jealousy through the States generally; and this jealousy it was which excited the strong opposition to the conventional Constitution; a jealousy which yielded at last only to a general determination to establish certain amendments as barriers against a government either monarchical [Col 2] or consolidated. ³³¹ --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 89.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 158.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

5344. MONARCHY, Hamilton and. --

[Alexander] Hamilton's financial system had then [1790] passed. It had two objects. First, as a puzzle, to exclude popular understanding and inquiry. Secondly, as a machine for the corruption of the Legislature; for he avowed the opinion, that man could be governed by one of two motives only, force or interest. ³³² Force, he observed, in this country was out of the question; and the interests, therefore, of the members must be laid hold of, to keep the Legislature in unison with the Executive. And with grief and shame it must be acknowledged that his machine was not without effect; that even in this, the birth of our government, some members were found sordid enough to bend their duty to their interests, and to look after personal, rather than public good. [* * *] [The measures of Hamilton's financial system, -- the Funding and United States Bank Acts,

-569-
small | large [Col 1] &c.,] added to the number of votaries to the Treasury, and made its Chief the master of every vote in the Legislature, which might give to the government the direction suited to his political views. I know well, and so must be understood, that nothing like a majority in Congress had yielded to this corruption. Far from it. But a division, not very unequal, had already taken place in the honest part of that body, between the parties styled republican and federal. The latter being monarchists in principle, adhered to Hamilton of course, as their leader in that principle, and this mercenary phalanx added to them, ensured him always a majority in both Houses; so that the whole action of the Legislature was now under the direction of the Treasury. [* * *] By this combination, legislative expositions were given to the Constitution, and all the administrative laws were shaped on the model of England, and so passed. [* * *] Here then was the real ground of the opposition which was made to the course of administration. Its object was to preserve the Legislature pure and independent of the Executive, to restrain the administration to republican forms and principles, and not permit the Constitution to be construed into a monarchy, and to be warped in practice into all the principles and pollutions of their favorite English model. Nor was this an opposition to General Washington. He was true to the republican charge confided to him; and has solemnly and repeatedly protested to me, in our conversations that he would lose the last drop of his blood in support of it; and he did this the oftener, and with the more earnestness, because he knew my suspicions of Hamilton's designs against it, and wished to quiet them. For he was not aware of the drift, or of the effect of Hamilton's schemes. Unversed in financial projects, and calculations and budgets, his approbation of them was bottomed on his confidence in the man. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 160, 164, 165.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

5345. MONARCHY, Hamilton and. -- [continued] .

Hamilton was not only a monarchist, but for a monarchy bottomed on corruption. In proof of this, I will relate an anecdote, for the truth of which I attest the God who made me. Before the President [Washington] set out on his southern tour in April, 1791, he addressed a letter of the fourth of that month, from Mount Vernon, to the Secretaries of State, Treasury, and War, desiring that if any serious and important cases should arise during his absence, they would consult and act on them. And he requested that the VicePresident should also be consulted. This was the only occasion on which that officer was ever requested to take part in a cabinet question. Some occasion for consultation arising, I invited those gentlemen (and the Attorney General as well as I remember), to dine with me, in order to confer on the subject. After the cloth was removed, and our question agreed and dismissed, conversation began on other matters, and, by some circumstance, was led to the British Constitution, on which Mr. Adams observed, “Purge that constitution of its corruption, and give to its popular branch equality of representation, and it would be the most perfect constitution ever devised by the wit of man”. Hamilton paused and said, “purge it of its corruption, and give to its popular branch equality of representation, and it would become an impracticable government; as it stands at present, with all its supposed defects, it is the most perfect government which ever existed”. And this was assuredly the exact line which separated the political [Col 2] creeds of these two gentlemen. The one was for two hereditary branches and an honest elective one; the other for an hereditary King, with a House of Lords and Commons corrupted to his will, and standing between him and the people.

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 96.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 165.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

5351. MONARCHY, Preference for. --

I returned from the mission [to France] in the first year of the new government [* * *] and proceeded to New York to enter on the office of Secretary of State. Here, certainly, I found a state of things which, of all I had ever contemplated, I the least expected. I had left France in the first year of her Revolution, in the fervor of natural rights, and zeal for reformation. My conscientious devotion to these rights could not be heightened, but it had been aroused and excited by daily exercise. The President received me cordially, and my colleagues and the circle of principal citizens, apparently, with welcome. The courtesies of dinner parties given me, as a stranger newly arrived among them, placed me at once in their familiar society. But I cannot describe the wonder and mortification with which the table conversations filled me. Politics was the chief topic, and a preference of kingly, over republican, government was evidently the favorite sentiment. An apostate I could not be, nor yet a hypocrite; and I found myself, for the most part, the only advocate on the republican side of the question, unless among the guests there chanced to be some member of that party [Col 2] from the Legislative Houses. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 91.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 159.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

5355. MONARCHY, Washington and. -- [continued] .

The next effort was (on suggestion of the same individuals, in the moment of their separation), the establishment of an hereditary order, under the name of the Cincinnati, ready prepared, by that distinction, to be engrafted into the future form of government, and placing General Washington still at their head. The General wrote to me on this subject, while I was in Congress at Annapolis. [* * *] He afterwards called on me at that place, on his way to a meeting of the society, and after a whole evening of consultation, he left that place fully determined to use all his endeavors for its total suppression. But he found it so firmly riveted in the affections of the members that, strengthened as they happened to be by an adventitious occurrence of the moment [the arrival of the badges of the Order from France] , he could effect no more than the abolition of its hereditary principle. ³³³ He called again on his return, ³³⁴ and explained to me fully the opposition which had been made, the effect of the occurrence from France, and the difficulty with which its duration had been limited to the lives of the present members. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 89.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 157.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818
See Cincinnati Society.

5393. MONEY, Standard. -- [Further continued] .

The flood with which the banks are deluging us of nominal money has placed us completely without any certain measure of value, and, by interpolating a false measure, is deceiving and ruining multitudes of our citizens. --

TITLE: To Albert Gallatin.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 116.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

5588. MUSIC, Ear for. --

Music is invaluable where a person has an ear. Where they have not, it should not be attempted. --

TITLE: To N. Burwell.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 103.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 105.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

6277. OPPOSITION, To Administrations. --

A quondam colleague of yours, who had acquired some distinction and favor in the public eye, is throwing it away by endeavoring to obtain his end by rallying an opposition to the administration. This error has already ruined some among us, and will ruin others who do not perceive that it is the steady abuse of power in other governments which renders that of opposition always the popular party. --

TITLE: To Albert Gallatin.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 106.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

6547. PENSACOLA, Capture of. --

The capture of Pensacola, which furnished so much speculation for European news-writers (who imagine that our political code, like theirs, had no chapter of morality), was nothing here. In the first moment, indeed there was a general outcry of condemnation of what appeared to be a wrongful aggression. But this was quieted at once by information that it had been taken without orders, and would be instantly restored. [* * *] This manifestation of the will of our citizens to countenance no injustice towards a foreign nation filled me with comfort as to our future course. --

TITLE: To Albert Gallatin.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 115.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: Nov. 1818

6629. PEOPLE, The western. -- [continued]

They are freer from prejudices than we are, and bolder in grasping at truth. The time is not distant, though neither you nor I shall see it, when we shall be but a secondary people to them. Our greediness for wealth, and fantastical expense, have degraded, and will degrade, the minds of our maritime citizens. These are the peculiar vices of commerce. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 103.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 107.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

6951. PRINCIPLE, Republican vs. Monarchical. --

The contests of that day [1793-1800] were contests of principle, between the advocates of republican and those of kingly government, and had not the former made the efforts they did, our government would have been, even at this early day (1818) a very different thing from what the successful issue of those efforts have made it. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 88.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 156.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

7013. PROGRESS, Constant. --

When I contemplate the immense advances in science and discoveries in the arts which have been made within the period of my life, I look forward with confidence to equal advances by the present generation, and have no doubt they will consequently be as much wiser than we have been as we than our fathers were, and they than the burners of witches. --

TITLE: To Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 101.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 103.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

7067. PROPHECY, Fallacious. --

Perhaps in that super-mundane region, we may be amused with seeing the fallacy of our own guesses. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 105.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 109.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

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small | large [Col 1]

7156. READING, Passion for. --

My repugnance to the writing table becomes daily and hourly more deadly and insurmountable. In place of this has come on a canine appetite for reading. And I indulge in it, because I see in it a relief against the tœdium senectutis; a lamp to lighten my path through the dreary wilderness of time before me, whose bourne I see not. Losing daily all interest in the things around us, something else is necessary to fill the void. With me it is reading, which occupies the mind without the labor of producing ideas from my own stock. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 104.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 108.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

7378. REPUBLICANS, Federalists vs. -- [Further continued] .

[It was] a contest ⁴²⁰ which was to change the condition of man over the civilized globe. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 156.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818
See Monarchy.

7381. REPUBLICANS, Historical misrepresentation of. --

Were a reader of this period [immediately following the establishment of the Constitution] to form his idea of it from this history alone [Marshall's Life of Washington] he would suppose the republican party (who were in truth endeavoring to keep the government within the line of the Constitution, and prevent its being monarchised in practice) were a mere set of grumblers, and disorganizers, satisfied with no government, without fixed principles of any, and, like a British parliamentary opposition, gaping after loaves and fishes, and ready to change principles, as well as position, at any time, with their adversaries. But [* * *] the contests of that day were contests of principle, between the advocates of republican and those of kingly government, and had not the former made the efforts they did, our government would have been, even at this early day [1818] , a very different thing from what the successful issue of those efforts have made it. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 156.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

7398. REPUBLICANS, Washington's administration and. --

The object of the opposition which was made to the course of administration was to preserve the Legislature pure and independent of the Executive, to restrain the administration to republican forms and principles, and not permit the Constitution to be construed into a monarchy, and to be warped in practice into all the principles and pollutions of their favorite English model. Nor was this an opposition to General Washington. He was true to the republican charge confided to him; and has solemnly and repeatedly protested to me, in our private conversations, that he would lose the last drop of his blood in support of it, and he did this the oftener, and with the more earnestness, because he knew my suspicions of [Alexander] Hamilton's designs against it; and wished to quiet them. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 95.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 165.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818
See Federalists, Monarchy and Washington.

7473. REVOLUTION (American), Beginning of. --

The question who commenced the Revolution? is as difficult as that of the first inventors of a thousand good things. For example, who first discovered the principle of gravity? Not Newton; for Galileo, who died the year that Newton was born, had measured its force in the descent of gravid bodies. Who invented the Lavoiserian chemistry? The English say Dr. Black, by the preparatory discovery of latent heat. Who invented the steamboat? Was it Gerbert, the Marquis of Worcester, Newcommen, Savary, Papin, Fitch, Fulton? The fact is, that one new idea leads to another, that to a third, and so on through a course of time until some one, with whom no one of these ideas was original, combines all together, and produces what is justly called a new invention. I suppose it would be as difficult to trace our Revolution to its first embryo. We do not know how long it was hatching in the British cabinet before they ventured to make the first of the experiments which were to develop it in the end and to produce complete parlimentary supremacy. Those you mention in Massachusetts as preceding the Stamp Act, might be the first visible symptoms of that design. The proposition of that Act in 1764, was the first here. Your opposition, therefore, preceded ours, as occasion was sooner given there than here, and the truth, I suppose, is, that the opposition in every colony began whenever the encroachment was presented to it. This question of priority is as the inquiry would be who first, of the three hundred Spartans, offered his name to Leonidas? --

TITLE: To Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 99.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 102.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

7474. REVOLUTION (American), Beginning of. -- [continued] .

It would [* * *] be as difficult to say at what moment the Revolution began, and what incident set it in motion, as to fix the moment that the embryo becomes an animal, or the act which gives him a beginning. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 104.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 107.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

7855. SHEEP (Merinos), Present of. --

I send you a Merino ram of full blood, born of my imported ewe of the race called Agueirres, by the imported ram of the Paular race which belonged to the Prince of Peace, was sold by order of the Junto of Estremadura, was purchased and sent to me, 1810, by Mr. Jarvis, our consul at Lisbon. The Paulars are deemed the finest race in Spain for size and wool taken together, the Agueirres superior to all in wool, but small. --

TITLE: To Archibald Stuart.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 109.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

8019. SOUTH AMERICA, Revolt in. --

I enter into all your doubts as to the event of the revolution of South America. They will succeed against Spain. But the dangerous enemy is within their own breasts. Ignorance and superstition will chain their minds and bodies under religious and military despotism. I do believe it would be better for them to obtain freedom by degrees only; because that would by degrees bring on light and information, and qualify them to take charge of themselves understandingly; with more certainty, if in the meantime, under so much control as May keep them at peace with one another. Surely, it is our duty to wish them independence and self-government, because they wish it themselves, and they have the right, and we none, to choose for themselves; and I wish, moreover, that our ideas may be erroneous and theirs prove well-founded. But these are speculations which we may as well deliver over to those who are to see their development. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 104.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 108.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818
See Spanish America.

8148. STATES, Confederation of. --

The alliance between the States under the old Articles of Confederation, for the purpose of joint defence against the aggression of Great Britain, was found insufficient, as treaties of alliance generally are, to enforce compliance with their mutual stipulations; and these, once fulfilled, that bond was to expire of itself, and each State to become sovereign and independent in all things. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 88.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 157.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818
See Confederation, Defects.

9002. WASHINGTON (George), Crown refused. --

The alliance between the States under the old Articles of Confederation, for the purpose of joint defence against the aggressions of Great Britain, was found insufficient, as treaties of alliance generally are, to enforce compliance with their mutual stipulations; and these, once fulfilled, that bond was to expire of itself, and each State to become sovereign and independent in all things. Yet it could not but occur to every one, that these separate independencies, like the petty States of Greece, would be eternally at war with each other, and would become at length the mere partisans and satellites of the leading powers of Europe. All then must have looked to some further bond of union, which would insure internal peace, and a political system of our own, independent of that of Europe. Whether all should be consolidated into a single government, or each remain independent as to internal matters, and the whole form a single nation as to what was foreign only, and whether that national government should be a monarchy or a republic, would of course divide opinions according to the constitutions, the habits, and the circumstances of each individual. Some officers of the army, as it has always been said and believed (and Steuben and Knox have ever been named as the leading agents), trained to monarchy by military habits, are understood to have proposed to General Washington to decide this great question by the army before its disbandment, and

-928-
small | large [Col 1] to assume himself the crown, on the assurance of their support. The indignation with which he is said to have scouted this parricide proposition was equally worthy of his virtue and his wisdom. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 88.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 157.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

9013. WASHINGTON (George), Federalists and. -- [Further continued] .

From the moment [* * *] of my retiring from the administration, the federalists got unchecked hold of General Washington. His memory was already sensibly impaired by age, the firm tone of mind for which he had been remarkable, was beginning to relax, its energy was abated; a listlessness of labor, a desire for tranquillity had crept on him, and a willingness to let others act, and even think for him. Like the rest of mankind, he was disgusted with the atrocities of the French Revolution, and was not sufficiently aware of the difference between the rabble who were used as instruments of their perpetration, and the steady and rational character of the American people, in which he had not sufficient confidence. The opposition too of the republicans to the British treaty, and zealous support of the federalists in that unpopular, but favorite measure of theirs, had made him all their own. Understanding, moreover, that I disapproved of that treaty, and copiously nourished with falsehoods by a malignant neighbor of mine [Henry Lee, “ LightHorse Harry”] , who ambitioned to be his correspondent, he had become alienated from myself personally, as from the republican body generally of his fellow citizens; and he wrote the letters to Mr. Adams and Mr. Carroll, over which, in devotion to his imperishable fame, we must forever weep as monuments of mortal decay. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 99.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 168.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

9017. WASHINGTON (George), Loved and venerated. --

He possessed the love, the veneration, and confidence of all. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 155.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

9018. WASHINGTON (George), Marshall's life of. --

The party feelings of General Washington's biographer [Marshall] to whom after his death the collection of [Washington's papers] was confided, have culled from it a composition as different from what General Washington would have offered, as was the candor of the two characters during the period of the war. The partiality of this pen is displayed in lavishments of praise on certain military characters, who had done nothing military, but who afterwards, and before he wrote, had become heroes in party, although not in war; and in his reserve on the merits of others, who rendered signal services indeed, but did not earn his praise by apostatizing in peace from the republican principles for which they had fought in war. It shows itself too in the cold indifference with which a struggle for the most animating of human objects is narrated. No act of heroism ever kindles in the mind of this writer a single aspiration in favor of the holy cause which inspired the bosom, and nerved the arm of the patriot warrior. No gloom of events, no lowering of prospects ever excites a fear for the issue of a contest which was to change the condition of man over the civilized globe. The sufferings inflicted on endeavors to vindicate the rights of humanity are related with all the frigid insensibility with which a monk would have contemplated the victims of an auto da fé. Let no man believe that General Washington ever intended that his papers should be used for the suicide of the cause for which he had lived, and for which there never was a moment in which he would not have died. The abuse of these materials is chiefly, however, manifested in the history of the period immediately following the establishment of the present Constitution. [* * *] Were a reader of this period to form his idea of it from this history alone, he would suppose the republican party (who were, in truth, endeavoring to keep the government within the line of the Constitution, and prevent its being monarchized in practice) were a mere set of grumblers, and disorganizers, satisfied with no government, without fixed principles of any, and, like a British parliamentary opposition, gaping after loaves and fishes, and ready to change principles, as well as position, at any time, with their adversaries. But a short review of facts omitted, or uncandidly stated in this history will show that the contests of that day were contests of principle between the advocates of republican and those of kingly government, and that had not the former made the efforts they did, our government would have been, even at this early day, a very different thing from what the successful issue of those efforts have made it. ⁵¹⁴ --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 155.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

9023. WASHINGTON (George), Opinions of. --

His opinions merit veneration and respect; for few men have lived whose opinions were more unbiased and correct. Not that it is pretended he never felt bias. His passions were naturally strong; but his reason, generally stronger. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 155.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

9026. WASHINGTON (George), Opposition to administration. -- [Further continued] .

The object of the opposition which was made to the course of administration was to preserve the Legislature pure and independent of the Executive, to restrain the Administration to republican forms and principles, and not permit the Constitution to be construed into a monarchy, and to be warped, in practice, into all the principles and pollutions of their favorite English model. Nor was this an opposition to General Washington. He was true to the republican charge confided to him; and has solemnly and repeatedly protested to me, in our conversations that he would lose the last drop of his blood in support of it; and he did this the oftener and with the more earnestness, because he knew my suspicions of Hamilton's designs against it, and wished to quiet them. For he was not aware of the drift or of the effect of Hamilton's schemes. Unversed in financial projects and calculations and budgets, his approbation of them was bottomed on his confidence in the man. --

TITLE: The Anas.
EDITION: Washington ed. ix, 95.
EDITION: Ford ed., i, 165.
PLACE: [none given]
DATE: 1818

9051. WEALTH, Greediness for. --

Our greediness for wealth, and fantastical expense, have degraded, and will degrade, the minds of our maritime citizens. These are the peculiar vices of commerce. --

TITLE: To John Adams.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 104.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 107.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

9121. WHISKY, Loathsome effects. --

The loathsome and fatal effects of whisky, destroying the fortunes, the bodies, the minds, and morals of our citizens. --

TITLE: To William H. Crawford.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 113.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

9153. WINES, Tax on. --

I rejoice, as a moralist, at the prospect of a reduction of the

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small | large [Col 1] duties on wine, by our national Legislature. It is an error to view a tax on that liquor as merely a tax on the rich. It is a prohibition of its use to the middling class of our citizens, and a condemnation of them to the poison of whisky, which is desolating their houses. No nation is drunken where wine is cheap; and none sober, where the dearness of wine substitutes ardent spirits as the common beverage. It is, in truth, the only antidote to the bane of whisky. Fix but the duty at the rate of other merchandise, and we can drink wine here as cheap as we do grog; and who will not prefer it? Its extended use will carry health and comfort to a much enlarged circle. Every one in easy circumstances (as the bulk of our citizens are) will prefer it to the poison to which they are now driven by their government. And the treasury itself will find that a penny apiece from a dozen, is more than a groat from a single one. This reformation, however, will require time. --

TITLE: To M. de Neuville.
EDITION: Washington ed. vii, 110.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818

9154. WINES, Tax on. -- [continued] .

I think it a great error to consider a heavy tax on wines, as a tax on luxury. On the contrary, it is a tax on the health of our citizens. It is a legislative declaration that none but the richest of them shall be permitted to drink wine, and, in effect, a condemnation of all the middling and lower conditions of society to the poison of whisky. [* * *] Surely it is not from the necessities of our treasury that we thus undertake to debar the mass of our citizens the use of not only an innocent gratification, but a healthy substitute instead of a bewitching poison. This aggression on the public taste and comfort has been ever deemed among the most arbitrary and oppressive abuses of the English government. It is one which, I hope, we shall never copy. --

TITLE: To William H. Crawford.
EDITION: Ford ed., x, 112.
PLACE: Monticello
DATE: 1818
See Life, Jefferson's Habits of.

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