Chapter 3:
The Federal Government of the United States,
1788-May 5, 1789

IT was time for America to be known abroad as a nation. The statesmen of France reproached her unsparingly for failing in her pecuniary engagements. Boatmen who bore the flag of the United States on the father of rivers were fearlessly arrested by Spain, while Don Gardoqui, its agent, in private conversation tempted the men of Kentucky "to declare themselves independent" by the assurance that he was authorized to treat with them as a separate power respecting commerce and the navigation of the Mississippi.

The colonists in Nova Scotia were already absorbing a part of south-eastern Maine, and inventing false excuses for doing so. Great Britain declined to meet her own obligations with regard to the slaves whom she had carried away, and who finally formed the seed of a British colony at Sierra Leone. She did not give up her negotiations with the men of Vermont. She withheld the interior posts, belonging to the United States; in the commission for the government of Upper Canada she kept out of sight the line of boundary, in order that the commanding officer might not scruple to crowd the Americans away from access to their inland water-line, and thus debar them from their rightful share in the fur-trade. She was all the while encouraging the Indian tribes within the bounds of New York and to the south of the western lakes to assert their independence. Hearing of the discontent of the Kentuckians and the men of west North Carolina, she sought to foment the passions which might hurry them out of the union, as far as it could be done without promising them protection.

In England John Adams had, in 1786, vainly explained the expectation of congress that a British plenipotentiary minister should be sent to the United States. The bills regulating Newfoundland and intercourse with America were under the leadership of the same Jenkinson who had prepared the stamp act; and, with the acquiescence of Pitt, the men and the principles which had governed British policy toward America for most of the last twenty years still prevailed. In February 1788 the son of George Grenville, speaking for the ministry in the house of commons, said: "Great Britain, ever since the peace, has condescended to favor the United States." Moreover, the British government would take no notice of American remonstrances against the violations of the treaty of peace. Self-respect and patriotic pride forbade John Adams to remain.

Adams and Jefferson had exchanged with each other their portraits, as lasting memorials of friendship; and Adams, on leaving Europe, had but two regrets: one, the opportunity of research in books; the other, that immediate correspondence with Jefferson which he cherished as one of the most agreeable events in his life. "A seven months’ intimacy with him here and as many weeks in London have given me opportunities of studying him closely," wrote Jefferson to Madison. "He is vain, irritable, and a bad calculator of the force and probable effect of the motives which government. This is all the ill which can possibly be said of him. He is disinterested, profound in his views, and accurate in his judgment, except where knowledge of the world is necessary to form a judgment. He is so amiable that you will love him, if ever you become acquainted with him."

In America the new constitution was rapidly conciliating the affections of the people. Union had been held dear ever since it was formed; and now that the constitution was its surest guarantee, no party could succeed which did not inscribe union, and with union the constitution, on its banner. In September 1788 the dissidents of Pennsylvania held a conference at Harrisburg. With the delegates from beyond the mountains came Albert Gallatin, a native of Geneva, and educated there in a republic of a purely federal form. Their proceedings bear the marks of his mind. They resolved for themselves and recommended to all others to acquiesce in the organization of the government under "the federal constitution, of which the ratification had formed a new era in the American world;" they asked, however, for its speedy revision by a general convention. All their actions were kept within the bounds of legality.

In Virginia there had been a great vibration of opinion. Its assembly, which met on the twentieth of October 1788, was the first to take into consideration the proposal for another federal convention. The enemies to the government formed a decided majority of the legislature. No one of its members was able to encounter Patrick Henry in debate, and his edicts were registered without opposition. He had only to say, "Let this be law," and it became law. Taking care to set forth that so far as it depended on Virginia the new plan of government would be carried into immediate operation, the assembly, on the thirtieth, proposed a second federal convention, and invited the concurrence of every other state. Madison was the fittest man in the union to be of the senate of the United States: Henry, on the eighth of November, after pouring forth a declamation against his federal principles, nominated Richard Henry Lee and Grayson for the two senators from Virginia, and they were chosen at his bidding. He divided the state into districts, cunningly restricting each of them to its own inhabitants in the choice of its representative, and taking care to compose the district in which Madison would be a candidate out of counties which were thought to be unfriendly to federalism. Assured by these iniquitous preparations, Monroe, without scruple, took the field against Madison.

In Connecticut, in October, the circular letter of New York had a reading among other public communications, but "no anti-federalist had hardiness enough to call it up for consideration or to speak one word of its subject."

The legislature of Massachusetts concurred with Hancock, the governor, that an immediate second federal convention might endanger the union. The legislature of Pennsylvania put the question at rest by saying: "The house do not perceive this constitution wanting in any of those fundamental principles which are calculated to ensure the liberties of their country. The happiness of America and the harmony of the union depend upon suffering it to proceed undisturbed in its operation by premature amendments. The house cannot, consistently with their duty to the good people of this state or with their affection to the citizens of the United States at large, concur with Virginia in their application to congress for a convention of the states." This vote Mifflin, the governor, early in March 1789, communicated to the governor of Virginia, and the subject was beard of no more.

Congress, as early as the second of July 1788, was notified that the constitution had received the approval of nine states; but they wasted two months in wrangling about the permanent seat of the federal government, and at last could agree only on New York as its resting-place. Not till the thirteenth of September was the first Wednesday of the following January appointed for the choice of electors of president in the several states; and the first Wednesday in March, which in that year was the fourth, for commencing proceedings under the constitution. The states, each for itself, appointed the times and places for electing senators and representatives.

The interest of the elections centred in New York, Virginia, and South Carolina. In four districts out of the six into which New York was divided the federalists elected their candidates. Having in the state legislature but a bare majority in the senate, while their opponents outnumbered them in the house, each branch made a nomination of senators; but the senate refused to go into a joint ballot. For this there was the excuse that the time for a new election was close at hand. But the senate further refused to meet the house for the choice of electors of president, and this was an act of faction.

The star of Hamilton was then in the ascendant, and he controlled the federalists; but only to make his singular incapacity to conduct a party as apparent as his swiftness and power of thought. He excluded the family of the Livingstons from influence. To defeat Clinton’s reelection as governor, he stepped into the camp of his opponents, and with Aaron Burr and other anti-federalists selected for their candidate Robert Yates, who had deserted his post in the federal convention, but had since avowed the opinion which was held by every one in the state that the new constitution should be supported. New York at the moment was thoroughly federal, yet Clinton escaped defeat through the attachment of his own county of Ulster and the insignificance of his opponent, while the federalists were left without any state organization. In the new legislature both branches were federal, and, at the behest of Hamilton, against the remonstrances of Morgan Lewis and others, Rufus King, on his transfer of residence from Massachusetts to New York, received the unexampled welcome of an immediate election with Schuyler to the senate.

In Virginia, Madison went into the counties that were relied on to defeat him, reasoned with the voters face to face, and easily won the day. Of the ten delegates from the state, seven were federalists, of whom one was from Kentucky. South Carolina elected avowed anti-federalists, except Butler, of the senate, who had conceded many points to bring about the union, and yet very soon took the alarm that "the southern interest was imperilled."

Under the constitution the house of representatives formed a quorum on the first of April 1789. The senate on the sixth chose John Langdon of New Hampshire its president. The house of representatives was immediately summoned, and in the presence of the two branches he opened and counted the votes. Every one of the sixty-nine, cast by the ten states which took part in the election, was for Washington. John Adams had thirty-four votes; and as no other obtained more than nine, he was declared to be the vice-president. The house devolved upon the senate the office of communicating the result to those who had been chosen; and proceeded to business.

"I foresee contentions," wrote Madison, "first between federal and anti-federal parties, and then between northern and southern parties, which give additional disagreeableness to the prospect." The events of the next seventy years cast their shadows before. Madison revived the bill which he had presented to congress on the eighteenth of March 1783, for duties on imports, adding to it a discriminating duty on tonnage. For an immediate public revenue, Lawrence of New York proposed a general duty ad valorem. England herself, by restraining and even prohibiting the domestic industry of the Americans so long as they remained in the condition of colonial dependence, had trained them to consider the establishment of home manufactures as an act of patriotic resistance to tyranny. Fitzsimons of Pennsylvania disapproved a uniform ad valorem duty on all imports. He said: "I have in contemplation to encourage domestic manufactures by protecting duties." Tucker of South Carolina enforced the necessity of great deliberation by calling attention to the antagonistic interests of the eastern, middle, and southern states in the article of tonnage. Boudinot of New Jersey wished glass to be taxed, for there were already several manufactures of it in the country. "We are able," said Hartley of Pennsylvania, "to furnish come domestic manufactures in sufficient quantity to answer the consumption of the whole union, and to work up our stock of materials even for exportation. In these cases I take it to be the policy of free, enlightened nations to give their manufactures that encouragement necessary to perfect them without oppressing the other parts of the community."

"We must consider the general interests of the union," said Madison, "as much as the local or state interest. My general principle is that commerce ought to be free, and labor and industry left at large to find their proper object." But he admitted that "the interests of the states which are ripe for manufactures ought to have attention, as the power of protecting and cherishing them has by the present constitution been taken from the states and its exercise thrown into other hands. Regulations in some of the states have produced establishments which ought not to be allowed to perish from the alteration which has taken place, while some manufactures being once formed can advance toward perfection without any adventitious aid. Some of the propositions may be productive of revenue and some may protect our domestic manufactures, though the latter subject ought not to be too confusedly blended with the former." "I," said Tucker, "am opposed to high duties because they will introduce and establish a system of smuggling, and because they tend to the oppression of citizens and states to promote the benefit of other states and other classes of citizens."

The election to the presidency found Washington prepared with a federal policy, which was the result of long meditation. He was resolved to preserve freedom; never to transcend the powers delegated by the constitution; even at the cost of life to uphold the union, a sentiment which in him had a tinge of anxiety from his thorough acquaintance with what Grayson called "the southern genius of America;" to restore the public finances; to establish in the foreign relations of the country a thoroughly American system; and to preserve neutrality in the impending conflicts between nations in Europe.

Across the Atlantic Alfieri cried out to him: "Happy are you, who have for the sublime and permanent basis of your glory the love of country demonstrated by deeds."

On the fourteenth of April he received the official announcement of his recall to the public service, and was at ten o’clock on the morning of the sixteenth on his way. Though reluctant "in the evening of life to exchange a peaceful abode for an ocean of difficulties," he bravely said: "Be the voyage long or short, although I may be deserted by all men, integrity and firmness shall never forsake me."

But for him the country could not have achieved its independence; but for him it could not have formed its union; and but for him it could not have set the federal government in successful motion. His journey to New York was one continued march of triumph. All the way he was met with addresses from the citizens of various towns, from societies, universities, and churches.

His neighbors of Alexandria crowded round him with the strongest personal affection, saying: "Farewell, and make a grateful people happy; and may the Being who maketh and unmaketh at his will, restore to us again the best of men and the most beloved fellow-citizen."

To the citizens of Baltimore, Washington said: "I hold it of little moment if the dose of my life shall be embittered, provided I shall have been instrumental in securing the liberties and promoting the happiness of the American people."

He assured the society for promoting domestic manufactures in Delaware that "the promotion of domestic manufactures may naturally be expected to flow from an energetic government;" and he promised to give "a decided preference to the produce and fabrics of America."

At Philadelphia, "almost overwhelmed with a sense of the divine munificence," he spoke words of hope: "The most gracious Being, who has hitherto watched over the interests and averted the perils of the United States, will never suffer so fair an inheritance to become a prey to anarchy or despotism."

At Trenton he was met by a party of matrons and their daughters, dressed mighty chief" who had rescued them from a "mercenary foe."

Embarking at Elizabeth Point in a new barge, manned by pilots dressed in white, he cleaved his course swiftly across the bay, between gayly decorated boats, filled with gazers who cheered him with instrumental music, or broke out in songs. As he touched the soil of New York he was welcomed by the two houses of congress, by the governor of the state, by the magistrates of the city, by its people; and so attended he proceeded on foot to the modest mansion lately occupied by the presiding officer of the confederate congress. On that day he dined with Clinton; in the evening the city was illuminated. The senate, under the influence of John Adams and the persistency of Richard Henry Lee, would have given him the title of "Highness;" but the house, supported by the true republican simplicity of the man whom they both wished to honor, insisted on the simple words of the constitution, and prevailed.

On the thirtieth, the day appointed for the inauguration, Washington, being fifty-seven years, two months, and eight days old, was ceremoniously received by the two houses in the hall of the senate. Stepping out to the middle compartment of a balcony, which had been raised in front of it, he found before him a dense throng extending to Broad street, and filling Wall street to Broadway. All were hushed as Livingston, the chancellor of the state, administered the oath of office; but when he cried, "Long live George Washington, President of the United States!" the air was rent with huzzas, which were repeated as Washington bowed to the multitude.

Then returning to the senate-chamber, with an aspect grave almost to sadness and a voice deep and tremulous, he addressed the two houses, confessing his distrust of his own endowments and his inexperience in civil administration. The magnitude and difficulty of the duties to which his country had called him weighed upon him so heavily that he shook as he proceeded: "It would be peculiarly improper to omit, in this first official act, my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who presides in the councils of nations, that his benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the people of the United States a government instituted by themselves. No people can be bound to acknowledge the invisible hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency. There exists in the economy of nature an indissoluble union between an honest and magnanimous policy and public prosperity. Heaven can never smile on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right. The preservation of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment intrusted to the American people."

At the close of the ceremony the president and both branches of congress were escorted to the church of St. Paul, where the chaplain of the senate read prayers suited to the occasion, after which they all attended the president to his mansion.

"Every one without exception," so reports the French minister to his government, "appeared penetrated with veneration for the illustrious chief of the republic. The humblest was proud of the virtues of the man who was to govern him. Tears of joy were seen to flow in the hall of the senate, at church, and even in the streets, and no sovereign ever reigned more completely in the hearts of his subjects than Washington in the hearts of his fellow-citizens. Nature, which had given him the talent to govern, distinguished him from all others by his appearance. He had at once the soul, the look, and the figure of a hero. He never appeared embarrassed at homage rendered him, and in his manners he had the advantage of joining dignity to great simplicity."

To the president’s inaugural speech one branch of the legislature thus responded: "The senate will at all times cheerfully co-operate in every measure which may strengthen the union and perpetuate the liberties of this great confederated republic."

The representatives of the American people likewise addressed him: "With you we adore the invisible hand which has led the American people through so many difficulties; and we cherish a conscious responsibility for the destiny of republican liberty. We join in your fervent supplication for our country; and we add our own for the choicest blessings of heaven on the most beloved of her citizens."

In the same moments of the fifth day of May 1789, when these words were reported, the ground was trembling beneath the arbitrary governments of Europe as Louis XVI. proceeded to open the states-general of France. The day of wrath, against which Leibnitz had warned the monarchs of Europe, was beginning to break, and its judgments were to be the more terrible for the long delay of its coming. The great Frederick, who alone of them all had lived and toiled for the good of his land, described the degeneracy and insignificance of his fellow-rulers with cynical scorn. Not one of them had a surmise that the only sufficient reason for the existence of a king lies in his usefulness to the people. Nor did they spare one another. The law of morality was never suffered to restrain the passion for conquest. Austria preyed upon Italy until Alfieri could only say, in his despair, that despotic power had left him no country to serve; nor did the invader permit the thought that an Italian could have a right to a country. The heir in the only line of protestant kings on the continent of Europe, too blind to see that he would one day be stripped of the chief part of his own share in the spoils, joined with two other robbers to divide the country of Kosciuszko. In Holland dynastic interests were betraying the welfare of the republic. All faith was dying out; and self, in its eagerness for pleasure or advantage, stifled the voice of justice. The atheism of the great, who lived without God in the world, concealed itself under superstitions observances which were enforced by an inquisition that sought to rend beliefs from the soul, and to suppress inquiry by torments which surpassed the worst cruelties that savages could invent. Even in Great Britain all the branches of government were controlled by the aristocracy, of which the more liberal party could in that generation have no hope of being summoned by the king to frame a cabinet. The land, of which every member of a clan had had some share of ownership, had been for the most part usurped by the nobility; and the people were starving in the midst of the liberality which their own hands extorted from nature. The monarchs, whose imbecility or excesses had brought the doom of death on arbitrary power, were not only unfit to rule, but, while their own unlimited sovereignty was stricken with death, they knew not how to raise up statesmen to take their places. Well-intentioned friends of mankind burned with indignation, and even the wise and prudent were incensed by the conscious endurance of wrong: while the lowly classes, clouded by despair, were driven sometimes to admit the terrible thought that religion, which is the poor man’s consolation and defence, might be but an instrument of government in the hands of their oppressors. There was no relief for the nations but through revolution, and their masters had poisoned the weapons which revolution must use.

In America a new people had risen up without king, or princes, or nobles, knowing nothing of tithes and little of landlords, the plough being for thin most part in the hands of free-holders of the soil. They were more sincerely religious, better educated, of serener minds, and of purer morals than the men of any former republic. By calm meditation and friendly councils they had prepared a constitution which, in the union of freedom with strength and order, excelled every one known before; and which secured itself against violence and revolution by providing a peaceful method for every needed reform. In the happy morning of their existence as one of the powers of the world, they had chosen justice for their guide; and while they proceeded on their way with well-founded confidence and joy, all the friends of mankind invoked success on the unexampled endeavor to govern states and territories of imperial extent as one federal republic.