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HAMILTON ESTABLIShes our FINANCIAL SYSTEM.

garb, but still maintained his soldier-like air. He was large in person, above the middle stature, with a full face, radiant and benignant, bespeaking his open, buoyant, generous nature. He had a sonorous voice, and sometimes talked rather grandly, flourishing his cane to give effect to his periods. He was cordially appreciated by Washington, who had experienced his prompt and efficient talent in time of war, had considered him one of the ablest officers of the Revolution, and now looked to him as an energetic man of business, capable of giving practical advice in time of peace, and cherished for him that strong feeling of ancient companionship in toil and danger, which bound the veterans of the Revolution firmly to each other.' '

First Steps to be taken.-There was everything to be done. The most urgent subject which pressed upon the attention of Congress, was a revenue; for the country had no means, either for carrying on the government, or discharging the public debt. One of its first acts was to create a tariff of duties on the importation of foreign goods, and on the tonnage of vesselsdirect taxation being considered unwise in policy, and odious in practice. Another measure of pressing necessity, was the organization of Public Departments to aid the President in carrying on the business of the government. By the Constitution, the number of executive departments of the government was not limited. It was consequently necessary, on the recommendation of the President, that Congress should make provision for the details of the administration; and departments were organized for State, Treasury, and

For his first secretaries, Washington chose Thomas Jefferson for the Department of State, Alexander Hamilton for the Department of the Treasury, and John Knox for the Department of War. The last-named secretary had also control of the navy.

Alexander Hamilton establishes the Financial Policy of the Republic.With some slight modifications, that policy has prevailed till the present day. This man, so munificently gifted, was justly regarded in his times, as he has been ever since, as endowed with pre-eminent ability in financial affairs. His reports from the Treasury Department were luminous and convincing, and his Essays on Public Credit are among the best that have ever

1 Irving's Life of Washington, vol. v. pp. 5, 6, 7. 2 Probably no other man ever lived of whose financial ability Daniel Webster would have used such words as the following:

Mr. Hamilton was elected one of the distinguished delegation from the city to the State Convention at Poughkeepsie, called to ratify the new Constitution. Its debates are published. Mr. Hamilton appears to have exerted on this occasion, to the utmost, every power and faculty of his mind.

The whole question was likely to depend on the decision of New York. He felt the full importance of the crisis, and the reports of his speeches, imperfect as they probably are, are yet lasting monuments to his genius and patriotism. He saw at last his hopes fulfilled; he saw the Constitution adopted, and the government

under it established and organized. The discerning eye of Washington immediately called him to that post, which was far the most important in the administration of the new system. He was made Secretary of the Treasury and how he fulfilled the duties of such a place at such a time the whole country perceived with delight, and the whole world saw with admiration. He smote the rock of the national resources, and abundant streams of revenue gushed forth. He touched the dead corpse of Public Credit, and it sprang upon its feet. The fabled birth of Minerva from the brain of Jove, was hardly more sudden or more perfect than the financial system of the United States, as it burst forth from the conceptions of ALEXANDER HAMILTON.→ Webster's Speech at the City Hall, New York, March 10th, 1831.

THE JUDICIARY OF THE UNITED STATES.

441

been written. He proposed the plan of funding the public debt, in which he embraced not only the fifty millions contracted by Congress, but the twentyfive millions owed by the States; providing for the payment of the interest, and the extinction of the principal, from a revenue of customs duties levied chiefly on articles of luxury imported from abroad, and distilled spirits made at home. The warmest personal and sectional feelings were aroused by this plan, and the debates which attended it reached dangerous intensity. The lines of political parties were sure soon to be definitively drawn after so unrelenting a war of ideas. The time was near when every man would range himself under one or the other of the two contending parties-the Federalists, headed by Hamilton as their chief champion, and the Republicans, whose recognized leader was Thomas Jefferson. The financial policy of Hamilton prevailed, and from that time it commanded the unlimited confidence of a large portion of the American people. It succeeded in giving us, at all times, an adequate revenue; in maintaining the credit of our government unimpaired; and it ended in the entire extinction of the national debt, which exceeded seventy-five million dollars.

Establishment of the Judiciary of the United States.-It was one of the most important events connected with the organization of the government and the administration of justice. The great Judiciary Act of the 24th of September, 1789, occupies, in fact, a position to the fundamental elements of our government, second only to the constitution itself. It organized the whole system of our national judiciary, which has reflected so much lustre upon the nation; and it remains to this day substantially as it was first passed. Oliver Ellsworth,1 of Connecticut, was the author of the Bill, and became the second Chief-Justice on the 4th of March, 1796, succeeding John Jay,' who resigned the office to accept the mission to England.

The First National Bank.-Other most important measures were passed by the First Congress which followed the adoption of the Constitution. A

1 ELLSWORTH, OLIVER, an American statesman and jurist, born in Windsor, Conn., April 29, 1745, died Nov. 26, 1807. He graduated at the College of New Jersey in 1766, and soon after commenced the practice of law. In 1777 he was chosen a delegate to the continental congress, and he was a member of the council of Connecticut from 1780 to 1784, when he was appointed a judge of the Superior Court. In 1787 he was elected to the convention which framed the federal constitution, and was afterward a member of the State convention which ratified that instrument. He was a Senator of the United States from 1789 to 1796, when he was nominated by Washington Chief-Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, over which he presided with great distinction, his opinions being marked by sound legal and ethical principles, in clear felicitous language. In 1799 he was appointed by President Adams envoy extraordinary to Paris, and with his associates, Davie and Murray, he successfully negociated a treaty with the French. This accomplished, and his health beginning to fail, he visited England for the benefit of its mineral waters; but his infirmities increasing, he resigned his office of Chief-Justice in 1800. Returning to Connecticut, he was again elected a member of the council; and in 1807 he was appointed Chief-Justice of the State, which office he de

clined on account of his health.-Appletons' American Cyclopædia.

In point of revolutionary services,' says Hildreth, only the President himself stood upon higher ground; nor could any person except the Vice-President, Adams, pretend to a place upon the same level. In lofty disinterestedness, in unyielding integrity, in superiority to the illusions of passions, no one of the great men of the revolution approached so near to Washington. Profound knowledge of the law, inflexible sense of justice, and solidity of judgment, had especially marked him out for the office which he held. Having played a very active part in a State, the seat of hostilities during the whole struggle of the revolution, he knew what war was, and dreaded it according ly. One of the ministers who negotiated the treaty of peace, and afterward secretary of foreign affairs, he was perfectly familiar with all the grounds of controversy between the two nations. Though on questions of principle perfectly unyielding, in matters of interest and expediency he knew the wisdom of giving up a part rather than to risk the loss of the whole. The only serious objection to his appointment was his judicial station; but even that gave an additional dignity te the mission, and in a crisis so important the objection lost much of its weight.'-Appletons' American Cr clopedia.

442

VERMONT ADMITTED TO THE UNION.

National Bank was organized, after the most violent and determined opposi tion from the Republican party; and it will not be denied that within the limits of its first charter, it highly subserved the purposes of the government, regulated the currency, and answered the wants of the people. It met with the deliberate approbation of Washington, and went into operation in Philadelphia, with a capital of ten million dollars. Kentucky was separated from Virginia, and erected into an independent government. Vermont was admitted as a new State into the Union;' and the first census of the United States was taken. It gave us a population of very nearly four millions with about seven hundred thousand slaves. Thus the Republic came into being with the Atlcan weight of African slavery, and it carried the embarrassing and disgraceful burden, till it was thrown off in the convulsions of a Civil War. The

1 Vermont.-The name of this State, borrowed from its evergreen mountains, stirs the imagination of every reader who is familiar with its history, and recalls images of grandeur and beauty to every traveller who has passed through those enchanting regions. From the crowned summit of Hay Stack mountain, which stands out boid and clear on the skies of South-western Vermont, the eye sweeps over an extended range of country which may be fairly termed the most picturesque his toric ground of North America. On the east, beyond the intervening hills, the Green Mountains lift their never-fading ramparts. Far away in the blue distance, rise the snow-tops of the Adirondacks, sheltering the deep forest valleys which stretch out from their base: to the west beyond, the crystal waters of Champlain and

Lake George-where the chivalry of France so long held the fleur-de-lis against the veterans of Marlborough-stand the encircling mountains, those unwasting fountains of the Hudson;-while to the south

lie the battlefields of Bennington and Saratoga, where England was forced to let go her grasp of that beautiful domain which had cost her so much blood and treasure to win from her French rival.

Vermont was then governed by a Council of Safety, with headquarters at Bennington. The following paper, which was extracted with supreme care by Mr. Heil Hollister, from the records of Bennington, shows the sentiment of the founders of that State, which was the only one that had then been established in America south of the St. Lawrence, whose soil was never trod by a slave. Though somewhat crude and inelegant for a State Paper, it might have served in spirit, and almost in form, as a miniature model for Abraham Lincoln's Proclamation of eighty-six years later:

'Headquarters, Pawlet. 28 Nov., 1777

'To whom it may concern :-Know ye that whereas

Dinah Mattis a negro woman with Nancy her Child of

two months old was taken Prissnor on Lake Cham

plain with the British troops Somewhere near Col. Gilliner's Patten the twelfth day of Instant November by a scout under my command, and according to a Resolve passed by the Honorable Continental Congress that all Prisses belorng to the Captivators therefore I being conscientious that it is not right in the sight of God to keep Slaves I therefore obtaining leave of Besides the innumerable conflicts between Indian the Detachment under my Command to give her & her tribes, which had raged long before the historic period, child their freedom I do therefore give the said Dinah these classic scenes have witnessed three wars. The Mattis & Nancy her child there freedom to pass & refirst saw the French and American colonists through pass any where through the United States of America the changing panorama of a seven years' conflict. The with her behaving as bocometh & to Trade & Traffic second saw a stranger sight, where those same American for her Self & Child as though she was born free, withand French soldiers met again, but as allies, to fight out being Molested by any Person or Persons. the same common foe; and still again in the war of witness whereunto I have 'hereunto set my hand or 1812, which raged along our borders, when the sons of subscribed my name (signed) EBENEZER ALLEN CAPT.' an independent and now powerful republic, were once more in arms against their ancient enemy.

A striking anecdote, which is not generally known, illustrates that spirit of love of liberty which has always had a home in that romantic region. When Burgoyne came up from Canada sweeping all before him—1777Colonel Herrick organized in the township of Pawlet, in Western Vermont, his famous regiment of rangers, who were the prototypes of the whole family of rangers that figured so largely in our early national history. They were the terror of all the country round-Tory, British, and Hessians. In one of his despatches, Burgoyne complained that they hung like a gathering cloud on his flank '

In

After the war was over, seventy revolutionary soldiers settled in Pawlet. Their longevity shows them to have been men of the highest physical and moral stamina. They, as a class, were distinguished for industry, thrift and enterprise, and though the fires of the revolution consumed their substance, and tried their souls, nearly all of them succeeded in establishing a home, and acquiring a competence. One (George Rush), lived to the age of 110; another (Nathan M. Lounsbury), 100; and the aggregate of the lives of the 54 ascertained. was 4,247 years, or an average of 78 years and 8 months. These interesting facts I have gathered from Mr. Hei Hollister's History of the Town of Pawlet.

OUR FOREIGN RELATIONS-WASHINGTON'S SECOND TERM. 443

revenue amounted to five millions, while the imports and exports were nearly balanced at twenty millions per annum. The ratio of representation in Congress was fixed at one representative for every thirty-three thousand inhabitants.

Our Foreign Relations.-The government was now in full working order, and a long period of peace and prosperity seemed to be spread out before it. The influence of Washington was so great and so benign, and he had been placed at the head of public affairs with such unanimity, that it was found to be no difficult task to institute advantageous and friendly relations with foreign States. The name of the political Father of the American Republic had already become known and venerated throughout the world. He was regarded as the noblest illustration of patriotism and incorruptible virtue among the living, perhaps even among the dead. The moral influence which began to be put forth by the Republic was by no means limited to its absolute power, and in no respect could it be measured by the years of its existence. The earth was dotted with nations hoary with antiquity, few of whom com manded such entire confidence, and none of whom elicited so much praise, Ministers Plenipotentiary were appointed by Washington to represent us near the chief governments of the world, and they were received with every mark of respect. Courtesy was extended to our travellers; protection was given to our citizens. Our commerce, which had lived even in defiance of the all-sweeping and all-desolating feets of the British navy, now sprang into a sudden expansion.

Washington elected for a Second Term.-A history of Washington's administration would stretch far beyond the limits assigned to this work. I have been able to spare space enough only to enumerate the most important events which occurred during his first administration. Before it had expired, the Constitution demanded that another Presidential election should take place. The country again turned its eyes to Washington, for the confidence reposed in him had grown, if possible, still stronger every year; and with the exception of a few men, who either entertained different views in regard to government, or who were prompted by a selfish ambition, there was the same feeling of unanimity that had been displayed when he was first placed in the presidential chair. He was accordingly re-elected, and his second inauguration took place in March, 1793. The great abilities of Thomas Jefferson were not called in question; but John Adams was elected VicePresident over his rival. This is less to be attributed to a lack of appreciation of Jefferson's character and public services, than to the fact that Jefferson was now known to hold different views in regard to the scope and the policy of the government, from those of Washington. A more sincere republican than Washington did not exist in the whole country; but Jefferson held opinions more radically democratic. His views on most great public questions, more closely resembled those of the statesmen of the pres

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APPREHENDED TROUBLES WITH FRANCE.

ent day. It is asserted with much plausibility, that Jefferson felt keenly jealous also of the great influence which Alexander Hamilton had over Washington's mind. Nothing would be further from the truth than to represent any individual as holding a controlling influence over Washington's mind or opinions; but, probably, among all the great men that were clustered around him, he felt more confidence in the political judgment, the financial ability, and the classic completeness of Hamilton's mind-he doubtless regarded him, 'take him all for all,' as the ablest man for this station. Washington had a keen perception of character, and he was very rarely mistaken in his judgment. He fully appreciated the abilities and the services of Jefferson, and he chose, during his first term, to have him act as his Secretary of State. He had no favorites—we cannot say he had no partialities—but in his public life, we can certainly trace none which grew out of selfish or private feelings. But Washington's mind was more conservative than Jefferson's. Washington surpassed almost all men in that rarest quality—a genius for crystallizing all the chaotic elements of power into the enduring structure of a well-organized civil administration. Washington had a native economy of mind, which in war or in cabinet councils, made the most out of everything. There was no variableness in his character-no incompleteness in his estimates his perception reached to every detail, and he perfectly comprehended all aggregates. Jefferson was as bold and daring in statesmanship, as Decatur was in a sea-fight; but he sometimes made mistakes-Washington never. No man but Jefferson could have written the Declaration of Independence so well; but the massive and colossal mind of John Adams was more compact and commanding. John Adams was a primitive man. We think we here discern the reasons why the country preferred to have John Adams lead the way as Washington's successor; nor is it probable that any enlightened American statesman or citizen now regrets, that in the early period of our Republic, the policy of the nation was decided so entirely by Washington, Adams, and Hamilton. They were the men to found a Republic-Jefferson and Jackson were the men to expand it into ampler proportions.

Development of the two great Political Parties.-Washington had not got on far in his second term, before party spirit began to run very high; and Jefferson unmasked his hostility to the entire Federal policy. He opposed it with the utmost vehemence of his nature, and with all the caustic severity of his pen. But in logical argument he was no match for Hamilton. Wherever he came in collision with him, he found his master. Jefferson was great in many directions-Hamilton in all.

Apprehended Troubles with France.—In the mean time the French Revolution had occurred. The head of Louis XVI. had rolled from the guillotine. The triumph of Democracy had been proclaimed in Paris, bringing with it a reign of blood. France had also declared war against Great Britain and Holland; and the men who controlled the French Councils at the time