ALEXANDER HAMILTON.

65 topics of conversation, and revived the conflict of opinions on the subject. As yet, the history of the world had furnished no favorable examples of popular government; speculative writers in England had contended that no government more popular than their own was consistent with either eternal tranquillity, the supremacy of the laws, or a great extent of empire. Our republic was ten times larger than any that had yet existed. Jay, one of the calmest thinkers of the Union, expressed himself dubiously on the subject.

"Whether any people could long govern themselves in an equal, uniform, and orderly manner, was a question of vital importance, to the cause of liberty, but a question which, like others, whose solution depends on facts, could only be determined by experience now, as yet, there had been very few opportunities of making the experiment."

Alexander Hamilton, though pledged and sincerely disposed to support the republican form, with regard to our country, preferred, theoretically, a monarchical form; and, being frank of speech, and, as Gouverneur Morris writes, " prone to mount his hobby," may have spoken openly in favor of that form as suitable to France; and as his admirers took their creed from him, opinions of the kind may have been uttered pretty freely at dinner-tables. These, however, which so much surprised and shocked Mr. Jefferson, were probably merely speculative opinions, broached in unguarded hours, with no sinister design, by men who had no thought, of paving the way for a mon

archy. They made, however, a deep impression on his apprehensive mind, which sank deeper and deeper until it became a fixed opinion with him, that there was the desire and aim of a large party, of which Hamilton was the leader, to give regal form to the government.

The Assumption of the State Debts discussed. - Washington in Favor. A Majority of Two against it. Hamilton's Appeal to Jefferson on the Subject. - The Latter arranges for a Compromise. - His Account of it. - Adjustment about the Seat of Government. - Assumption carried. - Treaty of Peace with the Creeks.- Cavillings about Presidential Etiquette. - Washington's Defense. - Adjournment of. Congress. Fancied Harmony of the Cabinet. - Jefferson suspects Hamilton of Finesse in procuring his Agency in the Assumption.

HE question of the assumption of the State debts was resumed in Congress on the 29th of March, on a motion to commit, which was carried by a majority of two; the five members from North Carolina (now a State of the Union), who were strongly opposed to assumption, having taken their seats and 1eversed the position of parties on the question. An angry and intemperate discussion was revived, much to the chagrin of Washington, who was concerned for the dignity of Congress; and who considered the assumption of the State debts, under proper restrictions and scrutiny into accounts, to be just and reasonable.1 On the 12th of April, when the question to commit was taken,

1 See letter to David Stuart, Writings, x. 98.

there was a majority of two against the assump tion.

a

On the 26th the House was discharged, for the present, from proceeding on so much of the report as related to the assumption. Jefferson, who had arrived in New York in the midst of what he terms "this bitter and angry contest," had taken no concern in it; being, as he says, stranger to the ground, a stranger to the actors in it, so long absent as to have lost all familiarity with the subject, and to be unaware of its object.” We give his own account of an earnest effort made by Hamilton, who, he says, was "in despair," to resuscitate, through his influence, his almost hopeless project. "As I was going to the President's one day, I met him [Hamilton] 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 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 judg

JEFFERSON'S COMPROMISE.

69

ment 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, 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 pill would be 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 projects to fix