Mr. President (48 page)

  8
. Jefferson to Washington, February 15, 1791, in ibid., 352.

  9
. Washington to Hamilton, February 16, 1791, in ibid., 357.

10
. Madison to Washington, February 21, 1791, in ibid., 395.

11
. Hamilton to Washington, February 23, 1791, in ibid., 425, 429, 430.

12
. For Hamilton’s personal meeting with Washington, see ibid., 452.

13
. Richard H. Kohn, “The Washington Administration’s Decision to Crush the Whiskey Rebellion,”
Journal of American History
59, no. 3 (December 1972): 584; Washington,
Writings
, 34:28–37.

14
. Washington to Graham, January 9, 1790, in Washington,
Papers
, Presidential Series, 4:552.

15
. Washington to Burgess Ball, September 25, 1794, in
George Washington in the Ohio Valley
, ed. Hugh Cleland (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1955), 369–71; Washington,
Writings
, 34:37.

16
. James Roger Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic: The New Nation in Crisis
(New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1993), 76; Hamilton, “Defense of the President’s Neutrality Proclamation,” in
The Pacificus-Helvidius Debates
, ed. Morton J. Frisch (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2007), 3.

17
. Frisch,
Pacificus-Helvidius Debates, 1
.

18
. Madison to Jefferson, June 19, 1793, in Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 77.

19
. Hamilton, “Pacificus Number 1
,”
in Frisch,
Pacificus-Helvidius Debates
, 12–13.

20
. Jefferson to Madison, July 7, 1793, in Madison,
Papers
, Congressional Series, 15:43; Frisch,
Pacificus-Helvidius Debates
, 54.

21
. Madison, “Helvidius Number 1
,”
in Frisch,
Pacificus-Helvidius Debates
, 59–63.

22
. Ibid., 63–64. Ironically, later writers who treat Hamilton’s views in
The Federalist
as definitive expositions of the Constitution rather than arguments in favor of the Constitution also treat his Pacificus essays as explanations of what the Constitution really means, even though in this instance the views of Publius and Pacificus are diametrically opposed.

23
. Madison,
Notes
, June 1 and August 6.

24
. Ibid., September 7.

25
. Ibid., August 17.

26
. Hamilton, “Pacificus Number 1
,”
13.

27
.
Senate Executive Journal
, April 19, 1794, Library of Congress, American Memory, A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation, 152,
http://​memory​.​loc​.gov​/ammem​/amlaw​/lwej​.html
.

28
. The full treaty appears in Samuel Flagg Bemis,
Jay’s Treaty: A Study in Commerce and Diplomacy
(New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1962), 442–84.

29
. Thomas J. Farnham, “The Virginia Amendments of 1795: An Episode in the Opposition to Jay’s Treaty,”
Virginia Magazine of History and Biography
, January 1967, 84–85.

30
. In the nine-day period leading up to its final decision, it received 104 petitions containing 17,400 signatures urging a vote one way or the other. By this time, Federalists had been able to mobilize support among the educated and politically active mercantile class, and slightly more than half the petitions favored the treaty (Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 129, 132).

31
. Len Travers,
Celebrating the Fourth: Independence Day and the Rites of Nationalism in the Early Republic
(Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1997), 88–106.

32
. Jefferson to William Branch Giles, December 31, 1795, in Jefferson,
Papers
, 28:566.

33
. For Hamilton’s authorship of Washington’s Farewell Address, see Hamilton,
Papers
, 20:168–83, 264–88, 294–303. While the introductory and concluding sections drew on Madison’s draft, the heart of the address, which concerned policy issues, was largely Hamilton’s doing. When Hamilton presented both a reworked draft of Madison’s and Washington’s authorship and one he had written himself, Washington chose Hamilton’s original.

34
.
Aurora General Advertiser
, July 22, 1795; Hamilton,
Papers
, 18:471–72, 485–88, and 20:42; Ron Chernow,
Alexander Hamilton
(New York: Penguin, 2004), 489–91.

35
. Documents from the Democratic-Republican Societies that Washington decried are collected in
The Democratic-Republican Societies, 1790–1800: A Documentary Sourcebook of Constitutions, Addresses, Resolutions, and Toasts
, ed. Philip S. Foner (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1976). Washington’s Farewell Address can be accessed through the Web site of Yale Law School’s Avalon Project,
http://​avalon​.​law​.yale​.edu​/​18th​_century​/washing​.asp
.

36
. Ames to Oliver Wolcott, September 26, 1796, cited in Alexander DeConde, “Washington’s Farewell, the French Alliance, and the Election of 1796,” in
Political Parties in American History
, vol. 1,
1789–1828
, ed. Winfred E. A. Bernhard (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1973), 160.

  1
. Hamilton to Wilson, January 25, 1789, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 5:248.

  2
. Madison,
Notes
, September 4.

  3
. After revealing to Wilson his plan to “throw away” seven or eight votes, Hamilton elaborated: “Under this impression I have proposed to friends in Connecticut to throw away two to others in Jersey to throw away an equal number & I submit it to you whether it will not be well to lose three or four in Pennsylvania” (Hamilton to Wilson, January 25, 1789, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 5:248–49). He then added, “Your advices from the South will serve you as the best guide,” suggesting the network of communication on strategizing for the election extended wider yet. Hamilton also communicated on this matter with Theodore Sedgwick in Massachusetts, James Madison in Virginia (the two were still allies at that point), and no doubt Federalist colleagues in New York (ibid., 236, 247, 250–53).

  4
. Richard P. McCormick,
The Presidential Game: The Origins of American Presidential Politics
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 41.

  5
. James Roger Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic: The New Nation in Crisis
(New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1993), 149 (Wolcott and Troup letters); Hamilton to King, May 4, 1796, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 20:158.

  6
. Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 156.

  7
. Hamilton to ——, November 8, 1796, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 20:376–77.

  8
. John Adams to Abigail Adams, December 26, 1793, in
My Dearest Friend: Letters of Abigail and John Adams
, ed. Margaret A. Hogan and C. James Taylor (Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2007), 345; Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 160.

  9
. Jefferson to Adams, December 28, 1796, and Jefferson to Madison, December 17, 1796, in Jefferson,
Papers
, 29:235–37, 223.

10
. Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 162.

11
. Jefferson to Madison, January 1, 1797, in Jefferson,
Papers
, 29:247–51; John Adams to Abigail Adams, December 12, 1796, in Adams,
Works
, 1:496.

12
. Gordon Wood,
Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789–1815
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 213–15.

13
. Stanley Elkins and Eric McKitrick,
The Age of Federalism
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 535.

14
. Jefferson to Edward Rutledge, December 27, 1796, in Jefferson,
Papers
, 29:232.

15
. Jefferson,
The Anas
, in Jefferson,
Writings
, 1:415; Adams,
Works
, 9:286.

16
. Jefferson to Rutledge, June 24, 1797, in Jefferson,
Papers
, 29:456–57.

17
. Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, Avalon Project, Yale Law School,
http://​avalon​.​law​.yale​.edu​/18th_​century​/kenres​.asp
and
http://​avalon​.​law​.​yale​.edu​/18th_​century​/virres​.asp
.

18
. Hamilton,
Papers
, 22:4–5, 17–19.

19
. Ibid., 9.

20
. Washington to Adams, September 25, 1798, in ibid., 14–15.

21
. Adams to Washington, October 9, 1798, in ibid., 15;
Senate Executive Journal
, July 2, 1798, Library of Congress, American Memory, A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation,
http://​memory​.​l​oc​.gov​/ammem​/amlaw​/lwej​.html
.

22
. William Heth to Hamilton, January 14, 1799, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 22:415; Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 209; David McCullough,
John Adams
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001), 485.

23
. Adams,
Works
, 9:291; Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 179. Abigail Adams, protective of her husband, was perhaps more forthright in her advocacy of the Sedition Act than John. Before the bill was passed, responding to a wave of personal attacks issued by Benjamin Franklin Bache, she wrote, “In any other country Bache & all his papers would have been seized and ought to be here, but congress are dilly dallying about passing a bill enabling the President to seize suspicious persons, and their papers.” Then, after the bill was passed and Congress had adjourned, she commented, “Their last deeds may be marked amongst their best, an Alien Bill a Sedition Bill and a Bill declaring void, all our treaties and conventions with France” (Elkins and McKitrick,
Age of Federalism
, 879n29).

24
. Thomas L. Purvis,
Revolutionary America, 1763 to 1800
, Almanacs of American Life Series (New York: Facts on File, 1995), 102–3, 124–25.

25
. McCormick,
Presidential Game
, 60.

26
. Edward J. Larson,
A Magnificent Catastrophe: The Tumultuous Election of 1800
(New York: Free Press, 2007), 78–80;
Annals
, 10:33, 47 (January 24 and February 14). The original bill, before being amended, awarded the final slot to the chief justice of the Supreme Court. All actions on the bill at various dates, taken from the
Annals of Congress
, are collected in
The Presidential Counts: A Complete Official Record
(New York: D. Appleton, 1877), 414–34.

27
.
Annals
, 10:49, 51 (February 20 and 24).

28
. Ibid., 126–46 (March 28). Note that the supremacy of the states in determining the manner of selecting electors would be severely modified by the Fourteenth Amendment, but at the time, according to Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution, states held exclusive power in the matter.

29
. Ibid., 146 (March 28).

30
. Larson,
Magnificent Catastrophe
, 80–83;
Aurora
, February 19, 1800.

31
. Hamilton,
Papers
, 24:444–52; Larson,
Magnificent Catastrophe
, 62–65; McCormick,
Presidential Game
, 60–62.

32
. Hamilton to Jay, May 7, 1800, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 24:464–67.

33
. Ames to Christopher Gore, March 5, 1800, and Sedgwick to Rufus King, December 12, 1799, cited in Larson,
Magnificent Catastrophe
, 84.

34
. Hamilton,
Papers
, 25:169–234.

35
. Jedediah Morse to Oliver Wolcott Jr., October 27, 1800, quoted in Hamilton,
Papers
, 25:178.

36
. Elkins and McKitrick,
Age of Federalism
, 741–43.

37
. Hamilton to Oliver Wolcott Jr., December 16, 1800, and Hamilton to Theodore Sedgwick, December 20, 1800, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 25:257, 270.

38
. Sedgwick to Hamilton, January 10, 1801, in ibid., 311.

39
. Jefferson to Monroe, February 15, 1801, in Jefferson,
Papers
, 32:594.

40
. McKean to Jefferson, March 19, 1801, quoted in Sharp,
American Politics in the Early Republic
, 269. This is McKean’s re-creation of a letter he wrote to Jefferson during the heat of the crisis. Monroe’s role is also discussed in ibid., 268–71. Bayard to John Adams, February 19, 1801, in Larson,
Magnificent Catastrophe
, 266.

41
. For a listing of presidential vetoes in the first century under the Constitution, see Edward Campbell Mason,
The Veto Power: Its Origin, Development, and Function in the Government of the United States
(Boston: Ginn, 1890). Although the threat of the veto was present from the start, the first three presidents shied from its use; Washington vetoed only two bills, Adams and Jefferson none.

  1
. Hamilton to James Bayard, January 16, 1801, in Hamilton,
Papers
, 25:319–20.

  2
. Jefferson,
Papers
, 1:21
(Summary View)
, 415–32 (Declaration of Independence), and 359–60 (draft for Virginia Constitution).

  3
. Jefferson to Marquis de Lafayette and Jefferson to Baron von Steuben, March 10, 1781, in ibid., 5:113, 120; Jefferson to House of Delegates, May 28, 1781, in ibid., 6:28–29; Michael A. McDonnell,
The Politics of War: Race, Class, and Conflict in Revolutionary Virginia
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2007), 410–11, 462–65.
Notes on the State of Virginia
, in
Basic Writings of Thomas Jefferson
, ed. Philip S. Foner (New York: Willey, 1944), 132, 137.