Albert Gallatin
chief highway of the country. Here gathered on July 27, 1791, a number
of persons opposed to the law, when it was agreed that county committees
should be convened in the four counties at the respective seats of
justice. Brackenridge, in his "Incidents of the Western Insurrection,"
says that Albert Gallatin was clerk of the meeting. One of these
committees met in the town of Washington on August 23, when violent
resolutions were adopted. Gallatin, engaged at Philadelphia, was not
present at this assemblage, three of whose members were deputed to meet
delegates from the counties of Westmoreland, Fayette, and Allegheny, at
Pittsburgh, on the first Tuesday in September following, to agree upon
an address to the legislature on the subject of excise and other
grievances. At the Pittsburgh meeting eleven delegates appeared for the
four counties. The resolutions adopted by them, general in character,
read more like a declaration of grievances as a basis for revolution
than a petition for special redress. No wonder that the secretary of the
treasury stigmatized them as "intemperate." They charge that in the laws
of the late Congress hasty strides had been made to all that was unjust
and oppressive. They complain of the increase in the salaries of
officials, of the unreasonable interest of the national debt, of the
non-discrimination between original holders and transferees of the
public securities, of the National Bank as a base offspring of the
funding system; finally, in detail, of the excise law of March 3, 1791.
At this meeting James Marshall and David Bradford represented Washington
County.
In August government offices of inspection were opened. The spirit of
resistance was now fully aroused, and in the early days of September the
collectors for Washington, Westmoreland, and Fayette were treated with
violence. Unwilling to proceed to excessive measures, and no doubt
swayed by the attitude of the Pennsylvania legislature, Congress in
October referred the law back to Hamilton for revision. He reported an
amended act on March 6, 1792, which was immediately passed, and became a
law March 8. It was to take effect on the last day of June succeeding.
By it the rate of duty was reduced, a privilege of time as to the
running of licenses of stills granted, and the tax ordered only for such
time as they were actually used.
But these modifications did not satisfy the malcontents of the four
western counties, and they met again on August 21, 1792, at Pittsburgh.
Of this second Pittsburgh meeting Albert Gallatin was chosen secretary.
Badollet went up with Gallatin. John Smilie, James Marshall, and James
Bradford of Washington County were present. Bradford, Marshall,
Gallatin, and others were appointed to draw up a remonstrance to
Congress. In order to carry out with regularity and concert the measures
agreed upon, a committee of correspondence was appointed, and the
meeting closed with the adoption of the violent resolutions passed at
the Washington meeting of 1791:--
"Whereas, some men may be found among us so far lost to every sense
of virtue and feeling for the distresses of this country as to
accept offices for the collection of the duty.
"Resolved, therefore, that in future we will consider such persons
as unworthy of our friendship; have no intercourse or dealings with
them; withdraw from them every assistance, and withhold all the
comforts of life which depend upon those duties that as men and
fellow citizens we owe to each other; and upon all occasions treat
them with that contempt they deserve; and that it be, and it is
hereby, most earnestly recommended to the people at large, to
follow the same line of conduct towards them."
If such an excommunication were to be meted out to an offending
neighbor, what measure would the excise man receive if he came from
abroad on his unwelcome errand?
These resolutions were signed by Mr. Gallatin as clerk, and made public
through the press. Resolutions of this character, if not criminal, reach
the utmost limit of indiscretion, and political indiscretion is quite as
dangerous as crime. The petition to Congress, subscribed by the
inhabitants of western Pennsylvania, was drawn by Gallatin; while
explicit in terms, it was moderate in tone. It represented the unequal
operation of the act. "A duty laid on the common drink of a nation,
instead of taxing the citizens in proportion to their property, falls as
heavy on the poorest class as on the rich;" and it ingeniously pointed
out that the distance of the inhabitants of the western counties from
market prevented their bringing the produce of their lands to sale,
either in grain or meal. "We are therefore distillers through necessity,
not choice; that we may comprehend the greatest value in the smallest
size and weight."
Hamilton, indignant, reported the proceedings to the President on
September 9, 1792, and demanded instant punishment. Washington, who was
at Mount Vernon, was unwilling to go to extremes, but consented to issue
a proclamation, which, drafted by Hamilton, and countersigned by
Jefferson, was published September 15, 1792. It earnestly admonished all
persons to desist from unlawful combinations to obstruct the operations
of the laws, and charged all courts, magistrates, and officers with
their enforcement. There was no mistaking Hamilton's intention to
enforce the law. Prosecutions in the Circuit Court, held at Yorktown in
October, were ordered against the Pittsburgh offenders, but no proof
could be had to sustain an indictment.
The President's proclamation startled the western people, and some
uneasiness was felt as to how such of their representatives as had taken
part in the Pittsburgh meeting would be received when they should go up
to the legislature in the winter. Bradford and Smilie accompanied
Gallatin; Smilie to take his seat in the state Senate, and Bradford to
represent Washington County in the House, where he "cut a poor figure."
Gallatin despised him, and characterized him as a "tenth-rate lawyer and
an empty drum." Gallatin found, however, that although the Pittsburgh
meeting had hurt the general interest of his party throughout the State,
and "rather defeated" the repeal of the excise law, his eastern friends
did not turn the cold shoulder to him. He said to every one whom he
knew that the resolutions were perhaps too violent and undoubtedly
highly impolitic, but, in his opinion, contained nothing illegal.
Meanwhile federal officers proceeded to enforce the law in Washington
County. A riot ensued, and the office was forcibly closed. Bills were
found against two of the offenders in the federal court, and warrants to
arrest and bring them to Philadelphia for trial were issued. Gallatin
believed the men innocent, and did not hesitate to advise Badollet to
keep them out of the way when the marshal should go to serve the writs,
but deprecated any insult to the officer. He thought "the precedent a
very dangerous one to drag people such a distance in order to be tried
on governmental prosecutions." Here the matter rested for a season.
At this session of the legislature Gallatin introduced a new system of
county taxation, proposed a clause providing for "trustees yearly
elected, one to each township, without whose consent no tax is to be
raised, nor any above one per cent. on the value of lands," which he
hoped would "tend to crush the aristocracy of every town in the State."
Also he proposed a plan to establish a school and library in each
county, with a sufficient immediate sum in money, and a yearly allowance
for a teacher in the English language.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: The drafting of this letter was, notwithstanding his
protest, intrusted to John Jay, one of the strongest of the Federal
leaders, and a warm supporter of the Constitution as it stood.]
CHAPTER III
UNITED STATES SENATE
The death of the grandfather of Mr. Gallatin, and soon after of his
aunt, strongly tempted him to make a journey to Geneva in the summer of
1793. The political condition of Europe at that time was of thrilling
interest. On January 21 the head of Louis XVI. fell under the
guillotine, to which Marie Antoinette soon followed him. The armies of
the coalition were closing in upon France. Of the political necessity
for these state executions there has always been and will always be
different judgments. That of Mr. Gallatin is of peculiar value. It is
found expressed in intimate frankness in a letter to his friend
Badollet, written at Philadelphia, February 1, 1794.
"France at present offers a spectacle unheard of at any other
period. Enthusiasm there produces an energy equally terrible and
sublime. All those virtues which depend upon social or family
affections, all those amiable weaknesses, which our natural
feelings teach us to love or respect, have disappeared before the
stronger, the only, at present, powerful passion, the _Amor
Patriae_. I must confess my soul is not enough steeled, not
sometimes to shrink at the dreadful executions which have restored
at least apparent internal tranquillity to that republic. Yet upon
the whole, as long as the combined despots press upon every
frontier, and employ every engine to destroy and distress the
interior parts, I think they, and they alone, are answerable for
every act of severity or injustice, for every excess, nay for every
crime, which either of the contending parties in France may have
committed."
Within a few years the publication of the correspondence of De Fersen,
the agent of the king and queen, has supplied the proof of the charge
that they were in secret correspondence with the allied sovereigns to
introduce foreign troops upon the soil of France,--a crime which no
people has ever condoned.
The French Revolution, which from its beginning in 1789 reacted upon the
United States with fully the force that the American Revolution exerted
upon France, had become an important factor in American politics. The
intemperance of Genet, the minister of the French Convention to the
United States on the one hand, and the breaches of neutrality by England
on the other, were dividing the American people into English and French
parties. The Federalists sympathized with the English, the late enemies,
and the Republicans with the French, the late allies, of the United
States.
Mr. Gallatin had about made up his mind to visit Europe, when an
unexpected political honor changed his plans. The Pennsylvania
legislature elected him a senator of the United States on joint ballot,
a distinction the more singular in that the legislature was Federalist
and Mr. Gallatin was a representative of a Republican district, and
strong in that faith. Moreover, he was not a candidate either of his own
motion or by that of his friends, but, on the contrary, had doubts as to
his eligibility because of insufficient residence. This objection, which
he himself stated in caucus, was disregarded, and on February 28, 1793,
by a vote of 45 to 37, he was chosen senator. Mr. Gallatin had just
completed his thirty-second year, and now a happy marriage came
opportunely to stimulate his ambition and smooth his path to other
honors.
Among the friends made at Philadelphia was Alexander J. Dallas, a
gentleman two years Gallatin's senior, whose career, in some respects,
resembled his own. He was born in Jamaica, of Scotch parents; had been
thoroughly educated at Edinburgh and Westminster, and, coming to the
United States in 1783, had settled in Philadelphia. He now held the post
of secretary of state for Pennsylvania. Mr. Gallatin's constant
committee service brought him into close relations with the secretary,