to its close.
Those who require further proof of the truth of this position beyond what results from a mere statement of the principles contended for by the respective parties, will find it fully sustained by definitions of Gouverneur Morris and James Madison. (2 Madison Papers, pp. 747–8, and 893.) Mr. Morris explained the distinction between a federal and a national supreme government—the former being a mere compact resting on the good faith of the parties, the latter having a complete and compulsive operation. Mr. Madison, in the debate on the propositions of Mr. Patterson, which constituted the plan of the Anti-Federalists, and which were rejected by a vote of seven States to three—one (Maryland) divided—said: "Much stress has been laid by some gentlemen on the want of power in the Convention to propose any other than a federal plan. … Neither of the characteristics of a federal plan would support this objection. One characteristic was that in a federal government the power was exercised, not on the people individually, but on the people collectively, on the States. The other characteristic was that a federal government derived its appointments, not immediately from the people, but from the States which they respectively composed."
It cannot be difficult to decide which of these parties was, in truth, federal, and which anti-federal, according to these authentic definitions of a federal government.[3]
Between these parties, thenceforth distinguished by the misnomers of Federalists and Anti-Federalists, there was, from the close of the war to the establishment of the present government, an uninterrupted succession of partisan conflicts, in which the whole country participated. They grew, for the most part, out of propositions to take from the State governments the rights of regulating commerce and of levying and collecting impost duties, and for the call of a Convention to revise the Articles of Confederation. The first two of these propositions were introduced by the Federalists, and for six years vigorously supported by their party, with Hamilton at its head; and, although advocated by Madison whilst he was in Congress, such was the strength of the Anti-Federal party in that body and in the States that they were not able to carry either. Advances were occasionally made in respect to imposts, but these were so restricted as to the officers by whom the duties should be collected, whether State or Federal, and in regard to the application of the money when collected, that the movers of the principal measure considered its value so much impaired that they declined to push it further under the existing circumstances.
A distrust of the motives of the Federal leaders, and an apprehension that they designed to employ the powers asked for in the establishment of a strong and absorbing general government, capable of becoming, and which the Anti-Federalists feared would, in the progress of time, become, disposed to practice a tyranny upon the people, as oppressive as that from which the Revolution had relieved them, with the suspicion already referred to, that many would not be willing to stop at that point, were doubtless the true causes of these otherwise unaccountable failures. The accounts which have been brought down to us of the proceedings of public bodies, and of appeals to the people, through different channels, abundantly sustain this assumption. These, in a work like this, can only be glanced at.
The grounds taken by the opponents of these measures, and which, backed by popular suspicions, made them so powerful, were that the views of the Federalists were rather political than financial—that they were at least as solicitous to gratify their well-understood passion for power, through the adoption of these propositions, as they were to maintain public credit. Beyond all doubt the belief that the government which the Federalists wished to create would, whatever it might be called, provide for the greatest practical extent of irresponsible power, led the Anti-Federalists not unfrequently to oppose measures which they would otherwise have supported.
General Hamilton's speech, most able as it was, went far to strengthen these impressions. The debate commenced on the 28th, and was continued to the 30th January, 1783, and was throughout one of great power. It resulted in the adoption, with slight amendments, of a proposition, submitted and vigorously supported by Mr. Madison, "That it is the opinion of Congress that the establishment of permanent and adequate funds to operate generally throughout the United States, is indispensably necessary for doing complete justice to the creditors of the United States, for restoring public credit, and for providing for the future exigencies of the war." Although this proposition finally passed without a dissenting vote, yet when an attempt was made to carry it into effect by an impost—the only way in which it was attempted—the measure was defeated, as has been before remarked, by restrictions in regard to the officers by whom it should be collected, and to the application of the money. In the course of his speech General Hamilton signified, as an additional reason why the impost ought to be collected by officers under the appointment of Congress, "that as the energy of the Federal Government was evidently short of the degree necessary for pervading and uniting the States, it was expedient to introduce the influence of officers deriving their emoluments from, and consequently interested in supporting the power of Congress."
Upon this Mr. Madison, in a note, observes: "This remark was imprudent and injudicious to the cause which it was meant to serve. This influence was the very source of jealousy which rendered the States averse to a revenue under the collection as well as appropriation of Congress. All the members of Congress who concurred in any degree with the States in this jealousy, smiled at the disclosure. Mr. Bland, and still more Mr. Lee, who were of this number, took notice in private conversation that Mr. Hamilton had let out the secret."[4]
It is scarcely possible, at this distant day, to appreciate the terror of irresponsible and arbitrary power which had been impressed upon the minds of men who had themselves suffered from its excesses, or had witnessed the cruelties it had inflicted on others, or whose fathers had been victims of its crimes. Even Mr. Jefferson, who differed from the Anti-Federalists in respect to these questions, as I shall hereafter have occasion to show, though he sympathized with them in their general feelings, in a letter to Mr. Madison in December, 1787, from Paris, upon the subject of the Constitution, did not hesitate to say, "I own I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive."[5]
Similar feelings were exhibited by Massachusetts in 1785. That leading State in the confederacy was, during the whole of this period, strongly imbued with the feelings of the misnamed Anti-Federal party. This was in no small degree owing to the talents, zeal, and activity displayed in their behalf by Samuel Adams and John Hancock, two of the three persons (John Adams having been the third), who were excepted by the British Government from the offer of pardon to its rebellious subjects. Hancock was a leading merchant and a zealous Revolutionary patriot, who had the honor of placing his name first to the Declaration of Independence, and the higher honor of sustaining the contest which it provoked to its close with inflexible firmness and at unusual risks, growing out of his large interests in commerce. Samuel Adams was equal to any man of his day in intelligence, integrity, and patriotism. He was among the very first who embraced the Revolution in the sense which it finally assumed—that of entire separation from the British Crown—and he supported the principles upon which it was founded, as well during the conflict as for the residue of his long life, with great ability and unsurpassed devotion. Whilst many of his associates, not less sincere than himself in resistance to the despotic acts of the mother country, could yet express their admiration of the English system and were consequently inclined to limit their efforts to a redress of temporary grievances, he at the earliest period avowed his hostility to kingly government, and rallied around himself the advocates for an entire separation, most of whom became with him early and prominent members of the Anti-Federal party.
The legislature of Massachusetts, momentarily diverted from the Anti-Federal track by influences which will be noticed in another place, adopted a resolution urging Congress to recommend a convention of the States "to revise the Confederation, and to report how far it may be necessary in their opinion to alter and enlarge the same, in order to secure and perpetuate the primary objects of the
