divested of a partisan character. He supported, ably and perseveringly, many, if not most of the propositions for the adoption of which the Federal party was particularly solicitous, whilst representing one of the most decided Anti-Federal States in the Confederacy, without losing the confidence of his constituents, or even hazarding its loss. He was, throughout, in favor of giving to the federal head an independent right to levy and collect its necessary revenue and to regulate commerce, and was from the beginning in favor of a convention to revise the Constitution. In that body he was one of the majority in favor of the course I have described, and which resulted in the present Constitution. His successful and brilliant efforts in favor of the new system of government placed him at the head of its friends; but there was no time when Mr. Madison can, with truth and fairness, be said to have belonged to the Federal party; he all the time represented a State which took the lead in opposition to that school, his political affinities and associations were in general adverse to that organization, and, as I have said, he never forfeited the good opinion of his State. She seems always to have confided in his sincerity and in the integrity of his motives, and to have been willing to allow him to follow the dictates of his own judgment in regard to particular measures.
The most auspicious prospects beamed upon the opening administration of the new government, and it is fair to presume that the anticipations thus inspired would have been triumphantly realized if those who had been selected to conduct it, and their successors for the ensuing twelve years, had accepted the Constitution in the sense in which it was known to have been understood by those who framed it, and by the people when they adopted it. A course thus right in itself, and thus acquiescent in the popular will by men, some of whom had been long suspected by many of their Revolutionary associates of not holding that will in very high respect, would not have failed to conciliate large portions of the Anti-Federal party. Their dread of the exercise of unauthorized power by a general government, of which the responsibility was, in their estimation, too remote to be safely trusted, and their apprehensions for the safety of State institutions, always an object of their greatest solicitude, might have been allayed, if not substantially subdued. These valuable objects accomplished, the great improvements in the condition as well of public as of individual affairs, unavoidably flowing from the reasonably harmonious action of a government which the Federal party had done so much to establish, and the crowning fact that these gratifying results were brought about in the name, and with the active coöperation of Washington, the object of universal respect and affection, would have secured to that party through the long lapse of time that has since intervened, at least as large a share in the control of the government as has been possessed by a party which became its successful rival, but which can scarcely be said to have then existed.
But the Federal party rashly turned its back upon the only course by which these advantages might have been secured, and in doing so, showed itself regardless of considerations which would not have escaped the attention of more discreet, if not wiser bodies. Its influential and leading men forgot that the administration did not, in point of fact, represent the political opinions in respect to the proper uses and spirit of governments in general of a majority of the people; that their party had acquired power solely by its wise course in regard to a single, though doubtless most important measure; and that even in respect to that large portions of the people felt, as expressed by John Quincy Adams, "that the Constitution itself had been extorted from the grinding necessity of a reluctant nation." The Federal party took its course also in momentary forgetfulness of the characters of those whose opinions it was about to violate, whose feelings were to be offended, and whose resentments it must incur. It overlooked what it had the fullest reason to know, that those whom it was about to drive into opposition were men, and the descendants of men, who had from the beginning, and at all times, and under all circumstances, been enthusiasts in devotion to liberty, and stern and uncompromising in demanding stringent restrictions upon delegated authority—as inflexible in their opinions, and as incapable of being driven from their support by the hand of power, or seduced by corruption, as human nature could be made in the schools of fiery trial in which they had been trained. The Federalists in power, or rather he who, through the great confidence of his chief, wielded that power, did nothing, if we except the personal efforts of Washington in favor of conciliation, absolutely nothing to soothe the feelings of their defeated opponents, or to allay their apprehensions, but much to exacerbate the former and to confirm the latter.
The justice of these allegations is fully proved by the acts of the public men of that day. From the official position of the first President, and the part he consequently took in the management of public affairs, a faithful survey of these cannot be made without embracing him in the review. This is treading upon privileged ground. No American, no good man, can approach it without feeling that it is such, or without being embarrassed by the apprehension that, however pure his intention, he may undesignedly outrage the sentiments of admiration and reverence by which it is naturally and properly intrenched. General Washington retired gracefully from his military command, with more true glory than ever fell to the lot of man. There have, doubtless, at times, appeared military leaders of more professional genius and science, but never one better adapted to the high duties to which he was called; never one of whom it could with more truth be said, to use a modern and comprehensive expression, that he was "the right man in the right place." Certainly without his seeking it, and doubtless against his wishes, he was transferred to the civil service of his country by his election to the office of President under the new Constitution. The administration, of which he thus became the constitutional head, adopted certain measures, proposed others, and set up claims to power under that instrument, of which many of his countrymen and personal friends could not approve, and which they felt themselves obliged to oppose; these, in the progress of time and events, became organized as a political party by which those objectionable measures and claims of power were perseveringly resisted, but without any diminution of respect for his character, position, and feelings. They overthrew the administration of his successor, which claimed to act upon his principles, succeeded to the control of the Federal Government, and have kept it ever since, with rare and limited exceptions, attributable to special causes.
There is, notwithstanding, in this great country, no hamlet, town, city, or place in which American citizens congregate, where the name of Washington is ever pronounced without the profoundest reverence, or in which there does not prevail an undying sense of gratitude for his public services. The history of the world will be searched in vain for a tribute of love and gratitude at all comparable to that which the people of the United States have rendered to him who was the commander of their armies in the war of the Revolution, and their first republican chief magistrate—a tribute, in paying which the only contest between political parties is as to which shall manifest the most zeal, and which shall attain the highest success.
Was ever before so great and so gratifying reward bestowed, including in its wide extent the noble, exalted, and well-won title of Pater Patriæ! This, the highest honor that man can receive on earth, was not, as of old, a title given to an adored chief by victorious soldiers who, however renowned for their valor, were always open to the influence of personal and temporary feelings; nor was it obtained through the instrumentality of a venal senate; neither did it originate in state-craft or priest-craft, which have in every age paid homage to the great men of the world for selfish and sinister purposes. The high honors paid to Washington proceeded from no such sources, nor were they exposed to the suspicions from which such bestowments are rarely free. They sprang from the disinterested and deliberate judgment of an intelligent, virtuous, and free people, who felt that he had, in his military capacity alone, done incomparably more than any other man for the establishment of their Independence, and that in all his civil service he had been actuated by the same upright motives which had governed his whole previous career, and that in that sphere also, as in every act of his life, he had placed the performance of public duties and the advancement of public interests before all other earthly considerations. Although many of them had differed from him in respect to some measures which had received his sanction, they were not on that account the less satisfied that he had, in the exercise of a rightful discretion, been influenced only by an earnest desire to promote the welfare of his country. So regarding his whole career, they with one accord gave him the highest place on the roll of fame and the first in their hearts.
This
