USA > Georgia > Miscellanies of Georgia, historical, biographical, descriptive, etc > Part 18
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THE YAZOO FRAUD.
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It was eminently an unprincipled and audacious thing, and nothing but that sort of triumphal palliation which success too often imparts to crime in this world could ever have prevented it from being regarded by everybody as also a mad and disgraceful thing.
The plan was to get up and carry through all the wind- ings and forms of high litigation a feigned case, so contrived as to draw out from the Supreme Court of the United States, if entertained there, a solemn, though volunteer, gratuitous pronouncement ex cathedra in favor of the claimants on all the points they deemed necessary or advantageous to their title. It was the celebrated case of Fletcher against Peck, reported at great length in the 6th volume of Cranch. No professional man acquainted with the story of the Yazoo Fraud can possibly read that case without seeing in it the unmistakable brands and marks of a feigned case, even though one of the Judges, Johnson, had not weakly called attention to the flagrant fact *- I say weakly, because he nevertheless, was not prevented by the fact, from entertain- ing the case and pronouncing an opinion thereon in favor of the Yazooists. To lawyers it would be neither necessary nor complimentary to enter here into the long and intricate de- tails of the case with its artistically concocted pleadings and laboriously constructed special verdict ; for they are to be
* Mr. Justice Johnson, in delivering his opinion, made the following remarks at the close : "I have been very unwilling to proceed to the decision of this case at all. It appears to-bear strong evidence upon the face of it of being a mere feigned case. It is our duty to decide on the rights but not on the specu- latien of parties. My confidence, however, in the respectable gentlemen,t who have been engaged for the parties, have induced me to abandon my scruples, in the belief that they would never consent to impose a mere feigned case upon this Court .- Cranch's Rep., 6th Vol., p. 147-S.
tAnd yet Robert Goodloe Harper was one of those gentlemen, whose name, as one of the large, original Yazoo partners, was in thousands of Congressional documents with which the country was then Hooded. Thirty years ago, in a book store in Washington. I picked up a bound second hand copy of one of them, which I now have, printed by order of Congress in 1809.
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THE YAZOO FRAUD.
supposed acquainted with them already. To the laity such a recital would certainly be alike irksome and unprofitable. Suffice it, then, to say that the Circuit Court of Massachu- setts in which the feigned suit was started, gratified fully the wishes of the claimants, deciding every point as they desired, and perfectly validating their title from beginning to end. Nevertheless, they carried the case up to the Supreme Court at Washington, in order that it might be there affirmed and clinched forever. And it was securely clinched by that tribunal. With the exception of poor Johnson, all the Court, from a regard to decency and appearances, made itself voluntarily blind to the staring fact that it was a feigned case, and consequently one which it was highly dis- creditable and criminal for the Court to entertain and decide at all. Moreover, the whole Court persistently shut its eyes to the grand, vital principles on which Washington had so decidedly combated and nullified the first Yazoo Sale, that of 1789, and on which he had equally come forth denouncing and ready, if need there should be, to combat and nullify likewise this second Yazoo Sale of 1795, when- ever it should put forth its head so as to be within reach of the National arm. Overlooking all these vast and weighty considerations, so important with the Father of his Country, the Court studiously narrowed its view to the points to which the Yazooists for their own purposes chose to solicit its attention. The result was a judgment delivered at the February term, 1810, going the full length for the title of the Yazoo claimants, pronouncing it just as good as if the Rescinding Act of Georgia had never been passed, invulner- able, indeed, by any act of the State either singly or in combination with the United States, and consequently better than the younger title the State had conveyed to the United States by the cession of April, 1802. In fine, it was a judgment which fully verified and reduced to an absolute certainty all the little credited vaticinations, the possibility of which turning out true had led the Commis- sioners to recommend the five million compromise as a
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thing for the interest of the United States and the interest and tranquility of the future settlers on the contested terri- tory.
And now Congress, seeing itself in vinculis, and very much at the mercy of the claimants in regard to all the Yazoo lands, upon well revolving the matter thought it best to come to terms with them, and finally, after a moody interval of some four years, passed the Act of 31st of March, 1814, appropriating the sum of five million of dollars to be raised by sales of the lands, to the perpetual quieting and extinguishment all the Yazoo Claims, which being agreed at once to be accepted by the claimants, there was an end at last of a matter which I have essayed to trace from its origin and through all its vicissitudes, and which with a better handling than I have been capable of giving it, would be found forming a chapter in the history of Georgia and of the United States interesting and important, as well as multi- farious, complicated and long.
FINIS.
ERRATA IN PART I. On page 34, 16 line from top, read post instead of past. On page 36, 5th line from bottom, read fury instead of fray
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PART III.
GENERAL JAMES JACKSON. GENERAL ANTHONY WAYNE.
CHAPTER 1.
GEN. JAMES JACKSON-GEN. ANTHONY WAYNE.
As when the laborious husbandman whose daily bread is sweetened by the sweat of his brow and by the holy sense of providing by his toil for his wife and children, has been all the week long, with measured stride and stalwart arms, swing- ing the scythed cradle here and there over his field wherever the nodding harvest looked ripest and most tempting; wearied atlength he pauses from his task at the near approach of the sacred day of rest, surveys his work, eyes gratefully his thick-standing sheaves, and taking note of what there still is for his industrious hands to do, beholds, well pleased, the rich, retiring nooks and deep, fertile hollows that yet await his blade :- so do I, having in an irregular, desultory man- ner, treated of the development, fortunes and affairs of Geor- gia during a considerable lapse of time next after the Revo- lutionary war, now looking back perceive in the period I have thus traversed not a few things which although interesting and well worthy of notice, have as yet remained untouched by my roving pen.
And first-of Gen. Jackson himself it is meet and would be both grateful and rewarding that something further should be said and told, even though it carry us back be- yond the Revolutionary era. For it is attended alike with pleasure and profit to follow and observe such a man from his early beginnings and through all his vicissitudes. What we have already had occasion to see and know about him naturally excites curiosity to know more, and we would
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GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
fain get a full view of one so marked and superior, so much above the world's ordinary standard and requirements, so much a pride and honor to our common nature ;- one whom such a judgeas Thos. Spalding, himself assuredly a most noble man and who enjoyed the amplest opportunities, in his long and honorable life, of knowing meu of distinction in Eu- rope and America, advisedly pronounced, forty odd years after his death, "the noblest man with whom it had been his lot to be acquainted."*
He landed on our shores from his native England in 1772: a lone lad of fifteen years. Of virtuous and respectable pa- rentage, breeding and connexions, we cannot but suppose that he had at that immature age already strongly evinced safe and superior qualities of mind and character and given evidences of high future promise ;- otherwise his father would hardly have consented, nor would such a man as Mr. Wereat, a name of great note and respect in our Colonial and Revolutionary annals and at one time Acting Governor of the State, have advised him to consent to his son's com- ing to America under his Mr. Wereat's, auspices, to make his own way and build up his fortunes in this remote and then wild part of the earth. We are told that his father
* Bench and Bar of Georgia-vol 2, page 102. Title, John Houston. See there a letter from Mr. Spalding to Maj. Miller, of the 19th October, 1850, from which the following is an extract :
"It gives me pleasure to state that Gen. Jame. Jackson, the noblest man with whom it has been my lot to be acquainted, when I called upon him as Governor to give me a letter to Mr. King, our then Minister in London, kept me to dine with him; and asked me what were Mr. Gibbons' receipts from his profession." I replied, "Three thousand pounds per annu' .... " "My own were about that amount when I unwisely left my profession to: politics. Mr. Gib- bons, as a whole, was the greatest lawyer in Georgia." Let me say to you that Gen. Jackson and Mr. Gibbons had exchanged three shots at each other. They were considered the bitterest enemies by the public. A high-minded man knows no enmity."
I had intended to add here a few words of my own about Mr. Spalding, whom I knew, revered and held in the highest honor. But on turning to the notice of him in White's Historical Sketches of Georgia, I prefer it to any thing I can write. It will be found in full as a note at the end of this chapter.
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was a strenous lover of freedom and free Government and of the rights of the people as against arbitrary power,-and particularly that he was a warm sympathiser with the Colo- nies in their as yet bloodless quarrel with the mother coun- try for their rights and liberties. These principles and sen- timents young Jackson had deeply imbibed before quitting the paternal roof and indeed they largely influenced his em- igration and casting his lot here. Accordingly, it was not long after reaching his new home in Georgia, before they shone out in his warm participation in the feelings and pro- ceedings which were even then beginning to herald the ap- proaching Revolution.
The very pursuit to which his father and Mr. Wereat had destined him in Georgia is proof of their high . opinion of his capacity and endowments. For although so young, he was, upon his arrival in Savannah, at once put to the study of law in the office of Samuel Farley, Esq., applying him- self at the same time to such other studies as were necessary to the completion of his general education. With what en- thusiasm, industry and success he applied himself, some idea may be formed from the fact handed down from his own lips by Mr. Spalding, that after the Revolutionary war and before embarking in politics, he practiced law so prosperously that his professional earnings at their acme reached to the sum of £3,000 per annum-a prodigious amount when we consider the small population and the still smaller wealth, commerce and resources of Georgia in those times.
Before, however, finishing his studies and coming to the Bar, and whilst yet a mere stripling, he, like that other glorious young genius of the day-spring of the Revolution, Alexander Hamilton, betwixt whom and himself there are not wanting strong points of resemblance, obeyed the im- pulse of courage, ambition, patriotism and a passionate love of liberty and hastened to exchange his books and seclusion for arms and the din of war.
It comports not with my plan to enter into the minute
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GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
details of the young soldier's Revolutionary career, and indeed nothing could be more unnecessary. For are they not to be found written in every book of the chronicles of Georgia ?- where, among the many things in relation to him, it is recorded that his first feat of arms (a very daring and purely volunteer affair of himself and a little band of other patriots, resulting in their burning several of the enemy's armed vessels which had grounded in proceeding up the river against the city) won for him much applause and a lieuten- ancy. Soon a captaincy rewarded his rapidly developing martial merits. And so he continued to rise, never failing to justify his promotions by his performances-until at length we see him before the end of the war by Gen. Green's appointment and the confirmation of Congress, the commander, in his 24th year, of a mixed Legion of cavalry and infantry. On every occasion and in every position throughout the long, harsh struggle, he added to his steadily growing reputation. Victory brought him laurels which, so fine was ever his conduct, no adversities or reverses that befel him could take away or dim. For alike in distress and in good fortune he exhibited fertile and brilliant capacity, an unflinching devotion to duty, indefatigable activity and a heroism not to be cowed by wounds, perils, fatigues ; nor by hunger, thirst and nakedness, nor all the other nameless discouragements and sufferings of ill-provided war and cam- paigning in the woods and swamps of lower Georgia and Carolina against an enemy entrenched and under cover in Augusta, Savannah and Charleston, and continually sally- ing out from these strongholds as assailants, pursuers, ma- rauders, devastators-and then rushing back again to their shelter when routed or endangered or wearied out or sated with spoliation. Such an impression did his extraordinary merits and services in the closing scenes of the war in Geor- gia make on his General, that renowned soldier and com- mander, Anthony Wayne, that on the occasion of the final surrender of Savannah by the British to our arms in July, 1782, he honored him by ordering that the formal surrender
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GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
should be made into his hands. And accordingly it was so done by the keys of the city being delivered up to him by the evacuating British commander in presence of both armies.
One of those remarkable incidents which, by reason of he- falling men of celebrity, often become canonized in history, is related to have occurred during the gloomiest period of the Revolution to him and his young friend, John Milledge, the same who afterwards became a Representative and then a Senator in Congress, and Governor also of the State-in honor of whom likewise Milledgeville was named, destined as the permanent capital of the State-a destiny, however, not permitted to stand, but to the mortal shame of Georgia set aside now by her submission thus far to an ephemeral satrap's wanton, dishonoring edict. During the utter pros- tration of our cause in lower Georgia, consequent on the fall of Savannah, in 1778, these undaunted youthful patriots repaired together to South Carolina to seek service. Whilst on their way to join Gen. Moultrie's standard "barefoot and in rags, these sons of liberty," we are told, "were appre- hended as spies by some American soldiers and condemned to be hung. The gallows was actually prepared, and but for the timely arrival of Maj. Devaux, who accidentally heard of the transaction, the two young patriots would have been executed."* Behold here in our own annals an authentic fact which taken in connection with the subsequent eminence and illustriousness of both the men, surpasses any thing in history, nay, even excels that famous antique fiction of Belisarius, old and blind, begging a penny, t victim of Justinian's imperial ingratitude and cruelty after a life- time of the hardships and dangers of war in his service, and an hundred victories won for him and declining Rome.
The long revolutionary struggle being at last ended and the occupation of arms at an end with it, -- peace found Col. Jackson standing amidst the ruins of the recent war like
* White's Statistics of Georgia, page 337. National Portrait Gallery. Title James Jackson.
t "Da Belisario obolum."
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GENERALS JACLSON AND WAYNE.
thousands of his brother officers and soldiers in utter pov- erty-houseless, penniless, without means or employment- with no resources but such as existed in his own mind and character, and in the boundless love and admiration of his fellow-citizens, a love and admiration heightened by a sense of gratitude for his services-all which was well attested by legislative resolutions of thanks and honor, and the gift to him by the State of a house and home in the city of Savannah.
But by nothing could he be paralysed or rendered a cypher. It was a necessity of his nature and character that he should cherish and pursue high aims under all circum- stances, adverse or prosperous, of peace or of war. He went instantly to work in the ardnous, aspiring profession to which he had been early dedicated. As we have already seen, he had stored and trained his mind by juridical and miscellaneous studies before the Revolution, and during it not in arms alone was he developed and exercis- ed. Led by duty and martial ardor t) harrangue his com- mands on many a trying occasion, he found out and culti- vated that rare talent of ready, effective, stirring eloquence with which nature, study, self-discipline and practice com- bined gradually to endow him in a distinguished manner. This bright, crowning talent coming in aid of his general mass of ability and knowledge, and of his great energy, uprightness, industry and enthusiasm, he rose rapidly at the Bar and won the triumphant success there to which allusion has been made. So striking was his success and such the impression he made of possessing qualifications equal to any, the highest, spheres of public service, that his fellow-citizens soon looked forward with pride to his future career and foresaw the honors of the patriot statesman clus- tering on his brow along with those, already won, of the forum and the field. It was at this stage, in 1788, that the office of Governor was tendered him, but which his modesty declined, on the ground of the want of age and political expe- rience. For though his ambition was high and mettlesome,
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yet it was far from being prurient and self-blinding, and did not lead him to think that what service he had seen in our Legislature, and which was all the political apprentice- ship he had then had, was sufficient to fit one so young for the chief magistracy of the State.
There was, however, another great and interesting politi- cal theatre just opening at that time, better suited to his years, his genins, and his training and for which he felt a predilection that may have had some subtle influence, for aught we know, in disinclining him to the Governorship. For the new Federal Constitution had been now adopted, and in apportioning the representation of the States in Congress, there had been given to Georgia three members in the Lower House, and the Legislature at its first meeting afterwards had divided the State into three Congressional Districts for the election of those members. Gen. Jackson became a can- didate and a successful one in the First or Eastern District, composed of the counties of Chatham, Liberty, Effingham, Glyon and Camden. In the Second or Middle District, Abraham Baldwin was chosen, and in the Third or Western, George Mathews. All over the United States, likewise, the people rallied in their respective States to make choice of their Representatives in this their First Congress under the new Federal system, and the Legislatures of the several States proceeded also to elect their first National Senators. Mowly and not without a seeming of backwardness and dif- fidence did the great historic body get together and go about its mighty task of building up from the very bottom, on a plan prefixed and wholly novel, a vast and complex Republican Empire. On the appointed day of meeting, the 4th of March, 1789, only eight Senators and thirteen Representa- tives were in attendance. Gradually other members came, but so scatteringly that it was as late as the first of April before a quorum appeared in the Lower House, and five days later still before there was one in the Senate, nor was it until the 30th of the month that Washington was installed and the new Government ready to go to work.
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GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
In the illustrious assemblage of tried, picked men with whom Gen. Jackson now saw himself associated in the National service, there was not a younger politician to be found than himself. So he himself tells us in one of his speeches. * And yet those who will follow him, as I have done, through the volumes containing the debates of that memorable, three-sessioned Congress, will perceive that he carried with him into that body not only the exalted manly fervor and public-spirit appropriate to his age, temperament and patriotic character, but also such thorough and various preparation of mind and knowledge, such accurate acquain- tance with the subjects that had to be discussed, and such sense, talent and readiness in discussing them, in fine, such a judicious activity and such sound, enlightened views, as would have done honor to gray hairs and veteran statesman- ship and soon secured to him rank and consideration among his fellow members. Keeping attention closely upon him throughout this, his two-years' Congressional novitiate, we at times cannot help feeling wonder, as in the very parallel case of Alexander Hamilton, that under all the actual circumstances of his whole preceding life he should have been able to make himself what he was in mental culture and discipline, and to have amassed such intellectual stores, especially of the political kind, as he showed himself to possess. Nothing but a very superior constitution of mind and nature combined with high ambition and indefatigable energy, industry and application can explain the rare and interesting phenomenon.
But whilst he was thus devoting himself to his country's service and acquiring a proud name in Congress, intelli- gence reached him there towards the end of his term, of an event at home for which he was unprepared and which was well calculated to sting him to the quick and rouse all the lion in his nature. The 3d of January, 1791, was the time of the election for the next Representative term. Though
* Gales' Debates of the First Congress, vol. 1, pige 1,266. Benton's Abr. Debates, vol. 1, page 216.
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GENERALS JACKSON AND WAYNE.
standing again as a candidate, yet with a noble conscien- tiousness and full of trust in his strength with the people, he stirred not from his distant post of duty, but faithfully remained there-leaving his election to the care of his con- stituents. That care happened not to be adequate to the needs of the case. It did not prevent frauds and lawless irregularities, the result of which was that he was superseded, and Gen. Anthony Wayne, now become a citizen of Georgia, the famed hero of Stony Point, the recoverer of Savannah and Lower Georgia from the British, the winner also of countless laurels at Brandywine, Germantown, Monmouth, and on other hard fought fields of the Revolution, was re- turned in his stead.
Perfectly characteristic was Gen. Jackson's dealing with the criminalities of this election, and particularly with the two most conspicuous criminals. His investigations, his denunciations and his vengeance were prompt and severe. The most outrageous villainy was that enacted in Camden county by Osborne, Judge of the Superior Court, who, after the close of the regular election in the day-time, not satis- fied with the result, got possession of the legal returns and substituted therefor during the night the forged returns of a sham election. Short breathing time had he to exult over the success of this foul perpetration. The very next Legis- lature saw him arraigned for the crime, impeached by the House of Representatives, dragged before the Senate, tried, convicted and expelled from office,-the only precedent of the kind in any case higher than that of a Land Lottery Commissioner that has ever occurred in the State. The other worst iniquity was practiced in Effingham county. It consisted of illegal management of the election and some illegal voting besides, under the inimical counsel and influ- ence of Thomas Gibbons, a man of very strong, determined character and great courage and ability, and much noted throughout a long and prosperous after-life, though uever engaged in any but private and professional pursuits. He quitted Savannah, where he lived, and repaired to Effing-
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ham for the purpose of working there in the election against Gen. Jackson. It was the terrible denunciations which the part he thus acted brought down upon him from Gen. Jack- son in his speech before the House of Representatives contest- ing the election, that, doubtless, led to the duel and 'the three shots' between them of which Mr. Spalding makes mention .*
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