USA > New York > New York City > History of the city of New York : its origin, rise, and progress Vol. III > Part 15
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COLUMBIA COLLEGE.
Wharton, an Episcopal clergyman and author, became president of the institution for one year. He resigned in 1801, and the accomplished scholar and divine, Benjamin Moore, Episcopal Bishop of New York, was elected to the chair, which position he filled until 1811. The professors were all men of exceptional scholarship, and the influence of the insti- tution upon the literary character of the State was marked, many of the graduates attaining great distinction in professional and public life. Among the students when the century opened were John Anthon, Henry H. Schieffelin, and Gulian Crommelin Verplanck, representing respec- tively our lawyers, merchants, and men of letters.1 Others upon the roll included Philip Hamilton, Robert Benson, John J. De Peyster, Lewis M. Ogden, John Delafield, Edward P. Livingston, afterwards lieutenant- governor of the State (grandson of Philip, signer of the Declaration of Independence), John McComb, who married Livingston's sister, Clement C. Moore, afterwards professor of Hebrew and Greek literature, and Na- thaniel F. Moore, long identified with the college as professor, president, and trustee, blending rare learning with a loving appreciation of the Greek dramatists. He said " the college was much more to educate than to instruct ; to open the door for all knowledge, to strengthen the judg- ment, to purify the affection, to refine the taste, and to secure for the moral and intellectual powers the proper culture." David S. Jones and Gouverneur Ogden were in the class of 1796. John Ferguson, John Brod- head Romeyn, a distinguished clergyman, Pierre C. Van Wyck, recorder of the city, and Daniel D. Tompkins, judge, governor of the State, and vice-president of the United to eternal honor by rec- nor, the establishment of a York should forever cease, and in that of 1792, 1793, tively, Cornelius Brower, Brower, of a wealthy and who settled in New York miliar names of Gouvern- rence, William M. Price HONORE ET AMORE so prominently connected theatricals of New York, sor of moral and intellect- States, who entitled himself ommending, while gover- day when slavery in New were in the class of 1795 ; and 1798, were, respec- John Brower, and Jacob substantial Dutch family about 1635. And the fa- eur Kemble, John L. Law- and his brother Stephen, with the criminal law and Hamersley Arms. With the Durham quarterings. [From the monument of Sir Hugh Hamersley in London. } [See note, page 209.] and John Mc Vickar, profes- ual philosophy, belles lettres, and political economy, are found upon the lists of 1803 and 1804.
The professor of the Institutes of Medicine from 1792 to 1808 was Dr. William Hamersley, who had received his medical degree at Edinburgh,
1 Columbia College Centennial Address, by the Hon. John Jay, December 21, 1876.
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and who was a gentleman of varied learning and great elegance of man- ners. He was also professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine from 1795 to 1813. The professor of Botany from 1795 to 1811 was the cele- brated Dr. David Hosack. The professor of Anatomy from 1793 to 1813 was Dr. Wright Post. The professor of Surgery from 1793 to 1811 was Dr. Richard Bailey. Other members of the Medical Faculty were Dr. John R. B. Rodgers and Dr. Samuel Latham Mitchell. The dean, from 1792 to 1804, was Dr. Samuel Bard. The New York Hos- pital at this period afforded one of the best practical medical schools in the United States, and its governors embraced some of the leading men of the period.
When the returns of the electoral votes came in it was soon known that
the Republican ticket had triumphed, as had been generally ex- 1801. pected. But, what was anything but agreeable to the Republican party at large, Jefferson and Burr had both received the same number of votes. The decision therefore rested, according to the Constitution, upon the House of Representatives voting by States.
In December, before the equality of votes was precisely ascertained, the Federalists conceived the idea of disappointing Jefferson and the body of the Opposition, by giving the first office to Burr. Hamilton vigorously disapproved of such a course. He wrote to Wolcott on the 16th : "I trust New England will not so far lose its head as to fall into the snare. There is no doubt that, upon every prudent and virtuous cal- culation, Jefferson is to be preferred. He is by far not so dangerous a man, and he has pretensions to character. As to Burr, there is nothing in his favor. His private character is not defended by his most partial friends. He is bankrupt beyond redemption, except by the plunder of his country. His public principles have no other spring or aim than his own aggrandizement. If he can, he will certainly disturb our institutions to secure to himself permanent power and with it wealth." Hamilton wrote a similar letter to Morris on the 26th : " I trust the Federalists will not be so mad as to vote for Burr. If there be a man in the world I ought to hate, it is Jefferson. With Burr I have always been personally well. But the public good must be paramount to every private consider- ation."
Hamilton was confident Burr never could be won to Federal views, as some of the party fondly imagined. "He may break with the Repub- licans, but it will certainly not be to join the Federalists. He will never choose to lean on good men, because he knows they will never support his bad projects ; but instead of this, he will endeavor to disorganize both parties, and to form from them a third, composed of men best fitted for
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EDWARD LIVINGSTON.
tools." Subsequent events proved that Hamilton's judgment of Burr was correct; but being supposed influenced by professional jealousy, or prejudiced through political collisions with Burr, his warnings were little heeded. Gouverneur Morris had been elected in the spring of 1800 by the Legislature of New York to supply a vacancy in the Senate of the United States, but kept aloof as much as possible from the strife result- ing from the tie. He wrote to Hamilton soon after Congress assembled at Washington, saying: "Since it was evidently the intention of our fellow-citizens to make Mr. Jefferson their President, it seems proper to fulfill that intention." The crisis approached slowly. The whole country had become painfully alive to a threatened danger of great magnitude.
Meanwhile the Republicans of New York were planning to overcome the Federalists in the city government. The public mind was systemati- cally poisoned with charges against nearly every man in authority, and the zeal for change became fiery and unmanageable. The rival candi- dates for mayor were Richard Varick, who had filled the office for twelve years, and Edward Livingston, who was not a candidate for re-election to the Seventh Congress. The popularity of Edward Livingston, and his known competency to execute with precision all the duties pertaining to the mayoralty, together with his unconquerable energy, rendered his ap- pointment extremely probable. The mayor's office at that time is said to have been worth about ten thousand dollars per annum.
[The Engine-house shown in the cut is a fac-simile of the seal adopted by Joseph Horn- blower, the ancestor of the Hornblower family in this coun- house in the style in which accommodate the Newcomen gigantic affairs. Every engine commodation. The walking- side walls with one arm inside, of the engine, and the other pump. For the impression of engine-house, the author is in- Hon. Joseph P. Bradley, of the D. C.] try. It represents an engine- those structures were built to Engines - which were very had a house built for its ac- beam rested on one of the out- connected with the piston-rod outside, connected with the the seal, and description of the debted to the courtesy of the Supreme Court, Washington,
Steam-Engine House. [Erected at the Schuyler Mines on the Passaic in 1753.] [See pp. 426, 427, Vol. II.]
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CHAPTER XLII.
1801 -1804.
THE NEW POLITICAL ERA.
THE PRESIDENTIAL TIE. - JEFFERSON AND BURR. - THE NEW CABINET. - THE NEW YORK CONTEST FOR GOVERNOR. - DEFEAT OF THE FEDERALISTS. - THE LIVINGSTONS IN POWER. - THE MAYORALTY OF THE CITY. - DUEL OF PHILIP HAMILTON. - THE EVENING POST. - THE NEWSPAPER WAR. - DUELING. - COLEMAN AND CHEETHAM. - PRESIDENT JEFFERSON. -- THE GRANGE. - THEODOSIA BURR. - DINNER TO THE INDIAN CHIEF. - BURR'S INDEPENDENT PARTY. - DUEL OF DE WITT CLINTON AND SWARTWOUT. - CHANCELLOR LIVINGSTON SECURES LOUISIANA. - DE WITT CLINTON APPOINTED MAYOR. - BURR'S STRUGGLE FOR THE GOVERNORSHIP. - RESULTS OF THE STORMY ELECTION. - HAMILTON'S LIBEL SUIT. - BURR CHALLENGES HAMILTON. - DUEL OF BURR AND HAMILTON. - SORROWFUL SCENES. - DEATH OF HAMILTON. - BURR'S MOVEMENTS. - PUBLIC SENTIMENT. - TOMB OF HAMILTON.
H EAVY clouds hung over the new city of Washington on the morn- ing of the 11th of February, 1801, and before nine o'clock snow began to fall. The great day had at last arrived. The House of Repre- sentatives proceeded in a body to the Senate-Chamber, where Vice-Presi-
dent Jefferson, in view of both houses of Congress, opened the 1801. certificates of the electors of the different States. As the votes were read the tellers on the part of each house counted and took lists of them, which being compared and delivered to Jefferson, he announced the result as follows : for Thomas Jefferson seventy-three, for Aaron Burr seventy-three, for John Adams sixty-five, for Charles C. Pinckney sixty- four, for John Jay one. Jefferson then declared that the choice devolved upon the House.
There were sixteen States in the Union, and a majority of these States was necessary to an election. If results had depended upon a majority of the members, Burr would undoubtedly have been chosen on the first vote. As it was, thirty-five ballotings ended alike, showing eight States in favor of Jefferson, six for Burr, and two States, Vermont and Mary- land, equally divided. New York voted steadily for Jefferson.
Before proceeding to the great business of the day, the House resolved
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not to adjourn till a President had been chosen. One member, too ill to leave his bed, was borne on a litter to the Capitol; his wife attended him, and remaining at his side administered his medicines. The ballot-boxes were carried to his couch, so that he did not miss a single ballot. All that day, all through the night, and until noon of the day following, the balloting went on. Then the exhausted members evaded their resolution not to adjourn, by agreeing to take a recess. " Our opponents have begged for a dispensation from their own regulation," wrote John Randolph.
For seven days the country was kept in a ferment by the wild reports from the capital. The governor of Virginia established a line of express riders between Washington and Richmond during the whole of this event- ful week, that he might learn as speedily as possible the result of each ballot. On the 15th Jefferson wrote to his daughter: " After four days of balloting, they are exactly where they were on the first. There is strong expectation in some that they will coalesce to-morrow; but I have no foundation for it. I feel no impulse from personal ambition to the office now proposed to me, but on account of yourself and your sister and those dear to you."
On the thirty-sixth balloting Jefferson was found to have received the votes of ten States, while four adhered to Burr and two cast blank ballots. Jefferson was thereupon declared President, and Burr, by law, became Vice-President.
Late at night on the 3d of March the Sixth Congress terminated. Ex- President Adams had no heart to witness the inauguration of his succes- sor, but left the city of Washington early the next morning for his home in Massachusetts. A domestic affliction in the loss of his March 4. second son, Charles, came also at this moment to darken the shades of his retirement. The Republicans were jubilant, particularly in New York. Meetings were held in every city and village in the State, and proces- sions and orations were the order of the day. In Albany the Republican members of the Legislature and citizens met at a grand dinner, where one of the toasts was, " Aaron Burr, Vice-President of the United States. His uniform and patriotic exertions in favor of republicanism eclipsed only by his late disinterested conduct."
When Jefferson reached the Presidential chair the pecuniary prosperity of the country was greater than at any previous date. Pacific relations with France, and the prospect of peace throughout Europe, promised effectual and permanent relief from the embarrassments to which Ameri- can commerce was exposed. The treasury was fuller, and the revenue more abundant than ever before. The obnoxious Sedition Aet had ex- pired by its own limitation with the close of the Sixth Congress. Insti-
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tutions had been framed, taxes levied, and provision made for debts. Indeed, the whole machinery of the Federal government, as it now oper- ates, had been the work of the Federalists in their twelve years of supremacy. Thus the path of the chief executive of the nation seemed very smooth and easy to travel.
James Madison was appointed Secretary of State, Albert Gallatin Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Dearborn Secretary of War, and Levi Lincoln Attorney-General. The Navy Department was offered to Chan- cellor Livingston, who declined the appointment, and it was given to Robert Smith. Livingston, having reached the age of sixty, and being obliged, under a constitutional provision, to vacate the Chancellorship of New York, consented to accept the embassy to France to which he was nominated ; he was confirmed prior to the adjournment of the Senate. Not long after M. Pinchon, remembered as Secretary of the French lega- tion at The Hague, arrived at Washington as French chargé d'affaires.
In April the New York election for governor was spirited and ran- corous. Some one had said that the tenantry of Van Rensselaer, 1801. in arrears for rent (numbering thousands), were to be prosecuted for payment if they refused to vote for him. As soon as this report reached the ears of the high-minded patroon, he immediately denied it in all the papers printed in Albany and Van Rensselaer counties, assuring his tenants that he wished them to vote as in their judgment duty required, and that no man should be harmed who voted against him. He received two thousand and thirty-eight votes in the county of Albany, while Clinton received but seven hundred and fifty-five. The general result of the election, however, was in favor of the Republican party. George Clinton was chosen by more than four thousand majority.
In October a convention chosen to amend the constitution met at Albany and organized by unanimously electing Vice-President Burr its presiding officer. This convention was authorized to fix a limit to the number of members of the two houses of the Legislature, which was quickly accomplished, the number being reduced from forty-three to thirty-six, and to decide upon "the true construction of the twenty-third article of the constitution," in other words, to determine the power of the Council of Appointment. The convention was given no authority to alter the terms of that article, or to abolish it and create a new one in its place; but its maxim was to strip the governor of as much power as possible. It decided, against the letter of the constitution and the opinion of Governors Clinton and Jay, to reduce the governor to a mere fifth mem- ber of the council, with no greater power than that of any other member, except the right to preside. De Witt Clinton was a member of the
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THE LIVINGSTONS IN POWER.
Council of Appointment at the time of his uncle's accession, and before the decision of the convention, and in spite of the protests of the gov- ernor, he, in connection with Ambrose Spencer and a third Republican member, commenced a system of removals and appointments similar to those introduced into the politics of Pennsylvania by McKean.
This proscription was not confined to Federalists. A furious struggle had already commenced between the Clintons and Livingstons on the one hand, and Burr and his partisans on the other, which was carried on with the utmost bitterness. The known friends of Burr were ex- cluded from office as rigidly as the Federalists. Appointments in every instance were made from the Clinton and Livingston factions. Of the great State offices the Livingstons received the larger share. The Chan- cellorship was conferred upon John Lansing; Morgan Lewis, brother-in- law of Chancellor Livingston, succeeded Lansing as chief justice ; Judge Egbert Benson having been appointed, under what was styled the mid- night act of John Adams, a circuit judge of the United States (on the 3d of March, 1801), his place was filled by Brockholst Livingston; and Smith Thompson, whose wife was a Livingston, was also created an associate judge. Thus the bench of the Supreme Court of New York was mainly in the hands of the Livingstons. Dr. Thomas Tillotson, another brother-in-law of Chancellor Livingston, was made secretary of the State. And it will be remembered that General John Armstrong, still another brother-in-law of Chancellor Livingston, had been recently appointed United States Senator by the New York Legislature.
The appointment of Edward Livingston United States Attorney for the District of New York, in place of Richard Harrison, was one of the acts of President Jefferson immediately following the appointment of his brother, Chancellor Livingston, minister to France. In August of the same year Edward Livingston was also appointed mayor of the city of New York. The holding of two such offices, one under the national, the other from the State government, which would now be esteemed im- proper, excited no cavil then, and both appointments, which were for short terms at first, were renewed the following winter.
The mayoralty of New York was at this time a post of great dignity and importance. The mayor not only presided over the deliberations of the common council, but was the presiding judge of a high court of record with both civil and criminal jurisdiction. The emoluments were in the form of liberal fees and perquisites ; and a few years' incumbency was equivalent to a handsome fortune. Richard Varick had been the mayor for twelve years, and his removal by the new party in power created indignant dissatisfaction. A public dinner was tendered him by
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the Federalist lawyers, and twenty-five appreciative toasts, surcharged with political satire, contributed to the life of the occasion. His quali- fications for the office liad been universally conceded, and his gentlemanly culture and personal habits had made him a favorite among all classes-except, indeed, in the heat of po- litical strife, when, like all other candidates for office in that decade, he was abused and caricatured to an extraordinary degree.
Mayor Livingston found himself in a situation where all his energies were brought into active service. His du- ties were legion. Important capital trials occupied his attention at once, and his charges to juries are de- scribed by the newspapers Richard Varick. of the time as exception- ally impressive. He undertook a reformation of the rules and practice of the court in civil actions, and soon commenced the preparation of a volume of reports of such of his own and the recorder's decisions as he thought should be generally known at the bar. This was before any regular reporting of the judgments of either the city or State courts had been undertaken, and when but a single volume of reports - that of Coleman's Cases - had appeared.1 The office of attorney-general was honorable and profitable, and its functions were in the line of his profes- sion, but it required him, in addition to presiding over a court of justice and of a deliberative body, to appear as an advocate in all causes of im- portance in which the national government was interested in his district ; then in turn he must superintend the administration of municipal affairs of every character, from the regulation of finance to the assize of bread. In connection with all this he was required by the custom of the period to devote to the public and private entertainment of distinguished stran- gers a degree of attention which the growth of the city and of the world's travel subsequently rendered impossible.
1 Hunt's Life of Edward Livingston ; Judicial Opinions, delivered in the mayor's court of the city of New York in the year 1802.
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This last requisition was a pleasure rather than a duty to a man of his temperament. He was fond of society, genial, witty, charming in conversation, and attractive in manners. He is said never to have allowed an opportunity to pass for producing a pun, and if a good one did not come to his mind he made a poor one answer, laughing at it all the same. On the same month in which he retired from Congress he experi- enced a severe affliction in the loss of his accomplished wife, which partly accounts for his devotion to philanthropic projects while in the midst of his manifold occupations as mayor of the city. He resided at No. 1 Broadway. Many of the beautiful trees upon the common between his windows and the bay were planted during his administration and under his particular direction.
On the 4th of July George L. Eacker, a promising young member of the New York Bar, aged twenty-seven, delivered an oration in the city on the subject of American Independence. He was a partisan of Vice-President Burr, and while his talented effort was generally praised, there were those among the Federalists who denounced the whole performance. At the Park Theater one autumn evening Eacker occupied a box, accom- Nov. 20. panied by Miss Livingston and others. In an adjoining box was seated Philip Hamilton, eldest son of the financier, a youth of nineteen, in company with a young gentleman by the name of Price; and the two indulged in ironical remarks about Eacker's Fourth of July oration, which seemed to be intended for the ear of the young lady. Eacker looked round and saw them laughing, and believing himself the subject of ridi- cule stepped out in great agitation and asked if they meant to insult him, at the same time stigmatizing them as "rascals." They in turn insisted upon his particularizing the person he meant to distinguish as a " rascal." After some high words Eacker exclaimed, "Well, then, you are both rascals." The result was a laconic message from Price, before the play was finished, to name a time and place of meeting. Philip Hamilton hastened to find David S. Jones, who consulted John B. Church, the uncle of young Hamilton, and hero of the recent duel with Burr, and together they framed a message requiring an explanation, which was pre- sented to Eacker about half past eleven o'clock on the same evening. Eacker made no reply except to remark that when the affair with Price was over he would receive any communication from Hamilton. At noon on the 22d, which was Sunday, Eacker and Price, attended by their seconds, met at Weehawken and exchanged four shots, with- Nov. 22. out effect, after which they shook hands and separated. Before two o'clock on the same afternoon young Hamilton had learned the facts re- Nov. 23. specting the duel, and renewed his challenge to Eacker. The
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two met on Monday about three in the afternoon. Eacker's second was Thomas Apthorpe Cooper, the actor, and David S. Jones appeared in behalf of young Hamilton. Charles H. Winfield, the able historian of Hudson County, New Jersey, writes : " After the word had been given, a pause of a minute, perhaps more, ensued, before Mr. Eacker discharged his pistol. He had determined to wait for Hamilton's fire, and Hamilton, it is said, reserved his fire in obedience to the commands of his father. Eacker then leveled his pistol with more accuracy, and at the same instant Hamilton did the same. Eacker fired first, but almost simultaneously with Hamil- ton. The latter's fire, it is said, was unintentional, and in the air. The ball from Eacker's pistol entered Hamilton's right side, just above the hip, passed through his body, and lodged in his left arm. He was imme- diately taken over to the city, where he died the next morning at five o'clock." 1
Symptoms not at all in harmony with Jefferson's promise of political tranquillity and a united people began to be perceptible before he 1802. had been many months in office. Burr's irregular ambition was not satisfied with his imposing but hollow position as Vice-President. He foresaw obstacles to his becoming the next Republican President, in the dislike of Jefferson and the growing popularity of Madison, the Secretary of State, who was a man of immense family interest in Vir- ginia. In New York the Republican party was already divided into factions each jealous of the other. Thus he began a kind of political flirtation with the Federalists.
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