USA > New York > Westchester County > Westchester county in history; manual and civil list, past and present. County history: towns, hamlets, villages and cities, Volume II > Part 6
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It must not be understood that these measures presented by Hamilton were adopted without serious discussion, though finally enacted as laws, forming a comprehensive system of public policy. This, at times, bitter discussion in debates created a feeling that finally resulted in the formation of two well-defined and compact political parties.
During President Washington's administration the leadership of the opposition to Hamilton and his measures was bestowed on Thomas Jefferson, also a member of Washington's cabinet, as Secretary of State, about the latter part of the year 1791. This opposition to the Hamilton policy was based chiefly upon the theory that Congress did not have power under the Con- stitution to enact the measures which Hamilton recommended. The government of the United States possesses only those specific powers which are enumerated in the Constitution. When it is first proposed that the government shall exercise a particular power, the question is always raised as to whether or not the provisions of the Constitution will permit.
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As it was when Secretary Hamilton recommended the estab- lishment of a national bank, his opponents contended that the power to enact such a law was not granted by the Constitution. Hamilton and his friends met this argument by asserting that in addition to the powers expressly enumerated in the Consti- tution, the government has certain implied powers; as example, they cited the provision of the Constitution which gives to Congress authority to make all laws necessary and proper for carrying into effect the powers delegated to the general gov- ernment, which is sometimes called the elastic clause of the Constitution.
Ever since the adoption of the Constitution, Congress has had power to levy direct taxes if it pleases, subject only to the restrictions that they be apportioned among the several States according to population. As a matter of public policy, how- ever, Congress has never exercised this power. The effect of popular sentiment upon the taxing powers of Congress is stated with exceptional force by United States Supreme Court Justice Harlan in his recent dissenting opinion in the income-tax case. He says: " Any attempt on the part of Congress to apportion among the States, upon the basis simply of their population, taxation of personal property or of incomes, would tend to arouse such indignation among the freemen of America that it would never be repeated." In other words, the taxing power of Congress has to be exercised in accordance with the sentiment of the American people.
Congress recently, in 1908, levied an excise tax upon the net income of all corporations doing business in the United States.
In the time of the Civil War, and during the Spanish-Ameri can War, Congress enacted what was termed a stamp-tax, tc raise money to defray current expenses of the Government revenues received from other sources proving inadequate.
Contests in early Congresses over what was termed Constitu tional questions were always spirited, and sometimes, probably, very bitter.
Representatives of the Nation in those days were patriotic, above desire for personal gain or advantage, seeking first the welfare of their country, for which many of them had made personal sacrifices; they were able, strong, sincere.
Thomas Jefferson, in leading the forces opposing that remark- able young leader Alexander Hamilton, was aided by Randolph Attorney-General in Washington's Cabinet, and James Madison
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who later, like Jefferson, became a President of the United States. Hamilton would, more than probably, have reached that high office had it not been for his untimely death at the hands of one who dared to question his bravery.
The discussions between Hamilton and his allies on one side and Jefferson and Madison and their supporters on the other, are said to have been the most brilliant ever heard in the Nation's legislative bodies.
It was not long before the people began ranging themselves on one side or on the other, and a result was the formation of two political parties, representing two theories as to proper construction of the Constitution. One of these parties, of which Hamilton was the leading representative, favored what has been termed a " loose " construction of the Constitution, giving the government extensive implied powers. This was called the Federalist party. The followers of the other party contended for a " strict " construction of the Constitution, allowing the general government to exercise only the powers which had been granted to it in specific terms. Jefferson was the acknowledged leader of this latter party, which was first called the Anti-Fed- eralist party, and then, within a few years, the Republican- Democratic party.
Since then the citizens of the United States have been divided principally into two parties along practically the same lines, although the names of the parties have changed from time to time. The Federalist party retained that name until 1828, when, until 1832, it was known as the National Republican party. In the latter year the name was changed to the Whig party, which declared for Protection of Home Industry, National Internal Improvements, etc. The Whig party name continued until 1854, when it, or a part of it, adopted the name of Repub- lican party, the designation it bears to-day. In 1856, at a convention held in Pittsburg, Pa., the name Republican was generally adopted by this party. The party of Thomas Jeffer- son held on to the name Republican-Democratic until 1828, when the name Democratic was adopted, and is the name by which the party is known at present.
In 1843 there sprung up what was known as the " American " party, familiarly characterized as the " Know-Nothing " party. It had its origin in New York city and spread to other large cities. The party first assumed the shape of a secret order, hostile in profession to foreign domination, and in effect to the
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naturalization of immigrants until after a residence in this country twenty-one years, the time a native born has to serve before he reaches his majority and becomes eligible to vote. This party was at first confined to the larger cities, but in the early fifties its influence had extended and achieved temporary triumphs in many southern and eastern states. Many who had been prominent as leaders in the Whig party had gone into the American party. In 1855 the American party came within a few votes of carrying New York State and controlling the State Legislature. In 1856 this party nominated as its candi- date for President of the United States, Millard Fillmore, of this State, who had been Vice-President elected on the Whig ticket, and who had served as President, filling the vacancy caused by the death of President Taylor. In this latter election the American party made such a poor showing, carrying only one State, Maryland, that it went gradually down, dwindling until its members had been fully absorbed into one or the other of the great rival parties.
During the present year (1911) a Republican statesman of national fame, on being asked his views as to the possibilities of the formation of a new political party, such as the so-called " New Nationalists," growing out of the present dissensions in the older party ranks, replied, " I have little faith or belief in these announcements of the birth of new political parties through man-made agencies. New parties grow and develop because they are started from the seed of an issue. Issues make political parties, not men. It is no more possible for one man to plan and create a party than it is to bridge the Atlantic. No, not for one man nor ten men, nor ten thousand men, to form a new party. These new parties come and they go. They spring up in the night and are chased away by a sunrise. Many of them have been seen to come and go within the last fifty years."
" In 1864 there was an attempt by some of the strongest men in the Republican party to form a newer party right in the furnace heat of the Rebellion. They met at Cleveland, Ohio. They had conferences and they even went so far as to nominate for President John C. Fremont, who had been the Republican party candidate for President in 1856; but this new party did not even live until election day."
" Then came the Liberal Republican movement of 1872. That was the year I came to Congress. That movement failed of
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fruition, although it took no less personages than David Davis and Gov. Trumbull of Illinois and Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks out of the Republican party and they made Greeley their nominee." " The defeat of Greeley was the death knell of the Liberal Republican party."
" The same year another political party, calling itself the Greenback party, came into existence, and tried to nominate the most esteemed philanthropist Peter Cooper for the Presi- dency."
" The Greenbackers came to the front again in 1876 and figured in a small way in the campaign of 1880. Then we had the Populist movement, that lived and died and went the way of the others.
" No, there won't be a new party until there is a new issue, and there is not a new issue to-day. Of course, the Prohibi- tionists, we always have them with us. They will hardly reach the proportions of a new party. They have been trying too long for the distance they have gotten thus far."
CHOOSING A PRESIDENT.
The question as to " who shall be chosen the first President " of the new Republic, was one of the many difficult problems that confronted the early day patriots, the young nation's best friends, and proved to be a matter of serious concern. As natural to be supposed, there were many willing to serve the public in the capacity of President, and in this respect human nature was in that former period very much as it is to-day, Many call, but few are wanted.
General Washington was the first choice by unanimous con- sent. He had, however, on resigning his commission at the close of the war, announced his intention of retiring from public business, and had been with difficulty induced to act as a member of the Constitutional Convention. To abandon his retirement for the labors of the office of President was even more repugnant to his wishes.
Benjamin Franklin, who had served his country most loyally at home and in positions of great responsibility abroad, was considered, but the advanced age of Franklin rendered it inex- pedient that he should be a candidate for the Presidency, nor is it possible that he would have permitted himself to be pro- posed. John Adams, of Massachusetts, was a willing candi- date, and in fact was the only apparent candidate against
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Washington or any one else in the field; his persistency gained for him election as first Vice-President.
The more the question was considered, stronger appeared the necessity of electing Gen. Washington. He was believed to be the only person who would be likely to unite all suffrages. The demand for Washington was so strong that even he himself could not overcome it in any other way than by compliance with the wishes of the people. His repugnance was such that it became necessary that he should be strongly urged to allow his being proposed as a candidate for the Presidency. Prominent men, whose standing entitled them to serious consideration, wrote strong letters pressing him to undertake this important office. Gen. Washington, convinced. by these arguments, no longer attempted to shun the responsibilities involved, and his name was proposed to the electoral college.
His election followed unanimously. His Cabinet was com- posed of the heads of four departments, Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of War, and an Attorney- General. Two members of the Cabinet, Thomas Jefferson, Sec- retary of State, and Edmund Randolph, Attorney-General, were, like the President, from Virginia, Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, was from New York, and Henry Knox, Secretary of War (army and navy), was from Massa- chusetts.
At the commencement of President Washington's first term there was no semblance of a political party, but, as the per- formance of public business progressed in Congress, opinions differed and men began to take sides on questions occurring. On the subjects of credit, of finance, of an excise, and of a National Bank, the Cabinet of President Washington was divided. Jefferson, who held for a strict interpretation of the Constitution, appeared as the opponent of many of the measures of Hamilton, who favored a liberal construction of the Consti- tution. A gradual estrangement, and, finally, a cessation of friendly intercourse between them, had thus arisen (though later Hamilton did Jefferson a great service when opportunity afforded). President Washington had applied himself assidu- ously to heal the breach, but unsuccessfully. The President reposed perfect reliance in the integrity and honesty of purpose of both ; and while maintaining most cordial relations, he appears to have determined to commit himself in no shape with a party which might be formed to sustain the opinions of either. The
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end of his first term of office was about to expire, and he longed to retire to private life. This wish was combatted by members of his Cabinet. His retention in office was one thing they surely agreed upon. Jefferson, Hamilton and Randolph each addressed him letters expressive of their opinions on this sub- ject; and, however various were their views and the reasons they alleged, they concurred in urging him to serve for a second term. His consent to be considered as a candidate was reluc- tantly given, and he was elected and again inaugurated.
Up to this time little distinction of party existed, save that founded on the old difference between the friends and the opponents of the Federal Constitution. The personal popularity of President Washington, and the reverence in which he was held by the great body of the people, would have rendered any direct attempt to oppose his administration fatal to those who made it.
The debates on the funded system and excise, and more par- ticularly the question of the constitutionality of a National Bank, led to a distinction among political men which speedily caused the formation of two great factions, whose contests con- tinued for more than twenty years. Hamilton became the leader of the Federal party, which adopted his principles. The oppo- site party, the Anti-Federal, later the Republican, recognized as its leaders Jefferson and Randolph, of the President's Cabi- net, and James Madison, then a member of Congress, afterward President.
President Washington had resolved that he would not govern as the President of a faction, and knew his power of making the discordant materials of his Cabinet work together for the general good. Therefore neither of the opposing parties assumed the form of opposition to him, but charged what was obnoxious to each upon the leaders of the other.
. President Washington at all times friendly with Secretary Hamilton and to a considerable degree favoring Hamilton's measures, yet had the highest regard for Secretary Jefferson and other members of his Cabinet. In several instances he was governed by the opinions of Secretaries Jefferson and Ran- dolph, contrary to the advice of Hamilton. When it came. to dealing with foreign nations and upholding the interests of this country, the Cabinet was unanimous in giving hearty support to the President. In fact in all cases when the President made
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known his wishes he found his Cabinet united in carrying out his views.
When Hamilton, in 1795, resigned the office of Secretary of the Treasury and returned to New York and recommenced the practice of law, he retained his place as head of the Federalist party. He found that to make money necessary for a proper existence for self and family, he could not afford to devote all his time to politics. In those days of official purity, it was not yet imagined that the possession of a public trust could ever be made a source of fortune, either directly or indirectly. The salaries were fixed at the lowest limit believed to be compatible with the decent support of the incumbent; (Washington had urged that he be permitted to serve as President without salary, that the money be used where most needed) and an attempt to save from salary would be considered saving what was granted for public purposes and would have been visited by contempt. Speculations growing out of the opportunity for information possessed by the departments would have been reckoned crim- inal, if not within the strict letter of the laws, at least in the eye of the community. Hamilton, however, never seems to have imagined the possibility of acquiring wealth in the latter way. Had this been his object, he had opportunities such as no other public man ever possessed. Jefferson and other members of Washington's Cabinet were equally above suspicion and no charge of official wrong committed was ever brought against either.
When Hamilton retired from the office of Secretary of the Treasury, after nearly twenty years of public service, he did so with less wealth than when he had entered it; and the neces- sity for providing a support for his family was his strongest reason for resigning. His hopes for success at the bar were fully realized.
The administration of Washington was drawing to a close, in 1796, and he had determined not to serve a third term. The two great parties had been fully developed, and Jefferson had been placed at the head of that which, after passing through the phases of Anti-Federal and Democratic, had assumed the style of Republican. The opposing party remained known as the Federal, with Hamilton as its acknowledged leader.
John Adams, the second President, was credited to the Federal party, but was more inclined to consider himself the party leader than to recognize Hamilton as such.
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The administration of Adams professed to carry out Wash- ington's " policies." The heads of department under Wash- ington (after Hamilton, Jefferson, Randolph and Knox had resigned), were retained in office, and all the great features of the national policy remained for a time unchanged. Adams, however, speedily became unpopular. The fact that he had been the apparent opponent of Washington in the election for President, which was necessary, in the original form of the Constitution, to make him Vice-President, and the large majority by which he was chosen as the successor, seem to have given him an overwhelming estimate of his personal importance. Beginning his political career by professions of implicit obedi- ence to the popular will, he underwent, when he obtained power, the transformation almost certain to demagogues, from supple subserviency to arbitrary exertion of authority. Familiar with the etiquette of the courts of Europe, he felt inclined to mimic the state and seclusion of monarchs. The reserve and distance of manner, natural and dignified in President Washington, might awe, but they never excited resentment. Manners of the same description, ingrafted unnaturally on the less imposing person of Adams, excited derision in some, and roused the anger of others. The sterling honesty of his purposes was no com- pensation for the faults of his manner. Advantage was taken by the opposition party of the defects of his character, and the popularity of his administration speedily declined.
In one or more instances Washington had to intercede to prevent Adams making blunders fatal to his administration. Instead of appreciating the kind offices of the former President he grew jealous, especially when he realized that the greater part of his Cabinet entertained a higher respect for the opinions of Washington than for his own. Further, Adams became jealous of Hamilton, whom he considered an aspirant for the Presidency, and for this and similar foolish reasons he became estranged from the party to which he owed his own elevation to office. Probably Washington's high regard for Hamilton was a cause of Adams considering Hamilton as a dangerous rival. The petty jealousies and vacillating policy of the Adams administration were the contributing causes of the decline of the Federal party. Thomas Jefferson, who was head of the party opposing that which Adams represented, and at the same time Vice-President, was a man of entirely different temperament from that of Adams and shared to a greater degree the
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popularity given Washington; he was able to note the mistakes President Adams made and to profit by Adams' experience.
It was John Adams who described New York politics as " the devil's own incomprehensible."
The leaders of the Federal party were guilty of mistakes made by many political leaders since that early day ; taking it for granted that the " organization " is so strong that error after error committed will be overlooked by a "long-suffering people."
The continued victories which had been gained by the Feder- alists from the time the Convention which framed the Consti- tution assembled, caused them to forget the absolute dependence of our politicians on popular favor. The leading Federalists held themselves aloof from the mass of the people, and thus gave force to the charge of aristocratic feeling which was urged against them. This charge was reiterated until it was believed by many, and alienated the yeomanry of the country from Adams' administration. Another cause was the levying of special tax for warlike preparations; among these taxes was that of stamps, which was adroitly coupled by the opposing party with the similar measure that, when enacted by the British Parliament, had operated as one of the prominent causes of the Revolutionary struggle.
Finally, two laws were passed repugnant to the feelings of the people, the one imposing penalties on political writers, and creating the crime of sedition; the other placing the personal liberty of emigrants at the disposal of the executive. By these acts many of those who had swelled the Federal majorities became alienated, and if they did not join their strength to the Republican-Democratic party, withdrew their support from the administration.
The death of Washington might also be considered as one of the causes of the decline of the strength of the Federal party. We have here spoken of that prudence which held the balance between the members of his Cabinet, that, while he may have adopted the views of one, he gave to the others no just cause of offense. After his retirement from office, Washington was not specially active in public affairs; he had by no public act, save the acceptance of the command of the provisional army which it was thought best to organize to be in readiness in case of need, given support to the administration of Adams; at times it seemed as if his dissatisfaction with the policy of Adams was such that it appears possible that he might have been induced
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to stand again as a candidate for the Presidency. He was still in the vigor of his faculties, and little impaired in personal activity ; and the convictions of the danger to which the country was exposed from the prevalence of the principles of the French Revolutionists were such that it is not improbable that he might again have left his beloved retirement, could he have been satisfied that by so doing he would have again become the ruler of a nation, not the head of a political party.
The consummate prudence and political tact of Jefferson prevented the forebodings of Washington from being realized. The funded debt was not meddled with; the National Bank was not only left undisturbed, but continued as the fiscal agent of the government; a dignified policy relative to foreign powers was maintained, and the measures enacted during Washington's administration, and dear to him, were not interfered with. Jefferson even studiously avoided the exercise of his Constitu- tional powers of removal from office for the mere purpose of rewarding his political adherents.
Such was the number of seceders from the Federal party after the death of Washington, that their opponents resolved to adopt the bold policy of running two candidates in order to secure the election of a Vice-President, and thus, although a choice by the electoral colleges was not effected, the two candi- dates of the Republican-Democratic party were brought before the House of Representatives with claims apparently equal. In the vote of this body by States, it soon appeared that the Federal members had it in their power to determine which of the two, Thomas Jefferson or Aaron Burr, should be chosen President to succeed Adams. Many violent Federal partisans were inclined to throw a brand of discord into the Republican- Democratic party, by conferring the dignity upon Burr, who even at that time was considered a demagogue, a political adven- turer who would serve only his own ends regardless of the interests of others more patriotic. At this time Burr was accused of intriguing with opponents of his party to secure preferment for himself. It is reliably stated that Hamilton, whom the death of Washington had placed in the first rank of the Federal party, was responsible for the defeat of Burr, as he interfered to prevent the votes of his friends being cast for that gentleman. And this action on the part of Hamilton con- tributed to the ill-feeling between Hamilton and Burr that led to the killing of the former by the latter.
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