USA > Rhode Island > The Dorr war; or, The constitutional struggle in Rhode Island > Part 21
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penter, John Pitman, Elisha R. Potter, and Samuel Y. Atwell. (17) Here was complete harmony among political enemies. Mr. Dorr was a commissioner of the Scituate bank, chosen to that position by the legislature of the State.(18) He was also administrator and trustec of the property of several private individuals; and just before the attack on the arsenal he told his friend, Walter S. Burges, where all his papers were, and gave him the keys to use in case of need. (19)
Mr. Dorr is thus shown to have been one of Rhode Island's model citizens. He had the courage of his convictions, politically, even when they resulted in driving him out of his party. His lack of consistency in his views on the United States Bank may surely be pardoned, as due partly to the rupture of party relations and partly to the change in the man himself as he grew from the age of twenty-nine to that of thirty-four. As a public-spirited citizen, we find him earnest and true; in financial, educational, and histori- cal affairs he took strong and energetic positions; and finally, as a neighbor and friend, he was greatly beloved. Surely, " A far nobler destiny he might have achieved."
In what lay his failure? Can we place all the censure, as he himself tried to do, upon the weak and vacillating people who de- serted him? Can we hold President Tyler responsible for the disaster, as did many of the Governor's friends? Was Governor Dorr ahead of his times, and unable to bring his followers up to his position? Or was there some quality lacking in his composi- tion, without which failure was inevitable? Did he undertake a task too great for him, but one which the right man might have accomplished ? Or was the cause so radically erroneous that it must have failed under any leader ? These are questions more easily asked than answered.
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Dorr had his faults and idiosyncracies like any other man, and a plain narrative of the movements of the people's Governor, dur- ing the two critical months, shows some of them only too plainly. While generally popular, he was not a great leader of men. He had a few very earnest, unselfish friends, but the majority of his followers were place-hunters and "hangers-on." He could map out a plan which might be successful if he personally saw to its execution; but he had not the knack of so directing the work that others could carry it out exactly as it was planned. When the Foundry legislature adjourned, after enacting a few laws, it evidently expected that the executive would carry on the govern- ment. But it had failed to provide any of the necessary means. The executive officers had none of the State papers or documents : they had no material of any sort with which to work: above all, they had no funds; no access to the treasury; and no way of col- lecting taxes. Shall we accuse the timid legislature of being wholly to blame for this condition of affairs? Or should Governor Dorr have had more control over his party? Did he not acknowledge that he advised the immediate taking possession of the State House? He should not have yielded so readily his opinion : as he was situ- ated he was right, and should have compelled the Assembly to fol- low his bidding. Either he weakly yielded to its judgment, or it had too little confidence in him. As has been seen, the sudden obliteration of the people's government led many people to desert the lost cause.
A second evident characteristic of Thomas W. Dorr was his remarkable credulity; his apparent willingness to believe every re- port and to accept every suggestion which seemed to favor his cause. We have noticed two especial occasions on which this trait has been apparent. When Tammany Hall, under the lead of such
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men as Slamm and Purdy, promised him, or led him to expect, that troops would come from New York to his assistance; when he honestly believed that these proffers came from the hearts of men deeply interested in the suffering non-voters of Rhode Island; when he failed to see that these practical politicians were merely seeking to feather their own nests; then Governor Dorr was fool- ishly, if not criminally, blind. When, again, he was coaxed to be- take himself to Chepachet by the stories of five hundred men there, of the hundreds on the way, of the hundreds more that only awaited his arrival, he ought to have known better. He ought to have real- ized that when the leaders of the party, the State officers, and the members of the General Assembly, had resigned their places and had repudiated their Governor, the rank and file would not be eager to take the sword for their rights no matter how dear. The fiasco of Acote's Hill was mainly due to Governor Dorr's credulity.
But one more characteristic trait of the People's Governor need be mentioned, and that perhaps the most prominent-his obsti- nacy ; or, as his friends called it, his persistency. Once convinced that he was right, nothing could turn him from his course. When the attack on the arsenal had failed, he was with difficulty per- suaded that, for the time at least, his cause was lost. Even though he learned that most of his friends were against him, he repaired to Chepachet. After his third flight from the State, at a time when a heavy reward hung over his head, he wrote from New Hampshire asking if it were not best for him to return to Rhode Island. His persistent obstinacy is especially shown by his refusal to yield one iota-to accept any compromise with the enemy. His . constitution, he claimed, was legally adopted-it was adopted by a majority of the people of the State. No later constitution could be legal, unless it superseded the People's Constitution either in
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the manner therein prescribed or by a majority of the people, just as the People's Constitution had been adopted. Therefore no new constitution, however liberal, however like his own, the people's, was of any interest to him, unless, in his opinion, legally adopted. The People's Constitution was binding still; and he was the true Governor of Rhode Island, even until his death.
In this he but carried his position to the logical end. He was told by such men as ex- President Van Buren, Senator Benton, Governor Morton, and even the historian, George Bancroft, that his proceedings were strictly just and legal. With such authority to uphold him, perhaps we need not wonder that the very fact that Dorr had a clear and logical mind, together with the honesty of his nature, in reality caused his downfall. These commendable traits first drove him out of the party to which he naturally be- longed, isolated him from his own family and his best friends, led him to attempt war against his beloved State, placed him in a traitor's cell, and made him, at the end of his short life, a broken- hearted man.
Of whatever failings Thomas Wilson Dorr may be accused, his virtues clearly outrank them. Whatever he did to lose the esteem of his contemporaries is more than offset by the truth of the cause in which he was engaged. His trial and conviction were unneces- sary, and his early death might have been postponed. If we call him a rebel, we must call him an honest rebel and one who sought only what seemed to him the true welfare of the people. If we . condemn him for what he did, we must praise him for what he meant to do. And, after all, Thomas Wilson Dorr, though he never realized it, did bring a people's government to the people of Rhode Island.
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AUTHORITIES. - 1 Rhode Island Acts and Resolves, January, 1845, P. 59. 2 Rhode Island Manual, 1896-97, 102. 3 Rhode Island Acts and Resolves, June, 1845, P. II. 4 Rhode Island Manual, 1896-97, 102. The same year a United States Senator was chosen. Thomas Wilson Dorr was given the complimentary vote of the minority, receiving thirty - four votes out of a total of ninety- eight. Rhode Island Manual, 1896-97, 141. 5 Rhode Island Manual, 1896 - 97, 103. 6 Rhode Istand Manual, 1896-97, 130. 7 Rhode Island Acts and Resolves, January, 1854, P. 249. S Provi- dence Journal, March 1, 1834. 9 Providence Journal, May 24, 1842. 10 Burke's Report : Trial of Dorr, 967. 11 Potter, Considerations, 5. note. 12 Republican Herald, November 5, IS34.
13 Providence Journal, April 13, 1840. 14 Goodell, Rights and Wrongs of Rhode Island, 35. 15 Rhode Island Manual, 1896-97, 160. 16 Providence Journal, March 1, IS41. 17 Providence Journal, July 24, 1840. 18 Pitman, Trial of Dorr, 92. 19 Turner, Trial of Dorr, 36 : Testimony of Walter S. Burges.
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CHAPTER XXI.
CONGRESSIONAL INTERFERENCE.
W HEN Senator Allen, of Ohio, permitted his resolutions on Rhode Island matters to be placed on the calendar for " Monday week," which day happened to be July 4th, 1842,(1) the Rhode Island question was dead, so far as the United States Senate was concerned. The House of Representatives apparently cared little about the dual governments, for in neither session of the twenty-seventh Congress do we find any other official reference to the affairs in Rhode Island.
The governments of other States, far as well as near, were, however, greatly concerned. Naturally the most interested States were those of New England. When Governor Dorr sent his beg- ging letter to Governor Fairfield, of Maine, (?) that executive imme- diately sent a message to the State legislature, as requested by the People's Governor. A caucus of the dominant party was held, in which resolutions were adopted sympathizing with the people's government. (3) However, before the party had an opportunity to put the legislature on record, news arrived of the attack on the arsenal, of Dorr's flight, and of the reported compromise. Accord- ingly the legislature referred the matter to a committee, which brought in two reports early in June : the majority, believing "that
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the long-existing difficulties concerning the nature of the State governments were, happily, about to be settled in an amicable manner," declared that it afforded them "lively satisfaction to learn that the contest had ended in the promised establishment of free suffrage; " on the other hand, the minority resolved "that a revo- lution by force of arms can be justified only by its necessity, as the last resort of the people in their efforts to throw off oppressive and intolerable government, and that no such necessity exists in the free States of this Union."(1)
When the New Hampshire legislature met, early in June, 1842, Governor Hubbard, later known as a friend and protector of Gov- ernor Dorr, sent in his annual address. In this he referred to the fact that there had "been, of late, in one of the States of the Union, a controversy of a most extraordinary character, involving the right of the people to self-government."(5) Soon, however, the final flight took place, and the position of the State of New Hamp- shire is shown only by the attitude of the Governor and the reso- lution passed by the State convention that renominated Governor Hubbard : " Resolved that the General Government has no right to interfere in any political controversy between different portions of the people of a State, in which the question of Sovereignty is in issue; and that John Tyler, the acting President of the United States, by interfering with and deciding the question of sovereignty pending between the two parties in Rhode Island, has been guilty of a wanton and flagrant act of usurpation, for which he deserves impeachment and expulsion from office."(6)
The Vermont Democratic State Convention expressed its views . even earlier than that of New Hampshire. It resolved " That we believe in the right of a majority of the people of Rhode Island to change their form of Government from a King's Charter to a
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Republican Constitution, and cordially sympathize with them in their attempts to do so; and while we would encourage them to persevere, we cannot but condemn the action of the present Exec- utive and those members of his cabinet who are his advisers in the course he has adopted in ordering an armed force to that State to overawe the people in the exercise of the inalienable rights and privileges guaranteed to them by the Constitution of the United States." (?)
Massachusetts was in the hands of the Whigs in 1842; Gov- ernor Davis agreed to honor Governor King's requisition ; and, in fact, the Old Bay State practically gave the charter government something more than sympathy. At the next election, however, Governor Davis received one less vote than his opponent, and Governor Morton did not hesitate to uphold the principles upon which the people's party was acting; he did not, however, approve the use of force.
In Connecticut, the legislature showed an interest in her neigh- bor early in the controversy. On the tenth of May, a resolution was introduced in the House of Representatives to appoint a joint committee of the two houses "to inquire into the expediency of offering the mediation of this State in settling the difficulties exist- ing in our sister State, Rhode Island, under the present 'gestion of affairs.' " (8) This resolution passed the House, but the matter went no farther.
These illustrations show, at least, that the trouble in Rhode Island was attracting general attention. Governor Dorr's failure, and the adoption of the new liberal constitution, however, appeared to end the controversy, and interest in the "Affairs of Rhode Island " quieted down. Some months later, however, the subject was reviewed in the national legislature as a partisan affair, begun
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with a memorial to Congress from the Democratic members of the Rhode Island General Assembly. To understand the circumstances, we must note the condition of politics in the State during the year 1843.
In October, 1842, the Journal showed that the Democrats were beginning to take up the suffrage movement as a party measure, by a labored article designed to prove that that party did not up- hold Dorr. It stated that a majority of the State Senate, elected in accordance with the charter in April, 1842, were Democrats; that but four towns gave a majority against King for Governor, at the same election, two of these being Whig and two Democratic ; and that while eleven towns voted for the Freemen's Constitution and eight against it, nine Democratic towns voted for it to three against. () In November, the Journal again tried to show that the Rhode Island Democrats were not Dorrites, by claiming that the call, just issued, for a Democratic convention was made without the approval of the Democratic party; that the most prominent men in that party knew nothing of it and would have nothing to do with it.(10) While there is a measure of truth in this statement, it is only partially true. Many of the leading Democrats had joined the law and order party, and therefore had no interest in this con- vention ; while some others, seeing the strong movement in the party towards Dorrism, held aloof for the time. Yet the names of the delegates to this convention were well known in Democratic annals, and seven of the nine members of the State Central Com- mittee, chosen by this convention, were among the most prominent delegates to the Democratic State convention held in January, 1840. (a)
(a) Compare account of the Democratic Republican State Convention in Republican Herald, January 18, 18440, with that of the Democratic State Convention, December 20, 1842, given in Burke's Report, 239- 245. It is interesting to note that at least six members of the committee of nine, and twenty-five of the thirty-six members of the full State committee are recorded as voting for the People's Constitution.
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The platform adopted by this convention upheld the national Democratic party, and denounced the Whigs and Henry Clay; but most of the planks referred to domestic matters. The resolutions affirmed "the right of the people" to institute government and to "make or alter the fundamental law at any time" in any way; they criticised the new constitution, but advised the members of the party to register and vote under it; affirming that "in recommend- ing this course and in order to avoid all doubt or misconstruction of [their] purposes, [they] explicitly avowed [their] object to be, to accomplish in a satisfactory manner, and with the least delay, the establishment in fact, as well as in right, of the People's Con- stitution."(11)
How this result was to be reached was not announced, but it was evident that the upholders of the People's Constitution pro- posed to make a strong effort to carry the State, under the liberal suffrage of the new constitution. The election took place in April, 1843, and resulted in a good majority for the law and order party. Governor Fenner received 9,100 votes to 7,300 cast for Thomas F. Carpenter. (12) The Senate stood about twenty-two law and order . men to seven Democrats (or Dorrites), and the House forty-eight to nineteen. (b)
In the words of Governor Dorr, "the suffrage men of Rhode Island seemed to hesitate in employing the ballot-box at the vitally important election of April, 1843, as they had before hesitated to employ the cartridge-box when force had become in- dispensable to the safety of their cause. Through desertions they
(b) Providence Journal. All the Democratic members chosen were from Providence county, the towns of Burrillville, Glocester, Smithfield, Cumberland, North Providence, Cranston, and Johnston giving a majority against the government. From Providence county seven Dorrite Senators were returned to three law and order men, and in the House the county was represented by nineteen Democrats out of thirty - five. The county gave seven hundred more votes to Carpenter than to Fenner, though Providence city furnished a majority of four hundred the other way.
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were overthrown at this election." (13) However strong the suffrage party had been, however many desertions occurred at this time, one fact is fixed-the party did not poll a majority of the votes cast, much less of " The People."
Another winter came, and the people of Rhode Island were evi- dently becoming satisfied with the new constitution. The Demo- cratic minority had been able to accomplish nothing in the General Assembly ; everything fore- told an easy victory for the law and order party in April, 1844. In fact, the Demo- cratic case seemed so des- perate that no State ticket was nominated, (10) and when the election came, but two hundred scattering votes were cast against the re- election of Governor Fen- ner,(15) while the law and order majority in joint ses- sion of the two houses was sixty.(16) With this prospect before them the Democratic members of the legislature THOMAS F. CARPENTER. appealed to Congress.
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This Democratic minority consisted of the seven Senators and eighteen Representatives from seven towns in Providence county, and the Senator from Jamestown, in Newport county. Each of these Representatives is recorded as having voted for the People's Constitution, and the names of five of the Senators are also found
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in the printed lists.(0) The minority of the legislature, therefore, was nearly, if not quite, unanimously Dorrite from the beginning.
The memorial dated February 1, 1844, after affirming the adop- tion of the People's Constitution, declared the belief of the signers that the President of the United States, by his interference in the affairs of Rhode Island, caused the overthrow of the People's Con- stitution and government. The request was made that the Na- tional House of Representatives inquire whether the President had any such power of interfering in the "internal affairs of a sovereign State ;" and whether the present members of the House from Rhode Island were entitled to their seats. The memorial finally requested "the Congress of the United States to execute to [Rhode Island ] the guaranty in the National Constitution, of a Republican Consti- tution, in favor of that which was rightfully and duly adopted in [Rhode Island] in December, 1841, and. established and carried into effect by the organization of a government under it in May, 1842.(17)
Representative Burke, of New Hampshire, presented the memo- rial to the House of Representatives, February 19. (18) It was ordered printed, and, by a vote of 103 to 69, referred to a select committee of five, consisting of Burke, Rathbun, of New York ; Causin, of Maryland; McClernand, of Illinois; and Preston, of Mary- land. The Rhode Island Representatives, Henry Y. Cranston and Elisha R. Potter, demanded an opportunity for discussion, as they claimed that the memorial was full of misrepresentations, but debate ". was refused by a vote of 144 to 35.
After two fruitless sessions, the committee, March 7, voted to ask authority to send for persons and papers, and to recommend to
(e) The Senators from Burrillville, Johnston, and Cranston are not so recorded.
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the House of Representatives to request the President of the United States to furnish copies of all papers and documents in his posses- sion relating to the Rhode Island controversy. (19) The same day, in the House, Mr. Burke requested power to send for persons and papers, and was met by an amendment, offered by Mr. Causin, a member of the select committee, discharging the committee from further service. (20) After eleven days consumed in speeches by Representatives Cranston, of Rhode Island; Rathbun, of New York; Potter, of Rhode Island; Kennedy, of Indiana; Caleb Smith, of Indiana; McClernand, of Illinois; and Stetson, of New York, Cau- sin's amendment was defeated by a vote of 70 to 86, and Burke's resolution was adopted, 78 to 71.(!) March 23d, the resolution re- questing information from the President was passed.(d)
The committee held seventeen sessions, (2?) the last 'six of which were spent in listening to the report drawn up by the chairman. At the other sessions, Welcome B. Sayles, John S. Harris, Aaron White, Colonel Bankhead, and Captain Vinton were examined, and
(d) Congressional Globe, I Sess., 28 Cong .. 1843 - 44, Vol. XIII, p. 426. In these resolutions the President was requested to lay before the House "the authority and the true copies of all requests and applications upon which he deemed it his duty to interfere with the naval and military forces of the United States, on the occasion of the recent attempt of the people of Rhode Island to estab- lish a free constitution in the place of the old charter government of that State ; also, copies of the correspondence between the Executive of the United States and the charter government of the State of Rhode Island, and all the papers and documents connected with the same ; also, copies of the instructions to, and statements of, the charter commissioners sent to him by the then existing authorities of State of Rhode Island ; also, copies of the correspondence, if any, between the heads of departments and said charter government, or any person or persons connected with said govern- ment, and of any accompanying papers and documents ; also, copics of all orders issued by the Executive `of the United States, or any of the departments, to military officers, for the movement or employment of troops to or in Rhode Island ; also, copies of all orders to naval officers to pre- pare steam or other vessels of the United States for service in the waters of Rhode Island ; also, copies of all orders to the officers of revenue eutters for the same service ; also, copies of any instructions borne by the Secretary of War to Rhode Island, on his visit in 1842, to review the troops of the charter government ; also, copies of any order or orders to any officer or officers of the army or navy to report themselves to the charter government ; and that he be requested to lay before this House copies of any other papers or documents in the possession of the Executive eon- nected with this subject, not above specifically enumerated."
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the votes cast for the People's Constitution were counted. Benja- min F. Hallett was authorized to obtain depositions of witnesses examined in relation to the trouble in Rhode Island. June 3, 1844, the report, as prepared by Mr. Burke, was adopted, Burke, Rathbun, and McClernand voting for it; Causin and Preston were absent. Later, Mr. Causin presented to the House a minority report.
Meanwhile, April 10, the House received the reply of the Presi- dent and referred it to the select committee. (e) Mr. Burke pre- sented to the House the petition of Henry J. Duff and 175 others, naturalized citizens of Rhode Island, representing that they were deprived of their proper privileges as citizens of the United States, (23) and also the petition of certain citizens of Indiana, praying Con- gress to inquire into alleged abuses practiced by the Rhode Island charter party. (24) Mr. Cranston presented a protest from the Gen- eral Assembly of Rhode Island against the right of the Congress to inquire whether the late charter government of the State had been republican in form or not; against the right of Congress to inquire whether the People's Constitution or the existing constitu- tion was the lawful constitution of the State; and against the doing by Congress of anything that would tend to cause trouble again in Rhode Island. (25)
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