and may control a majority in more states than one. But this will not last long. The people of New England are sensible, and discerning. The day is at hand when they will do justice to themselves, and to those who have cheated and defrauded them, to advance their own power, and to increase their own riches. In the day of adversity, this people consider; and no people are better qualified than themselves, to understand cause and effect, when they do consider.

LETTER LXIII.

JANUARY 9, 1834.

ALL citizens now alive, who were old enough to know the character of the war in relation to the opponents of the administration, remember, and will remember while they live, that they were identified with the chosen and public enemy of the United States. They were charged with adhering to, and giving aid and assistance to the enemy; with treason, and with the design to re-establish the dominion of Great Britain, in their native land! What was the evidence? Opposition to Mr. Madison! Opposition, for the reasons, and none other, which are contained in the address of the minority of Congress, to their constituents. Terror sealed the lips of thousands in free America, concerning the conduct and motives of their own elected rulers. If the burning of Moscow, and the freezing of Napoleon's hosts, had not happened, it is not hazardous to assert, that the press and the tongue would have been used in the United States, for no other public purpose than to subserve, applaud, and honor Jefferson, Madison, and their adherents. What would have prevented military executions, the action of the guillotine, and the confiscation of the fortunes of traitors? Nothing but

the native spirit of New England could have prevented it : the spirit that descended from the pilgrim fathers. As soon as the horrible transactions, which occurred in Baltimore, in the last ten days of July, were known in Boston, the proper spirit of the citizens was manifested. In that city there was an undue proportion of " oppressed humanity," which had sought "an asylum" there; and they became most effective allies in Madison's war. A meeting was held at Faneuil Hall on the sixth of August, and resolutions were passed, among which was the following: "Resolved, that we are alarmed, astonished, and confounded, "to find that a paper published at the seat of government, "and which is understood, on some occasions, to be its organ, not only led the way to these scenes of confusion, "but has impliedly approved and justified them; and that "while no mention is made of this late horrible massacre, "in which the blood of our oldest revolutionary officers "flowed in the streets, a severe commentary was issued in "that paper, against a republican magistrate of New York, "because he expressed his abhorrence of mobs. We will σε not admit the conclusion, which these facts would seem "to warrant, that these mobs are not discountenanced by "the Executive of the United States. We would rather "consider them as of French origin, and the first fruits of "that unnatural and dreadful alliance, into which we have "entered in fact, if not in form."

The citizens of Boston took very effective measures, that no such "fruits" should be known among them; whether any such were intended or not. There is no reason to suppose that these citizens will, in any future time, be regardless of their duties, either to their country, or to themselves.

The principal object of the disgraceful scenes at Baltimore was to silence the Federal Republican, a paper edited by Alexander Hanson, who was afterwards a member of Congress. The same General Lee, who was the Governor

of Virginia, and the congressional eulogist of Washington, carried the effects of that assault to his grave, years afterwards. It was seen with indignant astonishment, that no reprobation of such measures came, directly or indirectly, from Mr. Madison. It was believed that he did not disapprove of them. If rumors are entitled to credit, he was given to understand, that if any such scenes occurred in the city of Washington, he would be held responsible in his own person.

These are no fictions, but realities, as thousands now living can testify. Did Mr. Madison mean to break through all constitutional restraints, and establish himself as a tyrant over his fellow citizens? Not at all. Mr. Madison was acting, as he believed, constitutionally, and as a patriot. It was constitutional, and patriotic to annihilate the natural and determined enemy of France; and to silence, and make odious, every citizen who dared to say it was not so. Mr. Madison is not to be charged with tyranny, nor with disregarding the constitution and laws; but he is to be held up as an example, and a terrible one too, of what PARTY may do in a republic, when a ruler believes that THE people, (as he calls them,) will sustain him. Mr. Madison has been long enough at leisure to review his political career again and again; long enough for the mists of party to clear away from before his vision; long enough to know, if he looks out upon the world, how some of his opponents lived, and what their countrymen did in honor of their fame; and how those who yet live, are esteemed, whom he called traitors, and enemies of his country. Is he now of the same opinion?

The conscientious opponents of the national administration, had reason to apprehend, and did believe, that opposition was to be silenced by violence, and terror: that they were, by such means, to be deprived of the right of judging for themselves of the wisdom, fidelity, and purposes of their own trustees, and public servants. They felt that the power

which had been created for the security of life, person, and property, was to be used to make all these objects secondary to the will of a dominant faction. They found it necessary to combine to obtain that protection, which their rulers seemed voluntarily to have withdrawn.

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For such reasons, and none other, they associated themselves under the name of Washington Benevolent Societies, throughout the state. They had regular meetings; quarterly addresses; and annual orations. The members of this society in Boston, were of all the various classes. The different vocations among the mechanics had their respective banners, bearing appropriate emblems of their callings; there were other banners which bore the insignia of peace, union, fidelity, and patriotism. In the annual processions these banners were carried through the streets. These societies were not like jacobin clubs, or secret societies," as Washington called them, instituted to overawe the govern. ment in the exercise of its powers; but to maintain the rights of free and independent citizens. Not a sentiment was ever expressed, in these societies, inconsistent with the allegiance due to the constitution, and to the union. On the contrary, there is no doubt, that they tended to preserve that allegiance, to preserve the union, and sustain the community through its discouraging oppressions. The frowns and attempts of the war-party to make these societies objects of suspicion, and to render them odious, served only to strengthen them, and convince their members of their utility, and necessity. If the day shall ever come, when the like perils shall overtake the good citizens of the United States, let them remember this example. When the causes which produced these combinations ceased, these also ceased; but their banners are still preserved; and are occasionally produced to decorate the "cradle of liberty."

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LETTER LXIV.

JANUARY 13, 1834.

In the course of the summer of 1812, there was some reason to hope, that Mr. Madison had become sufficiently unpopular, by his war measures, to lose a re-election. De Witt Clinton was then a person of some distinction in the state of New York. He had expressed his detestation of mobocracy, and had been reprimanded for it in a government paper. Although he had been ranked with the Jeffersonian school, yet as he had indicated his dissatisfaction with the policy of Mr. Madison, it was hoped, that he might be elected President. Any man that could have been elected, would have been thought by the federalists, preferable to Mr. Madison. This party were willing to combine with any portion of the citizens who were willing to withdraw from the support of that gentleman. They felt that any change must be for the better.

Measures were taken to hold a convention in the city of New York, in the month of September, 1812. No convention was ever assembled from more pure and patriotic motives, nor any, whose members were more worthy and respectable, as men and citizens. Many of them had filled exalted stations; and were afterwards honored with high confidence by their fellow citizens, and by executive appointment. If this page should ever fall under the eye of any surviving member of that assembly, it may remind him of the solemnity and dignity, of the proceedings then had; he can answer for himself, for the purity and patriotism of his own motives; he will remember the fervent eloquence there' displayed; and the dreadful apprehensions, then entertained, for the fate of his country.

This convention continued three days. It resolved on