Albert Beveridge - The Life of John Marshall, Volume 3 - Conflict and construction, 1800-1815

Wirt: Letters of the British Spy , 10-11.

These brilliant articles, written by Wirt when he was about thirty years old, were published in the Richmond Argus during 1803. So well did they deceive the people that many in Gloucester and Norfolk declared that they had seen the British Spy. (Kennedy: Memoirs of the Life of William Wirt , i, 111, 113.)

Ames to Pickering, Feb. 4, 1807, Pickering MSS. Mass. Hist. Soc.

Jefferson to Rush, Oct. 4, 1803, Works : Ford, x, 32.

Immediately after his inauguration, Jefferson restated the American foreign policy announced by Washington. It was the only doctrine on which he agreed with Marshall.

"It ought to be the very first object of our pursuits to have nothing to do with European interests and politics. Let them be free or slaves at will, navigators or agricultural, swallowed into one government or divided into a thousand, we have nothing to fear from them in any form… To take part in their conflicts would be to divert our energies from creation to destruction." (Jefferson to Logan, March 21, 1801, Works : Ford, ix, 219-20.)

Jefferson to Postmaster-General (Gideon Granger), May 3, 1801, Works : Ford, ix, 249.

The democratic revolution that overthrew Federalism was the beginning of the movement that finally arrived at the abolition of imprisonment for debt, the bestowal of universal manhood suffrage, and, in general, the more direct participation in every way of the masses of the people in their own government. But in the first years of Republican power there was a pandering to the crudest popular tastes and passions which, to conservative men, argued a descent to the sansculottism of France.

See infra , chaps. iii and vi; also vol. iv, chap. i.

1 Cranch, 1 et seq.

Wilson vs. Mason, 1 Cranch, 45-101.

1 Cranch, 102-10.

Turner vs. Fendall, 1 Cranch, 115-30.

See vol. ii, 531-47, of this work.

See Adams: U.S. i, chaps. ix and x, for account of the revolutionary measures which the Republicans proposed to take.

Marshall to Pinckney, March 4, 1801, "four o'clock," MS.

"It is the sole object of the Administration to acquire popularity." (Wolcott to Cabot, Aug. 28, 1802, Lodge: Cabot , 325.)

"The President has … the itch for popularity." (J. Q. Adams to his father, November, 1804, Writings, J. Q. A. : Ford, iii, 81.)

"The mischiefs of which his immoderate thirst for … popularity are laying the foundation, are not immediately perceived." (Adams to Quincy, Dec. 4, 1804, Quincy, 64.)

"It seems to be a great primary object with him never to pursue a measure if it becomes unpopular." (Plumer's Diary, March 4, 1805, Plumer MSS. Lib. Cong.)

"In dress, conversation, and demeanor he studiously sought and displayed the arts of a low demagogue seeking the gratification of the democracy on whose voices and votes he laid the foundation of his power." (Quincy's Diary, Jan. 1806, Quincy, 93.)

Ames to Gore, Dec. 13, 1802, Works of Fisher Ames : Ames, i, 309.

Dodd in American Historical Review , xii, 776; and see next chapter.

Jefferson to Dickinson, Dec. 19, 1801, Writings of Thomas Jefferson : Washington, iv, 424.

"The only shield for our Republican citizens against the federalism of the courts is to have the attorneys & Marshals republicans." (Jefferson to Stuart, April 8, 1801, Works : Ford, ix, 248.)

"The judge of course stands until the law [Judiciary Act of 1801] shall be repealed which we trust will be at the next Congress." (Jefferson to Stuart, April 8, 1801, Works : Ford, ix, 247.) For two weeks Jefferson appears to have been confused as to the possibility of repealing the Judiciary Act of 1801. A fortnight before he informed Stuart that this course would be taken, he wrote Giles that "the courts being so decidedly federal and irremovable," it was "indispensably necessary" to appoint "republican attorneys and marshals." (Jefferson to Giles, March 23, 1801, MSS. Lib. Cong. as quoted by Carpenter in American Political Science Review , ix, 522.)

But the repeal had been determined upon within six weeks after Jefferson's inauguration as his letter to Stuart shows.

Giles to Jefferson, March 16, 1801, Anderson: William Branch Giles – A Study in the Politics of Virginia 1790-1830 , 77.

Same to same, June 1, 1801, ib. 80.

Sedgwick to King, Dec. 14, 1801, King, iv, 36.

Hale to King, Dec. 19, 1801, King, iv, 39.

It must be carefully kept in mind that from the beginning of the Revolution most of the people were antagonistic to courts of any kind, and bitterly hostile to lawyers. (See vol. i, 297-99, of this work.)

Braintree, Mass., in 1786, in a town meeting, denounced lawyers and demanded by formal resolution the enactment of "such laws … as may crush or, at least, put a proper check of restraint" upon them.

Dedham, Mass., instructed its members of the Legislature to secure the passage of laws that would "check" attorneys; and if this were not practicable, then "you are to endeavor [to pass a bill declaring] that the order of Lawyers be totally abolished." (Warren: History of the American Bar , 215.) All this, of course, was the result of the bitter hardships of debtors.

For an able defense of the adoption by the National courts of the British common law, see Works of the Honourable James Wilson : Wilson, iii, 384.

Columbian Centinel , July 11, 1801, as quoted in Warren, 225-27.

Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay : Johnston, iii, 478-85.

Wharton: State Trials of the U.S. during the Administrations of Washington and Adams , 60 et seq. ; and see Wilson's law lecture on the subject, Wilson, iii, 384.

2 Dallas, 297-99.

Ib. Ravara was tried and convicted by the jury under the instructions of the bench, "but he was afterward pardoned on condition that he surrender his commission and Exequatur." (Wharton: State Trials , 90-92.)

For the documents preceding the arrest and prosecution of Henfield, see Wharton: State Trials , footnotes to 49-52.

See Wilson's charge, Wharton: State Trials , 59-66.

See Wharton's summary of Wilson's second charge, ib. footnote to 85.

Ib. 88.

Marshall: Life of George Washington , 2d ed. ii, 273-74. After the Henfield and Ravara cases, Congress passed a law applicable to such offenses. (See Wharton: State Trials , 93-101.)

Wharton: State Trials , 653-54.