CHAPTER 111

A STRONG GOVERNMENT DEMANDED

ALTHOUGH the War of the Rebellion did not end until Cornwallis surrendered his army to Washington at Yorktown, in October, 1781, and the treaty with Great Britain, which acknowledged the independence of the United States, was not signed until September, 1783, Great Britain was defeated in its military purpose as early as October, 1777, when the army of Burgoyne, marching south from Canada, in an endeavor to join with a force from New York for the control of the line of the Hudson, was met by a Continental army under Gates, and compelled to surrender. Had this operation of the British succeeded, the United States would have been cut in two, and might then have been conquered, a severed part at a time; it failed, and thereafter Great Britain controlled only so much of the territory of the rebellious States as its army was encamped upon, for even in Cornwallis's last campaign in the Carolinas and Virginia, no territory remained subjected after Cornwallis passed on. But the war dragged along because Congress was powerless to utilize the strength of the country; to command the men and money with which to equip Washington for an aggressive war. How he did, with matchless genius, defeat a strong, well-organized, well-equipped army, handicapped as he was by domes

tic treachery, intrigue, incompetence, jealousy and ignorance, does not belong to this story except as the subject is related to the weakness and incompetency of the Government, and the resulting necessity for a stronger union under a better Constitution.

One result of the loss of the British army under Burgoyne was that Parliament repealed all the obnoxious laws the Colonies had suffered under, and forever renounced its right to raise revenue in America. British commissioners were appointed to arrange peace with Congress, but that body was restrained from acting, even had it been so inclined, for the United States had entered into a treaty with France, agreeing, in consideration of aid in troops and money, to reject all proposals of peace by Great Britain unless accompanied by acknowledgment of American independence. Great Britain was not yet ready to admit so much as the existence of such a political body as the "United States," much less its independence, and at that time there were signs that many Americans were growing doubtful as to the expediency of a centralized government-a United States -and thus Congress was restrained on the one hand by its treaty obligations to France, on the other by a lack of strong public opinion which might have induced it even then to demand recognition of independence. Perhaps this shrinking away of public opinion from the idea of a central, united government was the result of disgust with the weakness of Congress-the only embodiment of the united doctrine the people had On the contrary, historians generally assume that the Congress lacked popular support because of a fear that it might become too strong: stronger than the States. It does not seem to the present writer

seen.

that fearsome visions of absolutism could have been aroused by any known acts of the Congress. That unhappy body was even yet, in the years of Washington's direst extremities, acting under no instrument of government, but exercised such powers as it did by sufferance of the States. Congress, as we have seen, adopted the Articles of Confederation in 1777, but these did not become operative until 1781, when Maryland, last State to do so, ratified them, when Green was rounding up Cornwallis's army in Yorktown. The wisest patriots rested their hopes on Washington, rather than upon the Congress, which was no longer inspired and guided, as in its earlier sessions, by such men as Jefferson, Rutledge, Jay or Henry, all of whom were serving in other capacities.

But at last Washington, aided on land by a French army under Rochambeau, and on water by a French fleet under Grasse (young Alexander Hamilton was there, leading in person desperate assaults on the British works), forced Cornwallis to surrender; and the destinies of the country passed for a time from the soldiers to the diplomats. The treaty, negotiated for the Americans by Franklin, Jay, John Adams and Henry Laurens, conceded about everything the Americans hoped for, although Dr. Franklin's modest request for Canada and Nova Scotia was abandoned after it had served the good Doctor's purpose of making a claim with the full intention of giving it up. But favorable as the treaty was, the Congress could not comply with its terms concerning payment of debts owed to British creditors by American merchants. The States became afflicted with an hysteria of repudiation, rag money issue and Tory persecution legislation; the Congress was helpless; political quacks

arose and sought to do a political business on a capital composed wholly of base bullion. They attempted to arouse class. hatred, claimed to have magic curealls for the disease of the body politic, which, as ever, largely resolved themselves into doses of repudiation of honest debts, issue of money without value, and laws for the mulcting of those citizens whose oldfashioned ways of conducting their worldly affairs had given them comparative wealth, and therefore made them the natural objects of the hatred and envy of the demagogues and their unfortunate dupes. Then thoughtful men began to see that if anarchy was to be avoided, power sufficient to deal with such dangers to the country must be lodged with the Congress.

Washington, at the beginning of these troubles, had been among those who believed that Congress already had powers under the Articles to enforce obedience upon the States, and through the States upon the citizens; but he saw that the right without the might put the odium of the effects of disobedience upon the States themselves. "Unless the States will suffer Congress to exercise those prerogatives they are undoubtedly invested with by the Constitution, everything must very rapidly tend to anarchy and confusion." Washington wrote this in June, 1783, two or three weeks after he had formally proclaimed peace to the army-the army he saw go home unpaid; of whom he wrote to Congress, that they were “veterans who have suffered and bled without a murmur, and who had retired in perfect order to their homes, without a settlement of their accounts or a farthing of money in their pockets." He also wrote a circular letter to the Governors of the States, in which he said of the United States: "This is the time of their politi

cal probation; this is the moment when the eyes of the whole world are turned upon them; this is the moment to establish or ruin their political character forever; this is the favorable moment to give such a tone to our federal government, as will enable it to answer the ends of its institution, or this may be the ill-fated moment for relaxing the powers of the Union, annihilating the cement of the confederation, and exposing us to become the sport of European politics, which may play one State against another, to prevent their growing importance, and to serve their own interested purposes. For, according to the system of policy the States shall adopt at this moment, they will stand or fall; and by their confirmation or lapse it is yet to be decided, whether the Revolution must ultimately be considered as a blessing or a curse; a blessing or a curse, not to the present age alone, for with our fate will the destiny of unborn millions be involved." He urged these things as essential to the well-being of the United States as an independent power: “An indissoluble union of the States under one federal head; a sacred regard to public justice; the adoption of a proper peace establishment; the prevalence of that pacific and friendly disposition among the people of the United States, which will induce them to forget their local prejudices and policies; to make those mutual concessions, which are requisite to the general prosperity; and, in some instances, to sacrifice their individual advantages to the interest of the community.

"These," he said, "are the pillars on which the glori ous fabric of our independence and national character must be supported. Liberty is the basis; and whoever would dare to sap the foundation, or overturn the