Chapter XXXIV: Section 4: And be it further enacted, That this act shall (2)

On the 31st of January, 1801, near the close of the term of
President Adams, the latter appointed John Marshall, who had
been Secretary of State in his cabinet since the previous May,
to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. It was a memorable
appointment,—the most memorable, perhaps, that has ever been
made by official and not popular selection, in America, since
Washington was appointed to the command of the continental
army. Its result was to place the new, uninterpreted, plastic
Constitution of the Federal Republic under the hands of a
master, during thirty-four years of the period in which it
hardened into practical, determined law. It decided the
character of the Constitution, and by that decision the great
instrument was made a bond of nationality, firm, strenuous and
enduring. "The abilities of the new Chief Justice were
recognized by the profession and the public at the time of his
appointment, but the attractive qualities of his heart and his
kindly manners soon caused respect and reverence to ripen into
affection. Perhaps no American citizen except Washington ever
conciliated so large a measure of popularity and public
esteem. … In surveying the results of the labors of
thirty-four years recorded in thirty-two volumes of reports,
it is obvious that it was in the decision of cases involving
international and constitutional law that the force and
clearness of the Chief Justice's intellect shone most
conspicuous. Such was the ready assent of his colleagues on
the bench to his supremacy in the exposition of constitutional
law, that in such causes a dissenting opinion was almost
unknown. Having had occasion to discuss and thoroughly study
the Constitution, both in the Virginia convention which
adopted it and afterward in the legislature, he had
preconceived opinions concerning it, as well as perfect
familiarity with it. But in the hot contest waging between the
friends of a strict and those of a liberal construction of its
language, he wished to take no part. He stated that there
should be neither a liberal nor a strict construction, but
that the simple, natural, and usual meaning of its words and
phrases should govern their interpretation. In the case of
Gibbons v. Ogden, in which he is called upon to define the
true rule of construction of the United States Constitution
regarding the rights of the States and the rights and powers
of the general government, he studiously avoids each extreme,
steering safely in the middle course. He lays down his own
rule thus clearly and definitely:—'This instrument contains
an enumeration of powers expressly granted by the people to
their government. It has been said that these powers ought to
be construed strictly; but why ought they to be so construed?
Is there one sentence in the Constitution which gives
countenance to this rule? In the last of the enumerated
powers, that which grants expressly the means for carrying all
others into execution, Congress is authorized to make all laws
that shall be necessary and proper for the purpose. But this
limitation on the means which may be used is not extended to
the powers which are conferred, nor is there one sentence in
the Constitution which has been pointed out by the gentlemen
of the bar, or which we have been able to discern, that
prescribes this rule. We do not therefore think ourselves
justified in adopting it. If they contend only against that
enlarged construction which would extend words beyond their
natural and obvious import, we might question the application
of the term but should not controvert the principle. If they
contend for that narrow construction which, in support of some
theory not to be found in the Constitution, would deny to the
government those powers which the words of the grant, as
usually understood, import, and which are consistent with the
general views and objects of the instrument; for that narrow
construction which would cripple the government, and render it
unequal to the objects for which it is declared to be
instituted, and to which the powers given, as fairly
understood, render it competent; then we cannot perceive the
propriety of this strict construction, nor adopt it as a rule
by which the Constitution is to be expounded.' … Marshall's
dictum that there must be neither a strict nor a liberal
construction of the Constitution, but that the natural meaning
of the words must govern, was undoubtedly sound and wise. The
broad proposition was above criticism; it meant only that the
language of the instrument should not be stretched or wrenched
in any direction; and however politicians or even statesmen
might feel, there was no other possible ground for a judge to
take. Jefferson might regard it as a duty to make the
Constitution as narrow and restricted as possible; Hamilton
might feel that there was an actual obligation upon him to
make it as broad and comprehensive as its words would admit.
But Jefferson and Hamilton, in a different department of
public life from Marshall, had duties and obligations
correspondingly different from his. They might properly try to
make the Constitution mean what it seemed to them for the
public welfare that it should mean. Marshall could not
consider any such matter; he had only to find and declare what
it did mean, what its words actually and properly declared,
not what they might possibly or desirably be supposed or
construed to declare. This was the real force and the only
real force of his foregoing assertion. As an abstract
statement of his function it was impregnable. But, as with
most broad principles, the difficulty lay in the application
of it to particular cases. The constitutional questions which
came before Marshall chiefly took the form of whether or not
the Constitution conferred some power or authority upon
Congress, or upon the Executive. Then the Federalist lawyers
tried to show how much the language could mean, and the
anti-Federalist counsel sought to show how little it could
mean, and each urged that public policy was upon his side.
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The decision must be yes or no; the authority did or did not
rest in the government. It was easy to talk about the natural
and proper meaning of the words; but after all it was the
question at issue; did they (not could they) say yes, or did
they (not could they) say no, to the special authority sought
to be exercised. Now it is one thing to be impartial and
another to be colorless in mind. Judge Marshall was impartial
and strongly possessed of the judicial instinct or faculty.
But he was by no means colorless. He could no more eliminate
from his mind an interest in public affairs, and opinions as
to the preferable forms of government and methods of
administration, than he could cut out and cast away his mind
itself. Believing that the Constitution intended to create and
did create a national government, and having decided notions
as to what such a government must be able to do, he was
subject to a powerful though insensible influence to find the
existence of the required abilities in the government. … The
great majority of his decisions were in accordance with
Federalist principles of construction and of policy. The
Republicans all denounced him as a Federalist, even of an
extreme type."

_A. B. Magruder,
John Marshall,
chapter 10._

ALSO IN:
_H. Flanders,
Lives and Times of the Chief Justices of the Supreme Court,
volume 2._

_J. Story,
John Marshall
(North American Review, volume 26)._

[Image: The United States in 1860.]

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1801.
First American naval demonstration against the Barbary Pirates.

See BARBARY STATES: A. D. 1785-1801.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1802.
Admission of Ohio to the Union.

See NORTHWEST TERRITORY: A. D. 1788-1802.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1802-1804.
Land cessions of Georgia annexed to Mississippi Territory.

See MISSISSIPPI: A. D. 1798-1804.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803.
The Louisiana Purchase.
Its constitutional and political aspects.

"The Mississippi question, which had played so important a
part in the times of the confederation, had arisen again and
demanded a solution, as Spain had, on the 1st of October,
1800, ceded the whole of Louisiana to France. The United
States had had experience enough already of how dangerous and
how great an obstacle in the way of the commercial development
of the country it might become, if the mouth of the
Mississippi were in the possession of a foreign power, even if
it were no stronger than Spain. Jefferson had not shared in
this experience in vain. This was one of the instances in
which he gave evidence of a really statesmanlike insight. He
wrote on the 18th of April, 1802, to his embassador Livingston
in Paris: This cession 'completely reverses all the political
relations of the United States, and will form a new epoch in
our political course. … There is on the globe one single spot,
the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy.'
Livingston was instructed to enter into negotiations
immediately for the cession of New Orleans and the Floridas,
in case France should consider the possession of Louisiana
indispensably necessary. As Bonaparte at this very time
entertained the idea of resuming the old French colonial
policy, the negotiations remained long without result. The
uprising of the negroes in San Domingo and the warlike turn
which the affairs of Europe began again to assume, disposed
him more favorably towards the American offer. On the 30th of
April, 1803, the treaty, ceding the whole of Louisiana to the
United States for $15,000,000, was concluded in Paris.

See LOUISIANA: A. D. 1798-1803.

Hamilton shared Jefferson's view, that the purchase of
Louisiana was a question of the greatest, and even of vital,
importance for the Union. His opposition on other occasions to
the policy of the administration, and his personal enmity to
the president, did not prevent his lending him a helping hand
in this matter when an opportunity offered. The great majority
of the Federalists opposed this increase of the territory of
the Union with as much decision as Hamilton advocated it. They
showed in their attitude towards this question a
short-sightedness which would have been astonishing even among
the doctrinarians of the opposite party."

_H. von Holst,
Constitutional and Political History of the United States,
volume 1, pages 183-185._

"Mr. Jefferson belonged to the school of strict construction,
and was in fact its leader and apostle. … Under a construction
of the Constitution as strict as he had been insisting upon,
it was plain that the government would have no power to
acquire foreign territory by purchase, and that any attempt in
that direction would be usurpation. … To give the necessary
authority an amendment of the Constitution would be essential,
and amendment would be a slow process which might not be
accomplished in time to meet the emergency. The case would be
complicated by the fact that if the territory was acquired a
considerable population would be brought into the Union and
thus made citizens by a process of naturalization not
contemplated by the Constitution. Mr. Madison, the Secretary
of State, agreed with the President in his views. To use Mr.
Jefferson's words, "The Constitution has made no provision for
our holding foreign territory; still less for incorporating
foreign nations into our Union.' But under circumstances so
imperative he thought the political departments of the
government should meet the emergency by consummating the
purchase, and 'then appeal to the nation for an additional
article in the Constitution approving and confirming an act
which the nation had not previously authorized.' He did not
conceal from himself, however, that in so doing ground would
be occupied which it would be difficult to defend, and he
proceeds to say: 'The less that is said about any
constitutional difficulty the better. Congress should do what
is necessary in silence. I find but one opinion as to the
necessity of shutting up the Constitution for some time.' Mr.
John Quincy Adams held similar views. … But it is difficult to
conceive of any doctrine more dangerous or more distinctly
antagonistic to the fundamental ideas of the American Union
than the doctrine that the Constitution may be 'shut up' for a
time in order that the government may accomplish something not
warranted by it. The political immorality was obvious and
glaring; more so in the case of the apostle of strict
construction than it could have been if advanced by any other
statesman of the day. … But Mr. Jefferson's political mistake
was scarcely greater than that committed by his opponents:
and, indeed, from a party standpoint it was no mistake
whatsoever, but a bold measure of wise policy.

{3328}

… The purchase, according to the Federal view of the
Constitution, was perfectly legitimate. … But the Federalists
in general took narrow and partisan views, and in order to
embarrass the administration resorted to quibbles which were
altogether unworthy the party which had boasted of Washington
as its chief and Hamilton as the exponent of its doctrines. …
The Federal leaders did not stop at cavils; they insisted that
the unconstitutional extension of territory was in effect a
dissolution of the Union, so that they were at liberty to
contemplate and plan for a final disruption."

_Judge T. M. Cooley,
The Acquisition of Louisiana
(Indiana Historical Society Pamphlets, number 3)._

The result of the debates on the Louisiana treaty, in the
Senate and the House, "decided only one point. Every speaker,
without distinction of party, agreed that the United States
government had the power to acquire new territory either by
conquest or by treaty; the only difference of opinion regarded
the disposition of this territory after it was acquired. Did
Louisiana belong to the central government at Washington, or
to the States? … Whether the government at Washington could
possess Louisiana as a colony or admit it as a State, was a
difference of no great matter if the cession were to hold
good; the essential point was that for the first time in the
national history all parties agreed in admitting that the
government could govern. … Even in 1804 the political
consequences of the act were already too striking to be
overlooked. Within three years of his inauguration Jefferson
bought a foreign colony without its consent and against its
will, annexed it to the United States by an act which he said
made blank paper of the Constitution; and then he who had
found his predecessors too monarchical, and the Constitution
too liberal in powers,—he who had nearly dissolved the bonds
of society rather than allow his predecessor to order a
dangerous alien out of the country in a time of threatened
war,—made himself monarch of the new territory, and wielded
over it, against its protests, the powers of its old kings.
Such an experience was final; no century of slow and
half-understood experience could be needed to prove that the
hopes of humanity lay thenceforward, not in attempting to
restrain the government from doing whatever the majority
should think necessary, but in raising the people themselves
till they should think nothing necessary but what was good."

_H. Adams,
History of the United States of America
during the first Administration of Jefferson,
volume 2, chapters 4-6._

ALSO IN:
_Treaties and Conventions between the United States
and other Powers (edition of 1889),
pages 331-342. _

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803.
Report on the British impressment of seamen from American ships.

"In consequence of a resolution of the Senate, calling upon
the President for information respecting the violation of the
national flag, and the impressment of American seamen, he
communicated to that body a letter from the Secretary of
State, specifying all the cases of impressment which had come
to the knowledge of that Department. The Secretary had no
information of the violation of the national flag, except in
the recent aggression of Morocco. It appeared, by this report,
that 43 citizens of the United States had been impressed by
the British, of whom 12 had protections. Ten were natives of
the British dominions, and 17 of other countries, none of whom
were stated to have been naturalized. Thus a practice which,
even within the British dominions, violates the dearest rights
of personal liberty, and which their courts have never
ventured to justify, and which is excused and acquiesced in on
the plea of necessity, was unhesitatingly exercised by British
navy officers on board of American vessels."

_G. Tucker,
History of the United States,
chapter 12 (volume 2)._

"When the captain of a British frigate overhauled an American
merchant-vessel for enemy's property or contraband of war, he
sent an officer on board who mustered the crew, and took out
any seamen whom he believed to be British. The measure, as the
British navy regarded it, was one of self-protection. If the
American government could not or would not discourage
desertion, the naval commander would recover his men in the
only way he could. Thus a circle of grievances was established
on each side. … The growth of American shipping stimulated
desertions from the British service to the extent of injuring
its efficiency; and these desertions in their turn led to a
rigorous exercise of the right of impressment. To find some
point at which this vicious circle could be broken was a
matter of serious consequence to both countries, but most so
to the one which avowed that it did not mean to protect its
interest by force. Great Britain could have broken the circle
by increasing the pay and improving the condition of her
seamen; but she was excessively conservative, and the burdens
already imposed on her commerce were so great that she could
afford to risk nothing. … Conscious of her own power, she
thought that the United States should be first to give way.
Had the American government been willing to perform its
neutral obligations strictly, the circle might have been
broken without much trouble; but the United States wished to
retain their advantage, and preferred to risk whatever England
might do rather than discourage desertion, or enact and
enforce a strict naturalization law, or punish fraud, The
national government was too weak to compel the States to
respect neutral obligations, even if it had been disposed to
make the attempt. The practice of impressment brought the two
governments to a deadlock on an issue of law. No one denied
that every government had the right to command the services of
its native subjects, and as yet no one ventured to maintain
that a merchant-ship on the high seas could lawfully resist
the exercise of this right; but the law had done nothing to
define the rights of naturalized subjects or citizens. The
British government might, no doubt, impress its own subjects;
but almost every British sailor in the American service
carried papers of American citizenship, and although some of
these were fraudulent, many were genuine. The law of England,
as declared from time out of mind by every generation of her
judges, held that the allegiance of a subject was
indefeasible, and therefore that naturalization was worthless.
The law of the United States, as declared by Chief-Justice
Ellsworth in 1799, was in effect the same."

_H. Adams,
History of the United States of America, during
the first Administration of Thomas Jefferson,
volume 2, chapter 14._

{3329}

"Great Britain was clearly in the wrong. She ought to have
kept her seamen by increasing their pay and putting an end to
the grievances which produced the mutiny of the Nore. In
heartlessly neglecting to render the service just to the
common sailor, and at the same time making a brutal use of
impressment, aristocratic government showed its dark side. It
is true that impressment was conscription in a coarse form,
and that the extreme notion of indefeasible allegiance still
prevailed. But the practice, however lawful, was intolerable,
and its offensiveness was sure to be aggravated by the conduct
of British commanders full of the naval pride of their nation
and perhaps irritated by the loss of their crews; for it is
not denied that many British seamen were seduced from the
service and that the American marine, both mercantile and
national, was largely manned in this way."

_Goldwin Smith,
The United States,
chapter 3._

See, also, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1809.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1803-1804.
Federalist Secession movement.

"In the winter … of 1803-4, immediately after, and as a
consequence of, the acquisition of Louisiana, certain leaders
of the Federal party conceived the project of the dissolution
of the Union, and the establishment of a Northern Confederacy.
The justifying causes to those who entertained it were, that
the annexation of Louisiana to the Union transcended the
constitutional powers of the government of the United States;
that it created, in fact, a new confederacy, to which the
States, united by the former compact, were not bound to
adhere; that it was oppressive to the interests and
destructive to the influence of the Northern section of the
Confederacy, whose right and duty it therefore was to secede
from the new body politic, and to constitute one of their own.
It was lamented that one inevitable consequence of the
annexation of Louisiana to the Union would be to diminish the
relative weight and influence of the Northern section; that it
would aggravate the evil of the slave representation; and
endanger the Union itself, by the expansion of its bulk, and
the enfeebling extension of its line of de·fence against
foreign invasion. A Northern Confederacy was thought to be the
only probable counterpoise to the manufacture of new States in
the South. This project was quietly and extensively discussed
at the time, by the members of Congress from Massachusetts and
Connecticut especially. General Hamilton, indeed, was chosen
as the person to be placed, at the proper time, at the head of
the military movement which, it was foreseen, would be
necessary for carrying the plan into execution. He was
consulted on the subject; and although it is quite certain
that he was opposed to it, he consented to attend a meeting of
Federalists in Boston in the autumn of 1804, but his untimely
death, in the summer of that year, prevented the meeting. To
whatever proportions, however, the project might otherwise
have gone, it was checked by the advantage which was evident
to all of the securing of so large a domain, by the great
desirableness of preventing France from holding the mouth of
our great river, and by the settlement of the question of our
national boundaries. These considerations gave a quietus for a
time to the suggestions of sectional jealousy."

_C. F. Robertson,
The Louisiana Purchase in its Influence
upon the American System
(Papers of the American Historical Association, volume 1),
pages 262-263._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804.
Fifth Presidential Election.

Thomas Jefferson, Democratic Republican, reelected by the vote
of 162 Electors in the College, against 14 voting for Charles
C. Pinckney, Federalist. George Clinton was chosen Vice
President.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1805.
Impeachment and trial of Judge Chase.

In the closing hours of the session of Congress which expired
March 4, 1803, proceedings of impeachment were begun for the
removal from the bench of Judge Pickering, United States
District Judge of New Hampshire, who had become mentally
incapable of discharging the duties of his office. "By the
federalists, the attack on Judge Pickering was taken as the
first of a series of impeachments, intended to revolutionize
the political character of the courts, but there is nothing to
prove that this was then the intent of the majority. The most
obnoxious justice on the supreme bench was Samuel Chase of
Maryland, whose violence as a political partisan had certainly
exposed him to the danger of impeachment; but two years had
now passed without producing any sign of an intention to
disturb him, and it might be supposed that the administration
thus condoned his offences. Unluckily, Judge Chase had not the
good taste or the judgment to be quiet. He irritated his
enemies by new indiscretions, and on May 13, 1803, nearly
three months after Pickering's impeachment, Mr. Jefferson, in
a letter to Joseph H. Nicholson, suggested that it would be
well to take him in hand:—'You must have heard of the
extraordinary charge of Chase to the grand jury at Baltimore.
Ought this seditious and official attack on the principles of
our Constitution and on the proceedings of a State to go
unpunished? And to whom so pointedly as yourself will the
public look for the necessary measures? I ask these questions
for your consideration. As for myself, it is better that I
should not interfere.' … Nicholson seems to have passed on to
Randolph the charge he had received from the President. … On
January 5, 1804, Randolph rose to move for an inquiry into the
conduct of Judge Chase. … After a long debate, the inquiry was
ordered, and Randolph, with his friend Nicholson, was put at
the head of the committee. On March 26, 1804, they reported
seven articles of impeachment. … With this the session ended,
and the trial went over to the next year. … The impeachment of
Justice Chase is a landmark in American history, because it
was here that the Jeffersonian republicans fought their last
aggressive battle, and, wavering under the shock of defeat,
broke into factions which slowly abandoned the field and
forgot their discipline. That such a battle must one day be
fought for the control of the Judiciary was from the beginning
believed by most republicans who understood their own
principles. Without controlling the Judiciary, the people
could never govern themselves in their own way; and although
they might, over and over again, in every form of law and
resolution, both state and national, enact and proclaim that
theirs was not a despotic but a restricted government, which
had no right to exercise powers not delegated to it, and over
which they, as States, had absolute control, it was none the
less certain that Chief Justice Marshall and his associates
would disregard their will, and would impose upon them his
own. The people were at the mercy of their creatures. The
Constitutions of England, of Massachusetts, of Pennsylvania,
authorized the removal of an obnoxious judge on a mere address
of the legislature, but the Constitution of the United States
had so fenced and fortified the Supreme Court that the
legislature, the Executive, the people themselves, could
exercise no control over it.
{3330}
A judge might make any decision, violate any duty, trample on
any right, and if he took care to commit no indictable offence
he was safe in office for life. On this license the
Constitution imposed only one check: it said that all civil
officers should be removed from office 'on impeachment for,
and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and
misdemeanors.' This right of impeachment was as yet undefined,
and if stretched a little beyond strict construction it might
easily be converted into something for which it had not been
intended. … Judge Chase's offences were serious. The immediate
cause of impeachment, his address to the grand jury at
Baltimore on the 2d May, 1803, proved that he was not a proper
person to be trusted with the interpretation of the laws. In
this address he said that those laws were rapidly destroying
all protection to property and all security to personal
liberty. 'The late alteration of the federal Judiciary,' said
he, 'by the abolition of the office of the sixteen circuit
judges, and the recent change in our state Constitution by the
establishing of universal suffrage, and the further alteration
that is contemplated in our state Judiciary, if adopted, will,
in my judgment, take away all security for property and
personal liberty. The independence of the national Judiciary
is already shaken to its foundations, and the virtue of the
people alone can restore it.' That by this reference to the
virtue of the people he meant to draw a contrast with the want
of virtue in their government was made clear by a pointed
insult to Mr. Jefferson: 'The modern doctrines by our late
reformers, that all men in a state of society are entitled to
enjoy equal liberty and equal rights, have brought this mighty
mischief upon us, and I fear that it will rapidly progress
until peace and order, freedom and property, shall be
destroyed.' … There was gross absurdity in the idea that the
people who, by an immense majority, had decided to carry on
their government in one way should be forced by one of their
own servants to turn about and go in the opposite direction;
and the indecorum was greater than the absurdity, for if Judge
Chase or any other official held such doctrines, even though
he were right, he was bound not to insult officially the
people who employed him. On these grounds Mr. Jefferson
privately advised the impeachment, and perhaps Randolph might
have acted more wisely had he followed Mr. Jefferson's hint to
rely on this article alone, which in the end came nearer than
any other to securing conviction. … The articles of
impeachment which Randolph presented to the House on March 26,
1804, and which were, he claimed, drawn up with his own hand,
rested wholly on the theory of Chase's criminality; they
contained no suggestion that impeachment was a mere inquest of
office. But when Congress met again, and, on December 3, the
subject came again before the House, it was noticed that two
new articles, the fifth and sixth, had been quietly
interpolated, which roused suspicion of a change in Randolph's
plan. … No one could doubt that Randolph and his friends,
seeing how little their ultimate object would be advanced by a
conviction on the old charges, inserted these new articles in
order to correct their mistake and to make a foundation for
the freer use of impeachment as a political weapon. The
behavior of Giles and his friends in the Senate strengthened
this suspicion. He made no concealment of his theories, and
labored earnestly to prevent the Senate from calling itself a
court, or from exercising any functions that belonged to a
court of law."

_H. Adams,
John Randolph,
chapters 4-6._

The doctrine of impeachment which Giles (Senator from
Virginia) and John Randolph maintained, in connection with the
trial of Judge Chase, and which seems to have been acquiesced
in by the majority of their party, is reported by John Quincy
Adams from a conversation to which he was a listener. In Mr.
Adams' Memoirs, under date of December 21, 1804, the incident
is related as follows: "There was little business to do [in
the Senate], and the adjournment took place early. Sitting by
the fireside afterwards, I witnessed a conversation between
Mr. Giles and Mr. Israel Smith, on the subject of
impeachments; during which Mr. John Randolph came in and took
part in the discussion. Giles labored with excessive
earnestness to convince Smith of certain principles, upon
which not only Mr. Chase, but all the other Judges of the
Supreme Court, excepting the one last appointed, must be
impeached and removed. He treated with the utmost contempt the
idea of an 'independent' judiciary—said there was not a word
about such an independence in the Constitution, and that their
pretensions to it were nothing more nor less than an attempt
to establish an aristocratic despotism in themselves. The
power of impeachment was given without limitation to the House
of Representatives; the power of trying impeachments was given
equally without limitation to the Senate; and if the Judges of
the Supreme Court should dare, as they had done, to declare an
act of Congress unconstitutional, or to send a mandamus to the
Secretary of State, as they had done, it was the undoubted
right of the House of Representatives to impeach them, and of
the Senate to remove them, for giving such opinions, however
honest and sincere they may have been in entertaining them.
Impeachment was not a criminal prosecution; it was no
prosecution at all. The Senate sitting for the trial of
impeachments was not a court, and ought to discard and reject
all process of analogy to a court of justice. A trial and
removal of a judge upon impeachment need not imply any
criminality or corruption in him. Congress had no power over
the person, but only over the office. And a removal by
impeachment was nothing more than a declaration by Congress to
this effect: You hold dangerous opinions, and if you are
suffered to carry them into effect you will work the
destruction of the nation. We want your offices, for the
purpose of giving them to men who will fill them better. In
answer to all this, Mr. Smith only contended that honest error
of opinion could not, as he conceived, be a subject of
impeachment. And in pursuit of this principle he proved
clearly enough the persecution and tyranny to which those of
Giles and Randolph inevitably lead. It would, he said,
establish 'a tyranny over opinions,' and he traced all the
arguments of Giles to their only possible issue of rank
absurdity. In all this conversation I opened my lips but once,
in which I told Giles that I could not assent to his
definition of the term impeachment."

_J. Q. Adams,
Memoirs,
edited by C. F. Adams,
volume 1, pages 322-323._

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The trial of Judge Chase was opened on the 9th of February,
1805, and ended on the 23d. By votes ranging from 15 to 34
(the total number of Senators being 34), he was acquitted on
each of the charges—a result attributed considerably to the
offensive and incapable manner in which the prosecution had
been conducted by John Randolph.

_J. Schouler,
History of the United States,
volume 2, page 77._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1805.
Expedition of Lewis and Clark across the continent.
The first exploration of the Missouri and beyond.

Captain Meriwether Lewis and Captain William Clark "were the
first men to cross the continent in our zone, the truly golden
zone. A dozen years before them, Mackenzie had crossed in
British dominions far north, but settlements are even now
sparse in that parallel. Still earlier had Mexicans traversed
the narrowing continent from the Gulf to the Pacific, but
seemed to find little worth discovery. It was otherwise in the
zone penetrated by Lewis and Clark. There development began at
once and is now nowhere surpassed. Along their route ten
States, with a census in 1890 of eight and a half millions,
have arisen in the wilderness. … The credit of our Great
Western discovery is due to Jefferson, though he never crossed
the Alleghanies. When Columbus saw the Orinoco rushing into
the ocean with irrepressible power and volume, he knew that he
had anchored at the mouth of a continental river. So
Jefferson, ascertaining that the Missouri, though called a
branch, at once changed the color and character of the
Mississippi, felt sure that whoever followed it would reach
the innermost recesses of our America. Learning afterward that
Captain Gray had pushed into the mouth of the Columbia only
after nine days' breasting its outward current, he deemed that
river a worthy counterpart of the Missouri, and was convinced
that their headwaters could not be far apart in longitude.
Inaugurated in 1801, before his first Presidential term was
half over he had obtained, as a sort of secret-service fund,
the small sum which sufficed to fit out the expedition. He had
also selected Lewis, his private secretary, for its head, and
put him in a course of special training. But the actual voyage
up the Missouri, purchased April 30, 1803, was not begun till
the middle of May, 1804. Forty-five persons in three boats
composed the party. … After 171 days the year's advance ended
with October, for the river was ready to freeze. The distance
up stream they reckoned at 1,600 miles, or little more than 9
miles a day, a journey now made by railroad in forty-four
hours. … Winter quarters were thirty miles above the Bismarck
of our day. Here they were frozen in about five months. The
huts they built and abundant fuel kept them warm. Thanks to
their hunters and Indian traffic, food was seldom scarce.
Officials of the Hudson's Bay Company (who had a post within a
week's journey) and many inquisitive natives paid them visits.
From all these it was their tireless endeavor to learn
everything possible concerning the great unknown of the river
beyond. Scarcely one could tell about distant places from
personal observation, but some second-hand reports were
afterward proved strangely accurate, even as to the Great
Falls, which turned out to be a thousand miles away. It was
not long, however, before they learned that the wife of
Chaboneau, whom they had taken as a local interpreter, was a
captive whose birth had been in the Rocky Mountains. She,
named the Bird-woman, was the only person discoverable after a
winter's search who could by possibility serve them as
interpreter and guide among the unknown tongues and
labyrinthine fastnesses which they must encounter. Early in
April, 1805, the explorers, now numbering thirty-two, again
began to urge their boats up the river, for their last year's
labors had brought them no more than half-way to their first
objective, its source. No more Indian purveyors or pilots:
their own rifles were the sole reliance for food. Many a
wigwam, but no Indian, was espied for four months and four
days after they left their winter camp. It was through the
great Lone Land that they groped their dark and perilous way.
In twenty days after the spring start they arrived at the
Yellowstone, and in thirty more they first sighted the Rocky
Mountains. Making the portage at the Great Falls cost them a
month of vexatious delay. Rowing on another month brought them
on August 12 to a point where one of the men stood with one
foot each side of the rivulet, and 'thanked God that he had
lived to bestride the Missouri, heretofore deemed endless.'
They dragged their canoes, however, up the rivulet for five
days longer. It was 460 days since they had left the mouth of
the river, and their mileage on its waters had been 3,096
miles. A mile further they stood on the great divide, and
drank of springs which sent their water to the Pacific. But
meantime they had been ready to starve in the mountains. Their
hunters were of the best, but they found no game: buffaloes
had gone down into the lowlands, the birds of heaven had fled,
and edible roots were mostly unknown to them. For more than
four months they had looked, and lo! there was no man. It was
not till August 13 that, surprising a squaw so encumbered with
pappooses that she could not escape, and winning her heart by
the gift of a looking-glass and painting her cheeks, they
formed friendship with her nation, one of whose chiefs proved
to be a brother of their Bird-woman. Horses were about all
they could obtain of these natives, streams were too full of
rapids to be navigable, or no timber fit for canoes was within
reach. So the party, subsisting on horse-flesh, and afterwards
on dog-meat, toiled on along one of the worst possible routes.
Nor was it till the 7th of October that they were able to
embark in logs they had burned hollow, upon a branch of the
Columbia, which, after manifold portages and perils, bore them
to its mouth and the goal of their pilgrimage, late in
November. Its distance from the starting-point, according to
their estimate, was 4,134 miles. … Many an episode in this
eventful transcontinental march and countermarch will
hereafter glorify with romantic associations islands, rivers,
rocks, cañons, and mountains all along its track. Among these
none can be more touching than the story of the Bird-woman,
her divination of routes, her courage when men quailed, her
reunion with a long-lost brother, her spreading as good a
table with bones as others could with meat, her morsel of
bread for an invalid benefactor, her presence with her infant
attesting to savages that the expedition could not be hostile.
But when bounties in land and money were granted to others,
she was unthought of. Statues of her, however, must yet be
reared by grateful dwellers in lands she laid open for their
happy homes. Western poets will liken her to Ariadne and
Beatrice."

The Nation,
October 26, 1893
(Reviewing Dr. Coues' edition of "History of the
Expedition under the Command of Lewis and Clark").

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1805,
Jefferson's Plans of National defense.
His Gunboat fleet.

Mr. Jefferson's views as to the measures required for national
defense, in the disturbed foreign relations of the country,
were indicated in his message to Congress, when it assembled
in November, 1804, but were afterwards communicated more fully
to Mr. Nicholson, of Maryland, chairman of the committee to
which the subject was referred. "Concerning fortifications, he
remarks that the plans and estimates of those required for our
principal harbours, made fifty millions of dollars necessary
for their completion. It would require 2,000 men to garrison
them in peace, and 50,000 in war. When thus completed and
manned, they would avail but little, as all military men agree
that when vessels might pass a fort without tacking, though it
may annoy, it cannot prevent them. Two modes of effecting the
same object might be 'adopted in aid of each other.' 1. Heavy
cannon on travelling carriages, with militia trained to the
management of them. 2. Floating batteries or gunboats. There
were, he estimated, fifteen harbours in the United States
needing and deserving defence. They would require 250
gunboats. The cost of these had been estimated at 2,000
dollars each, but he puts it down at 4,000, amounting in all
to 1,000,000 dollars. Such of them as were kept under a
shelter, ready to be launched, when wanted, would cost nothing
more than an inclosure, or sentinel; those that were afloat,
with men enough to take care of them, about 2,000 dollars a
year each; and those fully manned for action about 8,000
dollars a year. He thought twenty-five of the second
description enough, when France and England were at war. When
at war ourselves, some of the third description would be
required, the precise number depending on circumstances. There
were ten then built and building, and fifteen more it was
thought would be sufficient to put every harbour into a
respectable state of defence. Congress, neither fulfilling the
wishes of the President, nor altogether resisting them, gave
the President the means of partially trying his favourite
scheme, by the appropriation of 60,000 dollars. The
sufficiency of this species of naval defence occasioned a good
deal of discussion about this time between the opponents and
the supporters of the administration. … The scheme was
vehemently assailed by his adversaries in every form of
argument and ridicule, and was triumphantly adduced as a
further proof that he was not a practical statesman. The
officers of the navy were believed to be, with scarcely an
exception, opposed to the system of gunboats, especially those
who were assigned to this service, partly because it was found
to be personally very uncomfortable, and yet more, perhaps,
because the power they wielded was so inferior, and their
command so insignificant, compared with that to which they had
been familiarized. It was like compelling a proud man to give
up a fine richly caparisoned charger for a pair of panniers
and a donkey. To stem the current of public opinion, which so
far as it was manifested, set so strong against these
gunboats, and to turn it in their favour, Mr. Jefferson
prevailed on Paine, who had since his return been addressing
the people of the United States on various topics, through the
newspapers, to become their advocate. He set about it with his
wonted self-confidence and real talent in enforcing his views,
and proceeded to show that a gun from a gunboat would do the
same execution as from a seventy-four, and cost no more,
perhaps less; but a ship carrying seventy-four guns, could
bring only one half to bear on an enemy at once, whereas if
they were distributed among seventy-four boats, they could all
be equally effective at once. In spite of this logic, the
public, pinning its faith on experienced men, remained
incredulous; and when, soon afterwards, many of the new marine
were driven ashore in a tempest, or were otherwise destroyed,
no one seemed to regard their loss as a misfortune, and the
officers of the navy did not affect to conceal their
satisfaction: nor has any attempt been since made to replace
them. … The error of Mr. Jefferson was not, as his enemies
charged, in adopting a visionary scheme of defence, but in
limiting his views from a motive of economy, to the protection
of the harbours, and in leaving his country's commerce and
seamen, on the ocean, defenceless."

_G. Tucker,
The Life of Thomas Jefferson,
volume 2, chapter 8._

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1804-1809.
Difficulties with Great Britain.
Neutral rights.
The Right of Search.
Impressment.
Blockade by Orders in Council and the Berlin and Milan Decrees.
Embargo and Non-intercourse.

For a time, after 1803, almost the whole carrying trade of
Europe was in American hands. "The merchant flag of every
belligerent, save England, disappeared from the sea. France
and Holland absolutely ceased to trade under their flags.
Spain for a while continued to transport her specie and her
bullion in her own ships protected by her men-of-war. But
this, too, she soon gave up, and by 1806 the dollars of Mexico
and the ingots of Peru were brought to her shores in American
bottoms. It was under our flag that the gum trade was carried
on with Senegal; that the sugar trade was carried on with
Cuba; that coffee was exported from Caracas; and hides and
indigo from South America. From Vera Cruz, from Carthagena,
from La Plata, from the French colonies in the Antilles, from
Cayenne, from Dutch Guiana, from the Isles of France and
Reunion, from Batavia and Manilla, great fleets of American
merchantmen sailed for the United States, there to neutralize
the voyage and then go on to Europe. They filled the
warehouses at Cadiz and Antwerp to overflowing. They glutted
the markets of Embden and Lisbon, Hamburg and Copenhagen with
the produce of the West Indies and the fabrics of the East,
and, bringing back the products of the looms and forges of
Germany to the New World, drove out the manufactures of
Yorkshire, Manchester, and Birmingham. But this splendid trade
was already marked for destruction. That Great Britain should
long treat it with indifference was impossible. … She
determined … to destroy it, and to destroy it in two ways: by
paper blockades and by admiralty decisions. In January, 1804,
accordingly, Great Britain blockaded the ports of Guadeloupe
and Martinique. In April her commander at Jamaica blockaded
Curaçoa. In August she extended the blockade to the Straits of
Dover and the English Channel."

_J. B. McMaster,
History of the People of the United States,
volume 3, pages 225-226._

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