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nebulous, mysterious, vague, conjectural, and it still remains so. Wilkinson, who has been charged with complicity in the plot and whose conduct in the matter is in many respects inexplicable, sent the papers by a special messenger to Washington, and they were placed in the hands of the President on the 25th of November. On the 27th he issued a proclamation in the following words, in which the name of Burr is carefully avoided. In Wilkinson's dispatches he had stated that he did not know who was the prime mover of the conspiracy; but there was every reason for believing that Burr's association with it. was well known to the President. In fact, it is admitted in his message to Congress of January 22, 1807.a

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas, information has been received that sundry persons, citizens of the United States or residents within the same, are conspiring and confederating together to begin and set on foot, provide, and prepare the means for a military expedition or enterprise against the dominions of Spain; that for this purpose they are fitting out and arming vessels in the western waters of the United States, collecting provisions, arms, military stores, and means; are deceiving and seducing honest and wellmeaning citizens, under various pretenses, to engage in their criminal enterprises; are organizing, officering, and arming themselves for the same, contrary to the laws in such cases made and provided:

I have therefore thought proper to issue this my proclamation, warning and enjoining all faithful citizens who have been led without due knowledge or consideration to participate in the said unlawful enterprises to withdraw from the same without delay, and commanding all persons whatsoever engaged or concerned in the same to cease all further proceedings therein, as they will answer the contrary at their peril and incur prosecution with all the rigors of the law. And I hereby enjoin and require all officers, civil and military, of the United States, or of any of the States or Territories, and especially all governors and other executive authorities, all judges, justices, and other officers of the peace, all military officers of the Army or Navy of the United States, or officers of the militia, to be vigilant, each within his respective department and according to his functions, in searching out and bringing to condign punishment all persons engaged or concerned in such enterprise, in seizing and detaining, subject to the disposition of the law, all vessels, arms, military stores, or other means provided or providing for the same, and, in general, in preventing the carrying on such expedition or enterprise by all lawful means within their power; and I require all good and faithful citizens and others within the United States to be aiding and assisting herein, and especially in the discovery, apprehension, and bringing to justice of all such offenders, in preventing the execution of their unlawful designs, and in giving information against them to the proper authorities.

In testimony whereof, I have caused the seal of the United States to be affixed to these presents, and have signed the same with my hand.

Given at the city of Washington, on the 27th day of November, eighteen hundred and six, and in the year of the sovereignty of the United States the thirty-first. [SEAL.] TH: JEFFERSON.

By the President:

JAMES MADISON,

Secretary of State.

a Messages and Papers of the Presidents (Richardson), Vol. I, p. 412.

In the message above referred to the President asserts that Burr's designs seem to differ as they are revealed by different informants. One was a severance of the Union by the Allegheny Mountains; a second an attack on Mexico; a third the settlement of a pretended purchase of a tract of country on the Washita. That finding the attachment of the Western country to the Union was not to be shaken, he determined to seize New Orleans, plunder the bank there, seize the military and naval stores, and proceed on his expedition to Mexico. It was upon this theory that the Government proceeded to act. Orders were dispatched to every point on the Ohio and Mississippi from Pittsburg to New Orleans for the employment of regular troops or militia to arrest all persons concerned and to suppress the further progress of the enterprise. The governor and legislature of Ohio were prompt to act; the militia were called out, and dispatched at once to Marietta, opposite Blennerhassett Island, in the Ohio River, where it was known that Burr was building boats and collecting stores; fifteen boats were captured, but Burr with two other boats had escaped. The island was a part of the State of Virginia, and the Ohio militia could not visit it; but under the authority of the proclamation the colonel of a militia regiment in Wood County, Va., called out his men and took possession of the island, where they destroyed considerable property and committed much vandalism, but failed to discover the fugitives. Many years afterwards Mrs. Blennerhassett petitioned Congress for indemnification for these depredations, but without avail."

In the meantime Burr had reached Nashville. The governor of Kentucky had called out his militia and detachments had been stationed at various river points, but the two boats had passed them unnoticed. On the 19th of December the proclamation reached the governor of Tennessee, who immediately ordered out a body of militia with orders to seize the boats and arrest the men. Again the news reached Burr in time to enable him to drop down the river into the Mississippi Territory. He reached Bayou Pierre, 30 miles above Natchez, where he first learned of Wilkinson's course, and of a proclamation of the governor of Mississippi calling upon his militia to arrest him and crush his plot. The militia came up to the boats on the 15th of January, 1807, and Burr agreed to surrender upon proper legal process. A grand jury was at once impaneled, but instead of presenting the expected indictment they declared Burr innocent of any crime or misdemeanor against the laws of the United States or of Mississippi Territory, condemned the calling out of the militia as foolish and unnecessary, and denounced the arrests as unwarranted and unjustifiable. Burr then resolved to make his way across the country to Pensacola, then Spanish territory, where he hoped to find refuge. He

a Senate Doc. No. 394, Twenty-seventh Congress, second session.

succeeded in reaching the frontier, but before he could cross it he was arrested by a detachment of regular troops under Capt. (afterward Maj. Gen.) E. P. Gaines and taken to Fort Stoddart. Burr was brought before the United States circuit court at Richmond, Va., August 3, 1807, on an indictment for treason, and on August 31 the jury brought in a verdict of "not guilty." A second trial followed on the charge of misdemeanor, and on this he was again acquitted on the ground that the offense was not committed in Virginia, but in Ohio. The Government made no further prosecution and Burr left the country soon after for a long period of exile."

created.

Up to this time, and for some years later, the Regular Army was too few in numbers to warrant its employment for other purpose than the manning of the few fortifications on the seacoast and the protection of the frontier. The first recognition of the Army after the adoption. of the Constitution was the act of September 29, 1789, which authorized a force of 700 men to be raised for three years, which, with the two companies of artillery then in service, made an aggregate of 886 officers and men. This was increased to 1,273 by the act of April 30, 1790, and to 2,232 by the act of March 3, 1791, but at no time was the number actually in service equal to that authorized. A Regular Army The act of March 5, 1792, creating the "Legion of the United States," authorized a reorganization of this slender Army which gave it an increase up to 5,414, and this was substantially its strength until the 30th of May, 1796, when another act reduced it to 3,359. The panic of 1798-99, created by the fear of possible hostilities with France, induced Congress to clothe the President with power to raise an emergency army, and by the various acts of May 30, 1797; April 28, 1798; May 28, 1798; July 16, 1798, and March 3, 1799, all of which were vague, uncertain, and contradictory, an army was created, on paper, with a strength of 50,000 men and 2,000 officers; but although commissions were tendered and accepted to nearly the authorized number, few men were ever enlisted, and the opening of the new century found the Army reduced to about its former strength of 4,000 officers and men. Another attack upon this meager force (act of March 16, 1802) reduced it to 3,287, and it there remained until by the act of April 12, 1808, it was increased to 10,000, which maximum obtained until the breaking out of the second war with Great Britain. During this period of evolution it was quite impracticable to expect the Army to afford any assistance in case of domestic disturbances, it being generally understood and accepted that all duties of that nature were the special work of the militia.

a See also Lossing's Cyclopædia of American History, Vol. I; Pickett's History of Alabama, vol. 2, p. 213; message on the Burr conspiracy, and accompanying documents, January 22, 1807; House of Representatives report on the conduct of General Wilkinson, May 1, 1810, Eleventh Congress, second session.

S. Doc. 209- -4

The first contraproposition was advanced in the act of March 8, 1807 (2 Stat. L., 443):

That in all cases of insurrection or obstruction to the laws, either of the United States or of any individual State or Territory, where it is lawful for the President of the United States to call forth the militia for the purpose of suppressing such insurrection or of causing the laws to be duly executed, it shall be lawful for him to employ, for the same purposes, such part of the land or naval force of the United States as shall be judged necessary, having first observed all the prerequisites of the law in that respect.

The occasion for the exercise of this judgment was already developing. The embargo act of Congress of December 22, 1807, supplemented by that of March 12, 1808, prohibiting the departure of any vessel from any port of the United States, and ordering all American vessels abroad to return home forthwith, which aroused the most violent and incessant opposition throughout the country, was nowhere received with greater dismay and consternation than by the people of northern Vermont along the shores of Lake Champlain. Depending entirely upon Canada as a market for the cattle, timber, and other products, which constituted the chief articles of export, and upon the articles of wear and sustenance received in exchange, the effect of this law was to simply take from them their sole means of support and to goad them to resistance. Immediately upon receipt of the official copy of the law the collector of the Vermont district, Mr. Penniman, advised Mr. Gallatin, the Secretary of the Treasury, that it would be impossible to execute it without a military force. This report having been sent to the President, he called the members of the Vermont delegation in Congress into consultation and, upon embargo troubles, their advice, decided that it was most important to 1808. crush at once every example of forcible opposition to the law. The collector was accordingly instructed to arm, equip, and man as many vessels as he might think necessary-with volunteers, if possible; otherwise by force of arms. At the same time the United States marshal was authorized, if the opposition be too powerful for the collector, to raise his posse and aid in suppressing the insurrection. Should these measures prove ineffective, the Secretary of War was instructed to request the governor to publish the usual proclamation and to call out the militia. (Jefferson's Complete Works, vol. 5, p. 271.)

The

On the 5th of May (1808), by order of the governor, Gen. Levi House, commanding the First Brigade of Vermont Militia, ordered out a small detachment from the First Regiment in Franklin County, and these men were stationed at Windmill Point. The proclamation appeared five days later, and was greeted with derision by the more desperate and with amazement by all. Town meetings were called at various points, in which resolutions were framed, unanimously passed,

and forwarded to Washington, protesting against the implication that insurrection and rebellion existed or that there was any other cause for the charge than the acts of a few individuals whose families were on the verge of starvation and ruin because of the embargo restrictions. The proclamation is as follows:

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas, information has been received that sundry persons are combined or combining and confederating together on Lake Champlain and the country thereto adjacent for the purposes of forming insurrections against the authority of the laws of the United States, for opposing the same and obstructing their execution, and that such combinations are too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings or by the powers vested in the marshals by the laws of the United States:

Now, therefore, to the end that the authority of the laws may be maintained, and that those concerned, directly or indirectly, in any insurrection or combination against the same may be duly warned, I have issued this my proclamation, hereby commanding such insurgents and all concerned in such combination instantly and without delay to disperse and retire peaceably to their respective abodes. And I do hereby further require and command all officers having authority, civil or military, and all other persons, civil or military, who shall be found within the vicinity of such insurrections or combinations to be aiding and assisting by all the means in their power, by force of arms or otherwise, to quell and subdue such insurrections or combinations, to seize upon all those therein concerned who shall not instantly and without delay disperse and retire to their respective abodes, and to deliver them over to the civil authorities of the place to be proceeded against according to law.

In testimony whereof, I have caused the seal of the United States to be affixed to these presents and signed the same with my hand.

Given at the city of Washington, the 19th day of April, eighteen hundred and eight, and in the year of the sovereignty and Independence of the United States the thirtysecond.

[SEAL.]

By the President:

JAMES MADISON,

Secretary of State.

TH: JEFFERSON.

It appearing that notwithstanding the presence of the detachment at Windmill Point, several rafts owned by the smugglers passed into Canada, another detachment of 150 men from Rutland County was sent to join them. This act seems to have incited the ire of the militia from Franklin County, for on the 17th of June a meeting of all the commissioned officers of the First Brigade was held and a spirited address to the public adopted in which it was declared that the sending of the Rutland County militia into the district was "an open, direct, and most degrading insult." A few weeks later another mass meeting was held in Franklin County, in which it was declared "the inhabitants on Lake Champlain would never submit to the enforcement of the embargo law." Under these circumstances it was decided by the President that

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