Page images
PDF
EPUB

him from nominating any other individual qualified to discharge faithfully the duties of a Minister. He therefore suffered the business to devolve on his successor."

On the 4th of March, the Presidency of ADAMS expired. JEFFERSON entered upon the office the same day, with the following address to the two Houses of Congress.

"Friends and Fellow Citizens,

"Called upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of our country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my fellow citizens which is here assembled, to express my grateful thanks for the favour with which they have been pleased to look towards me, 'to declare a sincere conscious ness that the task is above my talents, and that I approach it with those anxious and awful presentiments, which the greatness of the charge, and the weakness of my powers so justly inspire. A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land, traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their industry; engaged in commerce with nations, who feel powers and forget right, advancing rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye; when I contemplate these transcendant objects, and see the honour, the happiness, and the hopes of this beloved country, committed to the issue and the auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation, and humble myself before the magnitude of the undertaking. Utterly, indeed, should I despair, did not the presence of many whom I here see, remind me that in the other high authorities provided by our constitution, I shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal, on which to rely under all difficulties. To you, then, Gentlemen, who are charged with the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those associated with you, I look with encouragement for that guidance and support, which may enable us to steer with safety the vessel in which we are all embarked amidst the conflicting elements of a troubled world.

During the contest of opinion through which we have passed, the animation of discussions and exertions has sometimes worn an aspect, which might impose on strangers, unused to think freely, and to speak and to write what they think; but this being now decided by the voice of the nation, announced according to the rules of the constitution, all will of course arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in common efforts for the common good. All too will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the

majo

majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which. equal laws must protect, and to violate would be oppression. Let us, then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart and one mind; let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection, without which liberty, and even life itself, are but dreary things; and let us reflect, that having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance, as despotic as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient world, during the agonising spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood and slaughter his long lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the agitation of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful shore-that this should be more felt and feared by some and less by others, and should divide opinions as to measures of safety; but every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all Republicans-all Federalists. If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this union, or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed, that some honest men fear that a republican government cannot be strong, that this government is not strong enough. But would the honest, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm in the theoretic and visionary fear that this government, the world's best hope, may, by possibility, want energy to preserve itself? I trust not; I believe this, on the contrary, the strongest government on earth.-I believe it the only one where every man at the call of the law would fly to the standard of the law, and would meet invasions of the public order as his own personal concern. Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trasted with the government of himself-Can he then be trusted. with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer the question. Let us, then, with courage and confidence pursue our own federal and republican principles; our attachment to union and representative government. Kindly separated by nature, and a wide ocean, from the exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe, too high minded to endure the degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country, with room enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisition of our own industry, to honour and confidence from our fellow citizens, resulting not from birth, but from our actions, and their sense of them

en

enlightened by a benign religion, professed indeed and practised in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man, acknowledging and adoring an over-ruling providence, which, by all its dispensations, proves that it delights in the happiness of man here, and his greater happiness hereafter; with all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and prosperous people? Still one thing more, fellow citizens: a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labour the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government; and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.

"About to enter, fellow citizens, on thé exercise of duties which comprehend every thing dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our government, and consequently those which oughtto shape its administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not its limitations: Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliances with none; the support of the state governments in all their rights, as the most competent administration for our domestic concerns, and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies; the preservation of the general government in its whole constitutional vigour, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the people; a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution, where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a well disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace, and for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labour may be lightly burthened; the honest payment of our debts, and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture and commerce, as its handmaid; the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of the person, under protection of the Habeas Corpus; and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of all our sages, and blood of our heroes

have been devoted to their attainment: they should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and, should we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps, and regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty and safety.

"I repair, then, fellow citizens, to the post you have assigned me. With experience enough in subordinate offices to have seen the difficulties of this, the greatest of all, I have learned to expect that it will rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station, with the reputation and the favour which bring him into it. Without pretensions to that high confidence you reposed in your first and greatest revolutionary character, whose preeminent services had entitled him to the first place in his country's love, and destined for him the fairest page in the volume of faithful history, I ask so much confidence only as may give firmness and effect to the legal administration of your affairs. I shall often go wrong through defect of judgment: when right, I shall often be thought wrong by those whose positions will not command a view of the whole ground. I ask your indulgence for my own error, which will never be intentional; and your support against the errors of others, who may condemn what they would not if seen in all its parts. The approbation implied by your suffrage is a great consolation to me for the past, and my future solicitude will be to retain the good opinion of those who have bestowed it in advance; to conciliate that of others, by doing them all the good in my power, and to be instrumental to the happiness and freedom of all.

"Relying, then, on the patronage of your good will, I advance with obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become sensible how much better choices it is in your power to make; and may that infinite Power, which rules the destinies of the Universe, lead our councils to what is best, and give them a favourable issue for your peace and prosperity."

TO

PORCUPINE'S WORKS,

IN TWELVE VOLUMES.

N. B. The Roman Numerals refer to the Volume, and the Figures to the Page.

A

A.B.'s letter to Governor Shelby, iii. 428.

ix. 7.

X.211.

letter to Mr. Brown, news-printer, refpecting a furprise,

letter to Friend Peter, on M'Kean's turning Quaker,

Abercrombie's, Rev. Mr. letter to the O'Careys, v. 349.
Ability of the republican judiciary in America, x. 429.

Abominable republican fraternity in the cafe of Captain Worth, v. 235.

A. C.'s letter to Porcupine on the patriotifm of his paper, viii. 27. Academy, female, in Philadelphia, xi. 242.

Accommodation. Mr. Lee retracts his charge against Judge Livermore, xi. 33.

Account of the infurrection in the western counties of Pennfylvania, in 1794, i. 221.

of the rejoicings for peace at Philadelphia, iii. 437Act of the United States refpecting French royalifts, ix. 1. Adams, Mr. chosen Vice-prefident of the United States, 1788,

i. 91.

Mr. Vice-prefident of the United States, &c. iii. 29. 's, Mr. John, election to the office of Prefident, iv. 344. Prefident, his first speech to the two Houses of Reprefentatives, iv. 344.

Mr. John, took his oath of office, and delivered his firft fpeech as Prefident, v. 16.

vi. 65.

Prefident, ratifies the treaty of America with Tripoli,

Prefident, his fpeech on dispatches received from General Pinckney, vi. 105.

242.

Samuel, his proclamation to the people of Boston, ii.

Prefident, his answer to the addrefs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, vii. 117.

-, Samuel, républican honesty, vii. 169.

[blocks in formation]

Adams,

« PreviousContinue »