'making provision for the debt," as limits the right of the United States, in their redemption of it, was "dangerous to the rights, subversive of the interests of the people; and demanded the marked disapprobation of the General Assembly." They denounced the Assumption as "repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, giving to it, the exercise of a power not granted to the General government;"" as a measure particularly injurious to the interests of Virginia ;" "as an act impolitic, unjust, odious and deformed;" one which, "republican policy could scarcely have suggested; as intended to concentrate and perpetuate a large moneyed interest, which would produce a prostration of agriculture at the feet of commerce, or a change in the present form of the Federal government, fatal to the existence of American Liberty."

This proceeding was looked upon with well-grounded alarm by the friends of the Constitution. "We shall soon, whenever this comes into general practice," a disguished patriot wrote to Hamilton, "be without a Federal government; and with its fall, we shall probably be deprived, for ages to come, of the power of again assembling and forming a system for the general government of the United States, by the voice of the people." *

"This is the first symptom of a spirit," was the language of Hamilton to the Chief Justice," which must either be killed, or will kill the Constitution of the United States. I send the resolutions to you, that it may be considered what ought to be done. Ought not the collective weight of the different parts of the government to be employed in exploding the principles they contain? This question arises out of sudden and undigested thought."

General Lincoln to Hamilton.-Hamilton's Works, v. 460.

These Resolutions were presented to the House of Representatives by Madison, on the fourteenth of January, seventeen hundred and ninety-one; and, subsequently, in pursuance of the express request of Virginia, by the President; an unworthy artifice thereby to gain his apparent sanction to their opposition to a measure, he had both privately and officially approved.

The discontents on this subject were not confined to that State. The nucleus of a party, to pervade the Union, had been formed; and its influence was seen in the proceedings of other legislatures.

In Maryland, a resolution, that the Assumption was dangerous to the State governments was defeated only by the vote of the Speaker of the House. North Carolina stigmatized it, with great violence, and instructed her senators to urge the reduction of the monstrous salaries of the Federal officers, and to vote against any act levying an Excise, or direct tax. Her judges, subsequently, refused to make a return to a writ from the District Court of the United States; and, she denied the use of her prisons to convicts under the laws of the nation. Georgia also evinced her dissatisfaction, though as to other subjects.

Thus, the commencement of this Government presented an extraordinary scene-Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and South Carolina, on the one hand, pressing their claims for justice upon the General government; while Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia denounced the provision for those claims, as pregnant with dangers to their liberties. The Northern States meanwhile clamoring against high salaries and pensions; the Southern, denouncing the Quakers, and deprecating the abolition of slavery.

The Report on Public Credit proposed to derive the

revenue to discharge the interest upon the continental debt from the existing duties on imports, and tonnage, and from additional duties to be imposed upon wines, spirits, (including those distilled within the United States,) teas, and coffee.

The bill framed by Hamilton, for raising a revenue from distilled spirits, it has been seen, was considered before the Funding bill had passed both Houses. The revenue from imports having been granted to the General government, the advocates of the Assumption, unwilling to deprive the States of the resource of an excise, while they remained charged with a debt which properly was a debt of the Union; rejected this bill.

As a mode of discharging the public burthens, without imposing on commerce duties, which, in its infancy, might be prejudicial, Hamilton renewed his proposition at the third session of Congress for a duty on domestic, distilled spirits. A concerted clamor was raised. The greatest violence was manifested in Georgia, the Carolinas, Virginia, and Pennsylvania.

In the latter State, a petition to Congress against the bill was widely circulated; and soon after, the subject was brought before its Legislature. There, the most active and conspicuous opponents to the system of internal revenue were-William Findley, who is seen to have signalized himself in his hostility to the Constitution, and Alphonso Albert Gallatin, a young Swiss, who having sojourned for a time in Massachusetts and Virginia, alighted near the Western limits of Pennsylvania, where he began his marked career.

* "The Southern people," Ames wrote, " care little about the debt. They doubt the necessity of more revenue. They fear the excise themselves, and still more their people, to whom it is obnoxious; and to whom they are making it more odious still, by the indiscreet violence of their debates,"

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In the debate upon Resolutions by that body (following the recent example of Virginia) to instruct her Senators to oppose the Excise, which were adopted; the mode of preventing the execution of this law was indicated by Findley. He remarked, "Excise men can be held in disgrace; they may be refused the countenance and comforts of society; they may be refused lodging and refreshment; and think themselves happy in escaping from their districts, without the penalty of any law being incurred;" suggestions which were soon after minutely followed.

The opposition in Congress now changed their ground. They first voted for the Excise, in the hope, that, if it passed, it would defeat the Assumption. The Assumption having been authorized, this motive no longer existed. The original Excise bill contained clauses which, from a regard to personal liberty, Hamilton afterwards expunged— yet they supported it! They now sanctioned the violence which their leaders had excited; denounced the amended law as inconsistent with popular rights; and proposed, as substitutes, taxes on newspapers, on internal navigation, a stamp act!

It has been seen, that the plan of a National Bank, was announced to the House of Representatives, in the Report on Public Credit, published in January, seventeen hundred and ninety, as the medium of applying the money to be borrowed for the purpose of effecting the purchase and reduction of the debt. This plan was, therefore, before the public, from the beginning of the second meeting of Congress; yet, though it was occasionally alluded to, not an objection was made during the whole excited debate of that session, either as to its constitutionality or expediency.

In the public press, not a sentence appeared against