of the same principle. We are all republicans, we are 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 patriot, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm, on 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 trusted 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 this 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 acquisitions of our own industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow-citizens resulting not from birth but from our actions and their sense of them; enlightened by a benign religion, professed indeed and practiced in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man; acknowledging and ador

ing an overruling 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 a 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 of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor 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 the exercise of duties which comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our government, and consequently those which ought to shape its administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle but not all 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 administrations for our domestic concerns, and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies: the preservation of the general government in its whole constitutional vigor, 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 labor may be lightly

burthened: the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith:- encouragement of agriculture and of 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 person under the 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 the age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of 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 alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to 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 learnt to expect that it will rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station with the reputation, and the favor which bring him into it. Without pretensions to that high confidence you reposed in our 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 errors, 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 choice 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 favorable issue for your peace and prosperity.

Journal of the Senate, 6th Congress, 2d Session, pp. 141147. March 4, 1801.

QUESTIONS

What did Jefferson consider to be the real strength of the Government of the United States? Why was a Republican government most sure to be stable? What material conditions favorable to its peace and happiness did the United States enjoy? Describe the kind of government that Jefferson pronounced necessary to complete this happiness. What did Jefferson indicate as his foreign policy? What did he consider to be the value in the American constitutional system of the State governments? Of popular elections? What further principles of government and of liberty did he include in his political programme? Notice how the address is filled with a sense of the worth of free popular government, and especially with his doctrine of individualism, that is to say, the doctrine that each man should be unhampered and left alone to work out his own destiny.

XXI

HOW THE EMBARGO WAS ENFORCED AND

EVADED

President Jefferson on December 18, 1807, recommended to Congress the passage of an embargo prohibiting the sailing of American ships from our ports. He took this resolution immediately on receiving news of official acts of the English and French

- orders in coun

governments that boded ill for our commerce cil and Napoleon's Decrees. The Senate on the same day passed an embargo bill. It then was passed by the House, and was signed, Tuesday, December 22, 1807. The selection illustrates the expedition with which the hastily passed measure was put in force, as well as the later efforts to evade and to enforce it. Although the Embargo was intended to save American shipping from danger of capture, and American seamen from impressment as well as to punish the European States by cutting off American supplies, the profits of trade were so great that ship owners were anxious to take their chances. This explains the unpopularity of the Embargo with the very classes it was designed to protect. The further fact that it cut off exports into Canada by land made it unpopular with the farmers of the North. With a view to its enforcement various irritating orders were issued that aroused popular discontent.

The embargo had not been many minutes in force when express riders were galloping out of Washington and riding posthaste toward Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York, with orders from Gallatin to the collectors. Speed was most necessary, and so well did the messengers perform their task that at five o'clock on Friday morning one of them crossed the ferry from Paulus Hook and roused the Collector of the port of New York from his slumbers. The nearest Republican printer was sought, and by seven o'clock copies of the law in the form of handbills were distributed about the streets. Then followed a scene which to men not engaged in commerce was comical. On a sudden the streets were full of merchants, ship owners, ship captains, supercargoes, and sailors hurrying toward the water front. Astonished at this unusual commotion, men of all sorts followed, and by eight o'clock the wharves were crowded with spectators, cheering the little fleet of half-laden ships which, with all sail spread, was beating down the harbor. None of them had clearances. Many were half-manned. Few had more than part of a cargo. One which had just come in, rather than be embargoed, went off without breaking