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CALLENDER,
JAMES T. / RELATIONSHIP WITH
Your favor of the 1st was duly received, and I
would not have again intruded on you, but to rectify certain facts
which seem not to have been presented to you under their true
aspect. My charities to Callender are considered as rewards for his
calumnies. [Note: During the Presidential campaign of 1800,
Jefferson gave $50 to the writer, who was a victim of the infamous
Sedition Act which was passed under the Adams Administration.]
As early, I think, as 1796, I was told in Philadelphia that
Callender, the author of the Political Progress of Britain, was in
that city, a fugitive from persecution for having written that book,
and in distress. I had read and approved the book; I considered him
as a man of genius, unjustly persecuted. I knew nothing of his
private character, and immediately expressed my readiness to
contribute to his relief, and to serve him. It was a considerable
time after, that, on application from a person who thought of him as
I did, I contributed to his relief, and afterwards repeated the
contribution. Himself I did not see till long after, nor ever more
than two or three times. When he first began to write, he told some
useful truths in his coarse way; but nobody sooner disapproved of
his writing than I did, or wished more that he would be silent. My
charities to him were no more meant as encouragements to his
scurrilities, than those I give to the beggar at my door are meant
as rewards for the vices of his life, and to make them chargeable to
myself. In truth, they would have been greater to him, had he never
written a word after the work for which he fled from Britain. With
respect to the calumnies and falsehoods which writers and printers
at large published against Mr. Adams, I was as far from stooping to
any concern or approbation of them, as Mr. Adams was respecting
those of Porcupine, Fenno, or Russel, who published volumes against
me for every sentence vended by their opponents against Mr. Adams.
But I never supposed Mr. Adams had any participation in the
atrocities of these editors, or their writers. I knew myself
incapable of that base warfare, and believed him to be so. On the
contrary, whatever I may have thought of the acts of the
Administration of that day, I have ever borne testimony to Mr.
Adams' personal worth; nor was it ever impeached in my presence,
without a just vindication of it on my part. I never supposed that
any person who knew either of us, could believe that either of us
meddled in that dirty work. But another fact is, that I "liberated
a wretch who was suffering for a libel against Mr. Adams." I do
not know who was the particular wretch alluded to; but I discharged
every person under punishment or prosecution under the Sedition Law,
because I considered, and now consider, that law to be a nullity, as
absolute and as palpable as if Congress had ordered us to fall down
and worship a golden image; and that it was as much my duty to
arrest its execution in every stage, as it would have been to have
rescued from the fiery furnace those who should have been cast into
it for refusing to worship the image. It was accordingly done in
every instance, without asking what the offenders had done, or
against whom they had offended, but whether the pains they were
suffering were inflicted under the pretended Sedition Law. It was
certainly possible that my motives for contributing to the relief of
Callender, and liberating sufferers under the Sedition Law, might
have been to protect, encourage, and reward slander; but they may
also have been those which inspire ordinary charities to objects of
distress, meritorious or not, or the obligation of an oath to
protect the Constitution, violated by an unauthorized act of
Congress. Which of these were my motives, must be decided by a
regard to the general tenor of my life. On this I am not afraid to
appeal to the nation at large, to posterity, and still less to that
Being who sees himself our motives, who will judge us from his own
knowledge of them, and not on the testimony of Porcupine or Fenno.
You observe, there has been one other act of my Administration
personally unkind, and suppose it will readily suggest itself to me.
I declare on my honor, madam, I have not the least conception what
act was alluded to. I never did a single one with an unkind
intention. My sole object in this letter being to place before your
attention, that the acts imputed to me are either such as are
falsely imputed, or as might flow from good as well as bad motives,
I shall make no other addition, than the assurances of my continued
wishes for the health and happiness of yourself and Mr. Adams.
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Abigail
Adams
22 Jul 1804 |
CANADIAN
CAMPAIGN
I have it in my power to acquaint you, that the
success of our arms has corresponded with the justice of our cause.
Chambly and St John's were taken some weeks ago, and in them the
whole regular army in Canada, except about forty or fifty men. This
day, certain intelligence has reached us, that our General,
Montgomery, is received into Montreal; and we expect, every hour, to
be informed that Quebec has opened its arms to Colonel Arnold, who,
with eleven hundred men, was sent from Boston up the Kennebec, and
down the Chaudiere river to that place. He expected to be there
early this month. Montreal acceded to us on the i3th, and Carleton
set out~ with the shattered remains of his little army, for Quebec,
where we hope he will be taken up by Arnold & In a short time,
we have reason to hope, the delegates of Canada will join us in
Congress, and complete the American union, as far as we wish to have
it completed. We hear that one of the British transports has arrived
at Boston; the rest are beating off the coast, in very bad weather.
… |
John
Randolph
29 Nov 1775 |
CHARITY
I deem it the duty of every man to devote a
certain portion of his income for charitable purposes; and that it
is his further duty to see it so applied as to do the most good of
which it is capable. This I believe to be best insured, by keeping
within the circle of his own inquiry and information the subjects of
distress to whose relief his contributions shall be applied. If this
rule be reasonable in private life, it becomes so necessary in my
situation, that to relinquish it would leave me without rule or
compass. The applications of this kind from different parts of our
own, and from foreign countries, are far beyond any resources within
my command. The mission of Serampore, in the East Indies, the object
of the present application, is but one of many items. However
disposed the mind may feel to unlimited good, our means having
limits, we are necessarily circumscribed by them. They are too
narrow to relieve even the distresses under my own eye; and to
desert these for others which we neither see nor know, is to omit
doing a certain good for one which is uncertain. I know, indeed,
there have been splendid associations for effecting benevolent
purposes in remote regions of the earth. But no experience of their
effect has proved that more good would not have been done by the
same means employed nearer home. In explaining, however, my own
motives of action, I must not be understood as impeaching those of
others. Their views are those of an expanded liberality. Mine may be
too much restrained by the law of usefulness. But it is a law to me,
and with minds like yours, will be felt as a justification. With
this apology, I pray you to accept my salutations, and assurances of
high esteem and respect. |
Doctors
Rogers and Slaughter
2 Mar 1806 |
CITIZENSHIP
AND EMPLOYMENT / CULTIVATORS OF LAND
We have now lands enough to employ an infinite
number of people in their cultivation. Cultivators of the earth are
the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most
independent, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country,
and wedded to its liberty and interests, by the most lasting bonds.
As long, therefore, as they can find employment m this line, I would
not convert them into mariners, artisans, or anything else. But our
citizens will find employment in this line, till their numbers, and
of course their productions, become too great for the demand, both
internal and foreign. This is not the case as yet, and probably will
not be for a considerable time. As soon as it is, the surplus of
hands must be turned to something else. I should then, perhaps, wish
to turn them to the sea in preference to manufactures; because,
comparing the characters of the two classes, I find the former the
most valuable citizens. I consider the class of artificers as the
panders of vice, and the instruments by which the liberties of a
country are generally overturned. However, we are not free to decide
this question on principles of theory only. Our people are decided
in the opinion, that it is necessary for us to take a share in the
occupation of the ocean, and their established habits induce them to
require that the sea be kept open to them, and that that line of
policy be pursued, which will render the use of that element to them
as great as possible. I think it a duty in those entrusted with the
administration of their affairs, to conform themselves to the
decided choice of their constituents; and that therefore, we should,
in every instance, preserve an equality of right to them in the
transportation of commodities, in the right of fishing, and in the
other uses of the sea.
But what will be the consequence? Frequent wars without a doubt
Their property will be violated on the sea, and in foreign ports,
their persons will be insulted, imprisoned, &c., for pretended
debts, contracts, crimes, contra-band, &c., &C These insults
must be resented, even if we had no feelings, yet to prevent their
eternal repetition; or, in other words, our commerce on the ocean
and in other countries, must be paid for by frequent war. The
justest dispositions possible in ourselves, will not secure us
against it. It would be necessary that all other nations were just
also. Justice indeed, on our part, will save us from those wars
which would have been produced by a contrary disposition. But how
can we preyent those produced by the wrongs of other nati6ns? By
putting ourselves in a condition to punish them. Weakness provokes
insult and injury, while a condition to punish, often prevents them.
This reasoning leads to the necessity of some naval force; that
being the ouly weapon by which we can reach an enemy. I think it to
our interest to punish the first insult; because an insult
unpunished is the parent of many others. We are not, at this moment,
in a condition to do it, but we should put ourselves into it, as
soon as possible. If a war with England should take place, it seems
to me that the first thing necessary would be a resolution to
abandon the carrying trade, because we cannot protect it. Foreign
nations must, in that case, be invited to bring us what we want, and
to take our productions in their own bottoms. |
John
Jay
23 Aug 1785 |
CITIZENSHIP
AND EMPLOYMENT / OCEANIC COMMERCE
We have now lands enough to employ an infinite
number of people in their cultivation. Cultivators of the earth are
the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most
independent, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country,
and wedded to its liberty and interests, by the most lasting bonds.
As long, therefore, as they can find employment m this line, I would
not convert them into mariners, artisans, or anything else. But our
citizens will find employment in this line, till their numbers, and
of course their productions, become too great for the demand, both
internal and foreign. This is not the case as yet, and probably will
not be for a considerable time. As soon as it is, the surplus of
hands must be turned to something else. I should then, perhaps, wish
to turn them to the sea in preference to manufactures; because,
comparing the characters of the two classes, I find the former the
most valuable citizens. I consider the class of artificers as the
panders of vice, and the instruments by which the liberties of a
country are generally overturned. However, we are not free to decide
this question on principles of theory only. Our people are decided
in the opinion, that it is necessary for us to take a share in the
occupation of the ocean, and their established habits induce them to
require that the sea be kept open to them, and that that line of
policy be pursued, which will render the use of that element to them
as great as possible. I think it a duty in those entrusted with the
administration of their affairs, to conform themselves to the
decided choice of their constituents; and that therefore, we should,
in every instance, preserve an equality of right to them in the
transportation of commodities, in the right of fishing, and in the
other uses of the sea. |
John
Jay
23 Aug 1785 |
CIVILIZATION
/ ADVANCE OF AND PROGRESS
The idea which you present in your letter of
July 30th, of the progress of society from its rudest state to that
it has now attained, seems conformable to what may be probably
conjectured. Indeed, we have under our eyes tolerable proofs of it.
Let a philosophic observer commence a journey from the savages of
the Rocky Mountains, eastwardly towards our seacoast. These he would
observe in the earliest stage of association living under no law but
that of nature, subsisting and covering themselves with the flesh
and skins of wild beasts. He would next find those on our frontiers
in the pastoral state, raising domestic animals to supply the
defects of hunting. Then succeed our own semi-barbarous citizens,
the pioneers of the advance of civilization, and so in his progress
he would meet the gradual shades of improving man until he would
reach his, as yet, most improved state in our seaport towns. This,
in fact, is equivalent to a survey, in time, of the progress of man
from the infancy of creation to the present day. I am eighty-one
years of age, born where I now live, in the first range of mountains
in the interior of our country. And I have observed this march of
civilization advancing from the sea-coast, passing over us like a
cloud of light, increasing our knowledge and improving our
condition, insomuch as that we are at this time more advanced in
civilization here than the seaports were when I was a boy. And where
this progress will stop no one can say. |
William
Ludlow
6 Sep 1824 |
COMMERCE
AND SECURITY
A half-dozen aristocratical gentlemen,
agonizing under the loss of pre-eminence, have sometimes ventured
their sarcasms on our political metamorphosis. They have been
thought fitter objects of pity, than of punishment We are, at
present, in the complete and quiet exercise of well-organized
government, save only that our courts of justice do not open till
the fall. I think nothing can bring the security of our continent
and its cause into danger, if we can support the credit of our
paper. To do that, I apprehend, one of two steps must be taken.
Either to procure free trade by alliance with some naval power able
to protect it; or, if we find there is no prospect of that, to shut
our ports totally, to all the world, and turn our colonies into
manufactories. The former would be most eligible, because most
conformable to the habits and wishes of our people. Were the British
Court to return to their senses in time to seize the little
advantage which still remains within their reach, from this quarter,
I judge, that, on acknowledging our absolute independence and
sovereignty, a commercial treaty beneficial to them, and perhaps
even a league of mutual offence and defence, might, not seeing the
expense or consequences of such a measure, be approved by our
people, if nothing, in the mean time, done on your part, should
prevent it. But they will continue to grasp at their desperate
sovereignty, till every benefit short of that is forever out of
their reach. |
Benjamin
Franklin
13 Aug 1777 |
COMMERCE
/ FUR TRADE
I learn with great satisfaction the disposition
of our merchants to form into companies for undertaking the Indian
trade within our own territories. I have been taught to believe it
an advantageous one for the individual adventurers, and I consider
it as highly desirable to have that trade centered in the hands of
our own citizens. The field is immense, and would occupy a vast
extent of capital by different companies engaging in different
districts. All beyond the Mississippi is ours exclusively, and it
will be in our power to give our own traders great advantages over
their foreign competitors on this side the Mississippi. You may be
assured that in order to get the whole of this business passed into
the hands of our own citizens, and to oust foreign traders, who so
much abuse their privilege by endeavoring to excite the Indians to
war on us, every reasonable patronage and facility in the power of
the Executive will be afforded. |
John
Jacob Astor
13 Apr 1808 |
COMMERCE
/ MANUFACTURES AND AGRICULTURE / A BALANCE
An equilibrium of agriculture, manufactures,
and commerce, is certainly become essential to our independence.
Manufactures, sufficient for our own consumption, of what we raise
the raw material (and no more). Commerce sufficient to carry the
surplus produce of agriculture, beyond our own consumption, to a
market for exchanging it for articles we cannot raise (and no more).
These are the true limits of manufactures and commerce. To go beyond
them is to increase our dependence on foreign nations, and our
liability to war.
These three important branches of human industry will then grow
together, and be really handmaids to each other. |
James
Jay
7 Apr 1809 |
COMMERCE
/ MANUFACTURES IN THE WESTERN STATES
I received 4uly your favor of December the
15th, and with it the copies of your map and travels, for which be
pleased to accept my thanks. The book I have read with extreme
satisfaction and information. As to the Western States,
particularly, it has greatly edified me; for of the actual condition
of that interesting portion of our country, I had not an adequate
idea. I feel myself now as familiar with it as with the condition of
the maritime States. I had no conception that manufactures had made
such progress there, and particularly of the number of carding and
spinning machines dispersed through the whole country. …I have
not formerly been an advocate for great manufactories. I doubted
whether our labor, employed in agriculture, and aided by the
spontaneous energies of the earth, would not procure us more than we
could make ourselves of other necessaries. But other considerations
entering into the question have settled my doubts. |
John
Melish
13 Jan 1813 |
COMMERCE
/ MANUFACTURES VS AGRICULTURE
I have lately inculcated the encouragement of
manufactures to the extent of our own consumption at least, in all
articles of which we raise the raw material. On this the federal
papers and meetings have sounded the alarm of Chinese policy,
destruction of commerce, etc.; that is to say, the iron which we
make must not be wrought here into ploughs, axes, hoes, etc., in
order that the ship-owner may have the profit of carrying it to
Europe, and bringing it back in a manufactured form, as if after
manufacturing our own raw materials for our own use, there would not
be a surplus produce sufficient to employ a due proportion of
navigation in carrying it to market and exchanging it for those
articles of which we have not the raw material. Yet this absurd hue
and cry has contributed much to federalize New England, their
doctrine goes to the sacrificing agriculture and manufactures to
commerce; to the calling all our people from the interior country to
the seashore to turn merchants, and to convert this great
agricultural country into a city of Amsterdam. But I trust the good
sense of our country will see that its greatest prosperity depends
on a due balance between agriculture, manufactures and commerce, and
not in this protuberant navigation which has kept us in hot water
from the commencement of our government, and is now engaging us in
war. That this may be avoided, if it can be done without a surrender
of rights, is my sincere prayer. Accept the assurances of my
constant esteem and respect. |
Thomas
Leiper
21 Jan 1809 |
COMMERCE
/ PATENTS AND MONOPOLIES
It has been pretended by some, (and in England
especially,) that inventors have a natural and exclusive right to
their inventions, and not merely for their own lives, but
inheritable to their heirs. But while it is a moot question whether
the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all, it
would be singular to admit a natural and even an hereditary right to
inventors. It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the
subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate
property in an acre of land, for instance. By an universal law,
indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men
equally and in common, is the property for the moment of him who
occupies it, but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property
goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is
given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if
an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of
natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property. If
nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of
exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an
idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he
keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself
into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess
himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses
the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who
receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without
lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light
without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to
another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man,
and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and
benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire,
expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any
point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our
physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation.
Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. Society
may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an
encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but
this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience
of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody.
Accordingly, it is a fact, as far as I am informed, that England
was, until we copied her, the only country on earth which ever, by a
general law, gave a legal right to the exclusive use of an idea. In
some other countries it is sometimes done, in a great case, and by a
special and personal act, but, generally speaking, other nations
have thought that these monopolies produce more embarrassment than
advantage to society; and it may be observed that the nations which
refuse monopolies of invention, are as fruitful as England in new
and useful devices. |
Isaac
McPherson
13 Aug 1813 |
CONGRESS
/ LOCATION OF SESSION
The fever in Philadelphia has so much abated as
to have almost disappeared. The inhabitants are about returning. It
has been determined that the President shall not interfere with the
meeting of Congress. R. H. and K. were of opinion he had a right to
call them to any place, but that the occasion did not call for it. I
think the President inclined to the opinion. I proposed a
proclamation notifying that the Executive business would be done
here till further notice, which I believe will be agreed. H. R.
Lewis, Rawle, etc., all concur in the necessity that Congress should
meet in Philadelphia, and vote there their own adjournment. If it
shall then be necessary to change the place, the question will be
between New York and Lancaster. The Pennsylvania members are very
anxious for the latter, and will attend punctually to support it, as
well as to support much for Muhlenberg, and oppose the appointment
of Smith (S. C.) speaker, which is intended by the Northern members.
According to present appearances this place cannot lodge a single
person more. |
James
Madison
2 Nov 1793 |
CONGRESS
/ SPEECHES
I observe that the H. of R. are sensible of the
ill effects of the long speeches in their house on their
proceedings. But they have a worse effect in the disgust they excite
among the.. people, and the disposition they are producing to
transfer their confidence from the legislature to the executive
branch, which would soon sap our Constitution. These speeches,
therefore, are less and less read, and if continued will cease to be
read at all. |
John
Wayles Eppes
17 Jan 1810 |
CONGRESSIONAL
POWERS
…By the Confederation, Congress have no
power given them, in the first instance, over the commerce of the
States. But they have a power given them of entering into treaties
of commerce, and these treaties may cover the whole field of
commerce, with two restrictions only. 1. That the States may impose
equal duties on foreigners as natives: and 2. That they may prohibit
the exportation or importation of any species of goods whatsoever. .
. . I own to you that my wish to enter into treaties with the other
powers of Europe arises more from a desire of bringing all our
commerce under the jurisdiction of Congress, than for any other
views. |
John
Adams
7 Jul 1785 |
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