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After a tedious journey of a fortnight from Richmond, Mr. Jefferson arrived at the seat of government on the twenty-first of March, when the debate on the assumption of the state debts was at its bitterest point. He had returned to America after several years of diplomatic service in France, with a sincere desire to spend the remainder of his days in private life. But he was met at the house of his brother-in-law, on his way from Norfolk (where he landed) to his home at Monticello, by Washington's letter, already mentioned, inviting him to his cabinet as secretary of state. The diplomat was disappointed. He had seen, and in a degree had participated in, the opening act in the drama of the French revolution. He had, as we have observed, become deeply enamored of the leaders in the revolt, and the political sentiments they had proclaimed; and he preferred to remain in France, if he was to be continued in public employment. But the terms of Washington's invitation were such, that Jefferson's sense of duty and reverence for the president would not allow him to refuse, and after due deliberation he accepted the office.

On his arrival at New York, Jefferson found many things to surprise and startle him. A wonderful change had apparently taken place in political life during his residence in Europe; and being thoroughly imbued with republican principles and a deep-seated hatred of monarchy, his suspicions and jealousies were most painfully alive. He saw dangers to the state lurking in every recess where the full light of clear perceptions did not fall. “I found a state of things,” he wrote some years afterward, “which, of all I had contemplated, I least expected. I had left France in the first year of her revolution, in the fervor of natural rights and zeal for reformation. My conscientious devotion to these rights could not be heightened, but it had been aroused and excited by daily exercise. The president received me cordially, and my colleagues and circle of principal citizens apparently with welcome. The courtesies of dinner-parties given me, as a stranger newly arrived among them, placed me at once in their familiar society. But I can not describe the wonder and mortification with which the table conversations filled me. Politics were the chief topic, and a preference of kingly over republican government was evidently the favorite sentiment. An apostate I could not be, nor yet a hypocrite; and I found myself, for the most part, the only advocate on the republican side of the question, unless among the guests there chanced to be some member of that party from the legislative houses.”

That there were men of character in the United States at that time who desired a monarchical form of government, evidence is not wanting. Some of them had been loyalists during the war. Washington spoke of them in 1787, before the assembling of the convention that framed the federal constitution, as men who either had “not consulted the public mind,” or who lived “in a region more productive of monarchical ideas than was the case in the southern states.” But that any officer of the government, on Jefferson's arrival, had a desire for kingly rule, there is no positive evidence. The most earnest advocate for a strong, energetic, consolidated government, was Alexander Hamilton; yet he never expressed a desire for a monarchical government in America. In his speech in the constitutional convention on the eighteenth of June, 1787, he lauded the British constitution as the best ever devised by man, and said that he doubted whether anything short of a government like that of Great Britain (a constitutional monarchy) would do in America. These sentiments were uttered when everything like order appeared to be on the verge of destruction, and a strong arm, independent of the popular will, seemed necessary for the establishment of public strength and individual security. The crisis was passed, the federal constitution was formed, and Hamilton gave it his zealous support. Yet, to the close of his life, he considered the constitution too weak to perform the great duties assigned it.

Hamilton was always frank and unreserved in the expression of his political views; and immediately after Jefferson's arrival at the seat of government, the secretary of the treasury pressed upon his attention the importance of the assumption of the state debts—a measure which had been rejected. “He observed,” says Jefferson in his account of the matter, “that the members of the administration ought to act in concert; that though this question was not of my department, yet a common duty should make it a common concern; that the president was the centre on which all administrative questions ultimately rested; that, the question having been lost by a small majority only, it was probable that an appeal from me to the judgment and discretion of some of my friends might effect a change in the vote, and the machinery of government, now suspended, might be again set in motion.”

To this Jefferson replied that he was a stranger to the whole matter; that if the rejection of the proposition really, as Hamilton alleged, endangered the Union, it was important to reconsider it; and then proposed that the secretary of the treasury should meet two or three friends at table the next day to discuss the subject. The dinner and the discussion took place; and it was “finally agreed,” says Jefferson, “that whatever importance had been attached to the rejection of this proposition, the preservation of the Union and of concord among the states was more important, and that therefore it would be better that the vote of rejection should be rescinded, to effect which, some members should change their votes.”

At that time the question, Where shall the seat of the federal government be permanently located? was a subject of violent contest, the people in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, wishing it to be in their respective states. Debates had run high upon the subject in Congress, and the public press had discussed it vigorously. It being observed at Jefferson's dinner-party that a reconsideration of the assumption bill, and its adoption, would be “a bitter pill” to the southern states, it was proposed that “some concomitant measure should be adopted to sweeten it a little to them.” The location of the seat of government was chosen as the soother. The contest had narrowed, geographically, so that it lay between Philadelphia on the Delaware and Georgetown on the Potomac. It was proposed to give it to Philadelphia for ten years, and to Georgetown permanently thereafter, believing that “that might, as an anodyne, calm in some degree the ferment which might be excited by the other measure alone.” “Two of the Potomac members agreed to change their votes,” says Jefferson, “and Hamilton undertook to carry the other point. In doing this, the influence he had established over the eastern members, with the agency of Robert Morris with those of the middle states, effected his side of the engagement.” The assumption bill was carried, and the location of the seat of government was settled. Congress agreed to make Philadelphia its residence for ten years, during which time the public buildings should be erected at some point on the Potomac that the president might select. Subsequently a territory ten miles square, lying on both sides of the Potomac in Maryland and Virginia, was ceded by those states to the United States, and called the district of Columbia. Thus the matter was settled.

When Jefferson's sensitive republicanism took the alarm to which we have alluded, he became suspicious of all around him. His feelings toward Hamilton changed, until he considered him a monarchist in principle, and regarded all his financial schemes as intended to strengthen the general government, centralize power, and make the treasury the controlling lever of public affairs, the chief of which, with almost autocratic puissance, might direct everything to suit his own political views. With this impression, retrospection made him angry and resentful. He regarded the manner in which Hamilton had procured his aid in effecting the measure of assumption as a snare by which he had been entrapped, and he characterized the measure itself as a fiscal manoeuvre, to which he had “ignorantly and innocently been made to hold the candle.”

This was the beginning of those dissentions in his cabinet which afterward gave the president so much trouble. They had grown to mischievous proportions at a time when he believed there was perfect harmony among his constitutional advisers. He had never experienced the sentiment of jealousy himself, and he was the last man to suspect it in others; and at the time when Jefferson and Hamilton were regarding each other with a spirit of rivalry, Washington wrote to Lafayette, saying: “Many of your old acquaintances and friends are concerned with me in the administration of this government. By having Mr. Jefferson at the head of the department of state, Mr. Jay of the judiciary, Hamilton of the treasury, and Knox of war, I feel myself supported by able coadjutors who harmonize extremely well.”

Out of the rivalry between Jefferson and Hamilton, and the conflict of their opinions respecting the national jurisprudence and French politics, grew the two political parties known respectively, for about twenty years, as Federal and Republican. We shall observe that growth as we progress in our narrative.

While Congress and the nation were agitated by discussions concerning the public debt, another topic elicited a still more exciting discussion: it was African slavery and the slave-trade. Slavery then existed in all the states of the Union except Massachusetts, in whose constitution a clause had been inserted for the purpose of tacitly abolishing the system from the commonwealth. Pennsylvania had adopted measures with the same view, and had been imitated by Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire. New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland, had prohibited the further importation of slaves; and in Virginia and Maryland restrictions upon emancipation had been repealed. A desire to get rid of the system appeared to prevail throughout the Union. The Presbyteries of New York and Pennsylvania, composing a united synod, had constituted themselves as the general assembly of the Presbyterian church in America; and that representative body issued a pastoral letter in 1788, in which they strongly recommended the abolition of slavery, and the instruction of negroes in letters and religion. The Methodist church, then rising into notice, even refused slaveholders a place in their communion; and the Quakers had made opposition to slavery a part of their discipline. In these benevolent movements Washington sympathized; for he desired to see the system extinguished by some just method.

It was only a few days after the commencement of the debate on the public debt, that a petition from the yearly meeting of the Quakers of Pennsylvania and Delaware, with another from that of New York, was laid before the house of representatives. A motion for reference to a special committee caused a warm debate, and some of those who opposed its reception spoke sneeringly of “the men in the gallery,” who were the Quaker deputation appointed to look after the petition.[28] It was laid upon the table that day; and at the opening of the session on the following morning, another petition on the same subject, from the Pennsylvania society for the abolition of slavery, was presented. It was signed by Benjamin Franklin (president of the society), then in the last weeks of his life. The petition was read, and then the Quaker memorial was called up. The excitement in the house was very great. The movement was denominated an improper interference with state rights, or at least an act of imprudence; and Judge Burke, of South Carolina, declared that if these memorials were entertained by commitment, the act would “sound an alarm and blow the trumpet of sedition through the southern states.”The question was mainly a constitutional one, but the debates took great latitude. It was finally agreed to commit the memorials, by a vote of forty-three to eleven. They were referred to a committee consisting of one member from each of the states of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.

A month afterward, that committee reported seven resolutions: first, that the general government was expressly restrained from prohibiting the carrying on of the slave-trade until the year 1808; second, that by a fair construction of the constitution, Congress was equally restrained from interfering with slavery, in the matter of emancipation, in the several states; third, that Congress had no power to interfere in the internal regulations of slavery in the several states; fourth, that Congress had the right, by virtue of the revenue laws, to levy a tax of ten dollars upon every person imported as property under the special permission of any of the states; fifth, that Congress had power to regulate or to interdict the African slave-trade, carried on by citizens of the United States for the supply of foreign countries; sixth, that Congress had the right to prohibit foreigners from fitting out vessels in the United States, to be employed in the supply of foreign countries with slaves from Africa; seventh, that Congress would exercise their authority to its full extent, to promote the humane objects set forth in the memorial of the Quakers.

This report called forth zealous and sometimes angry debates for a whole week, when it was finally agreed, at the suggestion of Fisher Ames, seconded by Madison and others, by a vote of twenty-nine to twenty-five, to enter the report at length upon the journal of the house, where it might be consulted in the future, and to take no further action. Thus ended the first agitation of the still pending “slavery question” in Congress. In a letter to Doctor Stuart, in June, referring to a complaint of the tardiness of Congress, Washington remarked: “The introduction of the Quaker memorial respecting slavery was, to be sure, not only ill-timed, but occasioned a great waste of time. The final decision thereon, however, was as favorable as the proprietors of this species of property could well have expected, considering the light in which slavery is viewed by a large part of this Union.”

While topics of a domestic nature agitated the public mind and occupied the attention of the national legislature, the foreign relations of the government (in which expression may be included the relations with hostile Indian tribes) were far from satisfactory. We have already alluded to the hostile attitude of some of the tribes in the northwest and southwest, among whom it was suspected British emissaries were at work. Those of the southwest, especially the Creek nation, had been in a disturbed state for some time, and difficulties with the authorities of Georgia had caused an open rupture a little earlier than the period in question. The Creeks were governed by an accomplished chief, Alexander M'Gillivray, the son of a loyalist Scotchman, of that name, and a Creek woman of a leading family. He had been well educated, and his father designed him for commercial pursuits. He loved study more than ledgers; and his father owning large possessions in Georgia, the young man looked forward to wealth and social position. But the revolution swept all away. His father's property was confiscated, and young M'Gillivray took refuge with the Creeks, his heart filled with hatred of the republicans. He was brave, fluent in speech, popular with the leading men, and soon rose to the rank of head chief; and no doubt he stirred up his nation to assume an attitude hostile to the Americans.

The Creeks, with M'Gillivray at their head, had also established a close alliance with the Spaniards, who held possession of Florida. The Spanish governor of that province courted the young half-blood chief, and he was honored with a colonelcy in the military service of Spain. Through the Spaniards, the Creeks could readily obtain arms and ammunition in exchange for their furs; and thus, in point of strength, they were the most formidable enemies to the United States among the Indian nations.

Good policy caused the United States government to send commissioners to treat with the Creeks; and in the autumn of 1789, General Lincoln, Colonel Humphries, and David Griffin—a commission appointed by Washington—met deputies of that confederacy on the Oconee, to hold a treaty. M'Gillivray was at the head of the deputation. He received the American commissioners kindly, and expressed a desire for friendship; but when he found that they did not propose to restore to the Creeks their lands about which they had disputed with the Georgians, he abruptly ended the conference, promising, however, to remain peaceable until further negotiations could be had.

In March, 1790, Washington despatched Colonel Marinus Willett on a new mission to the Creeks. He succeeded in persuading M'Gillivray to go to New York, to carry on negotiations there. Attended by twenty-eight sachems, chiefs, and warriors, he arrived at the federal capital on the twenty-third of June, having been received with much attention at the principal towns on the line of his journey. The members of the Tammany society of New York, arrayed in Indian costume, escorted M'Gillivray and his party into the city; and the Creek chief, being the son of a Scotchman, was made an honorary member of the St. Andrew's society.

These attentions, and the gracious manner in which he was received by the president, made a deep impression on M'Gillivray's mind. General Knox, the secretary of war, was appointed to negotiate with him. A satisfactory treaty, founded upon mutual concessions, was made; and one of the last acts of Washington during the second session of the first Congress was the approval of that treaty. It was signed by the contracting parties on the seventh of August, and was ratified on the thirteenth, the day after Congress adjourned.

Meanwhile, the aspect of Indian affairs in the country northwest of the Ohio, into which a stream of emigration was rapidly flowing, claimed the serious consideration of the government. A territorial government for that region had been ordained in 1787, and the domain was called the northwest territory. General Arthur St. Clair was appointed governor. As we have observed, the Indians in that vicinity had shown much hostility to the Americans ever since the close of the Revolution. They were encouraged by Sir John Johnson, then Indian agent on that frontier, and by Sir Guy Carleton, who was again governor of Canada, to insist upon re-establishing the Ohio as the Indian boundary. They swarmed upon the banks of that river, waylaid the boats of emigrants, and even crossed the stream and made incursions into Kentucky, to attack frontier stations there. The president was convinced, by long experience with the Indians, that on the failure of negotiations with them, sound policy and true economy, not less than humanity, required the immediate employment of force, which should go as a scourge into the very heart of their country. Such were now the relations between the northwestern tribes and the United States; and in the autumn, a military force eleven hundred strong, under the command of General Harmer, was directed by the president to march against the Miami village on the Scioto, where Chilicothe now stands. After some successes and defeats the Americans withdrew, and the Indians became more insolent and bold.

At this time a general European war appeared inevitable. A long-pending controversy between Spain and Great Britain remained unsettled. It was believed that France would side with Spain; and it was thought to be a favorable time for the United States to press upon Great Britain the necessity of complying with the yet unfulfilled articles of the treaty of 1783. Accordingly, as early as January, 1790, Gouverneur Morris, then in Paris, was commissioned by Washington to proceed to London, as private agent of the United States, to sound the British ministry on the subject. At that time there was no diplomatic intercourse between the United States and Great Britain. Mr. Adams had returned home, and the court of St. James had never sent a minister to the United States. Morris opened a communication with the English minister for foreign affairs, but was unable to make much satisfactory progress for some time. As late as the first of July, Washington made the following record in his diary:

“Having put into the hands of the vice president of the United States the communication of Mr. Gouverneur Morris, who had been empowered to make informal inquiries how well disposed the British ministry might be to enter into commercial relations with the United States, and to fulfil the articles of peace respecting our western posts, and the slaves which had been carried from this country, he expressed his approbation that this step had been taken, and added that the disinclination of the British cabinet to comply with the two latter and to evade the former, as evidently appears from the correspondence of Mr. Morris with the duke of Leeds (the British minister for foreign affairs), was of a piece with their conduct toward him whilst minister at that court, and just what he expected, and that to have it ascertained was necessary.

“He thought, as a rupture between England and Spain was almost inevitable, that it would be our policy and interest to take part with the latter, as he was very apprehensive that New Orleans was an object with the former of their possessing, which would be very injurious to us; but he observed, at the same time, that the situation of our affairs would not justify the measure, unless the people [of the United States] themselves should take the lead in the business.”