Gazette Of The United States And Daily Evening Advertiser

Wednesday, November 26, 1794.

Debate on Mr. Fitzsimons's motion relative to self-created societies.

(Continued.)

Mr. Ames began with expressing his pleasure that he had sat down, to give way for Mr. Scott to speak; but this every one must see was attended with a personal sacrifice; as it was manifestly a disadvantage to bring forward his observations immediately after those of that gentleman, because they were too remarkable for their pertinence and strength to encourage the attempts of their opponents to invalidate, or his own to enforce them.

He requested Mr. Giles, and he urged it strongly on the House, to consider maturely how large a part of the argument he had to answer. Mr. Giles had been occupied in refuting what nobody had asserted, and in proving what nobody had denied. It would appear to every person, at a glance that, after so large a deduction should be made, the advocate of the amendment would be left almost without an adversary.

He observed, it would be amusing, and not without its uses, to turn a moment from the debate, to enquire what would be said of yesterday's decisions. Fame already bears it on all her wings, and proclaims it with all her tongues, that Congress had been engaged in trying the Democratic Clubs; and curiosity stands on a tiptoe on all our post roads for the answer, which is already gone forth. Forty-Seven members were for the clubs, and forty-five against them, so that the clubs gained the victory.

Is this true? I dare appeal, said Mr. Ames, to you, sir, and to every other patriotic bosom, that it is not true; a large majority, and I may even say, with pride and pleasure, almost all the members who hear me, despise and abominate the clubs as sincerely as the words of the President's speech, the answer of the Senate, his reply to them, or the amendment now before us can imply it.

How happens it, that the real sentiments of the house are so much misrepresented by the vote: I shall be pardoned if I undertake to explain this enigma. Two reasons have been suggested in private conversation as well as in debate, which will account for the vote of yesterday, and which on being stated and re-examined, will afford good cause for changing it to day. The first is, that we have nothing to do with the clubs. We hold them in too much contempt to have any thing to say to them, or about them. They are not worth notice.

This contempt had the appearance yesterday of countenance and patronage.

The other motive suggested is, if the words self created societies should be struck out, the amendment will still contain the substance of the proposition still contended for; which is to reprobate the combinations of men against law. This description will include the clubs, as well as any other wicked combinations that have had any agency in the insurrection.

How far the one or the other of these motives ought to influence those who have entertained them, to vote against the amendment for inserting the words self created societies and will appear by a survey of the true posture of the question.

Here Mr. Ames stated, that it was the duty of the President, by the constitution, to inform Congress of the state of the Union. That he had accordingly in his speech stated the insurrection and the causes that (he thought) had brought it on. Among the causes he explicitly reckons the self created societies and combinations of men to be one. The Senate as plainly charge that as one of the causes, the President in his reply to the Senate, expresses his high satisfaction that they concur with him in opinion. Here Mr. Ames read the passages in the speech, address and answer to the address. He said further that an amendment was now offered to the house, expressed, as nearly, as may be, in the very words of the President—an objection is urged against this amendment that the proposition contained in it is not true in fact.

It is also said, that although it were true, it would be dangerous to liberty, to assent to it in our answer to the speech. It is moreover, say they, improper, unnecessary and indecent to mention the self created societies. The amendment now urged upon the house has been put to vote in committee of the whole house, and rejected. What will the world say, and that too from the evidence of our own records, if we reject it again in the house?

Will it not be proclaimed that we reject the motion and give force and validity to the objections? Do we adopt such objections, are the committee consenting to the shame of having them charged upon the committee as the principles by which they have guided our decision? We are not, Mr. Ames was sure, we are not, for with a very few exceptions, I wish there were none both sides have united in reprobating the self created societies. Surely then, gentlemen will not hesitate to rescind a vote which is no less deceptive than it is pernicious? For if we adopt the amendment it will appear that all the branches of the government are agreed in sentiment. If we reject it, what will it proclaim less than imbecility and discord? What will faction interpret it to import short of this. "The President and Senate have denounced the self created societies alluded to in the speech, and this house has stepped forward for their protection." Besides the unspeakable dishonor of this patronage; is it not rekindling the fire-brands of sedition, is it not unchaining the demon of anarchy!

Few as the apologists of the clubs have been, the solemnity and perseverance of their appeal to principles demands for it an examination.

The right to form political clubs has been urged as if it had been denied. It is not, however, the right to meet, it is the abuse of the right, after they have met, that is charged upon them. Town meetings are authorized by law, yet they may be called for seditious or treasonable purposes. The legal right of the voters in that case would be an aggravation not an excuse for the offence. But if persons meet in a club with an intent to obstruct the laws, their meeting is no longer innocent or legal: it is a crime.

The necessity for forming clubs has been alleged with some plausibility in favor of all the states except New-England, because town meetings are little known and not practicable in a thinly settled country. (Mr. Ames here alluded to what had been yesterday said by Mr. Parker) But if people have grievances, are they to be brought to a knowledge of them only by clubs; clubs may find out more complaints against the laws, than the sufferers themselves had dreamed of. The number of those which a man will learn from his own and his neighbor's experience will be quite sufficient for every salutary purpose of reform in the laws, or of relief to the citizens. He may petition Congress, his own representative will not fail to advocate, or at least, to present and explain his memorial. As a juror, he applies the law, as an elector he effectually controls the legislators. A really aggrieved man will be sure of sympathy, and assistance within this body, and with the public. The most zealous advocates of clubs may think them useful, but he will not insist on their being indispensably so.

The plea for their usefulness seems to rest on their advantage of meeting for political information. The absurdity of this pretence could be exposed in a variety of views. I shall decline, said Mr. Ames, a detailed consideration of the topic, I would just ask however, whether the most inflamed party men, who usually lead the clubs, are the best organs of authentic information? Whether they meet in darkness, whether they hide their names, their number and their doings, whether they shut their doors to admit information. A laudable zeal for enquiry need not shun those who could satisfy it; it need not blush in the day light. With open doors and an unlimited freedom of debate, political knowledge might be introduced even among the intruders.

But, instead of exposing their affected pursuit of information, it will be enough to shew hereafter what they actually spread among the people-whether it is information, or in the words of the President, "jealousies, suspicions and accusations of the government," whether disregardful of the most daring outrages against social order, and the authority of the laws. (Vide the President's speech.)

They have arrogantly pretended sometimes to be the people, and sometimes the guardians, the champions of the people. They affect to feel more zeal for a popular government, and to enforce more respect for republican principles, than the real representatives are admitted to entertain. Let us see whether they are set up for the people, or in opposition to them, and their institutions.

Will any reflecting person suppose, for a moment that this great people, so widely extended, so actively employed, could form a common will and make that will law in their individual capacity, and without representation? They could not. Will clubs avail them as a substitute for representation? A few hundred persons only are members of clubs, and if they should act for the others, it would be an usurpation, and the power of the few over the many, in every view, infinitely worse than sedition itself, will represent this government.

To avoid this difficulty shall the whole people be classed into clubs? Shall every six mile square be formed into a club sovereignty? This would guard against the abuse of trust, because we should delegate none, but every man might go and do his business in his own person. We might thus form ten or twenty thousand democracies, as pure and simple as the most disorganizing spirit could sigh for--But what could keep this fair horizon unclouded? What could prevent the whirlwinds and fires of discord, intestine, and foreign, from scattering and consuming these fritters and rags of the society, like the dry leaves in autumn. Without respectability, without safety, without tranquility, they would be like so many caves of Aeolus, where the imprisoned storms were said to struggle for a vent. If we look at Greece, so famous for letters and more for misery, we shall see that ferocious liberty made their petty common wealths wolves dens-that liberty, which poetry represents as a goddess, history describes as a cannibal.

Representative government, therefore, is so far from being a sacrifice of our rights, that it is their security; it is the only practicable mode for a great people to exercise or have any rights. It puts them in full possession of the utmost exercise of them. By clubs will they have something more than all? Will such institutions operate to augment, to secure, or to enforce their rights, or just the contrary?

Knowledge and truth will be friendly to such a government, and that in return will be friendly to them. Is it possible for any to be so deluded as to suppose that the over zeal for government, on the part of the supporters of this amendment, would prompt them to desire or to attempt the obstruction of the liberty of speech, or the genuine freedom of the press? Impossible! That would be putting out the eyes of the government which we are so jealous to maintain. The abuses of these privileges may embarrass and disturb our present system; but if they were abolished, the government must be changed. No friend therefore of the constitution could harbour the wish to produce the consequences which it is insinuated, are intended to ensue. Mr. Ames resumed the remark that the government rests on the enlightened patriotism of an orderly and moral body of citizens. Let the advocates of monarchy boast that ignorance may be made to sleep in chains; that even corruption and vice may be enlisted as auxiliaries of the public order. It is however a subject of exultation and confidence that such citizens as we represent, so enlightened, so generally virtuous, and uncorrupted, under the present mild republican system, practicable and safe, nay more, it is evidently the only system that is adapted to the American state of society. But such a system combines within itself two indestructible elements of destruction, two enemies with whom it must conflict for ever; whom it may disarm, but can never pacify: Vice and ignorance. Those who do not understand their rights, will despise or confound them with wrongs, and those whose turbulence and licentiousness find restraints in equal laws, will seek gratification, by evasions or combinations to overawe or resist them.

A government that protects property, and cherishes virtue, will of course have vice and prodigality for its foes because it will be compelled to abridge their liberty, to prevent their invading the rights of other citizens. The virtuous and the enlightened will cling to a republican government, because it is congenial, no less with their feelings, than their rights. The licentious and the profligate are ever ready for confusion, which might give them every thing, while laws and order deny them every thing. The ambitious and desperate, by combinations, acquire more power and influence than their fellow-citizens: the credulous, the ignorant, the rash, and violent are drawn by artifice, or led by character to join these confederacies. The more free the government the more certain they are to grow up, for where there is no liberty at all, this abuse of it will not be seen. Once formed into bodies they have a spirit of corps, and are propelled into errors and excesses, without shame or reflection. A spirit grows up in their progress and every disappointment makes them more loose, as to the means and every success more and more immoderate in the objects of their attempts. Calumny is one of those means. Those whom they cannot punish or control they can vilify; they can make suspicion go where their force could not reach; and by rumors and falsehoods multiply enemies against their enemies. They become formidable, and they retaliate upon the magistrates, those fears, which the laws have inspired them with. The execution of the laws is not accomplished without effort, without hazard. Instead of mildness, of mutual confidence, instead of the laws almost executing themselves, more rigor is demanded in the framing, more force to secure the operation of the laws. The clubs and turbulent combinations exercising the resisting power, it is obvious that government will need more force, and more will then be given to it.

Thus it appears, that instead of lightening the weight of authority, it will acquire a new momentum from clubs and combinations formed to resist it. Turbulent men, embodied into hosts, will call for more energy to suppress them, than if the discontented remained unembodied. Disturbances fomented from time to time may unhappily change the mild principles of the system, and the little finger then may be found heavier than the whole hand of the present government. For if the clubs and the government should both subsist, tranquility would be out of the question. The continual contest of one organized body against another, would produce the alternate extremes of anarchy and excessive rigor of government. If the clubs prevail, they will be the government, and the more severe for having become so by a victory over the existing authorities.

In every aspect of the discussion, the societies formed to control and vilify a republican government are hateful. They not only of necessity make it more rigorous, but they tend with a fatal energy to make it corrupt. By perverting the truth and spreading jealousy and intrigue through the land, they compel the rulers to depend on new supports. The usurping clubs offer to faction within these doors the means of carrying every point without. A corrupt understanding is produced between them. The power of the clubs will prevail even here, and that of the people will proportionally decline. The clubs echo the language of their protectors here; truth, virtue, and patriotism, are no longer principles, but names for electioneering jugglers to deceive with. Calumny will assimilate to itself the objects it falls on. - It will persecute the man who does his duty; it will take away the reward of virtue, and bestow praise only upon the tools of faction. By betraying his trust, a man may then expect the support of the powerful combinations opposed to the government. By faithfully adhering to it, he encounters persecution. He finds neither refuge nor consolation with the public, who become at length so corrupted as to think virtue in a public station incredible, because it would be, in their opinion, folly. The indiscriminate jealousy which is diffused from the clubs tends no less to corrupt the suspicious than the suspected. It poisons confidence, which is no less the incitement than the recompense of public services. It lowers the standard of action.

These observations, which seem to be founded on theory, unfortunately bear the stamp of experience. History abounds with the proofs. Never was there a wise and free republic, which was exempt from this inveterate malady. We can find a parallel for the brightest worthies of Greece, as well as for their calumniators. In that country, as well as in this, the assassins of character abounded. While slander is credited only by its inventors it is easy for a man to maintain the serenity of his contempt for both. But when it is adopted by the public, few are hardy enough to despise the public opinion; he that pretends to do so is a hypocrite, and if he really does so, he is a wretch. This precious property is one of the first objects of invasion, and the combinations alluded to are well adopted and actively employed to destroy it.

It is a plausible opinion, that if the government is not grossly defective in its form, or corrupt in its administration, animosities against it will not exist. This corresponds neither with sound sense nor experience. Equal laws are the very grievances of these petty tyrants, who combine together to engross more than equal power and privileges. When power is conferred exclusively upon the worthy, the profligate and ambitious are driven to despair of success, by any methods that the worthy would adopt. The more pure and free the government, the more certainly will the worst men it protects and restrains become its implacable enemies, and such men have ever been the foes of Republics. The outcasts from society, those who singly are shunned because infamy has smitten them with leprosy, men who are covered with worse than plague sores, are the first to combine against it. And such men have the front to preach purity of principles and reformation.— Such men will meet in darkness and perform incantations against liberty- there they will gather to medicate their poisons, to whet their daggers, to utter their blasphemies against liberty, and may proceed again to shout from that gallery, or may collect with cannon at this door, to perpetrate sacrilege here in her very sanctuary.

It will be asked what remedy for this evil? I answer no violent one. The gentle power of opinion, I flatter myself, will prove sufficient among our citizens who have sense, morals and property. The hypocrisy of the clubs will be unmasked, and the public scorn, without touching their persons or property, will frown them into nothing.

Mr. Ames next proceeded to advert more particularly to facts. He made mention of the Jesuits, who were banished for becoming a club against the European governments. He mentioned the Jacobins also, who performed well in pulling down the old government, but because they would continue pulling down the new one, as such clubs ever will, had their hall locked up by Legendre. Our committees in 1774 and 1775, were efficient instruments to pull down the British government. Yet although they were friendly to our own, the people laid them aside, as soon as they wished to build up instead of pulling down. If our government were to be demolished, clubs would be a powerful means of doing it, and the people may choose to countenance them at that time. But as they choose no such thing at present, they will discountenance them. The Cincinnati were personally worthy men, officers of the most worthy army that ever triumphed. Yet although they were friendly to the government, and possessed the confidence of the citizens by the most brilliant titles, the nature of their institution raised a jealousy and ferment. The state legislatures condemned it, as setting up a government within the government. What then are we to say of clubs? Facts have been rather imprudently called for, and let them be examined.

The Democratic Society of Vermont state, as one reason of their establishment, the unmerited abuse with which the public papers have so often teemed against the minister of our only ally. This was long after Genet's whole correspondence had been published, and after France had unequivocally disapproved his conduct.

Agreeable to a previous notification, there met at Pittsburgh, on the 21st of August, a number of persons, styling themselves "A meeting of sundry inhabitants of the Western Counties of Pennsylvania."

This meeting entered into resolutions not less exceptionable than those of its predecessors. The preamble suggests that a tax on spirituous liquors is unjust in itself and oppressive upon the poor, that internal taxes, upon consumption must in the end destroy the liberties of the country in which they are introduced; that the law in question from certain local circumstances which are specified, would bring immediate distress and ruin upon the western country; and concludes with the sentiment, that they think it their duty to persist in remonstrances to Congress; and every other legal measure that may obstruct the operation of the law.

The resolutions then proceed, first to appoint a committee to prepare and cause to be presented to Congress an address stating objections to the law, and praying for its repeal- Secondly, to appoint committees of correspondence for Washington, Fayette, and Alleghany, charged to correspond together, and with such committees as should be appointed for the same purpose in the county of Westmoreland, or with any committees of a similar nature, that might be appointed in other parts, of the United States; and also if found necessary to call together either general meetings of the people, in their respective counties, or conferences of the several committees and lastly to declare that they will in future consider those who hold offices for the collection of the duty, as unworthy of their friendship, that they will have no intercourse nor dealings with them, will withdraw from them every assistance, withhold all the comforts of life which depend upon those duties, that as men and fellow-citizens we owe to each other, and will upon all occasions treat them with contempt: earnestly recommending it to the people at large, to follow the same line of conduct towards them.

He mentioned the shameful transaction at Lexington, in Kentucky, where Mr. Jay was burned in effigy. It was painful he said thus to dwell on the dishonor of the country, but it was already published.*

* The late appointment of John Jay as Envoy Extraordinary to the Court of London, brought so strongly to the recollection of the people of this country his former iniquitous attempt to barter away their most valuable right, that they could not refrain from openly testifying abhorrence of the man whose appointment at this critical period of their affairs, they consider as strangely ominous. Although they had not forgotten, nor even faintly remembered, his first act of treason against them; yet they hoped, from the office he filled, he was in as harmless a situation as he could be placed and that no effort of power or policy, could drag him forward, so long as he held his office, and set him once more to chaffering with our rights. With these impressions a number of respectable citizens of this place and its vicinity, on Saturday last, ordered a likeness of this civil genius of western America to be made, which was soon well executed. At the appointed hour he was ushered forth from a barber's shop, amid the shouts of the people, dressed in a courtly manner and placed erect on the platform of the pillory. In his right hand he held up-lifted, a rod of iron; in his left he held extended Swift's last speech in Congress, on the subject of British depredation; on one side of which was written Nemo repente fuit turpissimus: Juv. Sat. IV 33. No man e'er reached the heights of vice at first. And on the other— non deficit alter. Virg. Ecl. b. A second is not wanting. About his neck was suspended by a hempen string, Adams's defence of the American Constitutions; " on the cover of which was written " Scribere jussit aurum". Ov. Ep. --Gold bade me write. After exhibiting him in this condition for some time, he was ordered to be guillotined, which was soon dexterously executed and a flame instantly applied to him, which finding its way to a quantity of powder, which was lodged in his body, produced such an explosion that after it there was

, The Club of Charleston, South Carolina solicited an adoption of the Jacobin Club at Paris. They also addressed Consul Marguerit, who had actually granted commissions to privateers, in defiance of the President's Proclamation of Neutrality.

Extract of the Gazette Nationale, or Moniteur Universel, No. 27th.

JACOBIN SOCIETY.

October, 1793.

Coupe de L'oise in the chair.

The Republican Society of Charleston, in Carolina, one of the United States of America, demand of the Jacobin Club its adoption.

Hautheir " We have spilt our blood for the establishment of American liberty. I think that the Americans ought to do the same for us, before we grant them adoption."

A Citizen--" Before engaging them to intermeddle in our war, it is necessary to understand one another, to come to an agreement with them, I do not see then a more efficacious way for the previous re-union, than an adoption of their society."

Collot de Herbois-After making some general observations, says" Nevertheless, we should not neglect the advantages which may arise from this advance. I conclude that we agree to this adoption."

The club of Pinkney district in Carolina had voted in favor of war and against paying taxes, because they were too far from the market.

A Virginia club had voted an alteration in the constitution in order that an amendment might prevent the President being again eligible. Is proof necessary to those who remember the state of this city last spring? Are the resolves of the clubs of this place and New-York forgotten? Could outrage and audacity be expected to venture further? One condemned the excise as odious and tyrannical; the other, enforcing that sentiment, published its condemnation of Mr. Jay's mission of peace. Did not all of them arraign the whole government, reprobate the whole system of laws, charge the breach of the constitution on the President, and unspeakable turpitude on the administration, as well as on this body? Surely Americans, feeling as they ought, for the honor and peace and safety of their country, cannot forget these excesses; they cannot remember. them in any manner which my reprobation could enforce.

Extract from the proceedings of a meeting of delegates from the election districts of Alleghany county, held at Pittsburgh, April 1: Thomas Morton in the chair.

At this juncture we have France to assist us, who, should we now take a part, will not fail to stand by us until Canada is independent of Britain, and the instigators of Indian hostilities are removed; and should we lie by, while France is struggling for her liberties, it cannot be supposed that her republic will embark in a war on our account after she shall have been victorious. It was for this reason, that though we approved of the conduct of the President, and the Judiciary of the United States, in their endeavors to preserve peace and an impartial neutrality, until the sense of the nation had been taken on the necessity of retaliation by actually declaring war, yet now that the Congress have been convinced, and such just grounds exist, we are weary of their tardiness in coming forward to measures of reprisal.

But we have observed with great pain, that our councils want the integrity or spirit of Republicans. This we attribute to the pernicious influence of stock-holders or their subordinates; and our minds feel this with so much indignancy, that we are almost ready to wish for a state of revolution, and the guillotine of France, for a short space, in order to inflict punishment on the miscreants that enervate and disgrace our government.

Gaz. of the U. States, May 5, 1794.

If the black charges against Congress, and the whole government, were true, they ought to fly to arms. They ought to pull down this tower of iniquity so as not to leave one stone upon another. The deluded western people believed them true & acted accordingly. The great mass of the discontented, therefore, are to be pitied for the ignorance and credulity which make them the dupes of the clubs. They thought they were doing God and their country service by cleansing this Augean stable of its filth. It was not oppression that roused them to arms as some would insinuate: for their country flourishes wonderfully. It was an insurrection raised by the wicked arts of faction.

A moment however is due to the peculiar fatality of the two slanders on this body. The fears of the simple citizens have been startled with the fable that there is a monarchy party in this house and the other. Scarcely to be found a particle of the disjecta
Look round, Sir, said Mr. Ames, if you please, and decide whether there is one man who is not principled as a republican, who does not think such a form adapted to our people and our people to it, and who would not shed his blood and spend his last shilling against the introduction of monarchy? I persuade myself, Sir, there is not even one man here whom any other member even thinks in his heart is to be suspected on that head.

The other slander which has contributed to kindle a civil war is the paper nobility in Congress: that the taxes are voted for the sake, and carried solely by the strength of those who put the proceeds in their pockets. Is there a word of truth in this? On the contrary, there are probably not ten members who have any interest in the funds, and that interest very inconsiderable. Is it probable therefore, that when the citizens have been led by calumny and lies to despise the government and its ministers, to dread and hate it, that the insurrection is not owing to the men and the politics, who have invented or confirmed and diffused the slanders? When the rage of these passions broke out into a civil war, are those incendiaries innocent, who inspired that rage, who nourished it from time to time with fresh combustibles, and who at last fanned it into an open flame?

The fact is too notorious for any man even to pretend ignorance, that the insurgents were encouraged to take arms by the delusive hope that the militia would not turn out against them. Had they believed that the citizens were as firm as government, as to their immortal honor they shown that they have are, would the folly or desperation of the western people have proceeded to arms? They would not. But the self-made societies had published that the rulers were tyrants, usurpers, and plunderers, abhorred by the people, who would soon hurl them down.

Let us ask a moment's pause to reflect what would have been the fate of America, if these parricide clubs had really proceeded in poisoning the public mind, as completely as they attempted to do. The western insurgents would have found armies not to suppress but to aid them. The fairest edifice of liberty, the palladium of our country, the world's hope would be crumbled to powder.

Mr. Ames then proceeded to notice some of the observations which had been urged against the motion: He asked whether in a point that so nearly concerned truth, and duty, the Committee could conciliate, that is, deny the truth and betray their duty. The proposition stated by the President was true, & had been proved to be so. Shall our silence suppress or contradict the dictates of this conviction.

It is urged that we have no right to pass this vote; a singular objection, since those who make it are consenting to the adoption of the clause, to which the word self-created societies are moved to be added. That clause is as improper, and as unconstitutional a declaration as the amendment. Is it possible that those are serious in this objection, who voted applause to General Wayne and his gallant army! Is this house a court martial to try them if they had done ill instead of well?

Had the State Legislatures no right to pass votes respecting the Cincinnati? Then we have no right to answer the speech at all, as the constitution is silent on that head. But are gentlemen who profess so much attachment to the people, and their rights, disposed to abolish one of the most signal the character of this house as the grand inquest of the nation, as those who are not only to impeach those who perpetrate offences, but to watch and give the alarm for the prevention of such attempts.

We are asked, with some pathos, will you punish Clubs, with your censure, unheard, untried, confounding the innocent with the guilty? Censure is not punishment, unless it is merited, for we merely allude to certain self-created societies, which have disregarded the truth, and fomented the outrages against the laws. Those which have been innocent will remain uncensured. It is said, worthy men belong to those Clubs. They may be as men not wanting in merit, but when they join societies which are employed to foment outrages against the laws, they are no longer innocent. They become bad citizens. If innocence happens to stray into such company, it is lost. The men really good will quit such connections, and it is a fact, that the most respected of those who were said to belong to them, have long ago renounced them. Honest credulous men may be drawn in to favour very bad designs, but so far as they do it, they deserve the reproach which this vote contains, that of being unworthy citizens.

If the worst men in society have led the most credulous and inconsiderate astray, the latter will undoubtedly come to reflection the sooner for an appeal to their sense of duty. This appeal is made in terms which truth justifies, and which apply only to those who have been criminal.

It is said that this vote will raise up the clubs into importance. One member has even solemnly warned us against the awakening of their resentments. It is not clear to my understanding, said Mr. Ames, how all the consequences which have been predicted from this vote will be accomplished. This is a breach of right, a crushing of those societies by our censure. It is putting them down, and yet we are warned that it is raising them up and making them stronger than this government. The friends of the motion are said not to agree in the principle of their defence of it, and therefore it is boldly affirmed that they have no principle. Is there any difficulty in retorting this invective?

If this vote will call the attention of the people of America to the subject, so much the better. The truth will no doubt be sought and found at last, and with such an enlightened public, I expect the result will be made with its usual good sense. That the self-created societies described in the clause are calculated to destroy a free government; that they will certainly destroy its tranquility and harmony, and greatly corrupt the integrity of the rulers, and the morals of the people.

In the course of his remarks, Mr. Ames strongly insisted that the vote was not indefinite in its terms. Societies were not reprobated because they were self made, nor because they were political societies. Every body as readily admitted that they might be innocent, as that they have been generally imprudent. It is such societies as have been regardless of the truth, and have fomented the outrages against the law, &c.

Nor is the intention of this amendment to flatter the President, as it has been intimated. He surely has little need of our praise on any personal account. This late signal act of duty is already with his grateful country, with faithful history: nor is it in our power, or in those of any offended self-created societies, to impair that tribute which will be offered to him. As little ground is there for saying that it is intended to stifle the freedom of speech and of the press, since the very persons who charge this, tell us, that it will have the contrary effect.

The question is simply will you support your chief magistrate? Our vote does not go merely to one man and to his feelings. It goes to the trust. Where clubs are arrayed against your government, and your chief magistrate decidedly arrays the militia to suppress their insurrection, will you countenance or discountenance the officer? will you ever suffer this house, the country, or even one seditious man in it, to question for an instant whether your approbation and co-operation will be less prompt and cordial than his efforts to support the laws?

Is it safe, is it honorable, to make a precedent, and that no less solemn than humiliating, which will authorize, which will compel every future president to doubt whether you will approve him or the clubs? The President now in office would doubtless do his duty promptly and with decision in such a case. But can you expect it from human nature, and if you could, would you put it at risk whether in future a President shall balance between his duty and his fear of your censure. The danger is, that a chief magistrate, elective as ours is, will temporize, will delay, will put the laws into treaty with offenders, and will even ensure a civil war perhaps the loss of our free government, by the want of proper energy to quench the first sparks.

You ought therefore on every occasion to show the most cordial support to the executive in support of the laws. This is the occasion. If it is dangerous to liberty, against right and justice, against truth and decency, to adopt the amendment, as it has been argued, then the President and Senate have done all this.

Mr. Ames concluded by saying that in a speech so long, containing such various matter, and so rapidly delivered, he might have dropped many observations in an incorrect state. He relied on the candor of the house, and of his opponents, for the interpretation of them.