Gazette Of The United States, & Daily Advertiser

For the GAZETTE of the UNITED STATES.
LOAVES AND FISHES.

In the seditious address to the Republicans of Bucks County, dated at Addis's Tavern, August 24, 1799, they were told, that if they succeeded in the grand object of raising to the first office in the State, Thomas M'Kean, the man of the people &c. &c. &c. it will be the prelude to future successes; a change of men and a change of measures will follow in due time.

In pursuance of the above doctrine, the Jacobin clubs (I use the epithet on account of the near resemblance between them and the clubs of that name, who acted so conspicuous a part on the theatre of France,) continued their periodical meetings, and altho' endeavors were used to keep their proceedings a secret among themselves, the attempt always proved abortive, for they were not all of the illuminati, and the business always transpired in a greater or less degree. It was soon publicly known that one grand object of their deliberation was to prevail on the Governor to displace Prothonotaries and Registers indiscriminately without a hearing, who had appeared in opposition to their favorite candidate, but, no individual would acknowledge that to be the principle upon which they acted, although one of the Directory of Eaton, who has since been rewarded with a portion of the loaves and fishes, was heard, in an unguarded moment, over his bottle, to declare, that the Governor would be a damned rascal, if he did not displace every damned rascal who had appeared against his election. Petitions and recommendations were accordingly drawn up and signed for the laudable purpose, in order to be presented upon or before the day of inauguration, and groundless calumnies, in imitation of the electioneering scandal of 1798 and 1799, were industriously circulated among the citizens, from the highest to the lowest, [I beg pardon, I had forgot that this is a land of liberty and equality], in order to prejudice the public mind against the objects, who were meant to be destroyed.

One miscreant in particular, who had long been remarkable for his want of common honesty, who has forged and recorded a receipt for interest money, never paid, in order to secure the payment of principal upon a bond long since discharged, has drawn and caused to be executed, a bond and judgment without a consideration, to defraud a poor woman of her living, in case she should be left a widow—and other feats of the same complexion; and who had never ventured to meddle with firelocks, except on the following occasion, viz. to drive from his dwelling a little kitchen girl, who had complained to his wife of his impudence—began to kick and squeal with all the grimaces of a crazy baboon, and circulated a report from Bristol to Durham, that there was such a set of damn'd rascals about the public office that he could not frequent it with safety, nor even venture into the street without carrying his pistol and bayonet.

At length came the memorable 17th of December, 1799, when the streets of Lancaster were illuminated with torches, and crowds of patriots moving in procession, rent the air with joyful acclamations. Meanwhile the chief, not elevated by success above his proper level, as vulgar minds usually are, retained his equanimity, and remained the same candid placid creature as before, entered immediately upon the duties of his office, and issued a proclamation, confirming and continuing all appointments and commissions, &c. &c. for 3 months, unless sooner superseded and annulled, &c. &c. &c. And on the 18th of the same month came forward the famous circular letter, whereby, it seems, the Governor had directed his secretary to intimate to 20 or 30 Prothonotaries and Registers that he was sorry (I wish he had chosen some other expression) that he had determined to displace them. And the secretary, kind soul! descants upon the pain he suffers in communicating the intelligence.

Together with the proclamation and circular letter, came a verbal report, that the Register and Recorder of Bucks in particular (though not honored with a circular letter) would be in danger unless he discarded a certain clerk, who had taken the principal charge of those offices, for some years past, and in the course of his business, fully evinced his ability, industry, integrity and sobriety. This report became great matter of speculation among the Republicans; some declared it was an upright decision of the Governor, and truly republican upon the principles of Rotation, while others, equally sanguine, declared it to be beneath the dignity of a Governor to dabble in such trifling affairs, and even affected to believe it a piece of aristocratic calumny raised in order to tarnish the reputation of his Excellency.

The matter was canvassed for a long time, and many pressing applications made to the officer for the removal of his clerk, who still retaining sense enough to know that he could not be spared, waved the matter from time to time, notwithstanding a numerous fry of candidates were besieging him on all sides. At length the tumult subsided, and many who were known to be the most determined adversaries of the young man, now declared themselves perfectly reconciled to his keeping his station, from a conviction that his presence was there absolutely necessary. After some time the affair of the Surveyor General made a noise in the State, and Broadhead and Parker, because they refused to be separated, were both ordered to decamp. Upon this, the patriots of Bucks took new courage, and renewed their solicitations, and finally, at a meeting of the Republican Committee of Bucks county, consisting of Delegates from twenty-five townships, at Addis's tavern, on the 14th of June, 1800, many resolutions were passed, among which is the following.

"Resolved, that it is expedient, that the Republican Citizens, and all who seek information on the subjects of the day, hold frequent meetings for mutual council, aid and encouragement. The more the measures of the expiring Faction are examined, the more their tendency will appear. If the people shall find upon enquiry, that their hard earnings have been extorted, to fill the pockets of a few; that their money has been paid and their estates mortgaged to fee advocates to plead for the powers that be, they will draw their own conclusions and act accordingly."

The Physiognomy of this resolve puts one in mind of the character of a demagogue drawn by a modern hand, which appears to be exactly in point, of which take the following extract for a comment.—"With the rights of the citizens, their virtue and their sovereignty, eternally vibrating on his lips, he may, for aught they care, have a heart as black as Tartarus. If he writes, let him fill his pages with frothy declamation, and vaunting bombast, with the canting jargon of modern republicans, and it matters little what arrangement he makes use of. Ambiguity and confusion are even an advantage to him, they are a labyrinth in which he loses the wretches whom he has enticed from their duty. In short, his business is to awaken in his readers, jealousy, envy, revenge and every passion that can disgrace the heart of man, to lull his gratitude, reason and conscience asleep, and then let him loose upon society."

This was considered as a good republican resolution, and therefore passed nem. con. altho' it is so perfect a riddle that no one but the demagogue, who drew it in his closet, can comprehend the meaning. Determined however to make the best of it, every one undertook to explain it in his own way. The Chairman of the committee thought it was an encouragement for those who had fine horses, to make a present of them to citizen Buonaparte, or cheerfully to give up their stock of grain for the use of the French army in case of an invasion, or to raise corps of volunteers for their assistance as occasion might require. Others thought it fixed an unequivocal mark of reprobation on the President in pardoning captain Fries, as the fellow had acted an imprudent part before he left Philadelphia, having according to the trite phrase let the cat out of the bag, by overstepping the prescribed mark, and shewing that the spirit of insurrection was not in full vigour. One other, an imported patriot, who thinks dat no man ud be contynued in offyse, who is not a riend to de coolitu bi on, fancied that it was advice to the militia colonels to cashier their paymasters and appoint others; and some were of opinion that the design was to enrol 20,000 United Irishmen to teach the Americans true liberty and the Rights of Man.

At length a tall raw-boned figure, who from his practice of neglecting his Clerical Functions for the sake of dabbling in politics, has taken the name of Talleyrand, who is the reputed author of the Buckingham address of last year, and who, previous to the last election upon a day of Sacrament, between sermons, disgusted the pious part of his hearers by distributing among them packets of the Aurora, advanced upon the floor, his aspect commanded immediate attention, and whether fraught with a message from his excellency supplementary to that of the 10th of December, or from his own native penetration, is uncertain, discovered that one principal object of the resolve was that the Register of Bucks be directed to discard his clerk, on pain of exhibiting the same spectacle that Broadhead and Parker had done before. Accordingly a vote was taken, when it was determined nem. con. that the young Federal Minion should tramp before the 17th of July, 1800.

When the Register received the mandate he could not but feel the diminution of his own importance, and smarting under the democratic lash was led into a train of very disagreeable sensations, which terminated in the following soliloquy—Is it for this that I have so long exerted every nerve to promote the cause? O the weary days and nights that I have spent in planning and executing electioneering schemes, when the cause was extremely doubtful! Have I not taken upon me every shape and name assumed by the party since the revolution? Have I not been a yellow-wig, a blue-skin, a red mouth, a constitutionalist, an anti-federal, a democrat and am I not now a republican? And shall I not be permitted to retain my own clerk, who has been long tried, and in whom I can place full confidence? But be dictated to by the sovereign people who are so much indebted to me for what they now possess? Be it so since the people have ordered it. Still am I determined to remain a republican, or whatever name may be adopted by the party, and like the patriot victims of our sister state when advancing to the national razor, cry out with ecstasy, Vive la Republique.

After awaking from his reverie he accordingly gave the signal to his clerk to depart, who upon the 17th inst. bid adieu to the painful service, consoling himself with this reflection, that the office wants me more than I want the office.

I should not have dwelt so long upon the minutiæ of this trifling and local affair, were it not that the same conduct pervades the whole system of modern democracy, were not the same exertions, duplicity and scandal used to secure the loaves and fishes of an ounce, as those of a pound weight, but when we see the same train of secret craft and open calumny practised against a President of the United States, a candidate for the office of Governor, or a Register's clerk, it matters little from whence you take your examples: I know no difference in respectability between a Secretary of State and his junto, and a chairman of a County Committee at Addis's Tavern, between a Gallatin, secretary of a seditious meeting in Braddock's Field, and a Fries at the head of the Northampton Insurrection. Such being the state of politics in this country, it would be well for those who put security of person and property upon a level, at least, with the new fangled system of Liberty and Equality, to consider whether tamely to suffer the rein of government to go into the hands of those who appear so little qualified to hold them, and who like the heroes in Hudibras—

Tug at both ends of the saw,
To tear down government and law.

or whether by a united and spirited exertion of the right of suffrage at the ensuing election continue the power in the hand of those men and their adherents, who at the commencement of the federal government rescued the states from the jaws of bankruptcy and impending ruin, and have since steadied their course with so much wisdom and moderation that no honest man by their means has suffered either in his person or property.

A BUCKS COUNTY MAN.