Albert Gallatin. John Austin Stevens
by the State. In conformity with this, the State paid to its creditors the difference between the nominal amount of the state debt assumed by the United States and the rate at which it was funded by the act of Congress.
“The proceeds of the public lands, together with the arrears, were the fund which not only discharged all the public debts, but left a large surplus. The apprehension that this would be squandered by the legislature was the principal inducement for chartering the Bank of Pennsylvania, with a capital of two millions of dollars, of which the State subscribed one half. This, and similar subsequent investments, enabled Pennsylvania to defray, out of the dividends, all the expenses of government without any direct tax during the forty ensuing years, and till the adoption of the system of internal improvement, which required new resources.
“It was my constant assiduity to business, and the assistance derived from it by many members, which enabled the Republican party in the legislature, then a minority on a joint ballot, to elect me, and no other but me of that party, senator of the United States.”
Among the reports enumerated by Mr. Gallatin, as those of which he was the author, is one made by a committee on March 22, 1793, that they … are of opinion slavery is inconsistent with every principle of humanity, justice, and right, and repugnant to the spirit and express letter of the Constitution of the Commonwealth. Added to this was a resolution for its abolition in the Commonwealth.
The seat of government was changed from New York to Philadelphia in 1790, and the first Congress assembled there in the early days of December for its final session. Philadelphia was in glee over the transfer of the departments. The convention which framed the new state Constitution met here in the fall, and the legislature was also holding its sessions. The atmosphere was political. The national and local representatives met each other at all times and in all places, and the public affairs were the chief topic in and out of doors. In this busy whirl Gallatin made many friends, but Philadelphia was no more to his taste as a residence than Boston. He was disgusted with the ostentatious display of wealth, the result not of industry but of speculation, and not in the hands of the most deserving members of the community. Later he became more reconciled to the tone of Pennsylvania society, comparing it with that of New York; he was especially pleased with its democratic spirit, and the absence of family influence. “In Pennsylvania,” he says, “not only we have neither Livingstons, nor Rensselaers, but from the suburbs of Philadelphia to the banks of the Ohio I do not know a single family that has any extensive influence. An equal distribution of property has rendered every individual independent, and there is amongst us true and real equality. In a word, as I am lazy, I like a country where living is cheap; and as I am poor, I like a country where no person is very rich.”
Hamilton's excise bill was a bone of contention in the national and state legislatures throughout the winter. Direct taxation upon anything was unpopular, that on distilled spirits the most distasteful to Pennsylvania, where whiskey stills were numerous in the Alleghanies. To the bill introduced into Congress a reply was immediately made January 14, 1791, by the Pennsylvania Assembly in a series of resolutions which are supposed to have been drafted by Mr. Gallatin, and to have been the first legislative paper from his pen. They distinctly charged that the obnoxious bill was “subversive of the peace, liberty, and rights of the citizen.”
Tax by excise has always been offensive to the American people, as it was to their ancestors across the sea. It was characterized by the first Continental Congress of 1774 as “the horror of all free States.” Notwithstanding their warmth, these resolutions passed the Assembly by a vote of 40 to 16. The course of this excitement must be followed; as it swept Mr. Gallatin in its mad current, and but for his self-control, courage, and adroitness would have wrecked him on the breakers at the outset of his political voyage. The excise law passed Congress on March 3, 1791. On June 22 the state legislature, by a vote of 36 to 11, requested their senators and representatives in Congress to oppose every part of the bill which “shall militate against the rights and liberties of the people.”
The western counties of Pennsylvania—Westmoreland, Fayette, Washington, and Allegheny—lie around the head-waters of the Ohio in a radius of more than a hundred miles. At this time they contained a population of about seventy thousand souls. Pittsburgh, the seat of justice, had about twelve hundred inhabitants. The Alleghany Mountains separate this wild region from the eastern section of the State. There were few roads of any kind, and these lay through woods. The mountain passes could be traveled only on foot or horseback. The only trade with the East was by pack-horses, while communication with the South was cut off by hostile Indian tribes who held the banks of the Ohio. This isolation from the older, denser, and more civilized settlements bred in the people a spirit of self-reliance and independence. They were in great part Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, a religious and warlike race to whom the hatred of an exciseman was a tradition of their forefathers. Having no market for their grain, they were compelled to preserve it by converting it into whiskey. The still was the necessary appendage of every farm. The tax was light, but payable in money, of which there was little or none. Its imposition, therefore, coupled with the declaration of its oppressive nature by the Pennsylvania legislature, excited a spirit of determined opposition near akin to revolution.
Unpopular in all the western part of the State, Hamilton's bill was especially odious to the people of Washington County. The first meeting in opposition to it was held at Red Stone Old Fort or Brownsville, the site of one of those ancient remains of the mound-builders which abound in the western valleys. It was easily reached by Braddock's Road, the chief highway of the country. Here gathered on July 27, 1791, a number of persons opposed to the law, when it was agreed that county committees should be convened in the four counties at the respective seats of justice. Brackenridge, in his “Incidents of the Western Insurrection,” says that Albert Gallatin was clerk of the meeting. One of these committees met in the town of Washington on August 23, when violent resolutions were adopted. Gallatin, engaged at Philadelphia, was not present at this assemblage, three of whose members were deputed to meet delegates from the counties of Westmoreland, Fayette, and Allegheny, at Pittsburgh, on the first Tuesday in September following, to agree upon an address to the legislature on the subject of excise and other grievances. At the Pittsburgh meeting eleven delegates appeared for the four counties. The resolutions adopted by them, general in character, read more like a declaration of grievances as a basis for revolution than a petition for special redress. No wonder that the secretary of the treasury stigmatized them as “intemperate.” They charge that in the laws of the late Congress hasty strides had been made to all that was unjust and oppressive. They complain of the increase in the salaries of officials, of the unreasonable interest of the national debt, of the non-discrimination between original holders and transferees of the public securities, of the National Bank as a base offspring of the funding system; finally, in detail, of the excise law of March 3, 1791. At this meeting James Marshall and David Bradford represented Washington County.
In August government offices of inspection were opened. The spirit of resistance was now fully aroused, and in the early days of September the collectors for Washington, Westmoreland, and Fayette were treated with violence. Unwilling to proceed to excessive measures, and no doubt swayed by the attitude of the Pennsylvania legislature, Congress in October referred the law back to Hamilton for revision. He reported an amended act on March 6, 1792, which was immediately passed, and became a law March 8. It was to take effect on the last day of June succeeding. By it the rate of duty was reduced, a privilege of time as to the running of licenses of stills granted, and the tax ordered only for such time as they were actually used.
But these modifications did not satisfy the malcontents of the four western counties, and they met again on August 21, 1792, at Pittsburgh. Of this second Pittsburgh meeting Albert Gallatin was chosen secretary. Badollet went up with Gallatin. John Smilie, James Marshall, and James Bradford of Washington County were present. Bradford, Marshall, Gallatin, and others were appointed to draw up a remonstrance to Congress. In order to carry out with regularity and concert the measures agreed upon, a committee of correspondence was appointed, and the meeting closed with the adoption of the violent resolutions passed at the Washington meeting of 1791:—
“Whereas, some men may be found among us so far lost to every sense of virtue and feeling for the distresses of this country as to accept offices for the collection of the duty.