In the former, the result of an election was frequently decided by the
operations of some local or exciting topic. No decisive contest took
place between the parties previous to 1800, founded on any great or
controlling principle of government. But, during the years 1798 and
1799, the whole country was agitated from one extreme to the other.
Revolutionary France was convulsed, and, in the midst of her
convulsions and sufferings, was daily committing the most cruel and
wanton excesses towards her own citizens, while she was offering
taunts and insults to foreign nations. The federal party seemed to
sigh for a war with France. Pretending that they apprehended a French
invasion, a large standing army was raised. At the head of this army,
second in command to General Washington, was placed General Alexander
Hamilton. To support the army and other useless extravagant
expenditures, a land tax and an _eight per cent._ loan was found
necessary. To silence the murmurs of an oppressed people, a sedition
law was enacted. Such were some of the fruits of the elder Mr. Adams's
administration.
In the autumn of 1799 and the winter of 1799-1800, the interesting and
vital question was presented to the American nation:--Will you sustain
this administration and these measures, and thus rivet chains upon
yourselves and your posterity? Or will you calmly, but firmly and in
union, resort to the constitutional remedy (the ballot-boxes) for
relief from wrongs and oppressions which, if permitted to endure, must
terminate in the horrors of intestine war? Here was a question of
principle; and, it is believed, a question which was to decide the
character of the government.
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