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The propositions for altering the constitution of the CHAPTER national judiciary and Senate, brought forward by Randolph and Nicholson; the semi-Revolutionary step, or ap- 1805. proach to it, taken by the Democratic convention which Pierrepont Edwards had called together in Connecticut; and now this proposition for a new constitution for Pennsylvania, together with the violence of the Clintonians in New York, excited general alarm, as evidences of the existence in the country of an ultra radical and Revolutionary party. Yet the memorial for a convention in Pennsylvania only proposed to make the election of senators annual; to reduce the patronage of the governor; and to limit the term of office of the judges—a thing already existing in Connecticut, Vermont, and Ohio, and since substantially carried into effect, not in Pennsylvania only, but in New York and many other states; and which (in spite of conservative objectors) may be considered as now coincident with the prevailing political ideas of intelligent men in America. Longer experience has tended to produce the conviction that all select bodies in which the appointing power may be vested, while they are hardly less liable to delusion than the mass of the voters, are far more likely to be managed by intrigue and warped by private interests. It is also to be borne in mind that the improved political education of the people, the multiplication of newspapers, and the immense and increasing diffusion of intelligence, has made practicable for us an infusion of democracy into the administration of public affairs which half a century ago might have been at least questionable, if not dangerous.

The moderate Democrats took the name of CONSTITUTIONALISTS; and, as a central point for operations, they organized what they called "the Constitutional Society."

The other section of the party constituted them

(

CHAPTER selves into a rival club, called "the Friends of the Peo

XVII. ple." The Federalists looked on and enjoyed the strife; 1805. yet not altogether without alarm; for the violence of the

factions seemed almost to threaten a civil war. McKean, having put his veto upon some further acts for increasing the power of the Assembly and for regulating the administration of justice, was openly denounced by "the Friends of the People ;" and at a legislative caucus, Simon Snyder, late speaker of the House, whose German name and lineage would attract, it was hoped, many votes, was nominated as the ultra Democratic candidate. for the office of governor. The Constitutionalists, on the other hand, rallied about M'Kean, among them that "plausible, elastic, extraordinary man" Dallas, for so the Aurora described him—and it charged him, too, with having pocketed $6598 for three months' services as state pay-master during the Whisky Insurrection. Logan also adhered to M'Kean, as did Cooper, the Sedition Law martyr, lately appointed president judge of one of the Common Pleas districts.

In their address to the Democratic citizens, the friends of Snyder represented M'Kean as a demagogue ready to purchase preferment by making a display of the most extravagant republican zeal, but, at the same time, by education, sentiment, and habit, a domineering and overbearing aristocrat, who, having first obtained office and secured his re-election by Democratic votes, had finally attempted, with Federal aid, to set up a third party of his own, and had always treated the Democratic Legislature with distant sullenness, private virulence, and public disrespect. The biting lash of the Aurora was now most bitterly felt by many who had formerly stimulated its application to others; so much so that the friends of M'Kean complained in their address "that the citizens

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might at length perceive that advantage had been taken CHAPTER of their just veneration for the liberty of the press to shackle them with the tyranny of printers."

How far the Democrats of Pennsylvania, whether Constitutionalists or Friends of the People, could make any just pretensions to "veneration for the liberty of the press," may be judged of by a prosecution which, before their schism, they had jointly promoted against Joseph Dennie, the able editor of the Port Folio, published at Philadelphia, in which journal had appeared a general diatribe against Democracy, setting forth the evils of that form of government as exhibited in Greece, Rome, and elsewhere, but without any direct allusions to America, though the application was obvious. Upon this article an indictment had been found (July, 1802), charging Dennie with the publication of a seditious libel, with the design to bring the government of the United States into contempt! Chief-justice Shippen, who presided at the trial, which came on toward the end of the current year, instructed the jury that if the publication had been made with the intent charged, the indictment would lie. But the jury settled the matter by a verdict of not guilty.

The veteran but now somewhat superannuated Thomas Paine, having returned to America, had taken up his residence on a farm in New York, the forfeited property of a refugee Tory, given him by that state for his Revolutionary services. His pen was enlisted on the side of "the Friends of the People;" but, by those same supporters of M'Kean who had admired the Letter to Washington in 1797, Paine was now denounced as "a polluted monster, infamous and execrated."

There was some difference of opinion among the Federalists as to what course they ought to take. Such was the bitterness against M'Kean of the more ardent mem

1805.

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CHAPTER bers of that party, that they were even ready to give their votes to Snyder. But the bulk of the Federalists 1805. determined to support M'Kean as the least of two evils —an aid which the Constitutionalists gladly accepted, though they guarded carefully against any actual amalgamation, strenuously contending with the Friends of the People for the title of "genuine Republicans." In October. the end M'Kean triumphed by a majority of upward of 5000 votes; and, what was still more important, the Constitutionalists obtained majorities in both branches of the Legislature.

While the Democratic party in New York and Pennsylvania was shaken by these violent internal struggles, Virginia remained quite tranquil. Even there, however, existed a more radical and a more moderate party, of which the latter triumphed in the election of William H. Cabell to succeed Page as governor.

In the course of the summer large additional cessions of land were obtained from the Indians. By a treaty July 4. held at Fort Industry, on the Maumee, between Gov

ernor Harrison and the Wyandots, Ottawas, Chippewas, Munsees, Delawares, Shawanese, and Potawatomies, those tribes, in consideration of a perpetual annuity of $1000, relinquished all claim to the tract in the State of Ohio known as the Connecticut Reserve. This was in addition to $16,000 already paid or secured to some of these tribes by the Connecticut Land Company, the purchasers from Connecticut of that tract. By another treaty, shortly after, with the Delawares, Potawatomies, Miamis, Eel River Indians, and Weas, the Indian title was extinguished to all that part of the present State of Indiana within fifty miles of the Ohio, except a narrow tract along the west bank of the Wabash; and thus, in connection with former cessions, was opened to settlement

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the whole northern bank of the Ohio, from its sources to CHAPTER its mouth. The consideration to the Indians was $4000 in cash, an annuity of $500 for ten years, and a perma- 1805. nent annuity of $1100.

On the south of the Ohio, also, cessions of no less importance were obtained. The introduction of the arts and habits of civilized life among the Indian tribes, originated by Washington, and zealously followed up by Jefferson, proved a measure no less politic than humane. The recent progress of the Cherokees in husbandry and the rearing of cattle made them the more ready to cede a part of their lands, now no longer needed as huntinggrounds. For $14,000 in cash and a perpetual annuity of $3000, they yielded up, of that wide, intervening tract by which hitherto the settlements of East and West Tennessee had been divided, the portion north of Duck River. They also conceded the opening of several roads and the passage of the mail through their territory.

Aug. 21.

The Georgians succeeded at last in obtaining that object of their ardent wishes, the tract, or the greater part of it, between the Oconee and Ocmulgee. A treaty had been made the year before, by which the Creeks had agreed to cede this tract for the sum of $200,000, in irredeemable six per cent. stock of the United States. But this treaty the Senate had refused to ratify, both because they thought the price exorbitant, and because they apprehended that the stock might soon pass out of the hands of the Indians into those of cunning traders and speculators. By a new treaty the Creeks agreed to Nov. 14. accept instead an annuity of $12,000 for eight years, to be followed by an annuity of $11,000 for ten years.