OBSCURITY OF THE ORIGIN OF POLITICAL PARTIES-LOYALISTS AND The origin of political parties in the state of New York is hidden in the mist of the past. During Colonial times there was always a fraction of the population who objected to the constant exactions and to the imperious financial demands of the crown. The sentiment that taxation without representation was an imposition was born long before the Albany Congress, but the inherent loyalty, so characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon race, bound the colonists to the mother country with the strongest ties and was the means of suppressing any expression that suggested ingratitude, treachery or rebellion. But when at last the division came between the colonies and England two lines were formed. On one stood the Loyalists or Tories, who were true to England; on the other the Whigs who began by trying to conciliate and ended as Rebels who defied England. The policy of the Tories was simple, direct and unmistakable. They believed in England and the King and in the temporal power of bishops. But the Whigs were without a policy and without a country. Sentiment with them had not crystallized into Independence. History affords no parallel to the fourteen years in America from 1775, when the colonies struck out for themselves, to 1789 when the young nation began to do business under the Constitution. For the first seven years the colonies were rent by a military revolution that was as demoralizing as it was devastating and as enervating as it was ruinous. During the final seven years, between Yorktown and the adoption of the Constitution, the country struggled with a political revolution within its own borders that threatened from time to time to shake the masts out of the ship of state or to throw her on her beam ends and let her founder in the sea of anarchy. Imperial commonwealths, such as Virginia, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and New York resented the proposition to place smaller and inferior states upon a level with them, and to grant the same powers and prerogatives and to admit into the Upper House of Congress, the same number of representatives, whether the population aggregated one hundred thousand or a million. The discordant conditions that faced the young nation in meeting its financial obligations threatened wreck and ruin at the outset. The Army at Newburg was at the point of mutiny and only the firm and tactful influence of Washington, whose sublimity of character never met a grave crisis with more self possession and self abnegation, quelled an uprising that would have resulted in a military despotism and destroyed every possibility of establishing a permanent form of civil government. The Congress of the Confederation was impotent. Local assemblies had drawn the strongest men from the arena of National to that of State politics. The state had become recognized as an institu tion greater than any Federal government. The ominous expression "States' Rights" was heard for the first time. It is not surprising therefore that the National Congress should consist of men of mediocre ability, only redeemed by the presence of such statesmen as Hamilton, Madison, Bland, Clymer and Wilson. Social and political conditions were hopelessly disordered. Never were statesmen called upon to face an emergency more grave or to build an enduring system out of such chaos. The people had not been educated up to the truism "in union there is strength." The potency of organization had never occurred to them. The state to them was not only the unit but the whole fabric of government. Such leaders as John Hancock, in Massachusetts, George Clinton in New York and Patrick Henry in Virginia, who were exceedingly jealous not only of their own power and influence in their own states but equally tenacious of the rights and prerogatives of those states, were honest in their convictions that the sovereignty of a commonwealth should not be impaired or destroyed by any common union because the state was superior to any National government and possessed the authority to secede whenever in its judgment the necessity for such a step should occur. With these apparently irreconcilable differences between the states and inordinate jealousies between the leaders, with the brutal ingratitude toward the army, with the Congress torn by factional strife, with the two ideas Centralization and Democracy clashing with and smashing at each other, each asserting that the supremacy of the other meant death to the country, with the general inclination to repudiate debts and an unmistakable incompetency to handle the grave question of finance and taxation, the reader of to-day is amazed to understand how the feeble young country ever stood the ordeal, how the pathway to National ascendency was ever marked out, and how the Republic ever came out of it at all with any shadow of success or any degree of strength. Three men at this particular period were no less conspicuous for the positions they occupied than for the influence they exerted over events. Each represented New York though in a different capacity: George Clinton, governor of the state, Alexander Hamilton, member of Congress and Gouverneur Morris, Assistant Financier, of the United States. As Hamilton is the recognized father of our National Banking system, so Morris, who was Hamilton's senior by five years, is the accredited founder of our National Coinage system. Hamilton's influence in Congress was in no wise commensurate with his abilities. The majority was opposed to him; his most commendable projects and suggestions were rejected. He foresaw the danger to the country in the development and expansion of democratic principles and in the great power wielded by the states. The ideas and principles he there enunciated he lived to see adopted by a very large proportion of the people. George Clinton was recognized as one of the strong men of the land. He had seen service in the field and had acquitted himself with prudence, credit and honor. As governor of the state he had established a following, at once large, obedient and faithful. He was a politician of unquestioned ability, and he understood thoroughly the temper and wishes of his people; he was obliging and considerate though firm and resolute in all his transactions and was sagacious enough to perceive that the geographical position of his state, sooner or later, meant an Empire of itself. Instead of paying tribute to other states or to a National Confederation, he determined that other states should pay tribute to New York. The suggestion for the first general impost for the benefit of the United States, is said to have been proposed in a convention held at Hartford, Connecticut, consisting of delegates from the New England States and from New York. The act, which was passed by Congress, in February 1781, was absolutely necessary because of "the utmost extremity of distress for want of money to carry on the war." On March 19, 1781, the legislature of New York in conformity with the recommendation of Congress, passed an act, which provided that the duties granted to Congress "should be levied and collected in such manner and form, and under such pains, penalties and regulations, and by such officers as Congress should from time to time, make, order, direct and appoint." Governor Clinton opposed this measure strongly and he refused to surrender the revenue collected, on the ground that New York as an independent sovereignty, had associated with the other colonies merely for the purpose of mutual assistance and protection and should not be expected to give up this source of wealth to the Nation at large. He was severely criticised by the Federalists for his course, and denounced as a demagogue and a hypocrite. He was largely instrumental in securing the repeal of the law. "The embarrassments experienced in carrying through the first plan," observes Hamilton "the increase of the National debt and other circumstances induced Congress to devise a new system of impost, which was finally agreed upon on the 18th of April 1783." As a compromise Congress gave to the states the power to appoint the collecting officers, but this proviso was subsequently annulled by bestowing the power · of removal upon the Federal authorities. All the States ac |