The American Chronicle 1 - Burr (28 page)

“You may depend on me in all things,” I said. I was sincere. Was he? It is hard to say. Jefferson was a ruthless man who wanted to create a new kind of world, dominated by independent farmers each living on his own rich land, supported by slaves. It is amazing how beguilingly he could present this contradictory vision. But then in all his words if not deeds Jefferson was so beautifully human, so eminently vague, so entirely dishonest but not in any meretricious way. Rather it was a passionate form of self-delusion that rendered Jefferson as president and as man (not to mention as writer of tangled sentences and lunatic metaphors) confusing even to his admirers. Proclaiming the unalienable rights of man for everyone (excepting slaves, Indians, women and those entirely without property), Jefferson tried to seize the Floridas by force, dreamed of a conquest of Cuba, and after his illegal purchase of Louisiana sent a military governor to rule New Orleans against the will of its inhabitants.

Finally, in his second term, when Jefferson saw that he could not create the Arcadian society he wanted, he settled with suspicious ease for the Hamiltonian order, and like a zealous Federalist proceeded to levy taxes, and to create a navy (admittedly on the cheap—his famed gunboats had to be scrapped), while setting for the west and the south an imperial course as coldly and resourcefully as any Bonaparte. Had Jefferson not been a hypocrite I might have admired him. After all, he was the most successful empire-builder of our century, succeeding where Bonaparte failed. But then Bonaparte was always candid when it came to motive and Jefferson was always dishonest. In the end, candour failed; dishonesty prevailed. I dare not preach a sermon on
that
text.

At the beginning of October 1791, I arrived in Philadelphia and took lodging at 130 South Second Street in the house of two elderly widows, one mother to the other, one deafer than the other. Very kindly the ladies suggested that I not strain my senatorial voice in trying to communicate with them. Since I was their only lodger, silence reigned in South Second Street and I slept marvellously well in a back bedroom.

On the 24th of October the Second Congress convened, and the next day President Washington haltingly read to us a message prepared for him by Hamilton. I remember thinking how uncommonly healthy the President looked, his normally sallow face quite ruddy. It was Senator James Monroe of Virginia who enlightened me.

“He’s taken to painting himself like a tavern sign whenever he appears in public. At home, he looks to be a hundred.” Monroe’s contempt for the father of his country was apparent even then while Washington detested the senator from his home state: thought him a regular Jacobite.

I was selected by the Senate to respond to the presidential address. After composing some elevated nonsense (fear of the Indian tribes was that session’s crisis), I went with the other members of Congress to the Morris mansion in High Street (called without irony “the palace”).

Like schoolboys we filed into the great man’s presence. Magnificently dressed, holding a cocked hat, sword at his side, heavily and plausibly painted, George Washington stood before the fireplace with Jefferson to his right and Hamilton to his left. Hamilton looked more than ever like a small ginger terrier at the side of those two giants—each was more than six feet tall; does such physical altitude insure greatness? Even Monroe was tall though constantly stooped.

Vice-President Adams mumbled a few remarks (he at least was comfortingly small and fat). Slowly and with care, the President inclined his head (when newly applied, the fine white powder he used to dress his hair sometimes gave the startling effect of a cloudy nimbus about that storied head).

I responded in the name of the Congress to his address, and he responded to me briefly. All the while Hamilton stared at me, smiling a most curious, perhaps involuntary smile. Then doors were flung open and there in the drawing-room stood the Lady Washington surrounded by various Philadelphia ladies. White servants in royal red livery dispensed sweet plum-cake and wine to us loyal commons.

I found myself with the fiercely republican Senator Maclay (who had lost his seat in March but was still in Philadelphia), an angry figure whose loathing of monarchy made Jefferson seem a mere dilettante on that sore subject.

“Look at King George!” Scornfully Maclay indicated the President who was stationed now in the centre of the room receiving ladies who curtsied deeply to him. “If the people could see this ...”

“They would be delighted.” It is my view that the people themselves are not democratic; only slave-owning aristocrats like Jefferson can afford to believe in democracy.

“I am not delighted.” Maclay watched with disgust as Washington inclined his head to each of a number of gentlemen who filed slowly past him. “Note how he never shakes a man’s hand. He deems it vulgar.”

Then I was taken up by the beautiful Mrs. Bingham (a cousin of Peggy Shippen Arnold). “We expect you later. After this!” Mrs. Bingham’s gesture toward the plump Lady Washington indicated serene condescension. The Washington court was a source of much amusement to Philadelphia’s high society, and particularly to its queen Mrs. Bingham whose mansion on Third Street was the most elaborate private house in the United States. “And you, too, Mr. Hamilton,” for that handsome little figure had suddenly appeared at my elbow.

I put out my hand in greeting only to realize too late that the Secretary of the Treasury had taken to imitating his chief. He gave me a decorous bow, arms to his side. “It is a pleasure, Colonel Burr, to see you here.”

We played at friendship. “I regret that my presence should be at the expense of General Schuyler.”

“There will be other elections.” Hamilton’s curious smile seemed permanently fixed to his lips. “I hope that you and I can avoid the spirit of faction which has begun.”

“I belong to no faction.” I was blunt, and spoke the truth. “I was chosen by both Federalists and Republicans.”

“I know, and they could not have chosen more shrewdly.”

Whatever that meant. But I was as intent as he on playing out the scene, and with the same urbanity. “Yet the divisions here do not seem to me to be too deep.”

“You have just arrived.” The smile went (as did Mrs. Bingham); the succeeding frown was real. “Jefferson is intent on destroying this administration from within.” In a tirade it all came out. Hamilton’s tragedy was also his gift: he was a man of high intellectual passion whose weapon was language. Unable to remain silent on any subject that excited him he, literally, dug his own grave with words.

“I know that you met with Jefferson and Madison in New York ...”

“Only with Mr. Jefferson. I’m afraid that your informant ...”

“Was a Hessian fly!” Hamilton’s eyes flashed with sudden good humour. He was as mercurial as the weather of that tropical West Indian island from which he came. “I am sure Jefferson did his best to convince you that I want to put a crown on the General’s head.”

“No, on your own.” If this was to be badinage, I would sustain my end. But it was not.

The frown returned. “I think, Burr, that Jefferson is mad. Certainly on that subject. First, he has been away too long in France, and has a womanish attachment to that nation. He has also decided that their present form of anarchy is highly desirable—at least to contemplate at a distance. I doubt if he will ever surrender that Virginia farm of his to the people. Oh, Burr, I tell you he is the perfect hypocrite!”

I was embarrassed by the suddenness of this outburst, particularly since Jefferson was dreamily watching us from the far end of the room; but Hamilton was not to be stopped. “You know what a bloody time of it we had in the last Congress, over my plan for the Bank.” I said that indeed I did. The dispute over the United States Bank was, in effect, the dividing line between two factions which, presently, became—and continue to be—two political parties. The northern states interested in trade and manufactures favoured the Bank. The agricultural southern states detested it; farmers are always short of cash and to a man they fear banks, mortgages, foreclosures.

Hamilton’s grievances against Jefferson were manifold and such was his passionate nature that he could not keep from confiding them to me, a potential enemy but then, for all he knew, a potential ally, since I was senator from a state devoted to trade and manufactures.

“Three years ago when Jefferson became secretary of state, we made an arrangement. I wanted the federal government to assume the debts of the states. But as Virginia had paid off most of her debt, the Virginians in Congress were opposed. I appealed to Jefferson. We were standing outside the President’s house in New York. I practically got down on my knees to him, begged him to help me change the Virginia votes. Warned him that other states would secede if we did not help them pay their debts. He entirely agreed, he said, and—now this is crucial—he agreed that the assumption of debts was in the interest of
all
the states. He then suggested that I put my case to Madison at a dinner in his house. I repeated for Madison what I had said to Jefferson but Madison was cool to the plan, and so to my surprise was Jefferson, who kept changing the subject. Spoke of climate. Of flora. Of fauna. Of the natural beauties of Virginia. I did my best to appear spellbound when he favoured me with a long digression on the physical nature of the opossum. There is a pouch, it seems, in the stomach of the opossum. Jefferson was worried about that pouch. Finally, I realized what our deep philosopher was after. He wanted the new capital of the country to be placed in Virginia—specifically on the banks of the Potomac River near Georgetown. If I gave him the capital, he and Madison would support me on the assumption of debts. I agreed. I had no choice. And that is how my bill to assume the debts of the states promptly passed the Congress, with the aid of the Virginia delegation, and that is why nine years from now Virginia will have the capital of the country, assuming those desultory farmers remember to build a city between now and then.”

At the time I rather doubted Hamilton’s version. Later I discovered it was correct. But then he was always truthful in such matters. Unlike Jefferson, Hamilton never lied about issues, only men.

“It would seem to me,” I was thinking rapidly, “that if Jefferson is so agreeable to arrangements, you must simply keep on making it worth his while ...”

“Unfortunately he has discovered
the people
.
That beast attracts him. He would like to level everyone, and not because he has any abiding love for the majesty of the multitude but because he is a demagogue and thinks that to cry ‘monarchist’ at the President or at me is the surest way of inciting the people against us. Well, if he succeeds, Heaven help him! No Washington, no United States. No United States, no Jefferson. He is without conscience.”

I made my only objection. “I would not underestimate his zeal. He strikes me as a man addicted to the most rigid principles ...”

“Principles! You should have seen the letter he recently wrote a friend in Paris.” During this period the one certain way of gaining total publicity was not through the newspapers but through the postal service. In consequence, most of us wrote in cipher; even so, letters were constantly intercepted and the ciphers regularly broken. Hamilton and Jefferson spent a good deal of time reading one another’s private correspondence.

“Jefferson wrote to advise a Mr. Short to invest his money
in the bank
! In the very bank Jefferson is publicly accusing of being a menace to the republic! Oh, he is as two-faced as Janus! Do you know why he is so eager for a war in Europe? Because it will increase the price of the wheat he is growing in prospect of just such a war. He has also instructed his farm agent to grow hemp, cotton and flax because when the fighting begins in Europe he will be able to make a huge profit here at home. So Jefferson actually promotes war as being—in his very phrase—‘helpful to domestic manufacture’!”

I have no idea if any of this was true. The important thing is that Hamilton believed it to be true. What zealots those two were! Yet of the two I regard Hamilton as the more honourable. Certainly he had the more realistic view of the world. Trained as a boy by Jews in the Indies, he understood money and commerce in a way that no one else at that time did, excepting Gallatin. Personally Hamilton was probably honest, though surrounded by thieves. One such thief was his close friend and assistant secretary of the Treasury, William Duer. Hamilton allowed Duer to sell Treasury secrets to speculators until Duer went to jail. But then Hamilton was no judge of character. He lived in a rarefied world of theory; unlike Jefferson who
appeared
unworldly yet understood human character better than any other politician I have ever known. Had the two been combined into a single statesman, we might have been governed by Plato’s philosopher-king, and I would have gone rather earlier to Mexico, my Syracuse!

I recall no more of our exchange. Hamilton was desperate for votes in the Senate now that he had lost Schuyler. He was counting on my neutrality—on my accessibility to reason in the coming sessions. As it turned out, much of the time we were allied.

As I was leaving “the palace,” I found myself walking beside Adams—known behind his back as His Rotundity. Round, plump, tactless, with a nose like a parrot’s beak and a cold piercing eye, Adams was an imposing if somewhat comical figure, famed for his
gaffes
:
as president he once told a hostile Republican Congress how honoured he had been to be presented to the King of England. He never did understand men, but he was quite at home with their ideas.

As we waited for our carriage (this was a part of our pretentiousness in Philadelphia: although most distances were short we all owned or hired carriages to take us from Congress Hall to “palace” to boarding-house), Adams said, “Your family is highly regarded in New England, Senator.” This sort of pronouncement was purest Adams. “Your grandfather Jonathan Edwards might be said to have shaped our very being.”

“Then I understand New England better.”

For all Adams’ bluntness, he was not—like Jefferson—immune to irony. “Yes, I suspect you do. You are a contemporary of Mr. Hamilton. I saw you speaking to him just now.”