“Good. Would you ever use ‘inexorable’?”
“I think I know what it means,” she said, “but no, it’s not a word I would use.”
“And if you did not use it in speech, you would not use it in a letter, which is the written spoken word. No—‘inexorable’ is a writer’s word, one that often appears in Hamilton’s writings.”
“What are you saying, James?”
“That the King of the Feds is a total fraud,” he said. “No wonder he called my request for the documents impudent.” He grinned triumphantly, head bandage and all. The boyish smile transformed his usually intense expression into one she found winsome.
He held out his cup for more tea. She took the proffered cup instead, placed it in another saucer, and poured, asking, “And what does Mr. Jefferson think, James? Colonel Burr tells me that you and the Vice President are in closer touch than most people know.”
“Strange Burr should know that. Years ago, when Thomas Jefferson was Secretary of State, he told President Washington that his Treasury Secretary, Hamilton, was corruptly speculating in securities. But Washington wouldn’t listen to Jefferson on that. Then as now, Hamilton was the apple of his eye.”
“And what does Mr. Jefferson think in my case? ” she pressed.
“Jefferson told me that Hamilton’s willingness to plead guilty to adultery,” Callender confided, “strengthened rather than weakened his suspicions that the Treasury Secretary was in truth guilty of corrupt speculations. That means Jefferson believes you, Maria. I am as sure of that as I am sure that after this national madness about a war passes, he will be our next President.”
Maria, satisfied, slipped off her heeled shoes so as not to tower over him as he left. When she rose, she shook hands solemnly and then touched his scarred face as she expressed condolences in his bereavement. “You will see your children again soon, James, I know it. Cobbett has been even crueler to you than he has been to me.”
“Porcupine’s quills never bother me,” he said stoutly, which struck her as plainly untrue, though the man might find comfort in deluding himself. He stared for a while into his teacup, examining the dregs, and veered off the subject to ask: “You keep in touch with Colonel Burr?”
She should not have mentioned that Burr had told her that Callender was in communication with Jefferson; she worried that it made it seem as if she was part of an intrigue. “He represented me in my divorce five years ago,” she explained. “And now he’s helping my husband Jacob find a position. I’ll always be grateful to him.”
“You knew him before the investigation by Monroe and the others took place.” Because he seemed to state it as a fact, she did not want to contradict him. And yet she did not want him to know about her relationship with Burr in New York, starting even before she went to Philadelphia and had to seek out Hamilton for help.
“In New York. I am related to the Livingston family, and Colonel Burr and his wife Theodosia were part of that social set.” When he waited, saying nothing, she felt the need to shift the subject slightly to “He was devastated when she died.”
“Was Hamilton aware, when he was dealing with your husband Reynolds seven years ago, that you were acquainted with Burr?”
“I have no idea.”
He shrugged as if it was of no importance, and she was glad when he did not continue down a road that might make her seem to be a manipulator of men. “Do you know the one line, in this curious pamphlet of Hamilton’s, that I will never forget?” the writer asked. “It’s about you. Here—‘The variety of shapes which this woman could assume was endless.’ ”
She had re-read and puzzled over that line as well. In a way, it was true: with Hamilton, she had been supplicant, mistress, confidante, supporter, stimulant, changing as their mutual needs changed. But she refused to accept his portrayal of her in his infamous pamphlet as assuming the shape of prostitute, blackmailer or betrayer. That was what made it so difficult for her to tell the whole truth about her relationship to Hamilton to her husband Jacob, or to this journalist, with whom she would like to be honest. If once she were to admit Hamilton’s account of an affair, that would make believable his entire story about blackmail. Her dilemma was that she could not tell the whole truth without adding credence to her former lover’s falsity. She had to refuse to admit their adultery to keep Hamilton from using it to cover up his corrupt financial dealings with Reynolds.
“Do you see me, James, as capable of assuming an endless variety of shapes, like a jealous goddess or a demon?”
“Of course not. It’s a flagrant lie,” he assured her, “but poetic in its imagery. Evil men like Hamilton can be brilliant writers. Porcupine, damn his eyes, is another.”
“I’m glad you recognize that I am incapable of such duplicity, James. Wait—you’ll need a sample of my writing beyond the words in your spelling test.”
She extracted the Reynolds pamphlet from his hand, took up her pen and wrote out a line she remembered from Shakespeare: “This above all—to thine own self be true, and thou canst not then be false to any man.” She added, “—or any woman. For James, with the trust and affection of Maria.”
Callender swallowed and said nothing more; he slid his cap over his bandages and left. She leaned back against the closed door, concerned about her dilemma, wondering if she could count on his belief in her or whether it would change as he delved further into her past. Susan came out of the kitchen and asked if the serious man in black was likely to return.
“Without a doubt, my darling,” Maria replied. “It’s inexorable.”
Chapter 17
October 27, 1798
VERGENNES , VERMONT
Jabez Fitch, marshal in charge of the imprifonment of Congressman Spittin’ Matt Lyon, proudly claimed that his penal facility was the darkest, stinkingest, most loathsome jail in all of western Vermont. He made certain that his new political prisoner received treatment hitherto reserved for lowly and violent charges.
Huddled in his overcoat, Lyon sat on a stool in the corner of the small cell farthest from the stench of the “necessary.” No glass was in the barred window and the late October cold snap chilled the prisoner to the bone. “Cheer up, Mr. Congressman,” Fitch called in to him, “the colder it gets, the less it stinks in there. Count your blessings. Tell that to the mob of your friends out there.”
The Green Mountain Boys, veterans of the Revolution that had served with Lyon under Ethan Allen, were massing outside the jail this Election Day to break him out. Lyon knew that such an unlawful assault was exactly what his jailers wanted; indeed, they had brought him to such humiliating and painful surroundings just to provoke a small rebellion. At the first sign of a riot, the militia would be called in, heads broken, his own jail term extended for years, and Inspector General Alexander Hamilton would have all the more reason to lure more recruits into his expensive standing army.
Standing on his rickety stool, the prisoner grabbed the freezing bars and shouted to the men outside: “Go home and vote! Obey the damn law! They’re treatin’ me fine in here!”
“I’m glad you appreciate our hospitality,” said Jabez Fitch outside the cell door. “You disunionists and opposers will get to spend a lot of time with us.”
“It is quite a new kind of jargon,” snapped Lyon, “to call an elected Representative of the people an Opposer of the Government just because he crosses the view of the Executive.” The worst he anticipated at his trial was a fine; he was astounded at the prison sentence with a $1,000 fine on top of that. Most republicans, Lyon included, had assumed the Sedition Act was directed at Callender and the other writers of defamatory pamphlets and newspapers, and not at duly elected officials. But now the purpose of the act was becoming clear: Unity required one party. Two parties meant disorganization, disunion, and secession. Therefore, all organized opposition was sedition and the opposers would be jailed.
The first Congressman convicted of sedition in America had to be careful about what he put in letters. He knew that Marsh
al Fitch would summon a Federalist lawyer to go over each one he wrote or received, hoping to find some new evidence of defaming the government on which to base a fresh arrest. That would permit months of detention pending another trial. When the Vermont Gazette, a Jefferson organ, castigated Fitch as “a hard-hearted savage, who has, to the disgrace of Federalism, been elevated to a station where he can satiate his barbarity on the misery of his victims,” the Marshal’s judicial allies promptly clapped its editor in jail to await trial. That effectively shut down that anti-Federalist paper through this election of 1798.
Only his son Jim was allowed to visit Lyon in prison, lest the people of Vermont be infected with red sedition or religious heresy during the month candidates stood for election. His son brought the one candle that the prisoner was allowed per day. Jim also brought a message from the republican almost as oppressed by the Sedition Act as the man in jail.
“Callender will be holed up for the winter in the home of Senator Stevens Mason,” the younger Lyon reported. “He sends word from Virginia that Mason is collecting the money to pay your thousand-dollar fine. That’ll be his own and from other republicans who can afford it.”
It was as if the Scot were sliding the Wild Irishman another set of fire tongs to help him beat off his newest attackers. Lyon’s jail term was supposedly for four months, but if the landowner could not get up the cash for the huge fine, the Adams men could keep him incarcerated for long afterward. “We can raise the money ourselves, lad. I’m not looking for charity.” His son was selling his Fairhaven land at distress prices to whatever buyers he could find. “Show me our newspaper.”
He lit the candle and avidly perused the Scourge of Aristocracy. He liked the statement of purpose in the first issue under his own signature: “to oppose truth to falsehood . . . to prepare the American mind to resist degrading subjection to a set of High Mightinesses in our own country, and a close connection with a corrupt, tottering monarchy in Britain.”
Better than that, he liked the way his son tied the foolish fervor for war closely to a sobering distaste for taxes. A standing army with the necessary barracks and forts, added to the purchase or construction of new vessels for a navy, would cost the farmers and workmen of America $14 million in taxes—“more than three dollars a head for every man, woman and child in the United States.” That brought the issue home. He hoped that such an appeal to the voters’ simple selfishness—more viscerally gripping than his own example of martyrdom to civil liberty—would help him make a respectable showing at the polls. The inmate-candidate was prepared to lose but did not want to be humiliated.
November 2, 1798
VERGENNES , VERMONT
Lyon could hear the shouting outside and again climbed up to warn the demonstrators through the window’s bars against taking the law into their hands. He was interrupted by Jabez Fitch, his face mottled with anger, who brought surprising news. “The people of this district have taken leave of their senses, Lyon. You were elected again.”
His son Jim brought in details of the astonishing victory: 4,576 for the “caged Lyon,” as his supporters called him, to 2,444 for his Federalist opponent. A secret message from Jefferson through Mason and Callender hailed his “great majority,” and saluted Vermont for instilling new spirit in republicans in races not yet finished across the country. An Episcopal minister, who joined with Methodists, Roman Catholics and Baptists to resist the persecution of the established Congregational Church backing the Federalists, had gone to Philadelphia with a petition signed by thousands of Vermonters. It asked President Adams to pardon the popular Representative of the people and rescind his heavy fine.
“What did His High-and-Mightiness have to say to that?”
“The President asked if you had requested the pardon yourself, Father. The minister had to admit it was his own idea. The President then told him ‘Penitence must precede pardon.’ ”
“He’ll get penitence from me when Hell freezes like this damn cell!”
“So he wouldn’t pardon you. And Treasury Secretary Wolcott had the minister investigated and jailed for non-payment of an old debt. You’re stuck in here for another month, and that’s assuming Senator Mason can come up with the money for the fine. You like this leading sentence on the front page?”
Lyon had difficulty seeing the type, and his son read it aloud with great pride: “Three months ago, twelve political enemies and an angry Federal judge gave their verdict: Matthew Lyon guilty of sedition. Today, 4,576 free citizens of the free state of Vermont gave their final verdict to the forces of oppression: Matt Lyon Not Guilty!”
Lyon sat down on the hard bench under the barred window. For the first time in as long as he could remember, the voluble Congressman could not speak.
February 2, 1799
Senator Stevens Mason was outside the cell door. Lyon could hear his friend arguing with Marshal Fitch. “I paid one thousand dollars in gold to the Registrar in Rutland and here’s the signed receipt and order for release. His sentence ends today, noon, which is now. You have no right to hold him one moment longer.”
“He stands accused of five new acts of sedition in his newspaper, ” the jailer snapped back. “I have an order for his re-arrest the minute he comes out of that door. And no damned Senator from Virginia can tell me what I can’t do here in Vermont.”
“My good man,” Mason said in a voice Lyon could hardly hear, “it happens that my father, George Mason, wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights. That document became the basis of our Declaration of Independence—yours and mine. He later led the fight against ratifying the United States Constitution because it failed to contain a bill of rights. That is why I always carry a copy of the Constitution, complete with the ten amendments, here in my pocket.”
“That’s got nothing to do with—”
“Let me read you Article I, Section 6, paragraph 1. ‘Senators and Representatives . . . shall be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of each of their respective Houses and in going to and returning from the same.’ ” Lyon, glad that Mason had skipped over the exceptions to the privilege about Representatives who commit a felony or breach of the peace, heard Mason shout through the door: “Hey, Representative Matthew Lyon, do you hear that? Where are you going right this minute?”
“I am on my way to Philadelphia to take my place at Congress in session!” He rattled the cell door. The new Congress had been in session for nearly two months and he was eager to get into the debates.
“Marshal Whatever-your-name-is,” Mason barked, “if you so much as lay a hand on my colleague on his way to take his seat, you will be in contempt of Congress. I will have you arrested and hauled before a Federal judge. And as an example of the punishment that awaits anyone who challenges the Congress and refuses to respect the United States Constitution, I will personally see to it that you will rot in your own hellhole of a jail.”
Lyon heard the welcome jangling sound as the key turned in the lock. Outside, the Green Mountain Boys led a parade that marched him to the state capital in Bennington, where the Federalist Governor grudgingly handed him his credentials. He was serenaded by thirty choristers singing a ballad entitled “Patriotic Exultation on Lyon’s Release from the Federal Bastille in Vergennes,” and he enjoyed these stirring lines: “Come take the glass and drink his health / Who is a friend of Lyon / First martyr under Federal law / The junto dare to try on.”
His triumphal parade continued all the way to Philadelphia’s Congress Hall. Toasts to “Lyon and liberty” hailed him down through Vermont, through New England, at rallies sponsored by republican societies in a dozen cities. It seemed spontaneous but was all too well organized; Lyon suspected Beckley must have had a hand in it, especially as his caravan approached Philadelphia.
Smiling and nodding to all, the freed convict took his seat in the House. He was startled to be greeted by a resolution by James Bayard of Delaware to expel him as “a notorious and seditious person.” The expulsion proposal was warml
y seconded by his aristocratic enemies from Connecticut, the same tightly knit Congregationalists who looked on Baptists and Catholics as scum. It seemed to Lyon, slowly shaking his head, that nothing had changed; most Congressmen were out of touch with the people. Election meant nothing to them. But this jail of Congress was one he wanted to stay in.
Albert Gallatin rose to speak against Bayard’s resolution to expel. “This elected representative from Vermont has been wrongfully tried for a political offense. He has suffered grievously. His constituents have spoken. To expel him from this House would be an act of political persecution.”
Lyon looked around at his colleagues. Most were stone-faced; “Spittin’ Matt,” the Wild Irishman, had few personal friends here. Gallatin recognized that sympathy would not be forthcoming. He tried a new argument to persuade his wavering moderate republicans to rally behind their unpopular colleague.
“You have passed a law that says that truth is a defense against a charge of sedition. The crime can exist only if the government can show the falsity of the statement,” the republican leader maintained. To many in the House, his argument was as offensive as his French-Swiss accent. “But Lyon’s words were expressed as opinions, not stated as facts. Do gentlemen say opinions can be false? Men’s opinions are as various as their faces, and the truth or falseness of these opinions are not fit subjects for the decision of a jury. Opinion is not susceptible of proof by evidence.”
Gallatin’s new theory broke fresh ground in the intellectual resistance to sedition, but as Lyon anticipated, changed no minds. The vote was taken. The Clerk of the House—the Federalist who had been given Beckley’s old job—announced the result: A majority of 49 voted “yea,” to expel Matthew Lyon from the Congress, and 45 voted “nay,” to allow him to stay.
“Because a two-thirds vote is required to expel a member,” intoned the Clerk, “the resolution fails.” Though rejected by a majority for a second time, Lyon was able to keep his seat.
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