American Aurora
Page 88
It is reported that Duane expects to be brigadier general of militia, if M’Kean is chosen governor, and that the company of Americans who have at present the honour to be under the command of this United Irishman are looked upon as so many men in paste-board by the maneuvering of whom the general is to learn the art military.—Quere.—if Duane should be the commander of a considerable corps, may it not be expected that he will employ one of his present employers for a Surgeon to it ! One good turn deserves another.
Curious Toast.
On the 4th of July, one of the Democratic clubs toasted “The Female Democrat who refused to marry A COACH” ! If the female to whom I suppose they alluded had refused to marry one of the horses, though her refusal would have surprized me much, it would have given more sense to the toast.
Porcupine’s speculation on my appointment of a surgeon refers to Peggy’s stepfather, Dr. Adam Kuhn. His speculation about Peggy’s willingness to marry me is just that, though I agree with his repeated description of Peggy Bache as “luscious”!1828
THURSDAY, JULY 11, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
BLOOMFIELD, FOURTH OF JULY, 1799 … [T]he citizens of Bloomfield … assembled at the Tree of Liberty … After the exercises … the citizens retired to Mr. Jacob Ward’s tavern when … the following toasts … 9. The celebrated Patron of Liberty, Benjamin Franklin …
VOLUNTEERS
The Vice President, Thomas Jefferson—3 cheers
May the presence of the Marquis de La Fayette in America destroy the influence of the British federal faction.
May the whole tribe of British Printers, Porcupine … Fenno, &c. in America meet with their deserts, the American altar …
Tonight, in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
LA FAYETTE …
It is said and, I believe, not without good foundation, that this revolutionary war hero is about to re-visit America …
Those who hire and who pay the Aurora have certainly informed their agents of their intention to send him … On the 4th of July, success to this intended mission was toasted by a gang of democrats in Maryland … They never toast at random.—This “hero” was sunk into merited obscurity, but, as he is, it seems, to be dragged out of it for the purpose of wheedling America, I shall, now-and-then, honour him with a notice which the contemptibleness of his character would not otherwise entitle him to.
The Aurora of yesterday; the paper in which General Washington has been styled “a coward, a traitor, and a murderer,” Mr. Adams, “a blind, bald, crippled, toothless, dotard,” … and the French Republic, “the liberator of oppressed nations, the friend and defender of liberty, and the asserter of natural and unalienable rights of mankind,” this same paper yesterday contained this sentiment—not ironically—but in a manner which must arouse every feeling of the President’s heart to blast the insolent caitiff: “THANKS TO OUR BETTER FORTUNE, WE ARE BLESSED WITH A WISE AND VIRTUOUS ADMINISTRATION” !!! If the President should not feel this as the deepest insult, well may we exclaim “Sic transit gloria mundi.”
FRIDAY, JULY 12, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
MR. [THOMAS] COOPER’s [FAREWELL] ADDRESS.
To the Readers of the Sunbury and
Northumberland [Penn.] Gazette, June 29, 1799.
[A]s this is the last opportunity I shall have to intrude on the patience of the public in the capacity of editor, I shall dedicate the space that is left to a subject of some importance …
[M]easures have been adopted … to stretch to the utmost the constitutional authority of our executive … I can best illustrate my meaning by supposing a case. Let me place myself in the President’s chair at the head of a party in this country aiming to … reduce by degrees to a mere name the influence of the people. How should I set about it? what system should I pursue?
Ist … [M]y first business would be to undermine [the] Constitution and render it useless …
2. My next object would be to restrict by every means in my power the liberty of speech and of the press … For the free discussion of public characters is too dangerous for despotism to tolerate … Hence too I would express the idea that all who opposed my measures were enemies of the Government, that is (in my construction) of their country …
3. In conformity to this plan, I would treat with derision and abhorrence the doctrines of the Rights of Man and the sovereignty of the people. I would seize upon every folly of the French in particular to bring those principles into contempt …
4. The more completely to enlist the ambitious, the needy, and the fashionable under my banners, I would take care it should be known that no place, no job, no countenance might be expected by any but those whose opinions and language were implicitly and actively coincident with my own.
5…. By strict attention to the forms of religion … by a declared preference of religious characters—by loud exclamations against infidels and atheists—by frequent appointment of days of humiliation and prayer, I would gain over the interest of the clergy and acquire the popular reputation of sanctity …
6. It would be my evident interest to cultivate the monied interest of the country …
7. But the grand engine, the most useful instrument of despotic ambition would be a standing army. The system of volunteer corps among the fashionable and would-be-fashionable young men …
It would therefore be my business to invent, to forge, to create reason for appointing a standing force, if no real motive existed. If there were no fears, I would manufacture subjects to alarm …
THOMAS COOPER
Forty-year-old lawyer Thomas Cooper, who served as stand-in editor (April 19–June 29) for the Sunbury and Northumberland Gazette, grew up well-to-do in Westminster, England, attended Oxford (which made him a barrister-at-law), moved to Manchester (where he helped found the Manchester Herald), and used his considerable intellect (in and out of corresponding societies) to criticize Britain’s slave trade, defend Tom Paine’s Rights of Man, oppose Britain’s war with France, and run afoul of the king’s 1792 Proclamation Against Seditious Writings. Rather than muzzle his political beliefs, Tom Cooper quit the British monarch in 1794, taking his wife, Alice, and the Cooper children (she bore him five) to seek democracy, write politics, and practice law in Pennsylvania’s rural Northumberland County, where, despite the disfigurements of a minuscule (under five foot), tapered body and a gigantic head (he looks like a wedge), Tom Cooper gains heroic stature in opposing the President of the United States and allying himself with the Philadelphia Aurora.1829
Tonight, in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
MOTHER BACHE
With that satan-like malignity which her very name seems now to imply, endeavours to excite a jealousy against the President, by observing that several of the vessels of war bear HIS NAME while “the name of WASHINGTON honours only one small vessel.” … [D]oes the impudent editress recollect what she and her soon-forgotten spouse have called this man whose name, it seems, now “honours” a vessel ? does she recollect that they have called him a LEGALIZER OF CORRUPTION, an IMPOSTOR, or an APOSTATE? nay, does she recollect that the name which now “honours” a vessel has been branded, in the Aurora, with THE CHARGE OF MURDER? … And the shameless woman who owns this paper has now the assurance to complain that “the name of Washington HONOURS but one small vessel.” …
The Aurora does not, as some people imagine, give the cure; on the contrary, it takes its cure from them. Their ideas are very clear and precise. Another revolution that will lay the property of the rich at their mercy is their sole object …
In Pennsylvania, in particular, things are fast approaching to a crisis. The good men must come forth, or the bad will rule over them with more than despotick sway. Property must be defended by those who hold it, or it will certainly change hands!
SATURDAY, JULY 13, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
Extract of a letter from Bucks County, dated July 11th 1799. “The letters from [British Mini
ster to the United States] Robert Liston to [Canadian] President Russell are enclosed.—it is of importance they should be promptly communicated to the American people …”
(COPY.) (No. III) Philadelphia, 23d May, 1799.
SIR … On public affairs I have scarcely any thing to add—ONE STEP FURTHER ON THE ROAD TO A FORMAL WAR BETWEEN FRANCE AND THE UNITED STATES has been taken by the Governor of Guadeloupe [in the French West Indies], WHO IN CONSEQUENCE OF THE CAPTURE OF THE INSURGENTE FRIGATE, has authorized French ships of war to capture all American vessels, whether belonging to the government or to individuals. But the resolution of the Directory [of France] on the great question of peace or war is not yet known …
In the interior of this country, the declamations of the democratic faction on the constitutionality and nullity of certain acts of the Legislature have misled a number of poor ignorant wretches into a resistance to the laws and a formal insurrection—This frivolous rebellion has been quelled by a spirited effort of certain volunteer corps lately embodied, WHO DESERVE EVERY DEGREE OF PRAISE. But the conduct of these gentlemen having been shamefully calumniated by SOME of the POPULAR newspapers, they have ventured to take the law into their own hands and to punish one or two of the printers (by a smart flogging), a circumstance which has given rise to much animosity, to threats, and to a commencement of armed associations (particularly the United Irishmen), and some apprehend that the affair may lead to a partial civil war! The portion of the jacobinic party who could carry matters to this extremity is but small: the government is on its guard AND DETERMINED TO ACT WITH VIGOUR …
ROBT LISTON
OBSERVATIONS OF THE EDITOR
The originals of the foregoing documents have been transmitted officially to the [President] … The public, however, are entitled to an examination … They were seized on a horse stealer of the name of Sweezy in Bucks County of this state. Sweezy had been one of [a] gang … [which] was outlawed and fled to Nova Scotia and Canada … [He] was sent to this city with dispatches, and, on his return with the above documents, was pursued under the former outlawry … [and] left behind … these documents …
Tonight, in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
MR. LISTON’S LETTERS …
The letters … seized and broken open were sent down and lodged in the hands of McKEAN, from the press of whose friend and intimate acquaintance, DUANE, they have this day been published … with a set of the most stupid attempts at perversion that were ever conceived by Democratick ignorance.
While the United Irishman was throwing out his threats to publish these letters, I was afraid he did not mean to do it … The letters breathe a desire of seeing America maintain her honour in a war with France … As to the Democrats, the partizans of France and M’Kean, the MEN WITHOUT A GOD, they are too wicked to be reformed and too despicable to be reasoned with.
Tonight, in the Gazette of the United States:
[N]othing can save these United States from the … cursed effects of a holy French brotherhood but the intervention of a Washington and a well appointed army. The jacobins know this well; and hence their opposition to the army; thence the Editor of the Aurora, on the 29th of June inst. copied from a Baltimore paper, established to propagate French principles, the following paragraph. “I (the Baltimore printer) discharged the duty incumbent on my situation by decrying an establishment (the American army, raised expressly to prevent or meet French hostilities) more to be dreaded … than the exertions of [the French Directory] …”
TUESDAY, JULY 16, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
[British Minister Robert Liston’s] letter, marked (No. 3) … displays … the minute concern and interests which the British minister takes in our most minute transactions … and it displays something still more important for the public consideration, that when the band of ruffians who took the law … into their own hands in attacking Mr. Schnyder of Reading and the Editor of this Paper, Mr. Liston informs his colleagues in British employment that the [American] government was determined to act with vigor … [W]hen with vigor?—If the Printer had beat the thirty federal officers or when the violation of law and order on the part of these federalists had produced resistance on the part of the people, then the government would act with determined vigor !
Tonight, in the Gazette of the United States:
[The] Duane’s of the Aurora think it would “serve the cause of virtue and promote the freedom of mankind” were the French to be conquerors in the four quarters of the world ! These men may call themselves real republicans, it is most certain they are not real Americans.
SUNDAY, JULY 21, 1799
Today, George Washington replies to a suggestion that he become a candidate for president:
[With] the line between Parties … so clearly drawn and the views of the opposition to clearly developed as they are at present … [my] personal influence would be of no avail …
[This is] a time when I am thoroughly convinced I should not draw a single vote from the Anti-Federal side and, of course, should stand upon no stronger ground than any other [Federal] character well supported; and when I should become a mark for the shafts of envenomed malice and the basest calumny to fire at, when I should be charged not only with irresolution but with concealed ambition, which waits only an occasion to blaze out; and, in short, with dotage and imbecility …
[N]o problem is better defined in my mind than that principle, not men, is now and will be the object of contention; and that I could not obtain a solitary vote from that [Republican] Party … Prudence on my part must arrest any attempt … to introduce me again into the chair of Government.1830
MONDAY, JULY 22, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
REPUBLICAN GREENS.
BE particular to attend in uniform this evening at your usual parade—at half past five … W. DUANE, Captain.
Tonight, Peter Porcupine in the Porcupine’s Gazette:
What is said in Mother Bache’s paper I think worth no attention. Her base misrepresentations are intended to urge on the democrats to open rebellion …
WEDNESDAY, JULY 24, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
BRITISH INFLUENCE.
[T]he dispatches of Robert Liston are objects of too great public concern to be suffered to pass into oblivion … [I]t is high time that we should look back and around us—and enquire how … British influence has been practicing … [W]e have evidence … 1. We have it in the records of the British Privy Council, in the most authentic form, that Britain had formed a party devoted to her interests in the U. States. 2. We have it in the hand-writing of John Adams, now President of the United States, that British influence has been employed, and with effect, in securing the appointment of an officer of the most confidential and important trust under the government … 4. We have it under the hand writing of Robert Liston, the British ambassador, residing among us, that the American government has embarked in concert with the British, in measures of aggression … calculated for the dismemberment of France … [I]n America, during the year 1798, Great Britain has expended Secret Service money to the amount of one hundred and eighty thousand pounds sterling—or 800,000 dollars.
Today, Secretary of State Timothy Pickering writes the President of the United States:
There is in the Aurora of the city an uninterrupted stream of slander on the American government. I inclose the paper of this morning. It is not the first time that the editor has suggested that you had asserted the influence of the British government in affairs of our own and insinuated that it was obtained by bribery. The general readers of the Aurora will believe both. I shall give the paper to Mr. Rawle, and, if he thinks it libellous, desire him to prosecute the editor …
The Editor of the Aurora, William Duane, pretends he is an American citizen, saying that he was born in Vermont, but was when a child, taken back with his parents to Ireland, where he was educated. But I understand the facts to be, that he went from America prior to our revolution,
remained in the British dominions till after the peace, went to the British East Indies, where he committed or was charged with some crime, and returned to Great Britain, from whence, within three or four years past, he came to this country to stir up sedition and work other mischief. I presume, therefore, that he is really a British subject and, as an alien, liable to be banished from the United States. He has lately set himself up to be the captain of a company of volunteers, whose distinguished badges are a plume of cock-neck feathers and a small black cockade and a large eagle. He is doubtless a United Irishman, and the company is probably formed to oppose the authority of the government; and, in case of war and invasion by the French, to join them.1831
Today, Timothy Pickering also writes William Rawle, the federal district attorney for Pennsylvania:
I inclose the Aurora of this morning and beg you to examine it. If the slander on the American government will justify a prosecution against the Editor or Author, be pleased to have it commenced.1832
FRIDAY, JULY 26, 1799
GENERAL * AURORA * ADVERTISER
Extract of a letter dated Hartford, July 21 … “You may be well surprised at this state of things in Connecticut … when you learn what lengths this domineering party proceeds … We have only the one print [the New London Bee] which dares even to take a glimpse of the worst practices or the wicked measures. Several attempts have been made in the post-office to obstruct its circulation and in many cases with success … The federal party … took another step, they interfered with the stage drivers, and every paper sent by that medium was destroyed …”