Fallen Founder

by Nancy Isenberg

  Privately, however, Burr must have shown his hand. Otherwise, how could his name have appeared on a handbill with several prominent Anti-Federalists—Melancton Smith, Marinus Willett, and William Denning—all of whom were later identifiable as Burrites? In New York City, not a single Anti-Federalist came close to winning a seat at the convention. “Antis” George Clinton, Denning, and Willett barely received 100 votes each, while well-known Federalists like John Jay received 2,735 votes. Melancton Smith was elected from Dutchess County, not New York City. If Burr had been known as a supporter of ratification, even a mild one, his candidacy would have been assured. Whoever had, without Burr’s knowledge, put forward his name in the papers, and on handbills and broadsides, as a spokesman for “the peace, liberty, and honor of the state,” saw him as a useful Anti-Federalist ally.44

  There is one more tantalizing incident that suggests Burr’s early affinity for the Anti-Federalists. Upon its adoption in July 1788, the U.S. Constitution received a surge of popular support across New York State. In cities and rural areas alike, local militia marched triumphantly, and local officials raised toasts to the reconciliation of political differences. (The Anti-Federalists and Federalists, though not official parties, had provoked intense passions and revealed wide ideological divisions.) Yet violent clashes marred the festivities in both Albany and New York City. As late as October, Burr wrote from Albany to Theodore Sedgwick (soon to become Hamilton’s principal champion in Congress) that “political Strife is still high in this City, the only part of the State where the Spirit of Party is kept thoroughly alive.” By “Spirit of Party,” he meant intense partisanship.45

  Burr disapproved of all political excess. Along with fellow attorney Nathaniel Lawrence, he took on the civil suit of Thomas Greenleaf of New York City, a prominent victim of party spirit. Greenleaf was editor of the Anti-Federalist New-York Journal, and his print shop was ransacked in August 1788 by a mob of ratification revelers. Greenleaf became a convenient target after publishing a satire mocking the “pompous appearance” of the Federalists in their “Grand Procession.” With ax in hand, Colonel William Smith Livingston, the parade’s grand marshal himself, broke down the door to Greenleaf’s shop, and joined his drunken cronies in destroying the printer’s equipment. They then made their way to the house of General John Lamb, another Anti-Federalist and future Burrite, but dispersed when they thought his home was empty.46

  That Burr took Greenleaf’s case is instructive—it speaks to his political instincts. A trial would redeem Greenleaf’s reputation, while placing the Federalist rioters in an unfavorable light. It was the redemption Greenleaf needed. He had become a local pariah, and a significant number of New Yorkers had already canceled their subscriptions, probably thinking he had gotten what he deserved. As a younger and less experienced lawyer, Nathaniel Lawrence served as Burr’s co-counsel. Lawrence numbered among the Anti-Federalists at Poughkeepsie, yet was one of the pivotal swing votes in favor of ratification. Looking up to Burr “with Veneration,” in the words of one knowing observer, Lawrence must have figured he and Burr were of one mind on the larger subject of ratification when he agreed to join in Greenleaf’s defense. And Burr? He just as easily could have represented Livingston, a friend from his college days, but instead he sided with Greenleaf. Taking everything in stride, he watched over the vulnerable Anti-Federalist printer—though, since ratification, “Anti-Federalism” had become a dirty word.47

  “TWISTINGS, COMBINATIONS AND MANEUVERS”

  Over the next three years, the entire complexion of politics in New York changed dramatically, and Burr was at the center of this radical reorganization. With the adoption of the federal Constitution, and the election of George Washington as president, the Schuyler faction, headed by Hamilton, felt that it finally had a chance to recover control of the state from Governor George Clinton. Clinton, the radical Whig turned Anti-Federalist, had been behaving for years as though he were unchallengeable.

  At the time of Washington’s inauguration, which took place on April 30, 1789, Federalists and Anti-Federalists reached a truce of sorts. A week earlier, Washington had arrived in grand style: crossing the Hudson by barge, he landed in New York City to the sound of thirteen guns, and according to one witness, “the whole city rung with repeated huzzas.” Meeting the “First of Men” when his boat docked at the wharf, Governor Clinton was sure to give Washington a warm reception, escorting his former commander through the streets of the city, and then bringing him home to dine. Many opponents of the Constitution became caught up in the excitement. Burr’s former commander, the ardent Whig (and now Anti-Federalist) William Malcolm, proudly strode in the procession that celebrated Washington’s arrival. Clinton supporter David Gelston, another Anti-Federalist friend of Burr’s, confessed: “I never felt such strong emotions upon any public occasion.”48

  On the day of the inauguration, a more formal ceremony and procession were arranged. Whereas Washington had walked among the citizens on the day he arrived, now, as befitting a new head of state, he rode in an elegant coach drawn by four horses. The paraders who accompanied him marched up Broad Street to Federal Hall, at the corner of Wall Street, where Washington took the oath of office. Burr, too, prepared to celebrate in high style, telling his stepson to hurry home. “Unless you are here to partake,” he wrote Frederick, “we shall but half enjoy the Glee of the day.”49

  Yet the feeling for Washington could not heal the political divisions, especially as Washington’s wartime aide, treasury secretary-designate Alexander Hamilton, was rubbing salt in the Anti-Federalists’ wounds. Two months earlier, he had recruited a former Anti-Federalist judge, Robert Yates, now a nationalist, to run for governor against Clinton. The point was to portray Yates as a moderate, in order to paint the incumbent Clinton as one who might subvert the Constitution. Yates, said Hamilton, was “better calculated to heal the present divisions.” On a nominating committee stacked with Federalists, there was one lonely (and somewhat closeted) Anti-Federalist standing up for Yates, a personal friend of his since 1783, and a closer friend to Yates than Hamilton ever was or would be. He was Aaron Burr, of course, who was now under consideration as a possible candidate for Congress.50

  Hamilton ran Yates’s campaign. He wrote a series of letters to the newspapers, attacking Clinton’s “obstinate” opposition to the Constitution, as he put it, while dismissing Clinton’s military reputation as nothing more than “mere rant and romance.” He observed acidly, “I have not been able to learn that he was ever more than once in actual combat.” He also accused Clinton of stealing the 1777 governor’s race from his father-in-law, Philip Schuyler. Hamilton went on to call Clinton “a very artful man,” known for his “CUNNING”—favorite insults that he would later use against Burr.51

  But the thrust of Hamilton’s attack was to insist that Clinton was a man out of his sphere. Clinton lacked “decorum.” He lacked the class background, the genteel standard, necessary to claim high office. Clinton’s humble origins had always rankled the aristocratic Schuyler, but this class baiting was something new. Even Clinton’s wife came under attack for failing to keep her “pantry . . . in order” and for refusing to hire cooks “capable of suiting the palate of everybody.” It sounds petty, but President and Mrs. Washington would shortly convene what became known as the “Republican Court,” holding weekly formal receptions, or levees—part of a calendar of teas, gala balls, and presidential dinners in the new federal capital of New York City. Even before these began, Hamilton was advancing a new federal standard: he wished to make social appearances matter on the political stage; he expected national and state figures who had previously shown their leadership skills on the battlefield to demonstrate a comparable facility in the parlor. A new style of manhood would measure political merit by a gentleman’s display of gentility and his wife’s display of social grace.52

  Yates lost the gubernatorial election. But the scurrilous nature of the campaign set the tone for all subs
equent New York elections. The family factions were jockeying for position, as they watched this attempt to find a moderate to fill the governor’s seat. This occurred at a moment when Burr and Hamilton were ostensibly working side by side on behalf of the same candidate. Because the election was close, Clinton realized that he would need new allies. Burr was one of those “talents,” as one Federalist at this time described him, whom Clinton tried unsuccessfully to bring into his fold. The ascendant Hamilton probably still thought that Burr was “his” man, but he would soon learn otherwise.53

  By September 1789, a half-year after the election, Clinton had made an opening gesture to Burr, offering him the post of state attorney general. It was a thankless job that paid relatively little (£400 per year), but it was a position that gave Burr wider visibility. Recognition came at a price: the attorney generalship demanded endless hours in court, time sitting on commissions, and more than enough paperwork. In his two years in the position, Burr would prosecute as many as 158 cases before the Supreme Court. Within his heavy caseload were many dramatic criminal cases: murder, theft, forgery, counterfeiting, and what Burr himself called “charges of a heinous nature”—rape.54

  His experience as attorney general gave Burr an exceptional opportunity to present himself as a legal reformer. In 1791, he prepared a report of “Observations,” which Clinton promptly brought to the attention of the New York legislature. Here we are able to see Burr’s Utilitarian philosophy put into practice, a philosophy based on the ideas of the Italian Cesare Beccaria, a leading Enlightenment rationalist.55

  Beccaria’s principle was a straightforward one: a punishment had to be proportional to the actual harm caused by the crime. In New York at this time, forgery and counterfeiting were capital crimes. In his “Observations,” Burr used Beccaria to oppose this law. Not all counterfeiters or forgers were equal, he said. Those who caused the greatest harm were the most ingenious men, who typically eluded detection. Then why go after the little guy, who was just a petty thief? Burr put forward his logic, using one of his favorite phrases: “An unprejudiced mind will not readily admit the justice or policy of sentencing to death him who forges an order for three crowns or for a pair of boots, when he who steals a thousand pounds is sentenced to be whipped.” Such inconsistencies had no place in New York’s criminal code. Despite his liberal plea, Burr’s fellow legislators ignored his reform agenda, suggesting that his view was perhaps too “unprejudiced”—or, one might say, ahead of its time.56

  Still, Burr was rewarded for his service. Clinton decided to make him the next U.S. senator from New York. But the embattled governor could not succeed in this without help. In promoting Burr, he would inevitably be demoting Hamilton’s father-in-law, the incumbent Philip Schuyler, at the same time; and so it had to be done discreetly. Because the New York State Assembly and State Senate selected U.S. senators (there would be no popular vote for senators until the twentieth century), Clinton worked a backroom deal. Robert Troup, previously a loyal friend to Burr who had by this time joined Hamilton’s inner circle, described the situation as “twistings, combinations and maneuvers.” Burr was to squeak by with a 32-to-27 vote in the state assembly, and then a more comfortable 14-to-4 vote in the state senate. His friend David Gelston led the charge in the senate. Burr was doing his part, meanwhile, by wining and dining the men who subsequently elected him.57

  This unexpected turn of events had as much to do with Hamilton’s bungling of federal patronage as it did with anyone’s conscious desire to reward Burr. Hamilton’s mistake turned into his greatest political headache, when out of jealousy or distrust he prevented Chancellor Robert Livingston from receiving spoils from the Washington administration. Livingston was a proud man and formidable intellect; ten years older than Hamilton, he was not likely to humble himself and do the new treasury secretary’s bidding. Even so, Livingston had been an unwavering supporter of General Washington during the Revolution, and an outspoken defender of the Constitution at Poughkeepsie. Practically begging for an appointment (even sending his sister Janet Livingston Montgomery to appeal to Washington directly), he expected some post equal to his stature in the new republic. He received nothing. Rebuffed and humiliated, Livingston broke with the Hamiltonian Federalists and turned to Clinton.

  There can be no doubt that the alliance between these two New York power brokers proved crucial to Burr’s career. Clinton and Livingston backed Burr so as to punish Hamilton, sending a powerful message that the Hamilton-Schuyler faction would face a vigorous opposition in New York. Thus Hamilton’s miscalculation—his desire to keep Livingston outside Washington’s inner circle—ended up giving Burr a chance he might never have had otherwise. It was Hamilton who inadvertently sent Burr to the U.S. Senate.58

  In Hamilton’s model for effective politicking, whether at election time or simply promoting legislation, successful campaigns required a well-tuned army, and allowed for only one party commander. Within the new federal administration, Hamilton was positioning himself as Washington’s unofficial minister of finance, based on the English model, using patronage to shore up the ranks and build a loyal following. Concerned at the same time about protecting his political command in New York, he demonstrated intolerance for any—a Livingston or a Burr—who might challenge him. Hamilton was known for surrounding himself with loyal subordinates; even his father-in-law had earned the nickname “supple Jack,” indicating that he left the policy making to Hamilton. Burr was too independent to play by Hamilton’s rules. He could never belong to a Hamiltonian network, and so Hamilton was bound to see him as a deterrent, a detractor, a potentially dangerous interloper.59

  In 1791, Hamilton arrived at a new level of concern. The quintessential Federalist of 1787, Congressman James Madison, was by now adopting the perspective of his Virginia neighbor and less certain Federalist, Thomas Jefferson, who together were soon to more visibly symbolize a formal opposition to the Washington administration—and the inauguration of the two-party system as Republicans. Secretary of State Jefferson was presently vying with Hamilton for the president’s attention, while exhibiting his suspicion that Hamilton’s policies were undermining the independence of the legislative branch of government and the balance of power between that branch and the executive. So, in the spring of 1791, when Jefferson and Madison came by carriage to the heart of New York State, Hamilton took note. The two Virginians met privately with Chancellor Livingston and newly elected Senator Burr. Though the stated rationale for their upstate visit was a botanical excursion—literally to collect floral specimens—canny Hamiltonians assumed that their real intent was to collect political allies. Robert Troup, one of Hamilton’s most active snoops, wrote breathlessly in June: “There was every appearance of a passionate courtship between the Chancellor, Burr, Jefferson and Madison.” And with a spectacular flourish, he added: “Delenda est Carthago [Carthage must be destroyed] I suppose is the maxim adopted with respect to you.” It is equally clear that Burr saw the meeting as the opening of a friendship that could lead to a stronger political alliance. When asked later that year by Nathaniel Hazard, another devoted Hamilton supporter, what his role would be in the Senate, Burr did nothing to ease his fears: “I shall not renounce my acquaintance with M[adison] and J[efferson] as Men of Science,” Hazard quoted Burr back to Hamilton.60

  The buzz among New York Federalists was that Hamilton’s enemies appeared to be lining up against him. Yet Burr somehow still wanted to consider Hamilton his friend, not his foe. Beginning at this time, and for the next thirteen years, until he killed Hamilton in their famous duel, Burr would be the object of Hamilton’s relentless political and personal attacks. Losing Schuyler’s Senate seat was the first major setback for Hamilton’s New York faction; it was a personal blow to Hamilton as well as his humiliated father-in-law. If Hamilton’s motive was not simply a matter of revenge, it might be more accurately called politics as usual. It was generally known, by 1791, that Burr’s star was on the rise—and Hamilton
would be there every step along the way to nervously monitor its trajectory.61

  “I DO NOT PRETEND TO CONTROL THE OPINIONS OF OTHERS”

  Burr was not overly concerned about Hamilton’s opposition to his election, though he did confide to Massachusetts congressman (and Federalist) Theodore Sedgwick, “my election will be unpleasing to several Persons now in Phila.” Less than a month later, Burr wrote to Sedgwick again, with “unreserved confidence,” on the subject of the national bank devised by Hamilton that still lacked a charter: A “Charter granted cannot be revoked, and this appears to me to be one of those Cases in which Delay can be productive of no Evil.” This seems a repeat of Burr’s Anti-Federalist distrust of concentrations of power; but his somewhat cautious response to Hamilton’s pet project reveals something even more important: he was not going to let Hamilton, at any point, pressure him.62

  Burr was an active senator from the start: he served on roughly sixty committees between 1791 and 1797, many of which dealt with military issues, public lands on the frontier, and veterans’ pensions. It was probably in early 1792 that his New York constituents first learned of Senator Burr’s duties, when he chaired a special committee and drafted its report on an act “for the relief of Widows, Orphans, and Invalids.” He made few political waves in this philanthropic endeavor.63

  His support for increasing the size of the military on the frontier proved to be more controversial. He heard it rumored that the administration had resorted to bribes in order to change legislators’ views, and that someone had dangled before him the prospect of a prestigious command appointment. Burr warned Theodosia: “You may expect a host of such falsehoods.” The rumors began to circulate in February 1792, after Burr had joined Hamiltonian Federalist Rufus King (New York’s other senator) in support of raising five additional regiments for the “Indian wars.” The United States Army was not faring well against the western tribes; during the previous fall, General Arthur St. Clair had suffered a devastating defeat in the Ohio Country, 600 of his men killed by the Miami. With his strong stand on defense, Burr did not follow the lead of the Virginian wing of the Republican Party, which would come to stand for small government and feared the growth of a standing army. Many New Yorkers agreed with Burr. He remained confident that he had reached a wise decision, telling his wife, “when the part I take in the bill on that subject is fully known, I am sure it will give entire satisfaction to my friends.”64