Fallen Founder

by Nancy Isenberg

  Burr still kept his eye on the New York political scene, becoming a player in the 1792 New York gubernatorial campaign. When the Albany Register reported in early February that Judge Yates had declined to run again, prominent Federalists within Hamilton’s faction proposed Burr for the job. Then Yates himself came out in favor of Burr. Hamilton and Schuyler panicked. They began pulling strings to stifle the growing movement: “Col. Burr is not the man,” Schuyler or one of his supporters wrote, pseudonymously, in the Register. Within days, Hamilton persuaded Supreme Court Chief Justice John Jay to run for the office. Suddenly, it was a three-man race for governor: John Jay, George Clinton, and Aaron Burr.65

  Schuyler and Hamilton had every reason to worry. Burr had appeal because, according to the New York Daily Advertiser, he stood “clear of party attachment” and was “aloof from party aspersion.” Just like Yates, Burr presented himself as a moderate, without direct ties to any of the ruling family factions. His military credentials, including, now, his support of the army on the frontier, helped him immensely. The Daily Advertiser further prophesied: “If any unusual concern of the state should require the abilities of a prompt and active governor, it will probably be a threatened frontier. For war and negotiation this candidate is known to be happily qualified.”66

  Federalists pressured Yates to withdraw his support from Burr, with warnings that his chances would be hurt if he planned to run for office in the future. Neither Burr’s land speculation, which was all too common among this crowd, nor his supposed political instability caused any alarm. Instead, as one New Yorker confided to Yates, the principal objections to Burr were his youth, and more important, his lack of “ties of birth or family connection to this state.” Family connection mattered in New York. One could rise to political prominence by choosing the right wife: Massachusetts-born Rufus King, who was merely a year older than Burr, married into the wealthy Alsop family of New York City, and this allowed him, in 1789, to become one of the first U.S. senators from the Empire State. Hamilton overcame much more: he surmounted his illegitimate birth and alien status (born on Nevis, an island in the West Indies), when he wed Elizabeth Schuyler, the daughter of Dutch-American patroon Philip Schuyler.67

  In the end, Hamilton convinced key political operatives not to back Burr. National party divisions were not yet firmly entrenched in New York, and like Yates, Burr had been proposed as a moderate who would attract men of all political persuasions. One of them, former Anti-Federalist turned Federalist Peter Van Gaasbeek, wrote to his friend Burr at the end of March that it was “with the greatest reluctance we agreed to relinquish You as our Candidate for Governor.” Burr withdrew and, curiously enough, took no part in electioneering—preferring, at least for the moment, to attach himself to no candidate.68

  The 1792 election was acrimonious, even more fiercely waged than the last. The Hamiltonians charged the Clinton administration with corruption. Accusations were hurled at the Land Office Commission for “lavishly” rewarding friends of the governor in the form of large land grants. The most conspicuous of these sales—3.6 million acres—was to Alexander Macomb, a “merchant prince” Federalist, who hardly fit the profile of a Clinton crony. Yet the Federalists charged that Macomb had secret partners in the fabulous deal; they clearly intended to point the finger at Governor Clinton or, minimally, his closest friends. Given that Burr (as attorney general) had served as an ex officio member of the commission, it is surprising that he was not lumped together with the other purported villains. But he was not. He was not present at the meeting when Macomb’s purchase was approved, but he was fully aware that Clinton and his fellow commissioners had played the patronage game. On a much smaller scale, Burr had used his clout on the same commission to ensure that a system of roads was built in southern New York—which unmistakably served the interests of Uncle Timothy, as well as his Federalist friend Van Gaasbeek.69

  All sides were making sweetheart deals. Federalists wanted to stigmatize those outside a trusted inner circle, but they had a difficult time painting themselves as the virtuous party. In March, as the Hamilton faction applied its energies to reputation bashing in order to secure the governorship, Hamilton’s close friend William Duer went bust. Until recently his assistant secretary at the Treasury Department, Duer had concocted a grandiose scheme for cornering the market on bank and government securities. The plan fell to pieces, sending shock waves through the national economy, while Duer and Macomb, two of the state’s most spectacular speculators, were unceremoniously carted off to debtor’s prison. Now it was Hamilton’s turn to squirm; his cozy relationship with Duer came under scrutiny, suggesting to neutral observers that no one of any stature in New York politics seemed to be able to steer clear of speculators and scandals.70

  Scandal pursued the 1792 New York gubernatorial election to its bitter end. By May, the votes had all been sent to the committee of canvassers, whose job was to inspect and count ballots. Rumors began circulating of apparent irregularities in three counties—this would necessitate discarding those votes altogether. Otsego, a Federalist stronghold under the control of Judge William Cooper, was one of the counties under scrutiny. In an extremely close race, many of the Federalists now feared that the canvassers, who were mostly Clinton men, planned to steal the election.71

  Despite staying clear of electioneering, Burr found himself at the center of this growing controversy. The canvassers had turned to him, as well as to his fellow senator, Federalist Rufus King, to supply them with legal advice. Burr and King debated the matter for two days, but could not reach agreement. King wished all the votes counted, and insisted on publishing his opinion; and so Burr was left with no alternative but to do the same. He was convinced that there were sound reasons for discarding the ballots, and was loath to trim his view to please others. He explained to a friend, “I shall never yield up the right of expressing my opinions.”72

  The canvassers disqualified the votes from Otsego, Clinton, and Tioga Counties. Clinton achieved victory, but by the slimmest of margins: 108 votes. Pandemonium ensued. Burr came under attack for what Robert Troup fumed in a letter to John Jay was a “shameful prostitution of his legal talents.” Outraged Jay-ites (as they were called in the press) filled the pages of New York’s newspapers with sharply worded criticisms and thinly veiled threats of armed rebellion; they urged a public convention to override the election and alter the existing constitution. Federalist lawyers claimed that Burr and the canvassers ought to be impeached for usurping the will of the people. As one of the Federalists saw it, “we have as it were, two chief magistrates, one, the governor, by the voice of God, and the people, and another the governor of Mr. Burr and the canvassers.”73

  Why, we must ask, did Burr defend the canvassers who disqualified the three counties and elected Clinton? It was not for reasons of partisanship alone, as many charged at the time, and as historians have argued. Only Otsego was a clear Federalist district, and Clinton was by no means Burr’s friend—he characterized Clinton’s disregard for him as an expression of “jealousy and malevolence.” On the surface, it may have looked different, insofar as Clinton had built up his political empire in New York by making alliances with potential enemies; this explains why he courted Burr after the 1789 gubernatorial election, offering him the post of attorney general. When Clinton helped to make Burr senator, it was out of self-interest only, that is, so as to curb Hamilton’s growing influence, and to keep Burr from (as he imagined it) falling completely under the sway of the Federalist treasury secretary. Whatever else might be said, Burr was never in Clinton’s pocket. Nor was he willing to “prostitute his legal talents,” as Troup charged, to help the governor win the election by “legal chicanery.”74

  So the truth lies elsewhere. Burr personally liked John Jay, a moderate Federalist, much as he was personally wary of Clinton. He ultimately supported the canvassers because they had reason to believe that the Otsego election was not free, but had been corrupted by “mischiefs”
and “unfair practices.” Additionally, two members of the committee were his close friends Melancton Smith and David Gelston, and while they were Clintonians, he trusted in their judgment and their honesty. Anti-Federalists like Smith believed that only strict regulations insured free elections—it was a cherished principle of the New York Bill of Rights. And nothing up to this point in his career suggests that Burr would have been at ease grossly distorting the law for political gain.75

  In fact, Burr saw the law being twisted, and it troubled him. In Otsego County, Sheriff Richard Smith continued to hold office and improperly delivered the votes to the canvassers even though his appointment had expired and he had taken a new job as town supervisor. Holding two posts at the same time was, in itself, a violation of the letter of the law. But the canvassers—and Burr—were not simply looking for a technicality in order to deny votes to the Federalist Jay. They grew even more suspicious when they learned that the new sheriff’s commission was “in the hands of William Cooper,” who was harassing poor but enfranchised farmers who had purchased land from him, in order to oblige them to support Jay. Cooper’s antics were legendary: he threatened Clinton supporters, and even an election inspector, with jail time or the stocks if they refused to do his bidding. Burr already had sufficient reason to distrust Judge Cooper: in 1785, he had watched him bribe another sheriff to get his hands on Major Prevost’s land. Once again, Cooper had colluded with a sheriff to get his own way, this time at the expense of the legitimate voters of Otsego.76

  Burr was won over by facts that he considered beyond dispute, if he was also plainly influenced by Cooper’s resort to strong-arm tactics. Confident in his legal opinion and concerned about the Federalists’ relentless attacks on his personal integrity, Burr decided go public and defend his reputation. In midsummer, he began soliciting lawyers who he felt would concur with his argument. He first approached two members of his own family, Pierpont Edwards and Tapping Reeve, both of whom were respected members of the Connecticut bar. Edwards would pen the most convincing defense of Burr’s opinion. He next rounded up support from Pennsylvania’s former attorney general, Jonathan Dickinson Sergeant; but his biggest coup was the endorsement he received from Edmund Randolph—Washington’s attorney general.77

  As he explained in a letter to James Monroe, whom he also solicited, Burr said that he needed the “authority of great names” because he felt the public at large needed to know that the “Canvassers did honestly pursue the direction of the law.” Eventually, he published a 46-page pamphlet, a concise legal brief, entitled An Impartial Statement of the Controversy, Respecting the Decision of the Late Committee of Canvassers. Issued in November 1792, the brief attracted positive notice among Republicans outside the state, who were hoping to see the mess in New York cleaned up.78

  His handling of the 1792 election controversy is a demonstration of Burr’s politics. He adhered to republican ideals, dispassionately sought out facts, and espoused a distinctive ideology—an ideology founded on the pursuit of justice and delivered with a candor that later detractors chose to overlook. These are hardly the actions of a man without principles, a man “for or against nothing, but as it suits his interest or ambition,” as Hamilton would characterize Burr in a private letter.79

  The evidence shows the opposite to be true. Burr displayed time and again, during the years of his rise in New York political circles, that he did not automatically take one side over another; he did not jump thoughtlessly to every Republican viewpoint, nor immediately discard every Federalist one. These were his principles. He relied first and foremost on evidence, and, as an above-board republican, aimed to root out flagrant election fraud. But he was an optimist as well as a moralist, for he believed that men should be able to disagree and remain friends. He respected many a Federalist. He also believed that no man should be bullied into reversing himself, but should change an opinion only when reason persuaded him to do so. Writing to a friend, Jacob Delamater, whom he knew would dispute his opinion on the election, he confided: “I do not see how any unbiased man can doubt [reasoned arguments], but still I do not pretend to control the opinions of others, much less take offense at any man for differing with me.” This was the political style of Aaron Burr that history has misplaced.80

  So determined was Burr to prove the validity of his legal argument that he sought out two friends among the Federalists, Theodore Sedgwick and Jonathan Trumbull, and asked them whether they might draft opinions in support of his views on the canvassers. He did this because he thought he could find objectivity and fair-mindedness even among highly ideological men who desired a particular outcome and were disappointed when Clinton emerged victorious. Was Burr naive or simply straightforward? Neither Sedgwick nor Trumbull agreed with his perspective on the election controversy—indeed, they did just the reverse of what Burr hoped for, and wrote strongly against him. In the case of Sedgwick, the relationship suffered. By the end of 1792, the Massachusetts congressman began to exhibit signs of the scorn he would display with increasing regularity as Burr became a more powerful figure in the Republican Party.81

  But in October of that year, Burr had not ceased to feel that he and Sedgwick could remain close friends. Acknowledging how their opinions had diverged, Burr ventured, “It is at all times painful to differ in Opinion with one we love.” Convinced that they would never see politics the same way, he had no intention of soft-pedaling his beliefs. Burr was one of the last holdouts in an increasingly spite-filled young republic, who maintained the belief that it was possible to rise above partisan bitterness and retain friendship with an opponent. As he came to feel uncertain about his Federalist friend, he gamely, good-naturedly chided Sedgwick: “if you have been in your sober senses, you are now far beyond the reach of reason—You have my prayers for your speedy recovery.” It might be argued that Burr allowed his own partisanship to sway his legal opinion in this instance; but if that were the case, he would have had to be either cocky or insensitive to approach men like Sedgwick and Trumbull and expect to persuade them of anything. And that seems unlikely.82

  Burr was far more sincere, and far more enlightened, than he has been given credit for—and yet he may have been stubborn, even foolish, to persist in conducting open and free discussions with those of dissenting political principles. When he published his Impartial Statement of the Controversy, he faithfully included opposing opinions—King’s, those canvassers who disagreed with the majority decision, and a joint statement of New York City attorneys, including Troup, who rejected Burr’s stand on the case. He did not publish Sedgwick or Trumbull’s negative opinions, and his enemies did see fit to print Trumbull’s a mere eight days after his pamphlet appeared. Even Burr’s idea of impartiality had its limits.83

  “YOUR FRIENDS EVERY WHERE LOOK TO YOU”

  Burr was not campaigning for any office after his name was withdrawn from contention in the recent governor’s race. Nevertheless, his handling of the election controversy drew attention from Republicans elsewhere. He had been forced into the limelight and had taken a leadership role, in the process of attempting to rise above partisan bitterness. Yet, at the same time, he saw that party lines were now more sharply drawn. And his sympathies clearly rested with the Republican interest.

  As of 1792, national parties were still undeveloped—there were no party platforms, no coordinated campaigns. Presidential and vice-presidential candidates did not run as a joint ticket, but as individuals. In fact, until the vice-presidential race of that year, it was not yet routine for opposing candidates to compete directly for high office. Washington had agreed to serve a second term, and fledging Republicans did not even consider challenging the unassailable incumbent. But the same shield did not protect the crusty New Englander John Adams. By publicly praising the English Constitution as the best in the world, Adams had become a target of attack, and was painted by his critics as a secret admirer of monarchy. He was vulnerable, and so Republicans decided to try to unseat him, in effec
t testing the waters as a prelude to the more important presidential contest four years down the road.

  Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was an admirer of Aaron Burr, Sr., and had known the son and namesake at least since 1772, when he attended the Princeton graduation at which Burr gave his well-received commencement speech. In September 1792, Rush sent Burr an impulsive letter of introduction on behalf of a former indentured servant turned political organizer, Virginian John Beckley. As the first clerk of the House of Representatives, the upwardly mobile Beckley was an ardent Republican who was proving to be a most valuable resource for the newly formed, anti-administration party. The historian Noble Cunningham has described him as the Republicans’ “political intelligence agent.” He was the eyes and ears of Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe throughout the 1790s. In his letter to Burr, Rush confirmed that view, confiding that Beckley “possesses a fund of information about men & things.”84

  Beckley’s visit to Burr was meant to serve a special purpose: to enlist the New Yorker in the Virginia-Pennsylvania campaign to remove Adams from office. Washington was a southerner; therefore, a northern vice president had to be found to replace the northerner Adams. Most remarkable in Rush’s letter to Burr was its strident, almost incendiary tone: “Your friends every where look to you to take an active part in removing the monarchical rubbish of our government. It is time to speak out—or we are undone.” The appeal was more than a call to arms; it was a bold invitation to Burr to personally lead the campaign against the Federalists in New York and beyond.85