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• Foreign Relations—camillus ( Continued )
• No. Xxiv
• No. Xxv
• No. Xxvi (from the Minerva. ) 1
• No. Xxvii
• No. Xxviii
• No. Xxix
• No. Xxx
• No. Xxxi
• No. Xxxii
• No. Xxxiii
• No. Xxxiv 1
• No. Xxxv
• No. Xxxvi
• No. Xxxvii
• No. Xxxviii—and Last
• Foreign Policy
• Hamilton to Washington
• France 1
• The Answer 1 (from the Minerva .)
• The Warning 1
• The Stand 1 (from the New York Commercial Advertiser. )
• Detector 1
• A French Faction
• The War In Europe
• Allegorical Device
• Pericles 1 (for the Evening Post. )
• The Whiskey Rebellion
• Hamilton to Washington 1
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Washington to Governors of Pennsylvania and North and South Carolina (circular)
• Draft By Hamilton.
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington Report On Opposition to Internal Duties
• Cabinet Opinion—hamilton and Knox to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Proclamation By the President of the United States of America
• Secretary of State to Mifflin Draft By Hamilton.
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Craig
• Hamilton to Washington
• Tully 1 to the People of the United States
• Hamilton to Craig
• Secretary of State to Mifflin Draft By Hamilton.
• Hamilton to Washington
• Proclamation By the President of the United States of America
• Hamilton to Lee
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Washington
• Military Papers
• Military Peace Establishment 1
• Hamilton to M C Henry
• Hamilton to M C Henry
• Hamilton to M C Henry
• Hamilton to Washington
• Hamilton to Jay

hamilton to washington

Sir:—

I had the honor of writing to you by the post of Monday last, and then transmitted sundry papers, respecting a meeting at Pittsburgh on the 21st of August, and other proceedings of a disorderly nature in opposition to the laws laying a duty on distilled spirits, and I added my opinion that it was advisable for the government to take measures for suppressing these disorders and enforcing the laws with vigor and decision.

The result of further and mature deliberation is, that it will be expedient for the President to issue a proclamation adverting in general terms to the irregular proceedings, and manifesting an intention to put the laws in force against offenders. The inducements to this measure are:

• 1. That it is a usual course in like cases, and seems, all circumstances considered, requisite to the justification of the Executive Department. It is now more than fourteen months since the duty in question began to operate. In the four western counties of Pennsylvania, and in a great part of North Carolina, it has never been in any degree submitted to. And the late meeting at Pittsburgh is, in substance, a repetition of what happened last year in the same scene. The disorders in that quarter acquire additional consequence from their being acted in the State which is the immediate seat of government. Hence the occasion appears to be sufficiently serious and of sufficient importance to call for such a procedure.
• 2. As an accommodating and temporizing conduct has been hitherto pursued, a proclamation seems to be the natural prelude to a different course of conduct.
• 3. There is considerable danger that before measures can be matured for making a public impression by the prosecution of offenders, the spirit of opposition may extend and break out in other quarters, and by its extension become much more difficult to be overcome. There is reason to hope that a proclamation will arrest it, and give time for more effectual measures.
• 4. It may even prevent the necessity of ulterior coercion. The character of the President will naturally induce a conclusion, that he means to treat the matter seriously. This idea will be impressive on the most refractory, it will restrain the timid and wavering, and it will encourage the well disposed. The appearance of the President in the business will awaken the attention of a great number of persons of the last description to the evil tendency of the conduct reprehended, who have not yet viewed it with due seriousness. And from the co-operation of these circumstances good may reasonably be expected.

In either view, therefore, of the propriety of conduct, or the effects to be hoped for, the measure seems to be an advisable one. I beg leave to add, that, in my judgement, it is not only advisable, but necessary. Besides the state of things in the western part of North Carolina, which is known to you, a letter has just been received from the supervisor of South Carolina, mentioning that a spirit of discontent and opposition had been revived in two of the counties of that State bordering on North Carolina, in which it had been apparently suppressed. This shows the necessity of some immediate step of a general aspect, while things are preparing, if unhappily it should become necessary, to act with decision in the western counties of Pennsylvania, where the government, for several obvious considerations, will be left in condition to do it. Decision successfully exerted in one place, will, it is presumed, be efficacious everywhere.

The Secretary of War and Attorney-General agree with me in opinion on the expediency of a proclamation. The draft of one now submitted has been framed in concert with the latter, except as to one or two particulars, which are noted in the margin of the rough draft in my handwriting, herewith also transmitted. In respect to these, the objections of that gentleman did not appear to me well founded, and would, I think, unnecessarily diminish the force of the instrument.

With the highest respect and trust attachment, I have the honor to be, etc.