PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION. 377 XXV. Vermont, Pennsylvania, and the six Democratic districts CHAPTER of Maryland raised Madison's vote to 128. The supporters of Clinton had entertained no hopes of Pennsyl- 1812. vania, so long Virginia's patient pack-horse, but they had expected that Vermont and North Carolina, in which latter state the peace Democrats were numerous, might have given them the victory. In Massachusetts, so lately Democratic, the peace electors obtained a majority of 24,000, and, in the ensuing congressional election, fifteen Federalists were chosen to five Democrats. The new delegation from New Hampshire were all Federalists. In New York, owing partly to dissensions between the Clintonians and Madisonians, the Federalists chose nineteen out of the twenty-three members. They also carried the New Jersey Legislature, and half of the congressional delegation. CHAPTER CHAPTER XXVI. SECOND SESSION OF THE TWELFTH CONGRESS. BRITISH THE war majority, though excessively mortified at the total failure of their schemes of conquest, found con1812. solation, however, not only in the exploits of the navy and in the re-election of Madison, but in the progress of the European contest. The victory of Salamanca, and the flight of Joseph Bonaparte from Madrid, had excited apprehensions of British triumph in that quarter, but, at the latest accounts, Madrid had been recovered, and the French dominion seemed to be re-established. At the same time, news had come of Bonaparte's triumph at the terrible battle of Borodino, and of his entry into Moscow, whence it was confidently expected that, according to his custom, he would speedily dictate a peace. With all Europe united against her, could Great Britain long delay that downfall with which she had so long been threatened? Considerable importance was attached by the newsOct. 26. papers to Barlow's having set out for Wilna, there to meet Bonaparte at his special request. The nominal ob ATTEMPT TO FILL UP THE ARMY. 379 XXVI. ject was to complete the commercial treaty with which CHAPTER Barlow had been so long tantalized; but the zealous supporters of the war looked earnestly for some arrange- 1812. ment by which French ships, manned by American sailors, might be brought into play against Great Britain. If Bonaparte entertained any such plans, they were defeated as well by Barlow's sudden death at Warsaw, without having seen the emperor, as by Bonaparte's own rapid and terrible disasters. To the first rumors of those disasters, which began to arrive subsequently to the meeting of Congress, coming as they did through English papers, little credit was given by the advocates for war, especially as Bonaparte's bulletins continued to put a good face upon matters, and to represent his flight and ruin as a mere retreat into winter quarters. To fill up the ranks of the army, the pay of privates was raised from six to eight dollars per month, recruits to be guaranteed from arrest for debt, and to have the option of enlisting for five years or the war. A clause in this bill as it passed the House, allowing the enlistment of minors without the consent of their parents or masters, excited a very sharp debate. It was defended Nov. 20-1. as being the practice in France, and on the ground that boys made the best soldiers. Quincy assailed it with great vehemence, as an interference with the rights of parents and masters in conflict with that clause of the Constitution which prohibited the taking private property for public use without compensation; as bearing particularly hard on the North, their apprentices being taken for soldiers, while the slaves of the South were exempt; and as a demoralizing law, tending to encourage the seduction of children from their parents, which, should Congress dare to pass it, would be met in New England by the good old state laws against kidnapping and man-stealing. XXVI. CHAPTER Williams, chairman of the military committee, taking fire at Quincy's assertion that the bill contained "an atro1812. cious principle," retorted upon him the charge of "atrocious falsehood," besides an abundance more of vehement and insulting vituperation, with which it was quite customary for Southern gentlemen (so called) to attempt to browbeat and silence Quincy. Williams attacked, also, the State of Massachusetts, as almost in arms against the government. If she dared to resist the law, he would teach her her duty; he would let her understand that she was a member of the Union, not its ar bitress. Macon, on the other hand, thought that no man ought to be called on to serve as a soldier till he was old enough to enjoy political rights. Randolph deprecated the attempts of Williams to dragoon Massachusetts, and, without justifying Quincy's violence, he reminded his Democratic friends of the extreme measures to which the Republican party had not scrupled to resort, and that too successfully, to put a stop to Adams's French war. Such, indeed, was the force of the objections to this clause, that in the Senate it was struck out by a large 1813. majority, an amendment in which the House concurred. Jan 20. The House voted to increase the bounty to recruits from $16 to $40, but the Senate would only agree to an advance to that amount out of the soldiers' wages. The allowance to recruiting officers was increased to four dol lars a man, and they were authorized to enlist militia-men while engaged in actual service. The volunteer system of the last session had proved exceedingly expensive and wholly inefficient. Of the officers chosen by the volunteers many were very ignorant of their duties, and very few able or willing to enforce any strictness of discipline. That act was accordJan. 29. ingly repealed, and, as a substitute for it, the president QUINCY'S ATTACK ON THE ADMINISTRATION. 381 XXVI. was authorized to enlist twenty regiments of twelve CHAPTER months' regulars, to whom a bounty of $16 was offered. Six new major generals and six additional brigadiers 1813. were authorized, and the number of company and regi- Feb. 24. mental officers was increased. Attempts were also made to invigorate the commissary and quarter-master's departments, both of which had been found very inadequate. A bill for arming and classifying the militia passed the House, but was lost in the Senate. The debate on the bill for the twelve months' regiments diverged into a general discussion of the whole policy of the administration and of the war. Undeterred by the systematic attempts, long practised and again renewed, to put him down by interruption and insult, Quincy led Jan. 5. off with all his usual vehemence, and with greater bitterness than ever. He denounced the invasion of Canada as a cruel, wanton, senseless, and wicked attack, in which neither plunder nor glory was to be gained, upon an unoffending people, bound to us by ties of blood and good neighborhood; undertaken for the punishment, over their shoulders, of another people three thousand miles off, by young politicians, fluttering and cackling on the floor of that House, half hatched, the shell still on their heads, and their pin feathers not yet shed, politicians to whom reason, justice, pity were nothing, revenge every thing; bad policy too, since the display of such a grasping spirit only tended to alienate from us that large minority of the British people anxious to compel their ministers to respect our maritime rights. So thought the people of New England, and hence the difficulty of getting recruits. The toad-eaters of the palace, party men in pursuit of commissions, fat contracts, judgeships, and offices for themselves, their fathers, sons, brothers, uncles, and cousins, might assert otherwise; but the people had |