This is the editor's introduction and the author's preface for the book, The American Nation: A History v. 11. The Federalist System, 1789-1801, by J.S. Bassett.
EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION
With the present volume, the American Nation passes to the continuous narrative history of the United States under an enduring federal government. From this point till i860, event follows event and year ushers in year in a continuous and orderly fashion. Nevertheless, although the separate history of the commonwealths is for the most part merged into that of the nation, the national history grows steadily more complex: while the colonies had no separate international relations or independent economic policy or extended geographical field, under the new Constitution foreign relations became an exciting cause of fluctuation in politics, economic welfare was a staple of discussion in Congress, and a new group of western communities powerfully reacted upon the other parts of the Union.
The year 1789, at which this volume begins, is not an exact delimitation: the influences which brought about the new federal constitution, and which are described in McLaughlin's Confederation and Constitution (Vol. X.), were still required to set the new government into operation; and hence Professor Bassett's first three chapters are devoted to an account of the creation of the machinery of government, the erection of a stable financial system, and the sudden appearance of rival political parties. The years from 1789 to 1793 make up a period of construction hardly less important and less permanent in its results than the years from 1787 to 1789.
Having thus seen the substructure securely laid, the author next attacks, in chapters iv.-vii., the complicated subject of a national foreign policy, taking up in succession the relations with England, Spain, and France. These powers, all of them occupying American colonies in the neighborhood of the United States, two of them holding strips of territory claimed by this country, were brought into complex relations among themselves by the outbreak of European wars in 1793. It has been the province of the author to unravel the threads of American diplomacy and to show where the interests of the United States lay and how they were subserved by Washington's administration.
Chapters VIII. and ix, describe the contentions with England, which were terminated for the time by the Jay treaty, and the political difficulties which came upon Washington in his second administration. Chapters x. to xiii. They are devoted to a study of social and economic conditions during the period of Federalist supremacy, including one chapter on slavery. This general treatment may be read in connection with chapter vi. in McLaughHn's Confederation and Constitution, and also with chapter vi. of Channing's Jeffersonian System. The remainder of the volume, chapters xiv. to xix., follows the progress of the difficulties with France up to the point of actual war, and the consequent dissensions within the Federal party. It includes chapters on the alien and sedition laws and their counterpart, the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions. The Critical Essay on Authorities deals particularly with the voluminous materials on biography and the collected works of the statesmen of the period.
The special function of this volume in the American Nation series is to describe the foundations of the present American party system and its application to the extremely difficult problems of that time. Such a study necessarily involves an effort to penetrate the character and discover the real motives of a group of giants: in any list of America's half-dozen greatest statesmen, the names of Washington, Hamilton, and Jefferson invariably appear; for those were the three men who most clearly expressed and most strongly influenced the American people of their time. The volume also distinguishes the causes of friction with foreign powers, especially the questions of neutral trade and neutral rights, in a period when many of the present principles governing American international relations were first enunciated. In a single sentence, the province of the book is to show how, from 1789 to 1801, the American people faced a new Constitution, a new party system, and a new set of problems, yet contrived to make their government effective and to transmit it unimpaired.
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
On its political side, this volume treats of three principal facts: the successful establishment of the government under the Constitution, the organization of the Republican party on the basis of popular government, and the steady adherence of the government to a policy of neutrality at a time when we were threatened with serious foreign complications. The first achievement was chiefly due to Hamilton, the second to Jefferson, and the third to Washington, first, and, after his presidency, to John Adams.
To these cardinal features of the history of the time, I have added some chapters on social and economic conditions. I have discussed at some length the progress of the anti-slavery cause in the country, because of its relation to the growth of sectionalism. In these chapters, as well as in those on political affairs, my endeavor has been to write from the standpoint of the men of the time. The men of the day were very human and practical, and they had definite views of the needs of the present and prospects of the future. They believed earnestly in some ideals which to the men of today seem
strange and in some cases grotesque. But they were average men, and, in spite of their passionate outbursts, their foreign sympathies, and their political sensitiveness, they met the problems before them as capable Americans. They had the good sense to approve of Hamilton's organization of the government, Washington's fidelity to neutrality, Jefferson's confidence in democracy, and Adams's unwillingness to bring on an X Y Z war. American self-government was never better justified than during the first three national administrations.
The difficulties in the preparation of this volume have been to a large extent offset by the sympathy and assistance of my friends. To Professor Albert Bushnell Hart, editor of the series; Mr. Frederic Bancroft, of Washington; Mr. Herbert Putnam, Librarian of Congress, and his ever-courteous assistant. Dr. Ainsworth R. Spofford, and Professor Andrew C. McLaughlin, of the University of Michigan, I am indebted for valuable help; to Mr. Worthington C. Ford, chief of the Manuscripts Division of the Library of Congress, I owe a peculiar debt of gratitude. To all I make my sincere acknowledgments.
John Spencer Bassett.