History of the United States of America Volume 1 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1921 Excerpt: ... principal. Economies in the civil list were equally impossible; for the Federalists had there wasted little money, and salaries were low. The army and navy could alone be cut down; and since the Western people required regular troops for their defence against the Indians, the most radical reformers hardly ventured to recommend that the army should be reduced much below 1 Life of Gallatin, p. 276. an aggregate of three thousand rank-and-file. The navy, on the other hand, was believed to be wholly superfluous, and Jefferson was anxious to lay up all the larger ships, especially the frigates. "I shall really be chagrined," he wrote from Monticello in April,1 " if the water in the Eastern Branch will not admit our laying up the whole seven there in time of peace, because they would be under the immediate eye of the department, and would require but one set of plunderers to take care of them. As to what is to be done when everything shall be disposed of according to law, it shall be the subject of conversation when I return. It oppresses me by night and by day, for I do not see my way out of the difficulty. It is the department I understand the least, and therefore need a person whose complete competence will justify the most entire confidence and resignation." Robert Smith was certainly not such a person as Jefferson described, and his appointment, however suitable in other respects, was not likely to attain the object which Jefferson had at heart. Hardly was the Navy Department thus bestowed, and the new Cabinet, toward the middle of July, completely organized for the work that was still to be defined, when another annoyance distracted the President's attention from the main objects of his policy. The government had been, for eight years, ...