XIV. two ships, running side by side, kept up the contest till CHAPTER near one o'clock the next morning, by which time the Frenchman's fire being completely silenced, he hauled 1800. off and drew out of the combat. While attempting again to get alongside, Truxtun discovered that the braces of his mainmast were all shot away, and before they could be supplied the mast went by the board, thus giving the Frenchman a chance of escape, which he hastened to improve. The Constellation, having lost thirty-nine men killed and wounded, bore up for Jamaica for repairs. The French frigate, almost a wreck, and with upward of a hundred and fifty men killed or disabled, succeeded in getting into Curaçoa, where she was condemned as unfit for further service. Truxtun's gallantry in this action, the news of which arrived before March 22 the adjournment of Congress, was acknowledged by the vote of a gold medal. XV. 1799. Dec. CHAPTER XV. PENNSYLVANIA, MASSACHUSETTS, NEW YORK. STATE TRI- CHAPTER NOTWITHSTANDING the constitutional ardor with which M'Kean espoused the politics of the opposition, the Federalists had hoped, knowing how conservative he was in most of his opinions, that, after having secured his election as governor of Pennsylvania, he would abate somewhat of that party vehemence by which he had been distinguished as a candidate. But the current which had set so fiercely in the new governor's mind against all who had opposed his election, could not be so suddenly stopped. In reply to the addresses of congratulation which his partisans poured in upon him, he stigmatized those who had voted against him as either enemies to the principles of the American Revolution, emissaries of foreign governments, or office-holders or expectants of office under the Federal government; and Dec. 17. no sooner was he inducted into office, than, to punish his enemies and reward his friends, he made a vigorous use of the extensive powers of removal and appointment vested in him as governor-a system which he was the first to introduce into American politics, at least upon an extensive and sweeping scale. Governor Mifflin, who XV. died shortly after the accession of M'Kean, in filling up CHAPTER the civil offices under the new state Constitution, at a time when party lines were not yet distinctly drawn, and 1799 while he himself was a Federalist, had naturally enough made his selections, to a very great extent, from among his fellow-soldiers in the Revolutionary army; and of these a very large proportion had taken the Federal side, and had voted and electioneered in favor of Ross. In the eyes of M'Kean, this was a crime more than sufficient to counterbalance any merits or services, however great; and almost all those so guilty were speedily removed from office, and their places filled by M'Kean's own partisans. Some of his appointments occasioned great surprise, especially that of Brackenridge, who had been so much implicated in the Whisky Insurrection, to a seat on the bench of the Supreme Court. But, while thus sacrificing to party with the one hand, he paid a tribute to legal learning on the other, in raising to the place of Chief Justice his late associate Shippen. During the Revolution Shippen had remained quiescent, being personally inclined to the British side. Upon the reorganization of the courts under the new Constitution, he had been appointed a judge by Mifflin. Even Brackenridge, whatever his eccentricities as a man or a politician, proved, in his judicial character, no disgrace to the bench. The Assembly met at Lancaster, whither, by an act of the preceding session, the seat of government had been removed. The Senate, in which the Federalists had a 1800. majority, after taking a month to consider M'Kean's cau- Jan. 18. tious inaugural address, briefly expressed in their answer their satisfaction at the sentiments announced in it. But they took the same opportunity to read the governor a lecture on the denunciatory style of his answers to ad CHAPTER dresses, and his proscriptive system of removals from XV. office to which the governor made a long and caustic 1800. replication, denying with his usual force of argument the Jan. 28. right of the Senate to intermeddle, under the form of an address, with his appointments, a matter over which the Constitution had given them no control, except in case of an impeachment for misbehavior in office. Such indeed was the tone of these papers, that they might almost seem to have been drawn from the old archives of the struggles between the proprietary governors and the provincial assemblies. In the House, where the governor's friends had a small majority, party spirit ran very high, giving rise to some singular scenes. The Republican members had introduced a new election act, by one section of which they proposed to deprive of the right of voting all citi zens of Pennsylvania enlisting into the military service Feb. 20. of the United States. Pending the debate on this bill, the pacific Logan, who had volunteered a voyage across the Atlantic to preserve peace between France and America, while leaving the House just after an adjournment, got into a bout of fisticuffs with a Federal member, whose speech against this disfranchising provision the doctor had chosen to pronounce "d-n nonsense"-a criticism answered by a blow, which Logan's Quakerism did not prevent him from returning. In Massachusetts the opposition had brought forward Gerry as their candidate for governor. Sumner had died in office, and Strong was elected by the Federalists to succeed him. The election was very warmly contested. apil 7. Strong was chosen by 19,600 to 17,000 votes; but the support given to Gerry was quite enough to prove that, even in Massachusetts, the predominancy of the Federalists was not entirely secure. XV. Already, before the adjournment of Congress, the im- CHAPTER portant election had taken place in New York, on which so much depended. Hamilton on the one side, and Burr 1800. on the other, had made every possible exertion. The April 30May 1. opposition Assembly ticket for the city of New York was very skilfully drawn up. At the head of it was placed ex Governor Clinton; it bore also the names of Brock holst Livingston as the representative of the Liv. ingston interest, and of General Gates, who, having sold his plantation and emancipated his slaves in Virginia, had resided for the last ten years in New York and the vicinity, and who was known as the warm political friend of Burr. It was only, however, by great efforts on Burr's part that either Clinton or Livingston had consented to this use of their names. Clinton considered his own pretensions to the presidency to have been unreasonably overlooked in favor of Jefferson, whom he regarded as a trickster and trimmer; nor was Livingston particularly anxious to promote the success of the presi dential ticket agreed on. Burr went beyond every body in all the arts of electioneering intrigue. The year before, upon the question of sustaining the Federal gov ernment against the insolence of the French Directory, the Federalists had carried the city by five hundred ma jority; now, upon the question of the next presidency, the opposition had a majority nearly as great. There was, however, one resource left. The political year of New York commenced with July. There was time, therefore, to call the present Federal Assembly together, and to pass an act similar to one proposed at the late session, but rejected by the combined votes of the more ardent of both parties, for an election by districts. Should such a bill pass, the Federalists might secure at least five out of the twelve votes to which New York |