The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut Part 14

The proposed law was subjected to public scrutiny of all sorts. It was agitated in town meetings, and the discussions for and against it were noticed in the newspapers, where much s.p.a.ce was given to its consideration. Ministers made it the subject of their sermons. Dr. Dwight discoursed upon the subject in his Thanksgiving sermon. [193] When the proposed bill came up before the legislature, it encountered considerable opposition, but after some modifications it became a law. As in school societies the dissenters had an equal vote, and in all town affairs were worth conciliating, there was more justice in the new law than in the old, where the ecclesiastical society was made the unit of division. From 1717 to 1793 the towns, parishes, and occasionally the ecclesiastical societies had charge of the schools. [194] But in 1794 school districts were authorized and the change to them begun. Such districts could, upon the vote of two thirds of all the qualified voters, locate schools, lay taxes to build and repair them, and appoint a collector to gather such rates. The act of May, 1795, appropriating the money from the Western Lands to the schools, provided also that the school districts should be erected into school societies to whom the money should be distributed, and by whom the interest thereon should be expended; and that it should go "to no other Use or Purpose whatsoever; except in the Case and under the circ.u.mstances hereafter mentioned." The circ.u.mstances here referred to were in cases where two thirds of the legal voters in a school society meeting, legally warned, voted to use the interest money for the support of the ministry in that Society, and appealed to the General a.s.sembly for permission to so use the money. Upon such an expression of the wish of voters, the General a.s.sembly was empowered to answer in the affirmative. The act also repealed that of 1793. The legislature appointed another commission for the sale of the lands. They were sold in the following October for $1,200,000. By this legislation was laid the foundation of Connecticut's School Fund. The Connecticut Land Company, which had made the purchase, pet.i.tioned the legislature in 1797 that Connecticut should surrender her jurisdiction over the lands to the United States. The state complied. In 1798 the organization of the new school societies was perfected, and the control of the schools pa.s.sed entirely into their hands until the district system of 1856 was adopted.

The Western Land bills had resulted in the establishment of a public school fund and in its just distribution, without reference to sectarianism, among the people. All the agitation attending both the certificate acts and Western Land bills had demonstrated the intense opposition of the dissenting minority, and that they were beginning to look to the increase of their numbers and the power of the ballot as the only means of changing the vexatious laws under which they were treated as inferiors. To the Congregationalists, strong both as the Established Church and as members of the Federal party, which counted many adherents among all the dissenting sects, the possibility that any voting strength could be brought against them, adequate to oppose their party measures, seemed improbable. Such a possibility must be very remote. Yet within twenty years, they were to see the downfall of the Federal party, of the Established Church, and of Connecticut's charter government.

FOOTNOTES:

[a] The vote of the a.s.sembly was: "That the ancient form of civil government, containing the charter from Charles the Second, King of England, and adopted by the people of this State, shall be and remain the Civil Const.i.tution of the State under the sole authority of the people thereof, independent of any King, or ftince whatever. And that this Republic is and shall forever be and remain a free, sovereign, and independent State, by the name of the State of Connecticut."--Revision of Acts and Laws, Ed. 1784, p. 1.

[b] "Courts and juries had usually been composed of what was considered the standing church, and they had frequently practiced such quibbles and finesse with respect to the forms of certificates and the nature of dissenting congregations as to defeat the benevolent intentions of the law."--Swift's _System of Laws_, pp. 146, 147.

[c] Yale received in all $40,629.80. In 1871, six alumni replaced the six senior councilors.

[d] So far the highest bid for the tract of land had been $350,000.

[e] The annual expenses were estimated to be approximately $90,000. In _Advice to Connecticut Folks_, 1786, occurs the following estimate:--

=================================================================== Necessary Unneces'y ------------------------------------------------------------------- Governor's salary, 300 300 Lieutenant-Governor's, 100 100 Upper House attendance and travel 60 days at 10 per day, 600 600 Lower House attendance and travel 170 members at 6s. a day, 60 days, 3,060 1,530 1,530 Five Judges of the Superior Court at 24s. a day, suppose 150 days, 900 900 Forty Judges of Inferior Court at 9s. a day, suppose 40 days, 720 720 Six thousand actions in the year, the legal expenses of each, suppose 3, 18,000 1,000 17,000 Gratuities to 120 lawyers, suppose 50 each, 6,000 1,000 5,000 Two hundred clergymen at 100 each, 20,000 20,000 Five hundred schools at 20 a year, 10,000 10,000 Support of poor, 10,000 10,000 Bridges and other town expenses, 10,000 10,000 Contingencies and articles not enumerated, 10,000 10,000 ------------------------------------------------------------------- Total, 89,680 66,150 23,530

As a glimpse at society, it may be added that the _Advice_ itself is an energetic and statistical condemnation of the prevalent use of "Rum," estimated at 90,000 or "ninety-nine hundredths unnecessary expense" in living. "Deny it if you can, good folks. Now say not a word about taxes, Judges, lawyers, courts and women's extravagances.

Your government, your courts, your lawyers, your clergymen, your schools and your poor, do not all cost you so much as one paltry article which does you little or no good but is as destructive of your lives as fire and brimstone."--Noah Webster's _Collection of Essays,_ pp. 137-139.

The evil was beginning to be recognized in all its danger. Here and there voluntary temperance clubs were beginning to be formed among the better cla.s.ses, but it was a time when hardly a contract was closed without a stipulation of a certain quant.i.ty of rum for each workman.

CHAPTER XIV

POLITICAL PARTIES IN CONNECTICUT AT THE BEGINNING OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

As well dam up the waters of the Nile with Bullrushes as to fetter the steps of Freedom.--L. M. Child.

Leland's attack upon the const.i.tution of Connecticut during the excitement over the Western Land bills called for new tactics on the part of the dissenters. Thus far, in all their antagonism to the union of Church and State, there had been on their part practically no attack upon the const.i.tution itself. Yet even as early as 1786 the Anti-Federalists had proclaimed that the state of Connecticut was without a const.i.tution; that the charter government fell with the Declaration of Independence; and that its adoption by the legislature as a state const.i.tution was an unwarranted excess of authority. The Anti-Federalists maintained also that many of the charter provisions were either outgrown or unsuited to the needs of the state. But the majority of the dissenters, like the Const.i.tutional Reform party of recent date, preferred redress for their grievances through legislation rather than through the uprooting of an ancient and cherished const.i.tution. Accordingly, it was not until the elections of 1804-6 that this question of a new const.i.tution could reasonably be made a campaign issue. But from 1793 the dissenters began to lean towards affiliation with the Democratic-Republican [a] party, the successors to the Anti-Federal; yet it was not until toward the close of the War of 1812 that the Republican party made large gains in Connecticut and the dissenters began to feel sure that the dawn of religious liberty was at hand. But before that time the Republicans made three distinct though abortive attempts to secure the electoral power.

The Anti-Federalists early began to probe for weak spots in the const.i.tutional government of Connecticut. The Fundamental Orders had given four deputies to each of the three original towns, and had made the number of deputies from each new town proportionate to its population. The Charter had limited the deputies to two from each town. The Fundamental Orders gave the General Court, composed of Governor, Magistrates or a.s.sistants, and Deputies, supreme governing power, including, together with that of legislation, the granting of levies, the admission of freemen, the disposal of public lands, and the organization of courts. It had also a general supervision over individuals, magistrates, and courts, with power to revise decisions and to mete out punishments. The Charter of 1662 did not materially alter the laws and customs of the government as previously established under the Fundamental Orders, or the "first written const.i.tution." The Charter emphasized the executive, and began the segregation of the Upper House or Council, since by it the "Particular Court" of the founders became the Governor's Council, serving upon like occasions, but requiring the presence of at least six magistrates for the transaction of business. The Particular Court had consisted of the Governor or Deputy-Governor, and three a.s.sistants. In emergencies occurring during adjournment of the General Court, the Particular Court was to serve in place of the larger body. After 1647 this special court could consist of two or three magistrates who, in the absence of the Governor or Deputy-Governor, chose one of their number to act as moderator. After 1662 the formula of the General Court "Be it ordered, enacted and decreed" was changed to "Be it enacted by the Governor and Council and House of Representatives in General Court a.s.sembled." At the regular session of the General Court or General a.s.sembly, the Councilors first sat as a separate body in 1698. After the Declaration of Independence this Upper House or Council became the Senate, and for many years was referred to under any one of the three names.

The power of the General Court--this jumble of legislative, executive, and judicial--worked well so long as the community consisted of a few hundred or a few thousand souls with little diversity of sentiment or industrial interest. It was not until the last quarter of the eighteenth century that the inefficiency of the "first written const.i.tution" began to be felt. Then there arose the need of a new const.i.tution to modify the body of laws and customs that had grown up; to destroy much of the erroneous legislation that in effect perverted or nullified their original intent; and to furnish a const.i.tutional basis for the government of a larger and less h.o.m.ogeneous people. Here and there a few thoughtful men, irrespective of their church or party, were beginning to apprehend the difficulty of piloting a democratic state under the old royal charter. The more prominent among them belonged to the Anti-Federal party, and naturally they sought to expose the const.i.tutional difficulties which they believed impeded progress. [b]

One of the earliest party tilts grew out of the increase of new towns and the unequal development of some of the older ones. Then as now, though on a much smaller scale, the unit of town representation threatened rotten boroughs and a fict.i.tious representation of the will of the majority as represented by the delegates to the Lower House. The state in 1786 had not recovered from the exhaustion due to the Revolutionary War, and the support of the many new deputies, due to the increase of the towns, was a burden which the October legislation of that year attempted to lighten. With the object of cutting down state expenses a bill was introduced into the House to refer to the freemen some proposition for reducing the number of their delegates and for equalizing representation. Mr. James Davenport of Stamford moved to subst.i.tute for the bill [c] another in which this reduction should be made by the legislature without submitting the proposed change to the freemen. This was objected to on the ground that a reduction of delegates was a const.i.tutional question, "the a.s.sembly having no right to alter the representation without authority given by their const.i.tuents." The supporters of the bill contended with Mr. Davenport that--

_we have no Const.i.tution_ but the laws of the State. The _Charter is not the Const.i.tution_. By the Revolution _that_ was abrogated. A law of the State gave a subsequent sanction to that which was before of no force; if that law be valid, any alteration made by a later act will also be valid; if not, we have no Const.i.tution, so defined, as to preclude the Legislature from exercising _any_ power necessary for the good of the people.

The bill was carried over to the May session of 1787, when it was defeated by sixty-two yeas to seventy-five nays, the towns of Hartford, East Hartford, Berlin, Stamford and Woodbury favoring it. A confidential letter of February, 1787, from Dr. Gale, the probable author of "Brief, decent but free Remarks or Observations on Several Laws pa.s.sed by the Honorable Legislature of the State of Connecticut since the year 1775, by a Friend to his Country," suggested that in addition to the reduction of representatives, laws should be pa.s.sed forbidding any citizen to hold, at the same time, more than one place of public trust, either civil or military, and also requiring an increase in the number of councilors, or senators, from the total of twelve to three from each county. [d] Dr. Gale believed that if these senators should be elected by each county, and not upon a general ticket, the change would be beneficial. [195]

In regard to the senators, the Fundamental Orders prescribed that nominations for the magistrates should be made by the towns through their deputies to the fall session of the General Court, and that the election should take place the following spring at the Court of Elections. As the life of the colony expanded, modifications of this rule were made; in time, vote by proxy took the place of the freeman's presence at the Court of Election. After 1689, the a.s.sistants to be nominated, twenty in number, were balloted for in the fall town meetings. The sealed lists were sent to the legislature, where they were opened, and the ticket for the spring election was made out from the twenty names receiving the largest vote. The Court could no longer as in earlier times add any new names. Hence, the custom grew up of listing nominations, not according to popularity, but first according to seniority in office, and then according to the number of votes received. These lists were published in the papers throughout the state. The candidates for election were presented at the April town meetings, where each name was read in order and voted upon. A much later enactment provided twelve ballots, and forbade any one to cast more than twelve, whether for or against a candidate or in blank. If a man held any one of his slips in reserve for a more satisfactory candidate, he had none for the teller, and thus the secrecy of the ballot was almost destroyed. New candidates or those not up for reelection, whose names appeared at the foot of the list, whatever the number of votes received, were sometimes kept waiting years for an election, until those above them had died in office or resigned. [e]

For instance, Jonathan Ingersoll received 4600 votes in nomination in 1792, while the senior councilor, William Williams, had only 2000; yet Williams's name was preferred, and Ingersoll's had to wait over another year, when he was again nominated and elected, and held his seat from 1793 to 1798. An election was a wearisome affair, and many men would not stay until the voting upon the list was finished, preferring for various reasons to cast an early ballot. The natural tendency was to support the experienced and known, even if indifferently efficient councilor, rather than to vote for an untried and unfamiliar man whose name would come up later, or even for popular men who could not be proposed until far into the day. As a result the party in power felt a.s.sured of their continuance in office. Moreover, proxies for the election were returned in April, but the result was not announced until the legislature met in May, nor was there any supervision compelling an honest count. Thus it was easy to keep in office Federal candidates, and thus the Senate, or Council, came to reflect public opinion about twenty years behind the popular sentiment. Furthermore, the clergy of the Establishment would get together and talk matters over before the elections, and the parish minister would endeavor to direct his people's vote according to his opinion of what was best for the commonwealth. This ministerial influence was not shaken until about 1817.

There was still another grievance against the Council besides that just mentioned. It had come to be almost a Privy Council for advice and consultation. Furthermore it was, until 1807, the Supreme Court of the state to which lay appeals in all cases, civil or criminal, where errors of law had been committed in the trial courts. Its twelve members were mostly, if not all, lawyers, holding a tremendous power of patronage over the members of the Lower House, many of whom were also lawyers, eager for preferment; over the courts throughout the state, from which, since 1792, the old non-professional judges had been debarred, and also over the militia, whose officers, from the earliest times, had been appointed by the General Court. Further, the united action of the two houses was necessary to pa.s.s or to repeal a law, and thus much important legislation centred upon a majority of seven in the Council.

Furthermore, at the opening of the nineteenth century, the courts of law also were thought to need reorganizing. The judges were declared partisan, as they naturally would be under the conditions of their appointment. The Republicans could not meet the Federals upon an equal footing in the state tribunals. They were disparaged in their business relations, "were treated as a degraded party, and this treatment was extended to all the individuals of the party however worthy or respectable; in fact as the Saxons were treated by the Normans and the Irish by the English government." [196]

Because of these political conditions, early in statehood, there were three schools of politicians; namely, those who approved a const.i.tutional convention, expressly called to frame a new const.i.tution; those who wished such a convention merely to amend the existing charter-const.i.tution; and those, until 1800, predominately in the majority, who were convinced that whether the state had a const.i.tution or not was a most frivolous and baneful question, mooted only by "visionary theorists," or by those who were desirous of a change, no matter how disastrous it might be to good government. The conservative party held that, since the charter had been drawn according to the tenor of a draft submitted by Winthrop and outlining the government according to the Fundamental Orders, framed in 1639 by the "inhabitants and residents of Hartford, Windsor and Wethersfield,"

the charter was not a grant of privileges but an approval asked and obtained for a government already existing. Consequently, such government as had been exercised before and was continued under the charter was essentially a creation of the people. It therefore needed only the declarative act of the legislature to annul those clauses of the charter that bound the colony to the crown and to continue over into statehood the government of the colonial period. Further, granting that the separation from Great Britain annulled the const.i.tution, the subsequent conduct of the people in a.s.senting to, approving of, and acquiescing in such acts of the legislature, had established and rendered those acts valid and binding, and had given them all the force and authority of an express contract. [197] Such discussion of const.i.tutional questions, confined at first to the few, spread among the many after Leland's attack upon the charter, and were debated with great earnestness. Leland's attack gained him, at the time, comparatively few adherents, but it brought the question of disestablishment fairly before the people, demonstrating to the discontented that there was very little hope for larger liberty, for greater justice, until the power of legislation, granted by the old charter, should be curtailed, and the bond between Church and State severed.

The growth in Connecticut of the Democratic-Republican party, outside its following among Methodists, Baptists and a few radical thinkers, was very slow. The Episcopalians were held in much higher esteem by the Federal members of the Establishment, or "Standing Order," as they were called, than were the other dissenters. Yet notwithstanding the wealth and conservatism of the sect, they were looked at askance when it came to giving them political office, for the old dislike to a Churchman still lingered in New England. Accordingly, they were somewhat dissatisfied at the treatment they received as political allies of the Standing Order, and, in order to quiet their incipient discontent, the government thought best to occasionally extend some small favor to them. So in 1799, the legislature granted them a charter for a fund for their bishop which they were trying to raise. About the same time, Yale first conferred upon an Episcopal clergyman the t.i.tle of doctor of divinity. The transfer of the annual fast day to coincide with Good Friday was appreciated by the Churchmen. The change was first made in 1795, and came about through Governor Huntington's friendship for Bishop Seabury, and because of a desire to remove from the public mind a misapprehension, arising from the refusal of the Episcopal church in New London to comply with President Washington's proclamation for a national Thanksgiving. [f]

From 1797 this change of fast-day became customary. It removed the long-standing complaint that Presbyterian days of fasting or rejoicing frequently occurred during Episcopal feasts or fasts. At an earlier period, the ignoring of such public proclamations was sometimes made the occasion for imposing fines for the benefit of the Establishment.

As has been said, the Republican gains were greater among the Methodists and Baptists. This was partly because not a few among these dissenters a.s.sociated Jefferson's party with his efforts towards disestablishment in Virginia in 1785. Out of Connecticut's population of two hundred and fifty thousand, the Republicans counted upon recruits from the Methodist body, numbering, in 1802, one thousand six hundred and fifty-eight, and from the Baptists, approximating four thousand six hundred and sixty members. In 1798-1800 the division of the Federalists over national issues strengthened the Republicans in Connecticut, as they were the successors to the Anti-Federalists, those "visionary theorists" of 1786. The new Democratic-Republican party received further additions to their ranks through the opposition in Connecticut to the Federal and obnoxious "Stand-up Law" of 1801. This law, which required a man to stand when voting for the nomination of senators, "was made to catch the secret vote of the Republicans," [198] and revealed at once the opposition of every dissenter, debtor, employee, or of any one who had cause to fear injury to himself if he gave an honest vote. It was pa.s.sed by a compact and reunited body of Federalists whose boast was that no division upon national questions could affect their unity and strength in the Land of Steady Habits.

The Republican-Democratic party in the state would have gained recruits more rapidly had it not been for its att.i.tude as a national party toward France. To appreciate the situation in Connecticut, one must consider, first of all, the influence of the French Revolution. One must realize the intense interest, the mingled exultation and terror with which conservatives who, though they might differ in their religious preferences, were yet the rank and file of the state, watched its varying aspects from its outbreak in 1789 on through the years of its earliest experiments in statecraft, of its exaggerated exploitation of "liberty, equality, and fraternity," and of its casting off of all religious bonds and trammels. As the Federal party lost its sympathy with the French cause the att.i.tude of the nation changed. The consolidated factions of the Anti-Federalists, however, increased their ardor for the French republic, and took from 1792 the name Democratic-Republican. They carried their keen sympathy even to expressing their French sentiments by their dress and manners. The change in the national att.i.tude was reflected in Connecticut by the whole-hearted antipathy of large numbers of her people to what they considered "radicalism of the most destructive character." English Arianism and Arminianism, with which the Edwardeans had waged war, were nothing compared to the influx of French infidelity and atheism which appeared to be sweeping over the land. Books formerly guarded by the clergy were on sale everywhere. They found among the ma.s.ses many like Aaron Burr, who, during his period of study with Dr. Bellamy, had preferred the logic of the printed books upon the shelves to that of the master who placed them there. Dr. Bellamy proposed to confute the pernicious arguments of these books, bringing them one by one before his select body of students, so that they should be able to guide their future parishioners when the insidious poison of these dangerous authors, these "followers of Satan," should force its way among them.

All sects attempted to oppose such an influx of irreligion. All but the Episcopalians fell back upon revivals as their chief means. In these revivals the Methodists and Congregationalists were perhaps the most successful in securing converts. The policy of the Episcopal church did not favor this phase of religious life. It felt that its whole att.i.tude was a protest against exaggerated liberty, or license, and against all atheistical ideas. During the revivals the Baptists, also, added largely to their numbers. The Methodists, however, brought to their revival meetings the peculiar strength of fervent proselytes to a new faith; of one rapidly becoming popular, appealing strongly to the emotions, and having a touch of martyrdom still clinging to its profession. Among those Federalists who were also Congregationalists, the French Revolution was believed to be the "result of a combination long since formed in Europe by infidels and atheists to root out and effectually destroy religion and civil government." Holding this opinion; seeing the Baptists and Methodists increasing in importance, both in the nation and in the state; watching the continual increase of the unorthodox and of the freethinker, and perceiving the growing loss of confidence in the Federal party both in the nation and the state, the Standing Order felt itself face to face with imminent peril. It scented danger to itself and to the existence of the commonwealth. But it sadly lacked a great leader, until the year 1795, when it found one in the recently elected president of Yale, the Rev. Timothy Dwight. He was a grandson of Jonathan Edwards, and was a man of amazing energy, of varied training, and of great personal charm.

In his experience Dr. Dwight counted a college education, a theological training under Jonathan Edwards, Jr., a tutorship at Yale, a chaplaincy among the rough soldiers of the war of the Revolution, home-life on his father's farm at Northampton, where the men in the field vied with each other "to rake or hoe beside Timothy" in order to hear him talk. In political life Dr. Dwight had served an apprenticeship in the General Court of Ma.s.sachusetts, where he sat as deputy from Northampton. He had had experience as a preacher in several small towns, and as pastor at Greenfield Hill, a part of Fairfield. There he had added to his income by establishing the Greenfield Academy for both s.e.xes. Upon accepting the presidency of Yale he became also professor of theology, and in addition he took under his special care the courses in rhetoric and oratory. These last two, together with literature, had, he thought, been entirely too much neglected. [g] His coming was a forecast of the man of the nineteenth century.[199] Dr. Stiles had been a fine type of the eighteenth. Dr. Dwight was a man of less acquirements in languages, but he was a more accurate scholar, of broader intelligence, and with a mind well stocked and ready. He had a pleasing power of expression, was tactful, and could readily adapt himself to men and circ.u.mstances. It was he who was to give Yale its initial movement from college to university. He himself was to become a celebrated teacher and theologian. He was to be one of the founders of the New England school, whose principles Dr. Taylor, in 1827, was to make known under the name of the New Haven Theology. [h] In his own day Dr. Dwight was equally celebrated as a power both in religion and politics. "Pope Dwight" his enemies termed him, and they nicknamed his ministerial following his "bishops," while they dubbed the Council or Senators "his Twelve Cardinals."

Outside his college duties, and as a part of his care for its spiritual welfare, President Dwight's immediate purpose was to combine all forces that could be used to stem the dangerous currents rushing against the bulwarks of Church and State. He had early favored the drawing together of Congregational and Presbyterian bodies. He had discerned, as early as 1792, a stirring of new life in the religious world, the breaking down of the apathy of half a century that had been indicated by revivals in places far scattered, not only throughout New England but in other states. Towns in Ma.s.sachusetts, with East Haddam and Lyme in Connecticut, had been roused as early as the year named. That element of personal experience which had been so marked a feature of the Great Awakening reappeared, but without that excessive emotionalism [i] which characterized the earlier revival. Nor was there any such p.r.o.nounced leadership as then. There was the same conviction of sinfulness, the peace after its acknowledgment, and the joyous satisfaction in the determination to lead an upright life, seeking G.o.d's grace and will. Recognition of this spiritual awakening had in some measure entered into the proposed disposal of the money from the Western Lands, as it had also in the discussion of the joint missionary work of 1791-1794, and again in 1797-98, [200] when the General a.s.sociation of Connecticut was incorporated as the Connecticut Missionary Society, [j] In all of these movements President Dwight had taken an active part. Upon entering the presidency of Yale he at once began a series of sermons, which he delivered Sunday mornings, and which were so arranged that in each four years the course was complete. These lectures were his "Theology Explained and Defended,"

first published in 1818. President Dwight, with the leading Presbyterian or Congregational ministers, together with the Methodist and Baptist clergy, continued to favor the revival movement. This reached its height in 1807. From beginning to end it lasted nearly a quarter of a century, and was punctuated by the revival years of 1798, 1800, and 1802, that were especially fruitful of conversions in Connecticut. That of 1802 attracted large numbers of the college students. The success of the revivals was marked by increasing austerities, such as the denunciation of amus.e.m.e.nts, both public and private, and the revival of dead-letter laws for the more strict observance of Sunday. Traveling or driving was prohibited without a pa.s.s signed by a justice of the peace. Travelers were held up over "holy time." Attempts were made to prevent the young people from gathering in companies on Sunday evenings after the Sabbath was legally over. Too much hilarity, though innocent, was condemned. Such restrictions were extremely distasteful to a large minority in the state, and seemed to many citizens only repeated proofs of how closely the government and the Presbyterian-Congregational church were banded together. Accordingly the Republicans began to think it was time to test the strength of such a platform as they could put forth while making a bid for the whole dissenting vote.

The election of Adams and Jefferson [k] in 1797 was a spur to both parties, lending hope to the scattered Republicans, and prodding the recently over-confident Federalists. In March, 1798, the whole nation was roused almost to forgetfulness of party lines by the anger created by the publication of the "X Y Z Papers." A few months later the Federal party, through its Alien and Sedition laws, had lost its renewed hold upon the nation. Connecticut denounced the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions of 1798-99, and was to all appearances stanchly Federal. But her leaders were looking for another presidential candidate than Adams, while the Republicans, elate with the antic.i.p.ated national victory in 1800, were making preparations to catch any and every dissatisfied voter in the state. The scattered Republican clubs and committees awoke to new activity. As Jefferson kept his party well in hand, and let the national dissatisfaction increase that he might rush to victory at the presidential election of 1800, so the Connecticut Republicans matured their plans. They did not formally organize their party till 1800, first making sure of their great leader as the nation's executive, and almost of his reelection. Then they began to urge the acceptance of their platform upon the oppressed Connecticut dissenters, and to taunt the Federal Episcopalians with an allegiance that as late as 1802 had not been thought of sufficient worth to warrant the small favor of a college charter for their academy at Cheshire. The Federalists attempted to disarm the Episcopal dissatisfaction over the refusal by granting them a license for a lottery to raise $15,000 for the bishop's fund.

The leader of the Republicans in Connecticut was Pierpont Edwards, a recently appointed United States district judge. He was brother of Jonathan Edwards, Jr., for years the pastor of the North Church at New Haven, and in 1800 president of Union College. This Republican leader was the maternal uncle of his opponent in Federal state politics, President Dwight, and also of the Republican Vice-President, Aaron Burr. Another nephew of his was Theodore Dwight, the brother of Yale's president, who led the Federal civilians, and who was editor of the "Hartford Courant," the organ of the Connecticut Federalists. The Hartford "American Mercury" voiced the sentiments of the Republicans. The latter party throughout the state was formally organized in 1800 at a meeting in New Haven, the home of Mr. Edwards and of his henchman, Abraham Bishop, son of that city's mayor.

The close personal relationship of the leaders, [l] the scorn of the radicals, the abhorrence of the conservatives for the principles, opinions, and even, in some cases, habits of life of their opponents, entered into the strife and vituperation of the political campaigns from 1800 to 1806. Personalities were unsparing, pa.s.sion rose high, and speeches were bitter. This was particularly the case in New Haven, where Abraham Bishop's impudent boldness of attack and denunciation was exaggerated by his father's position. Samuel Bishop, the father, was a man of seventy-seven, and old in the service of both Church and State. He was senior deacon in the North Church, or what was at that time known as the Church of the United White Haven and Fair Haven Societies. He was also a justice of the peace, town clerk, and mayor of the city. The last office was held, according to the charter, during the pleasure of the legislature. Samuel Bishop was also chief judge of the court of common pleas for New Haven County, and sole judge of probate, annual offices which the General a.s.sembly had re-conferred upon him in 1800 and in 1801. His son was a graduate of Yale (1778). He was a lawyer of somewhat indifferent practice, and from 1791 to 1798 clerk of the county court under his father, while from 1798 he had been clerk of the superior court. Before settling down to practice at the bar he had lived abroad, and had been caught in the whirl of French thought and democratic ideas. He had returned home bearing words of recommendation to Washington's secretary of state from Jefferson's European friends. A personal meeting with that party leader had added to Bishop's enthusiasm. For some years he had lived in Boston, and tried his hand at literature. He had returned to New Haven in 1791, and had thrown himself into politics. He purposely exaggerated his opinions. He was careless of his unorthodox expressions even to the verge of blasphemy. Though himself a believer in G.o.d, he was perhaps what one would probably have termed a little later a Unitarian. His enemies exaggerated his exaggerations,--and Unitarianism was a crime according to the Connecticut statutes. [m]

In his speeches and essays Abraham Bishop struck out boldly, with earnestness, logic, shrewd wit, and irony, and, as has been said, at times with dangerous irreverence,--often with down-right impudence when that would serve his purpose. An ill.u.s.tration of his extreme use of it was in 1800, about the time of the organization of the Republican party throughout the state.

He had been honored with the Phi Beta Kappa oration, annually delivered on the eve of the Yale Commencement, then in September. A polished literary effort was expected. He broke tradition, courtesy, and every implied obligation in the choice of his subject. In August he sent to the committee his paper for their acceptance or refusal. It was ent.i.tled "The Extent and Power of Political Delusions," and was an out and out campaign doc.u.ment. The presidential election was due in November! Further, Bishop made political capital of the antic.i.p.ated refusal of his paper, which was not sent him until the eleventh hour. The readers of the morning paper, wherein the committee offered an apology for the change of speakers at the Society's meeting to be held that night, were confronted by the announcement that the refused address would be given to all who cared to listen to it in the parlors of the White Haven church that same evening, and by the still further notice that copies of it were fresh from the printer's hands and were ready to be distributed to the remotest parts of the state. Needless to state, the Phi Beta Kappa audience dwindled away to swell the crowd of fifteen hundred, wherein Bishop gleefully counted "eight clergymen and many ladies." The address met with great favor, and the Wallingford Republicans at their celebration of March 11, 1801, in honor of the election of Jefferson and Burr, asked Mr. Bishop to be their orator. [n]

To top Bishop's insult,--as it was regarded by every friend of the Standing Order,--came in the following spring Jefferson's displacement of Elizur Goodrich, President Adams's appointee as collector of the port of New Haven, and the subst.i.tution of Samuel Bishop. President Jefferson considered himself at liberty to make this change; and all the more so because President Adams had made the appointment as one of his last official acts, when he must have known it would have been unacceptable to the incoming Republican administration. The merchants of New Haven immediately united in a pet.i.tion to President Jefferson, in which they declared that Samuel Bishop was too old to perform the duties of the office, and, moreover, not acquainted with accounts. a.s.suming that his son Abraham would a.s.sist him, they denounced the latter as "entirely dest.i.tute of public confidence, so conspicuous for his enmity to commerce and opposition to order, so odious to his fellow citizens, that we presume his warmest partizans would not have hazarded a recommendation of him." Notwithstanding this protest the appointment was continued, the President pointing out the honors bestowed upon the father and the care with which he, Jefferson, had investigated the case before acting upon it. Reproving the authorities for so long excluding the Republicans entirely from office, Jefferson expressed his regret at finding upon his accession to the presidency not even a "moderate partic.i.p.ation in office in the hands of the majority." He further stated that when such a situation was in some measure relieved he would be only too glad to make the question "Is he capable? Is he honest? Is he faithful to the Const.i.tution?" the only tests for obtaining and holding office. Samuel Bishop died in 1803, and the collector ship was then bestowed upon his son, who held it until his death in 1829.

In Connecticut the two political parties prepared for conflict. The Republicans desired a new const.i.tution and disestablishment. The old const.i.tutional and religious debates were opened and fiercely fought out in pamphlet, press, sermon, and political oration. Noah Webster replied to the "Extent and Power of Political Delusion" by "A Rod for the Fool's Back." John Leland published his famous Hartford speech as "A Blow at the Root, a fashionable Fast-Day Sermon," and his "High Flying Churchman," as contributions in behalf of civil and religious liberty. Abraham Bishop took up the latter topic in his "Wallingford Address, Proofs of a Conspiracy Against Christianity and the Government of the United States," published in 1802, as well as in his "Extent and Power of Political Delusion" of 1800. A fair type of Mr. Bishop's style and treatment is shown in his "Connecticut Republicanism," a campaign doc.u.ment, wherein he sets forth his opinion of the union of Church and State. [o]

In his campaign doc.u.ment under the t.i.tle "Connecticut Republicanism"

Bishop declared:

Christianity has suffered more by the attempts to unite church and state than by all the deistical writings, yet the men who denounce them are p.r.o.nounced atheists and no proof of their atheism is required but their opposition to Federal measures.... Church and state cannot be better served than by keeping them distinct and by placing them where they ought to be, above, instead of beneath the control of men who care no more for either of them than they can turn to their personal benefit. The self-styled friends of order have in all nations been the cause of all the convulsions and distresses which have agitated the world.... The clergyman preaches politics, the civilian prates of orthodoxy, and if any man refuse to join their coalition they endeavor to hunt him down to the tune "The Church is in danger."... In 1787 this visible intolerance had abated in New England; there was no written law in force that none but church-members should be free burgesses: yet the avowed charge of Christ's church was in our law-books, some nice points of theology were settled in our statutes and the common law of church and state was in full force.... The Trinitarian doctrine is established by laws, and the denial of it is placed in the rank of felony. Though we have ceased to transplant from town to town Quakers, New Lights, and Baptists; yet the dissenters from our prevailing denominations are even at this moment praying for a repeal of those laws which abridge the rights of conscience.

Break the league of church and state which first subjugates your consciences, then treating your understanding like galley slaves, robs you of religion and civil freedom.... Thirty thousand freemen are against the union of church and state. Thirty thousand more men, deprived of voting because they are not rich or learned enough, are ready to join them. [201]

In his "Wallingford Address," Bishop exclaims "The clerical _politician_ is a useless preacher; the _political_ Christian is a dangerous statesman." On the t.i.tle page of this address appeared the epigram, "Our statesmen to the Const.i.tution; our Clergy to the Bible." The unfortunately irreverent parallel which Bishop drew between the Saviour of the world and the leader of the national Republican party, or of the democracy or common people, gave to the epigram an evil significance not intended, and to its author a reputation not wholly deserved.

David Daggett, a prominent New Haven Federalist and lawyer, [p] tried in "Facts are Stubborn Things" to refute the charge that the people were priest-ridden, the legislature arbitrary and tyrannical, the clergy bigots. In the course of his argument he gives an account of the reception of a Baptist pet.i.tion which, voicing the smouldering discontent that was kept burning by the certificate law, had been presented to the legislature. Daggett charged the Republicans with inst.i.tuting the custom of holding their party meetings in Hartford and New Haven at the time of the meeting of the a.s.sembly in those cities, and of making the political gathering a means of directing what topics should be brought up for discussion in the House of Representatives, and what discussed in their party organ the "American Mercury."

Daggett accused the Republicans of purposely choosing subjects of discussion of an inflammable character, and declared that it was in Babc.o.c.k's paper (so called from its editor) that the Baptist pet.i.tion originated, which, circulated through the state, received some three thousand signatures, "many of whom doubtless sought the public good."

[202] The pet.i.tion was presented for trial in 1802 and a day set for its hearing, upon which Mr. Pierpont Edwards and Mr. Gideon Granger were to advocate it. The gentlemen, according to Mr. Daggett's account, did not appear, and of course no trial was held. Instead, the a.s.sembly referred it to a committee of eighteen from the two houses. Mr. Daggett insisted that "it was thoroughly canva.s.sed, and every gentleman professed himself entirely satisfied that there was no ground of complaint which the Legislature could remove, except John T. Peters, Esq., who declared that nothing short of an entire repeal of the law for the support of religion would accord with his idea."

The truth of the matter was that the committee were chiefly Federalists. Mr. Peters was a Republican. In their answer to the pet.i.tion, the committee a.s.sumed that it "was an equitable principle, that every member of the society should, in some way, contribute to the support of religious inst.i.tutions and so the complaint of those who declined to support any such inst.i.tution was invalid." If there was ground for complaint because of sequestration of property for the benefit of Presbyterians only, the committee failed to find any such cause, and if such existed, the proper channel of appeal was through the courts. All other complaints in the pet.i.tion were considered to be answered by the a.s.sumption that the legislature had the right, on the ground of utility, to compel contributions for the support of religion, schools, and courts, whether or not every individual taxpayer had need of them. The next year, 1803, the pet.i.tion gained a hearing, but that was all. It continued to be presented at every session of the a.s.sembly, and was first heard by both houses in 1815. It was finally withdrawn at the session that pa.s.sed the bill for the new const.i.tution of 1818.