Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 1.djvu/291

278 which will contravene his popularity or his interest. He is as likely as any man I know to temporize, to calculate what will be likely to promote his own reputation and advantage; and the probable result of such a temper is the preservation of systems, though originally opposed, which, being once established, could not be overturned without danger to the person who did it. To my mind, a true estimate of Mr. Jefferson's character warrants the expectation of a temporizing rather than a violent system."

Never was a prophecy more quickly realized. Jefferson's suggestion that the new Judiciary was unnecessary because it had not enough business to keep it fully employed, although by implication admitting that more business would justify its creation, became at once the doctrine of his party. Jan. 8, 1802, Breckinridge undertook the task of moving in the Senate the repeal of the Act; and his argument closely followed the President's suggestion, that the new courts, being unnecessary and therefore improper, might and should be abolished. The Federalists took the ground that the Constitution secured to the judges their office during good behaviour, and that to destroy the office was as distinct a violation of the compact as to remove the judge. Thus from the beginning the debate was narrowed to a technical issue. On the one side was seen an incessant effort to avoid the broader issues which the Federalists tried to force; on the other side, a certain dramatic folding of robes, a theatrical declamation over the