Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 1.djvu/309

296 only a new country could be inexperienced in politics; but the cynical indifference with which Europe looked on while patriots were bought, was as yet unknown to Jefferson's friends. They were honest; they supposed themselves to have crushed a corrupt system, and to have overthrown in especial the influence of Executive patronage upon Congress. Men like Gallatin, Giles, Randolph, Macon, Nicholson, Stanford, and John Taylor of Caroline listened to Bayard's catalogue of Executive favors as though it were a criminal indictment. They knew that he might have said more, had he been deeper in Executive secrets. Not only had he failed to include all the rewards given to Jefferson's friends, but he omitted the punishments inflicted on those who were believed to be Jefferson's enemies. He did not know that Theodorus Bailey, another of Burr's friends who had voted for Jefferson, was soon to be made postmaster of New York, while Burr himself was not only refused the appointment of Matthew L. Davis, but was to be condemned without a trial.

The acrimony which Giles's tongue thus threw into the debate continued to the end of the session, but had no deeper effect than to make the majority cautious. They were content to show that the Constitution did not expressly forbid the act they meant to perform. In truth the legality of the act depended on the legitimacy of the motive. Of all the root-and-branch Virginians, John Randolph was perhaps the most extreme; and his speech of February 20 laid