Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 1.djvu/310

1802. down an honest principle of action. "It is not on account of the paltry expense of the establishment that I want to put it down," he protested; and with still more energy he said, "I am free to declare that if the intent of this Bill is to get rid of the judges, it is a perversion of your power to a base purpose; it is an unconstitutional act."

As a matter of expediency and public convenience, no one seriously denied that the Federalists were altogether in the right. The introduction of railways and steamboats greatly altered the problem of judicial organization; but no system could have been better adapted to its time and purposes than that of 1801. The only solid argument brought against it was that it attained its object too completely, bringing Federal justice to every man's door, and removing every difficulty or objection to suing in Federal courts. There was truth in the complaint that it thus placed the State judiciaries at a disadvantage. Beyond and above this, the controversy involved another question of far-reaching consequences which the Republicans were too timid to avow. A true democrat might have said openly that he wanted an elective judiciary, or would have insisted that the whole judiciary must be made subject to removal by the legislature. In neither of these opinions was anything disgraceful or improper; yet such was the dread of Federalist and conservative outcry, that although many of the Republican speakers went to the verge of the avowal, none dared make the issue.