Citizens packed their valuables in readiness for
flight. Numerous incipient riots occurred in New York and other cities.
While the people of the French faction were thus expressing their
disapproval of the administration measures, their leaders were casting
about to find the most potent remedy against such abuse of the national
power. Even those who, like Madison, believed in the efficacy of the
new Government had not expected to see it turned into an agency for
the oppression of the individual. To their minds, a continuance of the
present course must mean the complete loss of individual and State
liberty, or the overthrow of the Union of States, which had been gained
only after great effort. An appeal to the ballot was one remedy; but
more than two years must elapse before a change of administration was
possible. The States, in forming the Union, had thrown about themselves
many safeguards. It was high time to test their efficiency.
In the debates on the Alien and kindred measures, the ratification
acts of the different States had been quoted by Republican members to
show that the States had granted certain powers to the Union, and that
the States alone could judge when those powers had been transcended.
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