Near him sat
the new major-generals, Alexander Hamilton and Charles C. Pinckney,
the latter one of the rejected envoys to France. Soon after the opening,
Washington returned to his home, leaving Hamilton in command, an
arrangement not consented to without reluctance by Adams, and destined
to bear fruit later. The war measures were continued by the so-called
"Logan act" providing punishment for any citizen of the United States
who should, without authority, carry on communication with a foreign
government with an intent to influence any action. It was brought out
by Doctor Logan, a well-meaning Republican of Pennsylvania, who had
unofficially gone to France in an effort to avert the threatened war
and had held communication to this end with Talleyrand, Merlin, the
First Director, and others. With the suspicion common to the times,
the Federalists thought he was endeavouring to act as mediator or
plotting some league with France in the event of war. This act marked
the extreme limit, to the Republican mind, of the tyranny of the Central
Government over citizens of a State.
It might have been fortunate if matters had been put to the test in
1798 and the following year.
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