571. What are the powers and duties of the President ? 572. What is the judicial power in government, and how is it vested by the constitution of the United States? 573. What is treason by the constitution? What provision is there for securing criminals fleeing from justice? How are new states admitted into the Union? What provision is there for toleration? 574. What are the advantages and what the evils of monarchy ? 575. What are the advantages and evils of aristocracy? 576. What are the advantages and evils of republican government? 577. What were the first measures of Congress and what success has attended our government? 578. What has been the origin of civil liberty? 579. What was the character of the puritans, and what their influence in introducing republican forms of government? 580. What were the institutions of the puritans which were the foundations of our republican government? 581. What have been the effects of the New England institutions, and what extensive effects may yet be expected from them? 582. What is the extent of the territory of the United States? How many square miles is it estimated to contain? 583. What are the climates of the United States? 584. What is the temperature of the several regions or sections of the United States? 585. What proportion of winters are severe ? 586. What is the temperature of summer? 587. What is the weather in spring and autumn? 588. What is the proportion of dry weather? 589. What are the prevailing winds in the United Statos? 590. What are the sea breezes ? 591. What are the usual winds in storms? 592. What are the prevailing rains? 593. What is the effect of summer showers? 594. What is the weather west of the mountains? 595. What is the climate in regard to health? 596, 597. What are the most usual diseases of the United States? CHAPTER XVII, CONTINUATION OF THE HISTORY OF THE UNITED 1. First President and Vice-President. Reception of -Gen. Washington at Alexandria. In pursuance of constitutional provisions, George Washington was elected, by a unanimous vote, to be President of the United States. John Adams was elected to be Vice-President. On the fourteenth of April, General Washington received official notice of his election, and with deep regret, he soon after left Mount Vernon, for New York, where the Congress had assembled. On his way, he received many signal proofs of the affectionate attachment of the people. A number of the citizens of Alexandria met him, and escorted him to their city, where a dinner was prepared for him, and there they presented to him an address, full of expressions of veneration and affection. 2. Honors bestowed on the President at Gray's Ferry, and in Philadelphia. As the General proceeded on his journey, he was escorted by military companies and private citizens. At Gray's Bridge, near Philadelphia, he was honored with an arch of laurel, erected at each end, in imitation of the triumphal arches of Rome; and as he passed under one of these, a civic crown was let down upon his -nead by a youth, who was decorated with sprigs of laurel. From this bridge, he was conducted to Philadelphia, through immense crowds of citizens; and in the evening the city was illuminated. 3. Honors bestowed on the President at Trenton. In passing, the next day, through Trenton, he was greeted with new marks of respect and attachment. In addition to the usual honors of military attendance, and discharges of cannon, the ladies manifested their remembrance of the splendid victory, which the General had gained in that town, twelve years before; a victory which changed the face of the war, and re-animated the languishing spirit of the army and of all classes of citizens. On a bridge in the town was erected a triumphal arch, highly ornamented with laurels and flowers. On the front of the arch was inscribed in large gilt letters, THE DEFENDER OF THE MOTHERS WILL BE THE PROTECTOR OF THE DAUGHTERS. 4. Honors bestowed on the President by the ladies. On the center of the arch, above the inscription, was a cupola of flowers and evergreens encircling the dates of two memorable events, the battle of Trenton, and the bold stand made by the American troops, by which the British army was arrested, on the evening preceding the battle of Princeton. Here the General was met by a number of ladies leading their daughters, dressed in white, bearing baskets of flowers in their hands, and singing a song of exquisite sweetness, composed for the occasion; and as they were uttering the last line, they strewed the flowers before the General in the road. 5. Manner of conducting the President from New Jersey to New York. At Brunswick, the General was joined by the governor of New Jersey, and on the road he was met by a committee of Congress who conducted him to Elizabethtown Point, where he embarked, in an elegant barge of thirteen oars, manned by branch pilots, furnished by the citizens of New York. On the passage, the display of boats, the music, the decorations of the ships, the roar of cannon, and the acclamations of thousands of people, who covered the wharves as he landed, exhibited splendid demonstrations of the public joy, and of the ardent attachment of all classes of citizens. At landing, he was received by the governor of New York, and attended to his apartments by an immense concourse of admiring spectators. 6. First measures of the first Congress. After General Washington had been duly inaugurated into the high office of President, Congress proceeded to organize the government, and passed laws establishing a department of State, another of the Treasury, and another of War. At the head of each department was appointed an able officer. Thomas Jefferson was appointed Secretary of State; Alexander Hamilton was made Secretary of the Treasury; General Knox was then at the head of the Department of War; and Edmond Randolph was appointed Attorney General. At the head of the Supreme Court, was placed that able lawyer and upright statesman, John Jay; and with him were associated John Rutledge, James Wilson, William Cushing, Robert Harrison, and John Blair. 7. Journey of the President to New England. After the close of the first session of Congress in September, President Washington determined to make a journey through the New England States, as far as Portsmouth in New Hampshire. This visit was highly gratifying to the citizens, and due honors were paid to him in every part of the country. From constituted authorities, corporate bodies, from various associations and classes of people, he received addresses, filled with flattering assurances of affection, esteem and confidence. To all these he gave polite and respectful answers. 8. Reception of the President in Boston. As the President approached Boston, the officers of government, and a great body of respectable citizens, met him and attended him into the town. By previous arrangement, the children of all the schools, handsomely dressed, were placed in lines, one on each side of the street, now called Washington street. These, the rising hopes of their country, presented a beautiful spectacle to the President, as he rode slowly along towards the center of the town. The President, mounted, and riding gracefully on his elegant favorite horse, and followed by a vast train of citizens on horseback or in carriages, reached the head of State street, where, alighting, he ascended the gallery of the State House, and presented himself to the view of ten thousand admiring citizens. 9. Funding of the public debt. Assumption of State debts. In the second session of Congress, in January 1791, the Secretary of the Treasury presented an able_report on the subject of supporting the public credit. In pursuance of the plan recommended for raising a revenue to pay the interest and principal of the debts contracted in the revolution, Congress passed acts to fund the debt of the United States, and to assume a given amount of the debts of the several States. The whole amount assumed was twenty-one millions, five hundred thousand dollars. These acts for funding the public debts, and for laying duties on imported goods to pay the interest, and ultimately the principal, established public credit, inspired confidence in the government, and invigorated every branch of bu siness. 10. Origin of parties. Opposition to the measures of Congress. These measures, however, met with violent opposition from many members of Congress. These consisted of persons most jealous of power in the hands of rulers. This party was formed or combined in the years 1783 and 1784. It appeared in great strength, in opposition to the acts of the old Congress, granting half pay for life, and afterwards, in lieu of that, five years full pay to the officers of the revolutionary army, to make good the losses they had suffered by receiving their wages in depreciated bills of credit. This opposition was most manifest in the New England States; and in Connecticut, it assumed a form that threatened a revolution in the go vernment. 11. Opposition to the Constitution. When the form of a new Constitution of government for the United States was offered to the people for ratification, this spirit was roused into a determined opposition in every State; and in some States, it was seconded by other considerations of local or state interests. A large part of the people, probably one third, opposed the ratification of the proposed Constitution. In most of the conventions called for the purpose of ratifying it, the majorities in favor of ratification were small. The opposers of this ratification were called anti-federalists, as the framers and advocates of the system were called federalists. 12. Effects of party spirit. Some of the causes which gave rise to these parties have long since ceased; and the parties have been, in some measure, changed or varied as new causes have occurred. But the original parties were the germs of the succeeding parties, which have, at all times agitated the people of this country; and which, as Chief Justice Marshall, in his Life of Washington, remarks, have sometimes shaken the government to its center. When the Constitution was first published, the apprehension was, that it would gradually annihilate the state governments, or at least reduce them to insignifi cance, under a consolidation: but events have proved that there is danger on the other side; that the State sove. reignties will destroy the federal government. |