The enquirer. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1804-1815, 1808-05-06

vert; and would you undertake to say that
the usurpation and exercise of such pow
er OF, the part of the president, would not be
ut least pniliatcd, il not completely justified
BY the necessity OF the case! wish not to
be misundcrstood--this case ] have stated,
as IN illustration, not as one analogous to a
caucus, but sufficient, / trust, to shew the
futility of Your argument, that if caucuses
are in direct hostility to the principles of
the sconstituticn,. and assumptions of power
not delegated by the people, nothing can ex-
.cnuate the inpropriety OF holding them
But il we are not grossly misinformed, it is
not very long, since you Yourself were exer-
cising all your dcxterity in attempts to white
wash, upon this plea OF necessity, one of the
most fragrant violations of the constitution,
ever perpetrated in this country, and that
too not by the civil--but military authority.
But perhaps you will reply that you were
only q laboring in your vocation" and for
which YOU had avery old and characteristic
precedent. You have no doubt, in the
course OF your practice, met with instances
enough, both OF 6 intellectual blindness audiof
moral depravity,' to enable you to eluci-
date these topics very well, but you Should
take care that III the application of them,
Won do not involve your friends with your
enemies. How, for example, can you &C
accuse the Professors, with violating
their oathS for fozver," without subjccting
the members Of the Washington caucus to
the inputation in a much stronger degree
The object OF their meeting was certainly to
confer fosUer on others and it might be said
by one much less suspicious than yourself,
to rceeiveit lerhafis IN, their tstrn. Favours
of this sort seldom go unrequitted. With
what proprlety, or even common sense, could
iosvc1 possibly be said TO be the object of
onr protest, when none was, or could be con-
har for. we
mended money or on ourselves BY it,
With respect to your belief of our secret
wishes, and above all Of our hostility to the
present administration, suffice it to say, that
until 1T is demonstrated to rest on better
foundation than the suspicious of &C One of
the People, no rational man can expect us
to notcc it in any other way, than by posi-
tive denial. You ought to have been better
acquainted with the nature and application
of evidence, than to be guilty of such an alb
surdity as 10 expect reply TO accusations
unsupported even by the semblance of proof
Before Won ventured to charge us with a
&C Observation-Disclosures. and rancorous op-
position to the administration, knowledge
OF which you say is derived from orr condatcf
on the floor Of Congress, you ought to have
rccolIected, if your lucid intervals were long
enough to enable you to do it, that YOU pro-
bounced us in your first number set of OBJ
scnre individuals, of whom neither you, nor
any body else, scarcely ever heard, and the
same sentiment is reiterated in still stronger
terms only a few lines beyond the paragraph,
IN Which you would have the people to be-
Hevc, that yon knew every thing about us
Is this the way, sir, you treat that people
with whom you accuse us of trying expe
Bents! Is this your respect for their under
standings If You meant to prove our
hostility to the administration from our.
conduct on the floor of Congress, one
would think you might have given your
self the trouble to quote, Tor to collate
as suppose you would express it) ma
jority of our votes--I will not say speeches,
as you seem unwilling to admit that any of
us~scarcely have been heard of in this way
This would have been the common, and in
deed the only mode of proving such an as
sertIoH, but uncommon men like Yourself |
presume, expect, ifthey do not claim exemp-
ton from ordinary rules. Like the ancient
Oracles, they consider themselves entitled to
1mplclt credeuCe, even for naked declara-
tions. From our Protest no such differences
as yours can possibly be drawn, for there is
not even an insEuation, much less positive
expression derogatory to the character of the
administration In it. But to save you some
trouble IN the labour of conjecture, we will
tea you what we think both of the republican
party, and CT the Identification OF the admin
stration with them. We consider no harty
emitted TO fhat character, which does not
aizOays act in strict conformity 10 the trim
c1fteS nfion 7vhich the hresent ad0linistrati-
on GENE int hozrer. Nay more, we believe
the administration itself no farther refubH-
can, than as they conform to those principles.
1t is an article of our faith too, that although
the present administration were placed at
the mead OF the government because it was
believed they would act upon those princi-
pies, yet that those who placed them there,
never considered them as so amalgamatcd
with the principles which they were selected
to maintain, as to be inseparable from them
Nor was it the fashion then as it now is, 10
use them as synenimous terms Although
1t was expected and believed that tie adj
minlstration won d generally asc upon re-
publican maxims, it was ne thought impos-
slble that they should ever depart from them
II IS also pcrt of our creed that if man,
Is Ipstfy pronounced to be no aehubican, it
must be because he vioiates republican hgt71-
cffles, and not because he happens 20 diGe,
IA some res71ects from the a,!1iinistratio,r.
we come now to your justification of
caucus, and let us see to What it amounts
ne constitution (you saw no where pro-
" hioits such conference, either expressly,
8 or by implication on the contrary, zve''
Cmeanmg yourself) "think The hrincihies Of
" me con8ftH'ion /iTomotcd by such a con
:" terence--J il BIZ managed 7vith that hono,.
- ana rood JQikH zyHicH zvas Herefof,,.e In