Inconsistencies of the Frontiersmen.

There was justification for the original excitement; there was none whatever for its continuance after Jay’s final report to Congress, in April, 1787, [Footnote:  W. H. Trescott, “Diplomatic History of the Administrations of Washington and Adams,” p. 46.] and after the publication by Congress of its resolve never to abandon its claim to the Mississippi.  Jay in this report took what was unquestionably the rational position.  He urged that the United States was undoubtedly in the right; and that it should either insist upon a treaty with Spain, by which all conflicting claims would be reconciled, or else simply claim the right, and if Spain refused to grant it promptly declare war.

So far he was emphatically right.  His cool and steadfast insistence on our rights, and his clearsighted recognition of the proper way to obtain them, contrasted well with the mixed turbulence and foolishness of the Westerners who denounced him.  They refused to give up the Mississippi; and yet they also refused to support the party to which Jay belonged, and therefore refused to establish a government strong enough to obtain their rights by open force.

But Jay erred when he added, as he did, that there was no middle course possible; that we must either treat or make war.  It was undoubtedly to our discredit, and to our temporary harm, that we refused to follow either course; it showed the existence of very undesirable national qualities, for it showed that we were loud in claiming rights which we lacked the resolution and foresight to enforce.  Nevertheless, as these undesirable qualities existed, it was the part of a wise statesman to recognize their existence and do the best he could in spite of them.  The best course to follow under such circumstances was to do nothing until the national fibre hardened, and this was the course which Washington advocated.

    Wilkinson Rises to Prominence.

In this summer of 1787 there rose to public prominence in the western country a man whose influence upon it was destined to be malign in intention rather than in actual fact.  James Wilkinson, by birth a Marylander, came to Kentucky in 1784.  He had done his duty respectably as a soldier in the Revolutionary War, for he possessed sufficient courage and capacity to render average service in subordinate positions, though at a later date he showed abject inefficiency as commander of an army.  He was a good-looking, plausible, energetic man, gifted with a taste for adventure, with much proficiency in low intrigue, and with a certain address in influencing and managing bodies of men.  He also spoke and wrote well, according to the rather florid canons of the day.  In character he can only be compared to Benedict Arnold, though he entirely lacked Arnold’s ability and brilliant courage.  He had no conscience and no scruples; he had not the slightest idea of the meaning of the word honor; he betrayed his trust from the basest motives, and he was too inefficient to make his betrayal effective.  He was treacherous to the Union while it was being formed and after it had been formed; and his crime was aggravated by the sordid meanness of his motives, for he eagerly sought opportunities to barter his own infamy for money.  In all our history there is no more despicable character.