Adams with a view to have this desperate measure prevented
by his negative. He grew warm in an instant, and said with a vehemence
he had not used towards me before, 'Sir, the event of the election is
within your own power. You have only to say you will do justice to
the public creditors, maintain the navy, and not disturb those holding
offices, and the government will instantly be put into your hands. We
know it is the wish of the people it should be so.''Mr. Adams,' said I,
'I know not what part of my conduct, in either public or private life,
can have authorized a doubt of my fidelity to the public engagements.
I say, however, I will not come into the government by capitulation. I
will not enter on it, but in perfect freedom to follow the dictates
of my own judgment.' I had before given the same answer to the same
intimation from Gouverneur Morris. 'Then,' said he, 'things must take
their course.' I turned the conversation to something else, and soon
took my leave. It was the first time in our lives we had ever parted
with any thing like dissatisfaction. And then followed those scenes of
midnight appointment, which have been condemned by all men. The last day
of his political power, the last hours, and even beyond the midnight,
were employed in filling all offices and especially permanent ones, with
the bitterest federalists, and providing for me the alternative, either
to execute the government by my enemies, whose study it would be
to thwart and defeat all my measures, or to incur the odium of such
numerous removals from office, as might bear me down.
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