could indulge, while whiskey was regarded as a
necessity, of universal consumption. Resistance went so far as to
organize an insurrection in Western Pennsylvania against the official
authority which attempted to collect the tax. The outbreak was
promptly suppressed by the power of the General Government but the
result of the agitation was a deep-seated prejudice against the
Federal party. Pennsylvania sympathized with the more liberal
views of Jefferson, and in the Presidential election of 1796 gave
him fourteen of her fifteen electoral votes. John Adams received
the other vote, and as he was chosen by a majority of one, his
Pennsylvania support, small as it was, proved timely and valuable.

Resistance to internal duties was tried by legal methods. A heavy
duty had been laid on carriages--two dollars per year for those of
simplest form and fifteen dollars for the most costly. The tax
applied to all carriages for the conveyance of persons, whether
kept for private use or for public hire. One Daniel Lawrence Hylton
of Virginia resisted the payment of the tax and the case was
ultimately heard before the Supreme Court in the February term of
1796. Mr. Hamilton who had resigned from the Treasury Department
the preceding year, argued the case for the Government in conjunction
with the Attorney-General, Charles Lee. Mr. Campbell, Attorney
for the Virginia District and Mr. Ingersoll, the Attorney-General
of Pennsylvania, appeared for the plaintiff. The case turned wholly
upon the point whether the tax, on carriages kept for private use,
was a direct tax. If not a direct tax, it was admitted to be
properly levied according to that clause in the Constitution which
declares that "all duties, imposts, and excises shall be uniform
throughout the United States." If a direct tax it was wrongfully
levied because the Constitution declares that "no capitation or
other direct tax shall be laid unless in proportion to the census
or enumeration of the inhabitants of the United States."

The well-known decision of the court, delivered by Judge Samuel
Chase, pronounced the tax to be constitutional. Justice James
Wilson who concurred in the decision had taken a very prominent
part as a delegate from Pennsylvania in the convention which framed
the Constitution, and ranked at that time as one of the ablest
lawyers in the Union. The opinion of the judges seemed to be,
though no formal decision was rendered to that effect, that a t