adily
lessened by Washington's frank criticism of the New England soldiers and
officers already noticed. Equally bitter to the New England delegates and
their allies were certain army measures that Washington pressed upon the
attention of Congress. He urged and urged that the troops should be
enlisted for the war, that promotions should be made from the army as a
whole, and not from the colony- or State-line alone, and most unpopular of
all, that since Continental soldiers could not otherwise be obtained, a
bounty should be given to secure them, and that as compensation for their
inadequate pay half-pay should be given them after the war. He eventually
carried these points, but at the price of an entire alienation of the
democratic party in the Congress, who wished to have the war fought with
militia, to have all the officers elected annually, and to whom the very
suggestion of pensions was like a red rag to a bull.

A part of their motive in this was unquestionably to prevent the danger of
a standing army, and of allowing the commander-in-chief to become popular
with the soldiers. Very early in the war Washington noted "the _jealousy_
which Congress unhappily entertain of the army, and which, if reports are
right, some members labor to establish." And he complained that "I see a
distrust and jealousy of military power, that the commander-in-chief has
not an opportunity, even by recommendation, to give the least assurance of
reward for the most essential services." The French minister told his
government that when a committee was appointed to institute certain army
reforms, delegates in Congress "insisted on the danger of associating the
Commander-in-chief with it, whose influence, it was stated, was already
too great," and when France sent money to aid the American cause, with the
provision that it should be subject to the order of the General, it
aroused, a writer states, "the jealousy of Congress, the members of which
were not satisfied that the head of the army should possess such an agency
in addition to his military power."

His enemies in the Congress took various means to lessen his influence and
mortify him. Burke states that in the discussion of one question "Jersey,
Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and South Carolina voted for expunging it;
the four Eastern States, Virginia and Georgia for retaining it. There
appeared through this whole debate a great desire, in some of the
delegates from the Eastern States, and