ugh which the
monetary affairs of the country could be controlled, were aiming to lay
hold of the government. If all this were true, imminent peril was
impending over republican institutions. The inconsistency of which
Hamilton accused Madison was therefore not necessarily a crime. It
might even be a virtue, and Madison be applauded for his courage in
avowing a change of opinion, if he saw in the practical application of
Hamilton's principles dangers that had not occurred to him when looking
at them only as abstract theories. But the Federalists believed that
Madison, governed by these purely selfish motives, sacrificed his
convictions of what was best for the country that he might secure for
himself a position on what he foresaw was the winning side. It is quite
likely that the more pronounced enmity he showed towards Hamilton during
the second session of Congress was due in some measure to his knowledge
of this feeling towards himself among Federalists. He seemed, at any
rate, to be animated by something more than the proverbial zeal of the
new convert. If it was not always shown in debate, it lurked in his
letters. Anything that came from the secretary, or anything that favored
the secretary's measures, was sure to be opposed by him. He was not, of
course, always in the wrong, and sometimes he was very right. There was
a manifest disposition on the part of the Federalists in the House to
defer to the secretary in a way to provoke opposition from those who did
not share in their estimate of his great ability. There was some
resentment, for example, when it was proposed that Congress should
submit to the secretary the question of ways and means to carry on the
Indian war at the West, after St. Clair's disastrous defeat, and when, a
few days later, it was suggested that he should be called upon to
report a plan for the reduction of the public debt. Members, chief among
them Madison, thought that they were quite capable of discharging the
duties belonging to their branch of the government without instructions
from a head of department whom many of them looked upon as only an
official subordinate of Congress. For the same reason they refused with
prompt decision to permit the secretary to appear upon the floor of the
House to explain some proposed measure. In the Carrington letter
Hamilton said that he had "openly declared" a "determination to treat
him [Madison] as a political enemy." He probably took care that Madison
sh