if elected by Federal votes, would pursue a
Federal policy. It was feared that Jefferson would wipe out the national
debt, abolish the navy, and remove every Federal officeholder in the land.
He was approached from many quarters, and even President Adams desired him
to give some intimation of his intended policy on these points, but
Jefferson firmly refused.

As to one such interview, with Gouverneur Morris, Jefferson wrote
afterward: "I told him that I should leave the world to judge of the
course I meant to pursue, by that which I had pursued hitherto, believing
it to be my duty to be passive and silent during the present scene; that I
should certainly make no terms; should never go into the office of
President by capitulation, nor with my hands tied by any conditions which
would hinder me from pursuing the measures which I should deem for the
public good."

The Federalists had a characteristic plan: they proposed to pass a law
devolving the Presidency upon the chairman of the Senate, in case the
office of President should become vacant; and this vacancy they would be
able to bring about by prolonging the election until Mr. Adams's term of
office had expired. The chairman of the Senate, a Federalist, of course,
would then become President. This scheme Jefferson and his friends were
prepared to resist by force. "Because," as he afterward explained, "that
precedent once set, it would be artificially reproduced, and would soon
end in a dictator."

Hamilton, to his credit, be it said, strongly advocated the election of
Jefferson; and finally, through the action of Mr. Bayard, of Delaware, a
leading Federalist, who had sounded an intimate friend of Mr. Jefferson as
to his views upon the points already mentioned, Mr. Jefferson was elected
President, and the threatening civil war was averted.

Mr. Adams, who was deeply chagrined by his defeat, did not attend the
inauguration of his successor, but left Washington in his carriage, at
sunrise, on the fourth of March; and Jefferson rode on horseback to the
Capitol, unattended, and dismounting, fastened his horse to the fence with
his own hands. The inaugural address, brief, and beautifully worded,
surprised most of those who heard it by the moderation and liberality of
its tone. "Let us," said the new President, "restore to social intercourse
that harmony and affection without which liberty, and even life itself,
are but dreary things."

Jefferson served two terms, and he