fettered
individuality, His administration was frugal almost to a fault. He
insisted upon making the civil power supreme over the military, and
scorned all pretensions on the part of any particular class to rule, In
two points only was his democracy ideal rather than illustrative of that
which followed, viz., adroitness in giving trend and consistency to
legislation, and non-partisan administration of the civil service. In
the former no executive has equalled him, in the latter none since
Quincy Adams.

Growing up as a scholar and a gentleman-farmer, with refined tastes,
penning the great Declaration, which was early scouted for its
abstractions, long minister to France, where abstract ideas made all
high politics morbid, the sage of Monticello turned out to be one of the
most practical presidents this nation has ever had. If he overdid
simplicity in going to the Capitol on horseback to deliver his first
inaugural, tying his magnificent horse, Wildair, to a tree with his own
hands, he yet entertained elegantly, and his whole state as President,
far from humiliating the nation, as some feared it would, was in happy
keeping with its then development and nature. His cabinet, Madison,
Gallatin, Dearborn, Smith, and Granger, was in liberal education
superior to any other the nation has ever had, every member a college
graduate, and the first two men of distinguished research and
attainments.

As to the civil service, Jefferson, it is true, made many removals from
office, some doubtless unwise and even unjust; but in judging of these
we must remember his profound and unquestionably honest conviction that
the Federalists lacked patriotism. It was this belief which dictated his
prosecution, almost persecution, of Burr, whom Federalists openly
befriended and defended.

[Illustration: Portrait.]
Aaron Burr.
From a painting by Vallderlyn at the New York Historical Society.

Aaron Burr was the brilliant grandson of President Edwards. Graduating
at Princeton at the early age of seventeen, he studied theology a year,
then law, which on the outbreak of the Revolution he deserted for army
life at Boston. He went in Arnold's expedition to Canada, was promoted
to be colonel, and served on Washington's staff. In Canada he did
service as a spy, disguised as a priest and speaking French or Latin as
needed. His legal studies completed, 1783 found him in practice in New
York, office at No. 10 Little Queen Street. Both as lawyer and