Notes on Debates, 14 November 1782
Notes on Debates
MS (LC: Madison Papers). See Notes on Debates, 4 November 1782, ed. n. Immediately preceding the entry for 14 November, JM wrote, “Wednesday 13 Novr. no Congress.”
The proceedings were confined to the report of the Committee on the case of Vermont entered on the Journal.1 As it was notorious that Vermont had uniformly disregarded the Recommendation of Congress of 1779,2 the report which ascribed the evils prevalent in that district to a late act of N. Y. which violated that recommendation was generally admitted to be unjust & unfair.3 Mr. Howel4 was the only member who openly supported it. The Delegates from N. Y.5 denied the fact that any violation had been committed on the part of that State. The temper of Congress on this occasion as the yeas & nays shew was less favorable to Vermont than on any preceding one.6 the effect probably of the territorial Cession of N. York to the U. S.7 In the course of the debate Mr. Howel cited the case of Kentucky as somewhat parallel to that of Vermont, said that the late erection of a separate Court by Virga.8 for the former resembled the issuing of Commissions by N. Y. to the latter, that the jurisdiction would probably be equally resisted & the same violences would follow as in Vermont. He was called to order by Mr. Madison. The President & the plurality of Congress supported & enforced the call.9
1. See , XXIII, 723–26. Having been informed that in the New Hampshire Grants (Vermont) there was renewed disorder, allegedly caused by Ethan Allen and his “armed force,” Congress on 17 October 1782 named John Rutledge, Samuel Osgood, and David Howell as a committee to consider Theodorick Bland’s resolution of that date admonishing “the Inhabitants of the District called the State of Vermont to desist” from disturbing “the peace and tranquillity of the Union” (, XXIII, 663–64, 664, n. 1). Congress later referred to the same committee a petition of an agent of “the Distressed Sufferers” from the measures taken by the “government” of Vermont against settlers who had adhered to their allegiance to New York and also a petition from two of them who claimed to have lost all their property and been banished by that “government” for the same offense (NA: PCC, No. 40, II, 345–46, 349; No. 185, III, 46, 47; , VI, 502, 509–10, 521–22, 526–27, 531, 540–41).
2. On 24 September 1779 Congress warned the inhabitants of the area known as Vermont who refused to yield allegiance to any of the three claimant states (Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and New York) to abstain from attempting to govern settlers who considered themselves to be citizens of one or another of those states. At the same time Congress requested the three states to cease granting land in the disputed region and to authorize Congress “to hear and determine all differences between them relative to their respective boundaries” (, XV, 1096–99). For the disregard of this and later warnings by the “government” of Vermont, see , IV, 200–202; 202, nn. 1, 6; 418; 420, n. 17; 421, n. 20; JM to Randolph, 5–6 August, and n. 15; 29 October; Harrison to Virginia Delegates, 16 August 1782, and n. 2.
3. See n. 1, above. The preamble of the report, submitted to Congress by the Rutledge committee on 14 November 1782, states that the “measures” occasioning the complaints of the petitioners against the “government” and certain inhabitants of Vermont probably had been taken to counter the issuance by New York of civil and military commissions to persons resident in the disputed area. The committee recommended that New York be asked to revoke these commissions; that the “government” of Vermont give “full and ample satisfaction” to the petitioners and other settlers with like grievances; and that both New York and the “government” of Vermont maintain the status quo there until Congress, in accord with the resolutions of 24 September 1779 (n. 2, above) should decide between the two jurisdictions (, XXIII, 723–24).
4. David Howell. Both he and Samuel Osgood of the Rutledge committee were “open advocates for the Vermont independence” (, VI, 541).
5. James Duane and Ezra L’Hommedieu.
6. A motion to adopt the resolution requesting New York to revoke the commissions, mentioned in n. 3, was rejected by every state effectively represented in Congress except Rhode Island and New Hampshire. The vote of the latter state was lost because her two delegates deadlocked. Madison alone represented Virginia, and he voted “no.” He also voted with the majority, which defeated a motion “for commitment” of the recommendation calling upon the “government” of Vermont to give satisfaction to the aggrieved settlers. Thereupon Congress adjourned after mustering a vote of six states to one (Rhode Island) to postpone consideration of the remainder of the committee’s report. In these three tallied votes, only Rhode Island clearly exhibited sympathy for the “government” of Vermont in its resistance to New York (, XXIII, 724–26). See also , VI, 489–90, 494, 501.
7. JM interlineated “territorial” and “to the U. S.” See JM to Randolph, 5 November 1782, and nn. 12, 13, 14.
8. JM interlineated “separate.” See Comments on Petition of Kentuckians, 27 August, and n. 1; Harrison to Virginia Delegates, 20 September 1782.
9. In the preceding sentence JM probably inserted his own surname after he wrote the original draft of his notes. Although the interchange with Howell goes unnoticed in the printed journal, JM acted under the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth rules of procedure, adopted on 4 May 1781, in calling him to order for conduct inconsistent “with the utmost decency and decorum.” Judging from JM’s notes, President Elias Boudinot thereupon invoked the twenty-sixth rule and sustained JM’s “call.” Exercising a privilege extended by the same rule, Howell then appealed the ruling of the Chair to the judgment of Congress, but a “plurality” of the members upheld Boudinot’s decision (, XX, 481). For a continuation of the discussion about Vermont, see Notes on Debates, 3 December 1782.