cipal offices; and without ambition, had freely devoted himself, in his more mature age, to the business of the Commonwealth, and the service of his country. He was a man of singularly quiet temper and quiet habits; home was his earthly paradise; and caring little for the trappings of office, or the gaze of the multitude, his family and the associates of his professional and private life, were world enough to fill up the measure of his happiness. He was simple in his manners, moderate in his desires, and wisely frugal and orderly in all his arrangements; and we can hardly better describe the natural modesty and wise forecast of this excellent man, than by the following beautiful lines, a copy of which, made in his own handwriting, and evidently for his own private use, was found among his papers after his decease: "Envy's censure, flattery's praise, With unmoved indifference view; Void of strong desire or fear, Life's wide ocean trust no more; Strive thy little bark to steer, With the tide, but near the shore. Thus prepared, thy shortened sail Waft thee to the port of peace." In Prudence and discretion were the governing virtues of his character. his conflicts at the bar, on the political theatre, in public and private, he offended no man, maintaining his opinions and independence, but with such a mild and gentle demeanor, that he had none but friends to contend with... But he was not suffered to choose his course of life. In the year 1800, the people of this Commonwealth called him to the chair of government. There are those, still living, who know with what unfeigned reluctance he yielded to this call. But he thought duty required the sacrifice, and he submitted. One of the most beautiful moral pictures ever displayed to the eye, was exhibited at that election. In seven or eight towns, of which Northampton is the centre, not a single dissenting vote was given. Nothing need be said of his private character after this. In the very scene of his professional labors, in which, if any where, causes of jealousy and discontent must have existed, not a man could be found whispering any thing to his dishonor. He was elected to this high office for seven successive years. It was a time of political agitation and party strife. The great storm which raged in Europe, had reached our shores and disturbed our tranquillity. The country, at that period, was divided into two great political parties, one of them denominated the federal, the other the democratic or republican party-terms of designation, it is true, imperfectly marking the distinction between them, as they were both sincerely and equally attached to our republican form of government, and differed only in their opinions of the probable influence of the great European conflict upon the and prosperity of their own country, which they equally loved. One party, the democratic or republican, saw in the principles and measures of the French government, the overthrow of tyrannical power, peace and the establishment of civil and political liberty throughout the world; and they rejoiced in French victories, and gloried in French success. The other saw, in those principles and measures, approaching ruin to all our institutions for the preservation of liberty, the horrors of despotism and furious passion, the abolition of all religion, and the tyranny of the mob; and they hailed, therefore, with joy, the success of England, regarding her as the stay and the staff of free government, of civil liberty, and of religion, and indeed as the only power, which could throw an effectual barrier between French usurpation and our free republican institutions. The passions which these different views excited, were inflamed by the enormous evils inflicted by both those foreign governments upon our commerce, and the consequent injury to all our most valuable interests. French spoliations were palliated and apologized for, by the one party, for the sake of the cause of mankind, which was to be ameliorated by the final triumph of France. British outrages were softened, or shut out of sight, by the other, because Great Britain was waging a war against infidels and anarchists, whose final success would extinguish the flame of liberty, wherever it blazed. The federal party were daily becoming more obnoxious, from their conscientious and openly avowed conviction of the probable disastrous effects of French influence upon the happiness of this country, and their frequent and often bitter crimination of the acts and opinions of the Executive of the United States, who was supposed to favor France; and in 1807, their opponents had gained such an ascendancy in the Commonwealth, as to defeat the reëlection of Gov. Strong, who cheerfully submitted to the will of the people, and retired to his beloved home, determined never to be drawn from it again. But the tide again turned. In 1810 and 1811, the party, which had so recently come into power, excited, by their indiscretion and violence, the displeasure of the people; while the measures of the General Government, indicating, more and more distinctly, an approaching disturbance in our foreign relations, awakened a virulence of party spirit, which blighted the happiness and darkened the best hopes of our country. At this critical moment, Gov. Strong was again called from his repose, in the hope, that by the wisdom and conciliatory firmness of his administration, the Commonwealth might be preserved from the disorder, and turbulence, and manifold evils, private and public, with which she was threatened. It is known to his confidential friends, that no occurrence of his life caused him more unhappiness, than this unexpected summons. He refused; was re-urged; and finally made to believe, what was certainly true, that he alone could appease the angry passions of the people, and restore comparative peace to the community. He was elected; but he brought no passion or resentment to the chair. He strictly confined himself to the restoration of those who had been driven from office for their opinions, and resisted all importunity to go further. Soon after this second election, the crisis arrived, which had been anticipated with so much anxiety. The government of the United States had selected its enemy, and that enemy was Great Britain. At this period, the power of France seemed to be firmly established over all continental Europe, except Russia; and the Emperor Napoleon was on his march to that country, with an army, which, it was believed, not even Russia could withstand. Great Britain stood alone, and it was thought if this expedition proved successful, could not stand long. There was a fearful looking for of all the evils which could befall our country. The war which had been just declared, was regarded by great numbers of our citizens, as unwise and unnecessary, if not unjust; and on their part, therefore, there was no disposition to enter into it, except so far as the exposed situation of the country might render active measures necessary for its defence. These were the opinions and feelings of a great majority of the people of Massachusetts, and of their representatives in both Houses of the Legislature, and the Governor participated in them. But while the great mass of our citizens were in a state of extreme agitation and alarm, he was calm, self-collected, and undismayed. He issued his proclamation for a day of fasting, humiliation and prayer, and subsequently, his general orders, as commander in chief, warning the people to abstain from those passions and outrages, which war usually begets, and exhorting them to continue, if possible, in a state of peace with the unarmed inhabitants of the bordering provinces. In the last measure, he was greatly aided by the then Adjutant General, afterwards Gov. Brooks; and the influence of the first, one of his most finished and effective public papers, was strikingly happy. After the adoption of these measures, the passions of the multitude were allayed, and feeling thenceforward entire confidence in the firmness, prudence, and ability of the Executive of the State, they became quiet and peaceable. War was declared on the 18th of June, 1812, and when, on the 22d of that month, the Governor was required, under the authority of the President of the United States, to order out a detachment of the militia of Massachusetts, to be placed under the command of Gen. Dearborn, a subordinate officer of the President; he hesitated, and after calling, with the advice of his Council, upon the Justices of the Supreme Judicial Court, for their official opinion of his rights and duties in that emergency, declined. And he did so, because he religiously believed, that the Constitution of the United States did not demand a compliance with that requisition, and his duty, as Governor of the Commonwealth, forbade it. In this opinion, he was sustained by all the other departments of the government, and by three-fourths of the people. His whole conduct, however, evinced his firm determination to resist, by all possible means, every aggression of the enemy. The whole military force of the State was put in array; suitable officers appointed; and the chief arrangement of the military defences of the Commonwealth intrusted to an able and experienced officer of the Revolutionary war-a man whom no one could suspect of a willingness to cringe to any enemy of his country-Gen. Brooks. Had the menaced invasion of the metropolis or its vicinity taken place, the invader would have been taught, that notwithstanding the occasional violence of party strife, "there is no rampart like the breasts of a free people." However mistaken may have been the views of Gov. Strong in regard to the militia, the people of Massachusetts should remember, that he was, in his own estimation, guarding them and their rights against the encroachments of unconstitutional power; and carrying their minds back to the period when these transactions took place, they cannot but discover some plausible ground at least for the Governor's apprehension, that to submit the militia of the State to the uncontrolled authority of a subordinate officer of the United States, (the Governor being by the Constitution of the State commander in chief,) was to compromit the rights and interest of the people intrusted to his care. Any one, indeed, who reads the Constitution with candor, will perceive, that there might well have existed, at the period referred to, an honest difference of opinion. "The President shall be commander in chief of the militia of the several States, when called into the actual service of the United States." Is it perfectly clear, that he can exercise this command by subordinate officers not of the militia? What then becomes of that clause of the Constitution, which, while it delegates to Congress the power to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of it as may be employed in the service of the United States, expressly reserves to the States respectively, at all times, the appointment of its officers? Why may not the President exercise his authority, through the intervention of an officer of the militia, or take the command in person over the Governors themselves, as Washington did in 1794, when detachments from the militia of four different States, were called into the service of the United States, for the suppression of the insurrection in Pennsylvania? But the fashion of the times will not admit of a discussion of this question, and if it did, the present is not a suitable occasion for such a discussion. Indeed, it is understood to have been settled by the Supreme Court of the United States, that the President's construction of the Constitution. was correct. But let it never be forgotten, that when Gov. Strong decided upon the course prescribed by his official duties, it had not been so settled; that he was sustained in his views by the opinions of some of the most highly gifted members of the Convention, by which the Constitution had been framed; and that his constitutional advisers, the Justices of the highest judicial tribunal of the State, one of whom in point of intellectual power and juridical attainments was confessedly among the most distinguished of his countrymen, were consulted, and their advice, comporting with his own opinions, made the guide upon this subject of his official conduct. It should be recollected also, that our militia would not have served under any but their own officers, from an apprehension that they were to be transported to Canada for conquest, while their wives, and children, and firesides were left utterly defenceless. The unexpected and almost miraculous termination of a war, which had begun so disastrously, has given an unpopularity to opinions, which, in a different event, would have been better received; and we have only to hope, that the time may never arrive, when it will be regretted that power is intrusted to the President, by judicial construction of the Constitution, not only to place his own officers over all the militia of the United States, but to determine also when the exigency exists, in which, by the Constitution, that power is conferred. Should an individual, possessing popular and splendid talents with unprincipled ambition, be found hereafter at the head of the government, this power may be his conductor to absolute and indefinite rule. After four years' administration of the Executive power of the State, the first two of which were convulsive and agitating, the last two quiet and harmonious, Gov. Strong declined the suffrages of the people, and again, and for the last time, sought the repose, which his age required, and his previous public services entitled him to claim. Whatever opinion may be formed of the principal measures of his administration during the anxious and turbulent season of the war, none will charge him with personal or ambitious views; none will deny, that he acted with a conscientious regard to supposed duty, and with an earnest desire to promote the best good of his country. We do not hesitate to express our sincere belief, that in all his conduct, public as well as private, he looked to a higher motive than the praise of man; that he felt himself under the restraints of religious obligation; and that humble and unaf fected piety towards God, governed his public actions as well as his private life. A wise and virtuous community will regard this feature of his character as one of preeminent excellence. In his intercourse with his family and the circle of his immediate acquaintance, Gov. Strong was remarkable, as well for the affability as the dignity of his deportment. His conversation, often full of playfulness and anecdote, was nevertheless so tempered with wisdom as to secure for him the most cordial affection and respect; and perhaps no individual of our country, who has occupied, as a public man, so high a place in the estimation of his fellow-citizens, has won more entirely the love and confidence of all classes of men, in the more retired scenes of private life. The poorest and humblest found in him the sympathy and kind counsels which the peculiarity of their circumstances required, while the wisest and most distinguished of his associates in public life, bore testimony to the simple. and serene dignity of his manners, his intelligence, and unwavering integrity. His acquaintance with Major Hawley, one of the leading spirits of the Revolution, was of the most familiar nature; and the name of his venerated instructor, and early and tried friend, was never mentioned by him, but with sentiments of the deepest gratitude and affection. The following incident, while it displays the weakness to which the loftiest minds are sometimes reduced by physical infirmity, may illustrate Gov. Strong's admirable knowledge of character, and the facility with which he could minister to the necessities of a mind diseased:-Major Hawley, it is known, was severely afflicted, at different periods of his life, by that morbid affection of the faculties, bodily and mental, denominated hypochondria; and soon after the commencement of the Revolutionary war, under the influence of such a state of mind, he informed his young friend, that it was high time for the colonies to submit to the mother country, assuring him, that all the leading men of that period, if the contest was persisted in, would unquestionably be hung as rebels. Mr. Strong, knowing the origin of this apprehension, very adroitly removed it, by intimating, that whatever might be the hazards of such men as Hancock and Samuel Adams, and other kindred spirits, who had acted a very prominent part during the war, he could not believe that the Major himself had any reasonable ground of fear! The remark immediately produced its desired effect, and the propriety of unconditional submission was never again adverted to; the venerable man seeming determined, that if he had not already exposed himself to the gallows, by his unflinching patriotism, he would be careful to secure himself against any such exemption from hazard for the future.* Mr. Strong's talents for the bar, if to be estimated at all by the extent of his professional practice, were of the highest order. His legal attainments gave him great weight with the Court, and in his addresses to the jury, he secured their confidence, by the urbanity of his manners, and his known uprightness. This confidence, which was never abused, with his sound common sense, and an easy and familiar elocution, added much to the success of his efforts, upon questions of fact. His classical attainments were highly respectable. He was once reading, before the Supreme Court, a Latin passage from some book of the common Joseph Hawley was a native of Northampton, and graduated at Yale College in 1742. He died March 10, 1788, aged 64 years. He had a very high character for knowledge of law and of political history, for stern integrity, patriotism, and bold and manly eloquence. A letter which he wrote in 1760, and which does him great honor, is preserved in the life of President Edwards. |