When he had finished dealing with this proposition, its day for being a
subject of animated debate was over. He then laid before the public
certain facts in the career of Jefferson with which they were
unacquainted: that he had first discountenanced the adoption of the
Constitution, and then advised the ratification of nine of the States
and the refusal of four until amendments were secured,--a proceeding
which infallibly would have led to civil war; that he had advocated the
transfer of the debt due to France to a company of Hollanders in these
words: "If there is a _danger_ of the public debt _not being punctual_,
I submit whether it may not be better, that _the discontents which would
then arise_ should be _transferred_ from a _court_ of whose _good-will
we have so much need_ to the _breasts_ of a _private company_"--an
obviously dishonourable suggestion, particularly as the company in view
was a set of speculators. It was natural enough, however, in a man whose
kink for repudiation in general led him to promulgate the theory that
one generation cannot bind another for the payment of a debt.
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