What could be done to save the rights and the property of "the wise, the rich and the good"? By what pathway could the chosen escape their doom? "The principles of our Revolution point to the remedy," declared the soured and flint-hearted Pickering. "The independence of the judges is now directly assailed.... I am not willing to be sacrificed by such popular tyrants.... I do not believe in the practicability of a long-continued union."[422]
For the same reasons, Roger Griswold of Connecticut avowed that "there can be no safety to the Northern States _without a separation from the confederacy_."[423] The Reverend Jedediah Morse of New Hampshire wrote Senator Plumer that "our empire ... must ... break in pieces. Some think the sooner the better."[424] And the New Hampshire Senator replied: "I hope the time is not far distant when ... the sound part will separate from the corrupt."[425]
With the exception of John Adams, only one eminent New England Federalist kept his head steady and his patriotism undefiled: George Cabot, while sympathizing with his ancient party friends, frankly opposed their mad project. Holding that secession was impracticable, he declared: "I am not satisfied that the thing itself is to be desired. My habitual opinions have been always strongly against it."[426]
But the expressions of such men as Pickering, Ames, and Griswold indicated the current of New England Federalist thought and comment. Their secession sentiment, however, did not appeal to the young men, who hailed with joy the opportunity to occupy these new, strange lands which accident, or Providence, or Jefferson had opened to them. Knowledge of this was indeed one cause of the anger of some Federalist managers who owned immense tracts in New England and in the Ohio Valley and wanted them purchased and settled by those now turning their eyes to the alluring farther western country.[427] They saw with something like fury the shifting of political power to the South and West.
The management of the unwelcome Louisiana windfall, the conduct of the National campaign, the alarming reports from New England, left Jefferson no time to rail at Marshall or to attack that "subtle corps of sappers and miners" who were then beginning "to undermine ... our confederated fabric," as Jefferson declared seventeen years later.[428] For the present the great public duty of exposing Marshall's decision in Marbury _vs._ Madison must be deferred.