Chapter Forty-Nine #2
Meanwhile, John pulled his hat from his head, dazed. “He died with Burr’s pistol bullet buried in his spinal marrow. They
say he died a penitent. Well, I have forgiven my arch enemy, but I do not forget his villainy.”
“Nor do I.”
“Still,” John said, terribly disturbed, “we ought to write a note of condolence to his wife. Whatever her husband’s faults,
Mrs. Hamilton was ever a saintly figure.”
It was true that I remembered Eliza Hamilton fondly. We’d passed many hours together at Martha Washington’s levees in the
earliest days of the republic. And truly, I did feel for her to lose her husband—especially knowing she had young children
to raise now, on her own.
So how was I to explain to John that I’d already sent a note of condolence to another political foe, only to have it explode
into a war of words that still continued?
In his latest letter to me, Jefferson said he didn’t free Callender as a reward for spreading lies about my husband. But rather, he considered the Alien and Sedition Acts to be a tyrannical abuse of power, completely unconstitutional, and therefore he issued a general pardon to all.
Burn his letter, I thought. It wasn’t my place to argue. Just burn his letter and all the others and be done with this man. But how does
any American banish the president of the United States from one’s life?
It couldn’t be done. Or, at least, I couldn’t do it.
As it happened, Alexander Hamilton wasn’t the only one unable to retreat from a fight.
Taking up my pen again I said that if Jefferson wanted to talk about tyranny, I was happy to oblige. The sedition prosecutions were the work of the legislature, and the justice system, with prosecutors
and judges and juries. Yet, Jefferson, on his own say-so alone, had issued pardons to the convicts.
Who was the tyrant, then?
If a chief magistrate can by his will alone annul a law with pardons, where is the difference between a republican and a despotic
government?
Jefferson replied with another lengthy justification of his actions, which only inflamed my contempt. So I took up my pen
one final time to express my fear that he was going to wreck the country.
Absolutely seething, I added,
I will not further intrude upon your time, but close this correspondence with my sincere wishes that you may be directed to
that path which may terminate in the prosperity and happiness of the people over whom you are placed.
By the time my temper cooled, I wondered if I’d conducted this correspondence in some fit of absolute insanity.
I wanted to destroy it all but couldn’t make up my mind to do it.
So when John Quincy came for an autumnal visit without his English wife—whose constitution was ill suited to farm life—I confided all.
Eyes wide behind his new spectacles, John Quincy said, “You’d better tell Father.”
I groaned with mortification. “That wasn’t what I’d hoped you’d say.”
“Jefferson is careless with his letters,” my son reminded me. “They’ve been intercepted and printed to embarrass him at least
twice before. This debate between the two of you would prove irresistible to the press. Is that how you want Father to learn
of it?”
I felt the blood drain from my face at that possibility while my son pressed his argument. “The exposure of these letters will not help me in my political career, I
can tell you that. And in any case, people will assume that my father wrote these letters; they’ll never believe you capable
of carrying on a debate with President Jefferson.”
“I’ve been debating politics for more than forty years,” I snapped. I’d matched wits with men, in and out of my husband’s
administration, but John Quincy was probably right that the public wouldn’t believe it; women in our country hadn’t come that
far.
In fact, the widowed Mr. Jefferson didn’t even have a lady to preside over Washington City to give further example of our
capabilities in political circles. He’d had to borrow his eldest daughter to be his hostess. Or, on occasion, Mrs. Madison.
And neither of those ladies opined on politics as readily as I did—though I’d heard that Dolley Madison was shrewder in political
matters than people realized.
I considered Johnny’s advice, and as the weather turned cold, I took pleasure in having our oldest at home again, even if
only for a visit. My husband also took joy in it, relishing their debates by the fire. John loved to talk about the farm with
Tommy, but our eldest son alone fed him with the political banter upon which he still thrived.
Proudly, John told me, “In Congress, John Quincy is making a strenuous effort to prevent the spread of slavery into the new
states and territories. Certain threats have been made against him, but he pays them no mind.”
I tried not to show how that frightened me. “Well, at least here at Peacefield, he can think clearly without the cries of violent slavers outside his office windows. We must invite him to stay longer.”
Unfortunately, John Quincy declined our invitation. “My wife and boys await me at home.” He knew I couldn’t protest against
that, but he promised, “I’ll be back soon enough.”
“I’ll write you in the meantime,” John said. “Or, at least, have your mother or Tommy write for me. My hands always ache these
days.”
While studiously avoiding my gaze, John Quincy said, “Father, please be careful what you write. Both political parties hate me virulently for my independence. And these are still dangerous times.”
This warning was more for me, I knew, and it made me all the more conscious of my guilt of exchanging compromising political
letters with President Jefferson.
But John was in the dark about that and puffed that barrel chest of his. “My boy, twenty political times as dangerous as these
have I weathered, and I’m alive and hearty yet. I’ll write as I please. If the peepers violate public faith and get stung
by a wasp in the folds of the paper, let them have the smart for their reward.”
Our son liked that answer, I could tell. “Nevertheless, we’re not entirely past the time of guillotines.”
My husband chuckled with bravado. “Should that come to pass, I should think it an honor to go with you to the scaffold.”
I wasn’t amused. I wanted no more talk of death and danger, so I pressed some of my knitting into our boy’s hands. “Socks
for my grandsons to keep their feet warm this winter.”
John Quincy took them in grateful farewell, then kissed my cheek to whisper, “You must tell Father.”
Later that night, I found my husband rummaging through old trunks for diaries and notebooks. These days he was always looking
for scraps of paper to verify what he was writing in his history.
Alas, I had more urgent reading for him now.
Wordlessly I handed him Jefferson’s letters, and copies of mine to him. Oh, how I cringed to think of what John might make
of it.
Curiously, my husband found his spectacles, lifted one of the letters to the light, and narrowed his eyes. “Abigail . . .”
“Keep reading.”
An hour later, when the candle was halfway gone, he looked up again, and this time his voice was harsher, and accusatory.
“Abigail.”
“I know,” I said, rubbing at my face. “I know.”
John stared at me as if I’d grown two heads. “I am sensible that your love compels you to defend me, but the recklessness of it in this political hour.”
“Didn’t you just tell Johnny that you’ve weathered twenty political storms just as dangerous? Well, I’ve weathered them, too.
I, too, struggled to make a place where I could write as I please.”
With a jaw clenched so tight I feared it might fracture, John collected all the letters into a pile. Then he got up—though
it was the wee hours of the morning now—and scribbled upon a note for his files. “The whole of this correspondence was begun
and conducted without my knowledge or suspicion. Last evening and this morning at the desire of Mrs. Adams, I read the whole.
I have no remarks to make upon it at this time and in this place.”