the matter. If it was not forbidden, but if Congress may
exercise powers not expressly bestowed upon it, and if by a bank some of
the things which the federal government had to do could be best done, it
would be not only right but wise to establish such an agency. This was
the burden of the argument of the Federalists, and Madison and his
friends had no sufficient answer. The bill was at length passed by a
vote of thirty-nine to twenty.

But it had still to pass the ordeal of the cabinet. The President was
not disposed to rely upon his own judgment either one way or the other.
He asked, therefore, for the written opinions of the secretaries of the
treasury and of state, Hamilton and Jefferson, and the attorney-general,
Randolph. The same request was made to Madison, probably more because
Washington held his ability and knowledge of constitutional law in high
esteem than because of the prominent part he had taken in the debate.
Hamilton's argument in favor of the bill was an answer to the papers of
the three other gentlemen, and was accepted as conclusive by the
President.

FOOTNOTE:

[Footnote 13: The most serious difficulty in the way of the final
suppression of the African slave trade in the present century was, that
it could be carried on without molestation in American bottoms, under
the American flag. The ruling power in the United States, from 1787 to
1860, was never willing that their own cruisers should meddle with the
slavers, and resented as an insult to the flag the search, by the
cruisers of other powers, of any vessel under the American flag, though
it might be absolutely certain that she had come straight from the coast
of Africa, and that her "between-decks" was crowded full of negroes to
be sold as slaves in Cuba.]

CHAPTER XII

FEDERALISTS AND REPUBLICANS

Madison was a Federalist until, unfortunately, he drifted into the
opposition. He was swept away partly, perhaps, by the influence of
personal friends, particularly of Jefferson, and partly by the influence
of locality,--that "go-with-the-State" doctrine, which is a harmless
kind of patriotism when kept within proper limits, but dangerous in a
mixed government like ours when unrestrained. Had he been born in a free
State it seems more than probable that he would never have been
President; but it is quite possible that his place in the history of his
country would have been higher. The better part of his life was before
he became a part