ountry
who recognized that the triumph of the colonial ideal was responsible
for undeniable disasters. Such men were found, especially, among the
army officers and among those who had tried to aid the cause in
diplomatic or civil office during the Revolution. Experience made them
realize that the practical abolition of all {132} executive authority
and the absence of any real central government had been responsible for
chronic inefficiency. The financial collapse, the lack of any power on
the part of Congress to enforce its laws or resolutions, the visible
danger that State legislatures might consult their own convenience in
supporting the common enterprises or obligations--all these
shortcomings led men like Washington, Hamilton, Madison, Webster, a
pamphleteer of New England, to urge even before 1781 that a genuine
government should be set up to replace the mere league. Their
supporters were, however, few, and confined mainly to those merchants
or capitalists who realized the necessity of general laws and a general
authority. It is scarcely conceivable that the inherited prejudices of
most Americans in favour of local independence could have been
overborne had not the Revolution been followed by a series of public
distresses, which drove to the side of the strong-government
advocates--temporarily, as it proved--a great number of American voters.

When hostilities ended, the people of the United States entered upon a
period of economic confusion. In the first place, trade was
disorganized, since the old West India markets were lost and the
privileges formerly enjoyed under the Navigation Acts were terminated
by the separation of the {133} countries. American shippers could not
at once discover in French or other ports an equivalent for the former
triangular trade. In the second place, British manufacturers and
exporters rushed to recover their American market, and promptly put out
of competition the American industries which had begun to develop
during the war. Specie, plentiful for a few months, now flowed rapidly
out of the country, since American merchants were no longer able to buy
British goods by drawing on West India credits. At the same time, with
the arrival of peace, the State courts resumed their functions, and
general liquidation began; while the State legislatures, in the effort
to adjust war finances, imposed what were felt to be high taxes. The
result was a general complaint of hard times, pov