"The single largest armed confrontation among American
citizens between the Revolution and the Civil War" - Thomas Slaughter
In 1790, the new national government of the United
States was attempting to establish itself. Because the government had
assumed the debts incurred by the colonies during the Revolution the
government was deep in debt. During the 1791 winter session of Congress
both houses approved a bill that put an excise tax on all distilled
spirits. United States Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton,
proposed the bill to help prevent the national debt from growing. Loud
protests from all districts of the new nation soon followed. These protests
were loudest in the western counties of Pennsylvania.
Acceptance of the excise tax varied with the scale
of the production; large producers, who produced alcohol as a business
venture, were more willing to accept the new tax. They could make an
annual tax payment of six cents per gallon. A smaller producer, who
only made whiskey occasionally, had to make payments throughout the
year at a rate of about nine cents per gallon. Large producers could
reduce the cost of the excise tax if they produced even larger quantities.
Thus, the new tax gave the large producers a competitive advantage over
small producers.
The smaller producers, who were generally in the
western counties, had a very different perspective of the tax. To them
the tax was abhorrent. The frontier farmers detested the excise because
it was only payable in cash, something rare on the western frontier.
Due to the great effort required to transport any product over the mountains
back to the markets of the East, farmers felt it made much more sense
to transport the distilled spirits of their grain rather than the raw
grain itself.
The Whiskey Rebellion took place throughout the
western frontier. There was not one state south of New York whose western
counties did not protest the new excise with some sort of violence.
Probably the biggest concern about the excise tax was the revenues from
it would support a national government the western people felt was not
representing them well. Their grievances involved resolving the Indian
problems and opening the Mississippi River to navigation. "They were
'convinced that a tax upon liquors which are the common drink of
a nation operates in proportion to the number and not to the wealth
of the people, and of course is unjust in itself, and oppressive upon
the poor.'" Without solving these problems the national government
could expect no compliance to he excise law.
People in the West resisted the excise
tax with different attitudes. Most simply refused to pay the tax while
others rebelled with violence. Excise officers received most of the
fury from the rebels. Each officer was to open an office in his county
of operation. The easiest form of nonpayment was to prevent the excise
officer from establishing an office in the county. To do this, rebels
threatened anyone who offered to house the excise office. More often
than not, the excise officer received threats to his well being. These
threats were usually enough to discourage the officer from staying and
trying to collect the tax. When an officer was brave enough to stay,
the residents who opposed the tax committed such humiliations as tarring,
feathering, and torturing the offender. This usually convinced the excise
officer to leave the area.
"Western Pennsylvania was 'a center of terrorism under
the guiding hand of Albert Gallatin.' " - Robert Hendrickson
The residents of western Pennsylvania played a
major role in the "Whiskey Rebellion." It was the violent reaction of
the people in this area that compelled President George Washington to
call 12,950 militia men to suppress the rebellion in 1794. The residents
of western Pennsylvania not only threatened the excise tax collectors,
they proceeded to carry out their threats. An angry mob marched on collector
John Neville's house in Washington County, had a shoot out with him
and his slaves, and eventually burned his home. Fortunately, Neville
narrowly escaped the grasp of the crowd. Not only did this mob attack
the tax collector but they also stole the mail from a post rider leaving
Pittsburgh. The logic behind this action was to discover who in the
local area opposed the rebels. This was a federal offense for which
the rebels could be prosecuted. Their actions of civil disobedience
should not be considered as totally without justification.
Since
the people of western Pennsylvania felt they were not being well represented
by Congress they decided to choose their own assembly. Each county was
to choose between three and five representatives. These people were
to bring the demands of their county to the assembly. Many of the representatives
had ill feelings toward the national government. These people tried
to push the residents of western Pennsylvania toward open insurrection.
Men such as Hugh Henry Brackenridge and Albert Gallatin were the moderating
force at these meetings and prevented the radicals from dominating the
proceedings. Albert Gallatin's role was as a representative of the residents
of Fayette County. As such he had to transmit the sentiment of the meetings
even though he may have disagreed. Gallatin served as secretary and
also delivered speeches that helped to pacify those radicals who were
at the meetings. Often Gallatin delivered these speeches while radicals
were in the crowd with their weapons in hand. Gallatin spoke about the
mistake of open rebellion toward the government.
Unfortunately for Gallatin, the government officials
did not differentiate between the moderates and the radicals who took
part in these meetings. Participation brought guilt as far as those
in the government were concerned. In 1794 the militia called by Washington
marched to dispel the rebels in western Pennsylvania. They also brought
a list of names of participants that certain members of the Presidential
staff wanted arrested. This list included Brackenridge and Gallatin.
Twenty rebels were arrested. Fortunately, Albert Gallatin was not among
them. Of the twenty rebels arrested, none were found guilty. The fact
that he was included on the list of rebels caused Albert Gallatin in
later reflections to call his participation in the Whiskey Rebellion
his "only political sin."
The rebellion ended and whiskey was taxed. It was the first test of President Washington's authority to use the national militia to suppress insurrection internally. In actuality, little fighting resulted and the rebellion melted away in the face of Maj. Gen. Henry Lee's forces.
Aroostook War (Northeastern Boundary Dispute)
A bloodless conflict over the disputed boundary between the U.S. state of Maine and the British Canadian province of New Brunswick. The peace treaty of 1783 ending the American Revolution had left unclear the location of a supposed “highlands,” or watershed, dividing the two areas. Negotiators from Britain and the United States in subsequent years failed to come to an agreement, and the matter was referred to the king of The Netherlands, who in 1831 rendered a decision that the citizens of Maine objected to strenuously, forcing the U.S. Senate to reject it.
Meanwhile, settlers from New England and lumbermen from Canada were moving into the disputed Aroostook area, and in 1838–39 the conflict warmed up, with officials and bands of men from both sides making arrests and taking prisoners of “trespassers.” In March 1839 British troops from Quebec reached Madawaska, the American sector of Aroostook; and the Maine legislature immediately voted $800,000, calling for 10,000 volunteer militiamen, who, within a week, were dispatched to Aroostook. The U.S. Congress voted for 50,000 men and $10,000,000; and General Winfield Scott was ordered to Augusta, Maine, by President Martin Van Buren to keep the peace. On March 21, 1839, he and the British negotiator, Sir John Harvey, arranged a truce and a joint occupancy of the territory in dispute until a satisfactory settlement could be reached. The boundary was later settled by the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842.
Mormon Expedition (The Utah War)
It was a good war. ‘Killed, none; wounded, none; fooled, everybody,’ reported a correspondent of the New York Herald. The incident of 1857-58 known as the Utah Expedition, the Utah War or Buchanan’s Blunder was a collision of territorial self-determination against a federal government already faced with insubordination in Kansas and its Southern states. When President James Buchanan decided to flex federal muscle against Utah Territory and ‘the Mormon problem,’ he ignited a full rebellion that, before it was all over, embarrassed the military arm of the young republic and confounded the president.
Instructions from General-in-Chief Winfield Scott to General William S. Harney on June 29, 1857, stated that the troops under Harney’s command were to be a posse comitatus, and that ‘in no case will you, your officers or men, attack any body of citizens whatever, except on such requisition or summons, or in sheer self-defense.’
On August 1, 1857, Utah mustered its territorial militia, called the Nauvoo Legion after its Illinois antecedent. Drilling commenced throughout the territory. The government sought to gather guns and ammunition, and manufactured Colt revolvers. Grain and other food supplies were cached. Settlers were recalled from distant homesteads such as San Bernardino, Calif., and the Carson Valley (then part of Utah Territory but later part of Nevada), while traveling associates were sent for from the Eastern states and Europe. Councils were held with the native tribesmen with the aim of keeping them friendly, or at least neutral.
Utah’s first line of defense, however, were several hundred mounted men known as’scouts,’ ‘rangers,’ or ‘bandits’ and’scoundrels,’ depending on your point of view. This unorthodox cavalry was sent eastward on the high mountain plains that are now southwestern Wyoming with orders to stampede the animals, burn the grass, stage nightly surprises to keep the soldiers from sleeping, block the road with fallen trees and destroy the fords; in other words, ‘to annoy [the army] in every possible way.’
There were practical reasons for the Mormons to want to avoid a shooting war. They hoped to garner sympathy from the public and Eastern newspapers, which could be a factor in any negotiations. But it was also a question of resources. Only about two-thirds of the Nauvoo Legion troops were even armed, and many of those were armed inadequately. In January 1858, Adjutant General James Ferguson reported to Brigham Young that the legion had 6,100 troops, with potentially 1,000 more older men available. Yet, their inventory of weapons included only 2,364 rifles, 1,159 muskets, 99 pistols, and 295 revolvers. Upon receiving his orders, Charles Griffin reported that he saddled his horse and ‘took my gun and my blankets, that being all the arms I then had.’
Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston finally arrived in the army camp near Harris Fork on November 3, boosting morale considerably. Following a few days’ assessment, his troops headed southwest, hoping to push to Salt Lake City, but Mother Nature took over where the Mormons left off, and winter began laying down blankets of snow upon the high mountain plains. It took the 15-mile-long army column 15 days to travel just 35 miles through the snow. Hundreds of oxen and mules died along the trail. ‘It is quite Russian,’ Gove remarked, referring to Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow. Many soldiers were left pulling their own wagons due to the loss of their stock through weather and theft.
Only days before spring thaw and resupply would permit Johnston’s Army to move west, Buchanan’s ‘Peace Commission’ arrived in the territory bearing a pardon for the Mormon people. Brigham Young’s acceptance on June 12, 1858, on behalf of his people was positive if not gracious: ‘I have no character to protect, no pride to gratify, no vanity to please. If a man comes from the moon and says he will pardon me for kicking him in the moon yesterday, I don’t care about it. I’ll accept of his pardon. It don’t affect me one way or the other.’
Peace returned to Utah Territory, to the disappointment of the now brevetted General Johnston and his officers. As a precaution, Young moved his people to the south and posted guards to burn the city should their agreement be violated. Johnston’s Army, however, marched professionally through an eerily empty Salt Lake City and built Camp Floyd 40 miles to the southwest, in present-day Cedar Valley. Utah’s citizens returned to their homes, and life resumed mostly as it had before, although tension and controversy would stalk the territory for some years to come.
It is uncertain what might have happened had the conflict escalated. What is clear, though, is that victory is not always achieved through battle. It was the largest military operation in the United States between the times of the Mexican War and the Civil War.
The American Revolution
1775-1783: Serving: 184,000 to 250,000 Service Deaths: 4,435
Who we fought: Great Britain, in essence our own government.
Who fought with us: France, later in the War.
The outcome: The United States won its independence.
Quick fact: The spirit of revolution simmered slowly after about 1750, as Britain piled taxes and restrictive regulations on the American colonists. War finally broke out at Lexington when the British tried to disarm the patriots there.
The Ohio Valley Campaigns
1790-1812: Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: The American Indian - Creek, Miami, Shawnee and others.
The outcome: The frontier was pushed steadily westward.
Quick fact: Only interrupted by the War of 1812, efforts to force open Indian lands to white settlement resulted in broken treaties and on-again, off-again warfare in the current states of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. Tecumseh and Tippecanoe became household names.
The Quasi-War
1798-1800: Service Deaths: 20 (Navy & Marines)
Who we fought: An undeclared war with France.
The outcome: U.S. naval squadrons, operating principally in West Indian waters, sought out and attacked enemy privateers until France agreed to an honorable settlement. (Convention of Mortefontaine, 30 September 1800)
Quick fact: The U.S. wins 9 of 10 naval encounters. Between 1798 and 1800 the U.S. Navy captured more than 80 French ships although neither country officially declared war.
The Barbary Wars
1801-05, 1815: Service Deaths: 35 (Navy & Marines)
Who we fought: The Pasha of Tripoli (now Libya), and three other North African states which supported piracy.
The outcome: U.S. captives freed; intermittent peace.
Quick fact: Barbary pirates had preyed on Christian ships for decades, collecting tribute. U.S. refused higher tribute, leading to two wars. In 1805, Marines crossed hundreds of miles of desert ..."to the shores of Tripoli"... to free U.S. captives.
Chesapeake & Little Belt Affairs
1807 & 1811: Service Deaths: 3 (Chesapeake)
Who we fought: Great Britain
The outcome: 22 June 1807: HMS Leopard fired two broadsides into USS Chesapeake, killing three and wounding 18. Four men were then forcibly removed to the British ship. 16 May 1811: USS President opened fire on HMS Little Belt. The Little Belt sustained much greater damage, with nine killed and twenty-three wounded.
Quick fact: Both of these incidents were in sight of American land. This proved anything was liable to come under a British hail or fire and gave strong support for The War of 1812.
Battle of Tippecanoe
1811: Serving: 1,000: Service Deaths: 62
Who we fought: The Shawnee, Tecumseh and the Prophet were two Shawnee Indians. They also were brothers.
The outcome: The American army drove off the Indians and burned Prophetstown to the ground. Most Indians no longer believing in the Prophet caused Tecumseh's confederation collapsed.
Quick fact: Commanded by William Henry Harrison, then governor of Indiana Territory, used his popularity as a successful Indian fighter to run for President of the United States. His campaign slogan was "Tippecanoe and Tyler too!"
The War of 1812 (2nd War for Independence)
1812-1815: Serving: 286,730 Service Deaths: 2,260
Who we fought: Great Britain
The outcome: Britain surrendered.
Quick fact: An unfortunate war that many believe didn't have to be, but began over the British impressment of U.S. sailors on the high seas. It burned Washington, but gave us our national anthem.
The Creek War
1813-1814: Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: Creek Indians
Who fought with us: Choctaws and Chickasaws
The outcome: The Creek Indians cede to the United States all their land east of the Mississippi River.
Quick fact: The Creek were aided and abetted by the Spaniards who supplied arms and ammunition. General Jackson demanded satisfaction from the Spanish, and as this was not furnished, Jackson took Pensacola. When this was done, the war was soon closed.
The First Seminole War
1817-1818: Serving: 1,800 Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: The Seminole and Creek tribes of southern Georgia and Florida.
The outcome: Suppression of Seminole attacks.
Quick fact: Seminole attacks on whites in Georgia were incited by two British adventurers. U.S. troops under Andrew Jackson moved south, capturing the Brits and burning Spanish forts in Florida. Spain ceded Florida to U.S. in 1819.
The Black Hawk War
1832: Serving: 1,000 regulars, 300 mounted volunteers, and 4,000 militia Service Deaths: 70 (settlers and soldiers)
Who we fought: Chief Black Hawk and about 500 Sac and Fox warriors.
The outcome: The Indians were decisively defeated at Bad Axe Creek, Wisconsin.
Quick fact: Reneging on two treaties ceding his tribal lands in western Illinois, Black Hawk led 2,000 of his people back across the Mississippi in an attempt to resettle there. They were defeated by 500 U.S. regulars, and re-established on a reservation in Iowa.
Assault on Sumatra
1832: Serving: 250 Marines (USS Potomac): Service Deaths: 2 (Navy)
Who we fought: Malay pirates
The outcome: The U.S. retaliates against an attack on the American ship Friendship, killing 100 Sumatrans and burning the town of Quallah Battoo (now in Indonesia).
Quick fact: The first U.S. armed intervention in Asia.
The Texas War for Independence
1835-1836: Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: The government of Mexico, under President Santa Anna.
Who fought with us: Texas was aided by a variety of American adventurers and military men, including Sam Houston, Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie and William Travis.
The outcome: Texas won her independence, and joined the Union nine years later.
Quick fact: Though technically not an American war, in essence the embattled Texians were all Americans seeking rights under the Mexican constitution of 1824, which Santa Anna had abolished. Best remembered for the heroic stand at the Alamo.
The Second Seminole War
1835-1842: Service Deaths: 1,600
Who we fought: The Seminole tribe of Florida, under Chief Osceola.
The outcome: The Seminoles were shipped west as planned.
Quick fact: When the U.S. decided that the Seminoles should be relocated to Arkansas, they naturally thought that was a dumb idea. Six bitter, hard-fought years and 1,600 American lives later, 3,800 half-starved Indians were shipped to Arkansas.
The Mexican War
1846-1848: Serving: 78,718 Service Deaths: 13,283
Who we fought: Mexico
The outcome: Mexico surrendered.
Quick fact: This conflict was an indirect effect of the Texas fight for freedom a decade before, as it erupted over her southern boundary. The surrender gave us most of our present southwest, including California.
Cayuse War
1847-1850: Serving: 500 Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: Cayuse Indians
The outcome: The U.S. military forces the Cayuse to surrender and hangs five people.
Quick fact: The Cayuse killed eleven whites living at a Presbyterian mission in what is called the Whitman Massacre.
Bleeding Kansas
1854-1861: Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: Three distinct political groups occupied Kansas: pro-slavers, free-staters and abolitionists. Federal troops quell the fighting between these opposing factions.
The outcome: Violence continued until 1861 when Kansas entered the Union as a free state on January 29th.
Quick fact: In May 1856, an 800-man "posse" made up of border ruffians from Missouri sacked Lawrence, wrecking the newspaper offices and burning the hotel and the home of the Free-Soil governor. Four days later, fanatic abolitionist John Brown and four of his sons seized five proslavery settlers from their homes along Pottawatomie Creek and, in front of the settler's families, hacked them to death with broadswords. More than 200 men would be killed in the era known as "Bleeding Kansas".
Third Seminole War (Billy Bowlegs War)
1855-1858: Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: Seminole Indians
The outcome: The war ended with Bowlegs' surrender on May 7, 1858.
Quick fact: In exchange for small cash outlays, Bowlegs agreed to leave Florida with about 165 members of his tribe to Indian Territory in Oklahoma. The tiny Seminole remnant that hung on has never surrendered.
The Indian Wars
1860-1890: Service Deaths: N/A
Who we fought: The American Indian - Paiute, Cheyenne, Crow, Pawnee, Sioux, Arapaho, Apache, Commanche.
The outcome: The frontier was pressed ever westward, and ultimately closed.
Quick fact: The glamor of the Wild West and charging horse cavalry surrounds what was really a series of broken treaties, massacres by both sides, and forced relocation of native tribes whenever their land was coveted for gold or settlement.
Apache-Geronimo surrendered in 1886. Geronimo died on Feb. 17, 1909, a prisoner of war.
Modoc-Boston Charlie, Black Jim, Schonchin John, and Captain Jack were hanged on the morning of October 3, 1873. The surviving Modocs were taken to the Quapaw Agency in Oklahoma where disease accomplished what bullets could not.
Sioux/Cheyenne/Arapaho-231 men were killed at the battle of the Little Bighorn 25 Jun 1876.
Sioux-Crazy Horse surrendered on May 6, 1877, in September 1877, while being led to a guardhouse, a soldier ran him through with a bayonet. Sitting Bull surrendered on July 19, 1881, on December 15, 1890, one of the 43 Lakota Sioux policemen sent to bring him into Standing Rock Reservation, put a bullet through his head.
Nez Percé-Chief Joseph was surrounded by troops on 5th October, 1877.
Bannocks/Paiutes-On July 15th, 1878 a band of reservation Umatilla's entered Chief Egan's camp, pretending that they wanted to join the resistance, instead, they killed him.
Sioux-On December 29, 1890, soldiers entered the Indian camp at Wounded Knee Creek demanding that all Indian firearms be relinquished. A scuffle ensued and a firearm discharged. The silence of the morning was broken and soon other guns echoed in the river bed. When it ended, at least 150 Indians had been killed and 50 wounded. In comparison, army casualties were 25 killed and 39 wounded.
The Civil War (War Between the States)
1861-1865: Serving: 2,213,363 (North); 600,000 to 1,500,000 (South) Service Deaths: 364,511 (North); 159,821 to 165,000 (South)
Who we fought: Each other. North versus South.
Who fought with us: Some European nations played us off against each other.
The outcome: The Union was preserved, the South subdued.
Quick fact: Our costliest war in terms of total American deaths and destruction. Beyond the final abolition of slavery, many of the core issues that split the nation were not fully resolved.
The First U.S. Korea War
1871: Serving: 650 (Marines and Navy Bluejackets) Service Deaths: 3
Who we fought: The Koreans
The outcome: The U.S. avenges the earlier loss of the U.S. Merchant Marine ship General Sherman and the 20 persons killed, destroying five forts and inflicting as many as 650 casualties on the defending Koreans. The U.S. forces departed on July 3. A treaty is secured in 1882.
Quick fact: The Medals of Honor awarded for action in Korea in 1871 were the first awarded for foreign service against a foreign enemy of the United States.
Coup in Hawaii
1893: Serving: 165 (aboard the USS Boston)
Who we fought: Supporters of Queen Liliuokalani
The outcome: The Kingdom of Hawaii ended after Queen Liliuokalani was
deposed in a coup by American businessmen and with the support of U.S. minister to Hawaii, John L. Stevens, on January 17, 1893. The strategic placement of the Marines proved instrumental in preventing the royal forces from effectively responding to the coup.
Quick fact: President Grover Cleveland investigated the coup and fired Stevens. He apologized to the queen. And on Dec. 18, 1893, he briefed Congress on his findings: "By an act of war, committed with the participation of a diplomatic representative of the United States and without authority of Congress, the government of a feeble but friendly and confiding people has been overthrown," Cleveland said. "A substantial wrong has thus been done, which a due regard for our national character, as well as the rights of the injured people, requires we should endeavor to repair."
"The single largest armed confrontation among American
citizens between the Revolution and the Civil War" - Thomas Slaughter
In 1790, the new national government of the United
States was attempting to establish itself. Because the government had
assumed the debts incurred by the colonies during the Revolution the
government was deep in debt. During the 1791 winter session of Congress
both houses approved a bill that put an excise tax on all distilled
spirits. United States Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton,
proposed the bill to help prevent the national debt from growing. Loud
protests from all districts of the new nation soon followed. These protests
were loudest in the western counties of Pennsylvania.
Acceptance of the excise tax varied with the scale
of the production; large producers, who produced alcohol as a business
venture, were more willing to accept the new tax. They could make an
annual tax payment of six cents per gallon. A smaller producer, who
only made whiskey occasionally, had to make payments throughout the
year at a rate of about nine cents per gallon. Large producers could
reduce the cost of the excise tax if they produced even larger quantities.
Thus, the new tax gave the large producers a competitive advantage over
small producers.
The smaller producers, who were generally in the
western counties, had a very different perspective of the tax. To them
the tax was abhorrent. The frontier farmers detested the excise because
it was only payable in cash, something rare on the western frontier.
Due to the great effort required to transport any product over the mountains
back to the markets of the East, farmers felt it made much more sense
to transport the distilled spirits of their grain rather than the raw
grain itself.
The Whiskey Rebellion took place throughout the
western frontier. There was not one state south of New York whose western
counties did not protest the new excise with some sort of violence.
Probably the biggest concern about the excise tax was the revenues from
it would support a national government the western people felt was not
representing them well. Their grievances involved resolving the Indian
problems and opening the Mississippi River to navigation. "They were
'convinced that a tax upon liquors which are the common drink of
a nation operates in proportion to the number and not to the wealth
of the people, and of course is unjust in itself, and oppressive upon
the poor.'" Without solving these problems the national government
could expect no compliance to he excise law.
People in the West resisted the excise
tax with different attitudes. Most simply refused to pay the tax while
others rebelled with violence. Excise officers received most of the
fury from the rebels. Each officer was to open an office in his county
of operation. The easiest form of nonpayment was to prevent the excise
officer from establishing an office in the county. To do this, rebels
threatened anyone who offered to house the excise office. More often
than not, the excise officer received threats to his well being. These
threats were usually enough to discourage the officer from staying and
trying to collect the tax. When an officer was brave enough to stay,
the residents who opposed the tax committed such humiliations as tarring,
feathering, and torturing the offender. This usually convinced the excise
officer to leave the area.
"Western Pennsylvania was 'a center of terrorism under
the guiding hand of Albert Gallatin.' " - Robert Hendrickson
The residents of western Pennsylvania played a
major role in the "Whiskey Rebellion." It was the violent reaction of
the people in this area that compelled President George Washington to
call 12,950 militia men to suppress the rebellion in 1794. The residents
of western Pennsylvania not only threatened the excise tax collectors,
they proceeded to carry out their threats. An angry mob marched on collector
John Neville's house in Washington County, had a shoot out with him
and his slaves, and eventually burned his home. Fortunately, Neville
narrowly escaped the grasp of the crowd. Not only did this mob attack
the tax collector but they also stole the mail from a post rider leaving
Pittsburgh. The logic behind this action was to discover who in the
local area opposed the rebels. This was a federal offense for which
the rebels could be prosecuted. Their actions of civil disobedience
should not be considered as totally without justification.
Since
the people of western Pennsylvania felt they were not being well represented
by Congress they decided to choose their own assembly. Each county was
to choose between three and five representatives. These people were
to bring the demands of their county to the assembly. Many of the representatives
had ill feelings toward the national government. These people tried
to push the residents of western Pennsylvania toward open insurrection.
Men such as Hugh Henry Brackenridge and Albert Gallatin were the moderating
force at these meetings and prevented the radicals from dominating the
proceedings. Albert Gallatin's role was as a representative of the residents
of Fayette County. As such he had to transmit the sentiment of the meetings
even though he may have disagreed. Gallatin served as secretary and
also delivered speeches that helped to pacify those radicals who were
at the meetings. Often Gallatin delivered these speeches while radicals
were in the crowd with their weapons in hand. Gallatin spoke about the
mistake of open rebellion toward the government.
Unfortunately for Gallatin, the government officials
did not differentiate between the moderates and the radicals who took
part in these meetings. Participation brought guilt as far as those
in the government were concerned. In 1794 the militia called by Washington
marched to dispel the rebels in western Pennsylvania. They also brought
a list of names of participants that certain members of the Presidential
staff wanted arrested. This list included Brackenridge and Gallatin.
Twenty rebels were arrested. Fortunately, Albert Gallatin was not among
them. Of the twenty rebels arrested, none were found guilty. The fact
that he was included on the list of rebels caused Albert Gallatin in
later reflections to call his participation in the Whiskey Rebellion
his "only political sin."
The rebellion ended and whiskey was taxed. It was the first test of President Washington's authority to use the national militia to suppress insurrection internally. In actuality, little fighting resulted and the rebellion melted away in the face of Maj. Gen. Henry Lee's forces.