Federalist Party leaders in Massachusetts faced a situation that is similar to what is going on within the Republican Party today. As Tea Party leaders clamor for principles, the party’s leadership in Congress, Mitch McConnell and John Boehner, pursue a moderate course of action.
To recap:
The Federalist Party’s rank and file had split with the leadership in New York during the state’s gubernatorial campaign of 1804. The party’s radicals from Massachusetts, Timothy Pickering and Roger Griswold, backed Aaron Burr as the candidate for governor of New York State. Pickering and Griswold hoped that as governor, Burr would bring New York into their scheme for a confederacy. Their plans unraveled. Alexander Hamilton and the party’s leaders intervened, opposing Burr’s support from the Federalist’s rank and file. Hamilton viewed Burr as a challenge to the party’s leadership in New York State.
In 1808, during Jefferson’s embargo, the Federalist leadership in New England urged a moderate course of action. Federalist editors, the clergy and radicals clamored for action. The party’s leaders had to find a middle course, or give up their control. Leadership and rank and file were not unified. Support for the Federalists waned in other parts of the United States. The party’s leaders in New England thought that electing a president would regain their sway over the rank and file.[1]
Their candidate would oppose Jefferson’s successor, James Madison. Party leaders Harrison Gray Otis, George Cabot, Christopher Gore, James Lloyd and Timothy Bigelow formed the committee. They organized the first national convention to nominate a presidential candidate. In the election of 1804, the Federalist candidate from South Carolina, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, lost to Thomas Jefferson. Otis and his committee, in an attempt to retain control and defeat Madison, favored George Clinton, a Democratic Republican from New York State. The Federalists had lost important elections in recent years. In addition to Pinckney’s loss to Jefferson, they had seen Democratic-Republican governor James Sullivan replace Federalist Caleb Strong in Massachusetts. To Otis and his associates, control of the leadership outweighed party affiliation. A moderate course of action trumped party principles.
Opposition to Clinton’s candidacy developed outside Otis’ organizing committee. Federalists elsewhere wanted to adhere to the party’s principles.[2] After some debate Federalists at the convention chose Charles Cotesworth Pinckney and Rufus King. Madison defeated them.
Madison’s victory brought new assaults on New England’s beleaguered merchants. Congress enacted the Enforcement Act in January 1809. Federal forces seized goods. Their grounds for seizure were solely on suspicion those goods were exports.
