University of Virginia Library

5890. NEUTRALITY PROCLAMATION, History of.—[continued].

I dare say you will have
judged from the pusillanimity of the proclamation,
from whose pen it came. A fear lest any
affection [to France] should be discovered is
distinguishable enough. This base fear will
produce the very evil they wish to avoid. For
our constituents, seeing that the government
does not express their mind, perhaps rather
leans the other way, are coming forward to express
it themselves.—
To James Madison. Washington ed. iii, 562. Ford ed., vi, 259.
(Pa., May. 1793)