University of Virginia Library

TO EDMUND PENDLETON.[1]

Dear Sir,—Congress are much occupied and perplexed
at present with the case of Vermont. The
pretensions of that settlement to the character of an

independent State, with the grounds on which they
are made, and the countenance given them by Congress,
are, I presume, pretty well known to you. It
has long been contended, that an explicit acknowledgment
of that character, and an admission of them
into the Federal Union, was an act both of justice
and policy. The discovery made through several
channels, and particularly the intercepted letters of
Lord G. Germaine, added such force to the latter of
these considerations, that in the course of last summer
preliminary overtures were made on the part of
Congress for taking them into the Confederation,
containing, as one condition on the part of Vermont,
that they should contract their claims within the
bounds to which they were originally confined, and
guaranteeing to New York and New Hampshire all
the territory without those bounds to which their
encroachments had been extended. Instead of complying
with this condition, they have gone on in
their encroachments both on the New York and
New Hampshire sides, and there is at this moment
every symptom of approaching hostility with each of
them. In this delicate crisis, the interposition of
Congress is again called for, and, indeed, seems to be
indispensable; but whether in the way of military
coercion, or a renewal of former overtures, or by
making the first a condition of a refusal of the last,
is not so unanimously decided. Indeed, with several
members, and, I may say, States in Congress, a want
of power either to decide on their independence, or
to open the door of the Confederacy to them, is
utterly disclaimed; besides which the danger of the
precedent, and the preponderancy it would give to
the Eastern scale, deserve serious consideration.
These reasons, nevertheless, can only prevail when
the alternative contains fewer evils. It is very unhappy
that such plausible pretexts, if not necessary
occasions, of assuming power should occur. Nothing
is more distressing to those who have a true respect
for the constitutional modifications of power, than to
be obliged to decide on them.