279. ALIEN AND SEDITION LAWS, Petitions against.—
Petitions and remonstrances
against the Alien and Sedition laws
are coming from various parts of New York,
Jersey and Pennsylvania. * * * I am in hopes
Virginia will stand so countenanced by those
States as to repress the wishes of the Government
to coerce her, which they might venture
on if they supposed she would be left
alone. Firmness on our part, but a passive
firmness, is the true course. Anything rash or
threatening might check the favorable dispositions
of these middle States, and rally them
again around the measures which are ruining
us.—
To James Madison. Washington ed. iv, 279.
Ford ed., vii, 341.
(Pa.,
Jan. 1799)
