"
There can be little doubt that he had Hamilton in mind when he answered,
as follows, in his own forceful way the radical views of that gifted
statesman.
"Some honest men fear that a republican government cannot be strong,
that this government is not strong enough. I believe this, on the
contrary, is the strongest government on earth. I believe it is the only
one where every man, at the call of the laws, would fly to the standard
of the law, and would meet invasions of the public order as his own
personal concern."
It was characteristic of Jefferson's nobility that one of his first
efforts was to undo, so far as he could, the mischief effected by the
detested Sedition law. Every man who was in durance because of its
operation was pardoned, and he looked upon the law as "a nullity as
obsolete and palpable, as if congress had ordered us to fall down and
worship a golden image."
He addressed friendly and affectionate letters to Kosciusko and others,
and invited them to be his guests at the White House. Samuel Adams of
Massachusetts had been shamefully abused during the canvas, but he felt
fully compensated by the touching letter from the president. Thomas
Paine was suffering almost the pangs of starvation in Paris, and
Jefferson paid his passage home.
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