The Whiskey Rebellion by William
Hodgeland, 2006, Excerpts
The Revolutionary War was effectively won in late 1782. The
past seven years had been a slog through cold, starvation, at time
near-nakedness, along with the daily horrors of slaughter. Neither officers nor
men had been paid in years. Tight cash forced choices between paying soldiers
and paying creditors. Creditors came first: Morris officially suspended army
pay. Washington himself was near bankruptcy. Mutiny was what Washington feared
most. He blamed Congress. Uncertainty about pay was haunting – and uniting – a
large, angry force, 550 officers and around 10,000 enlisted men, who might
refuse to be sent home impoverished and in debt.
When officers met with Congress, they mentioned mutiny as
the probable outcome of demands not being met. Hamilton was now determined to
build the situation into a genuine crisis. That the crisis really might end in
coup and military government was a risk they had to take. They even considered
the potential benefits to their national agenda of the success of such a coup. But
their main idea was merely to frighten the states with the threat of military
takeover. The officer class was armed. Morris advised the officers to refuse to
lay down their arms unless the states agreed to federal taxes.
In Philadelphia, Morris met with officers and hailed them as
fellow creditors. The only solution was to demand federal taxes to pay not just
officers but all creditors. Hamilton addressed Congress to rule out
compromises. He opposed a motion to levy the impost only for paying officers: all
bondholders must be included. Congress did just that. All army obligations thus
passed easily to the federal government, adding to the debt. The officers
agreed to take the interest-bearing bonds, to be funded after final settlement
of states’ accounts with Congress.
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