Table Of ContentPRAISE FOR FOUNDING FEUDS
“With the verve of a storyteller and the precision of a historian,
Paul Aron shows us how American politicians have been battling
and backstabbing since the days when talking heads wore powdered
wigs. Huzzah!”
—Gerard Helferich, author of New York Times bestseller
Theodore Roosevelt and the Assassin
“Anyone who thinks the founders of the American republic
were noble, selfless men ready to sacrifice private interests and per-
sonal opinions for the public good should read Founding Feuds.
In lively prose and with keen understanding Paul Aron sets forth
the personal animosities and grudges that drove politics in the new
nation—often to distraction. Remarkably, for all the bitterness
among these clashing personalities, the leaders of the fledgling
United States were able to compromise with one another when
necessary. Would that our preening politicians and self-centered
ideologues could do the same!”
—Robert Gross, author of The Minutemen and Their World
“By focusing on the internal conflicts that nearly tore the fledg-
ing United States to shreds, Paul Aron provides an excellent entrée
into the world of the founding fathers. He strips these stories to
their essentials without dumbing them down. And by summing up
each struggle as a contest between two outsized eighteenth-century
characters, he draws us readers right into the fray. As the sparks fly,
they light up the scene.”
—Woody Holton, author of Abigail Adams
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“Through his lively and often surprising descriptions of the
founders’ brawls, disagreements, public denunciations, court bat-
tles, and lethal duels, Paul Aron makes the important argument
that many of their feuds actually strengthened the young republic
and that our robust, open democracy is in fact built on an agree-
ment to disagree.”
—Susan Dunn, author of Dominion of Memories
“Paul Aron’s lively Founding Feuds should reassure readers that the
political stridency of the present is an essential part of our tradition.”
—Richard Buel, author of America on the Brink
“Those who think nastiness is a recent addition to our politics
should read this book. Founding Feuds reminds us that mud-slinging
goes back to the beginnings of the American republic.”
—John Mack Faragher, author of Eternity Street
“Founding Feuds is a sprightly and insightful account of mul-
tiple rivalries and rancorous disputes involving many of America’s
founding fathers and mothers. Paul Aron’s lucid and engaging style,
and his informed understanding of these bitter conflicts, makes for
good reading. I recommend Founding Feuds to all who wish to learn
more about the era of the American Revolution and many of its
most important players.”
—John Ferling, author of Whirlwind
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F F
ounding euds
U U
O
The Rivalries, Clashes,
and Conflicts That Forged a Nation
Paul Aron
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Copyright © 2016 by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Cover and internal design © 2016 by Sourcebooks, Inc.
Cover design by the Book Designers
Cover images used courtesy of the Colonial Williams Foundation. Full citations listed on pages
211–212.
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mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems— except in the case of
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This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to
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a Declaration of Principles Jointly Adopted by a Committee of the American Bar Association and a
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Published by Sourcebooks, Inc.
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4 410
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Aron, Paul, author.
Title: Founding feuds : the rivalries, clashes, and conflicts that forged a
nation / Paul Aron.
Description: Naperville, Illinois : Sourcebooks, 2016. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015050177 (pbk. : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: United States--Politics and government--1783-1809. | United
States--Politics and government--1775-1783. | National characteristics,
American--History. | Founding Fathers of the United States.
Classification: LCC E310 .A76 2016 | DDC 973.3092/2--dc23 LC record available at http://
lccn.loc.gov/2015050177
Printed and bound in the United States of America.
VP 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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Contents
Preface ix
Silas Deane and Arthur Lee 1
Desperate for French arms, Congress sent Deane
and Lee to Paris. The two seemed as eager to under-
cut each other as to cut a deal with the French.
George Washington and Harry Washington 11
Enslaved Harry Washington took care of George
Washington’s horses until Harry escaped from
Mount Vernon. Harry’s quest for freedom both
paralleled and challenged George’s.
Benjamin Lincoln and Daniel Shays 19
Just three years after the Revolutionary War ended,
two patriot veterans again led forces into battle, this
time against each other.
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Patrick Henry and James Madison 27
The Revolution’s greatest orator took on the father
of the Constitution, with the fate of that document
hanging in the balance.
Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson 35
So far apart were their views of what America ought
to be that they were, as Jefferson put it, “daily pitted
in the cabinet like two cocks.”
John Adams and Thomas Jefferson 45
The great allies of 1776 were bitter enemies when
they faced each other in the election of 1800.
John Adams and Alexander Hamilton 57
The two Federalist leaders so detested each other
that in 1800, Hamilton preferred Jefferson over
Adams, his own party’s candidate.
Thomas Paine and George Washington 67
Washington generally stood above the fray of feuding
founders. So it was surely startling when Paine—w hose
pen many equated to Washington’s sword—e xplained
that the president stood alone because he so easily
betrayed his friends, including Paine.
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Roger Griswold and Matthew Lyon 77
After Lyon, a Republican from Vermont, spit
at Griswold, a Federalist from Connecticut, their
fellow Congressmen witnessed a full- fledged brawl.
William Cobbett and Thomas Paine 87
Some of the nastiest feuds played out in newspa-
pers and pamphlets. Cobbett often wrote under the
byline of Porcupine; Paine referred to him as Skunk.
Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton 95
The founders insulted each other so much that it’s
surprising there weren’t more duels. But when the
vice president faced off against the former treasury
secretary, the result was deadly.
Aaron Burr and Thomas Jefferson 105
The president insisted that his former vice president
be tried for treason.
Thomas Jefferson and John Marshall 113
Jefferson and Marshall were cousins, and their feud
was deeply personal. It was also a test of the balance
of power between the branches of government the
two represented.
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Thomas Jefferson and John Randolph 123
Once a key ally of Jefferson in Congress, Randolph
broke with Jefferson to lead a group of Republicans
appalled by Jefferson’s embrace of federal power.
Thomas Jefferson and Phillis Wheatley 131
Wheatley’s poems impressed, among others,
Washington and John Hancock. Not Jefferson, who
could not conceive of an African American, let alone
a former slave, writing poetry.
John Adams and Mercy Otis Warren 141
Adams did not like the way he was portrayed in
Warren’s history of the Revolution. His enraged let-
ters to Warren and her indignant replies, while not
as lengthy as her history, fill hundreds of pages.
Epilogue 151
Notes 155
Further Reading 197
Acknowledgments 209
Photo Credits 211
Index 213
About the Author 221
About Colonial Williamsburg 223
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Preface
“ThirTeen clocks were made To sTrike TogeTher,”
John Adams wrote in 1818, recalling how the thirteen colonies
united to seize their independence.
Adams knew this had been a tentative and tenuous unity. On
July 1, the day before the colonists would vote for independence,
John Dickinson of Pennsylvania had argued for delay, mustering
the same arguments moderates had been making in the Continental
Congress for months: that it might still be possible to reconcile
with England, that Americans were not yet united behind inde-
pendence, that America needed allies and troops before it could
take on the world’s most powerful empire. To take on England
prematurely, Dickinson said, would be “to brave the storm in a
skiff made of paper.”
The day of the vote, Delaware supported independence
only because of the last- minute arrival of Caesar Rodney, who
had ridden through the night to break a tie among that colony’s
delegates. Pennsylvania supported independence only because
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