Thom Hutchimon/mm) Engraved for The Crotonial Society of Massachusetts Massachusetts Historical Society Emerson, in his essay on Politics, quoted approvingly Fisher Ames as saying that monarchy was a trim ship, which sails well and may carry you in comfort; but then, it may strike a rock, when all goes to pieces at once; whereas democracy is like a raft; the discomforts are great; your feet are always in the water; but it will always float and carry you somehow. But when all has been said that can be said against democracy, put it side by side with aristocracy or monarchy and it will bear the comparison well; its crimes and blunders are no greater than those of its rivals, and there are compensating advantages. America has been willing to commit herself to this idea. This was not the idea of Thomas Hutchinson. He was a man of the middle of the eighteenth century, and by our standards un-American. King, Lords, and Commons, the old triple-pillared polity of Britain was good enough for him. To the masses he would give only limited power conditioned on qualifications of education and property. Matthew Arnold's doctrine of the "remnant”—that in any society the guiding reins must be in the hands of a select few in order to a good result would have seemed wise to him. So had thought Pym and Hampden, a century before; so thought Pitt, Burke, Mansfield, his contemporaries; Hutchinson was in good company; no doubt there are many even in America who see wisdom in Matthew Arnold's doctrine of the remnant, and who sail only with trepidation upon the raft to which our society is committed. Born in 1711, Thomas Hutchinson, nurtured in such theories as have been described, reached manhood, and at twenty-five, having married, and in accordance with the puritanism he always professed joined the church, became selectman of Boston, thus entering upon a career of public service unbroken until the year 1774. He spent a decade in the Assembly, during three terms holding the place of speaker. Proceeding thence to the Council he became there a leading spirit. In the judicial field he was judge of probate, justice of the common pleas, and at length chief-justice. He filled finally the executive positions of lieutenant-governor and governor. He held in fact almost every conspicuous public office in the Province, several of them at one and the same time, a fact which gave rise to accusations of rapacity and place-hunting, when toward the end his popularity waned. Since there were no emoluments connected with these offices, the pay even when it came being the merest pittance, and since curses came to the public servant more often than blessings, it is more reasonable to describe Hutchinson's motive as a fine public spirit other than anything lower. An ample private estate made him free to serve the Province; this he did long and unremittingly, until disfavor overtook him and he was at last driven out of the country. Looking at the manner in which Hutchinson performed his public work, first, what can be said of him as a legislator? He was busy in all ways, but finance was the field in which he was especially a master; and his greatest feat here was the restoration, in 1749, of the currency of Massachusetts to a hard money basis. John Adams no doubt had this transaction in mind, when in 1809 he declared Hutchinson to have been the best financier he had ever known. For fifty years Massachusetts had been given over to issues of irredeemable paper which had reduced the Province almost to a condition of paralysis. The infatuation, at first moderate, became wide-spread and eager; issue followed issue, the neighboring colonies became infected with the same craze, circulating their bills in Massachusetts; the remedies to relieve the embarrassment proved worse than the disease until the evil could scarcely be more acute. Hutchinson's method, completely successful, of affording relief was as follows: Louisburg, on the Island of Cape Breton, was captured from the French in 1745 mainly through the efforts of Massachusetts; and the success being important, in recognition of what the Province had done, the British government indemnified the Province for its expenses, sending over in hard money one hundred and eighty thousand pounds. What should be done with the money? Hutchinson, speaker of the Assembly, put forward a plan which at first excited only ridicule. The irredeemable paper of the Province, at that time in circulation, amounted to between two and three million pounds, so far depreciated that eleven or even twelve pounds of it were equal to only one pound sterling. The indemnity therefore, if applied to taking up the scrip, would cancel nearly the whole, and this was what Hutchinson suggested. He was opposed almost unanimously. The large debtor class, strongly represented in the Assembly, clung to the currency as it was, while the wiser and more scrupulous hard money men found mysterious calamities from the "shock" in their opinion sure to result from the sudden change. Hutchinson stood almost alone, and better evidence cannot be adduced as to his weight of character and wisdom than that he swung the Province slowly round to his view. His plan was adopted: the indemnity, for the most part in the form of Spanish milled dollars, arrived and was at once applied; a state of prosperity succeeded the depression which wonderfully re-invigorated the Province, imparting indeed to a large extent the spirit and initiative which made Massachusetts the leader in the then imminent Revolution. Whether we look at the immense result that followed, or at the force and astuteness with which the great measure was achieved, no more memorable feat of statesmanship was performed in America's provincial period than the restoration, in 1749, of the Massachusetts currency to a sound basis. Taking up now Hutchinson's judicial work, we find uncontradicted evidence that as judge of probate he was careful and humane, retaining the office when it was only an embarrassment because he thought he could help the fatherless and the widow; that as a justice of the common pleas he was exemplary; while as chief-justice he won distinction which is not yet forgotten. Governor Emory Washburn commends 1 in strong terms the judicial ability and services of Hutchinson, and it seems probable at the present time that few men indeed have sat in that high place more dignified, more conscientious, or better endowed and equipped. In general he greatly invigorated in the Province the administration of justice. 1 While busy thus in public ways, Hutchinson yet found time to write a History of Massachusetts Bay which stands in early New England literature as one of its most memorable achievements, and remains to-day one of the most important sources. With this Society no authority will weigh more than Mr. Charles Deane, who declares the History of Massachusetts Bay to have the highest value, proving Hutchinson's mind to have been a judicial one, full of candor, moderation, and a desire for truth. As an historian he had great limitations. The position of Clarendon in the English Revolution, as active protagonist and at the same time describer for posterity of the events in which he moved, was similar to that of Hutchinson a century later; but the American had little of the power of his English prototype in depicting the characters of his fellow-strivers. A century later Hutchinson's townsmen, Prescott, Motley, and Parkman, exhibited almost 1 Sketches of the Judicial History of Massachusetts, p. 304. ' 1 Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, iii. 147. |