[Private] Alexander Hamilton Esq— Philadelphia My Dear Sir Richmond Decr. 25. 1794 [marginal filing notations: State of things in Virginia as to the Whiskey [undecipherable] Recomm[undecipherable] 82 — activity towards them — 144] You have upon sundry occasions done me the favor to request my Opinion, upon the public Sentiment in Virginia—conceiving that there can never have been an occurrence giving you greater anxiety than the present Insurgency in the Western parts of Pennsylvania or upon which a knowledge of the publick Opinion and dispositions have could be more interesting. I anticipate your request and proceed to give you that information in which I feel [undecipherable] very confident. Virginia will do as well, the requisition of the President and as many more as he shall find it necessary to make will be complied with, with alacrity. This is a case which goes home to the people themselves, and they will act according to their own principles. There are [undecipherable] cases in which they remain silent while democratic, vicious, British [undecipherable] & other factions presume to declare, in Resolutions & [undecipherable] Opinions for them. The great body of the People of Virginia are [undecipherable] planters & farmers, much attached to liberty property and domestic happiness, & busy themselves but little about public concerns, unless they feel that those blessings are brought into danger. hence it is, that factious Men for a time, succeed in giving a complexion to the conduct of the country, very different from the real temper of the People; and this is a misfortune under which Virginia has been placed for several years. Virtuous Men have been cried down under a [undecipherable] of Monarchy, Aristocracy, British influence, & French Republicanism terms to which no rational significations have been applied, because they have seriously recollected that we had a Country & Government of our own and, in [undecipherable] of [undecipherable] elsewhere, voted to preserve and [undecipherable] them. These clamors have been set up & [undecipherable] with a degree of [undecipherable] which none having [undecipherable] equal zeal [undecipherable]. [undecipherable], or the [undecipherable] have been beyond the reach of the [undecipherable] a [undecipherable] of course goes with the clamor. But the people of Virginia mean to be right when they are in possession of the truth. the [undecipherable] in which the truth cannot be veiled. The great Body of our Country knows that the [undecipherable] they have chosen for themselves is a republican one, to be decided by a majority; and [undecipherable] a minority openly resists the laws [undecipherable] by [p 152] a majority, and thus [undecipherable] the most essential principle of republicanism, the truth stands too fully exposed to be [undecipherable] perverted. pretended Republicans are compelled to support the Government, or to exhibit themselves in their true character of Anarchists. taking the first turn they may not do as much good, but taking the latter, they lose their power of doing evil. These are my reflections on the subject, and the accounts received from the different parts of the State affirm that the real State of the opinions & conduct of the country are in concord with them. I hope & trust that a radical extirpation will be effected in this instance. a [undecipherable] reconciliation will only [undecipherable] the [undecipherable] of faction to be rekindled with greater violence at a [undecipherable] day. there must be a compleat conquest and severe examples of the [undecipherable] in the [undecipherable]. I am with great resp— E. Carrington [marginal note at bottom left, largely undecipherable:] and you to [undecipherable] all [undecipherable] direction unless I [undecipherable] of this letter, as [undecipherable] will [undecipherable] of [undecipherable] the [undecipherable] my [undecipherable] [undecipherable]