Procuring the resolutions, however, proved a crafty political move. The enormity of the despicable acts was advertised as never before, while the endorsement of them by federalist legislators went upon record. Petitions for repeal came in so numerous and numerously signed that the VIth Congress could not but raise a committee to consider such action. It reported adversely, and the report was accepted, the majority in the House, fifty-two to forty-eight, trying contemptuously to cough down every speaker lifting his voice on the opposite side. [1799] This sullen obstinacy in favor of a miserable experiment sealed the doom of Federalism. In vain did the party orators plead that liberty of speech and the press is not license, but only the right to utter "the truth," that hence this liberty was not abridged by the acts in question, and that aliens had no constitutional rights, but enjoyed the privileges of the land only by favor. The fact remained, more and more appreciated by ordinary people, that a land ruled by such maxims could never be free. So a deep distrust of Federalism sprung up, as out of sympathy with popular government. It was furthered by the attachment of prominent Federalists to England. Several of them are on record as ready to involve the United States in an expedition planned by one Miranda, to conquer Spanish America in aid of Great Britain, Spain and ourselves being perfectly at peace. The federalist chieftains were too proud, ignoring too much the common voter. They often expressed doubt, too, as to the permanence of popular institutions. Federalism had too close affinity with Puritanism to suit many outside New England. And then--deadly to the party even had nothing else concurred--there was a quarrel among its leaders. Hamilton, the Essex Junto (Pickering, Cabot, Quincy, Otis), and their supporters were set against Adams and his friends. This rivalry of long standing was brought to a head by Adams's noble and self-sacrificing independence in accepting France's overtures for peace, when Hamilton, Pickering, King, and all the rest, out of private or party interest rather than patriotism, wished war. [1800] Toward 1800, Democracy bade fair soon to come into power, but the Federalists learned no wisdom. Rather were they henceforth more factious than ever, opposing Jefferson and Madison even when they acted on purely federalist principles. Tooth and nail they fought against the acquisition of Louisiana, the War of 1812, and the protective tariff of 1816, which was carried by Republicans. A worse spirit still was shown in their disunion scheme of 1804, after the purchase of Louisiana, and in the Hartford Convention of 1814. Federalism had further lost ground by its mean and revolutionary devices on resigning power in 1801, first to make Burr President instead of Jefferson, and, failing in this, to use its expiring authority in creating needless offices for its clients.