The first act of the new Cabinet was to reach a general understanding in regard to the objects of the Administration. These appear to have been two only in number: reduction of debt and reduction of taxes, and the relation to be preserved between them. On the 14th March, Mr. Gallatin wrote a letter to Mr. Jefferson, discussing the subject at some length;[51] immediately afterwards he set out for New Geneva to arrange his affairs there and to bring his wife and family to Washington. His sharp experience of repeated exclusion from office by legislative bodies made him nervous in regard to confirmation by the Senate, and Mr. Jefferson therefore postponed the appointment until after the Senate had adjourned. These fears of factious opposition were natural enough, but seem to have been unfounded. Samuel Dexter, the Secretary of the Treasury under President Adams, consented to hold over until Mr. Gallatin was ready. Mr. Stoddart, President Adams's Secretary of the Navy, was equally courteous. If the story, told in some of Mr. Jefferson's biographies, be true, that Mr. Marshall, while still acting as Secretary of State, was turned out of his office by Mr. Lincoln, under the orders of Mr. Jefferson, at midnight on the 3d of March,[52] it must be confessed that, so far as courtesy was concerned, the Federalists were decidedly better bred than their rivals. The new Administration was in no way hampered or impeded by the old one, and Mr. Gallatin himself was perhaps of the whole Administration the one who suffered least from Federal attacks; henceforward his enemies came principally from his own camp. This result was natural and inevitable; it came from his own character, and was a simple consequence of his principles; but, since this internal dissension forced itself at once on the Administration and became to some extent its crucial test in the matter of removals from office for party reasons, the whole story may best be told here before proceeding with the higher subjects of state policy. Among Mr. Gallatin's papers is a sort of pamphlet in manuscript, stitched together, and headed in ornamental letters: "CITIZEN =W. DUANE.=" It is endorsed in Mr. Gallatin's hand: "1801. Clerks in offices; given by W. Duane." It contains a list of all the Department clerks, after the following style: Offices. Names. Remarks. Secretary 1400 Jacob Wagner. Complete picaroon. of State's 600 Steph. Pleasanton. Nothingarian. Offices. 800 ---- Brent. Nincumpoop. Some of Duane's remarks are still more pointed: Offices. Names. Remarks. 1500 John Newman. Democratic executioner. 800 ---- Golding. Adamite. 600 Israel Loring. Assistant throat-cutter. 1000 Charles W. Goldsborough. } Damned Reps. 1000 Jeremiah Nicolls. }