In 1791, an opposition campaign commenced in western Pennsylvania as a result of a statute passed in early March. The statute, later labeled as the Whiskey Act, imposed a tax on spirits distilled within the United States. The resistance campaign, while minor at first, eventually escalated into a large scale and violent backlash against the federal government that tested the validity of the Constitution of the United States and the function of the Executive and Legislative Branches of government. The crusade against the Whiskey Act culminated in 1794 with a mass protest in western Pennsylvania known as the Whiskey Rebellion. Resembling the factionist separation of wartime belligerents, the Whiskey Rebellion pinned the federal government against the citizens of western Pennsylvania.
The two preeminent figures for the government faction were the nation’s leader, President George Washington, and it’s Secretary of Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. This project will analyze the measures taken by Washington and Hamilton to combat the opposition to the federal government. It will expound upon the circumstances that ultimately led to the mobilization of state militias under federal control to contest the spread of the insurgency in western Pennsylvania. Further, it will explain the extreme danger forced upon the nation by the insurgents and why the drastic and powerful actions taken by the federal government under the supervision of Washington and Hamilton were absolutely necessary.