A Fair Bargain by Francis Hopkinson

Francis Hopkinson. The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1868 - 1869.
http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47da-2b48-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99

"A Fair Bargain" by patriot-poet, musician, and Declaration-signer Francis Hopkinson (1737-1791) was first published over the initial "H." in the April 1787 issue of the great Columbian Magazine, during Hopkinson's first stint as editor.

•  https://archive.org/details/columbianmagazin17861787phil/page/392

In 1782 the Devil begs the new United States of America, personified as the gorgeous goddess Columbia, to give him one State. Scorning the kind offer of Vermont ("already got it," in other words), Satan takes Rhode Island instead. A fitting and to the poet's mind fair bargain, since Rhode Island had devilishly opposed a 5 percent impost tax on imports.

In A History of Early American Magazines 1741-1789 (New York, 1931; reprinted Octagon Books, 1966), Lyon Norman Richardson lists "A Fair Bargain" as one of Hopkinson's contributions from  March to May 1787.

For the COLUMBIAN MAGAZINE.

A FAIR BARGAIN.
(Written in the year 1782.)

 AS Satan was taking an airing one day
Columbia's fair genius fell plump in his way,
Array'd like a goddess, and blooming as May.

Vile monster, said she, you oppose me in vain,
My people shall surely their wishes obtain;
You can but perplex us — and so mark the end on't,
For, sooner or later they'll be independant. 

What you say, quoth the fiend, I confess is too true,
But why not allow the poor devil his due?
Give me one of your states, and the rest shall be free
To follow their fate, unmolested by me.

Agreed! said the lady, if that's all you want,
Here take and enjoy it — it is my Vermont.

Oh! ho! exclaim'd Satan, how gen'rous you've grown,
So kindly to give, what's already my own.
So thank you for nothing, fair lady, I trow
The Devil is not to be bamboozled so. 
Come — down with your dust — you know what I mean.
I must have at least one of your fav'rite Thirteen.

A tear in her eye, and a sigh from her breast
The doubts and the fears of the genius confest;
But while she was puzzled, unable to find
Which state might with ease be to Satan resign'd,
The Five per cent. impost law popt in her mind.
This settled the point — she look'd up with a smile and
Presented his Fiendship the state of RHODE ISLAND.
He seiz'd the fair prize — cramm'd it into his pocket,
And darted away in a blaze, like a rocket.

H.

"A Fair Bargain" was widely reprinted from the Columbian Magazine, for example in the Delaware Courant on May 12, 1787; Worcester Magazine Vol. 3, No. 8 (Fourth week in May, 1787), page 95; Country Journal and Poughkeepsie Advertiser, July 4, 1787; and American Museum Vol. 4 (August 1788), page 87.

Attributed to "Hopkinson" in the important anthology of early American poetry titled, The Beauties of Poetry, British and American (Philadelphia, 1791):

•  http://name.umdl.umich.edu/N17951.0001.001

Throughout his political career Hopkinson wrote poetry and satire on the politically derisive [divisive] issues of the day. He penned a popular and humorous work on the 1787 Constitutional Convention. He was also an accomplished harpsichordist and composer. His work “My Days Have Been So Wondrous Free,” set to the words of Thomas Parnell’s “Love and Innocence,” is the first extant secular song by a native American composer. --Penn University Archives & Records Center

Without reference to Hopkinson, "A Fair Bargain" is counted with poems that Mary S. Van Deusen would ascribe, tentatively and conjecturally, to her ancestor Henry Livingston, Jr.

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Gansevoort Melville at Tammany Hall, 1842

TYRANTS PROSTRATE LIBERTY TRIUMPHANT. 
1844 polemic applauding Democratic support of the Dorrite cause
Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

In 1843 the New York Express recalled that Gansevoort Melville's "first debut as a public orator was in favor of Dorr the Rhode Island runaway” ("Great Mass Meeting of Irish Repealers in the Park"; reprinted in the Richmond Whig on June 20, 1843).

Below we find Gansevoort arguing for the extension of democratic voting rights in Rhode Island in what must be one of his earliest political speeches, close in time and theme to that "first debut" in support of Thomas Wilson Dorr and the Dorr Rebellion.

From the New York Weekly Herald, April 30, 1842; reprinted from the New York Herald of Thursday, April 28, 1842:

Non-Extraordinary Meeting in Tammany Hall--Root Beer Crisis in Rhode Island.

A very curious, cool, dispassionate, hard, unenthusiastic meeting, was held on Wednesday at Tammany Hall, relative to the present crisis in the affairs of pretty little Rhode Island. The Hall was about half full. There was a great deal of talk, but no cider—we mean enthusiasm. It had more the appearance of a root-beer assemblage—gathered together to “head off Captain Tyler,” in a small way, about his letter to the Governor of Rhode Island; but the lion-spirit of the democracy did not shake his mane, nor give a roar worth a button….

MR. MELVILLE then rose, and said he was sorry Eli Moore and Mr. Parmentier were not there. They could speak so much better than him, and so could Aaron Vanderpoel. [Cheers.] He labored under great disadvantages. [Cheers] The worthy Chairman was great at compression. [Cheers] He was not. [Cheers] This meeting would assure Rhode Island of the sympathy of New York. Freemen should not be coerced into a charter which the people had despised and rejected—That charter dates from 1683. It’s the last relic of British oppression in this country. (Cheers) The people of Rhode Island had so much wisdom and purity, that they had borne it so long. Its two obvious features were inequality of representation and the property qualification. Portsmouth with 1700 inhabitants sent as many men to the Assembly as Providence with 23,000. The property qualification is a freehold real estate qualification. And a man can’t vote for a legislator, although they tax him as much as they please. This struggle began thirty years ago. In 1829 petitions poured into the Assembly, and they were laughed at, and insult was added to injury. Since then the people toiled. In 1841, a spirit was provoked, that will never be allayed till the people get universal suffrage. [Cheers.] Here Mr. Melville went into a history of the late troubles in Rhode Island, and the rejection of the Assembly’s constitution by 676 votes. He also denounced the Algerine Act, and called it an act for the propagation of constructive treason generally. The people have rightfully elected officers under their constitution. The others chose to live under Charles’s charter, who though dead 200 years, has still some very dutiful subjects now living in Rhode Island. And who was Charles 2d? A pitiful, profligate abandoned fellow, who, if he was living now in New York, couldn’t be elected Constable even for the 6th Ward; and his appropriate sphere, would be behind the counter of a perfumer’s store dealing out essences to the moustached fools and loungers of Broadway—(Cheers.)—or else he’d be in a brothel with panderers, procurers, and pimps. (Tremendous cheers) The great point contended for by the people of Rhode Island was a universal free suffrage. This had been tried in 22 States out of 26, and works well. Their opponents insist on a property qualification. And what is wealth? The sweat of the poor and the blood of the brave. (Cheers.) This is the old Federal plan to detract the capacity of the people for self government. But the tide of public opinion is sweeping on. Can they stand up against it? Let them try it if they dare. When they shall have rolled back the Amazon, and damned it up with bulrushes, and shaken the Andes to their base, then they may do it, but not before. (Cheers.