The Newburgh Conspiracy was a plot hatched in 1783 near the end of the American Revolutionary War resulting from the fact that many of the officers and men of the Continental Army had not received pay for many years.

Background

With the end of the war and dissolution of the Continental Army approaching, soldiers, many of whom were now deeply in debt due to their pro bono service, imagined that Congress would not meet previous promises concerning back pay and pensions. Congress, at the mercy of the states for all revenue, did not seem to have any way of paying more than a fraction of the money owed. The result was that, by March 1783, many officers were talking of launching a coup and setting up martial law to secure what had been promised to them.

The winter of 1783 marked the end of hostilities between the young nation and Britain, but a formal peace treaty had not yet been signed. Most of the Continental Army was camped near Newburgh, New York, where they maintained a watchful eye on the British, who still occupied New York City, some sixty miles to the south; any hint that there was turmoil in the Continental Army might have induced the British to attack and re-establish control over their former colonies.

Soldiers were paying for much of their own supplies, they had not been paid in eight months, and the Continental officers had been promised a pension of half their pay when they were discharged. At this point, the officers organized under the leadership of General Henry Knox and sent a delegation to lobby Congress; the delegation was headed by Alexander MacDougall. The officers had three demands: the Army's pay, their own pensions, and the option of commutation of those pensions into a lump-sum payment.

Actions of Congress

The officers' warning reached the Congress amid seemingly fortuitous political circumstances. Those members of Congress who supported a stronger central government, prominently Robert Morris, Gouverneur Morris, and Alexander Hamilton, saw providence in the Army's statement of discontent. MacDougall was a New York acquaintance of Hamilton; the Congressmen later approached Knox, and John Armstrong, aide to General Horatio Gates, through Captain John Brooks, one of MacDougall's colleagues.

In the Congressmen's thinking, the officers' demands for payment (and the threat therein) could be employed to push Congress and the states into granting the national government the power to tax imports, which these nationalists saw as absolutely critical to the long-term survival of the Union. Some of these members approached ranking generals in the army, proposing that the army be used to cajole Congress and the states into creating an impost or duty. General Horatio Gates may have agreed to involve himself, though this remains unclear. Generals George Washington and Henry Knox also were approached; Knox remained quiet for a long time.

Hamilton and the Morrises encouraged both MacDougall and Knox to continue an aggressive approach, threatening unknown consequences if their demands were not granted, and resolving to defy civil authority, at least by not disbanding on command if the army were not satisfied; meanwhile, the Congressmen defeated proposals which would have resolved the crisis without establishing general Federal taxation: that the states assume the debt to the army, or that an impost be established but dedicated to the sole purpose of paying that debt. They did not advocate the impractical step of the army actually taking over Congress.

Washington's involvement

Washington, in response to a letter from Hamilton, a former aide-de-camp of his, let Hamilton know that while he sympathized both with the plight of his officers and men and with those in Congress, he would not use the army to threaten the civil government, a course which Washington believed would end badly for the country. A small group of officers, led by John Armstrong, Jr., aide to Major General Horatio Gates, attempted to forestall Washington's intervention, viewing him as too moderate; they would have forcibly installed Gates in his place as Commander-in-Chief. They published placards, the Newburgh Addresses, calling for support.
Washington called a meeting of his officers on 15 March 1783 that Gates was supposed to chair. It was held in the "New Building", a 40 by 70 foot (12 by 21 m) building at the camp. After Gates opened the meeting, Washington entered the building to everyone's surprise. He asked to speak to the officers, and the stunned Gates relinquished the floor. Washington could tell by the faces of his officers, who had not been paid for quite some time, that they were quite angry and did not show the respect or deference that they had in the past toward Washington.

Washington then gave a short but impassioned speech to his officers, called the Newburgh Address, trying to persuade them to be patient with Congress. Washington, however, after finishing the speech, felt that the officers were unmoved. He then took a letter from his pocket from a member of Congress to read to the officers. Instead of reading it immediately, he gazed upon it and fumbled with it without speaking. He then took a pair of reading glasses from his pocket, which were new and few of the men had seen him wear them. He then said: "Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost blind in the service of my country." This caused the men to realize that Washington had sacrificed a great deal for the Revolution, just as much as any of them. These, of course, were his fellow officers, most having worked closely with him for several years. Many of those present were moved to tears, and with this act, the conspiracy collapsed as he read the letter. He then left the room and General Henry Knox and others offered resolutions reaffirming their loyalty, which were accepted by the group.

End of the war

It was just over a month later, on April 19, 1783, that the General Orders of the day announced the end of hostilities against Great Britain. Over the next couple of months, much of the Continental Army was furloughed and simply faded away, effectively disbanding much of the army. The official disbanding came in the following November, and left only a small force at West Point and some small detachments to man several scattered frontier outposts. The issue of the back pay and pensions of the officers and men would not be resolved for many years. Attempts by Congress to create an impost duty to finance the central government shortly after the affair would yet again fail. It was eventually left to the Constitutional Convention of 1787 to rectify these issues of governance.