In 1791, Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury, instituted an excise tax on distilled spirits made in the United States. He and President Washington did not predict that the tax would upset farmers. Hamilton's goal was to reduce the federal debt after the Revolutionary War, and he thought the excise tax was one way to do so. Anti-federalists opposed this tax, as they thought it gave the federal government too much power. Farmers in western Pennsylvania refused to pay the tax, as they grew rye, corn, and other crops that were used in making alcohol. In 1794, they mounted the Whiskey Rebellion, in which 400 rebels set fire to a tax collector's house near Pittsburgh. Washington called up over almost 13,000 militiamen to put down the rebellion, and the specter of so many troops coming to attack dispersed the rebels and ended their rebellion. This was the first test that the federal government could put down a domestic insurrection. In 1802, President Thomas Jefferson repealed the excise tax.