The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 3 (of 9)

Chapter XXII: Section 1: I can assure you with truth, that we meet you on this (5)

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When I embarked in the government, it was with a determination to intermeddle not at all with the Legislature, and as little as possible with my co-departments. The first and only instance of variance from the former part of my resolution, I was duped into by the Secretary of the Treasury, and made a tool for forwarding his schemes, not then sufficiently understood by me; and of all the errors of my political life, this has occasioned me the deepest regret. It has ever been my purpose to explain this to you, when, from being actors on the scene, we shall have become uninterested spectators only. The second part of my resolution has been religiously observed with the War Department; and as to that of the Treasury, has never been further swerved from than by the mere enunciation of my sentiments in conversation, and chiefly among those who, expressing the same sentiments, drew mine from me. If it has been supposed that I have ever intrigued among the members of the Legislature to defeat the plans of the Secretary of the Treasury, it is contrary to all truth. As I never had the desire to influence the members, so neither had I any other means than my friendships, which I valued too highly to risk by usurpation on their freedom of judgment, and the conscientious pursuit of their own sense of duty. That I have utterly, in my private conversations, disapproved of the system of the Secretary of the Treasury, I acknowledge and avow; and this was not merely a speculative difference. His system flowed from principles adverse to liberty, and was calculated to undermine and demolish the Republic, by creating an influence of his department over the members of the Legislature. I saw this influence actually produced, and its first fruits to be the establishment of the great outlines of his project by the votes of the very persons who, having swallowed his bait, were laying themselves out to profit by his plans; and that had these persons withdrawn, as those interested in a question ever should, the vote of the disinterested majority was clearly the reverse of what they made it. These were no longer the votes then of the representatives of the people, but of deserters from the rights and interests of the people; and it was impossible to consider their decisions, which had nothing in view but to enrich themselves, as the measures of the fair majority, which ought always to be respected. If, what was actually doing, begat uneasiness in those who wished for virtuous government, what was further proposed was not less threatening to the friends of the Constitution. For, in a report on the subject of manufactures, (still to be acted on,) it was expressly assumed that the General Government has a right to exercise all powers which may be for the _general welfare_, that is to say, all the legitimate powers of government; since no government has a legitimate right to do what is not for the welfare of the governed. There was, indeed, a sham limitation of the universality of this power _to cases where money is to be employed_. But about what is it that money cannot be employed? Thus the object of these plans, taken together, is to draw all the powers of government into the hands of the general Legislature, to establish means for corrupting a sufficient corps in that Legislature to divide the honest votes, and preponderate, by their own, the scale which suited, and to have the corps under the command of the Secretary of the Treasury, for the purpose of subverting, step by step, the principles of the Constitution which he has so often declared to be a thing of nothing, which must be changed. Such views might have justified something more than mere expressions of dissent, beyond which, nevertheless, I never went. Has abstinence from the department, committed to me, been equally observed by him? To say nothing of other interferences equally known, in the case of the two nations, with which we have the most intimate connections, France and England, my system was to give some satisfactory distinctions to the former, of little cost to us, in return for the solid advantages yielded us by them; and to have met the English with some restrictions which might induce them to abate their severities against our commerce. I have always supposed this coincided with your sentiments. Yet the Secretary of the Treasury, by his cabals with members of the Legislature, and by high-toned declamations on other occasions, has forced down his own system, which was exactly the reverse. He undertook, of his own authority, the conferences with the ministers of those two nations, and was, on every consultation, provided with some report of a conversation with the one or the other of them, adapted to his views. These views, thus made to prevail, their execution fell, of course, to me; and I can safely appeal to you, who have seen all my letters and proceedings, whether I have not carried them into execution as sincerely as if they had been my own, though I ever considered them as inconsistent with the honor and interest of our country. That they have been inconsistent with our interest is but too fatally proved by the stab to our navigation given by the French. So that if the question be by whose fault is it that Colonel Hamilton and myself have not drawn together? the answer will depend on that to two other questions, whose principles of administration best justify, by their purity, conscientious adherence? and which of us has, notwithstanding, stepped farthest into the control of the department of the other?

To this justification of opinions, expressed in the way of conversation, against the views of Colonel Hamilton, I beg leave to add some notice of his late charges against me in Fenno's Gazette; for neither the style, matter, nor venom of the pieces alluded to, can leave a doubt of their author. Spelling my name and character at full length to the public, while he conceals his own under the signature of "An American," he charges me, 1st. With having written letters from Europe to my friends to oppose the present Constitution, while depending. 2d. With a desire of not paying the public debt. 3d. With setting up a paper to decry and slander the government. 1st. The first charge is most false. No man in the United States, I suppose, approved of every tittle in the Constitution: no one, I believe, approved more of it than I did, and more of it was certainly disapproved by my accuser than by me, and of its parts most vitally republican. Of this the few letters I wrote on the subject (not half a dozen I believe) will be a proof; and for my own satisfaction and justification, I must tax you with the reading of them when I return to where they are. You will there see that my objection to the Constitution was, that it wanted a bill of rights securing freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom from standing armies, trial by jury, and a constant habeas corpus act. Colonel Hamilton's was, that it wanted a king and house of lords. The sense of America has approved my objection and added the bill of rights, not the king and lords. I also thought a longer term of service, insusceptible of renewal, would have made a President more independent. My country has thought otherwise, I have acquiesced implicitly. He wishes the General Government should have power to make laws binding the States in all cases whatsoever. Our country has thought otherwise: has he acquiesced? Notwithstanding my wish for a bill of rights, my letters strongly urged the adoption of the Constitution, by nine States at least, to secure the good it contained. I at first thought that the best method of securing the bill of rights would be for four States to hold off till such a bill should be agreed to. But the moment I saw Mr. Hancock's proposition to pass the Constitution as it stood, and give perpetual instructions to the representatives of every State to insist on a bill of rights, I acknowledged the superiority of his plan, and advocated universal adoption. 2d. The second charge is equally untrue. My whole correspondence while in France, and every word, letter and act on the subject, since my return, prove that no man is more ardently intent to see the public debt soon and sacredly paid off than I am. This exactly marks the difference between Colonel Hamilton's views and mine, that I would wish the debt paid to-morrow; he wishes it never to be paid, but always to be a thing wherewith to corrupt and manage the Legislature. 3d. I have never enquired what number of sons, relatives and friends of Senators, Representatives, printers or other useful partisans Colonel Hamilton has provided for among the hundred clerks of his department, the thousand excisemen, at his nod, and spread over the Union; nor could ever have imagined that the man who has the shuffling of millions backwards and forwards from paper into money and money into paper, from Europe to America, and America to Europe, the dealing out of treasury secrets among his friends in what time and measure he pleases, and who never slips an occasion of making friends with his means, that such an one, I say, would have brought forward a charge against me for having appointed the poet, Freneau, translating clerk to my office, with a salary of 250 dollars a year. That fact stands thus. While the government was at New York I was applied to on behalf of Freneau to know if there was any place within my department to which he could be appointed. I answered there were but four clerkships, all of which I found full, and continued without any change. When we removed to Philadelphia, Mr. Pintard, the translating clerk, did not choose to remove with us. His office then became vacant. I was again applied to there for Freneau, and had no hesitation to promise the clerkship for him. I cannot recollect whether it was at the same time, or afterwards, that I was told he had a thought of setting up a newspaper there. But whether then, or afterwards, I considered it a circumstance of some value, as it might enable me to do, what I had long wished to have done, that is, to have the material parts of the Leyden Gazette brought under your eye, and that of the public, in order to possess yourself and them of a juster view of the affairs of Europe than could be obtained from any other public source. This I had ineffectually attempted through the press of Mr. Fenno, while in New York, selecting and translating passages myself at first, then having it done by Mr. Pintard, the translating clerk, but they found their way too slowly into Mr. Fenno's papers. Mr. Bache essayed it for me in Philadelphia, but his being a daily paper, did not circulate sufficiently in the other States. He even tried, at my request, the plan of a weekly paper of recapitulation from his daily paper, in hopes that that might go into the other States, but in this too we failed. Freneau, as translating clerk, and the printer of a periodical paper likely to circulate through the States (uniting in one person the parts of Pintard and Fenno), revived my hopes that the thing could at length be effected. On the establishment of his paper, therefore, I furnished him with the Leyden Gazette, with an expression of my wish that he could always translate and publish the material intelligence they contained, and have continued to furnish them from time to time, as regularly as I received them. But as to any other direction or indication of my wish how his press should be conducted, what sort of intelligence he should give, what essays encourage, I can protest, in the presence of heaven, that I never did by myself, or any other, or indirectly, say a syllable, nor attempt any kind of influence. I can further protest, in the same awful presence, that I never did, by myself, or any other, directly or indirectly, write, dictate or procure any one sentence or sentiment to be inserted _in his, or any other gazette_, to which my name was not affixed or that of my office. I surely need not except here a thing so foreign to the present subject as a little paragraph about our Algerine captives, which I put once into Fenno's paper. Freneau's proposition to publish a paper, having been about the time that the writings of Publicola, and the discourses on Davila, had a good deal excited the public attention, I took for granted from Freneau's character, which had been marked as that of a good whig, that he would give free place to pieces written against the aristocratical and monarchical principles these papers had inculcated. This having been in my mind, it is likely enough I may have expressed it in conversation with others, though I do not recollect that I did. To Freneau I think I could not, because I had still seen him but once, and that was at a public table, at breakfast, at Mrs. Elsworth's, as I passed through New York the last year. And I can safely declare that my expectations looked only to the chastisement of the aristocratical and monarchical writers, and not to any criticisms on the proceedings of government. Colonel Hamilton can see no motive for any appointment, but that of making a convenient partizan. But you, Sir, who have received from me recommendations of a Rittenhouse, Barlow, Paine, will believe that talents and science are sufficient motives with me in appointments to which they are fitted; and that Freneau, as a man of genius, might find a preference in my eye to be a translating clerk, and make good title to the little aids I could give him as the editor of a gazette, by procuring subscriptions to his paper, as I did some before it appeared, and as I have with pleasure done for the labors of other men of genius. I hold it to be one of the distinguishing excellences of elective over hereditary successions, that the talents which nature has provided in sufficient proportion, should be selected by the society for the government of their affairs, rather than that this should be transmitted through the loins of knaves and fools, passing from the debauches of the table to those of the bed. Colonel Hamilton, alias "Plain Facts," says, that Freneau's salary began before he resided in Philadelphia. I do not know what quibble he may have in reserve on the word "residence." He may mean to include under that idea the removal of his family; for I believe he removed himself, before his family did, to Philadelphia. But no act of mine gave commencement to his salary before he so far took up his abode in Philadelphia, as to be sufficiently in readiness for the duties of the office. As to the merits or demerits of his paper, they certainly concern me not. He and Fenno are rivals for the public favor. The one courts them by flattery, the other by censure, and I believe it will be admitted that the one has been as servile, as the other severe. But is not the dignity, and even decency of government committed, when one of its principal ministers enlists himself as an anonymous writer or paragraphist for either the one or the other of them? No government ought to be without censors; and where the press is free, no one ever will. If virtuous, it need not fear the fair operation of attack and defence. Nature has given to man no other means of sifting out the truth, either in religion, law, or politics. I think it as honorable to the government neither to know, nor notice, its sycophants or censors, as it would be undignified and criminal to pamper the former and persecute the latter. So much for the past, a word now of the future.

When I came into this office, it was with a resolution to retire from it as soon as I could with decency. It pretty early appeared to me that the proper moment would be the first of those epochs at which the Constitution seems to have contemplated a periodical change or renewal of the public servants. In this I was confirmed by your resolution respecting the same period; from which, however, I am happy in hoping you have departed. I look to that period with the longing of a wave-worn mariner, who has at length the land in view, and shall count the days and hours which still lie between me and it. In the meanwhile, my main object will be to wind up the business of my office, avoiding as much as possible all new enterprise. With the affairs of the Legislature, as I never did intermeddle, so I certainly shall not now begin. I am more desirous to predispose everything for the repose to which I am withdrawing, than expose it to be disturbed by newspaper contests. If these however cannot be avoided altogether, yet a regard for your quiet will be a sufficient motive for my deferring it till I become merely a private citizen, when the propriety or impropriety of what I may say or do, may fall on myself alone. I may then, too, avoid the charge of misapplying that time which now, belonging to those who employ me, should be wholly devoted to their service. If my own justification, or the interests of the republic shall require it, I reserve to myself the right of then appealing to my country, subscribing my name to whatever I write, and using with freedom and truth the facts and names necessary to place the cause in its just form before that tribunal. To a thorough disregard of the honors and emoluments of office, I join as great a value for the esteem of my countrymen, and conscious of having merited it by an integrity which cannot be reproached, and by an enthusiastic devotion to their rights and liberty, I will not suffer my retirement to be clouded by the slanders of a man whose history, from the moment at which history can stoop to notice him, is a tissue of machinations against the liberty of the country which has not only received and given him bread, but heaped its honors on his head. Still, however, I repeat the hope that it will not be necessary to make such an appeal. Though little known to the people of America, I believe, that as far as I am known, it is not as an enemy to the Republic, nor an intriguer against it, nor a waster of its revenue, nor prostitutor of it to the purposes of corruption, as the "American" represents me; and I confide that yourself are satisfied that as to dissensions in the newspapers, not a syllable of them has ever proceeded from me, and that no cabals or intrigues of mine have produced those in the Legislature, and I hope I may promise both to you and myself, that none will receive aliment from me during the short space I have to remain in office, which will find ample employment in closing the present business of the department.

Observing that letters written at Mount Vernon on the Monday, and arriving at Richmond on the Wednesday, reach me on Saturday, I have now the honor to mention that the 22d instant will be the last of our post days that I shall be here, and consequently that no letter from you after the 17th, will find me here. Soon after that I shall have the honor of receiving at Mount Vernon your orders for Philadelphia, and of there also delivering you the little matter which occurs to me as proper for the opening of Congress, exclusive of what has been recommended in former speeches, and not yet acted on. In the meantime and ever I am, with great and sincere affection and respect, dear Sir your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO ARCHIBALD STUART, ESQ.

Monticello, September 9, 1792.

Dear Sir,--I wrote you a long letter from Philadelphia early in the summer, which would not have been worth recurring to, but that I therein asked the favor of you to sound Mr. Henry on the subject you had written to me on, to wit, the amendment of our Constitution, and to find whether he would not approve of the specific amendments therein mentioned, in which case the business would be easy. If you have had any conversation with him on the subject, I will thank you for the result. As I propose to return from my present office at the close of the ensuing session of Congress, and to fix myself once more at home, I begin to feel a more immediate interest in having the Constitution of our country fixed, and in such a form as will ensure a somewhat greater certainty to our laws, liberty and property, the first and last of which are now pretty much afloat, and the second not out of the reach of every enterprise. I set out for Philadelphia about the 20th, and would therefore be happy to hear from you before that. I am, with great and sincere esteem, dear Sir, your constant friend and servant.

TO MR. CLAY.

Monticello, September 11, 1792.

Dear Sir,--Your favor of August 8th, came duly to hand, and I should with pleasure have done what you therein desired, as I ever should what would serve or oblige you; but from a very early moment of my life I determined never to intermeddle with elections of the people, and have invariably adhered to this determination. In my own county, where there have been so many elections in which my inclinations were enlisted, I yet never interfered. I could the less do it in the present instance, your people so very distant from me, utterly unknown to me, and to whom I am also unknown; and above all, I a stranger, to presume to recommend one who is well known to them. The people could not but put this question to me, "who are you, pray?" In writing the letter to you on the former occasion, I went further than I had ever before done, but that was addressed to yourself to whom I had a right to write, and not to persons either unknown to me, or very capable of judging for themselves. I have so much reliance on your friendship and candor as not to doubt you will approve of my sentiments on this occasion, and be satisfied they flow from considerations respecting myself only, and not you to whom I am happy in every occasion of testifying my esteem. I hope to see you in Bedford about May next, and am with great attachment, dear Sir, your friend and servant.

TO EDWARD RANDOLPH, ESQ.

Monticello, September 17, 1792.

My Dear Sir,--The last post brought me your favor of the 26th of August; but it brought me at the same time so much business to be answered by return of post, and which did not admit of delay, that I was obliged to postpone the acknowledgment of yours. I thank you sincerely for what respects myself. Though I see the pen of the Secretary of the Treasury plainly in the attack on me, yet, since he has not chosen to put his name to it, I am not free to notice it as his. I have preserved through life a resolution, set in a very early part of it, never to write in a public paper without subscribing my name, and to engage openly an adversary who does not let himself be seen, is staking all against nothing. The indecency too, of newspaper squabbling between two public ministers, besides my own sense of it, has drawn something like an injunction from another quarter. Every fact alleged under the signature of "an American" as to myself, is false, and can be proved so; and perhaps will be one day. But for the present, lying and scribbling must be free to those mean enough to deal in them, and in the dark. I should have been setting out to Philadelphia within a day or two; but the addition of a grandson and indisposition of my daughter, will probably detain me here a week longer. My best respects to Mrs. Randolph, and am, with great and sincere esteem, dear Sir, your affectionate friend and servant.

TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

Monticello, September 18, 1792--2 o'clock, P.M.

Dear Sir,--Your express is this moment arrived with the Proclamation on the proceedings against the laws for raising a revenue on distilled spirits, and I return it herein enclosed with my signature. I think if, instead of the words "to render laws dictated by weighty reasons of public exigency and policy as acceptable as possible," it stood "to render the laws as acceptable as possible," it would be better. I see no other particular expressions which need alteration. I am sincerely sorry to learn that such proceedings have taken place; and I hope the Proclamation will lead the persons concerned into a regular line of application which may end either in an amendment of the law, if it needs it, or in their conviction that it is right. Your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO C. C. PINCKNEY, ESQ.

Philadelphia, October 8, 1792.

Sir,--I found on my return here three days ago, your favor of April 6th, and am happy to learn from it that the Agricultural Society has adopted the plan of employing a person at Marseilles to raise and send olive trees to them annually. Their success in South Carolina cannot be doubted, and their value is great. Olive grounds in France rent higher by the acre than those of any other growth in the kingdom, which proves they yield the greatest nett produce. Marseilles is the proper place for your nurseryman to be fixed, because it is the neighborhood of the best olives; and Mr. Cathalan the properest person to whom we can commit the whole superintendence, because he is our consul, is concerned in our commerce, eager to extend it, is a good man, a wealthy one, and has offered his services repeatedly in this business. He was brought up in a counting-house in London, is connected there, and therefore I think that the most convenient place on which to enable him to draw for the expenditures. This may be either by an annual letter of credit to him on some house there for any sum not exceeding fifty guineas, or a standing letter of credit for that annual sum till your further orders. I would advise that he should never be suffered to be in advance for the society, that there may be no motive for his being cool in the business. If you think proper to write to Mr. Cathalan merely to open the correspondence with him, enclosing him a letter of credit, and referring him to me for the mode of conducting the enterprise, I will enclose it to him with proper instructions as to the mode. My reason for this caution is that from my knowledge of circumstances, and from what has already passed between him and me, I can fix him at once as to a moderate scale of expense which I know to be sufficient, and which he might transcend under the idea that this is a public enterprise, supported by powerful and wealthy gentlemen. A copy of my letter shall be sent to you, so that you may make any alterations in the plan which may be agreeable to your ideas of the business, in the course of your future correspondence with Mr. Cathalan; and I shall at all future times be ready to do anything further in my power to promote the object. I am happy that while I was in the olive country I enquired for and procured the best book on the subject of the olive tree, which I now deliver to Mr. Smith for the use of the society. I suspect that the excrescence on your olive trees, described in your letter, is what they call the leprosy, which prevails among these plants I believe in every country. I have the honor to be, with great respect and esteem, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO MR. PINCKNEY.

Philadelphia, October 12, 1792.

Dear Sir,--Your favor of August the 7th came to hand on the 6th instant, and gave me the first certain information of your safe arrival. Mr. Otto being about to sail for London, furnishes me with an opportunity of sending the newspapers for yourself and Mr. Barclay, and I avail myself of it chiefly for this purpose, as my late return from Virginia and the vacation of Congress furnishes little new and important for your information. With respect to the Indian war, the summer has been chiefly employed on our part in endeavoring to persuade them to peace, in an abstinence from all offensive operations, in order to give those endeavors a fairer chance, and in preparation for activity the ensuing season, if they fail. I believe we may say these endeavors have all failed, or probably will do so. The year has been rather a favorable one for our agriculture. The crops of small grain were generally good. Early frosts have a good deal shortened those of tobacco and Indian corn, yet not so as to endanger distress. From the south my information is less certain, but from that quarter you will be informed through other channels. I have a pleasure in noting this circumstance to you, because the difference between a plentiful and a scanty crop more than counterpoises the expenses of any campaign. Five or six plentiful years successively, as we have had, have most sensibly ameliorated the condition of our country, and uniform laws of commerce, introduced by our new government, have enabled us to draw the whole benefits of our agriculture.

I enclose you the copy of a letter from Messrs. Blow and Milhaddo, merchants of Virginia, complaining of the taking away of their sailors on the coast of Africa, by the commander of a British armed vessel. So many instances of this kind have happened, that it is quite necessary that their government should explain themselves on the subject, and be led to disavow and punish such conduct. I leave to your discretion to endeavor to obtain this satisfaction by such friendly discussions as may be most likely to produce the desired effect, and secure to our commerce that protection against British violence which it has never experienced from any other nation. No law forbids the seamen of any country to engage in time of peace on board a foreign vessel; no law authorizes such seamen to break his contract, nor the armed vessels of his nation to interpose force for his rescue. I shall be happy to hear soon that Mr. B. has gone on the service on which he was ordered.

I have the honor to be, with great and sincere esteem, dear Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO MESSRS. CARMICHAEL AND SHORT.

Philadelphia, October 14, 1792.

Gentlemen,--Since my letters of March the 18th and April the 24th (which have been retarded so unfortunately), another subject of conference and convention with Spain has occurred. You know that the frontiers of her provinces, as well as of our States, are inhabited by Indians holding justly the right of occupation, and leaving to Spain and to us only the claim of excluding other nations from among them, and of becoming ourselves the purchasers of such portions of land, from time to time, as they may choose to sell. We have thought, that the dictates of _interest_ as well as _humanity_, enjoined mutual endeavors with those Indians to live in peace with both nations, and we have scrupulously observed that conduct. Our agent with the Indians bordering on the territories of Spain, has a standing instruction to use his best endeavors to prevent them from committing acts of hostility against the Spanish settlements. But whatever may have been the conduct or orders of the _government_ of Spain, that of their officers in our neighborhood has been indisputably unfriendly and hostile to us. The papers enclosed will demonstrate this to you. That the Baron de Carondelet, their chief Governor at New Orleans, has excited the Indians to war on us, that he has furnished them with abundance of arms and ammunition, and promised them whatever more shall be necessary, I have from the mouth of him who had it from his own mouth. In short, that he is the sole source of a great and serious war now burst out upon us, and from Indians who, we know, were in peaceable dispositions towards us till prevailed on by him to commence the war, there remains scarcely room to doubt. It has become necessary that we understand the real policy of Spain in this point. You will therefore be pleased to extract from the enclosed papers such facts as you think proper to be communicated to that court, and enter into friendly but serious expostulations on the conduct of their officers; for we have equal evidence against the commandants of other posts in West Florida, though they being subordinate to Carondelet, we name him as the source. If they disavow his conduct, we must naturally look to their treatment of him as the sole evidence of their sincerity. But we must look further. It is a general rule, that no nation has a right to keep an agent within the limits of another, without the consent of that other, and we are satisfied it would be best for both Spain and us, to abstain from having agents or other persons in our employ or pay among the savages inhabiting our respective territories, whether as subjects or independent. You are, therefore, desired to propose and press a stipulation to that effect. Should they absolutely decline it, it may be proper to let them perceive that as the right of keeping agents exists on both sides or on neither, it will rest with us to reciprocate their own measures. We confidently hope that these proceedings are unauthorized by the government of Spain, and in this hope, we continue in the dispositions formerly expressed to you, of living on terms of the best friendship and harmony with that country, of making their interests in our neighborhood our own, and of giving them every proof of this, except the abandonment of those essential rights which you are instructed to insist on.

I have the honor to be, with great and sincere esteem, Gentlemen, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO G. MORRIS, ESQ.

Philadelphia, October 15, 1792.

Sir,--I have duly received your favor of July 10, No. 4, but no other number preceding or subsequent. I fear, therefore, that some miscarriage has taken place. The present goes to Bordeaux, under cover to Mr. Fenwick, who, I hope, will be able to give it a safe conveyance to you. I observe that you say in your letter, that "the marine department is to treat with you for supplies to St. Domingo." I presume you mean "supplies of _money_," and not that our government is to furnish supplies of _provisions_, specifically, or employ others to do it; this being a business into which they could not enter. The payment of money here, to be employed by their own agents in purchasing the produce of our soil, is a desirable thing. We are informed by the public papers, that the late constitution of France, formally notified to us, is suspended, and a new convention called. During the time of this suspension, and while no legitimate government exists, we apprehend we cannot continue the payments of our debt to France, because there is no person authorized to receive it and to give us an unobjectionable acquittal. You are, therefore, desired to consider the payment as suspended, until further orders. Should circumstances oblige you to mention this (which it is better to avoid if you can), do it with such solid reasons as will occur to yourself, and accompany it with the most friendly declarations that the suspension does not proceed from any wish in us to delay the payment, the contrary being our wish, nor from any desire to embarrass or oppose the settlement of their government in that way in which their nation shall desire it; but from our anxiety to pay this debt justly and honorably, and to the persons really authorized by the nation (to whom we owe it) to receive it for their use. Nor shall this suspension be continued one moment after we can see our way clear out of the difficulty into which their situation has thrown us. That they may speedily obtain liberty, peace, and tranquillity, is our sincere prayer.

The present summer is employed by us in endeavors to persuade the Indians to peace, and to prepare for the ensuing campaign, if our endeavors for peace should fail. That they will fail, we have reason to expect, and consequently that the expenses of our armament are to continue for some time. Another plentiful year added to the several others which we have successively had, is some consolation under these expenses. Very early frosts, indeed, have somewhat shortened the productions of the autumn.

I have the honor to be, with great respect and esteem, dear Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO M. DE TERNANT.

Philadelphia, October 16, 1792.

Sir,--I am to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 9th instant, proposing a stipulation for the abolition of the practice of privateering in times of war. The benevolence of this proposition is worthy of the nation from which it comes, and our sentiments on it have been declared in the treaty to which you are pleased to refer, as well as in some others which have been proposed. There are in those treaties some other principles which would probably meet the approbation of your government, as flowing from the same desire to lessen the occasions and the calamities of war. On all of these, as well as on those amendments to our treaty of commerce which might better its conditions with both nations, and which the National Assembly of France has likewise brought into view on a former occasion, we are ready to enter into negotiation with you, only proposing to take the whole into consideration at once. And while contemplating provisions which look to the event of war, we are happy in feeling a conviction that it is yet at a great distance from us, and in believing that the sentiments of sincere friendship which we bear to the nation of France are reciprocated on their part. Of these our dispositions, be so good as to assure them on this and all other occasions; and to accept yourself those sentiments of esteem and respect with which I have the honor to be, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO MESSRS. VIAR AND JAUDENES, _Commissioners of Spain_.

Philadelphia, November 1, 1792.

Gentlemen,--I have now to acknowledge the receipt of your favor of October the 29th, which I have duly laid before the President of the United States; and in answer thereto, I cannot but observe that some parts of its contents were truly unexpected. On what foundation it can be supposed that we have menaced the Creek nation with destruction during the present autumn, or at any other time, is entirely inconceivable. Our endeavors, on the contrary, to keep them at peace, have been earnest, persevering and notorious, and no expense has been spared which might attain that object. With the same views to peace, we have suspended, now more than a twelvemonth, the marking a boundary between them and us, which had been fairly, freely and solemnly established with the chiefs whom they had deputed to treat with us on that subject; we have suspended it, I say, in the constant hope that taking time to consider it in the councils of their nation, and recognizing the justice and reciprocity of its conditions, they would at length freely concur in carrying it into execution. We agree with you, that the interests which either of us have in the proceedings of the other with this nation of Indians, is a proper subject of discussion at the negotiations to be opened at Madrid, and shall accordingly give the same in charge to our commissioners there. In the meantime, we shall continue sincerely to cultivate the peace and prosperity of all the parties, being constant in the opinion, that this conduct, reciprocally observed, will most increase the happiness of all.

I have the honor to be, with sentiments of great esteem and respect, Gentlemen, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO THE PRESIDENT.

Philadelphia, November 2, 1792.

Sir,--The letter of October the 29th, from Messrs. Viar and Jaudenes, not expressing the principle on which their government interests itself between the United States and the Creeks, I thought it of importance to have it ascertained. I therefore called on those gentlemen, and entered into explanations with them. They assured me, in our conversation, that supposing all question of boundary to be out of the case, they did not imagine their government would think themselves authorized to take under their protection, any nations of Indians living within limits confessed to be ours; and they presumed that any interference of theirs, with respect to the Creeks, could only arise out of the question of disputed territory, now existing between us; that, on this account, some part of our treaty with the Creeks had given dissatisfaction. They said, however, that they were speaking from their own sentiments only, having no instructions which would authorize them to declare those of their court; but that they expected an answer to their letters covering mine of July the 9th, (erroneously cited by them as of the 11th,) from which they would probably know the sentiments of their court. They accorded entirely in the opinion, that it would be better that the two nations should mutually endeavor to preserve each the peace of the other, as well as their own, with the neighboring tribes of Indians.

I shall avail myself of the opportunity by a vessel which is to sail in a few days, of sending proper information and instructions to our commissioners on the subject of the late, as well as of the future, interferences of the Spanish officers to our prejudice with the Indians, and for the establishment of common rules of conduct for the two nations.

I have the honor to be, with the most perfect respect and attachment, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO MESSRS. CARMICHAEL AND SHORT.

Philadelphia, November 3, 1792.

Gentlemen,--I wrote you on the 14th of last month; since which some other incidents and documents have occurred, bearing relation to the subject of that letter. I therefore now enclose you a duplicate of that letter.

Copy of a letter from the Governor of Georgia, with the deposition it covered of a Mr. Hull, and an original passport, signed by Olivier, wherein he styles himself commissary for his Catholic Majesty with the Creeks.

Copy of a letter from Messrs. Viar and Jaudenes to myself, dated October the 29th, with that of the extract of a letter of September the 24th, from the Baron de Carondelet to them.

Copy of my answer of No. 1, to them, and copy of a letter from myself to the President, stating a conversation with those gentlemen.

From those papers you will find that we have been constantly endeavoring, by every possible means, to keep peace with the Creeks; that in order to do this, we have even suspended and still suspend the running a fair boundary between them and us, as agreed on by themselves, and having for its object the precise definition of their and our lands, so as to prevent encroachment on either side, and that we have constantly endeavored to keep them at peace with the Spanish settlements also; that Spain on the contrary, or at least the officers of her governments, since the arrival of the Baron de Carondelet, have undertaken to keep an agent among the Creeks, have excited them and the other southern Indians to commence a war against us, have furnished them with arms and ammunition for the express purpose of carrying on that war, and prevented the Creeks from running the boundary which would have removed the cause of difference from between us. Messrs. Viar and Jaudenes explain the ground of interference on the fact of the Spanish claim to that territory, and on an article in our treaty with the Creeks, putting themselves under our protection. But besides that you already know the nullity of their pretended claim to the territory, they had themselves set the example of endeavoring to strengthen that claim by the treaty mentioned in the letter of the Baron de Carondelet, and by the employment of an agent among them. The establishment of our boundary, committed to you, will, of course, remove the grounds of all future pretence to interfere with the Indians _within our territory_, and it was to such only that the treaty of New York stipulated protection; for we take for granted, that Spain will be ready to agree to the principle, that neither party has a right to stipulate protection or interference with the Indian nations inhabiting the territory of the other. But it is extremely material also, with sincerity and good faith, to patronize the peace of each other with the neighboring savages. We are quite disposed to believe that the late wicked excitements to war, have proceeded from the Baron de Carondelet himself, without any authority from his court. But if so, have we not reason to expect the removal of such an officer from our neighborhood, as an evidence of the disavowal of his proceedings? He has produced against us a serious war. He says in his letter, indeed, that he has suspended it. But this he has not done, nor possibly can he do it. The Indians are more easily engaged in a war than withdrawn from it. They have made the attack in force on our frontiers, whether with or without his consent, and will oblige us to a severe punishment of their aggression. We trust that you will be able to settle principles of a friendly concert between us and Spain, with respect to the neighboring Indians; and if not, that you will endeavor to apprize us of what we may expect, that we may no longer be tied up by principles, which, in that case, would be inconsistent with duty and self-preservation.

I have the honor to be, with sentiments of perfect esteem and respect, Gentlemen, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

TO THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

Philadelphia, November 3, 1792.

Sir,--In order to enable you to lay before Congress the account required by law of the application of the moneys appropriated to foreign purposes through the agency of the Department of State, I have now the honor to transmit to you the two statements, Nos. 1 and 2, herein enclosed, comprehending the period of two years preceding the 1st day of July last.

The first statement is of the sums paid from the Treasury under the act allowing the annual fund of $40,000 for the purpose of foreign intercourse, as also under the acts of March 3, 1791, c. 16, and May 1792, c. 41, 5, 3, allowing other sums for special purposes. By this it will appear, that, except the sum of $500 paid to Colonel Humphreys on his departure, the rest has all been received in bills of exchange, which identical bills have been immediately remitted to Europe, either to those to whom they were due for services, or to the bankers of the United States in Amsterdam, to be paid out by them to persons performing services abroad. This general view has been given in order to transfer the debt of these sums from the Department of State to those to whom they have been delivered.

But in order to give to Congress a view of the specific application of these moneys, the particular accounts rendered by those who have received them, have been analyzed, and the payments made to them have been reduced under general heads, so as to show at one view the amount of the sums which each has received for every distinct species of service or disbursement, as well as their several totals. This is the statement No. 2, and it respects the annual fund of $40,000 only, the special funds of the acts of 1791 and 1792, having been not yet so far administered as to admit of any statement.

I had presented to the Auditor the statement No. 1, with the vouchers, and also the special accounts rendered by the several persons who have received these moneys, but, on consideration, he thought himself not authorized, by any law, to proceed to their examination. I am, therefore, to hope, Sir, that authority may be given to the Auditor, or some other person, to examine the general account and vouchers of the Department of State, as well as to raise special accounts against the persons into whose hands the moneys pass, and to settle the same from time to time on behalf of the public.

I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most perfect respect and attachment, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.

THE DEPARTMENT OF STATE IN ACCOUNT WITH THE U. S.

Dr.
-------------+----------------------------------------------+---------
1790 Aug. 14 | To a warrant from the Treasury |
| under the Act for foreign |
| intercourse (1790, July 1) | $ 500
Dec. 20 | To the Treasurer's Exchange on |
| Will. V. Staph. |
| & Hub. under do. x $ |
| 2475.0 = 1000. | |
| To do. 577-10 = 233.33| |
1791 Mar. 19 | To do. 99,000 =| 40,000
May 7 | To do. under Act of |
| March 3, 1791, c. 16 32,175 =| 13,000
1792 Jan. 27 | To do. under Act |
| for foreign |
| intercourse 95,947-10 = 38,766,67| |
| ---------------------| | 40,000
| 99,000 = 40,000 | |
June 30 | To do. under the Act of 1792, |
| May 8, c. 41, 5, 3 123,750| 50,000
| |---------
| | $143,500

======================================================================
Cr.
-------------+----------------------------------------------+---------
1790 Aug. 14 | By paid Col. Humphreys on his mission to |
| Madrid, (as by his receipt) |$ 500
Dec. 17 | By remittance to Mr. G. Morris, |
| (as by his letter, |
| Feb. 26, 91), |
| the bill per contra x |
| for 2475 = $1,000|
| By do. to J. B. Cutting, |
| (as by papers given |
| in to Congress,) the |
| bill per contra for 577-10 = $233-1/3|
1791 Mar. 19 | By do. to Will V. Staphorsts |
| & Hub., (as by |
| their account, June 10, 91), |
| the bill per contra for 99,000 =| 40,000
May 13 | By do. to do. subject to |
| Humphreys & Barclay, |
| (as by their receipt,) |
| the bill per contra for 32,175 =| 13,000
1792 Jan. 23 | By do. to do., (as by their |
| account, April 10, 92), |
| the bill per contra for 95,947 = 38,766-2/3|
| -------------------|
| 99,000 = 40,000 | 40,000
July 3 | By do. to do. subject to J. Pinckney for |
| purposes of Act May 8, 92, |
| the bill per contra for 123,750| 50,000
| |---------
| | $143,500

_Analyses of the Expenses of the United States for their intercourse
with Foreign Nations from July 1, 1790, to July 1, '91,
and from July 1, '91, to July 1, '92, taken from the accounts
of Messrs. Short, Humphreys, Morris, Pinckney, Willincks,
Van Staphorsts, Hubbard, given to the auditor._

(a) Contingencies, viz., Gazettes, &c. to dept. of state, printing, poor
seamen, &c.

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