PRESIDENT JEFFERSON’S decision, in October, 1805, to retrace
his steps and reverse a policy which had been publicly and repeatedly
proclaimed, was the turning-point of his second Administration. No one
can say what might have happened if in August, 1805, Jefferson had
ordered his troops to cross the Sabine and occupy Texas to the Rio
Bravo, as Armstrong and Monroe advised. Such an act would probably
have been supported, as the purchase of Louisiana had been approved,
by the whole country, without regard to Constitutional theories; and
indeed if Jefferson succeeded to the rights of Napoleon in Louisiana,
such a step required no defence. Spain might then have declared war;
but had Godoy taken this extreme measure, he could have had no other
motive than to embarrass Napoleon by dragging France into a war with
the United States, and had this policy succeeded, President Jefferson’s
difficulties would have vanished in an instant. He might then have
seized Florida; his controversies with England about neutral trade,
blockade, and impressment would have fallen to the ground; and had
war with France continued two years, until Spain threw off the yoke
of Napoleon and once more raised in Europe the standard of popular
liberty, Jefferson might perhaps have effected some agreement with
the Spanish patriots, and would then have stood at the head of the
coming popular movement throughout the world,--the movement which he
and his party were destined to resist. Godoy, Napoleon, Pitt, Monroe,
Armstrong, John Randolph, and even the New England Federalists seemed
combined to drag or drive him into this path. Its advantages were so
plain, even at that early moment, as to overmaster for a whole summer
his instinctive repugnance to acts of force.
After long hesitation, Jefferson shrank from the step, and fell back
upon his old policy of conquering by peace; but such vacillations were
costly. To Gallatin the decision was easy, for he had ever held that
on the whole the nation could better afford a loss of dignity than a
war; but even he allowed that loss of dignity would cost something,
and he could not foretell what equivalent he must pay for escape from
a Franco-Spanish war. Neither Jefferson nor Gallatin could expect to
be wholly spared; but Madison’s position was worse than theirs, for he
had still to reckon with his personal enemies,--John Randolph, Yrujo,
and Merry,--and to overawe a _quasi_ friend more dangerous than an
enemy,--the military diplomat, Turreau.
Turreau during this summer kept his eye fixed on the Secretary of
State, and repeatedly hinted, in a manner extremely frank, that he
meant to tolerate no evasions. He wrote to Talleyrand in a tone of
cool confidence. July 9 he said that the Emperor’s measures for the
protection of Florida were sufficient:
“The intervention of France in the negotiations with Spain has
stopped everything. They have been affected by it here, but have
not shown to me any discontent at it. ‘Well,’ said Mr. Jefferson
to me lately, ‘since the Emperor wishes it, the arrangement
shall be adjourned to a more favorable time.’”
That Jefferson made this remark could be believed only by his enemies,
for it contradicted the tenor of his letters to Madison; but although
Turreau doubtless overstated the force of the words, he certainly
gave to Talleyrand the impression that the President was reduced to
obedience. The impression was enough; correct or not, it strengthened
Napoleon’s natural taste for command.
A few weeks afterward, Turreau wrote to Madison a note in regard to
General Moreau’s reception in the United States. In a tone excessively
military he said:[71]--
“General Moreau ought not (_ne doit point_) to be, in a
foreign country, the object of honors which the consideration
of his services would formerly have drawn upon him; and it is
proper (_il convient_) that his arrival and his residence
in the United States should be marked by no demonstration which
passes the bounds of hospitality.”
Madison was indignant at this interference, and proposed to resent it.
The President encouraged him to do so, on the express ground that they
had not ventured to resent the conduct of France in regard to Monroe’s
negotiation:[72]--
“The style of that government in the Spanish business was
calculated to excite indignation; but it was a case in which
that might have done injury. But the present is a case which
would justify some notice in order to let them understand we are
not of those Powers who will receive and execute mandates.”
Meanwhile General Smith, who had not resented the repudiation of
his niece by the Emperor, and to whom Madison showed the offensive
letter, undertook to soothe the irritation. “He says,” wrote Madison
in his next letter to the President,[73] “that Turreau speaks with
the greatest respect, and even affection, toward the Administration;
and such are the dispositions which it is certain he has uniformly
manifested to me.” Upon these assurances Madison toned down the
severity he had intended.
Turreau had resided hardly six months in the United States before he
announced to Talleyrand the conviction of all American politicians that
any war would end in driving from office the party which made it:[74]--
“To such an extent is the actual Administration convinced of
this fact, that it allows itself to be outraged every day by
the English, and accepts all the humiliations they care to
impose; and notwithstanding the contempt generally felt here for
Spain, against whom a war was last year quite openly provoked,
the members of the United States government have not dared to
undertake it, although sure of beginning it with public opinion
in their favor. And no one need think that this indisposition to
war depends only on the personal character and the philanthropic
principles of Mr. Jefferson, for it is shared by all the
party leaders, even by those who have most pretensions and
well-founded hopes to succeed the actual President,--such as Mr.
Madison.”
Turreau’s sketch of American character and ambition was long and
interesting, and suggested the vulnerable point where France should
throw her strength against this new people. Neither as a military nor
as a naval power did he think the United States formidable. Their
government made no concealment of its weakness:--
“They especially lack trained officers. The Americans are
to-day the boldest and the most ignorant navigators in the
universe. In brief, it seems to me that, considering the
weakness of the military constitution, the Federal government,
which makes no concealment of this weakness, will avoid every
serious difference which might lead to aggression, and will
constantly show itself an enemy to war. But does the system of
encroachment which prevails here agree with a temper so pacific?
Certainly not, at first sight; and yet unless circumstances
change, the United States will succeed in reconciling the
contradiction. To conquer without war is the first fact in their
politics (_Conquérir sans guerre, voilà les premiers faits
politiques._)”
These reflections were written early in July, 1805, before the
President and his Cabinet had begun to discuss Monroe’s failure and
the policy of a Spanish war, and more than three months before the
President wholly abandoned the thought of warlike measures. Turreau’s
vision was keen, but he had no excuse for short-sightedness. Madison
made little effort to disguise his objects or methods.
“I took occasion to express to Mr. Madison,” wrote Turreau
in the same despatch, “my astonishment that the schemes of
aggrandizement which the United States government appeared to
have, should be always directed toward the south, while there
were still in the north important and convenient territories,
such as Canada, Nova Scotia, etc. ‘Doubtless!’ replied the
secretary, ‘but the moment has not yet come! When the pear is
ripe it will fall of itself.’”
Had Turreau asked why, then, Madison gave so violent a shaking to the
Florida pear-tree, Madison must have answered, with the same candor,
that he did so because he supposed the Florida pear to be ripe. The
phrase was an admission and an invitation,--an admission that Florida
would have been left alone if Spain had been as strong as England; and
an invitation to Turreau to interpose with safety the sword of France.
Turreau could not doubt the effect of his own blunt interference.
So confident had the new French minister already become, in July,
1805, that he not only told Madison to stop these petty larcenies of
Spanish property, but also urged Napoleon to take the Floridas and
Cuba into his own hand solely to check American aggression. “I believe
that France alone can arrest these American enterprises and baffle
(_déjouer_) their plan.”
Had Turreau’s discipline stopped there, much might have been said in
his favor; but in regard to still another matter he used expressions
and made demands such as Madison never yet had heard from a diplomatic
agent, although the secretary’s experience was already considerable.
Neither Yrujo nor Merry had succeeded in giving to their remonstrances
or requests the abruptness of Napoleon’s style.
The Federalist newspapers during Jefferson’s first term had found so
little reason for charging him with subservience to France, that this
old and stale reproach had nearly lost its weight. Neither the New
England merchants whom France had plundered, and whose claims Jefferson
consented to withdraw, nor the British government or British newspapers
had thought it worth their while to press the charge that Jefferson
was led astray by love or fear of Napoleon or the Empire. Not until
the winter of 1805–1806 did the doctrine of French influence recover a
certain share of strength; but as John Randolph and his friends, who
detested Madison, were outraged by the conduct of France in Spanish
affairs, so Timothy Pickering and the whole body of Federalists, who
hated the South and the power which rested on the dumb vote of slaves,
were exasperated by the conduct of France in regard to their trade with
St. Domingo. In both cases Madison was the victim.
St. Domingo was still in name and in international law a colony of
France. Although Rochambeau surrendered himself and his few remaining
troops as prisoners of war to the English in November, 1803; although
the negroes in January, 1804, proclaimed their independence, and held
undisputed control of the whole French colony, while their ports were
open, and not an armed vessel bearing the flag of France pretended to
maintain a blockade,--yet Napoleon claimed that the island belonged
to him. General Ferrand still held points in the Spanish colony for
France, and defeated an invasion attempted by Dessalines; nor did any
government betray a disposition to recognize the black empire, or to
establish relations with Dessalines or Christophe, or with a negro
republic. On the other hand, the trade of Hayti, being profitable, was
encouraged by every government in turn; but because it was, even more
than other West Indian trade, unprotected by law, the vessels which
carried it were usually armed, and sailed in company. In the winter
of 1804–1805, soon after General Turreau’s arrival at Washington, a
flotilla armed with eighty cannon and carrying crews to the number of
seven hundred men, set sail from New York with cargoes which included
contraband of war of all kinds. Turreau remonstrated with Madison, who
assured him that a law would soon be reported for correcting this abuse.
A Bill was accordingly reported; but it prohibited only the armed
commerce and put the trade under heavy bonds for good behavior. To
answer Turreau’s object the trade must be prohibited altogether. Dr.
Logan, one of the senators from Pennsylvania, who led the Northern
democrats, with the “Aurora’s” support, in hostility to the Haytian
negroes, moved an amendment to the Bill when it came before the Senate.
He proposed to prohibit every kind of commerce with St. Domingo; and
the Senate was so closely divided as to require the casting vote of the
Vice-President. Burr gave his voice against Dr. Logan’s amendment, and
the Bill accordingly passed, March 3, 1805, leaving the unarmed trade
still open.
Turreau duly reported these matters to his Government.[75] The facts
were public, and were given needless notoriety by the merchants
themselves. On the return of the Haytian flotilla to New York, they
celebrated the event in a public dinner, and the company drank a
health to the government of Hayti. Another expedition was reported
to be preparing. General Ferrand issued severe proclamations against
the trade,[76] and Madison remonstrated strongly against Ferrand. One
armed American vessel, which had carried three cargoes of powder to
the Haytians, was taken by a British cruiser, sent into Halifax, and
there condemned by the British court as good prize for carrying on an
unlawful trade.
Early in August, 1805, after Monroe’s return to London, and while
Jefferson and Madison were discussing the problem of protecting
themselves from French designs, the Emperor Napoleon, who had
returned from Italy and gone to the camp at Boulogne, received
Turreau’s despatch, and immediately wrote in his own emphatic style to
Talleyrand:[77]--
“The despatch from Washington has fixed my attention. I request
you to send a note to the American minister accredited to me.
You will join to it a copy of the judgment [at Halifax]; and
you will declare to him that it is time for this thing to stop
(_que cela finisse_); that it is shameful (_indigne_)
in the Americans to provide supplies for brigands and to take
part in a commerce so scandalous; that I will declare good prize
everything which shall enter or leave the ports of St. Domingo;
and that I can no longer see with indifference the armaments
evidently directed against France which the American government
allows to be made in its ports.”
In this outburst of temper Napoleon’s ideas of law became confused.
The American government did not dispute his right to seize American
vessels trading with Hayti: the difficulty was that he did not or could
not do so, and for this reason he made the demand that the American
government should help him in doing what he was powerless to effect
without its aid. Talleyrand immediately wrote to Armstrong a letter
in which he tried to put the Emperor’s commands into a shape more
diplomatic, by treating the Haytians as enemies of the human race,
against whom it was right that the United States should interpose with
measures of hostility:[78]--
“As the seriousness of the facts which occasion this complaint
obliges his Majesty to consider as good prize everything which
shall enter into the part of St. Domingo occupied by the rebels,
and everything coming out, he persuades himself that the
government of the United States will take on its part, against
this commerce at once illicit and contrary to all the principles
of the law of nations, all the repressive and authoritative
measures proper to put an end to it. This system of impunity
and tolerance must last no longer (_ne pourrait durer
davantage_).”
For the third time within six months Talleyrand used the word “must”
to the President of the United States. Once the President had been
told that he must abandon his Spanish claims; then that he must
show no public respect for Moreau; finally he was told still more
authoritatively that he must stop a trade which France was unable to
stop, and which would continue in British hands if Congress should obey
Napoleon’s order. Talleyrand directed Turreau to repeat at Washington
the Emperor’s remonstrance, and Turreau accordingly echoed in Madison’s
ear the identical words, “must last no longer.”[79] His letter, to his
indignation, received no answer or notice.
Thus at the moment when Congress was to meet, Dec. 2, 1805, serious
problems awaited it. The conduct of Spain was hostile. At sea Spanish
cruisers captured American property without regard to treaty-rights;
on land Spanish armed forces made incursions from Florida and Texas at
will.[80] The conduct of France was equally menacing, for Napoleon not
only sustained Spain, but also pressed abrupt demands of his own such
as Jefferson could not hear without indignation. As though Congress had
not enough difficulty in dealing with these two Powers, Great Britain
also took an attitude which could be properly met by no resistance
short of a declaration of war.
During the whole year the conduct of England changed steadily for the
worse. The blockade of New York by the two frigates “Cambrian” and
“Leander” became intolerable, exasperating even the mercantile class,
who were naturally friendly to England, and who had most to dread
from a quarrel. On board the “Leander” was a young midshipman named
Basil Hall, who in later years described the mode of life he led in
this service, and whose account of the blockade, coming from a British
source, was less liable than any American authority to the charge of
exaggeration.
“Every morning at daybreak,” according to his story,[81] “we set
about arresting the progress of all the vessels we saw, firing
off guns to the right and left to make every ship that was
running in heave to, or wait until we had leisure to send a boat
on board ‘to see,’ in our lingo, ‘what she was made of.’ I have
frequently known a dozen, and sometimes a couple of dozen, ships
lying a league or two off the port, losing their fair wind,
their tide, and worse than all their market, for many hours,
sometimes the whole day, before our search was completed.”
An informality in papers, a suspicion of French ownership, a chance
expression in some private letter found and opened in the search,
insured seizure, a voyage to Halifax, detention for months, heavy
costs, indefinite damage to vessel and cargo, and at best release, with
no small chance of re-seizure and condemnation under some new rule
before the ship could reach port.
Such vexations were incident to a state of war. If the merchants of
New York disliked them, the merchants might always ask Government to
resent them; but in truth commerce found its interest in submission.
These vexations secured neutral profits; and on the whole the British
frigates and admiralty courts created comparatively little scandal
by injustice, while they served as a protection from the piratical
privateers of Spain and France. Madison, Gallatin, and the newspapers
grumbled and complained; but the profits of neutrality soothed the
offended merchant, and the blockade of New York was already a fixed
practice. Had the British commanders been satisfied with a moderate
exercise of their power, the United States would probably have allowed
the habit of neutral blockade to grow into a belligerent right by
prescription. Neither the mercantile class nor the government would
have risked profit or popularity on such a stake; but fortunately the
British officers steadily became more severe, and meanwhile in their
practice of impressment roused extreme bitterness among the seafaring
classes, who had nothing to gain by submission. In Basil Hall’s words,
the British officers took out of American vessels every seaman “whom
they had reason, or supposed or said they had reason, to consider”
a British subject, “or whose country they guessed from dialect or
appearance.” By these impressments American vessels were often left
short-handed, and were sometimes cast away or foundered. In such cases
the owners were greatly irritated; but commonly the exasperation was
most deeply felt by the laboring class and among the families of
seafaring men. The severity with which impressment was enforced in 1805
excited hatred toward England among people who had at best no reason to
love her. More than twenty years afterward, when Basil Hall revisited
New York, he was not surprised to find the name of his old ship, the
“Leander,” still held in detestation. Not only were the duties harsh,
but, as he frankly admitted, they were harshly performed.
After Pitt’s return to power impressments increased until they averaged
about a thousand a year. Among them were cases of intolerable outrage;
but neither President, Congress, nor people, nor even the victims
themselves, cared as a body to fight in defence of their rights and
liberties. Where an American-born citizen had been seized who could
prove his birth, Madison on receiving the documents sent them to
Monroe, who transmitted them to the British Admiralty, which ordered
an inquiry; and if the man had not been killed in action or died of
disease and hard usage, he was likely, after a year or two of service,
to obtain a release. The American-born citizen was admitted to be no
subject for impressment, and the number of such persons actually taken
was never so large as the number of British-born sailors who were
daily impressed; but both the mercantile and the national marine of
the United States were largely manned by British seamen, and could not
dispense with them. According to Gallatin’s calculation,[82] American
tonnage increased after 1803 at the rate of about seventy thousand tons
a year; and of the four thousand two hundred men required to supply
this annual increase, about two thousand five hundred were British.
If the British marine lost two thousand five hundred men annually by
desertion or engagement in the American service, even after recovering
one thousand seamen a year by impressment, the British navy made good
only a fraction of the loss. On the other hand, if the United States
government went to war to protect British seamen, America would lose
all her mercantile marine; and these same seamen for whom she was
fighting must for the most part necessarily return to their old flag,
because they would then have no other employer. The immediate result
of war must strengthen the British marine by sending back to it ten
thousand seamen whom America could no longer employ.
Nations rarely submit to injury without a motive. If Jefferson and the
Republican party, if Timothy Pickering and George Cabot, the merchants
of Boston and New York, and even the seamen themselves, rejected
the idea of war, it was because they found a greater interest in
maintaining peace. This interest consisted, as regarded England, in the
large profits realized in neutral freights. So long as the British navy
protected this source of American wealth, Americans said but little
about impressments; but in the summer of 1805 Pitt thought proper
to obstruct this source, and suddenly the whole American seaboard,
from Machias to Norfolk, burst into excitement, and demanded that the
President should do something,--they knew not what, but at moments they
seemed to ask for war.
The news of Sir William Scott’s decision in the case of the “Essex”
reached America in the month of September, while the President and
Madison were discussing an alliance with England to protect themselves
against France and Spain. The announcement that Great Britain had
suddenly begun to seize American ships by scores at the moment when
Jefferson counted most confidently on her willingness to oblige, was a
blow to the Administration so severe that a long time elapsed before
either Jefferson or Madison realized its violence. Their minds were
intent on the Spanish problem; and with the question of war pressing
upon them from the south, they did not at once perceive that another
war was actually declared against their commerce from the north.
Jefferson disliked commercial disputes, and gladly shut his eyes to
their meaning; Madison felt their importance, but was never quick to
meet an emergency.
Merry was near Philadelphia during the autumn, when Mrs. Madison’s
illness obliged the secretary to remain in that city. Early in
September Merry wrote to his Government that the complete failure of
Monroe’s Spanish mission was no secret, and that Madison expected some
collision with Spain in West Florida, but would wait for the meeting
of Congress before taking action. “Such a determination on the part of
the President,” continued Merry,[83] “is so consonant with his usual
caution and temporizing system (to which the opposition here give the
character of timidity and irresolution), that I cannot but be disposed
to give entire credit to the information.” Shortly after the date of
this despatch, news arrived that the British government had altered
its rules in regard to the neutral carrying-trade, and that British
cruisers were everywhere seizing American ships. Merry, who had not
been forewarned by Lord Mulgrave, and who had no wish to see his own
position made more uncomfortable than it already was, became uneasy.
“The sensation and clamor,” he wrote,[84] “excited by this news from
England (which has already caused the insurance on such cargoes to be
raised to four times the usual premium) is rendered the greater by
such events having been totally unexpected, and by the merchants here
having, on the contrary, considered themselves as perfectly secured
against them.” Merry saw that his Government had in the midst of peace
taken a measure which Madison could hardly fail to denounce as an act
of war. Dreading a violent explosion, the British minister waited
anxiously; but, to his surprise, nothing happened. “Although I have
seen Mr. Madison twice since the attention of the public has been so
much engaged with this object, he has not thought proper to mention it
to me.”[85] At first Merry could not account for this silence; only by
degrees was he taught to connect it with the Spanish quarrel, and to
understand that Madison hoped to conciliate England in order to overawe
France. In this play of cross-purposes Merry’s account of Madison’s
conversation was not calculated to alarm the British government:[86]--
“Before I quitted the vicinity of Philadelphia to return to
this place [Washington], I had an interview with Mr. Madison,
who having then received accounts from Mr. Monroe respecting
the detention by his Majesty’s ships of several American
vessels in consequence of their being loaded with the produce
of the enemy’s colonies, brought forward that subject to
me,--speaking upon it, however, with much more moderation than
from his natural irritability, and the sensation which it had
produced throughout this country, I could have expected on
his part. It is unnecessary for me to trouble your Lordship
by detailing to you the several observations which he made to
me to endeavor to prove the impropriety of the principle upon
which the detention of those vessels has taken place.... As I
had the honor to observe in the former part of this letter, the
American Secretary of State delivered his sentiments on this
subject with great temper, and concluded by expressing only a
wish that Mr. Monroe’s remonstrances upon it might prove so far
efficacious as at least to procure the liberation of the vessels
and cargoes which were already detained, as well as of those
which might be stopped before the new system adopted by his
Majesty’s government in regard to the trade in question should
be generally known. Our conversation afterward turned upon some
circumstances, the accounts of which had just been received,
of the recent conduct of Spain toward this country, when Mr.
Madison was much less reserved in expressing his sentiments than
on former occasions, and gave me the detail of the perfidious
and insolent proceedings of some of the Spanish officers who
still remain at New Orleans, and of others who command in the
disputed territory,--which, combined with information he had
received of the departure of four hundred troops with a quantity
of military stores from the Havana, supposed to be destined to
reinforce the garrisons in East and West Florida, and with a
report which prevailed at New Orleans of a considerable force
advancing from Mexico toward Louisiana, could not, he observed,
fail to render the differences subsisting between the two
governments still more difficult of accommodation.”
This conversation took place about the middle of October, before the
President had decided to acquiesce in the acts of Spain and France.
As a result of the high tone taken toward England in the winter of
1803–1804, the secretary’s mildness might well surprise a British
minister, who was not quick of comprehension, and required to be told
in plain language the meaning of Madison’s manœuvres. No sooner had
Merry returned to Washington than “a confidential person” was sent to
him to explain the mystery:[87]--
“On this subject it has been remarked to me by a person in a
confidential situation here that the detention of the American
vessels by his Majesty’s ships has happened very unseasonably to
divert the attention of the people of the United States and of
the Government from a proper consideration of the grievances and
injuries which they have experienced from Spain, and which the
Government were disposed and had actually taken the measures to
resent; and he conceived that when the state of the relations
between the United States and other Powers should be laid by
the President before Congress at their approaching meeting, the
circumstance abovementioned, of what is considered to be so
unfriendly a proceeding on the part of Great Britain, will have
the same effect upon the resolutions of that body by blunting
the feelings which would otherwise have been excited by the
conduct of Spain, supported by France, against this country.”
The “confidential person” usually employed by Jefferson and Madison
on such errands was either Robert or Samuel Smith; partly because
both these gentlemen were a little inclined to officiousness, partly
because they were men of the world, or what Pichon called “_hommes
fort polis_.” In this instance the agent was probably the Secretary
of the Navy. In telling the British minister that the President had
already taken measures to resist the conduct of Spain, this agent was
unwise, not so much because the assertion was incorrect, as because
Merry knew better. In the same despatch, written Nov. 3, 1805, Merry
informed his Government of the President’s hopes of an agreement with
Spain, founded on the war in Europe,--hopes which had been entertained
only ten days, since October 23. He had the best reason to be well
informed on this subject, for he drew his information directly from
Jefferson himself.
That Merry should have been exceedingly perplexed was no wonder. Two
years had elapsed since his first arrival in Washington, when he had
been harshly treated without sufficient reason, by President, Cabinet,
and Congress; and on returning to the same place in this autumn of
1805, immediately after his Government had made war on United States
commerce, he found himself received with surprising cordiality.
Immediately on his return, about October 20, he called at the White
House. Instead of finding the President in a passion, denouncing Pitt
and the British nation, as he might reasonably have expected, Merry was
delighted to find Jefferson in his most genial humor. Not a word was
said about British outrages; his conversation assumed the existence
of a close concert and alliance between England and the United
States:[88]--
“Upon my seeing the President on my return to this place a
fortnight ago, he spoke to me with great frankness respecting
the state of affairs between this country and Spain; saying that
it was possible that the accumulation of the injuries which they
had sustained might produce a resolution on the part of the
Congress to resent them. With a view to the hostile situation of
affairs, he lamented that unfortunately [notwithstanding] the
superiority of his Majesty’s naval force and the vigilance of
his officers, it had not been possible to prevent the enemy’s
fleet from crossing the Atlantic. He said that this experience
would render it necessary for the United States to proceed with
great caution and to gain time, in order to put their principal
seaports in a state of defence, for which he had already given
directions. In the event of hostilities he considered that East
and West Florida, and successively the Island of Cuba, the
possession of which was necessary for the defence of Louisiana
and Florida, as being the key to the Gulf of Mexico, would, in
the manner in which that island might and would be attacked,
be an easy conquest to them. He, however, expressed that his
individual voice would constantly be for the preservation of
peace with every Power, till it could no longer be kept without
absolute dishonor.”
Such speculations were not so practical as to affect Merry’s antipathy
to the American government, but he reported them to Lord Mulgrave
without comment, as intended to express the President’s plan in case
of a Spanish war. Meanwhile the Secretary of State was engaged in
composing a pamphlet, or book, to prove that the new rule adopted by
Great Britain was an act of bad faith, in violation of international
law. The task was not difficult.
Such was the diplomatic situation at Washington, Nov. 12, 1805, when
the Cabinet adopted Jefferson’s plan of reopening negotiations for the
purchase of Florida on the line so persistently recommended by the
irresponsible creatures of Talleyrand, and so steadily rejected to that
moment by Madison and Monroe. Congress was to meet in three weeks, and
within that time the diplomatic chaos must be reduced to order.