But so little had the President even yet grasped the wide sweep of the policy which his Secretary of State was framing that, when he read to the Cabinet a first draft of his annual message, he expressed his pointed disapprobation of the invasion of Spain by France and urged an acknowledgment of Greece as an independent nation. This declaration was, as Adams remarked, a call to arms against all Europe. And once again he urged the President to refrain from any utterance which might be construed as a pretext for retaliation by the allies. If they meant to provoke a quarrel with the United States, the administration must meet it and not invite it. "If they intend now to interpose by force, we shall have as much as we can do to prevent them," said he, "without going to bid them defiance in the heart of Europe." "The ground I wish to take," he continued, "is that of earnest remonstrance against the interference of the European powers by force with South America, but to disclaim all interference on our part with Europe; to make an American cause and adhere inflexibly to that." In the end Adams had his way and the President revised the paragraphs dealing with foreign affairs so as to make them conform to Adams's desires.
No one who reads the message which President Monroe sent to Congress on December 2, 1823, can fail to observe that the paragraphs which have an enduring significance as declarations of policy are anticipated in the masterly state papers of the Secretary of State. Alluding to the differences with Russia in the Pacific Northwest, the President repeated the principle which Adams had stated to Baron Tuyll: "The occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the American continents, by the free and independent condition which they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers." And the vital principle of abstention from European affairs and of adherence to a distinctly American system, for which Adams had contended so stubbornly, found memorable expression in the following paragraph:
"In the wars of the European powers in matters relating to themselves we have never taken any part, nor does it comport with our policy so to do. It is only when our rights are invaded or seriously menaced that we resent injuries or make preparations for our defense. With the movements in this hemisphere we are of necessity more immediately connected, and by causes which must be obvious to all enlightened and impartial observers. The political system of the allied powers is essentially different in this respect from that of America. This difference proceeds from that which exists in their respective Governments; and to the defense of our own, which has been achieved by the loss of so much blood and treasure, and matured by the wisdom of their most enlightened citizens, and under which we have enjoyed unexampled felicity, this whole nation is devoted. We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies and dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States."
Later generations have read strange meanings into Monroe's message, and have elevated into a "doctrine" those declarations of policy which had only an immediate application. With the interpretations and applications of a later day, this book has nothing to do. Suffice it to say that President Monroe and his advisers accomplished their purposes; and the evidence that they were successful is contained in a letter which Richard Rush wrote to the Secretary of State, on December 27, 1823:
"But the most decisive blow to all despotick interference with the new States is that which it has received in the President's Message at the opening of Congress. It was looked for here with extraordinary interest at this juncture, and I have heard that the British packet which left New York the beginning of this month was instructed to wait for it and bring it over with all speed.... On its publicity in London... the credit of all the Spanish American securities immediately rose, and the question of the final and complete safety of the new States from all European coercion, is now considered as at rest."
CHAPTER XV. THE END OF AN ERA
It was in the midst of the diplomatic contest for the Floridas that James Monroe was for the second time elected to the Presidency, with singularly little display of partisanship. This time all the electoral votes but one were cast for him. Of all the Presidents only George Washington has received a unanimous vote; and to Monroe, therefore, belongs the distinction of standing second to the Father of his Country in the vote of electors. The single vote which Monroe failed to get fell to his Secretary of State, John Quincy Adams. It is a circumstance of some interest that the father of the Secretary, old John Adams, so far forgot his Federalist antecedents that he served as Republican elector in Massachusetts and cast his vote for James Monroe. Never since parties emerged in the second administration of Washington had such extraordinary unanimity prevailed.
Across this scene of political harmony, however, the Missouri controversy cast the specter-like shadow of slavery. For the moment, and often in after years, it seemed inevitable that parties would spring into new vigor following sectional lines. All patriots were genuinely alarmed. "This momentous question," wrote Jefferson, "like a fire bell in the night, awakened and filled me with terror. I considered it at once as the knell of the Union. It is hushed, indeed, for the moment. But this is a reprieve only, not a final sentence."
What Jefferson termed a reprieve was the settlement of the Missouri question by the compromise of 1820. To the demands of the South that Missouri should be admitted into the Union as a slave State, with the constitution of her choice, the North yielded, on condition that the rest of the Louisiana Purchase north of 36 degrees 30' should be forever free. Henceforth slaveholders might enter Missouri and the rest of the old province of Louisiana below her southern boundary line, but beyond this line, into the greater Northwest, they might not take their human chattels. To this act of settlement President Monroe gave his assent, for he believed that further controversy would shake the Union to its very foundations. With the angry criminations and recriminations of North and South ringing in his ears, Jefferson had little faith in the permanency of such a settlement. "A geographical line," said he, "coinciding with a marked principle, moral and political, once conceived and held up to the angry passions of men, will never be obliterated; and every new irritation will mark it deeper and deeper." And Madison, usually optimistic about the future of his beloved country, indulged only the gloomiest forebodings about slavery. Both the ex-Presidents took what comfort they could in projects of emancipation and deportation. Jefferson would have had slaveholders yield up slaves born after a certain date to the guardianship of the State, which would then provide for their removal to Santo Domingo at a proper age. Madison took heart at the prospect opened up by the Colonization Society which he trusted would eventually end "this dreadful calamity" of human slavery. Fortunately for their peace of mind, neither lived to see these frail hopes dashed to pieces.