Thomas Jefferson, the Apostle of Americanism

by Gilbert Chinard

Thus spoke Jefferson in July, 1803, and Woodrow Wilson, who borrowed more than one page from the book of his predecessor, expressed himself in almost the same words one hundred and eleven years later. Thus, also, would probably speak any President of the United States should a new conflagration break out to-morrow. This, to be sure, was no proclamation of neutrality and none was needed at the time; but had Jefferson written one, he could scarcely have expressed himself more forcibly than he did in a letter sent two days later to General Horatio Gates: "We are friendly, cordially and conscientiously friendly to England. We are not hostile to France. We will be rigorously just and sincerely friendly to both."

But this fine declaration did not make Jefferson forget the immediate interests of the United States, for the preoccupation uppermost in his mind at that time was to find out how the European situation could be used to the best advantage of his own country.

In signing the treaty France had refused to give any guarantee as to the extent of the territory ceded under the Louisiana Purchase. Whether the cession included West Florida, on the occupation of which Jefferson had been so intent, was a matter of doubt. This particular point had not been pressed during the negotiations, France, according to the old maxim caveat emptor, taking the position that the question lay between the United States and Spain, while the United States had never abandoned the hope that they would be able to induce Bonaparte to exert pressure on Madrid so as to enable the American Government to make the most of the transaction. Soon after the treaty was signed, the United States found themselves enmeshed in one of the most complicated intrigues of European diplomacy.

While Madison and Jefferson were negotiating in Washington with the Spanish minister Yrujo, Pinkney and later Monroe negotiated in Madrid, sometimes at cross purposes but without ever losing sight of the main object. Jefferson had renewed his old contention that the United States were entitled to "all the navigable waters, rivers, creeks, bays, and inlets lying within the United States, which empty into the Gulf of Mexico east of the River Mississippi." As Henry Adams remarked, this was a most remarkable provision, as "no creeks, bays, or inlets lying within the United States emptied into the Gulf."[460] But if Jefferson's geography was faulty, his intent was perfectly clear, and every opportunity was to be used to round out the perimeter of the United States. When in October, 1804, Monroe reached Paris to push negotiations more vigorously, the plans of the United States had crystallized. They had a beautiful simplicity: to make Spain pay the claims resulting from the shutting-up of the Mississippi by Morales, to take immediate possession of Western Florida and to obtain the cession of Eastern Florida.

With the details of the diplomatic maneuvers we are not concerned here, but rather with the remarkable proposal made by Jefferson to Madison during the summer of 1805. Spain having declared war against England, the President, fearful of being "left without an ally", thought immediately of proposing "a provisional alliance with England" (August 7, 1805). This alliance was to be conditional and would become effective only in case the United States should have to declare war against France or Spain. "In that event," wrote Jefferson, "we should make common cause, and England should stipulate not to make peace without our obtaining the objects for which we go to war, to wit, the acknowledgment by Spain of the rightful boundaries of Louisiana (which we should reduce to a minimum by a secret article) and 2, indemnification for spoliation, for which purpose we should be allowed to make reprisal on the Floridas and retain them as an indemnification." Jefferson added that "as it was the wish of every Englishman's heart to see the United States fighting by their sides against France", the king and his ministers could do no better than to enter into an alliance and the nation would consider it "as the price and pledge of an indissoluble friendship."[461] There is little doubt that if, at this juncture, Monroe had maneuvered more skillfully, if England had showed less arrogance in her treatment of the United States, she could have secured at least the benevolent neutrality of America. But apparently England did not care for a benevolent neutrality. After Trafalgar, she was left undisputed mistress of the ocean, she could enforce her own regulations as she pleased, and she proceeded to do so.

The presidential message of December 3, 1805, had to present very "unpleasant views of violence and wrong." The coasts of America were infested by "private armed vessels, some of them with commissions, others without commissions", all of them committing enormities, sinking American merchantmen, "maltreating the crews, abandoning them in boats in the open seas or on desert shores." The same policy of "hovering on the coast" was carried on by "public armed vessels." New principles, too, had been "interloped into the law of nations, founded neither in justice nor in the usage or acknowledgment of nations"; this was an allusion to the decision of Judge Scott in the Essex case. With Spain negotiations had not had a satisfactory issue, propositions for adjusting amicably the boundaries of Louisiana had not been acceded to, and spoliation claims formerly acknowledged had again been denied.

The President concluded that, although peace was still the ultimate ideal of the United States, there were circumstances which admitted of no peaceful remedy. Some evils were "of a nature to be met by force only, and all of them may lead to it." Finally specific recommendations were made to organize the national defense: furnishing the seaports with heavy cannon, increasing the number of gunboats, classifying the militia so as to have ready a competent number of men "for offence or defence in any point where they may be wanted", prohibition of the exportations of arms and ammunition,—such were the chief measures contemplated by the President.

In the spring of 1806, he wrote a long letter to Alexander of Russia, who had manifested a desire to have a copy of the Constitution of the United States. This was an appeal to the Czar, insisting that special articles defining the rights of neutrals in time of war be inserted in the definitive treaty of peace sooner or later to be concluded between the European belligerents. Having taken no part in the troubles of Europe, "the United States would have no part in its pacification", but it was to be hoped that some one would be found "who, looking beyond the narrow bounds of an individual nation, will take under the cover of his equity the rights of the absent and unrepresented."[462] Unfortunately, more than ten years were to elapse before that pacification of Europe so earnestly hoped for by Jefferson came about, and only a week before the British ministry had again aggravated regulations against the neutrals by issuing orders blockading the coast of the continent (April 8, 1806).

A few weeks later, Jefferson who, yielding to the pressure of Congress, had agreed to appoint a special envoy to help Monroe negotiate a commercial treaty with England, sent William Pinkney of Maryland to London. "He has a just view of things, so far as known to him," wrote Jefferson to Monroe, but he did not deem it desirable to trust him with special instructions. For Monroe alone he reserved the complete exposition of the plans then brooding in his mind. The death of Pitt would probably mark a change in the attitude of Great Britain; the President had more confidence in Mr. Fox than in any other man in England and relied entirely on "his honesty and good sense." Then came an outline of the reasoning to be put forward by Monroe: "No two countries upon earth have so many points of common interests and friendship; and their rulers must be great bunglers indeed, if, with such dispositions, they break them asunder." England might check the United States a little on the ocean; but she should realize that nothing but her financial limitations prevented America from having a strong navy. If France provided the money, so as to equip an American fleet, the state of the ocean would be no longer problematical. If England, on the contrary, made such a proposition, an alliance of the two largest fleets "would make the world out of the continent of Europe our joint monopoly." Then Jefferson added: "we wish for neither of these scenes—We ask for peace and justice from all nations; and we will remain uprightly neutral in fact, though leaning in belief to the opinion that an English ascendency on the ocean is safer for us than that of France."

Finally, at the end of the letter, came the most extraordinarily imperialistic proposition ever made by any nation; it was the extension of a pet theory of Jefferson to the Atlantic Ocean. As he had claimed for the United States the free navigation of all the streams originating on the territory of the United States, he was ready to claim that the great current originating from the Gulf should not be considered differently, and he wrote: "We begin to broach the idea that we consider the whole Gulf Stream as of our waters, in which hostilities and cruising are to be frowned on for the present, and prohibited so soon as either consent or force will permit us."[463]