Jefferson could not help admiring the tenacity of the Assemblée Nationale, but at the same time estimated that they were going too far and had formed projects that were decidedly too ambitious. "Instead of being dismayed with what has passed, they seem to rise in their demands, and some of them to consider the erasing of every vestige of a difference of order as indispensable to the establishment and preservation of a good constitution. I apprehend there is more courage than calculation in this project."[220]
A letter of Lafayette to Jefferson dated Versailles, July 4, contains an interesting postscriptum: "Will you send me the bill of Rights with your notes." A subsequent letter is even more pressing: "To-morrow I propose my bill of rights about the middle of the sitting; be pleased to consider it again and make your observations." As Lafayette introduced his "Déclaration Européenne des droits de l'homme et du citoyen" on July 11, 1789, the latter may be dated July 10. I had the good fortune to find in the Jefferson papers not one text but two of the Declaration.
One of the versions probably antedated by several months the meeting of the National Assembly. Jefferson had it in his hands as early as the beginning of 1799 and he even sent a copy of it to Madison on January 12.[221] The second text, far more important, was annotated by Jefferson in pencil. Although the handwriting is faint, it is perfectly legible. The emendations and corrections he suggested are quite characteristic, and are studied more in detail in the text I have published elsewhere.[222]
Some of the modifications suggested by Jefferson do not require any comment; they are mere verbal changes such as the substitution of "tels sont" for "tels que". But as Lafayette had enumerated among the essential rights of man "le soin de son honneur" and "la propriété", Jefferson put both terms in brackets, thus indicating that they should be taken out. The elimination of the first term is probably due to the fact that Montesquieu had indicated that "honneur" is the main principle on which rests monarchical government and is easily understandable. The elimination of the "droit de propriété" can only be explained if we refer to the document in which Jefferson had "explained to himself" his theory of natural rights, and established a distinction between the natural rights and the civil rights. Lafayette accepted the first correction but not the second; he was too much under the influence of his physiocratic friends even to understand the much more advanced theory of Jefferson. The project he submitted to the Assembly, as well as the three "Déclarations des droits de l'homme", consequently followed on this point the Virginia Bill of Rights rather than the Declaration of Independence.
In a similar way, Lafayette had listed the powers constituting the government in the following order: "exécutif, législatif et judiciaire", and refused to follow the order suggested by Jefferson's "législatif, exécutif, judiciaire". This was more than a mere question of arrangement; there was evidently in the minds of both Jefferson and his French friend a question of hierarchy and almost subordination; if it is a mere nuance, the nuance was very significant. The last paragraph deserves even more careful consideration. In the January version it read: "Et comme le progrès des lumières, et l'introduction des abus nécessitent de temps en temps une revision de la constitution...." The second edition annotated by Jefferson expressed the same idea in much more definite terms: "Et comme le progrès des lumières, l'introduction des abus et le droit des générations qui se succèdent nécessitent la révision de tout établissement humain, il doit être indiqué des moyens constitutionnels qui assurent dans certain cas une convocation extraordinaire de représentants dont le seul objet soit d'examiner et modifier, s'il le faut, la forme du Gouvernement." This mention of the "droit des générations qui se succèdent" seems a typically Jeffersonian idea. The same theory will be found fully developed in a letter to Samuel Kercheval written in 1816 and dealing with the revision of the Constitution of Virginia. It was expressed originally in a letter to James Madison, written from Paris on September 9, 1789. Curiously enough, Jefferson declared then that this theory had never been proposed before: "The question whether one generation of men has a right to bind another, seems never to have been started on this or on our side of the water. Yet it is a question of such consequence as not only to merit decision, but places also the fundamental principles of every government."[223] It is true that this special point was not retained in the "Déclaration des droits de l'homme" as finally adopted by the Assemblée Nationale in its sessions of August, 1789, although it was proposed by Montmorency and reappeared as the last article of the "Déclaration" of the Convention Nationale of May 29, 1793. But one may wonder how Jefferson could overlook the fact that the same principle was embodied in Lafayette's "Declaration." It is very unlikely that he would have claimed credit for the idea if it had been originated by his friend. A more acceptable explanation would be to admit that having suggested to Lafayette a theory which was not retained by the committee, he felt perfectly free to state that "the question had never been started."
The American plenipotentiary was not an eye-witness of the famous scenes of the fourteenth of July, or as he calls it "the tumult of Paris", but he learned about it fully from M. de Corny, and wrote to Jay a long and interesting account (July 19) of the capture of La Bastille, the return of the king to Paris and the presentation of the national cockade.[224]
In the meantime he was placed in a very embarrassing situation by his French admirers. The prestige of the author of the Declaration of Independence was such that the committee in charge of a plan of constitution thought they could do no better than to call into consultation the Minister of the United States. Champion de Cicé, Archbishop of Bordeaux and chairman of the committee, sent him an urgent appeal to attend one of the first meetings, so that they might profit by the light of his reason and experience.[225] Jefferson, after mentioning the invitation, relates the incident in his "Autobiography" as follows: "I excused myself on the obvious considerations that my mission was to the King, as chief magistrate of the nation, that my duties were limited to the concerns of my own country, and forbade me to intermeddle with the internal transactions of that, in which I had been received under a specific charter." This may be the sense he wished to convey to Champion de Cicé but the actual letter is far less categorical. Contrary to his custom he wrote it himself, although it is in French, alleging that the dispatches for America took all his time and adding that the committee would lay themselves open to criticism if they invited to their deliberations a foreigner accredited to the head of the nation, when the very question under discussion was a modification and abridgement of his powers. But he assured the archbishop of his most sincere and most passionate wishes for the complete success of the undertaking, which was certainly stretching diplomatic proprieties to the limit.
The deliberations of the committee went on without Jefferson's official assistance; but shortly after the project of the constitution was presented, the deputies came to a deadlock on the veto power to be given to the king. After some stormy meetings, Lafayette conceived the idea that the house of the Minister of the United States was the only place near Versailles where some tranquillity could be obtained. He consequently invited eight of his friends to take dinner at the house of Jefferson, and having no time to consult him on the matter, scribbled a note in great hurry to ask Jefferson to make the necessary preparations for the unexpected guests: "Those gentlemen wish to consult with you and me; they will dine to-morrow at your house, as mine is always full."[226]
Jefferson has given a somewhat embellished account of the memorable dinner in his "Autobiography." The mention of it in a letter to John Jay a few weeks later is less florid and probably more accurate.[227] The members of the committee discussed together their points of difference for six hours, and in the course of the discussion agreed on mutual sacrifices. Writing from memory, at the age of seventy-seven, Jefferson added: "I was a silent witness to a coolness and candor of argument, unusual in the conflicts of political opinion; to a logical reasoning, and chaste eloquence, disfigured by no gaudy tinsel of rhetoric or declamation, and truly worthy of being placed in parallel with the finest dialogues of antiquity, as handed to us by Xenophon, by Plato and Cicero."[228]
Whether Jefferson remained a silent witness during these six hours is not so improbable as it would seem. It may well be doubted whether his knowledge of French was sufficient to enable him to participate in an animated discussion with eight Frenchmen. Under the circumstances silence was as much a necessity as a virtue. But when the American minister woke up the next morning he realized that it was impossible to keep the thing secret and that the French Government had every right to blame him for lending his house for a discussion of French internal politics. Unpleasant as it was, the only thing to do was to make a clean breast of it. He went at once to Montmorin to tell him "with truth and candor how it happened that my house had been made the scene of conferences of such a character."—"He told me," Jefferson continued, "that he already knew everything which had passed," which is the stock answer of the professional diplomat, whether he wishes to appear well-informed or wants to draw some further information from his interlocutor. Jefferson opened his heart, and if Montmorin did not know everything before giving audience to the American minister, there was little he did not know after hearing his account of the dinner.