In another letter, written the same day, General Smith rehearsed the story in a few words, which proved that Smith had a full share of the shrewdness that was lacking in Jefferson. He saw the future as clearly as politicians often saw what philosophers overlooked; but his jealousy of Jefferson appeared in every word:[306]—
“The Senate, agreeably to the first construction (given by General Washington and his Administration, of which Jefferson was one,—given, too, immediately after the knowledge of what was the intention of the convention that framed it), did unanimously advise the President to negotiate a treaty with Great Britain. The Senate agreed to his nomination of the negotiators. A treaty was effected. It arrives. It is well known that he was coerced by the Senate to the measure; and he refuses to submit it to their approbation. What a responsibility he takes! By sending it back he disgraces his ministers, and Monroe is one. Monroe and Pinkney come home, and in justification publish the treaty. It may appear good to the eyes of all unprejudiced men,—I suspect it will. By a refusal to accede to it the British continue their depredations, to the amount perhaps of their whole system of ‘You shall not trade in time of war where you are refused in time of peace;’ the impressment is carried to an excess bounded only by their power; immense losses are sustained; a general outcry will ensue; all will say, ‘If Monroe’s treaty had succeeded, those losses would not have happened; why was it refused?’ Jealousy of Monroe, and unreasonable antipathy by Jefferson and Madison to Great Britain!—this will be said, this will be believed. And Monroe will be brought forward; new parties will arise, and those adverse politically will be brought together by interest.... Shall we put all to jeopardy because we have not got all we ask? Will we go to war? No! What will we do to coerce? More non-importation. Will Congress under such circumstances consent to continue their non-importation? I suspect not; I cannot believe they will. Then where shall we be? J. Randolph will take his stand and ask, ‘Shall we hazard everything for a set of men who, etc.? What, put the landed interest to such inconvenience! The fair merchant is satisfied; the country is flourishing,’ etc. But I have not time to make a speech. Monroe will be called a martyr, and the martyr will be the President. And why? Because he has done right, and his opponent has advised wrong. The people care little or nothing about the seamen.”
The more closely the subject was studied the more clearly it appeared that Monroe had to all appearance knowingly embarrassed the Administration by signing a treaty in contravention of the President’s orders; but Jefferson added unnecessarily to his embarrassment by refusing the treaty before he read it. Tacit abandonment of impressments was the utmost concession that the President could hope from England, and even this he must probably fight for; yet he refused to consult the Senate on the merits of Monroe’s treaty for a reason which would have caused the withholding of every treaty ever made with England. That the public should be satisfied with this imperious treatment was an extravagant demand. No act of Jefferson’s administration exposed him to more misinterpretation, or more stimulated a belief in his hatred of England and of commerce, than his refusal to lay Monroe’s treaty before the Senate.
Perhaps the President would have been less decided had he known at first how faulty the treaty was. Not until it had been studied for weeks did all its faults become evident; and not until it was read in the light of Lord Howick’s Order in Council did its character admit of no more doubt. When news of this order reached Washington, about ten days after the treaty, Madison wrote to Erskine a letter[307] which showed an effort to treat the new restriction of neutral trade as though it might have some shadow of legality in the background, and as though it were not directed solely against America; but the truth soon became too evident for such mild treatment, and Madison was obliged ten days afterward to interrupt his study of Monroe’s treaty in order to tell Erskine that the operation of the new order “would be a proceeding as ruinous to our commerce as contrary to our essential rights.”[308]
To Monroe the President wrote with the utmost forbearance and kindness.[309] Instead of reproaching, Jefferson soothed the irritation of his old friend, contradicted newspaper reports which were calculated to wound Monroe’s feelings, and pressed upon him the government of New Orleans Territory: “It is the second office in the United States in importance, and I am still in hopes you will accept it; it is impossible to let you stay at home while the public has so much need of talents.” I regard to the treaty he said little; but what he did say was more severe than any criticism yet made to others. “depend on it, my dear Sir, that it will be considered as a hard treaty when it is known. The British commissioners appear to have screwed every Article as far as it would bear,—to have taken everything and yielded nothing.” He urged Monroe, if nothing better could be got, “to back out of the negotiation” as well as he could, letting it die insensibly, and substituting some informal agreement until a more yielding temper should rise. Next the President wrote privately to Bowdoin, his wandering minister to Spain, to whom Armstrong had shut the doors of the legation at Paris for betraying its secrets, and who in return was abusing Armstrong with recriminations. If a quarrel should arise with England, it might at least be made to bring Florida again within reach.
“I have but little expectation,” wrote the President to Bowdoin,[310] “that the British government will retire from their habitual wrongs in the impressment of our seamen, and am certain that without that we will never tie up our hands by treaty from the right of passing a non-importation or non-intercourse Act to make it her interest to become just. This may bring on a war of commercial restrictions. To show, however, the sincerity of our desire for conciliation, I have suspended the Non-importation Act. This state of things should be understood at Paris, and every effort used on your part to accommodate our differences with Spain under the auspices of France, with whom it is all important that we should stand in terms of the strictest cordiality. In fact we are to depend on her and Russia for the establishment of neutral rights by the treaty, of peace, among which should be that of taking no persons by a belligerent out of a neutral ship, unless they be the soldiers of an enemy. Never did a nation act toward another with more perfidy and injustice than Spain has constantly practised against us; and if we have kept our hands off of her till now, it has been purely out of respect to France, and from the value we set on the friendship of France. We expect, therefore, from the friendship of the Emperor that he will either compel Spain to do us justice or abandon her to us. We ask but one month to be in possession of the city of Mexico.”
In reality Jefferson needed somewhat more than a month to be in possession of Mexico, although the Spaniards might without much difficulty have reached New Orleans in less time. Had the Federalist press been able to print the letter to Bowdoin, with its semi-admissions of intent to wage a commercial war against England in dependence upon Napoleon in order to gain the Floridas, the scandal would have been as great as that caused by the famous letters to Mazzei and Paine; but in truth this flighty talk had no influence or importance, and the time was close at hand when Jefferson was to become helpless. Between the will of England and France on one side and the fixed theories of Virginia and Pennsylvania on the other, Jefferson’s freedom of action disappeared.
Madison, who rarely accepted either horn of a dilemma with much rapidity, labored over new instructions to Monroe which were to make the treaty tolerable, and called Gallatin and General Smith to his aid, with no other result than to uncover new and insuperable difficulties. April 20 he wrote to Jefferson at Monticello:[311]—
“The shape to be given to the instructions to our commissioners becomes more and more perplexing. I begin to suspect that it may eventually be necessary to limit the treaty to the subject of impressments, leaving the colonial trade, with other objects, to their own course and to the influence which our reserved power over our imports may have on that course. In practice the colonial trade and everything else would probably be more favored than they are by the Articles forwarded, or would be by any remodifications to be expected. The case of impressments is more urgent. Something seems essential to be done, nor is anything likely to be done without carrying fresh matter in the negotiation. I am preparing an overture to disuse British seamen, in the form of an ultimatum, graduated from an exception of those who have been two years in our navigation to no exception at all other than such as have been naturalized.”
A few days later news arrived that the Whigs had been driven from office, and a high Tory ministry had come into power. Madison was more than ever perplexed, but did not throw aside his treaty.