Life and Times of Washington, Volume 2 / Revised, Enlarged, and Enriched

by John Frederick Schroeder; Benson John Lossing

Though in reviewing the incidents of my administration I am unconscious of intentional error, I am, nevertheless, too sensible of my defects not to think it probable that I may have committed many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never cease to view them with indulgence, and, after forty-five years of my life dedicated to its service, with an upright zeal, the faults of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as myself must soon be to the mansions of rest.

Relying on its kindness in this as in other things, and actuated by that fervent love toward it, which is so natural to a man who views in it the native soil of himself and his progenitors for several generations, I anticipate with pleasing expectation that retreat, in which I promise myself to realize, without alloy, the sweet enjoyment of partaking, in the midst of my fellow-citizens, the benign influence of good laws under a free government, the ever favorite object of my heart and the happy reward, as I trust, of our mutual cares, labors, and dangers.

UNITED STATES, September 17, 1796.

The sentiments of veneration with which this farewell address was generally received were manifested in almost every part of the Union. Some of the State Legislatures directed it to be inserted at large in their journals, and nearly all of them passed resolutions expressing their respect for the person of the President, their high sense of his exalted services, and the emotions with which they contemplated his retirement from office. Although the leaders of party might rejoice at this event it produced solemn and anxious reflections in the great body, even of those who belonged to the opposition.

The person in whom alone the voice of the people could be united having declined a re-election, the two great parties in America brought forward their respective chiefs, and every possible effort was made by each to obtain the victory. Mr. John Adams and Mr. Thomas Pinckney, the late minister at London, were supported as President and Vice-President by the Federalists; the whole force of the opposite party was exerted in favor of Mr. Jefferson.

Motives of vast influence were added on this occasion to those which usually impel men in a struggle to retain or acquire power. The continuance or the change, not only of those principles on which the internal affairs of the United States had been administered, but of the conduct which had been observed toward foreign nations, was believed to depend on the choice of a chief magistrate. By one party the system of neutrality pursued by the existing administration with regard to the belligerent European powers, had been uniformly approved; by the other it had been as uniformly condemned. In the contests, therefore, which preceded the choice of electors, the justice of the complaints which were made on the part of the French republic were minutely discussed, and the consequences which were to be apprehended from her resentment or from yielding to her pretensions were reciprocally urged as considerations entitled to great weight in the ensuing election.

In such a struggle it was not to be expected that foreign powers could feel absolutely unconcerned. In November, while the parties were so balanced that neither scale could be perceived to preponderate, Mr. Adet addressed a letter to Colonel Pickering, the Secretary of State, in which he recapitulated the numerous complaints which had been urged by himself and his predecessors against the government of the United States, and reproached that government in terms of great asperity with violating those treaties which had secured its independence, with ingratitude to France, and with partiality to England. These wrongs, which commenced with the "insidious" proclamation of neutrality, were said to be so aggravated by the treaty concluded with Great Britain that Mr. Adet announced the orders of the Directory to suspend his ministerial functions with the Federal government. "But the cause," he added, "which has so long restrained the just resentment of the Executive Directory from bursting forth, now tempered its effects. The name of America, notwithstanding the wrongs of its government, still excited sweet sensations in the hearts of Frenchmen, and the Executive Directory wished not to break with a people whom they loved to salute with the appellation of friend." This suspension of his functions, therefore, was not to be regarded "as a rupture between France and the United States, but as a mark of just discontent, which was to last until the government of the United States returned to sentiments and to measures more conformable to the interests of the alliance, and to the sworn friendship between the two nations." "Let your government return to itself," concluded Mr. Adet, "and you will still find in Frenchmen faithful friends and generous allies."

As if to remove any possible doubt respecting the purpose for which this extraordinary letter was written, a copy was transmitted, on the day of its date, to a printer for publication.

This open and direct appeal of a foreign minister to the American people, in the critical moment of their election of a chief magistrate, did not effect its object. Reflecting men, even among those who had condemned the course of the administration, could not approve this interference in the internal affairs of the United States, and the opposite party resented it as an attempt to control the operations of the American people in the exercise of one of the highest acts of sovereignty, and to poison the fountain of their liberty and independence by mingling foreign intrigue with their elections. The reader of history, however, is familiar with the fact that the course of Adet in this affair was in strict accordance with the uniform practice of the new rulers of France at that time. Their agents endeavored to prejudice the people of every country in Europe against their respective governments, and never hesitated to interfere directly between the people and the government, wherever there was any prospect of introducing French ascendency by such proceedings. The people of the United States, on the present occasion, resented the officious interference of Adet in the pending election as a gross insult, and it undoubtedly aided the party which it was intended to defeat. Congress met on the 5th of December (1796). There was not a sufficient number of senators present on that day to form a quorum. In the House of Representatives, among the new members who presented themselves was Andrew Jackson, from Tennessee, the future President of the United States.

On the 7th of December Washington, for the last time, met the national Legislature in the hall of the House of Representatives. His address was comprehensive, temperate, and dignified. No personal consideration could restrain him from recommending those great national measures which he believed would be useful to his country, although open and extensive hostility had been avowed to them.