The continuance of the Indian war added still another item to this catalogue of discontents.
The efforts of the United States to make a treaty with the savages of the Miamis had proved abortive. The Indians insisted on the Ohio as the boundary between them and the whites; and, although the American commissioners expressed a willingness to relinquish some of the lands purchased at the treaty of fort Harmar, and pressed them to propose some line between the boundary established by that treaty and the Ohio, they adhered inflexibly to their original demand.
It was extensively believed in America, and information collected from the Indians countenanced the opinion, that they were encouraged by the government of Canada to persevere in this claim, and that the treaty was defeated by British influence. The conviction was universal that this influence would continue so long as the posts south of the lakes should be occupied by British troops; and the uneasiness which the detention of those posts created, daily acquired strength. Unfortunately, the original pretext for detaining them was not yet removed. The courts of the United States had not yet declared that British debts contracted before the war, were recoverable. In one of the circuits, a decision had been recently made, partly favourable, and partly unfavourable, to the claim of the creditor. To this decision writs of error had been brought, and the case was pending before the supreme court. The motives therefore originally assigned for holding the posts on the lakes still remained; and, as it was a maxim with the executive "to place an adversary clearly in the wrong," and it was expected that the existing impediments to the fulfilment of the treaty on the part of the United States would soon be done away, it was thought unadviseable, had the military force of the union been equal to the object, to seize those posts, until their surrender could be required in consequence of a complete execution of the treaty. In the mean time, the British minister was earnestly pressed upon the subject.
This prudent conduct was far from being satisfactory to the people. Estimating at nothing, infractions made by themselves, and rating highly those committed by the opposite party, they would, in any state of things, have complained loudly of this act of the British government. But, agitated as they were by the various causes which were perpetually acting on their passions, it is not wonderful that an increased influence was given to this measure; that it should be considered as conclusive testimony of British hostility, and should add to the bitterness with which the government was reproached for attempting a system "alike friendly and impartial to the belligerent powers."
The causes of discontent which were furnished by Spain, though less the theme of public declamation, continued to be considerable.
The American ministers at Madrid could make no progress in their negotiation. The question of limits remained unsettled, and the Mississippi was still closed against the Americans. In addition to these subjects of disquiet, the southern states were threatened with war from the Creeks and Cherokees, who were, with good reason, believed to be excited to hostility by the Spanish government. Of these irritating differences, that which related to the Mississippi was far the most operative, and embarrassing. The imagination, especially when warmed by discontent, bestows on a good which is withheld, advantages much greater than the reality will justify; and the people of the western country were easily persuaded to believe that the navigation of the Mississippi was a mine of wealth which would at once enrich them. That jealousy which men so readily entertain of the views of those with whom they do not associate, had favoured the efforts made by the enemies of the administration, to circulate the opinion that an opposition of interests existed between the eastern and the western people, and that the endeavours of the executive to open their great river were feeble and insincere. At a meeting of the Democratic Society in Lexington, in Kentucky, this sentiment was unanimously avowed in terms of peculiar disrespect to the government; and a committee was appointed to open a correspondence with the inhabitants of the whole western country, for the purpose of uniting them on this all important subject, and of preparing on it a remonstrance to the President and congress of the United States, to be expressed "in the bold, decent and determined language, proper to be used by injured freemen when they address the servants of the people." They claimed much merit for their moderation in having thus long, out of regard to their government, and affection for their fellow citizens on the Atlantic, abstained from the use of those means which they possessed for the assertion of what they termed a natural and unalienable right; and seemed to indicate the opinion that this forbearance could not be long continued. Without regarding the determination of Spain in the case or the poverty of the means placed in the hands of the executive for inducing a change in this determination, they demanded from the government the free use of the Mississippi, as if only an act of the will was necessary to insure it to them. Not even the probability that the public and intemperate expression of these dangerous dispositions would perpetuate the evil, could moderate them. This restless uneasy temper gave additional importance to the project of an expedition against Louisiana, which had been formed by Mr. Genet.
These public causes for apprehending hostilities[12] with Spain, were strengthened by private communications. The government had received intelligence from their ministers in Europe that propositions had been made by the cabinet of Madrid to that of London, the object of which was the United States. The precise nature of these propositions was not ascertained, but it was understood generally, that their tendency was hostile.
Thus unfavourable to the pacific views of the executive were the circumstances under which congress was to assemble.