Just here some grave international questions arose. Our rapid growth in the West gave Spain uneasiness. It certainly was putting her possessions in peril. In consequence she showed such an unfriendly spirit toward us as to keep the West in a state of chronic irritation.[3] It even disposed the West to listen to plans for separating her from the East, which Spain would gladly have aided in, and so was fast breaking up the feeling of national unity so essential to keep alive in the Republic.
Suddenly, without previous notice, the Spanish intendant at New Orleans revoked the right of deposit. The act shut the only door by which the people of Ohio, Kentucky, and Illinois could get to the sea. It exasperated them to such a point that they begged the General Government to drive the Spaniards out of the Mississippi for good and all.
In Thomas Jefferson the people of the West found a more sagacious advocate. The cession could not long remain a secret. It was soon known in the United States; but instead of calming the people, the change of masters revived their fears, since it was felt that Napoleon, whose exploits filled Europe with alarm, would prove more difficult to deal with than Spain, whom nobody feared.
Such was the situation presented to Mr. Jefferson. Fortunately for its solution, national pride and national policy do not always go hand in hand.
Our minister, Livingston,[4] a very able man, was told to bring the Louisiana question to Napoleon's attention, and to do it in such a way as to leave no doubt in his mind that the United States could not remain an idle looker-on while New Orleans was being bought and sold. She had too much at stake. Napoleon's army was getting ready to sail for Louisiana. There was no time to lose.
Mr. Livingston did not stop with the suggestion to sell New Orleans to us. He went further, and proposed the cession of all Louisiana above the Arkansas and east of the Mississippi. He did it with true republican frankness, never hesitating to press home upon Napoleon's advisers the dilemma which the possession of Louisiana must offer to their choice. "What will you do with Louisiana? Would you have England wrest it from you? Her navies have driven yours from the seas. Do you wish to force the United States into joining with England, against you? England would gladly give us what we ask, as the price of our help."
France was on the eve of war with England. But for this we should hardly have had Louisiana so easily. There was no assurance felt that the fleet Napoleon destined for Louisiana would ever reach the Balize. Napoleon wanted money. It was true, national pride might be hurt by the sacrifice, but it was most important, at this crisis, not to make an enemy of the United States; and Napoleon foresaw that no foreign power could long hold the mouth of the Mississippi, and have peace with those States. That conviction was decisive in its effects. He declared for the sale of Louisiana, outright, in these words: "I will not keep a possession which would not be safe in our hands, which would embroil our people with the Americans, or produce a coldness between us. I will make use of it, on the contrary, to attach them to me, and embroil them with the English, and raise up against the latter, enemies who will some day avenge us."
Napoleon would not even wait for Mr. Monroe to arrive, after making up his mind, but sent at once for Mr. Livingston, and opened the matter with him on the spot. So little had our ablest statesmen, Mr. Livingston excepted, touched the root of the matter, that, when Mr. Monroe did come, with powers from Congress to treat for the cession of New Orleans and the Floridas only, Napoleon surprised him with this master-stroke of policy which not even Mr. Jefferson had foreseen. And thus a treaty[5] for the whole of Louisiana was concluded on our part without adequate powers.
The price agreed upon was eighty million francs, the equivalent of twenty million dollars. Of this sum sixty were to be paid in money. The remaining twenty were to be retained by the United States as indemnity for damage done to our commerce under the orders of the Directory. In this way the nation became the trustee for what is known as the French Spoliation Fund. The principle was now laid down, that free ships make free goods. When they had signed the treaty, the commissioners arose and shook each other's hands. "We have lived long," said Livingston, "but this is the noblest work of our lives." Mr. Jefferson's efforts to bring about the geographical and political unity of the United States were thus far completely successful.