December the 17th. Hammond says the person is here to whom the Six Nations delivered the invitation for Simcoe to attend, who says they insisted on it, and would consider his non-attendance as an evidence that he does not wish for peace; but he says that Simcoe has not the least idea of attending; that this gentleman says we may procure in Upper Canada any quantity of provisions, which the people will salt up express during winter; and that he will return and carry our request whenever we are ready.
Thursday, December the 27th, 1792. I waited on the President on some current business. After this was over, he observed to me, that he thought it was time to endeavor to effect a stricter connection with France, and that Gouverneur Morris should be written to on this subject. He went into the circumstances of dissatisfaction between Spain and Great Britain, and us, and observed, there was no nation on whom we could rely, at all times, but France; and that, if we did not prepare in time some support, in the event of rupture with Spain and England, we might be charged with a criminal negligence. [I was much pleased with the tone of these observations. It was the very doctrine which had been my polar star, and I did not need the successes of the republican arms in France, lately announced to us, to bring me to these sentiments. For it is to be noted, that on Saturday last (the 22d) I received Mr. Short's letters of October the 9th and 12th, with the Leyden gazettes to October the 13th, giving us the first news of the retreat of the Duke of Brunswick, and the capture of Spires and Worms by Custine, and that of Nice by Anselme.] I therefore expressed to the President my cordial approbation of these ideas; told him I had meant on that day (as an opportunity of writing by the British packet would occur immediately) to take his orders for removing the suspension of payments to France, which had been imposed by my last letter to Gouverneur Morris, but was meant, as I supposed, only for the interval between the abolition of the late constitution by the dethronement of the King, and the meeting of some other body, invested by the will of the nation with powers to transact their affairs; that I considered the National Convention, then assembled, as such a body; and that, therefore, we ought to go on with the payments to them, or to any government they should establish; that, however, I had learned last night, that some clause in the bill for providing reimbursement of the loan made by the bank to the United States, had given rise to a question before the House of Representatives yesterday, which might affect these payments; a clause in that bill proposing, that the money formerly borrowed in Amsterdam, to pay the French debt, and appropriated by law (1690, August 4th, c. 34, s. 2) to that purpose, lying dead as was suggested, should be taken to pay the bank, and the President be authorized to borrow two millions of dollars more, out of which it should be replaced; and if this should be done, the removal of our suspension of payments, as I had been about to propose, would be premature. He expressed his disapprobation of the clause above mentioned; thought it highly improper in the Legislature to change an appropriation once made, and added, that no one could tell in what that would end. I concurred, but observed, that on a division of the House, the ayes for striking out the clause were twenty-seven, the noes twenty-six; whereon the Speaker gave his vote against striking out, which divides the House: the clause for the disappropriation remained of course. I mentioned suspicions, that the whole of this was a trick to serve the bank under a great existing embarrassment; that the debt to the bank was to be repaid by instalments; that the first instalment was of two hundred thousand dollars only, or rather one hundred and sixty thousand dollars, (because forty thousand of the two hundred thousand dollars would be the United States' own dividend of the instalment.) Yet here were two millions to be paid them at once, and to be taken from a purpose of gratitude and honor, to which it had been appropriated.
December the 30th, 1792. I took the occasion furnished by Pinckney's letter of September the 19th, asking instructions how to conduct himself as to the French revolution, to lay down the catholic principal of republicanism, to wit, that every people may establish what form of government they please, and change it as they please; the will of the nation being the only thing essential. I was induced to do this, in order to extract the President's opinion on the question which divided Hamilton and myself in the conversation of November, 1792, and the previous one of the first week of November, on the suspension of payments to France; and if favorable to mine, to place the principles of record in the letter books of my office. I therefore wrote the letter of December the 30th, to Pinckney, and sent it to the President, and he returned me his approbation in writing, in his note of the same date, which see.
February the 7th, 1793. I waited on the President with letters and papers from Lisbon. After going through these, I told him that I had for some time suspended speaking with him on the subject of my going out of office, because I had understood that the bill for intercourse with foreign nations was likely to be rejected by the Senate, in which case, the remaining business of the department would be too inconsiderable to make it worth while to keep it up. But that the bill being now passed, I was freed from the considerations of propriety which had embarrassed me. That &c. [nearly in the words of a letter to Mr. T. M. Randolph, of a few days ago,] and that I should be willing, if he had taken no arrangements to the contrary, to continue somewhat longer, how long I could not say, perhaps till summer, perhaps autumn. He said, so far from taking arrangements on the subject, he had never mentioned to any mortal the design of retiring which I had expressed to him, till yesterday, when having heard that I had given up my house, and that it was rented by another, he thereupon mentioned it to Mr. E. Randolph, and asked him, as he knew my retirement had been talked of, whether he had heard any persons suggested in conversation to succeed me. He expressed his satisfaction at my change of purpose, and his apprehensions that my retirement would be a new source of uneasiness to the public. He said Governor Lee had that day informed him of the general discontent prevailing in Virginia, of which he never had had any conception, much less sound information. That it appeared to him very alarming. He proceeded to express his earnest wish that Hamilton and myself could coalesce in the measures of the government, and urged here the general reasons for it which he had done to me in two former conversations. He said he had proposed the same thing to Hamilton, who expressed his readiness, and he thought our coalition would secure the general acquiescence of the public. I told him my concurrence was of much less importance than he seemed to imagine; that I kept myself aloof from all cabal and correspondence on the subject of the government, and saw and spoke with as few as I could. That as to a coalition with Mr. Hamilton, if by that was meant that either was to sacrifice his general system to the other, it was impossible. We had both, no doubt, formed our conclusions after the most mature consideration; and principles conscientiously adopted, could not be given up on either side. My wish was, to see both Houses of Congress cleansed of all persons interested in the bank or public stocks; and that a pure legislature being given us, I should always be ready to acquiesce under their determinations, even if contrary to my own opinions; for that I subscribe to the principle, that the will of the majority, honestly expressed, should give law. I confirmed him in the fact of the great discontents to the south; that they were grounded on seeing that their judgments and interests were sacrificed to those of the eastern States on every occasion, and their belief that it was the effect of a corrupt squadron of voters in Congress, at the command of the Treasury; and they see that if the votes of those members who had any interest distinct from, and contrary to the general interest of their constituents, had been withdrawn, as in decency and honesty they should have been, the laws would have been the reverse of what they are on all the great questions. I instanced the new Assumption carried in the House of Representatives by the Speaker's vote. On this subject he made no reply. He explained his remaining in office to have been the effect of strong solicitations after he returned here; declaring that he had never mentioned his purpose of going out but to the Heads of departments and Mr. Madison; he expressed the extreme wretchedness of his existence while in office, and went lengthily into the late attacks on him for levees &c., and explained to me how he had been led into them by the persons he consulted at New York; and that if he could but know what the sense of the public was, he would most cheerfully conform to it.
February the 16th, 1793. E. Randolph tells J. Madison and myself, a curious fact which he had from Lear. When the President went to New York, he resisted for three weeks the efforts to introduce levees. At length he yielded, and left it to Humphreys and some others to settle the forms. Accordingly, an ante-chamber and presence room were provided, and when those who were to pay their court were assembled, the President set out, preceded by Humphreys. After passing through the anti-chamber, the door of the inner room was thrown open, and Humphreys entered first, calling out with a loud voice, "the President of the United States." The President was so much disconcerted with it, that he did not recover from it the whole time of the levee, and when the company was gone, he said to Humphreys, "Well, you have taken me in once, but by God you shall never take me in a second time."
There is reason to believe that the rejection of the late additional Assumption by the Senate, was effected by the President through Lear, operating on Langdon. Beckley knows this.
February the 20th, 1793. Colonel W. S. Smith called on me to communicate intelligence from France. He had left Paris November the 9th. He says the French ministers are entirely broken with Gouverneur Morris; shut their doors to him, and will never receive another communication from him. They wished Smith to be the bearer of a message from the President, to this effect, but he declined; and they said in that case they would press it through their own minister here. He says they are sending Genet here with full powers to give us all the privileges we can desire in their countries, and particularly in the West Indies; that they even contemplate to set them free the next summer; that they propose to emancipate South America, and will send forty-five ships of the line there next spring, and Miranda at the head of the expedition; that they desire our debt to be paid them in provisions, and have authorized him to negotiate this. In confirmation of this, he delivers a letter to the President from Le Brun, minister for foreign affairs, in which Le Brun says that Colonel Smith will communicate plans worthy of his (the President's) great mind, and he shall be happy to receive his opinion as to the means the most suitable to effect it.
I had, five or six days ago, received from Ternant, extracts from the lives of his ministers, complaining of both Gouverneur Morris and Mr. Short. I sent them this day to the President with an extract from a private letter of Mr. Short, justifying himself, and I called this evening on the President. He said he considered the extracts from Ternant very serious—in short, as decisive; that he saw that Gouverneur Morris could be no longer continued there consistent with the public good; that the moment was critical in our favor, and ought not to be lost; that he was extremely at a loss what arrangement to make. I asked him whether Gouverneur Morris and Pinckney might not change places. He said that would be a sort of remedy, but not a radical one. That if the French ministry conceived Gouverneur Morris to be hostile to them; if they would be jealous merely on his proposing to visit London, they would never be satisfied with us at placing him at London permanently. He then observed, that though I had unfixed the day on which I had intended to resign, yet I appeared fixed in doing it at no great distance of time; that in this case, he could not but wish that I would go to Paris; that the moment was important: I possessed the confidence of both sides, and might do great good; that he wished I could do it, were it only to stay there a year or two. I told him that my mind was so bent on retirement that I could not think of launching forth again in a new business; that I could never again cross the Atlantic; and that as to the opportunity of doing good, this was likely to be the scene of action, as Genet was bringing powers to do the business here; but that I could not think of going abroad. He replied that I had pressed him to continue in the public service, and refused to do the same myself. I said the case was very different; he united the confidence of all America, and was the only person who did so: his services therefore were of the last importance; but for myself, my going out would not be noted or known. A thousand others could supply my place to equal advantage, therefore I felt myself free; and that as to the mission to France, I thought perfectly proper. He desired me then to consider maturely what arrangement should be made.
Smith, in speaking of Morris, said, that at his own table, in presence of his company and servants, he cursed the French ministers, as a set of damned rascals; said the king would still be replaced upon his throne. He said he knew they had written to have him recalled, and expected to be recalled. He consulted Smith to know whether he would bring his furniture here duty free. Smith has mentioned the situation of Gouverneur Morris freely to others here. Smith said also that the ministers told him they meant to begin their attack at the mouth of the Mississippi, and to sweep along the Bay of Mexico southwardly, and that they would have no objection to our incorporating into our government the two Floridas.
February the 25th, 1793. The President desires the opinions of the heads of the three departments, and of the Attorney-General, on the following question, to wit: Mr. Ternant having applied for money equivalent to three millions of livres, to be furnished on account of our debt to France at the request of the executive of that country, which sum is to be laid out in provisions within the United States, to be sent to France. Shall the money be furnished?