On 2 March 1805 President Thomas Jefferson persuaded the
United States Congress to approve the construction
of 25 new gunboats with $60,000 for operations.
Also on that day James Monroe arrived at Madrid to join
Charles Pinckney in the diplomatic efforts there.
Pinckney was ready to leave, though Monroe persuaded him to work together.
This is the complete Second Inaugural Address
that took place on 4 March 1805 in Washington:
Proceeding, fellow citizens, to that qualification which
the constitution requires, before my entrance
on the charge again conferred upon me,
it is my duty to express the deep sense I entertain of this
new proof of confidence from my fellow citizens at large,
and the zeal with which it inspires me, so to conduct
myself as may best satisfy their just expectations.
On taking this station on a former occasion,
I declared the principles on which I believed it my
duty to administer the affairs of our commonwealth.
My conscience tells me that I have, on every occasion,
acted up to that declaration, according to its obvious import,
and to the understanding of every candid mind.
In the transaction of your foreign affairs,
we have endeavored to cultivate the friendship
of all nations, and especially of those with which
we have the most important relations.
We have done them justice on all occasions,
favored where favor was lawful, and cherished mutual
interests and intercourse on fair and equal terms.
We are firmly convinced, and we act on that conviction,
that with nations, as with individuals, our interests
soundly calculated, will ever be found inseparable from
our moral duties; and history bears witness to the fact,
that a just nation is taken on its word, when recourse
is had to armaments and wars to bridle others.
At home, fellow citizens, you best know
whether we have done well or ill.
The suppression of unnecessary offices, of useless
establishments and expenses, enabled us
to discontinue our internal taxes.
These covering our land with officers, and opening
our doors to their intrusions, had already begun that
process of domiciliary vexation which, once entered,
is scarcely to be restrained from reaching successively
every article of produce and property.
If among these taxes some minor ones fell which
had not been inconvenient, it was because their amount
would not have paid the officers who collected them,
and because, if they had any merit, the state authorities
might adopt them, instead of others less approved.
The remaining revenue on the consumption of foreign
articles, is paid cheerfully by those who can afford
to add foreign luxuries to domestic comforts, being
collected on our seaboards and frontiers only, and
incorporated with the transactions of our mercantile citizens,
it may be the pleasure and pride of an American to ask,
what farmer, what mechanic, what laborer,
ever sees a tax-gatherer of the United States?
These contributions enable us to support the current
expenses of the government, to fulfil contracts with foreign
nations, to extinguish the native right of soil within our limits,
to extend those limits, and to apply such a surplus to our
public debts, as places at a short day their final redemption,
and that redemption once effected, the revenue thereby
liberated may by a just repartition among the states and a
corresponding amendment of the Constitution be applied in
time of peace to rivers, canals, roads, arts, manufactures,
education, and other great objects within each state.
In time of war, if injustice by ourselves or others must
sometimes produce war, increased as the same revenue
will be increased by population and consumption and aided
by other resources reserved for that crisis;
it may meet within the year all the expenses of the year
without encroaching on the rights of future generations
by burdening them with the debts of the past.
War will then be but a suspension of useful works,
and a return to a state of peace,
a return to the progress of improvement.
I have said, fellow citizens, that the income reserved had
enabled us to extend our limits; but that extension may
possibly pay for itself before we are called on, and
in the meantime, may keep down the accruing interest;
in all events it will repay the advances we have made.
I know that the acquisition of Louisiana has been
disapproved by some from a candid apprehension that
the enlargement of our territory would endanger its union.
But who can limit the extent to which
the federative principle may operate effectively?
The larger our association, the less will it be shaken by local
passions; and in any view is it not better that the opposite
bank of the Mississippi should be settled by our own
brethren and children, than by strangers of another family?
With which shall we be most likely to live
in harmony and friendly intercourse?
In matters of religion I have considered that its free
exercise is placed by the Constitution independent
of the powers of the general government.
I have therefore undertaken on no occasion to prescribe
the religious exercises suited to it; but have left them,
as the Constitution found them, under the direction
and discipline of state or church authorities
acknowledged by the several religious societies.
The aboriginal inhabitants of these countries I have
regarded with the commiseration their history inspires.
Endowed with the faculties and the rights of men,
breathing an ardent love of liberty and independence,
and occupying a country which left them no desire but to be
undisturbed, the stream of overflowing population from
other regions directed itself on these shores;
without power to divert, or habits to contend against,
they have been overwhelmed by the current,
or driven before it; now reduced within limits
too narrow for the hunter’s state, humanity enjoins us
to teach them agriculture and the domestic arts;
to encourage them to that industry which alone can enable
them to maintain their place in existence, and to prepare
them in time for that state of society, which to bodily
comforts adds the improvement of the mind and morals.
We have therefore liberally furnished them with the
implements of husbandry and household use;
we have placed among them instructors in the arts
of first necessity; and they are covered with the aegis
of the law against aggressors from among ourselves.
But the endeavors to enlighten them on the fate which
awaits their present course of life, to induce them to
exercise their reason, follow its dictates, and change their
pursuits with the change of circumstances, have powerful
obstacles to encounter; they are combated by the habits
of their bodies, prejudice of their minds, ignorance, pride,
and the influence of interested and crafty individuals among
them, who feel themselves something in the present
order of things, and fear to become nothing in any other.
These persons inculcate a sanctimonious reverence for the
customs of their ancestors; that whatsoever they did
must be done through all time; that reason is a false guide,
and to advance under its counsel in their physical,
moral, or political condition, is perilous innovation;
that their duty is to remain as their Creator made them,
ignorance being safety, and knowledge full of danger;
in short, my friends, among them is seen the action
and counteraction of good sense and bigotry;
they, too, have their anti-philosophers, who find
an interest in keeping things in their present state,
who dread reformation, and exert all their faculties
to maintain the ascendency of habit over the duty
of improving our reason and obeying its mandates.
In giving these outlines, I do not mean, fellow citizens,
to arrogate to myself the merit of the measures; that is due
in the first place to the reflecting character of our citizens
at large, who by the weight of public opinion influence and
strengthen the public measures; it is due to the sound
discretion with which they select from among themselves
those to whom they confide the legislative duties; it is due
to the zeal and wisdom of the characters thus selected, who
lay the foundations of public happiness in wholesome laws,
the execution of which alone remains for others;
and it is due to the able and faithful auxiliaries, whose
patriotism has associated with me in the executive functions.
During this course of administration, and in order to
disturb it, the artillery of the press has been levelled
against us, charged with whatsoever its
licentiousness could devise or dare.
These abuses of an institution so important to freedom
and science, are deeply to be regretted, inasmuch as
they tend to lessen its usefulness and to sap its safety;
they might, indeed, have been corrected by the
wholesome punishments reserved and provided by the laws
of the several States against falsehood and defamation;
but public duties more urgent press on the time
of public servants, and the offenders have therefore
been left to find their punishment in the public indignation.
Nor was it uninteresting to the world, that an experiment
should be fairly and fully made, whether freedom of
discussion, unaided by power, is not sufficient for the
propagation and protection of truth—whether a government
conducting itself in the true spirit of its Constitution
with zeal and purity, and doing no act which
it would be unwilling the whole world should witness,
can be written down by falsehood and defamation.
The experiment has been tried; you have witnessed
the scene; our fellow citizens have looked on,
cool and collected; they saw the latent source from which
these outrages proceeded; they gathered around their public
functionaries, and when the constitution called them
to the decision by suffrage, they pronounced their verdict,
honorable to those who had served them and
consolatory to the friend of man who believes
he may be entrusted with his own affairs.
No inference is here intended that the laws provided by
the State against false and defamatory publications,
should not be enforced; he who has time renders a service
to public morals and public tranquility in reforming these
abuses by the salutary coercions of the law;
but the experiment is noted to prove that,
since truth and reason have maintained their ground
against false opinions in league with false facts, the press,
confined to truth, needs no other legal restraint;
the public judgment will correct false reasonings and
opinions on a full hearing of all parties; and no other
definite line can be drawn between the inestimable
liberty of the press and its demoralizing licentiousness.
If there be still improprieties which this rule
would not restrain, its supplement must be sought
in the censorship of public opinion.
Contemplating the union of sentiment now manifested so
generally, as auguring harmony and happiness to our future
course, I offer to our country sincere congratulations.
With those, too, not yet rallied to the same point,
the disposition to do so is gaining strength;
facts are piercing through the veil drawn over them;
and our doubting brethren will at length see that the mass
of their fellow citizens with whom they cannot yet
resolve to act as to principles and measures,
think as they think and desire what they desire;
that our wish, as well as theirs, is that the public efforts
may be directed honestly to the public good, that peace be
cultivated, civil and religious liberty unassailed,
law and order preserved; equality of rights maintained,
and that state of property, equal or unequal, which results
to every man from his own industry or that of his fathers.
When satisfied of these views, it is not in human nature
that they should not approve and support them;
in the meantime let us cherish them with patient affection;
let us do them justice and more than justice in all
competitions of interest; and we need not doubt that truth,
reason, and their own interests, will at length prevail, will
gather them into the fold of their country and will complete
their entire union of opinion which gives to a nation the
blessing of harmony and the benefit of all its strength.
I shall now enter on the duties to which my fellow citizens
have again called me and shall proceed in the spirit
of those principles which they have approved.
I fear not that any motives of interest may lead me astray;
I am sensible of no passion which could seduce me
knowingly from the path of justice;
but the weakness of human nature and the limits
of my own understanding will produce errors
of judgment sometimes injurious to your interests.
I shall need, therefore, all the indulgence I have
heretofore experienced—the want of it
will certainly not lessen with increasing years.
I shall need too the favor of that Being in whose hands
we are, who led our forefathers, as Israel of old, from their
native land and planted them in a country flowing with all
the necessaries and comforts of life; who has covered
our infancy with his providence and our riper years
with his wisdom and power; and to whose goodness
I ask you to join with me in supplications, that he will
so enlighten the minds of your servants, guide their
councils, and prosper their measures that whatsoever they do,
shall result in your good, and shall secure to you
the peace, friendship, and approbation of all nations.1
In his “Second Inaugural Address” on 4 March 1805
President Jefferson summarized the accomplishments of his first term.
He cultivated friendship with all nations, did justice, gave lawful favors,
and valued mutual interests on equal terms.
In some cases a just nation may use arms “to bridle others.”
By eliminating unnecessary offices and expenses they ended internal taxes.
Yet the remaining taxes on the purchase of foreign goods by those
who could afford luxuries helped provide enough revenues
to pay expenses and apply the surplus to reducing the public debt.
He hoped that during peacetime they would be able to invest in
“rivers, canals, roads, arts, manufactures, education, and other great objects.”
Though injustice may cause war, its expenses could
be met without borrowing from future generations.
Useful works may be suspended during a war and resumed during peace.
Jefferson suggested that the Louisiana Purchase would enable
their own brothers and their children to settle the land west of the
Mississippi River rather than have strangers moving in there.
The government had not interfered with religion or churches,
and the rights of the native inhabitants were respected.
With limits making hunting difficult he encouraged them to learn
agriculture and industry, and he provided them with tools.
Jefferson believed that some Indians had resisted changes
because of
prejudice, ignorance, and stubborn adherence to past traditions.
The press had been lively, but falsehood and defamation could be punished by states.
The free expression of truth could correct false reasonings and opinions.
After the second inaugural address Jefferson announced that,
as Washington had, he would retire at the end of his second term.
The Republicans now had a 27-7 advantage in the United States Senate.
In April the Federalists in Massachusetts re-elected their Governor
Caleb Strong and retained their majority in the state legislature.
Pennsylvania’s Governor McKean united with Federalists to win re-election.
On 27 April 1805 Jefferson wrote in a letter
to Spain’s Minister James Bowdoin,
Your favor of March 25 has been duly received.
I regret that the state of your health renders
a visit to this place unadvisable.
Besides the gratification we should have felt from
personal considerations, the perusal of the correspondences
for some time back with the governments of Europe
most interesting to us, by putting you in possession
of the actual state of things between us, would have
enabled you to act under all emergencies with that
satisfaction to yourself which is derived from
a full knowledge of the ground.
But I presume you will find this supplied,
as to the government to which you go,
by the papers of the office at Madrid.
Our relations with that nation are vitally interesting.
That they should be of a peaceable & friendly character
has been our most earnest desire.
Had Spain met us with the same dispositions,
our idea was that her existence in this hemisphere
& ours should have rested on the same bottom;
should have swam or sunk together.
We want nothing of hers, & we want
no other nation to possess what is hers.
But she has met our advances with jealousy,
secret malice and ill-faith.
Our patience under this unworthy return
of disposition is now on its last trial.
And the issue of what is now depending between us
will decide whether our relations with her are to be
sincerely friendly or permanently hostile.
I still wish & would cherish the former,
but have ceased to expect it.
I thank you for the sentiments of esteem
you are so good as to express towards me,
and the mark of it you wish me to place at Monticello.
It shall be deposited with the memorials of
those worthies whose remembrance I feel
a pride & comfort in consecrating there.
With my best wishes for the restoration of your health
& for a pleasant voyage, I tender you my friendly
salutations & assurances of great esteem & respect.2
On 11 May 1805 Jefferson wrote to Dr. George Logan,
a former Quaker and an activist for peace.
I see with infinite pain the bloody schism which
has taken place among our friends in Pennsylvania
& New York, & will probably take place in other states.
The main body of both sections mean well,
but their good intentions will produce great public evil.
The minority, whichever section shall be the minority,
will end in coalition with the federalists,
and some compromise of principle;
because these will not sell their aid for nothing.
Republicanism will thus lose, & royalism gain
some portion of that ground which we thought
we had rescued to good government.
I do not express my sense of our misfortunes
from any idea that they are remediable.
I know that the passions of men will take their course,
that they are not to be controlled but by despotism,
& that this melancholy truth is the pretext for despotism.
The duty of an upright administration is to pursue its
course steadily, to know nothing of these family dissensions,
and to cherish the good principles of both parties.
The war ad internecionem which we have waged
against federalism has filled our latter times
with strife and unhappiness.
We have met it, with pain indeed, but with firmness,
because we believed it the last convulsive effort of that
Hydra which in earlier times we had conquered in the field.
But if any degeneracy of principle should ever render it
necessary to give ascendancy to one of the rising
sections over the other, I thank my god
it will fall to some other to perform that operation.
The only cordial I wish to carry into my retirement is the
undivided good will of all those with whom I have acted.3
James Madison and Albert Gallatin continued as the leading
members of the cabinet in the State and Treasury departments.
Navy Secretary Robert Smith was appointed Attorney General,
but he ended up running the Navy Department through the second term.
Jefferson nominated John Breckinridge of Kentucky to be Attorney General
in August, and he was not confirmed until January 1806.
Peace was restored in Tripoli, and trade flourished,
increasing the annual revenue to $14,000,000.
Charles Pinckney was the United States Minister in Madrid,
and James Monroe had arrived as a special envoy on 2 January 1805.
They worked together on the disagreements
with Spain over the Floridas and Texas.
French and Spanish agents kept telling Madison
that Spain had not ceded West Florida to France.
Spaniards were plundering American commerce,
and
the garrisons in West Florida and Texas were reinforced.
During the winter of 1804-05 while Monroe was in Spain, an American flotilla
with 80 cannons and 700 crew left New York carrying contraband of war.
The French Minister Louis Marie Turreau complained
to
Madison who promised him that a bill would be passed.
On March 3 the US Senate passed a law that
prohibited armed commerce but allowed unarmed trade.
William Henry Harrison governed the Indiana Territory
from January 1801 to December 1812.
He made treaties with the Miamis, Eel Rivers, Weas,
Piankeshaws, and Delawares in 1804 and 1805,
and these were resented by the better Indians in the territory.
In the summer of 1805 many chiefs and warriors of the Six Nations
gathered at Buffalo Creek in New York with
Reverend Cram of the Boston Missionary Society.
The Seneca Chief Red Jacket gave an eloquent oration
explaining that they relate to the Great Spirit in their own way
and complaining how the land was taken over by the white people.
He said they were thankful for the favors they received and would
love each other to be united and never quarrel about religion.
The white people wanted more land, and they
brought strong liquor that killed thousands.
He said they took their country but were not satisfied
and wanted to force their religion on them.
The Six Nations did not want to destroy their brothers’ religion,
and they wanted to keep their own.
They would wait and see what effect the preaching
of the white men had on their neighbors.
If they find that it makes them good and honest and less inclined to cheat Indians,
then they would consider what the missionaries were offering.
On August 17 Jefferson wrote to Secretary of State James Madison,
I am anxious to receive opinions respecting
our procedure with Spain: as, should negotiations
with England be advisable they should not be
postponed a day unnecessarily, that we may lay
their result before Congress before they rise next spring.
Were the question only about the bounds of Louisiana,
I should be for delay.
Were it only for spoliations, just as this is
as a cause of war, we might consider
if no other expedient were more eligible for us.
But I do not view peace as within our choice.
I consider the cavalier conduct of Spain as
evidence that France is to settle with us for her:
and the language of France confirms it:
and that if she can keep us insulated till peace,
she means to enforce by arms her will,
to which she foresees we will not truckle &
therefore does not venture on the mandate now.
We should not permit ourselves to be found
off our guard and friendless.4
President Jefferson sent Monroe to improve the friendship
with Britain in London as they might help the United States
in determining their boundary for Louisiana with Spain.
On August 27 Jefferson sent this clarification to Secretary of State Madison:
Considering the character of Bonaparte,
I think it material at once to let him see that
we are not one of the powers who will receive his orders.
I think you have misconceived the nature of the treaty
I thought we should propose to England.
I have no idea of committing ourselves immediately,
or independently of our further will to the war.
The treaty should be provisional only,
to come into force on the event of our being
engaged in war with either France or Spain
during the present war in Europe.
In that event we should make common cause,
& England should stipulate not to make peace without
our obtaining the objects for which we go to war, to wit,
the acknowledgement by Spain of the rightful boundaries
of Louisiana (which we should reduce to our minimum
by a secret article) and 2, indemnification for spoliations
for which purpose we should be allowed to make reprisal
on the Floridas & retain them as an indemnification.
Our cooperation in the war
(if we should actually enter into it)
would be a sufficient consideration for Great Britain
to engage for its object: and it being generally known
to France & Spain that we had entered into treaty
with England would probably ensure us
a peaceable & immediate settlement of both points.5
Jefferson on 23 October 1805 wrote this
short letter to Treasury Secretary Gallatin:
I send for your perusal another letter of Mr. Madison, which
I will ask the favor of you to return immediately with the
one sent on Saturday, and on which it is necessary to act.
The war on the Continent of Europe appears now so certain,
and that peace is at least one year off,
that we are now placed at our ease in point of time.
We may make another effort for a peaceable
accommodation with Spain without the danger of being
left alone to cope with both France and Spain;
and even if we are driven to war, it is now much more
questionable than it was whether we had not better enter
into it without fettering ourselves with an alliance, that we
may be free to retire whenever our terms can be obtained.
Peace cannot now be made in Europe but
by a general convention, and that will take
best part of a twelvemonth to arrange.
Our question now is in what way to give Spain
another opportunity of arrangement?
Is not Paris the place? France the agent?
The purchase of the Floridas the means?6
Also on October 23 Jefferson wrote in this
letter to Secretary of State Madison:
We are certain of one year of campaigning at least, and
one other year of negotiation for their peace arrangements.
Should we be now forced into war, it is become much more
questionable than it was, whether we should not pursue it
unembarrassed by any alliance & free to retire from
it whenever we can obtain our separate terms.
It gives us time too to make
another effort for peaceable settlement.
Where shall this be done? not at Madrid certainly.
At Paris: through Armstrong, or Armstrong &Monroe
as negotiators, France as the Mediator,
the price of the Floridas as the means.
We need not care who gets that: and an enlargement
of the sum we had thought of may be the bait to France,
while the Guadaloupe as the Western boundary
may be the soother of Spain providing for
our spoliated citizens in some effectual way.
We may announce to France that determined
not to ask justice of Spain again, yet desirous of
making one other effort to preserve peace,
we are willing to see whether her interposition
can obtain it on terms which we think just; that no delay
however can be admitted, & that in the meantime should
Spain attempt to change the status quo, we shall repel force
by force, without undertaking other active hostilities
till we see what may be the issue of her interference.7
By November 14 the Cabinet had a plan for a peace treaty with Spain and France.
On December 3 Jefferson in his Fifth Annual Message to Congress criticized Spain.
This is the entire text:
To the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States:
At a moment when the nations of Europe are in
commotion and arming against each other, and
when those with whom we have principle intercourse
are engaged in the general contest, and when
the countenance of some of them toward our peaceable
country threatens that even that may not be affected by
what is passing on the general theater, a meeting of the
representatives of the nation in both Houses of Congress
has become more than usually desirable.
Coming from every section of our country,
they bring with them the sentiments and the information
of the whole, and will be enabled to give direction
to the public affairs which the will and the wisdom
of the whole will approve and support.
In taking a view of the state of our country
we in the first place notice the late affliction of two
of our cities under the fatal fever which
in latter times has occasionally visited our shores.
Providence in His goodness gave it an early termination
on this occasion and lessened the number of victims
which have usually fallen before it.
In the course of the several visitations by this disease
it has appeared that it is strictly local, incident to cities
and on the tide waters only, incommunicable
in the country either by persons under the disease or by
goods carried from diseased places;
that its access is with the autumn
and it disappears with the early frosts.
These restrictions within narrow limits of time
and space give security even to our maritime cities
three-fourths of the year, and to the country always.
Although from these facts it appears unnecessary,
yet to satisfy the fears of foreign nations and cautions
on their part not to be complained of in a danger
whose limits are yet unknown to them
I have strictly enjoined on the officers at the head of
customs to certify with exact truth, for every vessel sailing
for a foreign port the state of health respecting this fever
which prevails at the place from which she sails.
Under every motive from character and duty
to certify the truth, I have no doubt
they have faithfully executed this injunction.
Much real injury has, however, been sustained from a
propensity to identify with this endemic and to call by
the same name fevers of very different kinds, which
have been placed among those deemed contagious.
As we advance in our knowledge of this disease,
as facts develop the source from which individuals
receive it, the State authorities charged with the care
of the public health, and Congress with that of the
general commerce, will become able to regulate
with effect their respective functions in these departments.
The burden of quarantines is felt at home
as well as abroad; their efficacy merits examination.
Although the health laws of the States should be found
to need no present revisal by Congress, yet commerce
claims that their attention be ever awake to them.
Since our last meeting the aspect of our
foreign relations has considerably changed.
Our coasts have been infested and our harbors watched by
private armed vessels, some of them without commissions,
some with illegal commissions, others with those of
legal form but committing piratical acts
beyond the authority of their commissions.
They have captured in the very entrance of our harbors,
as well as on the high seas, not only the vessels of
our friends coming to trade with us, but our own also.
They have carried them off under pretense of legal
adjudication but not daring to approach a court of justice,
they have plundered and sunk them by the way or in
obscure places where no evidence could arise against them,
maltreated the crews, and abandoned them in boats in the
open sea or on desert shores without food or covering.
These enormities appearing to be unreached
by any control of their sovereigns, I found it
necessary to equip a force to cruise within our own seas,
to arrest all vessels of these descriptions found
hovering on our coasts within the limits of the Gulf Stream
and to bring the offenders in for trial as pirates.
The same system of hovering on our coasts and harbors
under color of seeking enemies has been also carried on
by public armed ships to the great annoyance
and oppression of our commerce.
New principles, too, have been interpolated
into the law of nations, founded neither in justice
nor the usage of acknowledgment of nations.
According to these, a belligerent takes to himself
a commerce with its own enemy which it denies to
a neutral on the ground of its aiding that enemy in the war;
but reason revolts at such an inconsistency,
and the neutral having equal right with the belligerent
to decide the question, the interests of our constituents
and the duty of maintaining the authority of reason,
the only umpire between just nations,
impose on us the obligation of providing
an effectual and determined opposition to a doctrine
so injurious to the rights of peaceable nations.
Indeed, the confidence we ought to have in the justice
of others still countenances the hope that a sounder view
of those rights will of itself induce from every belligerent
a more correct observance of them.
With Spain our negotiations for a settlement
of differences have not had a satisfactory issue.
Spoliations during a former war, for which she had formally
acknowledged herself responsible, have been refused
to be compensated but on conditions affecting
other claims in no wise connected with them.
Yet the same practices are renewed in the present war
and are already of great amount.
On the Mobile, our commerce passing through
that river continues to be obstructed
by arbitrary duties and vexatious searches.
Propositions for adjusting amicably the boundaries
of Louisiana have not been acceded to.
While, however, the right is unsettled, we have avoided
changing the state of things by taking new posts or
strengthening ourselves in the disputed territories,
in the hope that the other power would not by
contrary conduct oblige us to meet their example
and endanger conflicts of authority the issue
of which may not be easily controlled.
But in this hope we have now reason
to lessen our confidence.
Inroads have been recently made into the Territories of
Orleans and the Mississippi, our citizens have been seized
and their property plundered in the very parts of the former
which had been actually delivered up by Spain, and this
by the regular officers and soldiers of that government.
I have therefore found it necessary at length to give
orders to our troops on that frontier to be in readiness
to protect our citizens, and to repel
by arms any similar aggressions in future.
Other details necessary for your full information
of the state of things between this country and that
shall be the subject of another communication.
In reviewing these injuries from some of the belligerent
powers the moderation, the firmness, and the wisdom
of the legislature will all be called into action.
We ought still to hope that time and a more correct
estimate of interest as well as of character will
produce the justice we are bound to expect.
But should any nation deceive itself by false calculations
and disappoint that expectation, we must join
in the unprofitable contest of trying which party
can do the other the most harm.
Some of these injuries may perhaps
admit a peaceable remedy.
Where that is competent it is always the most desirable.
But some of them are of a nature to be met by force only,
and all of them may lead to it.
I cannot, therefore, but recommend such preparations
as circumstances call for.
The first object is to place our seaport town
out of danger of insult.
Measures have been already taken for furnishing
them with heavy cannon for the service of
such land batteries as may make a part of
their defense against armed vessels approaching them.
In aid of these it is desirable we should have
a competent number of gunboats, and the number,
to be competent, must be considerable.
If immediately begun, they may be in readiness
for service at the opening of the next season.
Whether it will be necessary to augment
our land forces will be decided by occurrences
probably in the course of your session.
In the meantime you will consider whether it would not be
expedient for a state of peace as well as war so to organize
or class the militia as would enable us on any sudden
emergency to call for the services of the younger portions
unencumbered with the old and those having families.
Upward of 300,000 able-bodied men between the
ages of 18 and 26 years, which the last census shows
we may now count within our limits, will furnish a
competent number for offense or defense in any point where
they may be wanted, and will give time for raising regular
forces after the necessity of them shall become certain;
and the reducing to the early period of life all its active
service cannot but be desirable to our younger citizens
of the present as well as future times, inasmuch as
it engages to them in more advanced age a quiet
and undisturbed repose in the bosom of their families.
I cannot, then, but earnestly recommend to your early
consideration the expediency of so modifying our militia
system as, by a separation of the more active part
from that which is less so, we may draw from it
when necessary an efficient corps fit for real and
active service, and to be called to it in regular rotation.
Considerable provision has been made under former
authorities from Congress of materials for
the construction of ships of war of seventy-four guns.
These materials are on hand subject to
the further will of the legislature.
Turning from these unpleasant views of violence
and wrong, I congratulate you on the liberation
of our fellow-citizens who were stranded on
the coast of Tripoli and made prisoners of war.
In a government bottomed on the will of all the life and
liberty of every individual citizen become interesting to all.
In the treaty, therefore, which has concluded
our warfare with that State, an article for
the ransom of our citizens has been agreed to.
An operation by land by a small band of our countrymen,
and others—engaged for the occasion in conjunction
with the troops of the ex-Bashaw of that county,
gallantly conducted by our late consul, Eaton,
and their successful enterprise on the city of Derne,
contributed doubtless to the impression which produced
peace, and the conclusion of this prevented opportunities
of which the officers and men of our squadron destined for
Tripoli would have availed themselves to emulate the acts
of valor exhibited by their brethren in the attack of last year.
Reflecting with high satisfaction on the distinguished
bravery displayed whenever occasions permitted in the
late Mediterranean service, I think it would be a useful
encouragement as well as a just reward to make an
opening for some present promotion by enlarging
our peace establishment of captains and lieutenants.
With Tunis some misunderstandings have arisen not yet
sufficiently explained, but friendly discussions with their
ambassador recently arrived, and a mutual disposition
to do whatever is just and reasonable cannot fail
of dissipating these; so that we may consider
our peace on that coast, generally, to be on as sound
a footing as it has been at any preceding time.
Still it will not be expedient to withdraw immediately
the whole of our force from that sea.
The law providing for a naval peace establishment
fixes the number of frigates which shall be kept in
constant service in time of peace, and prescribes that
they shall be manned by not more than two-thirds
of their complement of seamen and ordinary seamen.
Whether a frigate may be trusted to two-thirds only
of her proper complement of men must depend
on the nature of the service on which she is ordered;
that may sometimes, for her safety as well as
to insure her object, require her fullest complement.
In adverting to this subject Congress will perhaps consider
whether the best limitation on the Executive discretion
in this case would not be by the number of seamen
which may be employed in the whole service
rather than by the number of the vessels.
Occasions oftener arise for the employment of small
than of large vessels, and it would lessen risk as well as
expense to be authorized to employ them of preference.
The limitation suggested by the number of seamen would
admit a selection of vessels best adapted to the service.
Our Indian neighbors are advancing, many of them
with spirit, and others beginning to engage in
the pursuits of agriculture and household manufacture.
They are becoming sensible that the earth yields
subsistence with less labor and more certainty
than the forest, and find it their interest from
time to time to dispose of parts of their surplus
and waste lands for the means of improving
those they occupy, and of subsisting their families
while they are preparing their farms.
Since your last session the Northern tribes have sold to us
the lands between the Connecticut Reserve and the former
Indian boundary; and those on the Ohio, from the same
boundary to the rapids, and for a considerable depth inland.
The Chickasaws and Cherokees have sold us the country
between and adjacent to the two districts of Tennessee,
and the Creeks, the residue of their lands in the fork
of Ocmulgee up to the Olcofauhatche.
The three former purchases are important, inasmuch as
they consolidate disjoined parts of our settled country and
render their intercourse secure; and the second particularly
so, as with the small point on the river which we expect
is by this time ceded by the Piankeshaws, it completes
our possession of the whole of both banks of the Ohio,
from its source to near its mouth, and the navigation
of that river is thereby rendered forever safe to our
citizens settled and settling on its extensive waters.
The purchase from the Creeks, too, has been for
some time particularly interesting to the State of Georgia.
The several treaties which have been mentioned
will be submitted to both houses of Congress
for the exercise of their respective functions.
Deputations now on their way to the seat of government
from various nations of Indians inhabiting the Missouri
and other parts beyond the Mississippi, come charged
with assurances of their satisfaction with the new relations
in which they are placed with us, of their dispositions
to cultivate our peace and friendship, and their
desire to enter into commercial intercourse with us.
A statement of our progress in exploring the principle rivers
of that country, and of the information respecting them
hitherto obtained, will be communicated so soon as
we shall receive some further relations
which we have reason shortly to expect.
The receipts at the Treasury during the year ending
on the 30th day of September last have exceeded
the sum of thirteen millions of dollars, which, with not quite
five millions in the Treasury at the beginning of the year,
have enabled us, after meeting other demands, to pay
nearly two millions of the debt contracted under the British
treaty and convention, upward of four millions of principle
of the public debt, and four millions of interest.
These payments, with those which had been made
in three years and a half preceding, have extinguished
of the funded debt nearly eighteen millions of principle.
Congress, by their act of November 10th, 1803,
authorized us to borrow one million seven hundred
and fifty thousand dollars, toward meeting the claims
of our citizens assumed by the convention with France.
We have not, however, made use of this authority,
because the sum of four millions and a half, which remained
in the Treasury on the same 30th day of September last,
with the receipts which we may calculate on for the
ensuing year, besides paying the annual sum of
eight millions of dollars appropriated to the funded debts,
and meeting all the current demands which may be
expected, will enable us to pay the whole sum of
three million seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars
assumed by the French convention, and still leave us
a surplus of nearly a million dollars at our free disposal.
Should you concur in the provisions of arms and armed
vessels recommended by the circumstances of the times,
this surplus will furnish the means of doing so.
On this first occasion of addressing Congress, since
by the choice of my constituents, I have entered on
a second term of administration, I embrace the opportunity
to give this public assurance, that I will exert my best
endeavors to administer faithfully the executive department,
and will zealously cooperate with you in every measure
which may tend to secure the liberty, property, and
personal safety of our fellow citizens, and to consolidate
the republican forms and principles of our government.
In the course of your session you shall receive all the
aid which I can give for the dispatch of public business,
and all the information necessary for your deliberations,
of which the interests of our own country and the confidence
reposed in us by others will admit a communication.8
Three days later Jefferson sent a private message to Congress
in which
he asked for a secret appropriation of $5 million to purchase Florida.
Also on that day Spanish Minister Yrujo sent a reply to Secretary of State Madison.
The President and his cabinet decided not to respond to his letter.
After President Jefferson, Secretary Madison, and Navy Secretary
Robert Smith approved Eaton’s plan to restore Ahmad Karamanli,
they collected about 500 men and began the march of 520 miles
on March 6, reaching Bomba on April 17.
They found no American ships there but continued on toward Derne
which was defended by a garrison of 800 men.
Eaton sent the governor a flag of truce which was rebuffed.
Yusuf Karamanli proposed peace terms on April 21,
but Tobias Lear and Barron rejected them.
One week later the cruisers Nautilus, Argus, and Hornet joined Eaton
n an attack that drove out the governor and the garrison from Derne.
Eaton was wounded in the wrist, but the ships’ guns protected his men
from being massacred by the Tripolitans led by Hassan Agha on May 13.
They were still almost 700 miles from Tripoli, and Ahmad Karamanli
did get the popular support he had anticipated.
Samuel Barron resigned his command on May 22
and was replaced by John Rodgers.
On the 26th three frigates sailed into Tripoli harbor.
Tobias Lear was the American consul-general at Algiers, and on June 3
he negotiated a peace that ransomed the crew of 307 men from the
USS Philadelphia for the exchange of 81 Tripolitan prisoners and $60,000.
Ahmad Karamanli was abandoned.
On July 30 the United States sent 18 Navy ships with 2,500 men to Tunis Bay.
Jefferson did not learn of the Tripoli treaty until September 6,
and the United States Senate did not ratify it until 12 April 1806.
Prime Minister William Pitt and the British Parliament enacted legislation
to open West Indies’ ports to enemy ships to trade for British merchandise
and to import the enemy’s produce in British ships to England.
On July 23 William Scott judged the case of the American merchant ship Essex,
overturning the protection of broken voyages of ships with American customs papers
and opening the way for British ships to seize American vessels.
Talleyrand communicated that Napoleon was going
to oppose Monroe’s negotiation in Spain.
After his diplomatic efforts failed, Monroe left Spain in August.
That month Jefferson rejected the advice to occupy part of Texas given by
the Minister to Britain James Monroe and the Minister to France John Armstrong.
Madison learned of the British seizing American ships in late September.
On October 18 Monroe urged Jefferson to
threaten war against France, Spain, and England.
On the 21st Admiral Horatio Nelson won a great victory for
the British off Cape Trafalgar against French and Spanish fleets,
giving the English supremacy in the Atlantic Ocean.
This news reached Washington about December 20.
Napoleon’s army had defeated the Russian and
Austrian coalition at Austerlitz on December 3.
War in Europe helped neutral American exports
which reached $53 million in 1805.
James Stephen published War in Disguise: or, the Frauds of the Neutral Flags
in October, and Monroe sent a copy to America on November 1.
Stephen argued that the Rule of 1756 was settled law and that French and Spanish
ships carrying French or Spanish property in the name of neutrality was fraudulent.
He also contended that American trade was also fraudulent and could ruin Britain.
Therefore he recommended enforcing the Rule of 1756
by cutting off neutral trade altogether.
In July 1805 Governor William Henry Harrison made
a treaty with the Wyandots, Ottawas, and other tribes.
Indian lands were paid for, and they were obtained for about one cent per acre.
Chickasaws and Cherokees sold land between the Cumberland and
Tennessee rivers to Tennessee, opening the road from Knoxville to Nashville.
Creeks sold to Georgia the land between the Oconee and Ocmulgee rivers.
These treaties provided horse-roads to the Mobile River.
Jefferson hoped to use a third of revenues for the improvements of industries.
Harrison came to realize that the treaties were unfair to the Indians.
Regardless of whether an Indian killed a white man
or a white man murdered an Indian, they were tried by American law,
and in the history of the Indiana Territory no American jury
ever convicted a white man of murdering an Indian.
Jefferson hoped that the Indians would cultivate the soil and raise animals;
yet he still acted on behalf of the Americans’ greed for more land
In 1805 Harrison promoted the forming of the Indiana legislature which
allowed settlers to bring slaves into the territory for a limited
number of days;
then they could be emancipated or bound in service for years.
Another treaty completed in December 1806 with Chickamaugas
upset conservative Cherokees who complained that their
National Council had not been consented.
In August 1807 the feared Cherokee-Chickamauga
Chief Doublehead was killed for being corrupt.
On 8 January 1806 Jefferson and his cabinet resolved
not to pay a dollar for peace, though they would ransom prisoners.
When Marquis Yrujo arrived in Washington on 15 January 1806,
Madison signed a letter informing him that the President
had requested his recall; but Yrujo refused to leave.
John Randolph hated Madison and did not want him to succeed Jefferson,
and he accused the administration of corruption in its attempts to buy Florida.
Madison criticized the British for trying to prevent neutrals from trading
with non-British colonies, and he gave copies of his pamphlet
Examination of the British Doctrine, Which Subjects to Capture a Neutral Trade
to members of Congress on January 16.
After Randolph took a vacation for a week, Congress denied the
President’s request for funds and passed a resolution to increase the army.
During 1805 Spanish cruisers captured much American property,
and Spanish armed forces made incursions into Florida and Texas.
The revolutionary Francisco de Miranda came to New York
in November 1805 to ask for support against Spain,
and then he went to Washington and met with Madison.
Yrujo persuaded the French chargé Turreau
to complain about Miranda to Madison.
Two British frigates blockaded New York for the whole year.
About 2,500 British sailors deserted to work on American ships,
and the British navy impressed about a thousand to get some back.
The Americans complained that the British captured 500 American ships,
and by the end of the year Americans no longer
doubted that Britain was at war against them.
After returning to America in 1805 Joel Barlow spent most of his time
in Washington living in a house recommended to him by Jefferson.
On 24 February 1806 the President sent Barlow this short letter
with a draft for a bill to establish a National Academy:
I return you the draft of the bill for the establishment of a
National Academy & University at the city of Washington,
with such alterations as we talked over the last night.
They are chiefly verbal.
I have often wished we could have a Philosophical society
or academy so organized as that while the central academy
should be at the seat of government, its members
dispersed over the states, should constitute filiated
academies in each state, publish their communications,
from which the central academy should select
unpublished what should be most choice.
In this way all the members wheresoever dispersed
might be brought into action, and a useful emulation
might arise between the filiated societies.
Perhaps the great societies now existing might incorporate
themselves in this way with the National one.
But time does not allow me to pursue this idea,
nor perhaps had we time at all to get it into the present bill.
I procured an Agricultural society to be established
(voluntarily) on this plan, but it has done nothing.9
Barlow presented his ideas on higher education in his
“Prospectus of a National Institution To Be Established in the United States.”
He agreed with George Washington and Jefferson that the United States
needed a national university, and he recommended a college and a scientific
society to conduct research with a printing press to publish their findings.
He also suggested moving the patent office from the State Department
to the National Institute so that it would expose impostors and
establish what eventually became the Bureau of Standards.
He wanted teaching and research in mineralogy, botany, chemistry, medicine,
mechanics, hydraulics, and mathematics as well as
in literature, morals, government, and law.
On March 12 George Logan wrote to Jefferson and gave him this advice:
Your errors in conducting the exterior relations of our
country oppress the minds of your best friends
with the most anxious solicitude—
you may retrieve your character and preserve
the confidence of your fellow citizens.
Call together your too long neglected Council,
take the state of the Union into consideration,
submit every subject with frankness to discussion,
and united with them, determine on such measures
as may preserve the peace and honor of your country.
Your own reputation imperiously demands that
you should recede from pretensions and projects,
which are demonstrably groundless and unjust.10
In July 1806 Jefferson offered to give Barlow access to all his papers
and those of Madison if he would write a Republican history of his administration.
In 1808 Barlow published the revised version of his epic poem,
The Vision of Columbus, as The Columbiad with changes to
the “importance of republican institutions” to the “rising generation.”
He expanded his account of the American Revolution
from two books to three, and he urged Americans
to establish human equality by abolishing slavery.
He reduced the emphasis on the Biblical account
of creation and updated scientific theories.
Barlow became the American minister to France in 1811 and died while
with Napoleon’s army as they retreated from Russia in December 1812.
On 16 January 1806 the US House of Representatives appropriated
$2,000,000 to purchase Spanish territory east of the Mississippi,
and the US Senate passed it on February 7.
On the 18th in a letter to Judge Cooper the President expressed his concern
that Europe realize he was not “entirely in Quaker principles.”
On February 28 Congress passed a one-year law declaring that
any American ship going to St. Domingue should be forfeited with its cargo.
This was passed to please Napoleon but also because those in southern
states feared rebellious Africans in Haiti who had overthrown slavery.
Madison on March 13 sent a letter to John Armstrong in Paris
giving him
secret permission to offer France $5,000,000
for Florida and Texas to the Colorado River.
Madison had long favored restriction of British trade,
and on 29 January 1806 Andrew Gregg of Pennsylvania
sponsored a bill to ban all imports from England and its colonies.
Southerners opposed this because their agricultural products
were bought in large quantities by the British.
In 1802, 1803, and 1804 tobacco exports had averaged $6,140,000,
and $3,290,000 was from the British.
England’s share of the annual cotton exports worth $6,970,000 was $5,630,000.
Jacob Crowninshield of Massachusetts argued that because
the British held $16 million of the US public debt,
$8 million of the Louisiana stock, and $4 million in US Bank stock,
they would not risk these being confiscated in a war.
This led others to suggest confiscating these without a war.
Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin considered these proposals dangerous,
and his brother-in-law Joseph Nicholson noted that Gregg’s bill would
cost the US Government $5 million a year in revenue.
Senator Samuel Smith of Maryland and his brother Robert Smith,
the Navy Secretary, wanted to build up the Navy.
Their proposal was defeated, but the Congress did resolve
to send a special minister despite Jefferson’s disagreement.
After Pitt’s death on January 23 his policies were changed
by the new foreign minister, Charles James Fox, a friend of Americans.
On February 10 Nicholson presented his compromise resolutions.
On March 25 the House agreed to set November 15
to begin implementing
the Non-importation Bill based on those resolutions even though
it was opposed by John Randolph who on March 5
broke with the Jefferson administration in his speech.
They appropriated less money for the Navy but did fund
50 more gunboats the President requested, and they insisted on
sending William Pinkney of Maryland as a special emissary to London.
Jefferson signed the Non-importation Bill on April 18, and the next day
he nominated Monroe and Pinckney as commissioners to Britain.
On April 14 Rep. John Randolph proposed repealing the hated salt tax
that had raised $500,000 a year, but the US Senate rejected that.
Randolph then got the House to remove the Mediterranean Fund
that brought in nearly one million dollars, and the most
contentious session of Congress ended on April 21.
Jefferson on April 19 wrote to Russia’s Emperor Alexander I,
I owe an acknowledgement to Your Imperial Majesty
of the great satisfaction I have received from your letter
of August 20, 1805, and embrace the opportunity
it affords of giving expression to the sincere respect
and veneration I entertain for your character.
It will be among the latest and most soothing comforts
of my life to have seen advanced to the government
of so extensive a portion of the earth, and at so early a
period of his life, a sovereign whose ruling passion is the
advancement of the happiness and prosperity of his people;
and not of his own people only, but who can extend
his eye and his good will to a distant and infant nation,
unoffending in its course, unambitious in its views.
The events of Europe come to us so late and
so suspiciously, that observations on them would
certainly be stale and possibly wide of their actual state.
From their general aspect, however, I collect that
your Majesty’s interposition in them has been
disinterested and generous, and having in view
only the general good of the great European family.
When you shall proceed to the pacification which is to
reestablish peace and commerce, the same dispositions
of mind will lead you to think of the general intercourse
of nations, and to make that provision for its future
maintenance, which in times past it has so much needed.
The Northern nations of Europe, at the head of which
your Majesty is distinguished, are habitually peaceable.
The United States of America, like them,
are attached to peace.
We have then, with them a common interest
in the Neutral rights.
Every nation indeed on the continent of Europe, belligerent
as well as neutral, is interested in maintaining these rights,
in liberalizing them progressively with the progress of
science and refinement of morality, and in relieving them
from restrictions which the extension of the arts has
long since rendered unreasonable & vexatious.11
Massachusetts in April elected a legislature with a Republican majority,
and the Federalist Governor Strong was only re-elected by a few hundred votes.
On April 25 during the British blockade of New York harbor the vessel Leander,
while attempting to shoot over the bow of the American merchant ship Richard,
killed the captain’s brother John Pierce.
A grand jury in New York indicted Captain Whitby for murder,
and on May 3 President Jefferson closed American ports
to the three frigates involved in the blockade.
Jefferson on May 14 wrote this short letter to Dr. Edward Jenner:
I have received a copy of the evidence at large
respecting the discovery of the vaccine inoculation
which you have been pleased to send me,
and for which I return you my thanks.
Having been among the early converts,
in this part of the globe, to its efficiency,
I took an early part in recommending it to my countrymen.
I avail myself of this occasion of rendering you
a portion of the tribute of gratitude
due to you from the whole human family.
Medicine has never before produced
any single improvement of such utility.
Harvey’s discovery of the circulation of the blood was a
beautiful addition to our knowledge of the animal economy,
but on a review of the practice of medicine before
and since that epoch, I do not see any great amelioration
which has been derived from that discovery.
You have erased from the calendar
of human afflictions one of its greatest.
Yours is the comfortable reflection that mankind
can never forget that you have lived.
Future nations will know by history only that the loathsome
small-pox has existed and by you has been extirpated.
Accept my fervent wishes for your health and happiness
and assurances of the greatest respect and consideration.12
On May 16 the British Foreign Secretary Charles James Fox told Monroe
that Britain was blockading European ports because of Napoleon
but that American ships not carrying contraband could trade,
negating the Essex decision and reinstating the neutral carrying policy.
Jefferson learned in late May that Spanish forces
had crossed the Sabine River into the Orleans Territory.
During the summer of 1806 William Steuben Smith,
the surveyor of the Port of New York, and Samuel Ogden, owner of the Leander,
were put on trial for violating the neutrality laws by supporting the attempted
revolution led by Francisco de Miranda against imperial Spain in Colombia;
but when members of his administration were subpoenaed,
Jefferson told them to disobey the summons.
Jefferson removed Smith from his position, and he was acquitted.
On 4 November 1806 the British ambassador Anthony Merry
was replaced by the better-liked David Montague Erskine.
On the 15th the American Non-importation Act went into effect,
and six days later Napoleon issued his Berlin Decree
blockading England for violating international law.
This would also effect neutral rights and American commerce, and
on December 1 the American envoys Monroe and Pinkney reacted by
signing a treaty with the new British Foreign Secretary Charles Grey
that ignored the conditions requested by Jefferson and Madison.
In early 1806 federal attorney for Kentucky, Joseph Hamilton Daveiss,
wrote Jefferson letters advising him that Aaron Burr
was planning a rebellion in the newly opened West.
On November 27 President Jefferson issued this proclamation
prohibiting private expeditions into Spanish territory.
Whereas information has been received that sundry
persons, citizens of the United States or residents
within the same, are conspiring and confederating
together to begin and set on foot, provide, and prepare
the means for a military expedition or enterprise
against the dominions of Spain; that for this purpose
they are fitting out and arming vessels in the western
waters of the United States, collecting provisions, arms,
military stores, and means; are deceiving and seducing
honest and well-meaning citizens under various pretenses
to engage in their criminal enterprises; are organizing,
officering, and arming themselves for the same,
contrary to the laws in such cases made and provided:
I have therefore thought proper to issue this my
proclamation, warning and enjoining all faithful citizens
who have been led without due knowledge or consideration
to participate in the said unlawful enterprises to withdraw
from the same without delay, and commanding all
persons whatsoever engaged or concerned in the
same to cease all further proceedings therein,
as they will answer the contrary at their peril
and incur prosecution with all the rigors of the law.
And I hereby enjoin and require all officers, civil and
military, of the United States, or of any of the States or
Territories, and especially all governors and other executive
authorities, all judges, justices, and other officers of the
peace, all military officers of the Army or Navy of the
United States, or officers of the militia, to be vigilant,
each within his respective department and according to
his functions, in searching out and bringing to condign
punishment all persons engaged or concerned in such
enterprise, in seizing and detaining, subject to the
disposition of the law, all vessels, arms, military stores,
or other means provided or providing for the same,
and in general in preventing the carrying on such expedition
or enterprise by all lawful means within their power;
and I require all good and faithful citizens and others
within the United States to be aiding and assisting herein,
and especially in the discovery, apprehension, and
bringing to justice of all such offenders, in preventing
the execution of their unlawful designs, and in giving
information against them to the proper authorities.13
Jefferson in December refused to submit to the Senate for ratification
the treaty with Britain that Monroe, the US minister there,
and William Pinkney had negotiated and signed.
Revenues in 1806 reached $14,500,000,
and the Treasury had a surplus of $4,000,000.
The national debt had been reduced to less than $57,500,000
which included $11,250,000 in Louisiana stock.
The public force acted strictly on the defensive to protect
citizens from aggression and to suppress criminal attempts
by private individuals to begin unauthorized hostilities.
The size of American military forces would depend on the negotiations with Spain.
Jefferson urged the Congress to pass a law to take effect on the first day
of 1808 in order to remedy violations of human rights which had
for so long continued against the unoffending inhabitants of Africa.
Although he recognized the value of private enterprise, Jefferson suggested
that a public institution could aid the sciences and improve the country.
The Congress began by cooperating with the President’s request
to suspend the Non-importation Act that had been passed in April.
The House declined to expand the Army and refused to fortify New York.
In December the President appointed Henry Brockholst Livingston
of New York to the Supreme Court.
President Jefferson in a letter on 20 June 1803
wrote instructions for Meriwether Lewis,
Your mission has been communicated to the Ministers
here from France, Spain, & Great Britain, and through
them to their governments: and such assurances
given them as to its objects as we trust will satisfy them.
The country of Louisiana having been ceded by Spain to
France, the passport you have from the Minister of France,
the representative of the present sovereign of the country,
will be a protection with all its subjects.
And that from the Minister of England will entitle you
to the friendly aid of any traders of that allegiance
with whom you may happen to meet.
The object of your mission is to explore the Missouri river,
& such principal streams of it as by its course &
communication with the waters of the Pacific Ocean,
may offer the most direct & practicable water
communication across this continent,
for the purposes of commerce.
Beginning at the mouth of the Missouri, you will take
observations of latitude and longitude, at all remarkable
points on the river, & especially at the mouths of rivers,
at rapids, at islands & other places & objects distinguished
by such natural marks & characters of a durable kind,
as that they may with certainty be recognized hereafter.
The courses of the river between these points of
observation may be supplied by the compass, the log-line
& by time, corrected by the observations themselves.
The variations of the compass too,
in different places should be noticed.
The interesting points of the portage between the heads of
the Missouri & the water offering the best communication
with the Pacific ocean, should also be fixed by observation,
& the course of that water to the ocean,
in the same manner as that of the Missouri.
Your observations are to be taken with great pains
& accuracy to be entered distinctly, & intelligibly for
others as well as yourself, to comprehend all the
elements necessary, with the aid of the usual tables
to fix the latitude & longitude of the places at which
they were taken, & are to be rendered to the war office
for the purpose of having the calculations made
concurrently by proper persons within the U. S.
Several copies of these, as well as of your other notes,
should be made at leisure times & put into the care
of the most trustworthy of your attendants,
to guard by multiplying them against the accidental
losses to which they will be exposed.
A further guard would be that one of these copies
be written on the paper of the birch, as less liable
to injury from damp than common paper.
The commerce which may be carried on
with the people inhabiting the line you will pursue,
renders a knowledge of those people important.
You will therefore endeavor to make yourself acquainted,
as far as a diligent pursuit of your journey shall admit….
In all your intercourse with the natives treat them in the
most friendly & conciliatory manner which their own conduct
will admit; allay all jealousies as to the object of your
journey, satisfy them of its innocence, make them
acquainted with the position, extent, character, peaceable
& commercial dispositions of the U. S., of our wish to be
neighborly, friendly & useful to them, & of our dispositions
to a commercial intercourse with them; confer with them
on the points most convenient as mutual emporiums, &
the articles of most desirable interchange for them & us.
If a few of their influential chiefs, within practicable distance,
wish to visit us, arrange such a visit with them,
and furnish them with authority to call on our officers,
on their entering the U. S. to have them conveyed
to this place at the public expense.
If any of them should wish to have some of their young
people brought up with us & taught such arts as may be
useful to them, we will receive, instruct & take care of them.
Such a mission, whether of influential chiefs or of young
people, would give some security to your own party.
Carry with you some matter of the kine-pox;
inform those of them with whom you may be,
of its efficacy as a preservative from the small-pox;
and instruct & encourage them in the use of it.
This may be especially done wherever you winter.
As it is impossible for us to foresee in what manner
you will be received by those people, whether
with hospitality or hostility, so is it impossible
to prescribe the exact degree of perseverance
with which you are to pursue your journey.
We value too much the lives of citizens
to offer them to probable destruction.
Your numbers will be sufficient to secure you against the
unauthorized opposition of individuals or of small parties:
but if a superior force, authorized or not authorized by a
nation, should be arrayed against your further passage,
& inflexibly determined to arrest it,
you must decline its further pursuit & return.
In the loss of yourselves, we should lose also
the information you will have acquired.
By returning safely with that, you may enable us
to renew the essay with better calculated means.
To your own discretion therefore must be left
the degree of danger you may risk, & the point
at which you should decline, only saying we wish
you to err on the side of your safety & to bring back
your party safe, even if it be with less information.15
Lewis left Washington on 5 July 1803, and William Clark led the expedition
called the Corps of Discovery that began from St. Louis on 14 May 1804.
Lewis acquired hundreds of brooches, rings, earrings, beads, mirrors, and knives
to give to the Otos, Omahas, Missouris, Sioux, Pawnees, Poncas, Arikaras,
and other tribes they met along the way.
Jefferson instructed them to be friendly and conciliatory,
and they received hospitality that included food, presents, and “temporary wives.”
The expedition with 33 men traveled up the Missouri River 1,609 miles
and camped near Mandan villages in October in what is now North Dakota.
Lewis and Clark instilled discipline by using courts martial
and up to 100 lashes on the back.
They built a fort and spent the winter there.
The people of Louisiana remonstrated by
presenting two petitions to the Congress.
On 2 March 1805 the Congress authorized the people of Louisiana
to elect 25 representatives to a General Assembly and gave the people
of New Orleans all the rights of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787.
When the population would reach 60,000 free inhabitants,
they could apply for admission into the Union;
but this could not be established until the 1810 census was taken.
On 11 March 1805 Jefferson appointed General James Wilkinson Governor of the
Louisiana Territory, and the Senate did not consent to it until 27 January 1806.
Neither Claiborne nor Wilkinson knew any French or Spanish,
and both became very unpopular.
Claiborne reported to Madison that many people believed that
the territory west of the Mississippi would be ceded back to Spain.
In 1806 the Code Noir divided the people of Louisiana legally
into whites and non-whites who had no rights.
In April 1805 Lewis and Clark sent their
keelboat back with some men and a report.
On April 7 the Corps of 33 men set out in six canoes
and two pirogues up the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains.
They were guided by the Shoshone woman Sacagawea
and her husband Toussaint Charbonnneau.
They reached the Nez Percé Indians on the Clearwater River
on September 22 by what became the Idaho border.
From there they built canoes and went down the Clearwater, Snake,
and Columbia rivers, reaching the Pacific Ocean on November 7.
They began their return journey in March 1806 and spent a month
with the Nez Percé waiting for snow to melt.
They crossed the Rockies again and explored the Marias and Yellowstone rivers.
Blackfoot Indians tried to steal their horses and had two men killed.
They left Sacagawea and her family with the Mandans
and arrived in St. Louis on September 23.
They found 178 new plants and 122 species and subspecies
of animals and kept records of them.
Despite the many dangers they faced and venereal disease suffered,
only one of their men died, probably from appendicitis.
Lewis shared the fruits of the expedition with Jefferson at the White House
on 10 January 1807, and he planted some of the seeds and specimens at Monticello.
In 1807 Jefferson appointed William Clark a brigadier general
in the Louisiana Territory and the agent for Indian affairs.
In the summer of 1805 Governor James Wilkinson sent Lt. Zebulon Pike
with 19 soldiers to find the source of the Mississippi River.
They left from St. Louis and by October 16 had gone 233 miles
beyond the Falls of Saint Anthony where they built a winter station.
Pike held a council with the Sioux at those falls and persuaded them
to grant 100,000 acres in that area,
but he was unable to get the Sioux and the Chippewas to make peace.
Some of his men went farther north on sleds in December
and reached the British trading post by Sandy Lake on 8 January 1806.
Pike informed the British and Indians that they were in the territory of the United States.
He began the return journey on February 18 and arrived at St. Louis on April 30.
On 24 June 1806 Governor Wilkinson ordered Captain Zebulon Pike
to find the source of the Red River.
His expedition with 20 soldiers left the St. Louis area on July 15
following the Missouri and Osage rivers and took
50 Osage hostages back to their people a month later.
Pike went west along the Republican River and
reached a Pawnee village on September 29.
From there he turned south and came to the Arkansas River on October 14.
The Governor’s son, Lt. James Biddle Wilkinson, led a group down the Arkansas
to the Mississippi and back up to St. Louis while Pike
led the others upstream to the source of the Arkansas River.
On November 15 Pike named a high mountain “Grand Peak,”
and it soon came to be known as Pike’s Peak.
Pike tried to get to the headwaters of the Red River.
He
could not find it, and he went up the Platte River.
Some fatigued men were left behind, and Pike’s group
reached the Rio Grande on 30 January 1807.
Spaniards captured Pike and his men near Santa Fe on February 26.
They were taken to the capital at Chihuahua and were released at
San Antonio before returning to Louisiana at Natchitoches on July 1.
Jefferson chose the scientists Thomas Freeman and Peter Custis
and Captain Richard Sparks to lead an expedition
in the Spanish territory looking for the source of the Red River.
They left Fort Adams near Natchez on 19 April 1806
and were joined by 21 more soldiers along the way.
They went 615 miles up the Red River by July 28
when they encountered Spanish troops.
To provoke a confrontation Governor Wilkinson of the Louisiana Territory
had secretly notified Spain which sent two contingents of soldiers.
Freeman negotiated with the Spanish commander and followed
Jefferson’s order to avoid violence, agreeing to turn back the next day.
The naturalist Peter Custis made pioneering discoveries.
In his 6th Annual Message to Congress on December 2 Jefferson
reported how he acted to curtail military actions by private individuals
into Spanish territory, and he ordered ships and arms seized.
This is the entire text:
To the Senate and House of Representatives
of the United States in Congress Assembled:It would have given me, fellow citizens, great
satisfaction to announce in the moment of your
meeting that the difficulties in our foreign relations,
existing at the time of your last separation, had
been amicably and justly terminated.
I lost no time in taking those measures which were
most likely to bring them to such a termination, by
special missions charged with such powers and
instructions as in the event of failure could leave no
imputation on either our moderation or forbearance.
The delays which have since taken place in our
negotiations with the British government appears to
have proceeded from causes which do not forbid the
expectation that during the course of the session I
may be enabled to lay before you their final issue.
What will be that of the negotiations for settling our
differences with Spain, nothing which had taken place
at the date of the last dispatches enables us to pronounce.
On the western side of the Mississippi she advanced
in considerable force, and took post at the settlement
of Bayou Pierre, on the Red river.
This village was originally settled by France, was
held by her as long as she held Louisiana, and
was delivered to Spain only as a part of Louisiana.
Being small, insulated, and distant, it was not
observed, at the moment of redelivery to France
and the United States, that she continued a guard
of half a dozen men which had been stationed there.
A proposition, however, having been lately made by our
commander-in-chief, to assume the Sabine river as a
temporary line of separation between the troops of the two
nations until the issue of our negotiations shall be known;
this has been referred by the Spanish commandant to his
superior, and in the meantime, he has withdrawn his
force to the western side of the Sabine river.
The correspondence on this subject, now
communicated, will exhibit more particularly
the present state of things in that quarter.
The nature of that country requires indispensably
that an unusual proportion of the force employed
there should be cavalry or mounted infantry.
In order, therefore, that the commanding officer
might be enabled to act with effect, I had authorized
him to call on the governors of Orleans and Mississippi
for a corps of five hundred volunteer cavalry.
The temporary arrangement he has proposed
may perhaps render this unnecessary.
But I inform you with great pleasure of the promptitude
with which the inhabitants of those territories have
tendered their services in defense of their country.
It has done honor to themselves, entitled them to the
confidence of their fellow-citizens in every part of the Union,
and must strengthen the general determination to protect
them efficaciously under all circumstances which may occur.
Having received information that in another part of the
United States a great number of private individuals were
combining together, arming and organizing themselves
contrary to law, to carry on military expeditions against the
territories of Spain, I thought it necessary, by proclamations
as well as by special orders, to take measures for
preventing and suppressing this enterprise, for seizing the
vessels, arms, and other means provided for it, and for
arresting and bringing to justice its authors and abettors.
It was due to that good faith which ought ever to be
the rule of action in public as well as in private transactions;
it was due to good order and regular government, that
while the public force was acting strictly on the defensive
and merely to protect our citizens from aggression,
the criminal attempts of private individuals to decide
for their country the question of peace or war,
by commencing active and unauthorized hostilities,
should be promptly and efficaciously suppressed.
Whether it will be necessary to enlarge our regular
force will depend on the result of our negotiation with Spain;
but as it is uncertain when that result will be known,
the provisional measures requisite for that, and to
meet any pressure intervening in that quarter,
will be a subject for your early consideration.
The possession of both banks of the Mississippi reducing
to a single point the defense of that river, its waters, and
the country adjacent, it becomes highly necessary to
provide for that point a more adequate security.
Some position above its mouth, commanding the passage
of the river, should be rendered sufficiently strong to
cover the armed vessels which may be stationed there
for defense, and in conjunction with them to present an
insuperable obstacle to any force attempting to pass.
The approaches to the city of New Orleans, from the
eastern quarter also, will require to be examined,
and more effectually guarded.
For the internal support of the country, the encouragement
of a strong settlement on the western side of the Mississippi,
within reach of New Orleans, will be worthy the
consideration of the legislature.
The gun-boats authorized by an act of the
last session are so advanced that they will
be ready for service in the ensuing spring.
Circumstances permitted us to allow the time
necessary for their more solid construction.
As a much larger number will still be wanting to place
our seaport towns and waters in that state of defense
to which we are competent and they entitled,
a similar appropriation for a further provision
for them is recommended for the ensuing year.
A further appropriation will also be necessary
for repairing fortifications already established,
and the erection of such works as may have real
effect in obstructing the approach of an enemy to
our seaport towns, or their remaining before them.
In a country whose constitution is derived from the will
of the people, directly expressed by their free suffrages;
where the principal executive functionaries, and those of
the legislature, are renewed by them at short periods;
where under the characters of jurors, they exercise in
person the greatest portion of the judiciary powers; where
the laws are consequently so formed and administered as
to bear with equal weight and favor on all, restraining no
man in the pursuits of honest industry, and securing to
everyone the property which that acquires, it would not
be supposed that any safeguards could be needed against
insurrection or enterprise on the public peace or authority.
The laws, however, aware that these should not be
trusted to moral restraints only, have wisely provided
punishments for these crimes when committed.
But would it not be salutary to give also the
means of preventing their commission?
Where an enterprise is meditated by private individuals
against a foreign nation in amity with the United States,
powers of prevention to a certain extent are given by the
laws; would they not be as reasonable and useful were
the enterprise preparing against the United States?
While adverting to this branch of the law, it is proper to
observe, that in enterprises meditated against foreign
nations, the ordinary process of binding to the observance
of the peace and good behavior, could it be extended to acts
to be done out of the jurisdiction of the United States, would
be effectual in some cases where the offender is able to
keep out of sight every indication of his purpose which could
draw on him the exercise of the powers now given by law.
The states on the coast of Barbary seem generally
disposed at present to respect our peace and friendship;
with Tunis alone some uncertainty remains.
Persuaded that it is our interest to maintain our peace with
them on equal terms, or not at all, I propose to send in
due time a reinforcement into the Mediterranean, unless
previous information shall show it to be unnecessary.
We continue to receive proofs of the growing attachment
of our Indian neighbors, and of their disposition to place all
their interests under the patronage of the United States.
These dispositions are inspired by their confidence in our
justice, and in the sincere concern we feel for their welfare;
and as long as we discharge these high and honorable
functions with the integrity and good faith which alone
can entitle us to their continuance, we may expect to
reap the just reward in their peace and friendship.
The expedition of Messrs. Lewis and Clarke,
for exploring the river Missouri, and the best
communication from that to the Pacific ocean, has
had all the success which could have been expected.
They have traced the Missouri nearly to its source,
descended the Columbia to the Pacific ocean,
ascertained with accuracy the geography of that
interesting communication across our continent,
learned the character of the country, of its commerce,
and inhabitants; and it is but justice to say that Messrs.
Lewis and Clarke, and their brave companions, have
by this arduous service deserved well of their country.
The attempt to explore the Red river, under the direction
of Mr. Freeman, though conducted with a zeal and prudence
meriting entire approbation, has not been equally successful.
After proceeding up it about six hundred miles, nearly
as far as the French settlements had extended while
the country was in their possession, our geographers
were obliged to return without completing their work.
Very useful additions have also been made to our
knowledge of the Mississippi by Lieutenant Pike, who
has ascended to its source, and whose journal and map,
giving the details of the journey, will shortly be ready
for communication to both houses of Congress.
Those of Messrs. Lewis and Clarke, and Freeman,
will require further time to be digested and prepared.
These important surveys, in addition to those before
possessed, furnish materials for commencing an
accurate map of the Mississippi, and its western waters.
Some principal rivers, however, remain still to be
explored, toward which the authorization of Congress,
by moderate appropriations, will be requisite.
I congratulate you, fellow-citizens, on the
approach of the period at which you may interpose
your authority constitutionally, to withdraw the citizens
of the United States from all further participation in those
violations of human rights which have been so long
continued on the unoffending inhabitants of Africa, and
which the morality, the reputation, and the best interests
of our country, have long been eager to proscribe.
Although no law you may pass can take prohibitory
effect till the first day of the year one thousand eight
hundred and eight, yet the intervening period is not
too long to prevent, by timely notice, expeditions
which cannot be completed before that day.
The receipts at the treasury during the year ending on the
30th of September last, have amounted to near fifteen
millions of dollars, which have enabled us, after meeting the
current demands, to pay two millions seven hundred
thousand dollars of the American claims, in part of the price
of Louisiana; to pay of the funded debt upward of three
millions of principal, and nearly four of interest; and in
addition, to reimburse, in the course of the present month,
near two millions of five and a half per cent. stock.
These payments and reimbursements of the funded debt,
with those which have been made in the four years and a
half preceding, will, at the close of the present year, have
extinguished upwards of twenty-three millions of principal.
The duties composing the Mediterranean fund will
cease by law at the end of the present season.
Considering, however, that they are levied chiefly
on luxuries, and that we have an impost on salt, a
necessary of life, the free use of which otherwise
is so important, I recommend to your consideration
the suppression of the duties on salt, and the
continuation of the Mediterranean fund, instead thereof,
for a short time, after which that also will become
unnecessary for any purpose now within contemplation.
When both of these branches of revenue shall in this way
be relinquished, there will still ere long be an accumulation
of moneys in the treasury beyond the instalments of
public debt which we are permitted by contract to pay.
They cannot, then, without a modification assented to by
the public creditors, be applied to the extinguishment of this
debt, and the complete liberation of our revenues—the
most desirable of all objects; nor, if our peace continues,
will they be wanting for any other existing purpose.
The question, therefore, now comes forward,—to what
other objects shall these surpluses be appropriated,
and the whole surplus of impost, after the entire
discharge of the public debt, and during those intervals
when the purposes of war shall not call for them?
Shall we suppress the impost and give that advantage
to foreign over domestic manufactures?
On a few articles of more general and necessary use,
the suppression in due season will doubtless be right,
but the great mass of the articles on which impost is
paid is foreign luxuries, purchased by those only who
are rich enough to afford themselves the use of them.
Their patriotism would certainly prefer its continuance and
application to the great purposes of the public education,
roads, rivers, canals, and such other objects of public
improvement as it may be thought proper to add to
the constitutional enumeration of federal powers.
By these operations new channels of communication
will be opened between the States; the lines of separation
will disappear, their interests will be identified, and
their union cemented by new and indissoluble ties.
Education is here placed among the articles of public care,
not that it would be proposed to take its ordinary branches
out of the hands of private enterprise, which manages so
much better all the concerns to which it is equal; but a
public institution can alone supply those sciences which,
though rarely called for, are yet necessary to complete the
circle, all the parts of which contribute to the improvement
of the country, and some of them to its preservation.
The subject is now proposed for the consideration of
Congress, because, if approved by the time the State
legislatures shall have deliberated on this extension of
the federal trusts, and the laws shall be passed, and
other arrangements made for their execution, the
necessary funds will be on hand and without employment.
I suppose an amendment to the constitution,
by consent of the States, necessary, because
the objects now recommended are not among
those enumerated in the constitution, and to
which it permits the public moneys to be applied.
The present consideration of a national establishment
for education, particularly, is rendered proper by this
circumstance also, that if Congress, approving the
proposition, shall yet think it more eligible to found
it on a donation of lands, they have it now in their
power to endow it with those which will be among
the earliest to produce the necessary income.
This foundation would have the advantage of
being independent on war, which may suspend
other improvements by requiring for its own
purposes the resources destined for them.
This, fellow citizens, is the state of the public
interest at the present moment, and according
to the information now possessed.
But such is the situation of the nations of Europe,
and such too the predicament in which we stand
with some of them, that we cannot rely with certainty
on the present aspect of our affairs that may change
from moment to moment, during the course of your
session or after you shall have separated.
Our duty is, therefore, to act upon things as they are, and
to make a reasonable provision for whatever they may be.
Were armies to be raised whenever a speck of war is visible
in our horizon, we never should have been without them.
Our resources would have been exhausted on
dangers which have never happened, instead of
being reserved for what is really to take place.
A steady, perhaps a quickened pace in preparations
for the defense of our seaport towns and waters;
an early settlement of the most exposed and vulnerable
parts of our country; a militia so organized that its effective
portions can be called to any point in the Union, or
volunteers instead of them to serve a sufficient time,
are means which may always be ready yet never
preying on our resources until actually called into use.
They will maintain the public interests while a more
permanent force shall be in course of preparation.
But much will depend on the promptitude with
which these means can be brought into activity.
If war be forced upon us in spite of our long and vain
appeals to the justice of nations, rapid and vigorous
movements in its outset will go far toward securing us in its
course and issue, and toward throwing its burdens on those
who render necessary the resort from reason to force.
The result of our negotiations, or such incidents in their
course as may enable us to infer their probable issue;
such further movements also on our western frontiers
as may show whether war is to be pressed there
while negotiation is protracted elsewhere, shall be
communicated to you from time to time as they become
known to me, with whatever other information I possess
or may receive, which may aid your deliberations on
the great national interests committed to your charge.15
After 4 March 1805 Aaron Burr was no longer Vice President,
and he tried to negotiate with Anthony Merry, the British minister to the United States,
in a conspiracy to separate the Louisiana Territory from the United States
as a confederation led by Burr and sponsored by Britain.
On March 29 in a secret letter Merry wrote,
Mr. Burr (with whom I know that the deputies
became very intimate during their residence here)
has mentioned to me that the inhabitants of Louisiana
seem determined to render themselves
independent of the United States, and that the execution
of their design is only delayed by the difficulty of obtaining
previously an assurance of protection and assistance
from some foreign Power, and of concerting and connecting
their independence with that of the inhabitants
of the western parts of the United States,
who must always have a command over them
by the rivers which communicate with the Mississippi.16
Burr asked the British government for aid from a British squadron
at the mouth of the Mississippi River and for a loan of $500,000.
While waiting for a response he planned to visit New Orleans
in order to promote creole disaffection.
He also plotted this with James Wilkinson, the commanding general of the US Army.
The British recalled their Minister Merry on June 1.
On 14 July 1806 Joseph Hamilton Daveiss, the US Attorney for Kentucky,
wrote a letter to President Jefferson warning him of Burr’s conspiracy.
Louisiana Governor James Wilkinson was approached by Burr who wanted his support.
Wilkinson in October wrote a letter to the President
that incriminated Burr but not Wilkinson.
Jefferson’s administration on October 22 began taking steps to suppress the conspiracy
led by Aaron Burr, and he instructed Governor Wilkinson to keep the peace.
On November 25 Jefferson received from Louisiana Governor James Wilkinson
two confidential dispatches dated October 21, and the cabinet met again.
On that 25th Daveiss renewed his motion against Burr at Frankfort, Kentucky,
though on December 5 a grand jury of 22 people
declared that they found nothing improper.
Wilkinson was ordered to suppress any hostile act
in the territory of the United States or Spain.
On November 27 Jefferson in a proclamation warned citizens against
participating in any unlawful “enterprise against the dominions of Spain,”
and he ordered military officers and judges to punish violators.
In his annual message to Congress on 2 December 1806 he praised
Governor Edward Tiffin of Ohio who had ordered
Burr’s boats seized at Marietta, Ohio.
Some more boats were captured on December 9, and the next day
about 35 conspirators fled down the river while Burr and John Adair,
the former senator of Kentucky, went to Nashville.
On the 14th Andrew Jackson asked Burr to disavow any rebellion
against the United States, and he did so.
Yet Jackson went on building boats for Burr.
Jefferson’s Proclamation reached Nashville on December 19;
but nothing was done, and Burr managed to escape.
Jefferson ordered Burr arrested for treason in January 1807.
Burr turned himself in twice and was released,
and on February 19 Burr was arrested in the Mississippi Territory.
On July 14 Jefferson wrote in a letter to Dupont de Nemours,
Burr’s conspiracy has been one of the most flagitious
of which history will ever furnish an example.
He had combined the objects of separating the
western States from us, of adding Mexico to them,
and of placing himself at their head.
But he who could expect to effect such objects by the aid
of American citizens must be perfectly ripe for Bedlam.
Yet although there is not a man in the U. S. who is not
satisfied of the depth of his guilt, such are the jealous
provisions of our laws in favor of the accused & against
the accuser, that I question if he can be convicted.
Out of 48 jurors who are to be summoned, he has a right
to choose the 12 who are to try him, and if any one of the
12 refuses to concur in finding him guilty, he escapes.
This affair has been a great confirmation in my mind
of the innate strength of the form of our government.
He had probably induced near a thousand men
to engage with him by making them believe
the government connived at it.
A proclamation alone, by undeceiving them,
so completely disarmed him, that he had not above
30 men left, ready to go all lengths with him.17
In his trial for treason by a federal court in Richmond, Virginia
with Chief Justice John Marshall presiding, the jury acquitted Burr on September 1.
In the United States many people burned effigies of Burr, and he fled to Europe.
Notes
1. Thomas Jefferson Writings, p. 518-523.
2. The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Volume X ed. Paul Leicester Ford, p. 140-141.
3. Ibid. p. 142-143.
4. From Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 17 August 1805 (Online)
5. The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Volume X, p. 172-173.
6. Ibid. p. 178-179.
7. From Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 23 October 1805 (Online)
8. The Basic Writings of Thomas Jefferson ed. Philip S. Foner, p. 363-369.
9. Thomas Jefferson Writings, p. 1160.
10. Thomas Jefferson: A Biography by Nathan Schachner, p. 810.
11. Ibid. p. 1161.
12. Ibid. p. 1163.
13. The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Volume X, p. 301-302.
14. Thomas Jefferson Writings, p. 1126-1130.
15. Thomas Jefferson Writings, p. 524-531.
16. History of the United States During the Administrations of Thomas Jefferson
by Henry Adams, p. 576.
17. The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Volume X, p. 461-462.
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