CHAPTER X.

MR. JEFFERSON AS FOREIGN MINISTER-HIS VERSATILE EMPLOYMENTS-VIEWS OF THE CONSTITUTION

OF THE UNITED STATES.

N May, 1784, Mr. Jefferson was appointed by the Congress as an additional agent to negotiate commercial treaties with foreign nations, and after making a trip through the Middle and Eastern States for the purpose of acquainting himself better with their condition, with his oldest daughter, Martha, he sailed from Boston on the 5th of July. On the 6th of August he took up his residence in Paris, and shortly afterwards his daughter was placed at a popular convent school.

John Adams and Dr. Franklin were the other American ministers, and with them, soon after his arrival, a form of treaty to be offered to all nations disposed to negotiate, was agreed upon. But their progress was slow. Even in France during his entire residence there he met with little success in rearranging the unsatisfactory commercial relations between that country and his own. Dr. Franklin, who was a great favorite of the French government and people, soon made arrangements to return to America, leaving Mr. Jefferson the duly accredited minister to France, and, although he was a greatly superior and more accomplished scholar than Franklin, he felt some hesitancy

as to his ability to fill the place of the easy old philosopher at the French Capital. But his success was marked, and it is doubtless just to say, that no other agent of this country for many years so perfectly filled the room of Franklin, in France, as did Thomas Jefferson.

He was generally successful throughout his life in avoiding broils or difficulties, and in France there was a peculiar fitness about him for missing the troubles into which Mr. Adams fell. Both French practices and French philosophy were congenial to him, and, although his residence abroad attached him more to his own freer, purer, and better land, he found a social and intellectual atmosphere which had, no doubt, been long one of the sources of his desire to visit that country. Then, too, he was greatly devoted to the French government and people for the noble service they had rendered the United States. His congenial temper towards France enabled him to see well what could be expected from her towards this country in its irresponsible condition. While he hoped for much, he did not really expect more than he received from that nation.

The severer and more exacting character of Mr. Adams enabled him to see at the beginning of the American conflict the motives that would be likely to influence foreign friendship, and to divine the genuine spirit of the French government, as it also led him to detest the practices and moral status of the French people, things which Mr. Jefferson was not willing to believe, and was only able to see in after years, and in his pen pictures, drawn in his better moments. the great difficulties against which Mr. Adams contended in France had passed away with the settlement of the peace treaty, and Mr. Jefferson had an easier

But

task to which no man was better suited or was better able to perform.

A matter which demanded his early leisure in Paris was the printing of his "Notes on Virginia." This work was soon translated and published in French, and afterwards republished in London, it is believed. Many of the principles which distinguished Mr. Jefferson were interspersed throughout this writing, and being agreeable to the state in which he found the French people, it, of course, went very far in introducing him to their favor. Then, too, his acquaintance with and warm reception of many of the French officers during the Revolutionary War served to make him at home among these generous foreigners. France was just giving birth to a spirit, caught, to some extent, from the success of America, and by contact with such men as Mr. Jefferson, who was the natural representative of her free and independent life. Political liberalism was developed in that country, and Mr. Jefferson was its friend. His part in establishing the American Republic was by no means insignificant, and the fabric already apparently on the verge of dissolution had more respect at that time in France, among the people, than it deserved, and Mr. Jefferson was its fortunate minister.

One of the great sources of anxiety to Mr. Jefferson in 1785 and 1786, was the piratical conduct of the Barbary States on the Mediterranean. The way open to peace with these pirates was by paying a tribute, and this way most of the neighboring governments chose to take. America came in for a share of the indignity dealt out on the seas by these people, some of her captive seamen being compelled to serve as

slaves for years under them. Mr. Jefferson actually favored war with these pirates, and at that time saw clearly enough the use and necessity of organizing a naval force of some respectability, able to cope with these enemies to civilization, and protect our commerce. Notwithstanding this experience, he favored an almost entire neglect of the navy, during his Presidency, as a part of his extreme republican theory of letting evil and good interests alike regulate themselves. He led the way in proposing a plan for all the powers to unite against the African buccaneers, but when he informed the home government as to what would be expected of it, there was no money in the treasury, and nothing could be done.

Early in the spring of 1786, he joined Mr. Adams in London for the purpose of attempting some satisfactory settlement with the representative at Tripoli, and to advise as to the form of a commercial treaty to be finally presented to England. to England. With neither of these cases were they successful, and then, they had the added mortification of being snubbed by George III. While in England Mr. Jefferson took occasion to visit the noted places, but he was stung by his cool reception, which he, no doubt, remembered in fixing his unfriendly tendencies and policy towards that country long after.

His success in negotiating to the advantage of his government in Paris was of little greater moment than that of Mr. Adams in London. The difficulties were increased on all hands, too, by the reckless, improvident, and irresponsible condition of the Congress and its agents at home. The necessities of some more certain and stable form of government, became apparent

to him, as well as the anxious friends of the country in America. He was, however, as little concerned about the whole matter as almost any one, as he believed that all evils would regulate themselves in the government; nor did the insurrections in parts of the country occupy his mind as affairs of much importance. Yet he was deeply concerned about many things, and at this period wrote and disclosed much of his views and plans for the regulation of the affairs of the country.

January 25, 1786, Mr. Jefferson wrote from Paris to an American friend :—

"American reputation in Europe is not such as to be flattering to its citizens. Two circumstances are particularly objected to in us; the non-payment of our debts, and the want of energy in our government. These discourage a connection with us. I own it to be my opinion, that good will arise from the destruction of our credit. I see nothing else which can restrain our disposition to luxury, and to the change of those manners which alone can preserve republican government. As it is impossible to prevent credit, the best way would be to cure its ill effects, by giving an instantaneous recovery to the creditor. This would be reducing purchases on credit to purchases for ready money. A man would then see a prison painted on every thing he wished, but had not ready money to pay for it.

"I fear from an expression in your letter, that the people of Kentucky think of separating, not only from Virginia (in which they are right), but also from the Confederacy. I own I should think this a most calamitous event, and such a one as every good citizen should set himself against. Our present federal limits are not too large for good government, nor will the increase of votes in the Congress produce any ill effect. On the contrary, it will drown the little divisions at present existing there. Our Confederacy must be viewed as the nest, from which all America, North and South, is to be peopled."

On the state of the Union under the old Continental Congress, Mr. Jefferson wrote in his Autobiography :

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