Томас Джефферсон
The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 3 (of 9)
TO MR. PAINE
Philadelphia, July 29, 1791.
Dear Sir,—Your favor of Sept. 28th, 1790, did not come to my hands till Feb. 11th, and I have not answered it sooner because it said you would be here in the spring. That expectation being past, I now acknowledge the receipt. Indeed I am glad you did not come away till you had written your "Rights of Man." That has been much read here with avidity and pleasure. A writer under the signature of Publicola has attacked it. A host of champions entered the arena immediately in your defence. The discussion excited the public attention, recalled it to the "Defence of the American constitutions" and the "Discourses on Davila," which it had kindly passed over without censure in the moment, and very general expressions of their sense have been now drawn forth; and I thank God that they appear firm in their republicanism, notwithstanding the contrary hopes and assertions of a sect here, high in name but small in numbers. These had flattered themselves that the silence of the people under the "Defence" and "Davila" was a symptom of their conversion to the doctrine of king, lords, and commons. They are checked at least by your pamphlet, and the people confirmed in their good old faith.
Your observations on the subject of a copper coinage has satisfied my mind on that subject, which I confess had wavered before between difficulties. As a different plan is under consideration of Congress, and will be taken up at their meeting, I think to watch the proper moment, and publish your observations (except the notes which contain facts relative to particular persons, which I presume you would dislike to see published, and which are not necessary to establish the main object), adding your name, because it will attract attention and give weight to the publication. As this cannot take place under four months, there is time for you to forbid me, if it should be disagreeable to you to have the observations published, which, however, I hope it will not be.
General Scott has just returned from a successful expedition against the Indians, having killed thirty-two warriors, and taken fifty-eight women and children, and burnt several towns. I hope they will now consent to peace, which is all we ask. Our funds are near par; the crops of wheat remarkably fine; and a great degree of general prosperity arising from four years successive of plentiful crops, a great diffusion of domestic manufacture, a return to economy, and a reasonable faith in the new government. I shall be happy to hear from you, and still more to see you, being with great, and sincere esteem, dear Sir, your friend and servant.
TO THE PRESIDENT
Philadelphia, July 30, 1791.
Sir,—I have the honor to inclose for your perusal, a letter which I have prepared for Mr. Short.
The ill humor into which the French colonies are getting, and the little dependence on the troops sent thither, may produce a hesitation in the National Assembly as to the conditions they will impose in their constitution. In a moment of hesitation, small matters may influence their decision. They may see the impolicy of insisting on particular conditions, which, operating as grievances on us, as well as on their colonists, might produce a concert of action. I have thought it would not be amiss to trust to Mr. Short the sentiments in the cyphered part of the letter, leaving him to govern himself by circumstances, whether to let them leak out at all or not, and whether so as that it may be known or remain unknown that they come from us. A perfect knowledge of his judgment and discretion leaves me entirely satisfied, that they will be not used, or so used as events shall render proper. But if you think that the possibility that harm may be done, overweighs the chance of good, I would expunge them, as, in cases of doubt, it is better to say too little than too much.
I have the honor to be, with the most perfect respect and attachment, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant.
TO GENERAL KNOX
Philadelphia, August 10, 1791.
Dear Sir,—I have now the honor to return you the petition of Mr. Moultrie on behalf of the South Carolina Yazoo company. Without noticing that some of the highest functions of sovereignty are assumed in the very papers which he annexes as his justification, I am of opinion that government should firmly maintain this ground; that the Indians have a right to the occupation of their lands, independent of the States within whose chartered lines they happen to be; that until they cede them by treaty or other transaction equivalent to a treaty, no act of a State can give a right to such lands; that neither under the present constitution, nor the antient confederation, had any State or person a right to treat with the Indians, without the consent of the General Government; that that consent has never been given to any treaty for the cession of the lands in question; that the government is determined to exert all its energy for the patronage and protection of the rights of the Indians, and the preservation of peace between the United States and them; and that if any settlements are made on lands not ceded by them, without the previous consent of the United States, the government will think itself bound, not only to declare to the Indians that such settlements are without the authority or protection of the United States, but to remove them also by the public force.
It is in compliance with your request, my dear Sir, that I submit these ideas to you, to whom it belongs to give place to them, or such others as your better judgment shall prefer, in answer to Mr. Moultrie.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most sincere and respectful esteem, dear Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant.
TO COLONEL HARVIE
Philadelphia, August 14, 1791.
Dear Sir,—Being charged with the preparation of a statement to Congress of all their lands north of the Ohio, it becomes necessary for me to know what quantity of lands was assigned to the Virginia Continental line on the south side of the Ohio, say on the Cumberland, in satisfaction of their claims of bounty lands against the Continent. If I can by any means come at this quantity, by deducting it from the sum total of bounty lands given to all the lines, which sum total I know, the residue will be exactly what the army is entitled to on the north side of the Ohio. I am in hopes your office can furnish me with this information, and am to ask the favor of you to have it inquired into. All I wish is the sum total in lots located by the Virginia Continental line south of the Ohio. I suppose your office cannot inform me what was located for the same line north of the Ohio, and therefore I do not ask it. The fees of office for these researches, be so good as to inform me of, and they shall be remitted you. As your answer cannot be here before my departure for Virginia, I shall be glad to receive it there. If your office cannot furnish the information, and you know where it may be obtained, I shall consider it as a singular favor, if you will be so good as to put it for me at once into its right channel. I am, with great esteem, dear Sir, your sincere friend and humble servant.
TO MR. CARMICHAEL
Philadelphia, August 24, 1791.
Sir,—Your letter of January 24, is still the only one received from you within the period so often mentioned. Mine to you of the present year have been of March 12 and 17, April 11, May 16, and June 23. I have lately preferred sending my letters for you to Colonel Humphreys, in hopes he might find means of conveying them to you. The subjects of those of the 12th and 17th of March are still pressed on you, and especially the first, the great object of which cannot be delayed without consequences which both nations should deprecate.
Mr. Jaudenes arrived here some time ago, and has been received as joint commissioner with Mr. Viar. The concurring interests of Spain and this country certainly require the presence of able and discreet ministers.
The crop of wheat of the present year has surpassed all expectation as to quantity, and is of fine quality. Other articles of agriculture will differ more by an extraordinary drought.
I enclose you a copy of our census, which, so far as it is written in black ink, is founded on actual returns, what is in red ink being conjectured, but very near the truth. Making very small allowance for omissions, which we know to have been very great, we may safely say we are above four millions.
Our first expedition against the Indians, under General Scott, has been completely successful; he having killed thirty odd, taken fifty odd, and burnt their towns. A second expedition against them has commenced, and we expect daily the result.
The public credit continues firm. The domestic debt funded at six per cent., is twelve and a half per cent. above par. A spirit, however, of gambling in our public paper has seized on too many of our citizens, and we fear it will check our commerce, arts, manufactures, and agriculture, unless stopped.
Newspapers for you accompany this, addressed to the care of Colonel Humphreys.
I am, with great esteem, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.
TO SIR JOHN SINCLAIR
Philadelphia, August 24, 1791.
Dear Sir,—I am to acknowledge the receipt of your two favors of December 25 and May 14, with the pamphlets which accompanied them, and to return you my thanks for them. The Corn Law, I perceive, has not passed in the form you expected. My wishes on that subject were nearer yours than you imagined. We both in fact desired the same thing for different reasons, respecting the interests of our respective countries, and therefore justifiable in both. You wished the bill so moulded as to encourage strongly your national agriculture. The clause for warehousing foreign corn tended to lessen the confidence of the farmer in the demand for his corn. I wished the clause omitted, that our corn might pass directly to the country of the consumer, and save us the loss of an intermediate deposit, which it can illy bear. That no commercial arrangements between Great Britain and the United States have taken place, as you wish should be done, cannot be imputed to us. The proposition has surely been often enough made, perhaps too often. It is a happy circumstance in human affairs, that evils which are not cured in one way will cure themselves in some other.
We are now under the first impression of the news of the King's flight from Paris, and his re-capture. It would be unfortunate were it in the power of any one man to defeat the issue of so beautiful a revolution. I hope and trust it is not, and that, for the good of suffering humanity all over the earth, that revolution will be established and spread through the whole world.
I shall always be happy, my dear Sir, to hear of your health and happiness, being with sentiments of the most cordial esteem and respect, dear Sir, your most obedient humble servant.
TO E. RUTLEDGE, ESQ
Philadelphia, August 25, 1791.
My Dear Sir,—I have received your favor of the 7th, by Mr. Harper, and that also by Mr. Butler. I thank you for both, and shall duly respect both. I find by the last that, not your letter on the subject of British commerce, but mine in answer to it, has miscarried. Yours was dated June 20, 1790, was received July 2, and answered July 4. I send you a copy of the answer, which will read now like an old almanac; but it will show you I am incapable of neglecting anything which comes from you. The measures therein spoken of as in contemplation, for the purpose of bringing Great Britain to reason, vanished in a reference of the subject to me to report on our commerce and navigation generally, to the next session of Congress. I have little hope that the result will be anything more than to turn the left cheek to him who has smitten the right. We have to encounter not only the prejudices in favor of England, but those against the Eastern States, whose ships, in the opinion of some, will overrun our land. I have been sorry to see that your State has been over-jealous of the measures proposed on this subject, and which really tend to relieve them from the effects of British broils. I wish you may be able to convert Mr. Barnwell, because you think him worth converting. Whether you do or not, your opinion of him will make me solicitous for his acquaintance, because I love the good, and respect freedom of opinion. What do you think of this scrippomony? Ships are lying idle at the wharfs, buildings are stopped, capitals withdrawn from commerce, manufactures, arts, and agriculture to be employed in gambling, and the tide of public prosperity almost unparalleled in any country is arrested in its course, and suppressed by the rage of getting rich in a day. No mortal can tell where this will stop; for the spirit of gaming, when once it has seized a subject, is incurable. The tailor who has made thousands in one day, though he has lost them the next, can never again be content with the slow and moderate earnings of his needle. Nothing can exceed the public felicity, if our papers are to be believed, because our papers are under the orders of our scripmen. I imagine, however, we shall hear that all the cash has quitted the extremities of the nation, and accumulated here. That produce and property fall to half price there, and the same things rise to double price here. That the cash accumulated and stagnated here, as soon as the bank paper gets out, will find its vent into foreign countries, and instead of this solid medium, which we might have kept for nothing, we shall have a paper one, for the use of which we are to pay these gamesters fifteen per cent. per annum, as they say.
Would to God yourself, General Pinckney and Major Pinckney, would come forward and aid us with your efforts. You are all known, respected, wished for; but you refuse yourselves to everything. What is to become of us, my dear friend, if the vine and the fig tree withdraw, and leave us to the bramble and thorn?
You will have heard before this reaches you, of the peril into which the French revolution is brought by the flight of their King. Such are the fruits of that form of government, which heaps importance on idiots, and of which the Tories of the present day are trying to preach into our favor. I still hope the French revolution will issue happily. I feel that the permanence of our own, leans in some degree on that; and that a failure there would be a powerful argument to prove there must be a failure here. We have been told that a British minister would be sent out to us this summer. I suspect this depends on the event of peace or war. In the latter case, they will probably send one; but they have no serious view of treating or fulfilling treaties. Adieu, my dear Sir. Yours affectionately.
TO MESSRS. JOHNSON, STUART, AND CARROL
Philadelphia, August 28, 1791.
Gentlemen,—Your joint letter of the 2d instant to the President, as also Mr. Carrol's separate letters of the 5th and 15th, have been duly received. Major L'Enfant also having arrived here and laid his plan of the Federal City before the President, he was pleased to desire a conference of certain persons, in his presence, on these several subjects. It is the opinion of the President, in consequence thereof, that an immediate meeting of the Commissioners at Georgetown is requisite; that certain measures may be decided on, and put into a course of preparation for a commencement of sale on the 17th of October, as advertised. As Mr. Madison and myself, who were present at the conference, propose to pass through Georgetown on our way to Virginia, the President supposes that our attendance at the meeting of the Commissioners might be of service to them, as we could communicate to them the sentiments developed at the conferences here and approved by the President, under whatever point of view they may have occasion to know them. The circumstances of time and distance oblige me to take the liberty of proposing the day of meeting, and to say that we will be in Georgetown on the evening of the 7th or morning of the 8th of the next month, in time to attend any meeting of the Commissioners on that day, and in hopes they may be able, in the course of it, to make all the use of us they may think proper, so that we may pursue our journey the next day. To that meeting, therefore, the answers to the several letters before mentioned are referred.
This letter is addressed to Mr. Carrol only, with a requisition to the Postmaster at Georgetown to send it to him by express, under the hope that it will, by expresses to the other gentlemen, take timely measures for the proposed meeting on the 8th.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the highest respect and esteem, Gentlemen, your most obedient, and most humble servant.
TO WILLIAM SHORT
Philadelphia, August 29, 1791.
Dear Sir,—I am to acknowledge the receipt of your No. 67, June the 6th, No. 68, June the 10th, No. 69, June the 22d, No. 70, June the 26th, No. 71, June the 29th; the three last by the British packet. My last to you was of July the 28th, by a vessel bound to Havre. This goes to the same port, because accompanied by newspapers. It will be the last I shall write you these two months, as I am to set out for Virginia the next week. I now enclose you a copy of my letter of March the 12th, to Mr. Carmichael, which you say was not in that of the same date to you. There was no paper to accompany it but St. Marie's, which you say you received. I enclose you also a copy of our census, written in black ink, so far as we have actual returns, and supplied by conjecture in red ink, where we have no returns; but the conjectures are known to be very near the truth. Making very small allowance for omissions, which we know to have been very great, we are certainly above four millions, probably about four millions one hundred thousand.
There is a vessel now lying at Philadelphia, advertising to receive emigrants to Louisiana, gratis, on account of the Spanish government. Be so good as to mention this to M. de Montmorin, who will be a judge what we must feel under so impudent a transaction.
You observe, that if Drost does not come, you have not been authorized to engage another coiner. If he does not come, there will probably be one engaged here. If he comes, I should think him a safe hand to send the diplomatic dye by, as also all the dyes of our medal, which may be used here for striking off what shall be wanting hereafter. But I would not have them trusted at sea, but from April to October inclusive. Should you not send them by Drost, Havre will be the best route. I have not spoken with the Secretary of the Treasury yet, on the subject of the presses, but believe you may safely consider two presses as sufficient for us, and agree for no more without a further request.
The decree of the National Assembly, relative to tobacco carried in French or American ships, is likely to have such an effect in our ports, as to render it impossible to conjecture what may or may not be done. It is impossible to let it go on without a vigorous correction. If that should be administered on our part, it will produce irritation on both sides, and lessen that disposition which we feel cordially to concur in a treaty, which shall melt the two nations as to commercial matters into one, as nearly as possible. It is extremely desirable, that the National Assembly should themselves correct the decree, by a repeal founded on the expectation of an arrangement.
We have, as yet, no news of the event of our second expedition against the Indians.
I am, with great and sincere esteem, dear Sir, your friend and servant.
TO M. LA MOTTE
Philadelphia, August 30, 1791.
Sir,—I am now to acknowledge the receipt of your favors of February the 9th, March the 25th, and April the 24th; as also of the several packages of wine, carriages, &c., which came safe to hand, and for your care of which be pleased to accept my thanks.
I am sensible of the difficulties to which our consuls are exposed by the applications of sailors, calling themselves Americans. Though the difference of dialect between the Irish and Scotch, and the Americans, is sensible to the ear of a native, it is not to that of a foreigner, however well he understands the language; and between the American and English (unless of particular provinces) there is no difference sensible even to a native. Among hundreds of applications to me, at Paris, nine-tenths were Irish, whom I readily discovered. The residue, I think, were English; and I believe not a single instance of a Scotchman or American. The sobriety and order of the two last, preserve them from want. You will find it necessary, therefore, to be extremely on your guard against these applications. The bill of expenses for Huls is much beyond those aids which I should think myself authorized to have advanced habitually, until the law shall make express provision for that purpose. I must, therefore, recommend to you, to hazard only small sums in future, until our legislature shall lay down more precise rules for my government.
The difference of duty on tobacco carried to France in French and American bottoms, has excited great uneasiness. We presume the National Assembly must have been hurried into the measure, without being allowed time to reflect on its consequences. A moment's consideration must convince anybody, that no nation upon earth ever submitted to so enormous an assault on the transportation of their own produce. Retaliation, to be equal, will have the air of extreme severity and hostility. Such would be an additional tonnage of twelve livres ten sous the ton burthen, on all French ships entering our ports. Yet this would but exactly balance an additional duty of six livres five sous the hogshead of tobacco, brought in American ships entering in the ports of France. I hope, either that the National Assembly will repeal the measure, or the proposed treaty be so hastened, as to get this matter out of the way before it shall be necessary for the ensuing legislature to act on it. Their measure, and our retaliation on it, which is unavoidable, will very illy prepare the minds of both parties for a liberal treaty. My confidence in the friendly dispositions of the National Assembly, and in the sincerity of what they have expressed on the subject, induce me to impute it to surprise altogether, and to hope it will be repealed before time shall be given to take it up here.
I have the honor to be, with great esteem, Sir, your most obedient humble servant.
