Kitabı oku: «Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 3», sayfa 19
LETTER CXII.—TO THOMAS PINCKNEY, June 11, 1792
TO THOMAS PINCKNEY.
Philadelphia, June 11, 1792.
Sir,
The letter I have addressed to Admiral Jones, of which you have had the perusal, has informed you of the mission with which the President has thought proper to charge him at Algiers, and how far your agency is desired for conveying to him the several papers, for receiving and paying his drafts to the amount therein permitted, by re-drawing yourself on our bankers in Amsterdam, who are instructed to honor your bills, and by acting as a channel of correspondence between us. It has been some time, however, since we have heard of Admiral Jones. Should any accident have happened to his life, or should you be unable to learn where he is, or should distance, refusal to act, or any other circumstance deprive us of his services on this occasion, or be likely to produce too great a delay, of which you are to be the judge, you will then be pleased to send all the papers confided to you for him, to Mr. Thomas Barclay, our Consul at Morocco, with the letter addressed to him, which is delivered you open, and by which you will perceive that he is, in that event, substituted to every intent and purpose in the place of Admiral Jones. You will be pleased not to pass any of the papers confided to you on this business, through any post-office.
I have the honor to be, with great and sincere esteem, Sir, your most obedient, humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CXIII.—TO MR. PINCKNEY, June 14, 1792
TO MR. PINCKNEY.
Philadelphia, June 14, 1792.
Sir,
The United States being now about to establish a mint, it becomes necessary to ask your assistance in procuring persons to carry on some parts of it; and to enable you to give it, you must be apprized of some facts.
Congress, some time ago, authorized the President to take measures for procuring some artists from any place where they were to be had. It was known that a Mr. Drost, a Swiss, had made an improvement in the method of coining, and some specimens of his coinage were exhibited here, which were superior to any thing we had ever seen. Mr. Short was therefore authorized to engage Drost to come over, to erect the proper machinery, and instruct persons to go on with the coinage; and as he supposed this would require but about a year, we agreed to give him a thousand louis a year and his expenses. The agreement was made, two coining mills, or screws, were ordered by him; but in the end he declined coming. We have reason to believe he was drawn off by the English East India Company, and that he is now at work for them in England. Mr. Bolton had also made a proposition to coin for us in England, which was declined. Since this, the act has been passed for establishing our mint, which authorizes, among other things, the employment of an assayer at fifteen hundred dollars a year, a chief coiner at the same, and an engraver at twelve hundred dollars. But it admits of the employment of one person, both as engraver and chief coiner; this we expect may be done, as we presume that any engraver who has been used to work for a coinage, must be well enough acquainted with all the operations of coinage to direct them; and it is an economy worth attention, if we can have the services performed by one officer instead of two, in which case, it is proposed to give him the salary of the chief coiner, that is to say, fifteen hundred dollars a year. I have therefore to request that you will endeavor, on your arrival in Europe, to engage and send us an assayer of approved skill and well attested integrity, and a chief coiner and engraver, in one person, if possible, acquainted with all the improvements in coining, and particularly those of Drost and Bolton. Their salaries may commence from the day of their sailing for America. If Drost be in England, I think he will feel himself under some obligation to aid you in procuring persons. How far Bolton will do it, seems uncertain. You will doubtless make what you can of the good dispositions of either of these or any other person. Should you find it impracticable to procure an engraver capable of performing the functions of chief coiner also, we must be content that you engage separate characters. Let these persons bring with them all the implements necessary for carrying on the business, except such as you shall think too bulky and easily made here. It would be proper, therefore, that they should consult you as to the necessary implements and their prices, that they may act under your control. The method of your paying for these implements and making reasonable advances to the workmen, shall be the subject of another letter, after the President shall have decided thereon. It should be a part of the agreement of these people, that they will faithfully instruct all persons in their art, whom we shall put under them for that purpose. Your contract with them may be made for any term not exceeding four years.
I have the honor to be, with great respect and much esteem, Dear Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
P. S. Should you not be able to procure persons of eminent qualifications for their business, in England, it will be proper to open a correspondence with Mr. Morris on the subject, and see whether he cannot get such from France. Next to the obtaining the ablest artists, a very important circumstance is to send them to us as soon as possible. T. J.
LETTER CXIV.—TO GOUVERNEUR MORRIS, June 16, 1792
TO GOUVERNEUR MORRIS.
Philadelphia, June 16, 1792.
Dear Sir,
My last to you was of March the 28th. Yours of April the 6th and 10th came to hand three days ago.
With respect to the particular objects of commerce susceptible of being placed on a better footing, on which you ask my ideas, they will show themselves by the enclosed table of the situation of our commerce with France and England. That with France is stated as it stood at the time I left that country, when the only objects whereon change was still desirable, were those of salted provisions, tobacco and tar, pitch and turpentine. The first was in negotiation when I came away, and was pursued by Mr. Short with prospects of success, till their general tariff so unexpectedly deranged our commerce with them as to other articles. Our commerce with their West Indies had never admitted amelioration during my stay in France. The temper of that period did not allow even the essay, and it was as much as we could do to hold the ground given us by the Marshal de Castries’ Arrêt, admitting us to their colonies with salted provisions, &c. As to both these branches of commerce, to wit, with France and her colonies, we have hoped they would pursue their own proposition of arranging them by treaty, and that we could draw that treaty to this place. There is no other where the dependence of their colonies on our States for their prosperity is so obvious as here, nor where their negotiator would feel it so much. But it would be imprudent to leave to the uncertain issue of such a treaty, the re-establishment of our commerce with France on the footing on which it was in the beginning of their revolution. That treaty may be long on the anvil; in the mean time, we cannot consent to the late innovations, without taking measures to do justice to our own navigation. This object, therefore, is particularly recommended to you, while you will also be availing yourself of every opportunity which may arise, of benefiting our commerce in any other part. I am in hopes you will have found the moment favorable on your arrival in France, when Monsieur Claviere was in the ministry, and the dispositions of the National Assembly favorable to the ministers. Your cipher has not been sent hitherto, because it required a most confidential channel of conveyance. It is now committed to Mr. Pinckney, who also carries the gazettes, laws, and other public papers for you. We have been long without any vessel going to Havre. Some of the Indian tribes have acceded to terms of peace. The greater part, however, still hold off, and oblige us to pursue more vigorous measures for war. I enclose you an extract from a circular letter to our Consuls, by which you will perceive, that those in countries where we have no diplomatic representative, are desired to settle their accounts annually with the Minister of the United States at Paris. This business I must desire you to undertake. The act concerning Consuls will be your guide, and I shall be glad that the 1st of July be the day to which their accounts shall be annually settled and paid, and that they may be forwarded as soon after that as possible to the office of the Secretary of State, to enter into the general account of his department, which it is necessary he should make up always before the meeting of Congress.
I am with great sincere esteem Dear Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
P.S. I have said nothing of our whale-oil, because I believe it is on a better footing since the tariff than before. T. J.
LETTER CXV.—TO MR. VAN BERCKEL, July 2,1792
TO MR. VAN BERCKEL.
Philadelphia, July 2,1792.
Sir,
It was with extreme concern that I learned from your letter of June the 25th, that a violation of the protection, due to you as the representative of your nation had been committed, by an officer of this State entering your house and serving therein a process on one of your servants. There could be no question but that this was a breach of privilege; the only one was, how it was to be punished. To ascertain this, I referred your letter to the Attorney General, whose answer I have the honor to enclose you. By this you will perceive, that from the circumstance of your servant’s not being registered in the Secretary of State’s office, we cannot avail ourselves of the more certain and effectual proceeding which had been provided by an act of Congress for punishing infractions of the law of nations, that act having thought proper to confine the benefit of its provisions to such domestics only, as should have been registered; We are to proceed, therefore, as if that act had never been made, and the Attorney General’s letter indicates two modes of proceeding. 1. By a warrant before a single magistrate, to recover the money paid by the servant under a process declared void by law. Herein the servant must be the actor, and the government not intermeddle at all. The smallness of the sum to be redemanded will place this cause in the class of those in which no appeal to the higher tribunal is permitted, even in the case of manifest error, so that if the magistrate should err, the government has no means of correcting the error. 2. The second mode of proceeding would be, to indict the officer in the Supreme Court of the United States; with whom it would rest to punish him at their discretion, in proportion to the injury done and the malice from which it proceeded; and it would end in punishment alone, and not in a restitution of the money. In this mode of proceeding, the government of the United States is actor, taking the management of the cause into its own hands, and giving you no other trouble than that of bearing witness to such material facts as may not be otherwise supported. You will be so good as to decide in which of these two ways you would choose the proceeding should be; if the latter, I will immediately take measures for having the offender prosecuted according to law.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of respect, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CXVI.—TO MR. PALESKE, August 19,1792
TO MR. PALESKE.
Monticello, August 19,1792.
Sir,
I have received at this place your favor of the 9th instant, wherein you request, that agreeably to the treaty of commerce between the United States and his Prussian Majesty, his Consul General be acknowledged as belonging to a most favored nation; that the privileges and immunities due to a Consul General of the most favored nation be granted to his Consul General, and that commissioners be appointed to regulate, by particular convention the functions of the Consuls and Vice-Consuls of the respective nations.
Treaties of the United States duly made and ratified, as is that with his Prussian Majesty, constitute a part of the law of the land, and need only promulgation to oblige all persons to obey them, and to entitle all to those privileges which such treaties confer. That promulgation having taken place, no other act is necessary or proper on the part of our government, according to our rules of proceeding, to give effect to the treaty. This treaty, however, has not specified the privileges or functions of Consuls; it has only provided that these shall be regulated by particular agreement. To the proposition to proceed as speedily as possible to regulate these functions by a convention, my absence from the seat of government does not allow me to give a definitive answer. I know, in general, that it would be agreeable to our government, on account of the recent changes in its form, to suspend for a while the contracting specific engagements with foreign nations, until something more shall be seen of the direction it will take, and of its mode of operation, in order that our engagements may be so moulded to that, as to insure the exact performance of them, which we are desirous ever to observe. Should this be the sentiment of our government on the present occasion, the friendship of his Prussian Majesty is a sufficient reliance to us for that delay which our affairs might require for the present: and the rather, as his vessels are not yet in the habit of seeking our ports, and for the few cases which may occur for some time, our own laws, copied mostly in this respect from those of a very commercial nation, have made the most material of those provisions which could be admitted into a special convention for the protection of vessels, their crews, and cargoes, coming hither. We shall on this, however, and every other occasion, do every thing we can to manifest our friendship to his Prussian Majesty, and our desire to promote commercial intercourse with his subjects; and of this, we hope, he will be fully assured.
I have the honor to be, with great respect, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CXVII.—TO THE PRESIDENT, August 19, 1792
TO THE PRESIDENT.
Monticello, August 19, 1792.
Sir,
I was yesterday honored with yours of the 13th instant, covering the Governor of Vermont’s of July the 16th. I presume it can not now be long before I shall receive his answer to the two letters I wrote him from Philadelphia on the same subject. I now enclose letters received by yesterday’s post from Mr. Hammond, Mr. William Knox, and Mr. Paleske, with answers to the two latter. Should these meet your approbation, you will be so good as to seal and let them go on under the cover to Mr. Taylor, who will have them conveyed according to their address. Should you wish any alteration of them, it shall be made on their being returned. The Prussian treaty is, I believe, within four years of its expiration. I suspect that personal motives alone induce Mr. Paleske to press for a convention, which could hardly be formed and ratified before it would expire; and that his court cannot lay much stress on it. Mr. Hammond’s former explanations of his notification of the 12th of April having been laid before Congress, may perhaps make it proper to communicate to them also his sovereign’s approbation of them.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most perfect respect and attachment, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CXVIII.—TO M. DE TERNANT, September 27,1792
TO M. DE TERNANT.
Philadelphia, September 27,1792.
Sir,
Your letter of the 2d instant, informing me that the legislative body, on the proposition of the King of the French, had declared war against the King of Hungary and Bohemia, has been duly received, and laid before the President of the United States: and I am authorized to convey to you the expression of the sincere concern we feel, on learning that the French nation, to whose friendship and interests we have the strongest attachments, are now to encounter the evils of war. We offer our prayers to Heaven that its duration may be short, and its course marked with as few as may be of those calamities which render the condition of war so afflicting to humanity; and we add assurances, that during its course we shall continue in the same friendly dispositions, and render all those good offices which shall be consistent with the duties of a neutral nation.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of the most perfect esteem and respect, Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CXIX.—TO MR. PINCKNEY, October 12,1792
TO MR. PINCKNEY.
Philadelphia, October 12,1792.
Dear Sir,
Your favor of August the 7th came to hand on the 6th instant, and gave me the first certain information of your safe arrival. Mr. Otto, being about to sail for London, furnishes me with an opportunity of sending the newspapers for yourself and Mr Barclay, and I avail myself of it, chiefly for this purpose, as my late return from Virginia and the vacation of Congress furnish little new and important for your information. With respect to the Indian war, the summer has been chiefly employed on our part in endeavoring to persuade them to peace, in an abstinence from all offensive operations, in order to give those endeavors a fairer chance, and in preparation for activity the ensuing season, if they fail. I believe we may say these endeavors have all failed, or probably will do so. The year has been rather a favorable one for our agriculture. The crops of small grain were generally good. Early frosts have a good deal shortened those of tobacco and Indian corn, yet not so as to endanger distress. From the south my information is less certain, but from that quarter you will be informed through other channels. I have a pleasure in noting this circumstance to you, because the difference between a plentiful and a scanty crop more than counterpoises the expenses of any campaign. Five or six plentiful years successively, as we have had, have most sensibly ameliorated the condition of our country, and uniform laws of commerce, introduced by our new government, have enabled us to draw the whole benefits of our agriculture.
I enclose you the copy of a letter from Messrs. Blow and Milhaddo, merchants of Virginia, complaining of the taking away of their sailors on the coast of Africa, by the commander of a British armed vessel. So many instances of this kind have happened, that it is quite necessary that their government should explain themselves on the subject, and be led to disavow and punish such conduct. I leave to your discretion to endeavor to obtain this satisfaction by such friendly discussions as may be most likely to produce the desired effect, and secure to our commerce that protection against British violence, which it has never experienced from any other nation. No law forbids the seaman of any country to engage in time of peace on board a foreign vessel: no law authorizes such seaman to break his contract, nor the armed vessels of his nation to interpose force for his rescue. I shall be happy to hear soon, that Mr. B. has gone on the service on which he was ordered.
I have the honor to be, with great and sincere esteem, Dear Sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
LETTER CXX.—TO MESSRS. CARMICHAEL AND SHORT, October 14,1792
TO MESSRS. CARMICHAEL AND SHORT.
Philadelphia, October 14,1792.
Gentlemen,
Since my letters of March the 18th and April the 24th (which have been retarded so unfortunately), another subject of conference-and convention with Spain has occurred. You know that the frontiers of her provinces, as well as of our States, are inhabited by Indians holding justly the right of occupation, and leaving to Spain and to us only the claim of excluding other nations from among them, and of becoming ourselves the purchasers of such portions of land, from time to time, as they choose to sell. We have thought that the dictates of interest as well as humanity enjoined mutual endeavors with those Indians to live in peace with both nations, and we have scrupulously observed that conduct. Our agent with the Indians bordering on the territories of Spain has a standing instruction to use his best endeavors to prevent them from committing acts of hostility against the Spanish settlements. But whatever may have been the conduct or orders of the government of Spain, that of their officers in our neighborhood has been indisputably unfriendly and hostile to us. The papers enclosed will demonstrate this to you. That the Baron de Carondelet, their chief Governor at New Orleans, has excited the Indians to war on us, that he has furnished them with abundance of arms and ammunition, and promised them whatever more shall be necessary, I have from the mouth of him who had it from his own mouth. In short, that he is the sole source of a great and serious war now burst out upon us, and from Indians who, we know, were in peaceable dispositions towards us till prevailed on by him to commence the war, there remains scarcely room to doubt. It has become necessary that we understand the real policy of Spain in this point. You will, therefore, be pleased to extract from the enclosed papers such facts as you think proper to be communicated to that court, and enter into friendly but serious expostulations on the conduct of their officers; for we have equal evidence against the commandants of other posts in West Florida, though, they being subordinate to Carondelet, we name him as the source. If they disavow his conduct, we must naturally look to their treatment of him as the sole evidence of their sincerity. But we must look further. It is a general rule, that no nation has a right to keep an agent within the limits of another, without the consent of that other, and we are satisfied it would be best for both Spain and us, to abstain from having agents or other persons in our employ or pay among the savages inhabiting our respective territories, whether as subjects or independent. You are, therefore, desired to propose and press a stipulation to that effect. Should they absolutely decline it, it may be proper to let them perceive that, as the right of keeping agents exists on both sides or on neither, it will rest with us to reciprocate their own measures. We confidently hope that these proceedings are unauthorized by the government of Spain, and, in this hope, we continue in the dispositions formerly expressed to you, of living on terms of the best friendship and harmony with that country, of making their interests in our neighborhood our own, and of giving them every proof of this, except the abandonment of those essential rights which you are instructed to insist on.
I have the honor to be, with great and sincere esteem, Gentlemen, your most obedient and most humble servant,
Th: Jefferson.
