The Hermione, an English frigate, came into the port, anchored, and sent her boats to board the Americans. Every man in the vessels, was taken away, excepting the captains and mates.
They were, to the number of sixty or seventy, kept on board and fasting, during forty-eight hours. All these men were Americans born, excepting two Danes, who had been naturalized here. But, after Jay had declined to write an article in favour of our sailors, they were sure of meeting with the worst usage. Camillus, in No.
By Thomas Pinckney, and his efforts, we need not set much store. Pinckney was silly enough to approve of his management in making so good a bargain. Yet they clapped up a treaty, when every moment of delay was inestimable to America. The affair had hung over ten years, and then was finished at a moment of infinite impropriety.
Such miserable botching the world has probably never seen before. In No. The posture of things at the time of the negociation, and not at this time, is the standard to try its merits. It will indeed be useful to go back; for every line of this argument is contradicted by undisputed facts. Page 93 The President's message to Congress about his having appointed Jay, was dated the 16th of April, Pitt afterwards gave him twelve hundred thousand pounds to make him return to the combat.
He took the money, but never performed his promise. Instead of that, he went into Poland to besiege Warsaw. Surely, Mr. Hamilton imagines that nobody reads newspapers except himself.
Thus Camillus stands detected of an intentional and notorious falsehood. As to the general elation about lord Howe's victory, the French were equally satisfied, and with better reason.
Again, Camillus says that Jay entered upon the business of his mission previous to those important successes which terminated in the conquest of Holland. This is another stupendous untruth, like that about the king of Prussia.
A few facts and dates will prove it to be so. On the 26th of April, , Pichegru totally beat Clairfait at Moucron, and Page 94 killed six thousand of his troops. So early as the 19th of May, , the emperor printed an address to the inhabitants of Brussels, in a tone almost as dejected as the king of Prussia's farewell manifesto. The armies continued almost constantly fighting till the 26th of June, when the French gained the battle of Fleurus.
This completely turned the scale. The grand Austrian army immediately sent off their baggage, and, in the course of a few days, thirty thousand people fled from Brussels. From that day forward every man in England, excepting Jay, must have foreseen the conquest of Holland.
They certainly did not approve of the treaty till after the defection of the king of Prussia, and the surrender of Amsterdam.
They did not ratify till the 24th of June, The question then comes to be why the Senate did not stand out to get them? They sent back an article. Secondly, the ratification was an object of party.
But, independent of French victories, Jay must have known that Pitt, from his dreadful want of money, could not hold out for any considerable time. Smith, on the 22d of February, In September, , Walter Boyd, junior, was requested by Pitt to advance him a million sterling. He did so, and by agreement, he was to draw bills on the lords commissioners of the treasury, which they were to accept.
Now comes the astonishing part of the transaction. They were, says Mr. Smith, of such a nature and description, as the bank of England would have refused to discount for any commercial house whatever, and such as it would have been injurious to the credit of any private house, to have negociated.
These are civil words, but, in plain English, any other parties of such a plot, but the minister and his friends, would infallibly have been hanged. With such facts in view, it is amazing how completely some of the ablest men in America were deceived about it.
War, said Dr. The causes of it would remain, would be aggravated, would be multiplied, and soon become intollerable. More captures, more impressments, would swell the list of our wrongs, and the current of our rage. The country is thriving undoubtedly, but not the more from the extravagant spirit of over-trading] The vast crop of our neutrality is all seed-wheat, and is sown again to swell, almost beyond calculation, the future harvest of prosperity.
And in this Page 97 progress what seems to be fiction is found to fall short of experience. And, in this progress, the bank of the United States, unless its discounts are extremely circumspect, will go to the family-vault of those in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin.
The reign of paper is past in Europe, and, as a matter of course, its expiration in America will happen sooner or latter. In case of any serious rupture with France, and after the unparalelled ruin that is overspreading England, every man here will directly insist on metal for his bank notes. We shall now go back to Mr. Smith's resolutions, and cite another proof of the utter incapacity of England, in June , to have attacked America.
No man could imagine that such a system was to hold out, any more than the gambling interest of five per cent. Another instance shall be given of the hurry in which Pitt was to secure the loan for , and of the extreme impatience with which the people of England saw the war prolonged. When the bankers of London agreed to lend a sum of money to the minister, the custom was to Page 98 give them credit in the public funds to a certain amount.
The current price of stock, at the time of making the bargain, determined the quantity of it to be given for the new advances of the creditors. Thus, if the three per cents were at eighty, the same proportion of them would buy ten thousand pounds, that would only buy seven thousand five hundred, if the stocks were at sixty per cent.
It was hence the great aim of every premier to raise them as high as possible, before his loan, and it was usual to cast prospects of peace, into some royal speech or message, by which they were sure of being raised.
But, on the 27th of November, , Mr Pitt, with a precipitancy that wears the foulest aspect, closed a loan for eighteen millions with Mr. A message that he must have foreseen, came on the 8th of December, thereafter, from George the Third to parliament, telling his earnest desire of peace.
The funds instantly got up so high that the quantity given for the loan, rose in its value, nine hundred thousand pounds sterling. This was just so much money lost to the public, and gained to the bankers, who probably run halves with Pitt himself. So rapid a rise in the funds, on the slender prospect of peace, shewed how very little the British were by this time disposed or indeed enabled for a war with America.
I consider all those war arguments that have been made use of," said Mr. Events have since proved that the dread of war was a mere chimera, as the public credit of England Page 99 had become too feeble to support such a shock. Page With such a document staring in his face, how could a representive pretend to say that he was afraid of Britain declaring hostilities? Or how could two-third of the people in this country fall into so foolish a tremor on that head?
It argues very little either for the sound information, or the good sense of our citizens. The whole paper goes on the same principles, that the British West-Indies are absolutely at the mercy of the United States. Page Every step of investigation discovers more clearly the utter ignorance, negligence, or corruption of his excellency John Jay. By the twelfth article, we were not to keep the British islands from starving by freighting any vessels larger than seventy tons! Thus far we have about one-fourth part of the memorial.
We now plainly see that the more islands which England conquered in the West-Indies, the more she was dependant on this country, for their means of subsistence, for timber to build houses, Page for staves and heading, as likewise for taking off a great part of the West-Indian productions that would not bear the expence of being conveyed to Europe.
The planters and merchants proceed to complain heavily of the mode of intercourse then permitted between the continent and the islands. It is difficult to do justice to their ideas but in their own words. Here follows part of what they say. The memorial goes on in these words. For this, and other reasons above stated, they solicit a more extended intercourse with America.
In the debate, in parliament, about the beginning of , on the bill for abolishing the slave-trade, in the House of Commons, Mr. On the 10th of February, , Mr. Such was the known track of the trade-winds that they were obliged to come within seven days sailing of this coast.
The stopping of this enormous trade must have ruined the credit of Britain. But this was, most likely, a mere decoy for our executive. Grenville even pretended to deny the possibility of such a harangue having ever been delivered. What an impostor! He tries to play upon our prudence and our fears.
The evils of war for one month would outweigh the advantage, if, at the end of it, there was a certainty of attainment. But was war the alternative? Should we not have rendered ourselves ridiculous and contemptible in the eyes of the whole world by forbearing them?
But wisdom would have chosen a middle course. Jay might have addressed Grenville in terms like these. You have wronged the United States in a variety of shapes. We shall not declare war against you. There is a shorter and a cheaper way. She cannot be accused of breaking any, by stopping the exportation of provisions to your West-India islands. We know that your fifty thousand whites, and five hundred thousand blacks cannot find bread or pork for their dinners, or timber to build their houses, or staves for their casks, or even horses or cattle, but by sending for them to our continent.
Twenty thousand of our militia, would, in a few weeks, drive your handful of regulars out of Canada, and you could not, at present, spare a fleet or an army to recover it. We should thus put an end to Indian wars, by tearing up the root from whence they spring. After driving Victor Hughes out of Guadaloupe, you might burn some of our towns on the sea coast, as you did in the last war. But then we shall infallibly destroy your nine millions sterling per annum of imports from the West-Indies, and the sixteen hundred thousand pounds of revenue derived from them.
This would be a mortal stroke to your finances, and so take your choice. In No xv. Camillus treats of the compensation afforded by the seventh article of Jay's treaty for British piracies on American commerce. Since the apoplexy of British paper the word compensation sounds like mockery. But Camillus would have it believed that Pitt never intended the confiscation of our vessels.
These terms, legal adjudication, were certainly not equivalent, upon any rational construction, to condemnation. The stile of Mr. The latter must have been a very great blockhead, if he could not write a dozen intelligible lines, especially on a subject of such immense importance.
When the object had been attained, it was very easy for Pitt to deny his orders. A second set was published by the cabinet of London on the 8th of January, They were very little better than the first.
A former edition, just about as bad, had been issued on the 8th of June, , under which also some bucaneering was committed. Thus the court of London acted upon a system, and it was very wrong in Camillus to cast the blame on the judges in the West-Indies.
As for the above door Page that has been opened, it costs two hundred and fifty pounds sterling to get in. Among the inflammatory topics of the federal party, no one has had a more powerful effect than the attempt of Genet to involve this country in hostilities with England.
This was the very part which Dr. Nothing, therefore, can be more impenetrably stupid than to advance, as Mr. This identical trap had been laid by the old Congress and Franklin for the French cabinet, so that it was perfectly natural for France to endeavour at obtaining a retaliation. While Genet must be condemned, Mr. Hammond was equally culpable. His perfidious and insolent proposal to Mr.
A compliance by General Washington would have cast him completely into the lee-way of the Page British ambassador. The possession of such a secret must have been of immense value to the British cabinet.
If this disgraceful project had come from Genet, the Gazette of the United States would have played a weekly tune upon that fiddle to the end of this century. Washington has made an uncommon parade about the impartiality of his conduct between France and England.
But the fact is, that he has preferred Britain to France. This will appear from what follows. Another idea was to break up the colonial and monopolizing systems of all nations, and emancipate the new world. These expressions betray Mr. His feelings are so perfectly British, and monarchical, that it seems inconceivable how he ever came to sight, as he did, for the American revolution.
Mexico and Brasil are just as well entitled to freedom as New-York and Pennsylvania. Their emancipation would be Page an immense benefit both to the inhabitants of those countries themselves, and to mankind at large. In the last age, Camillus would have defended the divine right of kings. Were these regions of the new world independent, a rapid influx of the precious metals would pour into this country; and Mr. Hamilton's bank of the United States might then be able, upon a month's warning, to give hard dollars for one-fortieth part of the notes which it hath in circulation.
So far from such an emancipation being chimerical, it is next to certain of taking place. If the French do not atchieve this great event, the tide of federal population, rolling westward, will begin it in less than a century. Page Yet, in the following spring, while the Senate were in session, and without ever once consulting them, did this identical George Washington take John Jay from the bench of the Supreme Court of this country, and send him to England, where, as we all know, he made a treaty.
They could no longer put trust in a man capable of such naked inconsistency. The Senate being then in recess, and not to meet again till the fall, I apprised Mr. Gentlemen of the Senate. Page The President's message is of considerable length, but the few words above quoted contain its essence. No words can be plainer or stronger than those which he employs. The opposite column speaks an opposite language. Upon this account, not a word more shall be said about the matter.
Nothing but the necessity of explanation could have, at all, brought the subject forward. While this sheet was going to press, 16th May, , President Adams has delivered a speech at the opening of the first session of the fifth Congress. With respect to France, what has been above cited refutes the assertion. The speech consists entirely of a complaint against the republic. It forms a kind of postscript to Pickering's letter to Pinckney. Not a word escapes the President about British piracy, which continues to expand in full blossom.
The French had carried about sixteen American vessels into Jean Rabel. When Mr. Scotland has perhaps a still larger proportion, and the number is hourly augmenting. The Irish are a jacobin nation. They are as ripe for a revolution, as a peach ever was for dropping. Confine your solicitude to them, and leave us to get rid, as quietly as we can, of your correspondent, Alexander Hamilton, and his funding cancer of six per cent.
Pinckney pocketed the stigma. He sent home the precious notice of a jacobin faction in Page America. That Pinckney should have endured such mockery was bad. The etiquette of federal degradation had been established at London. It had been approved by the President and Congress. Barras, with a thousand reasons for resentment, while Grenville had not one, was highly excusable for giving us a repetition of the dose.
The President affects to bristle up at the mention of American parties. In the House of Representatives the treaty escaped by a single vote. Every second number of Camillus represents America as full of desperate incendiaries. On the part of Barras the sarcasm was perfectly fair. We had no right or pretence to complain about it. The House of Representatives have set out with a direct breach of one of their standing rules. The propriety of adopting this rule will be happily illustrated by a recent circumstance, which occurred within the walls of that house.
In the second session of the third Congress, Mr. Sedgwick presented a petition from a person who wanted to be appointed as their short hand writer. Had a stenographer been, at that time, chosen by ballot, Mr. This looked like fairness. The proposal was resisted by Dr. William Smith of South-Carolina. The object of this maritime embassy was to buy up continental certificates. They were obtained at eighteen pence or half a crown per pound.
They were then funded by the doctor at twenty shillings. There the Doctor draws eight per cent. In plainer words, he advanced as it were ten dollars to serve his country, and, by various steps, he now draws an yearly interest for them, at the moderate rate of eight dollars.
John Beckley from his office as Clerk of Congress, an office which he has held ever since the operation of the new government. This made it necessary to exclude him by a silent vote. The motion was carried by forty-one voices against forty. Beckley may now, like Sully, find leisure to write an history of the abominations to which he has been a witness.
No Page certainty existed of their being funded by the new government, and much less of their being funded at the full nominal value.
Among other defects of the new government, one was that the House of Representatives consisted only of sixty-five members. A majority of each house voted for funding the whole mass at its nominal value. A member of Congress might, on this occasion, be very fitly compared to an attorney whom you send into court to make the best composition that he can with your just creditors.
It is the business of your agent to take advantage of this juncture; instead of which he clandestinely buys up all those debts against you, at the reduced price, for which his funds afford Page him ability. You would not think that such an attorney had discharged his trust with fidelity. You never would employ him again. It is even possible that he might be turned out of his profession. Within the last twenty years, Mr. At the time and place publicly appointed, no purchaser appeared, and Mr.
M'Kenzie bought it up in his own name. Several of his brethren, men above being suspected of collusion, attended the whole transaction, and gave evidence that they had no jealousy of unfair dealing. Yet the Court of Session declared that no factor could buy and sell at the same time. They reversed the bargain, and the house of peers confirmed their decree. But, if Mr. The first glance from the bench would have announced the annihilation of his scheme. Of the above forty millions of dollars, a small part was funded at only three per cent.
These heroes promoted an American revolution, when we were fifty times less heavily taxed than any other subjects of the British crown. HUNC tu Romane caveto. After such doings, they are unfit to be trusted under any government. The interest, at six per cent. If this sum had remained in the pockets of those who pay it, we should have been saved from many of the burdensome taxes which are so heavy on the inhabitants of the sea-port towns; and more or less so upon every part of the country.
The enormous dearth of labour must partly be deduced from this cause, and it produces, in an hundred different ways, inconvenience and Page backwardness to all sorts of business. Thus nominally we pay about fifty per cent. The common body of creditors must have been very glad to see six millions of dollars. This would have doubled their principal and made a very snug adventure.
The greatest rogue always turns king's witness, says the proverb. This was the dawning scene of that government whose wisdom and virtue have resounded through the four quarters of the globe. British piracies on American shipping in Samuel Green — British privateers built in the United States. This monument of bucanneering might have served as an useful curb to national vanity, and have taught us, if not quite incurable on that side, Page to apprehend the meanness of our present maritime condition.
The devastation has been going on, with different degrees of violence, since the summer of A complete account of these piracies would very far exceed our present limits. Only one of them happened to be on board, besides the mate and a boy. The rest were on shore on business. In case of non-compliance, he was threatened with a slogging.
Whether he obeyed this order, we are not told. The rest of the crew were secreted on shore by the captain, for ten days, till the sloop of war sailed, as her declared design was to impress the whole. The sloop's crew consisted of eighty-seven men. Of these, thirty-five were said to be Americans, who had been impressed in the West-Indies. The crews had been impressed. If Hercules had permitted Cacus to keep his stolen oxen, the insertion of his name would have been more intelligible.
As for Caesar and Cato—but it is needless to tread upon imbecility. He had the command of a fast-sailing schooner, of three bundred barrels burden, and carried a cargo for the British at that island. Page On his arrival, the consignee shewed him a bill of sale of the vessel, and told him, that he was no longer master, because the schooner was bought for the British government, and to be fitted out as a privateer.
If captain Green chose to remain on board, he was told that he might have employment. Several of the sailors were impressed by the British. This was the treament which other American crews, in the same trade, met with as well as his. Thus the United States furnished privateers and seamen for the destruction of their own commerce. This is one proof, among many, of the indifference of some American owners to the personal safety of their sailors.
The attested recital of such a fact would make the owner completely odious to the public. But, in this country, a series of such transactions does not excite the smallest emotion, or even attention. The man got a letter conveyed to England, and though Frederic possessed, in all its vigour, the faculty of retention, yet he found it necessary Page to give Jack his freedom. The story was printed in the English newspapers, and became, for a short time, a topic of conversation.
A newspaper of this city, of the 15th of March, , contained a narrative subscribed by Jacob Peterson, master of the sloop Polly, of Philadelphia. On the 31st, he sailed for Jeremie. While he remained in that port, about nine o'clock in the evening, of the 9th of February, captain Reynolds, of the Harriot, a British armed ship in government service, manned his boat and pressed several American seamen from different ships in the harbour.
He began with the ship Carolina, of Baltimore, captain Lusher. About nine o'clock in the evening, a boat full of armed men was observed coming from the Harriot towards the Eliza. She was hailed and enjoined to keep her distance. Reynolds caused his men to fire.
This was returned; and, after sometime, the boat went off. She came back with a fresh supply of men, and again found it prudent to retire.
The people in the Eliza then went on board of the Richard and James. Reynolds went on shore, obtained a reinforcemt, and came back to a third assault. Finding the Eliza deserted he Page gave up the attempt. The Americans had one killed, and one wounded. The above account, as to what happened at port Jeremie, was almost immediately confirmed by the arrival of captain Webb, of the brig Nymph.
Murray answered, that he had given no orders for the impress, and that he would use his influence to get the men restored; but, when captain Webb left Jeremie, there was no appearance of that taking place. The answer of Murray was mere mockery. Reynolds durst not have fired a pistol against the real inclination of the admiral.
Dorchester was said to act without orders, when, on the 10th of February, , he made his famous or infamous speech to the savages. The rank and file, with their faces blacked, and the three British officers dressed in scarlet, who kept at a distance, in the rear, and directed the motions of the Putawatimes, were certainly acting likewise without orders.
Page On the 15th of March, , Mr. He deposed that, when he was at cape Nichola Mole, he was on board a schooner from Virginia, where he saw two of the crew, native Americans, impressed by the officers of the British ship Severn. In saying this, he paid a compliment to Jay's treaty which it does not merit. All seamen, whether with protections or without them, are alike unnoticed by that paper. On presenting this protest, an insignificant debate ensued in the house. The question was, whether it should be referred to the select committee on American seamen, or to the Secretary at War, that the President might make suitable representations to the British government.
It was remitted to the committee. Those who refused to do duty were whipt. Four days before capt. The rest of the impressed men, in these two frigates, had found it prudent to comply with British orders. This was the treatment of our seamen fifteen months after the signing of Jay's treaty, and before Congress began to debate on the propriety of accepting it.
On Thursday, January 28, , at five P. On Monday, February 8th, at two P. That same night I went on board to solicit for my man. After communicating to the captain my errand, he told me he was certain I had men stowed away, and he would send Page his boat on board, and overhaul us from keel to gunnel; and, after giving me much abusive language, said, he would flog me, and all I had on board.
Accordingly, the Mermaid's boat came on board with a great many hands, hove the long boat out of the chocks, hoisted up twenty-two barrels of beef, moved part of the ballast, and, as the saying is, turned every thing upside down. After we had laid some time, they sent the boat on board, who rummaged and overhauled; but seeing they could find nothing, they returned on board.
On Thursday, the 11th, at nine A. George's bay. When she got into our wake she tacked but did not come up with us until two P. I received a great deal of abusive language from the captain without giving any reasons. He cursed and damned the Americans and said they were their greatest enemies. He said he had fired twelve shot at us, that I should pay two dollars for the first, and double for every one after: however, I not being willing to comply with this unreasonable request, and seeing he had no business to have fired at us, as he had boarded us the day before, and Page as he did not think fit to send his boat on board, he suffered us to set sail.
This is a short specimen of the usage we meet with from the British cruizers in the West-Indies. All which I can attest to; and much more if required. On the 28th of March, , the ship Bacchus, captain George, arrived at Philadelphia. She pressed his mate and cabin boy, on a suspicion of their being British subjects. The boy was an indented apprentice. As it is proper to do justice to all parties, it may here be noticed that, at this time, captain Burnet, of the brig George, arrived in Philadelphia from Kingston, and brought a complaint of the French privateers.
He said that several of them were cruising off Jamaica, when he left it. They were very troublesome to American vessels, sometimes plundering them of their sea stores, and otherwise behaving with the greatest insolence.
At the same time, several articles of British rapine have been omitted for want of room. So contrasted at that period, was the conduct of these two nations to this country!
The Argonaut man of war of sixty-four guns, had, a few days before, sent into Kingston, two American vessels. Her cargo consisted of cotton and coffee, with six thousand dollars in specie. The whole Page property belonged to Mr. Trisdale of Boston. The other vessel was the schooner Paragon of Norfolk, laden with coffee, and owned by Mr. Moses Myers of that town. In June, , it had got up to one shilling and four pence.
By November, , if not sooner, it rose to two shillings and four pence. The writer of the above letter added that both vessels were libelled, and that indeed none need expect to escape that fate, whatever might be the final verdict about them. The supercargo, Mr. At this time, the captain of the Severn had kept Mr. Page Captain Hall, and Mr. Duncan had been sent prisoners from cape Nichola Mole to Port Royal, on board of the Lark man of war.
One of them, the letter does not say which, happening to sleep in the next birth to the lieutenant, had his watch and money stolen out of his pocket. It was their opinion that the Severn had designed to send the schooner to the bottom, for she run so near as to carry away their bowsprit.
About four leagues to windward of Port-Royal, he had been boarded by the Regulus. She took away his mate, and four men. Before taking them on board, the British captain sent his surgeon into the Lydia, to examine the men, and see if they were in good health. The Regulus had pressed above fifty seamen, went to Port-au-Prince, and from thence to England; so that when the Portsmouth sailors were to see their families, or whether they were ever to see them at all, was extremely doubtful.
The French put Blackburn, with Page his whole private property, on board of the brig. In his trunk were two bags of money; the plate of the ship's cabin; and two bills of exchange to the amount in whole of eight hundred pounds. The Frenchman said that he disdained to take any thing from a prisoner, and wished him a good voyage to Kingston. A Philadelphia print of the 26th of March, , contained an extract of a letter dated March 2d, from Bermuda.
The writer mentions that the ship Hannah, captain Hoare, from Philadelphia to France, was, on the 24th of February, taken by the Lynx sloop of war. She stript the Hannah of her whole crew, excepting the mate, the cook, and the cabin boy, and sent her into Bermuda. Most of the hands impressed had protections. The captain of the Lynx had spoke, on the day before, with the Roebuck of Philadelphia, and said that he was prevented from taking her by a violent gale of wind.
An article dated Salem, the 22d of March, gives what is called verbal information by captain Blacker. Part of it is in substance as follows:.
Two hundred and fifty American sailors assembled, went to the house of rendezvous of the gang, and rescued their companion. They placed the officers of the impress in the centre of the room, obliged them to uncover, and give three cheers to Page the United States. On the 27th, another American was impressed. On the 2d of February, the American captains were called before the mayor and magistrates of Liverpool.
They were admonished to keep their crews in order. They made an answer which must have occurred to any body excepting a member of Congress vindicating appropriations for the British treaty. A letter from New-York to a merchant in Philadelphia, dated the 2d of April, informed that his ship, the Ocean, captain Vredenburgh, had been taken on the 31st ult. The whole crew, at the time of writing the letter, were detained on board of the frigate, except the master, the first mate and a boy.
The Ocean was from Havre-de-Grace, and the frigate took her, not far from the Highlands, with a pilot on board. The Argus, of April 4th, says, that before she was dismissed for Halifax, several passengers were most graciously permitted to jump into the long boat, and come up to New-York. President George Washington issues his Farewell Address, which warns against partisan politics and foreign entanglements.
December 7 — The U. Electoral College meets to elect John Adams president. What happened in the year ? February 11 — The first session of the United States Senate is open to the public. The Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution is passed by Congress for submission to the states for ratification. How many states were there in ? Votes for Federalist electors have been assigned to John Adams and votes for Democratic-Republican electors have been assigned to Thomas Jefferson.
Only 9 of the 16 states used any form of popular vote. What was happening in ? July 4 — The Louisiana Purchase is announced to the American people. Jan 12 French evacuate Vienna. Jan 30 Prussia takes possession of Hanover.
What happened in during the French Revolution? In the hopes of quelling mounting tensions between the United States and Britain, Washington selects Chief Justice of the Supreme Court John Jay to serve as a special envoy to Britain, in the hope that he can broker a deal with the British government to improve relations and address American grievances.
Farmers in western Pennsylvania rebel over the strict enforcement of an excise tax on whiskey passed in President Washington issues a proclamation on August 7 ordering the insurgents to return home. When this fails, he calls up more than 12, militiamen and dispatches them to Pennsylvania, whereupon the insurrection dissolves. The victory helps open the Ohio territory for American settlement and is a defeat for Britain, which had allied with the Native Americans in the region.
The treaty, now known as Jay's Treaty, was designed to resolve issues between the United States and Britain. Although the treaty left some important issues unresolved and its ratification divided politicians in the young federal government, it successfully allowed the United States to avoid war with its more powerful adversary, Britain.
In the s, the United States was struggling to assert both its political and economic independence, and the new nation encountered difficulties in foreign relations when its two primary trading partners, Britain and France, went to war yet again.
President George Washington sought to follow a policy of strict neutrality, allowing American merchants and ships to trade with both countries while aiding neither in their war efforts. Britain, however, confiscated many American ships and their cargoes, arguing that they aided the French war effort.
British naval vessels also frequently impressed American sailors, forcing them to work on British ships. Britain, in addition, still barred American ships from participating in the lucrative West Indian trade, a policy it formulated during the American Revolution. The United States was also upset by Britain's refusal to evacuate its forts in the Great Lakes area, although it had agreed to do so in the Treaty of Paris of These British actions outraged many Americans.
Attempting to keep the United States out of war, President Washington worked for a diplomatic solution. Jay concluded a treaty in which Britain promised to leave its forts in the Great Lakes region, agreed to arbitration for disputes over the Canadian border one of the first instances of arbitration in diplomatic history , and gave American ships limited trading rights with British possessions in the East and West Indies.
The treaty left unresolved, however, the issues of impressments and American neutrality. Jay's Treaty still needed to earn Senate ratification - and a tough battle loomed.
The ratification process, in which Federalists supported and Democrat-Republicans opposed the treaty, became bogged down in partisan differences, destroying what little remained of the consensus President Washington had tried to instill in the federal government. As a piece of diplomacy, Jay's Treaty was imperfect but still a success. The treaty did not secure everything the Americans wanted because it failed to deal with the impressment problem and American neutrality, and because it seemed to acquiesce to British supremacy on the seas.
The treaty, however, did put off direct conflict between America and its much stronger rival, and it won the United States important territorial and trade concessions - no small feat for a new nation confronting a global power. Alexander Hamilton resigns from his post as secretary of the treasury.
Washington appoints Oliver Wolcott to replace Hamilton. After fierce public debate, the Senate ratifies the Jay Treaty. President Washington signs the treaty on August The American Government, represented by David Humphreys, agrees to pay a sum of nearly a million dollars to the Dey of Algiers for protection of American shipping in the Mediterranean and for the ransom of sailors. A heated dispute erupts between President Washington and his Federalist allies and Democrat-Republicans in the House of Representatives after the latter demand that the President provide Congress with all papers relating to the Jay Treaty.
Washington refuses their demands. Congress grants Tennessee's application for statehood, allowing it to become the 16th state in the Union. France informs James Monroe, America's leading diplomat in Paris, that the Jay Treaty violates, and therefore suspends, certain provisions of the Treaty of Amity and Commerce between the two nations. This begins a serious diplomatic crisis between France and the United States. In his address, Washington summarized his presidential tenure, cautioned against political divisions, and advised future American leaders to minimize connections with foreign powers.
By this time, political divisions between Alexander Hamilton on one side and James Madison and Thomas Jefferson on the other had hardened into proto-political parties.
Whereas in , at the time of Washington's inauguration, loyalty to country and Constitution equated with loyalty to the President, the rise of political parties had begun to separate the two. Washington, as a result, faced increasing criticism of his domestic and foreign policies during his second term. Upon deciding to retire, he offered his Farewell Address both as a defense of his presidency and a plea for the future of the federal government.
The President opened with a tribute to the people of the United States and with an explanation that his time for retirement had come. He then emphasized the importance of union and the need to avoid sectional and factional divisions. He also warned the country against permanent alliances with foreign nations. Both points responded to issues in his presidency. Washington felt betrayed by the partisan criticism of his leadership and equated lack of support for his administration with lack of commitment to the Constitution.
His address thus sought to vindicate his leadership, as well as promote harmony in future governance. One policy that had been criticized by the Jefferson-led opposition involved relations with revolutionary France. Washington issued a proclamation of neutrality in upon the resumption of conflict between France and Britain. Jeffersonians argued this violated the French-American Treaty of whereby each nation pledged to assist the other.
Washington feared involvement in European conflicts would jeopardize the stability of the fledgling United States, and in his farewell attempted to justify his neutrality policy. Revisions by Alexander Hamilton softened many of the complaints and omitted the self-pitying passages. In an agreement resembling the one signed with the Dey of Algiers in , the American government signs a treaty with Tripoli, agreeing to pay a yearly tribute to the Pasha of Tripoli in exchange for the peaceful treatment of U.
John Adams is elected President of the United States. Thomas Jefferson, the candidate with the second highest electoral vote, becomes vice president. France refuses to accept Monroe's replacement, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, as American envoy to France, worsening relations between the two nations.
John Adams is inaugurated as the second President of the United States, thereby officially ending the presidency of George Washington. Washington retires to his home at Mount Vernon. Grant Rutherford B. Hayes James A. Garfield Chester A. Roosevelt Harry S. Truman Dwight D.
0コメント