hand. This was neither within compass of the envoys' instructions, nor the limit of the President's power, and however willing they may have been to suspect that the corrupt advances previously made were the result of the intrigues of private speculators, giving their "own hue to the communications of the French government, of whose participation there was neither proof nor probability," it was clear that the usefulness of the commission was over. On Feb. 4, according to a note in the manuscript journal of Mr. Marshall, cited by Mr. Pickering,t Mr. Gerry had an interview with Talleyrand, the tenor of which he did not feel at liberty to communicate at the time, but which resulted in a separate correspondence, which continued after his colleagues, virtually dismissed by the Directory, had returned to the United States. This, too, was ineffectual, in the first place from Mr. Gerry disclaiming all power to make a treaty except ad referendum, and in the second place, from the publication of Mr. Pinckney's dispatches, which, by exposing the scandalous proceedings on the French side of the negotiation at the outset, so much exasperated the functionaries principally concerned, as to make harmonious action impossible.

On the reception of the X. Y. Z. despatches, Mr. Adams, who for a long time, either from absence from the seat of government, or from a disinclination to official business when there, had taken but little part in executive details, was aroused to the liveliest resentment. One minister had been sent and rejected; a solemn embassy of three had now met with the same treatment; and the only remaining recourse was arms. In a message replete with his ancient fire, he communicated the correspondence to Congress, demanded its immediate co-operation in the raising of troops, and closed with the memorable declaration, "I will never send another minister to France, without assurances that he will be received, respected and honoured, as the representative of a great, free, powerful and independent people." The effect of this appeal was immediate and tremendous. The day of apathy seemed to have closed, and the people rose like one man, determined to avenge the insults which had been offered to their flag. Several of the Democratic leaders, feeling that it was now a question of national honour, gave up at once any further attempt to apologize for the French government; the rest maintained a querulous silence, no one daring to stem the torrent of popular indignation. Congress at once took vigorous measures, under the President's lead, for the protection of trade, for the raising of a provisional army, for the erection of a navy, and for the establishment of a war system of finance, and in three months the country was fully armed. But in the temper of defiance which pervaded every section, Talleyrand's practised eye discovered a spirit which it would be dangerous further to tempt. Before many months had expired, France was found inviting those very advances which so shortly before she had repelled.

On Oct. 1, 1798, Mr. Gerry arrived at Boston, and finding Mr. Adams at

⚫ 3 Jeff. Corr., 411. Talleyrand himself expressly disavowed the procedure: "I cannot observe without surprise, that intriguers have profited of the insulated condition in which the envoys of the United States have kept themselves, to make proposals and hold conversations, the object of which evidently was to deceive you. I pray you to make known to me immediately the names denoted by the initials X. Y. Z., and that of the woman who is described as having had conversation with Mr. Pinckney on the interests of America." Pick. Review, 122. Talleyrand's disclaimer, however, is entitled to no more weight than the mere presumption arising from circumstances give it; and the settled opinion now undoubtedly is, that either under his direct control, or at least with his privity, the X. Y. Z. approaches were made. See, for a clear and candid exposition of the negotiation, 2 Tuck. Life of Jeff, 61 et seq.

+ Pick. Rev., 118.

Diplom. of U. S., by Wells and Lilly, 93.

For the details of this reaction, see 1 Condie's Mag. for 1798, 344. I See "a letter in March, 1801," &c., by R. G. Harper.

Quincy, at once proceeded there to communicate with him in person. Independently of the documentary manifestations of the new-born conciliatory intentions of France, which will presently be noticed, the returned envoy, whose personal worth, added to an early friendship, gave him great weight with the President, announced to the latter that a request had been officially made to him by the French Directory "in the strongest terms, to evince their disposition for accommodating all subjects of difference between the two republics; for accrediting any minister or ministers which should thereafter be sent by the United States, immediately on the presentment of their letter of credence; for adopting a commercial treaty that should be liberal and beneficial to the said States; and for making effectual arrangements to discharge the numerous and just demands of American citizens on the French republic.”* Shortly after Mr. Gerry returned, letters were received from Mr. Murray, then the American minister at the Hague, covering a correspondence between M. Pichon, the French charge d'affaires at that place, and Talleyrand, in which the latter, in a despatch which was avowedly written for the purpose of communication to the American government, stated that he had given Mr. Gerry "the most solemn assurances concerning the reception a new plenipotentiary would receive." In a subsequent letter, in which the fact that the first document had been communicated to Mr. Murray, was referred to with approval, the "assurance" is tendered still more strongly, and almost in the very language which Mr. Adams, in his message of June 21, 1798, prescribed: "Whatever plenipotentiary the government of the United States might send to France, to put an end to the existing differences between the countries, would be undoubtedly received with the respect due to the representatives of a free, independent, and powerful nation." "Carry, therefore, citizen," was the closing injunction to Mr. Murray, "these positive instructions, in order to convince him of our sincerity, and prevail upon him to transmit them to his government." Nor were these the only advances made. A communication was received by General Washington from Mr. Barlow, then a resident in Paris, which stated that the writer was authorized by the French government in the most friendly though inofficial way, to urge the renewal of negotiations. This paper General Washington enclosed to Mr. Adams, commending it earnestly to the latter's attention, and mentioning, that, in his opinion, "the people of America were very desirous of peace;" a fact afterwards dwelt upon with much satisfaction by Mr. Adams, as indicating the opinion of his great predecessor. The same views were pressed by Dr. Logan, of Philadelphia, "a gentleman of fortune, education, good breeding, and not despicable abilities," who, to follow Mr. Adams' narrative, "after his return from France, made me a visit, and politely informed me, that he had waited on me at the request of Talleyrand, to assure me in the most solemn manner, that the Directory wished for peace with the United States, and desired me to send a minister, or authorize one already in Europe to treat, and that I might depend upon his cordial and honourable reception; and that such a treaty should be made to my satisfaction. I should, however, have paid no attention to this, if I had not received other similar assurances through Mr. Murray and Mr. Gerry."§

This is Mr. Gerry's own account, given by him in a letter several years after in the Boston Patriot. (See 2 Gibbs' Life of Wolcott, 198.) The result of the letters from M. Talleyrand to Mr. Gerry, is to the same effect. See, for a succinct and accurate revise of the correspondence, Mr. Austin's excellent Life of Gerry, vol. 2, 233 et seq. † Diplom. of U. S., by Wells and Lilly, 69.

Cunning. Corr., 106.

$ Cunn. Corr. 105. Dr. George Logan, whose diplomatic performances attracted so much notice in this instance, as to cause the passage of a bill, called the "Logan Bill," to check lay negotiating, was a Quaker, and came from a family, which, next to that of Penn himself, was the most historical in Pennsylvania. His large estates gave him a patroon like influ

The schism between Mr. Adams and his secretaries, or, at all events, with the Secretaries of State and of War, had now become such as to destroy anything more than the most formal official intercourse. The two first years of his administration had exhibited a cabinet without a President; the last two were to exhibit a President without a cabinet. Great must have been Mr. Pickering's amazement, accustomed as he had been to unlimited confidence in the first administration, and unlimited control, until the French difficulties in the second, to find that on Feb. 18, 1799, Mr. Adams had sent in the name of William Vans Murray, the envoy at the Hague, as minister plenipotentiary to the French Republic; prefixing the nomination with the announcement, that with it was communicated a document which "seems to be intended to be a compliance with a condition mentioned at the conclusion of my message to Congress of the 21st of June last;" but stating, at the same time, that the minister, thus appointed, should not, if commissioned, go to France," without direct and unequivocal assurances from the French government, signified by the minister of foreign relations, that he shall be received in character; shall enjoy the privileges attached to his character by the law of nations; and, that a minister of equal rank, title and powers shall be appointed to treat with him, to discuss and conclude all controversies between the two republics by a new treaty." Nor was the surprise excited by this message limited to Mr. Pickering alone; Mr. Hamilton did not hesitate to come forward, and, with his usual boldness, denounce the overture as servile to France and degrading to America. Even the government press launched at it its coarse invective. The Senate, startled from their propriety, took the novel expedient of appointing a committee, whether informally or in executive session does not now appear, to extract the withdrawal of the nomination. To this proposition, certainly unconstitutional, if formally made, Mr. Adams refused to accede, and, according to a letter from Mr. Pickering, ence in Philadelphia, whose politics he turned at an early period, by his decided though somewhat philosophic assumption of democratic doctrines. The Legislature of Pennsylvania was the scene of his early political efforts. In that turbulent body, however, he did not feel much at home, and impressed with the belief, that by a visit to Europe he could not only satisfy his polities, but his religion, he started on the mission which was the subject of so many misgivings to the Democratic press, and so much diversion to the Federalist. Some of Porcupine's coarsest sallies were levelled at the volunteer negotiator, who, with Barclay's Apology in the one hand, and Paine's Rights of Man in the other, carried over a piece of the sod which Penn's Treaty Tree shaded, as a douceur, with which Bonaparte was to be converted to Quakerdom and Democracy. If ridicule could have done this work, Dr. Logan would not have survived to take his seat in 1801, in the Senate of the United States,-a seat which he for six years held with dignity in that august body. But take it he did, having been first appointed by the Governor and then elected by the Legislature to fill the complete term declined by General Muhlenberg; and though his philanthropic tenderness made him sometimes an inconvenient associate, he represented the State with ability and rectitude. Fortunately for himself, he was not destined to descend to posterity with the imputation of having used his religion to forward his politics, for, during the progress of troubles with Great Britain, in 1810, he started on the same mission to the Court of St. James, as in 1798, had led him to the French Directory. He visited everybody, prince and people, and was so fortunate, as he afterwards informed his friends, as to find nobody in favour of a war except a very young lieutenant in the navy. This impartiality in the distribution of his diplomatic gifts relieved him from the suspicions of his Federalist friends, who had originally great difficulty in crediting him with sincerity; and even Mr. Pickering, who cannot be charged with too great leniency to his opponents, felt no difficulty, after the second expedition, in announcing Dr. Logan to be an acquaintance of mine, and I am perfectly satisfied of the purity of his views." (Pick. Review, 133.) After the unfortunate result of his second mission, which, Quixotic as it may appear, was conducted with great earnestness and energy, and with an unwearied patience and simplicity which always gained respect, and in many cases met with unexpected success, Dr. Logan retired to his farm near Philadelphia, where, in 1821, after a gradual decline, he died, leaving no one to doubt the excellence of his heart, or the integrity of his character.

*

still Secretary of State, on July 10, 1799, "the President's real friends" "determined to put a negative upon it. The President heard that such was to be the report of the committee, in very pointed language, on the morning of the 25th. This he thought best to anticipate." Accordingly, on Feb. 25, 1799, a new message was issued, which coupled with Mr. Murray (he being the junior in the commission), "Oliver Ellsworth, Esq., Chief Justice of the United States, and Patrick Henry, Esq., late Governor of Virginia." The nominations were confirmed, and Mr. Henry, almost immediately afterwards, having declined, Governor Davie, of North Carolina, was nominated in his stead. Mr. Davie and Mr. Ellsworth sailed from Newport on Nov. 3, 1799, and, on May 2, 1800, arrived at Paris, having been for some months detained at Lisbon, waiting to catch a stable government to which they might with safety be presented. When they arrived, the confusion of the revolution was at last over; Napoleon was First Consul; and on Sept. 3, 1800, the Treaty of Paris was signed, in which the claims of France to a loan were abandoned, the claims of America to an indemnity recognized, and a convention settled, under which American shipping soon secured the temporary carrying trade of the Atlantic.

While the negotiations which have been just traced brought out the secret hostility of the dynastic opposition of which Mr. Hamilton was at the head,hostility which, as will presently be seen, soon became open and implacable,tthe organic opposition of which Mr. Madison, Mr. Monroe, Mr. Nicholas, Mr. Livingston, and Mr. Gallatin, were the ostensible organs, was aroused to fresh exertions by the passage of the alien and sedition laws. By the act of July 6, 1798, (the Alien Law,) the President was invested with the power of ordering "all such aliens as he should judge dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States, or should have any reasonable grounds to suspect were concerned in any treasonable or secret machinations against the government thereof, to depart out of the territory of the United States within such a time as should be expressed in such order;" and, if the order was not complied with, the offence was made subject to an imprisonment for a maximum of three years, together with subsequent incapacity for citizenship. In case of war being declared, the President was authorized to apprehend and remove the subjects of the belligerent power. The act of July 14, 1798, (the Sedition Law,) imposed a penalty on unlawful combinations to oppose the measures of government, on counselling insurrections and riots, and on libelling the government, Congress, and the President. Both these bills were resisted with the whole power of the republican party, and were only carried on the top of the X. Y. Z. wave, passing the Senate, it is true, by about the usual vote of eighteen to ten, but getting through the House by a majority ranging from but two to four.

The motives which induced the majority to pass these laws, we are told by Mr. Tucker, in his admirable Life of Mr. Jefferson,¶ have never been satisfactorily explained; but perhaps the secret may be found in the tendency which exists in every dominant party to perpetuate its ascendency by the humiliation of its rivals. "Drive out the malcontents and perverse, by steel," cried Cromwell, and Colonel Pride, inflamed with the belief that he was thereby but weeding the tares, dashed into the House of Commons and rid it of the refractory 2 Gibbs' Wolcott, 204.

See Hubbard's Life of Davie, 25; Sparks' Am. Biog., N. S., 117.

There were some eminent exceptious, however, among the Federal leaders, to this course. Chief Justice Marshall boldly came forward, and, both then and afterwards, vindicated the treaty as judicious and honourable (see 2 Mars. Life of Wash. 438); and Mr. Robert Goodloe Harper, in the teeth of the strong party current pulling in the opposite direction, did not hesitate to tell his constituents in March, 1801, that the treaty was one which it was for "our honour and interest to ratify;" and that the "honour of the nation has been vindicated, and its rights have been asserted and protected."-(Harper's Works, 330.)

§ 1 Peter's Stat. at large, 577.

Ibid., 598.

T2 Tuck. Jeff. 46.

members. "Let the wisdom of the people correct the non-jurors," urged Walpole, then in the flush of a temporary ascendency; and the result was Sacheverell was impeached and suspended. Measures of a character almost identical-the suspension of the habeas corpus, the arms bill, and the suspected aliens bill,-were found necessary to check the progress of French principles in England, and were not some such steps necessary to check the progress of the same principles in America? Was not a quarantine justifiable to impede the advance of the little band of French and English philosophers who were infusing into the young blood of the American confederacy the virus of Jacobinism; or if arrived, and already at work, could not a judicious sanatary police interfere to punish, or at least to remove them? Volney, Paine, Cooper and Priestley; are such quacks to be allowed to roam from city to city, and village to village, planting the deadly poison in the system of the unwary? Whether or no the malpractices of individuals were chargeable upon the whole minority or not, certain it was by those malpractices the minority was benefitted, and ought not a majority, convinced of the sincerity and correctness of its principles, to exercise its temporary power to stop an agitation which it believes not only fatal to sound government, but dangerous to its own existence? The offensive matter, when it could not be expelled from the cell, might at least be glued up so tightly as to prevent the infection spreading; and where the alien laws could not transport the unwelcome visitors, the sedition law could put them in prison.-In vain the cooler heads of the party hesitated and doubted. Mr. Wolcott's intimation that he "never thought it a wise measure," and the anxious caution of the Pinckneys, were unheeded; and the same Congress which, by its manly resistance to French imposition had seemed to make permanent the federal ascendency, caused that ascendency to totter under the blows which they aimed at its adversaries. "The Alien and Sedition Laws," said Mr. Jefferson, with his usual quickness of perception, "are working hard;"† and so hard did they work that, before another general election arrived, the substantial edifice which the majority had erected was levelled to the dust.

But these unhappy times would be imperfectly sketched, were not a peculiar prominence given to the political literature which marked them. It was this, in fact, which under the Sedition Act led to nearly half of the following trials. From the close of Washington's administration, when, as has been noticed, the spirit of party was let loose in its worst shape through the land, the newspapers had assumed the wildest license. This, it is sure, can hardly be attributed to the natural temper of the people. With hardly an exception, the leading editors were either the emissaries or the exiles of foreign lands. Of the first, Cobbett was the most dashing representative. Of the second, the ranks were numerous enough to provide writers for nearly the whole opposition press. So offensive was the scurrility which pervaded the papers at the seat of government particularly, that hardly a week passed without a scuffle in which one at least of the leading editors was concerned. To keep up a party organ in those days required as much vigour of muscle as coarseness of vocabulary. The feature which beyond all others shows the low state of editorial decency was the relish with which each would in turn smack his lips over his brother's chastisements. "That wretch B. yesterday received his just deserts from

• Gibbs' Wol., 78.

Mr. Jefferson to Mr. Mason, Aug. 11, 1798 (3 Jeff. Corr. 402).

See post, 328.

"It is very remarkable that patriots born in British dominions, are very distinguishable among those who are the most invariably opposed to our government and its measures. They appear to be as little disposed to promote good will between our two countries as the French; indeed, they seem to like our government as little as their own." Mr. Jay to Lord Grenville, June 4, 1797. (2.Jay's Life, 281.)