Amusingly enough, Jefferson evidently believed that he had displayed a remarkable caution during the whole conversation. It is doubtful that such would have been the opinion of the Portuguese Government had his letter to Jay been intercepted, and one may wonder what he would have said if he had really intended to encourage a revolution in the Portuguese colonies. With a Mexican who made a similar inquiry he was somewhat more reserved. He had observed that the gentleman was "intimate at the Spanish Ambassador's" and suspected that he might be a spy. He was therefore "still more cautious with him than with the Brazilian"; mentioning simply that "a successful revolution was still at a distance with them": that he feared "they must begin by enlightening and emancipating the minds of their people." He finally recalled that the British papers had mentioned during the late war an insurrection in Peru "which had cost two hundred thousand lives, on both sides!"—a figure not to be taken too literally.

During the course of a year, however, Jefferson's views underwent a remarkable change. In May, 1788, he mentioned to Carmichael his suspicions that a Spanish squadron had been sent to South America in order to quell an incipient revolt started at the instigation of the British. This placed the situation in an entirely different light. The United States would have very little to gain if a weak neighbor were displaced by a powerful and treacherous nation. He consequently requested his colleagues to reassure the Spanish Court that the United States would not favor in any way a revolt of the Spanish colonies in the New World, for "those who look into futurity farther than the present moment or age, and who combine well what is, with what is to be, must see that our interests, well understood, and our wishes are, that Spain shall (not forever, but) very long retain her possessions in that quarter; and that her views and ours must, in a good degree, and for a long time concur."[178]

This is the more important as it already defines the position taken by Jefferson twelve years later during the negotiations concerning the Louisiana Purchase. It is also a reiteration of that desire of isolation which constituted the cardinal principle of American foreign policies and which had been enunciated in the Treaty of Alliance concluded with France in 1778. Jefferson had not originated the principle, since this article of the Treaty of Alliance was due to Adams, but his direct and prolonged contact with European affairs had strengthened in him the instinctive conviction that it was the only wise course for America to follow. If he had felt free to indulge in his own theory, he would have gone even further than any of his contemporaries for, as he wrote in 1785, "I should wish the United States to practice neither commerce, nor navigation, but to stand, with respect to Europe, precisely on the footing of China." Unfortunately, this was only a theory and the servants of the country were not at liberty to follow it, since "Americans have a decided taste for navigation and commerce." Being on a mission to protect and further the commerce of his fellow countrymen, Jefferson consequently thought it his duty to forget for the time being his personal preferences. In a similar way, although he strongly believed in free trade and would have seen no objection to "throwing open all the doors of commerce, and knocking its shackles", he realized that such an ideal condition could not be reached unless the European powers granted similar treatment to American goods. He therefore came to the conclusion that, "as this cannot be done for others, unless they will do it for us, and there is no great probability that Europe will do this, we shall be obliged to adopt a system which may shackle them in our ports, as they do in theirs."[179]

We have here another striking instance of the close partitioning established by Jefferson between theory and practice, between his wishes as a political philosopher, and his conception of his duties as a public servant. Far from being a single-track mind, his was decidedly a double-track intellect, with two lines of thought running parallel without any apparent contradiction, for theory never seemed to have interfered with his practice. When a month later he wrote to W. W. Seward about the future of commercial relations between Ireland and America, he excellently defined his position by saying that "the system into which the United States wishes to go, was that of freeing commerce from every shackle. A contrary conduct in Great Britain will occasion them to adopt a contrary system, at least as to that island."[180]

There is probably nothing in this to astonish the man in the street, either in Washington or in London, for it seems to be a curious quality of the Anglo-Saxon mind to be able to pursue a very practical and hard-headed policy, while keeping its belief in disinterested and idealistic principles. Yet it may not be out of place to mention that this is the very reason why both England and America have so often been accused of hypocrisy by European public opinion. Without attempting to justify all the foreign policies of the United States on that score, it may be said that in this particular case there was no hypocrisy. Jefferson made no attempt whatever to conceal the difference that existed between his theory and his practice; he even called attention to it. He did not attempt to color unpleasant reality with idealistic camouflage, and gave the European nations a chance to choose between two entirely different courses. He would rather have chosen to follow the more liberal system, but he gave due notice that if it came to playing the game of real politics, America could be just as practical and firm in insisting upon her rights as any nation of the Old World.

The millennium had not yet arrived; and America, in spite of her peaceful attitude, might be caught at any time in European "commotions." While maintaining a policy of strict aloofness, it would have been foolish and ostrich-like for her to ignore that danger, and it became the strict duty of those in power to keep close watch on political developments in the Old World. Such is the conclusion reached by Jefferson as a result of his observations, and in a letter to E. Carrington he outlined a policy of watchful waiting to which Woodrow Wilson himself would have subscribed:

Watchful waiting, no political entanglements, unofficial observers—everything is here and this page could have been written ten years ago or yesterday. It is sometimes said that America, being a young and inexperienced nation, has had no time to develop traditions, but it may be wondered whether any other nation could be found which, after defining so clearly the essentials of a policy, has adhered to them so persistently for a century and a half. There is no doubt, at any rate, that once again Jefferson, although he did not originate the theory, formulated it with his usual felicity of expression, and thus contributed toward giving America what Descartes would have called her "maxims of action."

CHAPTER IV

JEFFERSON AND THE FRENCH REVOLUTION

Jefferson has often been represented, both by his enemies and friends, as the American exponent of the theories of the French Revolution. The possible influence exerted upon the development of his political philosophy by French thought has been the subject of lengthy discussions and probably will never be determined with any degree of exactness. It is very difficult to see how a man of his character could have remained in Paris for more than five years without participating in some manner in the great battle of theories which preceded the French Revolution. He associated with Lafayette and his group of "republicans", exchanged some correspondence with Condorcet, frequently saw Abbé Morellet, was introduced by Benjamin Franklin to Madame Helvétius and her coterie; he worked with Du Pont de Nemours on commercial questions, subscribed to papers and gazettes and to the "Encyclopédie Méthodique", a continuation and systematization of Diderot's "Encyclopédie."

But when all is said, the most careful scrutiny of the letters he wrote during that period fails to reveal any enthusiasm or even any endorsement of the many and somewhat contradictory political doctrines which were preached in France at the time. I do not even see that his prolonged sojourn in France modified to any extent the conclusions he had already reached independently in the "Notes on Virginia." When he arrived in Paris he was over forty and had been in public life for almost fifteen years; he had written not only the Declaration of Independence but many reports on vital questions; he had participated actively and for several years in the deliberations of the Virginia Assembly and of the Congress of the United States and he had been chief executive of his native State. Such a man was not a student coming to Paris to sit at the feet of French masters; he was considered by the French themselves, not only as a master but as the apostle of the religion of liberty.[182] They looked up to him for advice and help, for he had over them the great superiority of having been more than a simple theorizer; he had contributed to a great movement of liberation; he was the promoter of the Bill for Religious Freedom; he had proposed a complete plan of public education and he had proclaimed in a national document the inviolable rights of man. They had much to learn from Jefferson and he was not reluctant to teach them, but he never felt that his French friends could repay him in kind. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that he was very happy to find enunciated in a very clear and logical way some of his favorite ideas; it is equally certain that France was to him a living demonstration and a sort of horrible example of all the evils caused by aristocratic, monarchical, and ecclesiastical oppressions. His sojourn in France had at least the effect of making him more intensely, more proudly American than he was before sailing, and more convinced than ever of the unsurpassed superiority of the civilization which had already developed on the northern continent of the New World.

This sentiment appears even during the first year of his stay in Paris in a letter to Mrs. Trist:

This was no passing mood: a few weeks earlier he had written much more vehemently to his friend and "élève", James Monroe, engaging him to come to France in order to see for himself the extraordinary superiority of America over Europe and particularly France.

But unhappy as they are, the French are lovable, for he loved them with all his heart and thought that, "with a better religion, a better form of government and their present Governors, their condition and country would be most enviable." At any rate they were to be preferred to the "rich, proud, hectoring, swearing, squibbling, carnivorous animals who lived on the other side of the Channel."[185]

At the beginning of his stay, Jefferson paid little attention to the internal affairs of the country; the only incident worth comment during his first year in Paris was the imprisonment of the chief editor of the Journal de Paris who was sent to the Bastille, perhaps to end his days there:

It is not until February, 1786, that he gave hints, quite incidentally, that the situation might become critical and that serious disturbances might be feared for the future.

But he did not see anywhere any immediate danger of a political commotion and during that year he continued to repeat in his letters that "Europe was very quiet for the present." As a matter of fact, he had come to the conclusion that the case of the Old World was hopeless; they were past redemption and, "if the Almighty had begotten a thousand sons, instead of one, they would not have sufficed for this task. If all the sovereigns of Europe undertook to emancipate the minds of their subjects, a thousand years would not place them on that high ground on which our common people are now setting out." France has become a horrible example to place constantly before the eyes of America, to remind her that the most important factor for the happiness of the people is the diffusion of common knowledge that will enable them to preserve themselves from kings, nobles, and priests, for it is impossible to imagine a people of more pleasant dispositions, more made for happiness, surrounded by so many blessings of nature, and yet "loaded with misery by kings, nobles, and priests, and by them alone."[187]

Never before had Jefferson been so vehement in his denunciations of kingly and priestly usurpations, never had he been so positive of the necessity of preserving American civilization from any foreign influences. But again this is not with him an a priori view, it is the result of his observations more than of his theories.

He was confirmed in his hatred of the French régime by his conversations with Latude, who "comes sometimes to take family soup with me, & entertains me with anecdotes of his five & thirty years imprisonment, all of which for having written four lines on Madame de Pompadour."[188]

In a letter to Washington already quoted, but capital for the history of his mind, he remarked that before coming to Europe he had not even begun to suspect the evils of monarchical government; what he saw there brought home to him the conviction that "as long as a single fibre of it would remain in America, the scourge that is rendering existence a scourge to 24 out of 25 parts of the inhabitants of this country might break out."[189]

As late as 1787 he was still persuaded that under pretence of governing, the ruling classes have divided the nations into two classes, wolves and sheep: "But what can the sheep do against the wolves except to submit, to suffer without any hope of ever changing the established order."[190]

His first mention of the possibility of introducing some modification in the existing order does not occur before he heard of the convocation of the Assembly of the Notables "which had not been done for one hundred and sixty years"; but this interests him only mildly at the beginning, as nothing certain could be known about the program of the Assembly.[191] A few days later he admitted to Colonel Edward Carrington that "this event which will hardly excite any attention in America is deemed here the most important one which has taken place in their civil life during the present century." But his only real interest in it was that Lafayette had finally been put on the list and was the youngest of the Notables but one.[192] He felt that it was his duty to attend the first meeting of the Notables, and still more to pay his call to the new minister Montmorin—the only thing that detained him in Paris, and when he wrote to John Adams and Jay to describe the inaugural session opened by the king, he restricted himself to a dry recital of facts. With a prince of the blood at the head of each committee, he did not expect great results from the convocation and was skeptical about the efficiency of the members.[193] Just as he was leaving Paris for his long extensive trip to the South of France, he thought, however, of sending a last word of advice to Lafayette whose republican ideas he evidently feared. It was a counsel of prudence. Whatever may have been his sympathies for the republicans, in his opinion France was not ready for a complete change in her system of government.

Least of all was she ready for a democratic experiment. Consequently Jefferson, the American patriot, the enemy of England, the alleged hater of aristocracies, advised his friend "to proceed step by step, towards a good constitution, keeping the good model of your neighboring country before your eyes. Though that model is not perfect, yet, as it would unite more suffrages than any new one which could be proposed, it is better to make that the object.

"You see how we Republicans are apt to preach", he said in conclusion; but his letter was more than a sermon; it contained also the advice of a shrewd and very practical politician who recommended that every possible effort be made to give the king what he wanted in the way of personal expenses. "If every advance is to be purchased by filling the royal coffers with gold, it will be gold well employed. The King who means so well, should be encouraged to repeat those Assemblies."[194]

That was all he could say, and even so he had probably said too much, for it was a risky thing for a diplomat to write about or to discuss at all. Jefferson was certainly guilty of trespassing on a province that constituted an essential part of the internal politics of the kingdom. And yet the charge of plotting against the existing government cannot be laid at his door. As long as he remained in France, and I believe, even after he came back to America, he carefully refrained from giving any encouragement to those of his French friends who held radical views. He was caught in the torrent and, as we shall see later, did not always observe the reticence of an old-fashioned diplomat; but whatever influence he exerted was exerted in order to maintain rather than to overthrow the existing order of things.

During his trip he observed the condition of the peasants and, much to his surprise, found among them a smaller degree of poverty than he had expected; but if he made observations and entered many minute facts in his diary, he did not come to any conclusion nor did he seem to have been interested by the state of mind of the people. He had judged them once for all, he knew that they were priest-ridden and lord-ridden and did not see how any real reform might originate from them. Once, however, but only once, did he indicate that he had paid serious attention to the work before the Assembly. Writing to Lafayette's aunt, Madame de Tessé, in the evident expectation that she would communicate his ideas to the proper persons, he drew up an almost complete plan of administrative reforms: To have frequent meetings of the Assembly of Notables; the Assembly to be divided into two houses—the Noblesse and the Commons; the Commons to be taken from those chosen by the people for provincial administrations; the number of deputies for the Nobility to be reduced. These two Houses so elected "would make the King great and the people happy." And the next sentence expresses very cleverly, too cleverly perhaps, that this innocuous reform would in fact be a sort of revolution, the name of which would be avoided. "They would thus put themselves in the track of the best guide they can follow (the king); they would soon overtake it, become its guide in turn, and lead to the wholesome modifications wanting in that model, and necessary to constitute a rational government." What he had in mind at the time was a sort of government following very closely the lines of the British, not as an ideal but as a temporary measure; for before the eyes of his friends he held another prospect. But for the present that was the maximum they could wisely expect; "should they attempt more than the established habits of the people are ripe for, they may lose all, and retard indefinitely the ultimate object of their aim."[195]

Commerce more than politics absorbed all his attention when he came back from his trip. He found time, however, to send to Madison his first estimate of the king and queen, a most unflattering portrait of poor Louis XVI.

It was not until August that he summed up in a letter to Monroe the great improvements in the constitution of the French effected by the Assemblées des Notables. He was surprised at the great explosion of joy, which he thought unwarranted; for after all, even the unexampled boldness of the enemies of the régime was nothing but the "follies of nations in their dotage."[197] Yet writing to John Jay the next day he took a more serious view of things and declared "It is evident, I think, that a spirit of this country is advancing towards a revolution in their constitution. There are not wanting persons at the helm, friends to the progress of this spirit. The Provincial Assemblies will be the most probable instrument of effecting it."[198]

But it is primarily from the American point of view that he continues to be interested, and he becomes more and more convinced that, "with all its defects, and with all those of our particular governments, the inconveniences resulting from them, are so light in comparison with those existing in every other government on earth that our citizens may certainly be considered as in the happiest political situation which exists."[199] With more intimate friends he was far more violent and outspoken, as in the letter he wrote the same day to Colonel Humphreys. It is seldom he indulges in these outbursts of passionate invective, so seldom that it may be wondered whether his expression is not stronger than his thought:

He had caught something of the general fever, and he drew a vivid picture of Paris with crowds surrounding the "Parliament House", stopping carriages in the queen's livery, indulging in bons mots, caricatures, "collecting in mobs, and yet the King, long in the habit of drowning his cares in wine, plunges deeper and deeper. The Queen cries, but sins on", and the only practical result one can see is that "all tongues in Paris and in France have been let loose."[201] The same note is given six weeks later in a letter to John Jay. "The King goes for nothing. He hunts one half of the day, is drunk the other, and signs whatever he is bid."[202] Even the reforms, the most important from the point of view of the French, seem to him insignificant, and when the edict on the Protestants appears, it is cruelly analyzed by the American minister:

When he wrote his "Autobiography", Jefferson used very extensively not only the notes he had taken when in Paris but the press copies of his correspondence, and on the whole gave an accurate picture of the events that immediately preceded the French Revolution—those he had witnessed before his departure from Paris, in October, 1789. But, true as the picture may be, it is not progressive, and here we aim not to trace again the main episodes of the French Revolution, but the development of Jefferson's mind, his reaction towards the events. Most of all we must seek to find out from contemporary evidence whether the old accusation launched by Gouverneur Morris, seized upon eagerly by Jefferson's enemies, and since repeated again and again, is in any way justified.

We have already seen that, with a corrupted court, a weak king, a selfish and ignorant queen, the only remedy he recommended at first was for the French not to reconquer their liberties by force and by a revolution, but gradually to buy them from the king. Yet he foresaw that the nobility would make a sort of alliance with the people, that is to say the tiers état, in order to get money from them, and he held the rather cynical view that "Courtiers had rather give up power than pleasures; they will barter, therefore, the usurped prerogatives of the King, for the money of the people. This is the agent by which modern nations will recover their rights."[204] This is written, not to Jay in a confidential letter, but to a French liberal of his acquaintance, and that practical piece of advice cannot be called philosophical. Altogether the results reached by the Assemblée des Notables were small and the king terribly slow to see the light. So for a long time Jefferson refused not only to encourage but even to admit that he was witnessing the beginnings of a true revolution. Writing to Rutledge in July, 1788, he declared "That the struggle in this country is, as yet, of doubtful issue. It is, in fact, between the monarchy and the parliaments. The nation is no otherwise concerned, but as both parties may be induced to let go some of its abuses, to court the public favor. The danger, is that the people deceived by a false cry of liberty, may be led to take sides with one party, and thus give the other a pretext for crushing them still more."[205] Writing to Cutting a few days later he was more optimistic. Most of the late innovations had been much for the better; a convocation of the States-General could not be avoided; "it will produce a national assembly meeting at certain epochs, possessing at first a negative on the laws, but which will grow into the right of original legislation. Much could be hoped from the States-General and it was also to be hoped that all this will be effected without convulsion."[206]

Such was his confident expectation. He foresaw "that within two or three years this country will be in the enjoyment of a tolerably free constitution, and that without its having cost them a drop of blood."[207]

To Carmichael he described his own attitude as that of a bystander, not otherwise interested, but entertaining a sincere love for the nation in general and a wish to see their happiness promoted, "keeping myself clear of the particular views and passions of individuals."[208] Had he felt differently he would not have taken into his confidence a man for whom he felt no particular friendship; but, at that date at least, he could make that statement without departing from the exact truth. As far as contemporary evidence is concerned, it does not seem that he ever urged his friends forward, but on the contrary he always advised them to play a waiting game, and to keep from having recourse to violence. About the middle of that year, 1788, he toned down his severe estimate of the king, to whom he attributed "no foible which will enlist him against the good of his people."[209] Calonne had been removed and Necker called in as Director General of finance; things were looking decidedly better, a convocation of the States-General had been decided upon; the issue depended largely on three possible solutions: whether the three orders would meet separately; whether the clergy and the nobility would form a house and the Commons a second one; or finally whether the three orders would meet in one house which would give the majority to the Commons. The choice was really thought incumbent upon the king, who thus had the power to place the people on his side if he was wise enough to prefer to have on his side twenty-three millions and a half instead of the other half million.[210]

At the end of 1788, with the convocation of the States-General announced for the beginning of the following year, he was still very optimistic, but he had not departed from his cautious and reserved recommendations. The States could not succeed if they asked too much, for the Commons would frighten and shock the court and even alarm the public mind. If any durable progress was to be accomplished, it would have to be by degrees and successive improvements. Such probably would be the course followed, unless an influence unaccountable, impossible to measure, and yet powerful entirely changed the situation: "The fact that women visit alone persons in office, solicit in defiance of laws and regulations, is an extraordinary obstacle to the betterment of things, unbelieveable as it may be to the inhabitant of a country where the sex does not endeavour to extend itself beyond the domestic line."[211]

He did not even believe that any real reform could be accomplished beyond fixing periodical meetings of the States-General and giving them the right to participate in the legislation and to decide on taxes. They did not seem to be unanimously in favor of the habeas corpus; as for the freedom of the press,—"I hardly think the nation itself ripe to accept it."[212] This was his prophecy at the beginning of 1789, and during the first month of the year he had no occasion to express new views, since everybody was in the provinces "electioneering, choosing or being chosen." With his experience of Assemblies, however, he could not help wondering how any result could be accomplished with a body which was to include some twelve hundred persons and moreover to consist of Frenchmen, among whom are always more speakers than listeners.[213] In a letter to Thomas Paine we find the first intimation that Jefferson began to be influenced by the political thinkers of France or rather to discover in them a certain quality of thought and presentation that make their work of some use for the American people. They were at any rate much preferable to the Englishman, who "slumbering under a kind of half reformation in politics and religion, is not excited by anything he sees or feels, to question the remains of prejudice. The writers of this country, now taking the field freely and unrestrained, or rather involved by prejudice, will rouse us all from the errors in which we have been hitherto rocked."[214] Taken in itself and without the context this sentence would tend to indicate in Jefferson an almost unreserved approval of the doctrines of the radical reformers and of the very spirit of the French Revolution, but as is so often the case with him, the real meaning is hidden in the last part. It was not so much in their theoretical views he was interested as in the fact that "their logical presentation, might be used in America to overcome the last resistance to the establishment of a true republican régime free from any vestige of monarchical order." But that he hoped that such radical reforms could succeed in France is not indicated. His complete thought is far better expressed in the letter written the next day to Humphreys:

On the other hand, to believe that they would be able to establish a truly representative and free government was certainly inconceivable to him at this date. To the last moment he hoped that some sort of an agreement would be possible between the nobility and the Commons, for he had decided very early that no confidence should be placed in the clergy. He was looking forward to a close coöperation between the younger part of the nobility and the Commons, who, working together with the king, would seek the support of the people and accomplish important reforms. No fundamental change however could be expected, since the French refused to show any interest in the most vital question of trial by jury.

But as soon as the States-General were opened he realized that he had been too optimistic. Since the "Noblesse" would not yield and wanted their delegates to do their dirty work for them, the only manly stand to take for a man like Lafayette, who although of liberal opinion had solicited and obtained a mandate from the nobility, was to go over wholly to the tiers état. The opening of the States-General was as imposing as an opera but it was poor business,[216] and even at that time Jefferson placed his confidence in the king who grew astonishingly in his estimation during this year: "Happy that he is an honest, unambitious man who desires neither money nor power for himself; and that his most operative minister (Necker), though he has appeared to trim a little, is still, in the main, a friend to public liberty."[217]

As the deadlock continued, the three orders sitting separately without being able to settle the "great parliamentary question whether they would vote by orders or by persons", Jefferson favored more and more the only solution which, in his opinion, could prevent complete failure,—a triumph of despotism or a sort of civil war:

At this juncture, Jefferson, in his anxiety to effect a satisfactory compromise, broke all diplomatic precedence; he could not and did not wish to write a French Declaration of Independence; but he could at least propose some form of government which would recognize the fundamental rights of the French citizen while preserving the appearance of the old monarchy. He therefore drew up a "Charter of Rights for the King and Nation" and sent it, not only to Lafayette, but also to Rabaud de Saint Etienne, a prominent defender of the newly reinstated Protestants. In view of the developments that took place later, Jefferson's proposal does not seem revolutionary. At that time, however (June 3, 1789), it went much farther than the Court was willing to go. No appeal to abstract principle and no mention of rights was made. The main provisions consisted of an annual meeting of the States-General, which alone had the right to levy taxes and to appropriate money; the abolishment of all privileges, a sort of habeas corpus, the subordination of the military to the civil authority and liberty of the press. In order to induce the king to accept these new charters, all debts already contracted by him became the debts of the nation, and he was to receive a sum of eighty million livres to be raised by a loan. Thus Jefferson was attempting to put into effect the advice he had several times given his French friends: to buy their liberty from the king rather than bring about a revolution. I leave it to others to judge of the morality of the expedient. Certainly it was not in accord with the old battle cry of Patrick Henry. But once more Jefferson was consistent in so much as he had always maintained that what was good for America was not necessarily good for France. Moreover, he knew there was no need to stir up the spirit of the Assembly by inflammatory declarations. More than any incitement to take radical steps they needed a dose of cool common sense.

Unfortunately the man at the helm (Necker) "had neither skill nor courage; ambition was his first passion, virtue his second, his judgement was not of the first order not even of the second", and the ship continued to drift in the storm. On June 18, 1789, Jefferson wrote a long letter to Madison, to indicate the situation of the different parties after the Commons had proclaimed themselves the National Assembly on the fifteenth. His characterization even to-day seems remarkably clear and disinterested. He sided decidedly with the Commons who had in their chamber almost all the talents of the nation;