upon consultation between the President and the head of that department alone to which it belonged. For measures of importance or difficulty consultation with the heads of departments was needful, and for this he preferred in theory to take their opinions separately, in conversation or in writing, the President being then left free, without any needless clash of opinion or rivalry among those he had consulted, to make up an opinion for himself; but he practiced the open cabinet method of his predecessors without experiencing any ill results. The latter is now the confirmed practice of government; "yet," said Jefferson, who held firmly to Presidential responsibility," this does, in fact, transform the executive into a directory, and I hold the other method to be more constitutional." The new President's disposition to escape formalities and to hold a more easy intercourse with the public than had been customary with his predecessors appeared at the inaugural ceremonies, and constantly afterwards. Adhering to his chosen policy Jefferson showed himself desirous that others should think well of it; but right or wrong, whatever he did showed a mind of original cast; he sought popularity, not by a mean subservience to other men's views, but by devising measures which deserved the public gratitude, and pressing them in a manner which would render then most likely to operate.

Jefferson had hastened out of the capital this first summer, so as to escape the importunity of office-seekers, who from most States except his own, harassed him with petitions for removing men in place; bringing letters, certificates, and affidavits to support charges against them. The greed for office, and the clamor that party services should be rewarded, was a continual annoyance to him.*

Jefferson's administration was popular from the start, as the gains in the earliest State elections showed. In New York, Governor Jay having announced his intention to retire from

* See John Quincy Adams's Memoirs, 1802. The story is told that Jefferson was solicited on behalf of some claiming to have saved their country. "Yes," he responded, "Rome was once saved by geese; but I never heard these geese were made revenue officers." Boston Centinel, July, 1801.

1801.

REPUBLICAN GAINS IN THE STATES.

15

public station, the Federalists ran for his place a wealthy and respectable citizen, Van Rensselaer; but the Republicans brought out George Clinton once more and carried him triumphantly into the chair he had so often filled. Strong was re-elected Governor of Massachusetts; but "the triumph of virtue over mendacious vice" (as the Federal press styled it) was by a reduced majority. Boston went Republican, and Republicans gained in the Congressional delegation. Connecticut gave Trumbull an old-fashioned majority; but the old New England phalanx was unexpectedly broken by the defection of Rhode Island, which now became a Republican State, and through its General Assembly sent congratulations to Jefferson. Vermont inclined towards the new administration. Through the middle and southern section Republican principles advanced resistlessly, and by the fall of 1801 New Jersey, Maryland, Georgia, and the two Carolinas were won completely, while Delaware elected a Republican governor. Except for the little State last named, Federalism could find neither executive nor legislature outside of New England.

Not to be buried out of sight thus speedily, Federalists themselves had felt compelled, in the spring canvass, to change their tone and speak better of Jefferson than hitherto. The excellence of his precepts the New York Federalists admitted, and Hamilton himself made in a public speech courteous allusion to the new administration, as one to be watched by men of his party, rebuked if it went astray, and commended when it did well. But voters could not be cajoled. Republicans held up the indelible record of prosecutions for sedition. and intrigues against the people's choice.* They who have lately dictated feel most keenly their disadvantage when put upon the defensive. So disastrous was the defeat of Hamilton's party in New York State, that the Clintons and Livingstons felt presently strong enough to combine and ostracize Burr politically, whose treachery in the electoral contest, now more than suspected, the President was resolved thus to punish.

Jefferson found the foreign relations of the United States

*We have seen that Hamilton himself discountenanced these intrigues, vol. i, p. 434.

pacific and prosperous, as never before, upon his accession, a state of affairs which President Adams had procured at the cost of disruption in his party and the bitterest personal humiliation. The great powers of Europe appeared to tire of war. England was left alone to contend with Napoleon after the peace of Luneville, a peace by which Austria, acknowledging her defeat, ceded the Rhine and the Adige as the eastern boundaries of the French dominions. The Baltic powers maintained their armed neutrality. British Sept. 1801. operations in Egypt failing of their main purpose, the ministry hastily concluded a cessation of hostilities with March 2, France, preliminary to the mortifying peace of

1802.

Amiens.

The First Consul promptly assented to the French Convention as modified in the United States Senate, on the further understanding that American spoliation claims should be thereby relinquished; and final ratifications were exchanged between France and the United States accordingly. Peaceful relations having been restored, Livingston sailed for France, while Pichon, whose agency in the negotiations opened by Talleyrand at the Hague in 1798 we have noticed, had already arrived at Washington, bearing the credentials of a French charge. The conduct of Great Britain at the outset of Jefferson's administration was friendly to the United States, and British cruisers in the West Indies were ordered to treat American vessels with consideration.*

The season was favorable, upon the whole, for a new departure in our Algerine policy. The Barbary States were growing insufferably insolent; pampered, as their Turkish masters had been, too long by Christian nations engaged in commerce, from whom they received a regular tribute. From the Great Desert to the Straits of Gibraltar the north coast of Africa was ruled by Moslem sovereigns, who recognized no law of nations upon the high seas, and consecrated each outrage as a courageous act against the enemies of their faith. Of these modern Vikings the Day of Algiers was chief, because the strongest. The northern commercial powers of Europe, signally unfortunate in their early efforts to crush these cor

* See Madison's Writings, 1801, Executive Correspondence.

1801.

THE BARBARY POWERS.

17

sairs, had, for more than a century, made ignoble treaties to save mercantile property from indiscriminate pillage; a policy chosen, it is possible, in the hope of advancing their own traffic by crippling that of the Mediterranean powers.

As we have seen, the first treaty of 1795 with Algiers, which was negotiated during Washington's administration, cost the United States, for the ransom of American captives and the Dey's forbearance, a round $1,000,000, in addition to which an annuity was promised.* Treaties with other Barbary States followed, one of which purchased peace from Tripoli by the payment of a gross sum. Nearly $2,000,000 had been squandered thus far in bribing these powers to respect our flag, and President Adams complained in 1800 that the United States had to pay three times the tribute imposed upon Sweden and Denmark. But this temporizing policy only made matters worse, for the rapacity of these libertines grew apace. Captain Bainbridge arrived at Algiers in 1800, bearing the annual tribute-money for the Dey in a national frigate, and the Dey ordered him to proceed to Constantinople to deliver Algerine dispatches. "English, French, and Spanish ships of war have done the same," said the Dey insolently when Bainbridge and the American consul remonstrated. "You pay me tribute because you are my slaves." Bainbridge had to obey, and the first American man-of-war ever seen in the Bosphorus,-its name the illustrious one of George Washington, entered the Golden Horn with the flag of a pirate nation fluttering from the masthead.

Sept. 1800.

May 25,

The lesser Barbary States were still more exasperating. The Bashaw of Tripoli had threatened to seize American vessels unless President Adams sent him 1800. a present like that bestowed upon Algiers. The Bashaw of Tunis made a similar demand upon the new President; and a fire breaking out in the palace not long after, which destroyed 50,000 stand of arms, the American consul was informed that his government must contribute 10,000 towards making good the loss.

April 15,

1801.

June 28.

Jefferson had, while in Washington's cabinet, expressed his

* See vol. i, p. 307. † John Adams's Works, July 11th, 1800.

VOL. II.-2

May 20.

July.

July.

detestation of the method hitherto favored for pacifying these pests of commerce; and, availing himself of the present favorable opportunity, he sent out Commodore Dale, with a squadron of three frigates and a sloop of war, to make a naval demonstration on the coast of Barbary. Dale's orders were to simply display his vessels from Gibraltar to Smyrna and back, if all was at peace, but otherwise to protect American commerce and chastise the offending state as it deserved, sinking, burning, or destroying the pirate ships if need be. The employment of our national vessels upon Algerine business was henceforth forbidden. Commodore Dale, upon arriving at Gibraltar, found two Tripolitan cruisers watching for American vessels; for, as had been suspected, Tripoli already meditated war. The frigate Philadelphia blockaded these vessels, while Bainbridge, with the frigate Essex, convoyed American vessels in the Mediterranean. Dale, in the frigate President, proceeded to cruise off Tripoli, followed by the schooner Experiment, which presently captured a Tripolitan cruiser of fourteen guns after a spirited action. The Barbary Aug. 6. powers were for a time overawed, and the United States thus set the first example among Christian nations of making reprisal instead of ransom the rule of security against these commercial marauders. In this respect Jefferson's conduct was applauded at home by men of all parties; Federalists exulting, moreover, in the exploits of a navy which was their own creation; Republicans, because their President had put this navy to a novel and practical use.*

The seventh Congress, the earliest that ever organized at the permanent capital of the nation, was Republican Dec. 7. in both branches. The Senate stood eighteen to

fifteen before the first session ended, while in the House the administration majority proved nearly two to one. Few of the statesmen conspicuous on the floor in former years were to be seen. Madison, Gallatin, Muhlenberg, and Edward Liv

* See President's Message and Executive Documents, 1801; 5 Hildreth. Four out of the six vessels still retained in the navy as the peace establishment were thus employed.