dent ought not to have taken on himself to decide on the subject of the letter, but that it was of importance enough to have consulted Congress thereon; and in that of June 22d, he tells the President, in direct terms, that Congress ought already to have been occupied on certain questions which he had been too hasty in deciding: Thus making himself, and not the President, the judge of the powers ascribed by the constitution to the Executive, and dictating to him the occasion when he should exercise the power of convening Congress, at an earlier day than their own act had prescribed.

On the following expressions no commentary shall be made.

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July 9. Les principes philosophiques proclameés par le President."*

June 22. Les opinions privées ou publiques de M. le President, et cette egide ne paroissant pas suffisante.'† June 22. Le gouvernement federal s'est empressé, poussé par je ne sçais quelle influence.'

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June 22. Je ne puis attribuer des demarches de cette nature qu'à des impressions etrangeres dont le tems et le verité triompheront.'§

June 25. On poursuit avec acharnement, en vertu des instructions de M. le President, les armateurs Français.'T June 14. Ce refus tend à accomplir le systeme infernal du roi d'Angleterre, et des autres rois ses accomplices, pour faire perir par la famine les republicains Français avec la liberté.'**

June 8. La lache abandon de ses amis.'tt

July 25. En vain le desir de conserver la paix fait-il sacrifier les interets de la France à cet interet du moment; en vain le soif des richesses l'emportet-elle sur l'honneur dans la balance politique de l'Amérique, tous

TRANSLATIONS OF THE FRENCH PASSAGES.

* The philosophical principles proclaimed by the President.' The opinions private or publick of the President, and this Egis not appearing to you sufficient.'

The federal government has been eager, urged by I know not what influence.'

I cannot ascribe measures of this nature, but to extraneous impres sions, over which time and truth will triumph."

They pursue with rage the French privateers by the orders of the President."

**This refusal tends to accomplish the infernal system of the king of England and of the other kings, his accomplices, to destroy by famine French freemen and freedom.'

The cowardly abandonment of their friends.'

ces menagemens, toute cette condescendance, toute cette humilité n'aboutissent à rien; nos ennemis en rient, et les Français trop confiants sont punis pour avoir cru que la nation Americaine, avoit un pavillon, qu'elle avoit quelque egard pour ses loix, quelque conviction de ses forces, et qu'elle tenoit au sentiment de sa dignité. Il ne m'est pas possible de peindre toute ma sensibilité sur ce scandale qui tend à la diminution de votre commerce, à l'oppression du notre, et à l'abaissement, à l'avilissement des republiques. Si nos concitoyens ont été trompés, si vous n'etes point en etat de soutenir la souveraineté de votre peuple, parlez; nous l'avons garantie quand nous etions esclaves, nous saurons la rendre redoutable etant devenus libres.' I

We draw a veil over the sensations which these expressions excite. No words can render them; but they will not escape the sensibility of a friendly and magnanimous nation, who will do us justice. We see in them neither the portrait of ourselves, nor the pencil of our friends; but an attempt to embroil both; to add still another nation to the enemies of his country, and to draw on both a reproach, which it is hoped will never stain the history of either. The written proofs, of which Mr. Genet was himself the bearer, were too unequivocal to leave a doubt that the French nation are constant in their friendship to us. resolves of their national convention, the letters of their executive council, attest this truth in terms which render it necessary to seek, in some other hypothesis, the solution of Mr. Genet's machinations against our peace and friendship.

The

Conscious, on our part, of the same friendly and sincere dispositions, we can with truth affirm, both for our nation

'In vain the desire to preserve peace leads you to sacrifice the interests of France to this interest of the moment; in vain the thirst of riches preponderates against honour in the political balance of America; all this management, all these condescensions, all this humiliation, end in nothing. Our enemies laugh at it, and the French, too confident, are punished for having believed that the American nation had a flag; that it had some respect for its laws; some conviction of its force; and that it had some sentiment of its dignity. It is not possible for me to paint to you all my sensibility at this scandal, which tends to the diminution of your commerce, to the oppression of ours, and to the debasement and vilification of republicks.

'If our fellow-citizens have been deceived, if you are not in a condition to maintain the sovereignty of your people, speak: we have guarantied it when we were slaves, we know how to render it respectable being become free.'

and government, that we have never omitted a reasonable occasion of manifesting them. For I will not consider as of that character opportunities of sallying forth from our ports to waylay, rob, and murder defenceless merchants and others, who have done us no injury, and who were coming to trade with us in the confidence of our peace and amity. The violation of all the laws of order and morality which bind mankind together, would be an unacceptable offering to a just nation. Recurring then only to recent things, after so afflicting a libel, we recollect with satisfaction that in the course of two years, by unceasing exertions, we paid up seven years arrearages and instalments of our debt to France, which the inefficacy of our first form of government had suffered to be accumulating; that pressing on still to the entire fulfilment of our engagements, we have facilitated to Mr. Genet the effect of the instalments of the present year, to enable him to send relief to his fellow citizens in France, threatened with famine; that in the first moment of the insurrection which threatened the colony of St. Domingo, we stepped forward to their relief with arms and money, taking freely on ourselves the risk of an unauthorized aid, when delay would have been denial; that we have received, according to our best abilities, the wretched fugitives from the catastrophe of the principal town of that colony, who, escaping from the swords and flames of civil war, threw themselves on us naked and houseless, without food or friends, money or other means, their faculties lost and absorbed in the depth of their distresses; that the exclusive admission to sell here the prizes made by France on her enemies, in the present war, though unstipulated in our treaties, and unfounded in her own practice, or in that of other nations, as we believe; the spirit manifested by the late grand jury in their proceedings against those who had aided the enemies of France with arms and implements of war; the expression of attachment to his nation, with which Mr. Genet was welcomed, on his arrival and journey from south to north, and our long forbearance under his gross usurpations and outrages of the laws and authority of our country, do not bespeak the partialities intimated in his letters. And for these things he rewards us by endeavours to excite discord and distrust between our citizens and those whom they have intrusted with their government; between the different branches of our government; be

tween our nation and his. But none of these things, we hope, will be found in his power. That friendship, which dictates to us to bear with his conduct yet awhile, lest the interest of his nation here should suffer injury, will hasten them to replace an agent, whose dispositions are such a misrepresentation of theirs, and whose continuance here. is inconsistent with order, peace, respect, and that friendly correspondence which we hope will ever subsist between the two nations. His government will see too that the case is pressing. That it is impossible for two sovereign and independent authorities to be going on within our territory, at the same time, without collision. They will foresee that if Mr. Genet perseveres in his proceedings, the consequences would be so hazardous to us, the example so humiliating and pernicious, that we may be forced even to suspend his functions before a successor can arrive to continue them. If our citizens have not already been shedding each others blood, it is not owing to the moderation of Mr. Genet, but to the forbearance of the government. It is well known that if the authority of the laws had been resorted to, to stop the Little Democrat, its officers and agents were to have been resisted by the crew of the vessel, consisting partly of American citizens. Such events are too serious, too possible, to he left to hazard, or to what is worse than hazard, the will of an agent whose designs are so mysterious. Lay the case then immediately before his government; accompany it with assurances, which cannot be stronger than true, that our friendship for the nation is constant and unabating; that, faithful to our treaties, we have fulfilled them in every point to the best of our understanding; that if in any thing, however, we have construed them amiss, we are ready to enter into candid explanations, and to do whatever we can be convinced is right; that in opposing the extravagances of an agent, whose character they seem not sufficiently to have known, we have been urged by motives of duty to ourselves, and justice to others, which cannot but be approved by those who are just themselves; and, finally, that, after independence and self-government, there is nothing we more sincerely wish than perpetual friendship with them. I have the honour to be, &c. TH: JEFFERSON. Note. A copy of the preceding letter was sent enclosed

by the Secretary of State to Mr. Genet.

Mr. Jefferson, Secretary of State, to Mr. Morris, Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States to France. Philadelphia, Aug. 23, 1793.

DEAR SIR,-The letter of the 16th instant, with its documents accompanying this, will sufficiently inform you of the transactions, which have taken place between Mr. Genet, the minister of France, and the government here, and of the painful necessity they have brought on, of desiring his recall. The letter has been prepared, in the view of being itself, with its documents, laid before the executive of the French government. You will, therefore, be pleased to lay it before them, doing every thing which can be done on your part, to procure it a friendly and dispassionate reception and consideration. The President would indeed think it greatly unfortunate, were they to take it in any other light; and, therefore, charges you, very particularly, with the care of presenting this proceeding in the most soothing view, and as the result of an unavoidable necessity on his part.

Mr. Genet, soon after his arrival, communicated the decree of the National Convention of February 15, 1793, authorizing their executive to propose a treaty with us, on liberal principles, such as might strengthen the bonds of good will, which unite the two nations; and informed us in a letter of May 23, that he was authorized to treat accordingly. The Senate being then in recess, and not to meet again till the fall, I apprized Mr. Genet that the participation in matters of treaty, given by the constitution to that branch of our government, would, of course, delay any definitive answer to his friendly proposition. As he was sensible of this circumstance, the matter has been understood to lie over, till the meeting of Senate. You will be pleased, therefore, to explain to the executive of France this delay, which has prevented, as yet, our formal accession to their proposition to treat; to assure them, that the President will meet them, with the most friendly dispositions, on the grounds of treaty proposed by the National Convention, as soon as he can do it in the forms of the constitution; and you will, of course, suggest for this purpose, that the powers of Mr. Genet be renewed to his suc

cessor.

Since my last, which was of the 13th of June, your Nos. 25, 26, 27 of March 26th, April 4th and 5th have been