John Quincy Adams
by Jr. John T. Morse · English · Gutenberg #20183 · 506,723 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: John Quincy Adams
Author: Jr. John T. Morse
Release date: December 26, 2006 [eBook #20183]
Language: English
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[Illustration: John Quincy Adams]
American Statesmen
STANDARD LIBRARY EDITION
[Illustration: The Home of John Quincy Adams]
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
American Statesmen
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
BY
JOHN T. MORSE, JR.
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
Copyright, 1882 and 1898,
By JOHN T. MORSE, JR.
Copyright, 1898,
By HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
_All rights reserved._
PREFACE (p. v)
Nearly sixteen years have elapsed since this book was written. In that
time sundry inaccuracies have been called to my attention, and have
been corrected, and it may be fairly hoped that after the lapse of so
long a period all errors in matters of fact have been eliminated. I am
not aware that any fresh material has been made public, or that any
new views have been presented which would properly lead to alterations
in the substance of what is herein said. If I were now writing the
book for the first time, I should do what so many of the later
contributors to the series have very wisely and advantageously done: I
should demand more space. But this was the first volume published, and
at a time when the enterprise was still an experiment insistence upon
such a point, especially on the part of the editor, would have been
unreasonable. Thus it happens that, though Mr. Adams was appointed
minister resident at the Hague in 1794, and thereafter continued in
public life, almost without interruption, until his death in (p. vi)
February, 1848, the narrative of his career is compressed within
little more than three hundred pages. The proper function of a work
upon this scale is to draw a picture of the man.
With the picture which I have drawn of Mr. Adams, I still remain
moderately contented--by which remark I mean nothing more egotistical
than that I believe it to be a correct picture, and done with whatever
measure of skill I may happen to possess in portraiture. I should like
to change it only in one particular, viz.: by infusing throughout the
volume somewhat more of admiration. Adams has never received the
praise which was his due, and probably he never will receive it. In
order that justice should be done him by the public, his biographer
ought to speak somewhat better of him than his real deserts would
require. He presents one of those cases where exaggeration is the
servant of truth; for this moderate excess of appreciation would only
offset that discount from an accurate estimate which his personal
unpopularity always has caused, and probably always will cause, to be
made. He was a good instance of the rule that the world will for the
most part treat the individual as the individual treats the world.
Adams was censorious, not to say uncharitable in the extreme, (p. vii)
always in an attitude of antagonism, always unsparing and denunciatory.
The measure which he meted has been by others in their turn meted to
him. This habit of ungracious criticism was his great fault; perhaps
it was almost his only very serious fault; it cost him dear in his
life, and has continued to cost his memory dear since his death.
Sometimes we are not sorry to see men get the punishments which they
have brought on themselves; yet we ought to be sorry for Mr. Adams.
After all, his fault-finding was in part the result of his respect for
virtue and his hatred of all that was ignoble and unworthy. If he
despised a low standard, at least he held his own standard high, and
himself lived by the rules by which he measured others. Men with
vastly greater defects have been much more kindly served both by
contemporaries and by posterity. There can be no question that Adams
deserved all the esteem which ought to be accorded to the highest
moral qualities, to very high, if a little short of the highest,
intellectual endowment, and to immense acquirements. His political
integrity was of a grade rarely seen; and, in unison with his
extraordinary courage and independence, it seemed to the average
politician actually irritating and offensive. He was in the same
difficulty in which Aristides the Just found himself. But neither (p. viii)
assaults nor political solitude daunted or discouraged him. His career
in the House of Representatives is a tale which has not a rival in
congressional history. I regret that it could not be told here at
greater length. Stubbornly fighting for freedom of speech and against
the slaveholders, fierce and unwearied in old age, falling literally
out of the midst of the conflict into his grave, Mr. Adams, during the
closing years of his life, is one of the most striking figures of
modern times. I beg the reader of this volume to put into its pages
more warmth of praise than he will find therein, and so do a more
correct justice to an honest statesman and a gallant friend of the
oppressed. Doing this, he will improve my book in the particular
wherein I think that it chiefly needs improvement.
JOHN T. MORSE, JR.
July, 1898.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
Page
Youth and Diplomacy 1
CHAPTER II.
Secretary of State and President 101
CHAPTER III.
In the House of Representatives 225
Index 309
ILLUSTRATIONS
John Quincy Adams Frontispiece
From the original painting by John Singleton
Copley, in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Autograph from the Chamberlain collection,
Boston Public Library.
The vignette of Mr. Adams's home in Quincy
is from a photograph.
Page
William H. Crawford 107
From the painting by Henry Ulke, in the
Treasury Department at Washington.
Autograph from the Chamberlain collection,
Boston Public Library.
Stratford Canning 149
After a drawing (1853) by George Richmond.
Autograph from "Life of Stratford Canning."
Henry A. Wise 291
From a photograph by Brady, in the Library
of the State Department at Washington.
Autograph from the Chamberlain collection,
Boston Public Library.
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS (p. 001)
CHAPTER I
YOUTH AND DIPLOMACY
On July 11, 1767, in the North Parish of Braintree, since set off as
the town of Quincy, in Massachusetts, was born John Quincy Adams. Two
streams of as good blood as flowed in the colony mingled in the veins
of the infant. If heredity counts for anything he began life with an
excellent chance of becoming famous--_non sine dîs animosus infans_.
He was called after his great-grandfather on the mother's side, John
Quincy, a man of local note who had borne in his day a distinguished
part in provincial affairs. Such a naming was a simple and natural
occurrence enough, but Mr. Adams afterward moralized upon it in his
characteristic way:--
"The incident which gave rise to this circumstance is not without
its moral to my heart. He was dying when I was baptized; and his
daughter, my grandmother, present at my birth, requested that I
might receive his name. The fact, recorded by my father at (p. 002)
the time, has connected with that portion of my name a charm
of mingled sensibility and devotion. It was filial tenderness
that gave the name. It was the name of one passing from earth to
immortality. These have been among the strongest links of my
attachment to the name of Quincy, and have been to me through
life a perpetual admonition to do nothing unworthy of it."
Fate, which had made such good preparation for him before his birth, was
not less kind in arranging the circumstances of his early training and
development. His father was deeply engaged in the patriot cause, and
the first matters borne in upon his opening intelligence concerned the
public discontent and resistance to tyranny. He was but seven years
old when he clambered with his mother to the top of one of the high
hills in the neighborhood of his home to listen to the sounds of conflict
upon Bunker's Hill, and to watch the flaming ruin of Charlestown.
Profound was the impression made upon him by the spectacle, and it was
intensified by many an hour spent afterward upon the same spot during
the siege and bombardment of Boston. Then John Adams went as a
delegate to the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, and his wife and
children were left for twelve months, as John Quincy Adams says,--it
is to be hoped with a little exaggeration of the barbarity of (p. 003)
British troops toward women and babes,--"liable every hour of the day
and of the night to be butchered in cold blood, or taken and carried
into Boston as hostages, by any foraging or marauding detachment."
Later, when the British had evacuated Boston, the boy, barely nine
years old, became "post-rider" between the city and the farm, a
distance of eleven miles each way, in order to bring all the latest
news to his mother.
Not much regular schooling was to be got amid such surroundings of
times and events, but the lad had a natural aptitude or affinity for
knowledge which stood him in better stead than could any dame of a
village school. The following letter to his father is worth
preserving:--
BRAINTREE, _June the 2d, 1777_.
DEAR SIR,--I love to receive letters very well, much better than
I love to write them. I make but a poor figure at composition, my
head is much too fickle, my thoughts are running after birds'
eggs, play and trifles till I get vexed with myself. I have but
just entered the 3d volume of Smollett, tho' I had designed to
have got it half through by this time. I have determined this
week to be more diligent, as Mr. Thaxter will be absent at Court
and I Cannot pursue my other Studies. I have Set myself a Stent
and determine to read the 3d volume Half out. If I can but (p. 004)
keep my resolution I will write again at the end of the week
and give a better account of myself. I wish, Sir, you would give
me some instructions with regard to my time, and advise me how to
proportion my Studies and my Play, in writing, and I will keep
them by me and endeavor to follow them. I am, dear Sir, with a
present determination of growing better. Yours.
P.S. Sir, if you will be so good as to favor me with a Blank
book, I will transcribe the most remarkable occurrences I met
with in my reading, which will serve to fix them upon my mind.
Not long after the writing of this model epistle, the simple village
life was interrupted by an unexpected change. John Adams was sent on a
diplomatic journey to Paris, and on February 13, 1778, embarked in the
frigate Boston. John Quincy Adams, then eleven years old, accompanied
his father and thus made his first acquaintance with the foreign lands
where so many of his coming years were to be passed. This initial
visit, however, was brief; and he was hardly well established at
school when events caused his father to start for home. Unfortunately
this return trip was a needless loss of time, since within three
months of their setting foot upon American shores the two travellers
were again on their stormy way back across the Atlantic in a leaky
ship, which had to land them at the nearest port in Spain. One (p. 005)
more quotation must be given from a letter written just after the
first arrival in France:--
PASSY, _September the 27th, 1778_.
HONORED MAMMA,--My Pappa enjoins it upon me to keep a Journal, or
a Diary of the Events that happen to me, and of objects that I
see, and of Characters that I converse with from day to day; and
altho' I am Convinced of the utility, importance and necessity of
this Exercise, yet I have not patience and perseverance enough to
do it so Constantly as I ought. My Pappa, who takes a great deal
of pains to put me in the right way, has also advised me to
Preserve Copies of all my letters, and has given me a Convenient
Blank Book for this end; and altho' I shall have the
mortification a few years hence to read a great deal of my
Childish nonsense, yet I shall have the Pleasure and advantage of
Remarking the several steps by which I shall have advanced in
taste, judgment and knowledge. A Journal Book and a letter Book
of a Lad of Eleven years old Can not be expected to Contain much
of Science, Literature, arts, wisdom, or wit, yet it may serve to
perpetuate many observations that I may make, and may hereafter
help me to recollect both persons and things that would other
ways escape my memory.
He continues with resolutions "to be more thoughtful and industrious
for the future," and reflects with pleasure upon the prospect that
his scheme "will be a sure means of improvement to myself, and (p. 006)
enable me to be more entertaining to you." What gratification must
this letter from one who was quite justified in signing himself her
"dutiful and affectionate son" have brought to the Puritan bosom of
the good mother at home! If the plan for the diary was not pursued
during the first short flitting abroad, it can hardly be laid at the
door of the "lad of eleven years" as a serious fault. He did in fact
begin it when setting out on the aforementioned second trip to Europe,
calling it
A JOURNAL BY J. Q. A.,
_From America to Spain._
Vol. I.
Begun Friday, 12 of November, 1779.
The spark of life in the great undertaking flickered in a somewhat
feeble and irregular way for many years thereafter, but apparently
gained strength by degrees until in 1795, as Mr. C. F. Adams tells us,
"what may be denominated the diary proper begins," a very vigorous
work in more senses than one. Continued with astonishing persistency
and faithfulness until within a few days of the writer's death, the
latest entry is of the 4th of January, 1848. Mr. Adams achieved many
successes during his life as the result of conscious effort, but (p. 007)
the greatest success of all he achieved altogether unconsciously. He
left a portrait of himself more full, correct, vivid, and picturesque
than has ever been bequeathed to posterity by any other personage of
the past ages. Any mistakes which may be made in estimating his mental
or moral attributes must be charged to the dulness or prejudice of the
judge, who could certainly not ask for better or more abundant
evidence. Few of us know our most intimate friends better than any of
us may know Mr. Adams, if we will but take the trouble. Even the brief
extracts already given from his correspondence show us the boy; it
only concerns us to get them into the proper light for seeing them
accurately. If a lad of seven, nine, or eleven years of age should
write such solemn little effusions amid the surroundings and
influences of the present day, he would probably be set down justly
enough as either an offensive young prig or a prematurely developed
hypocrite. But the precocious Adams had only a little of the prig and
nothing of the hypocrite in his nature. Being the outcome of many
generations of simple, devout, intelligent Puritan ancestors, living
in a community which loved virtue and sought knowledge, all inherited
and all present influences combined to make him, as it may be put (p. 008)
in a single word, sensible. He had inevitably a mental boyhood and
youth, but morally he was never either a child or a lad; all his
leading traits of character were as strongly marked when he was seven
as when he was seventy, and at an age when most young people simply
win love or cause annoyance, he was preferring wisdom to mischief, and
actually in his earliest years was attracting a certain respect.
These few but bold and striking touches which paint the boy are
changed for an infinitely more elaborate and complex presentation from
the time when the Diary begins. Even as abridged in the printing, this
immense work ranks among the half-dozen longest diaries to be found in
any library, and it is unquestionably by far the most valuable.
Henceforth we are to travel along its broad route to the end; we shall
see in it both the great and the small among public men halting onward
in a way very different from that in which they march along the
stately pages of the historian, and we shall find many side-lights, by
no means colorless, thrown upon the persons and events of the
procession. The persistence, fulness, and faithfulness with which it
was kept throughout so busy a life are marvellous, but are also highly
characteristic of the most persevering and industrious of men. (p. 009)
That it has been preserved is cause not only for thankfulness but
for some surprise also. For if its contents had been known, it is
certain that all the public men of nearly two generations who figure
in it would have combined into one vast and irresistible conspiracy to
obtain and destroy it. There was always a superfluity of gall in the
diarist's ink. Sooner or later every man of any note in the United
States was mentioned in his pages, and there is scarcely one of them,
who, if he could have read what was said of him, would not have
preferred the ignominy of omission. As one turns the leaves he feels
as though he were walking through a graveyard of slaughtered
reputations wherein not many headstones show a few words of measured
commendation. It is only the greatness and goodness of Mr. Adams
himself which relieve the universal atmosphere of sadness far more
depressing than the melancholy which pervades the novels of George
Eliot. The reader who wishes to retain any comfortable degree of
belief in his fellow men will turn to the wall all the portraits in
the gallery except only the inimitable one of the writer himself. For
it would be altogether too discouraging to think that so wide an
experience of men as Mr. Adams enjoyed through his long, varied, and
active life must lead to such an unpleasant array of human faces (p. 010)
as those which are scattered along these twelve big octavos.
Fortunately at present we have to do with only one of these
likenesses, and that one we are able to admire while knowing also that
it is beyond question accurate. One after another every trait of Mr.
Adams comes out; we shall see that he was a man of a very high and
noble character veined with some very notable and disagreeable
blemishes; his aspirations were honorable, even the lowest of them
being more than simply respectable; he had an avowed ambition, but it
was of that pure kind which led him to render true and distinguished
services to his countrymen; he was not only a zealous patriot, but a
profound believer in the sound and practicable tenets of the liberal
political creed of the United States; he had one of the most honest
and independent natures that was ever given to man; personal integrity
of course goes without saying, but he had the rarer gift of an
elevated and rigid political honesty such as has been unfrequently
seen in any age or any nation; in times of severe trial this quality
was even cruelly tested, but we shall never see it fail; he was as
courageous as if he had been a fanatic; indeed, for a long part of his
life to maintain a single-handed fight in support of a despised or
unpopular opinion seemed his natural function and almost exclusive
calling; he was thoroughly conscientious and never knowingly did (p. 011)
wrong, nor even sought to persuade himself that wrong was right;
well read in literature and of wide and varied information in nearly
all matters of knowledge, he was more especially remarkable for his
acquirements in the domain of politics, where indeed they were vast
and ever growing; he had a clear and generally a cool head, and was
nearly always able to do full justice to himself and to his cause; he
had an indomitable will, unconquerable persistence, and infinite
laboriousness. Such were the qualities which made him a great
statesman; but unfortunately we must behold a hardly less striking
reverse to the picture, in the faults and shortcomings which made him
so unpopular in his lifetime that posterity is only just beginning to
forget the prejudices of his contemporaries and to render concerning
him the judgment which he deserves. Never did a man of pure life and
just purposes have fewer friends or more enemies than John Quincy
Adams. His nature, said to have been very affectionate in his family
relations, was in its aspect outside of that small circle singularly
cold and repellent. If he could ever have gathered even a small
personal following his character and abilities would have insured him
a brilliant and prolonged success; but, for a man of his calibre (p. 012)
and influence, we shall see him as one of the most lonely and desolate
of the great men of history; instinct led the public men of his time
to range themselves against him rather than with him, and we shall
find them fighting beside him only when irresistibly compelled to do
so by policy or strong convictions. As he had little sympathy with
those with whom he was brought in contact, so he was very uncharitable
in his judgment of them; and thus having really a low opinion of so
many of them he could indulge his vindictive rancor without stint; his
invective, always powerful, will sometimes startle us by its venom,
and we shall be pained to see him apt to make enemies for a good cause
by making them for himself.
This has been, perhaps, too long a lingering upon the threshold. But
Mr. Adams's career in public life stretched over so long a period that
to write a full historical memoir of him within the limited space of
this volume is impossible. All that can be attempted is to present a
sketch of the man with a few of his more prominent surroundings
against a very meagre and insufficient background of the history of
the times. So it may be permissible to begin with a general outline of
his figure, to be filled in, shaded, and colored as we proceed. At
best our task is much more difficult of satisfactory achievement (p. 013)
than an historical biography of the customary elaborate order.
During his second visit to Europe, our mature youngster--if the word
may be used of Mr. Adams even in his earliest years--began to see a
good deal of the world and to mingle in very distinguished society.
For a brief period he got a little schooling, first at Paris, next at
Amsterdam, and then at Leyden; altogether the amount was
insignificant, since he was not quite fourteen years old when he
actually found himself engaged in a diplomatic career. Francis Dana,
afterward Chief Justice of Massachusetts, was then accredited as an
envoy to Russia from the United States, and he took Mr. Adams with him
as his private secretary. Not much came of the mission, but it was a
valuable experience for a lad of his years. Upon his return he spent
six months in travel and then he rejoined his father in Paris, where
that gentleman was engaged with Franklin and John Jay in negotiating
the final treaty of peace between the revolted colonies and the mother
country. The boy "was at once enlisted in the service as an additional
secretary, and gave his help to the preparation of the papers
necessary to the completion of that instrument which dispersed all
possible doubt of the Independence of his Country."
On April 26, 1785, arrived the packet-ship Le Courier de L'Orient, (p. 014)
bringing a letter from Mr. Gerry containing news of the appointment of
John Adams as Minister to St. James's. This unforeseen occurrence made
it necessary for the younger Adams to determine his own career, which
apparently he was left to do for himself. He was indeed a singular
young man, not unworthy of such confidence! The glimpses which we get
of him during this stay abroad show him as the associate upon terms of
equality with grown men of marked ability and exercising important
functions. He preferred diplomacy to dissipation, statesmen to
mistresses, and in the midst of all the temptations of the gayest
capital in the world, the chariness with which he sprinkled his wild
oats amid the alluring gardens chiefly devoted to the culture of those
cereals might well have brought a blush to the cheeks of some among
his elders, at least if the tongue of slander wags not with gross
untruth concerning the colleagues of John Adams. But he was not in
Europe to amuse himself, though at an age when amusement is natural
and a tinge of sinfulness is so often pardoned; he was there with the
definite and persistent purpose of steady improvement and acquisition.
At his age most young men play the cards which a kind fortune puts
into their hands, with the reckless intent only of immediate gain, (p. 015)
but from the earliest moment when he began the game of life Adams
coolly and wisely husbanded every card which came into his hand, with
a steady view to probable future contingencies, and with the resolve
to win in the long run. So now the resolution which he took in the
present question illustrated the clearness of his mind and the
strength of his character. To go with his father to England would be
to enjoy a life precisely fitted to his natural and acquired tastes,
to mingle with the men who were making history, to be cognizant of the
weightiest of public affairs, to profit by all that the grandest city
in the world had to show. It was easy to be not only allured by the
prospect but also to be deceived by its apparent advantages. Adams,
however, had the sense and courage to turn his back on it, and to go
home to the meagre shores and small society of New England, there to
become a boy again, to enter Harvard College, and come under all its
at that time rigid and petty regulations. It almost seems a mistake,
but it was not. Already he was too ripe and too wise to blunder. He
himself gives us his characteristic and sufficient reasons:--
"Were I now to go with my father probably my immediate
satisfaction might be greater than it will be in returning (p. 016)
to America. After having been travelling for these seven years
almost and all over Europe, and having been in the world and among
company for three; to return to spend one or two years in the
pale of a college, subjected to all the rules which I have so long
been freed from; and afterwards not expect (however good an opinion
I may have of myself) to bring myself into notice under three or
four years more, if ever! It is really a prospect somewhat
discouraging for a youth of my ambition, (for I have ambition
though I hope its object is laudable). But still
'Oh! how wretched
Is that poor man, that hangs on Princes' favors,'
or on those of any body else. I am determined that so long as I
shall be able to get my own living in an honorable manner, I will
depend upon no one. My father has been so much taken up all his
lifetime with the interests of the public, that his own fortune
has suffered by it: so that his children will have to provide for
themselves, which I shall never be able to do if I loiter away my
precious time in Europe and shun going home until I am forced to
it. With an ordinary share of common sense, which I hope I enjoy,
at least in America I can live _independent_ and _free_; and
rather than live otherwise I would wish to die before the time
when I shall be left at my own discretion. I have before me a
striking example of the distressing and humiliating situation a
person is reduced to by adopting a different line of conduct, and
I am determined not to fall into the same error."
It is needless to comment upon such spirit and sense, or upon (p. 017)
such just appreciation of what was feasible, wise, and right for him,
as a New Englander whose surroundings and prospects were widely
different from those of the society about him. He must have been
strongly imbued by nature with the instincts of his birthplace to
have formed, after a seven years' absence at his impressible age, so
correct a judgment of the necessities and possibilities of his own
career in relationship to the people and ideas of his own country.
Home accordingly he came, and by assiduity prepared himself in a very
short time to enter the junior class at Harvard College, whence he was
graduated in high standing in 1787. From there he went to Newburyport,
then a thriving and active seaport enriched by the noble trade of
privateering in addition to more regular maritime business, and entered
as a law student the office of Theophilus Parsons, afterwards the
Chief Justice of Massachusetts. On July 15, 1790, being twenty-three
years old, he was admitted to practice. Immediately afterward he
established himself in Boston, where for a time he felt strangely
solitary. Clients of course did not besiege his doors in the first
year, and he appears to have waited rather stubbornly than cheerfully
for more active days. These came in good time, and during the (p. 018)
second, third, and fourth years, his business grew apace to encouraging
dimensions.
He was, however, doing other work than that of the law, and much more
important in its bearing upon his future career. He could not keep his
thoughts, nor indeed his hands, from public affairs. When, in 1791,
Thomas Paine produced the "Rights of Man," Thomas Jefferson acting as
midwife to usher the bantling before the people of the United States,
Adams's indignation was fired, and he published anonymously a series
of refuting papers over the signature of Publicola. These attracted
much attention, not only at home but also abroad, and were by many
attributed to John Adams. Two years later, during the excitement
aroused by the reception and subsequent outrageous behavior here of
the French minister, Genet, Mr. Adams again published in the Boston
"Centinel" some papers over the signature of Marcellus, discussing
with much ability the then new and perplexing question of the
neutrality which should be observed by this country in European wars.
These were followed by more, over the signature of Columbus, and
afterward by still more in the name of Barnevelt, all strongly
reprobating the course of the crazy-headed foreigner. The writer was
not permitted to remain long unknown. It is not certain, but it (p. 019)
is highly probable, that to these articles was due the nomination
which Mr. Adams received shortly afterward from President Washington,
as Minister Resident at the Hague. This nomination was sent in to the
Senate, May 29, 1794, and was unanimously confirmed on the following
day. It may be imagined that the change from the moderate practice of
his Boston law office to a European court, of which he so well knew
the charms, was not distasteful to him. There are passages in his
Diary which indicate that he had been chafing with irrepressible
impatience "in that state of useless and disgraceful insignificancy,"
to which, as it seemed to him, he was relegated, so that at the age of
twenty-five, when "many of the characters who were born for the
benefit of their fellow creatures, have rendered themselves conspicuous
among their contemporaries, ... I still find myself as obscure, as
unknown to the world, as the most indolent or the most stupid of human
beings." Entertaining such a restless ambition, he of course accepted
the proffered office, though not without some expression of unexplained
doubt. October 31, 1794, found him at the Hague, after a voyage of
considerable peril in a leaky ship, commanded by a blundering captain.
He was a young diplomat, indeed; it was on his twenty-seventh (p. 020)
birthday that he received his commission.
The minister made his advent upon a tumultuous scene. All Europe was
getting under arms in the long and desperate struggle with France.
Scarcely had he presented his credentials to the Stadtholder ere that
dignitary was obliged to flee before the conquering standards of the
French. Pichegru marched into the capital city of the Low Countries,
hung out the tri-color, and established the "Batavian Republic" as the
ally of France. The diplomatic representatives of most of the European
powers forthwith left, and Mr. Adams was strongly moved to do the same,
though for reasons different from those which actuated his compeers.
He was not, like them, placed in an unpleasant position by the new
condition of affairs, but on the contrary he was very cordially
treated by the French and their Dutch partisans, and was obliged to
fall back upon his native prudence to resist their compromising
overtures and dangerous friendship. Without giving offence he yet kept
clear of entanglements, and showed a degree of wisdom and skill which
many older and more experienced Americans failed to evince, either
abroad or at home, during these exciting years. But he appeared to be
left without occupation in the altered condition of affairs, and (p. 021)
therefore was considering the propriety of returning, when advices
from home induced him to stay. Washington especially wrote that he
must not think of retiring, and prophesied that he would soon be
"found at the head of the diplomatic corps, be the government
administered by whomsoever the people may choose." He remained,
therefore, at the Hague, a shrewd and close observer of the exciting
events occurring around him, industriously pursuing an extensive
course of study and reading, making useful acquaintances, acquiring
familiarity with foreign languages, with the usages of diplomacy and
the habits of distinguished society. He had little public business to
transact, it is true; but at least his time was well spent for his own
improvement.
An episode in his life at the Hague was his visit to England, where he
was directed to exchange ratifications of the treaty lately negotiated
by Mr. Jay. But a series of vexatious delays, apparently maliciously
contrived, detained him so long that upon his arrival he found this
specific task already accomplished by Mr. Deas. He was probably not
disappointed that his name thus escaped connection with engagements so
odious to a large part of the nation. He had, however, some further
business of an informal character to transact with Lord Grenville, (p. 022)
and in endeavoring to conduct it found himself rather awkwardly placed.
He was not minister to the Court of St. James, having been only
vaguely authorized to discuss certain arrangements in a tentative way,
without the power to enter into any definitive agreement. But the
English Cabinet strongly disliking Mr. Deas, who in the absence of Mr.
Pinckney represented for the time the United States, and much
preferring to negotiate with Mr. Adams, sought by many indirect and
artful subterfuges to thrust upon him the character of a regularly
accredited minister. He had much ado to avoid, without offence, the
assumption of functions to which he had no title, but which were with
designing courtesy forced upon him. His cool and moderate temper,
however, carried him successfully through the whole business, alike in
its social and its diplomatic aspect.
Another negotiation, of a private nature also, he brought to a
successful issue during these few months in London. He made the
acquaintance of Miss Louisa Catherine Johnson, daughter of Joshua
Johnson, then American Consul at London, and niece of that Governor
Johnson, of Maryland, who had signed the Declaration of Independence
and was afterwards placed on the bench of the Supreme Court of (p. 023)
the United States. To this lady he became engaged; and returning
not long afterward he was married to her on July 26, 1797. It was a
thoroughly happy and, for him, a life-long union.
President Washington, toward the close of his second term, transferred
Mr. Adams to the Court of Portugal. But before his departure thither
his destination was changed. Some degree of embarrassment was felt
about this time concerning his further continuance in public office,
by reason of his father's accession to the Presidency. He wrote to his
mother a manly and spirited letter, rebuking her for carelessly
dropping an expression indicative of a fear that he might look for
some favor at his father's hands. He could neither solicit nor expect
anything, he justly said, and he was pained that his mother should not
know him better than to entertain any apprehension of his feeling
otherwise. It was a perplexing position in which the two were placed.
It would be a great hardship to cut short the son's career because of
the success of the father, yet the reproach of nepotism could not be
lightly encountered, even with the backing of clear consciences.
Washington came kindly to the aid of his doubting successor, and in a
letter highly complimentary to Mr. John Quincy Adams strongly urged
that well-merited promotion ought not to be kept from him, (p. 024)
foretelling for him a distinguished future in the diplomatic service.
These representations prevailed; and the President's only action as
concerned his son consisted in changing his destination from Portugal
to Prussia, both missions being at that time of the same grade, though
that to Prussia was then established for the first time by the making
and confirming of this nomination.
To Berlin, accordingly, Mr. Adams proceeded in November, 1797, and had
the somewhat cruel experience of being "questioned at the gates by a
dapper lieutenant, who did not know, until one of his private soldiers
explained to him, who the United States of America were." Overcoming
this unusual obstacle to a ministerial advent, and succeeding, after
many months, in getting through all the introductory formalities, he
found not much more to be done at Berlin than there had been at the
Hague. But such useful work as was open to him he accomplished in the
shape of a treaty of amity and commerce between Prussia and the United
States. This having been duly ratified by both the powers, his further
stay seemed so useless that he wrote home suggesting his readiness to
return; and while awaiting a reply he travelled through some portions
of Europe which he had not before seen. His recall was one of the (p. 025)
last acts of his father's administration, made, says Mr. Seward,
"that Mr. Jefferson might have no embarrassment in that direction,"
but quite as probably dictated by a vindictive desire to show how wide
was the gulf of animosity which had opened between the family of the
disappointed ex-President and his triumphant rival.
Mr. Adams, immediately upon his arrival at home, prepared to return to
the practice of his profession. It was not altogether an agreeable
transition from an embassy at the courts of Europe to a law office in
Boston, with the necessity of furbishing up long disused knowledge,
and a second time patiently awaiting the influx of clients. But he
faced it with his stubborn temper and practical sense. The slender
promise which he was able to discern in the political outlook could
not fail to disappoint him, since his native predilections were
unquestionably and strongly in favor of a public career. During his
absence party animosities had been developing rapidly. The first great
party victory since the organization of the government had just been
won, after a very bitter struggle, by the Republicans or Democrats, as
they were then indifferently called, whose exuberant delight found its
full counterpart in the angry despondency of the Federalists. That
irascible old gentleman, the elder Adams, having experienced a (p. 026)
very Waterloo defeat in the contest for the Presidency, had ridden
away from the capital, actually in a wild rage, on the night of the 3d
of March, 1801, to avoid the humiliating pageant of Mr. Jefferson's
inauguration. Yet far more fierce than this natural party warfare was
the internal dissension which rent the Federal party in twain. Those
cracks upon the surface and subterraneous rumblings, which the
experienced observer could for some time have noted, had opened with
terrible uproar into a gaping chasm, when John Adams, still in the
Presidency, suddenly announced his determination to send a mission to
France at a crisis when nearly all his party were looking for war.
Perhaps this step was, as his admirers claim, an act of pure and
disinterested statesmanship. Certainly its result was fortunate for
the country at large. But for John Adams it was ruinous. At the moment
when he made the bold move, he doubtless expected to be followed by
his party. Extreme was his disappointment and boundless his wrath,
when he found that he had at his back only a fraction, not improbably
less than half, of that party. He learned with infinite chagrin that
he had only a divided empire with a private individual; that it was
not safe for him, the President of the United States, to originate
any important measure without first consulting a lawyer quietly (p. 027)
engaged in the practice of his profession in New York; that, in short,
at least a moiety, in which were to be found the most intelligent
members, of the great Federal party, when in search of guidance,
turned their faces toward Alexander Hamilton rather than toward John
Adams. These Hamiltonians by no means relished the French mission, so
that from this time forth a schism of intense bitterness kept the
Federal party asunder, and John Adams hated Alexander Hamilton with a
vigor not surpassed in the annals of human antipathies. His rage was
not assuaged by the conduct of this dreaded foe in the presidential
campaign; and the defeated candidate always preferred to charge his
failure to Hamilton's machinations rather than to the real will of the
people. This, however, was unfair; it was perfectly obvious that a
majority of the nation had embraced Jeffersonian tenets, and that
Federalism was moribund.
To this condition of affairs John Quincy Adams returned. Fortunately
he had been compelled to bear no part in the embroilments of the past,
and his sagacity must have led him, while listening with filial
sympathy to the interpretations placed upon events by his incensed
parent, yet to make liberal allowance for the distorting effects (p. 028)
of the old gentleman's rage. Still it was in the main only natural for
him to regard himself as a Federalist of the Adams faction. His
proclivities had always been with that party. In Massachusetts the
educated and well-to-do classes were almost unanimously of that way of
thinking. The select coterie of gentlemen in the State, who in those
times bore an active and influential part in politics, were nearly all
Hamiltonians, but the adherents of President Adams were numerically
strong. Nor was the younger Adams himself long left without his
private grievance against Mr. Jefferson, who promptly used the
authority vested in him by a new statute to remove Mr. Adams from the
position of commissioner in bankruptcy, to which, at the time of his
resuming business, he had been appointed by the judge of the district
court. Long afterward Jefferson sought to escape the odium of this
apparently malicious and, for those days, unusual action, by a very
Jeffersonian explanation, tolerably satisfactory to those persons who
believed it.
On April 5, 1802, Mr. Adams was chosen by the Federalists of Boston to
represent them in the State Senate. The office was at that time still
sought by men of the best ability and position, and though it was
hardly a step upward on the political ladder for one who had
represented the nation in foreign parts for eight years, yet (p. 029)
Mr. Adams was well content to accept it. At least it reopened the door
of political life, and moreover one of his steadfast maxims was never
to refuse any function which the people sought to impose upon him. It
is worth noting, for its bearing upon controversies soon to be
encountered in this narrative, that forty-eight hours had not elapsed
after Mr. Adams had taken his seat before he ventured upon a display
of independence which caused much irritation to his Federalist
associates. He had the hardihood to propose that the Federalist
majority in the legislature should permit the Republican minority to
enjoy a proportional representation in the council. "It was the first
act of my legislative life," he wrote many years afterward, "and it
marked the principle by which my whole public life has been governed
from that day to this. My proposal was unsuccessful, and perhaps it
forfeited whatever confidence might have been otherwise bestowed upon
me as a party follower." Indeed, all his life long Mr. Adams was never
submissive to the party whip, but voted upon every question precisely
according to his opinion of its merits, without the slightest regard
to the political company in which for the time being he might find
himself. A compeer of his in the United States Senate once said (p. 030)
of him, that he regarded every public measure which came up as he
would a proposition in Euclid, abstracted from any party considerations.
These frequent derelictions of his were at first forgiven with a
magnanimity really very creditable, so long as it lasted, especially
to the Hamiltonians in the Federal party; and so liberal was this
forbearance that when in February, 1803, the legislature had to elect
a Senator to the United States Senate, he was chosen upon the fourth
ballot by 86 votes out of 171. This was the more gratifying to him and
the more handsome on the part of the anti-Adams men in the party,
because the place was eagerly sought by Timothy Pickering, an old man
who had strong claims growing out of an almost life-long and very
efficient service in their ranks, and who was moreover a most stanch
adherent of General Hamilton.
So in October, 1803, we find Mr. Adams on his way to Washington, the
raw and unattractive village which then constituted the national
capital, wherein there was not, as the pious New Englander instantly
noted, a church of any denomination; but those who were religiously
disposed were obliged to attend services "usually performed on Sundays
at the Treasury Office and at the Capitol." With what anticipations
Mr. Adams's mind was filled during his journey to this embryotic (p. 031)
city his Diary does not tell; but if they were in any degree cheerful
or sanguine they were destined to cruel disappointment. He was now
probably to appreciate for the first time the fierce vigor of the
hostility which his father had excited. In Massachusetts social
connections and friendships probably mitigated the open display of
rancor to which in Washington full sway was given. It was not only the
Republican majority who showed feelings which in them were at least
fair if they were strong, but the Federal minority were maliciously
pleased to find in the son of the ill-starred John Adams a victim on
whom to vent that spleen and abuse which were so provokingly
ineffective against the solid working majority of their opponents in
Congress. The Republicans trampled upon the Federalists, and the
Federalists trampled on John Quincy Adams. He spoke seldom, and
certainly did not weary the Senators, yet whenever he rose to his feet
he was sure of a cold, too often almost an insulting, reception. By no
chance or possibility could anything which he said or suggested please
his prejudiced auditors. The worst augury for any measure was his
support; any motion which he made was sure to be voted down, though
not unfrequently substantially the same matter being afterward moved
by somebody else would be readily carried. That cordiality, (p. 032)
assistance, and sense of fellowship which Senators from the same State
customarily expect and obtain from each other could not be enjoyed by
him. For shortly after his arrival in Washington, Mr. Pickering had
been chosen to fill a vacancy in the other Massachusetts senatorship,
and appeared upon the scene as a most unwelcome colleague. For a time,
indeed, an outward semblance of political comradeship was maintained
between them, but it would have been folly for an Adams to put faith
in a Pickering, and perhaps _vice versa_. This position of his, as the
unpopular member of an unpopular minority, could not be misunderstood,
and many allusions to it occur in his Diary. One day he notes a motion
rejected; another day, that he has "nothing to do but to make
fruitless opposition;" he constantly recites that he has voted with a
small minority, and at least once he himself composed the whole of
that minority; soon after his arrival he says that an amendment
proposed by him "will certainly not pass; and, indeed, I have already
seen enough to ascertain that no amendments of my proposing will
obtain in the Senate as now filled;" again, "I presented my three
resolutions, which raised a storm as violent as I expected;" and on
the same day he writes, "I have no doubt of incurring much censure
and obloquy for this measure;" a day or two later he speaks of (p. 033)
certain persons "who hate me rather more than they love any
principle;" when he expressed an opinion in favor of ratifying a
treaty with the Creeks, he remarks quite philosophically, that he
believes it "surprised almost every member of the Senate, and
dissatisfied almost all;" when he wanted a committee raised he did not
move it himself, but suggested the idea to another Senator, for "I
knew that if I moved it a spirit of jealousy would immediately be
raised against doing anything." Writing once of some resolutions which
he intended to propose, he says that they are "another feather against
a whirlwind. A desperate and fearful cause in which I have embarked,
but I must pursue it or feel myself either a coward or a traitor."
Another time we find a committee, of which he was a member, making its
report when he had not even been notified of its meeting.
It would be idle to suppose that any man could be sufficiently callous
not to feel keenly such treatment. Mr. Adams was far from callous and
he felt it deeply. But he was not crushed or discouraged by it, as
weaker spirits would have been, nor betrayed into any acts of foolish
anger which must have recoiled upon himself. In him warm feelings were
found in singular combination with a cool head. An unyielding (p. 034)
temper and an obstinate courage, an invincible confidence in his own
judgment, and a stern conscientiousness carried him through these
earlier years of severe trial as they had afterwards to carry him
through many more. "The qualities of mind most peculiarly called for,"
he reflects in the Diary, "are firmness, perseverance, patience,
coolness, and forbearance. The prospect is not promising; yet the part
to act may be as honorably performed as if success could attend it."
He understood the situation perfectly and met it with a better skill
than that of the veteran politician. By a long and tedious but sure
process he forced his way to steadily increasing influence, and by the
close of his fourth year we find him taking a part in the business of
the Senate which may be fairly called prominent and important. He was
conquering success.
But if Mr. Adams's unpopularity was partly due to the fact that he was
the son of his father, it was also largely attributable not only to
his unconciliatory manners but to more substantial habits of mind and
character. It is probably impossible for any public man, really
independent in his political action, to lead a very comfortable life
amid the struggles of party. Under the disadvantages involved in this
habit Mr. Adams labored to a remarkable degree. Since parties (p. 035)
were first organized in this Republic no American statesman has ever
approached him in persistent freedom of thought, speech, and action.
He was regarded as a Federalist, but his Federalism was subject to
many modifications; the members of that party never were sure of his
adherence, and felt bound to him by no very strong ties of political
fellowship. Towards the close of his senatorial term he recorded, in
reminiscence, that he had more often voted with the administration
than with the opposition.
The first matter of importance concerning which he was obliged to act
was the acquisition of Louisiana and its admission as a state of the
Union. The Federalists were bitterly opposed to this measure,
regarding it as an undue strengthening of the South and of the slavery
influence, to the destruction of the fair balance of power between the
two great sections of the country. It was not then the moral aspect of
the slavery element which stirred the northern temper, but only the
antagonism of interests between the commercial cities of the North and
the agricultural communities of the South. In the discussions and
votes which took place in this business Mr. Adams was in favor of the
purchase, but denied with much emphasis the constitutionality of the
process by which the purchased territory was brought into the (p. 036)
fellowship of States. This imperfect allegiance to the party gave more
offence than satisfaction, and he found himself soundly berated in
leading Federalist newspapers in New England, and angrily threatened
with expulsion from the party. But in the famous impeachment of Judge
Chase, which aroused very strong feelings, Mr. Adams was fortunately
able to vote for acquittal. He regarded this measure, as well as the
impeachment of Judge Pickering at the preceding session, as parts of
an elaborate scheme on the part of the President for degrading the
national judiciary and rendering it subservient to the legislative
branch of the government. So many, however, even of Mr. Jefferson's
stanch adherents revolted against his requisitions on this occasion,
and he himself so far lost heart before the final vote was taken, that
several Republicans voted with the Federalists, and Mr. Adams could
hardly claim much credit with his party for standing by them in this
emergency.
It takes a long while for such a man to secure respect, and great
ability for him ever to achieve influence. In time, however, Mr. Adams
saw gratifying indications that he was acquiring both, and in
February, 1806, we find him writing:--
"This is the third session I have sat in Congress. I came in (p. 037)
as a member of a very small minority, and during the two former
sessions almost uniformly avoided to take a lead; any other course
would have been dishonest or ridiculous. On the very few and
unimportant objects which I did undertake, I met at first with
universal opposition. The last session my influence rose a little,
at the present it has hitherto been apparently rising."
He was so far a cool and clear-headed judge, even in his own case,
that this encouraging estimate may be accepted as correct upon his
sole authority without other evidence. But the fair prospect was
overcast almost in its dawning, and a period of supreme trial and of
apparently irretrievable ruin was at hand.
Topics were coming forward for discussion concerning which no American
could be indifferent, and no man of Mr. Adams's spirit could be silent.
The policy of Great Britain towards this country, and the manner in
which it was to be met, stirred profound feelings and opened such
fierce dissensions as it is now difficult to appreciate. For a brief
time Mr. Adams was to be a prominent actor before the people. It is
fortunately needless to repeat, as it must ever be painful to remember,
the familiar and too humiliating tale of the part which France and
England were permitted for so many years to play in our national
politics, when our parties were not divided upon American (p. 038)
questions, but wholly by their sympathies with one or other of these
contending European powers. Under Washington the English party had,
with infinite difficulty, been able to prevent their adversaries from
fairly enlisting the United States as active partisans of France, in
spite of the fact that most insulting treatment was received from that
country. Under John Adams the same so-called British faction had been
baulked in their hope of precipitating a war with the French. Now in
Mr. Jefferson's second administration, the French party having won the
ascendant, the new phase of the same long struggle presented the
question, whether or not we should be drawn into a war with Great
Britain. Grave as must have been the disasters of such a war in 1806,
grave as they were when the war actually came six years later, yet it
is impossible to recall the provocations which were inflicted upon us
without almost regretting that prudence was not cast to the winds and
any woes encountered in preference to unresisting submission to such
insolent outrages. Our gorge rises at the narration three quarters of
a century after the acts were done.
Mr. Adams took his position early and boldly. In February, 1806, he
introduced into the Senate certain resolutions strongly condemnatory
of the right, claimed and vigorously exercised by the British, (p. 039)
of seizing neutral vessels employed in conducting with the enemies of
Great Britain any trade which had been customarily prohibited by that
enemy in time of peace. This doctrine was designed to shut out
American merchants from certain privileges in trading with French
colonies, which had been accorded only since France had become
involved in war with Great Britain. The principle was utterly illegal
and extremely injurious. Mr. Adams, in his first resolution,
stigmatized it "as an unprovoked aggression upon the property of the
citizens of these United States, a violation of their neutral rights,
and an encroachment upon their national independence." By his second
resolution, the President was requested to demand and insist upon the
restoration of property seized under this pretext, and upon
indemnification for property already confiscated. By a rare good
fortune, Mr. Adams had the pleasure of seeing his propositions
carried, only slightly modified by the omission of the words "to
insist." But they were carried, of course, by Republican votes, and
they by no means advanced their mover in the favor of the Federalist
party. Strange as it may seem, that party, of which many of the
foremost supporters were engaged in the very commerce which Great
Britain aimed to suppress and destroy, seemed not to be so much (p. 040)
incensed against her as against their own government. The theory
of the party was, substantially, that England had been driven into
these measures by the friendly tone of our government towards France,
and by her own stringent and overruling necessities. The cure was not
to be sought in resistance, not even in indignation and remonstrance
addressed to that power, but rather in cementing an alliance with her,
and even, if need should be, in taking active part in her holy cause.
The feeling seemed to be that we merited the chastisement because we
had not allied ourselves with the chastiser. These singular notions of
the Federalists, however, were by no means the notions of Mr. John
Quincy Adams, as we shall soon see.
On April 18, 1806, the Non-importation Act received the approval of
the President. It was the first measure indicative of resentment or
retaliation which was taken by our government. When it was upon its
passage it encountered the vigorous resistance of the Federalists, but
received the support of Mr. Adams. On May 16, 1806, the British
government made another long stride in the course of lawless oppression
of neutrals, which phrase, as commerce then was, signified little else
than Americans. A proclamation was issued declaring the whole (p. 041)
coast of the European continent, from Brest to the mouth of the Elbe,
to be under blockade. In fact, of course, the coast was not blockaded,
and the proclamation was a falsehood, an unjustifiable effort to make
words do the work of war-ships. The doctrine which it was thus
endeavored to establish had never been admitted into international
law, has ever since been repudiated by universal consent of all nations,
and is intrinsically preposterous. The British, however, designed to
make it effective, and set to work in earnest to confiscate all
vessels and cargoes captured on their way from any neutral nation to
any port within the proscribed district. On November 21, next following,
Napoleon retaliated by the Berlin decree, so called, declaring the
entire British Isles to be under blockade, and forbidding any vessel
which had been in any English port after publication of his decree to
enter any port in the dominions under his control. In January, 1807,
England made the next move by an order, likewise in contravention of
international law, forbidding to neutrals all commerce between ports
of the enemies of Great Britain. On November 11, 1807, the famous
British Order in Council was issued, declaring neutral vessels and
cargoes bound to any port or colony of any country with which (p. 042)
England was then at war, and which was closed to English ships, to be
liable to capture and confiscation. A few days later, November 25,
1807, another Order established a rate of duties to be paid in England
upon all neutral merchandise which should be permitted to be carried
in neutral bottoms to countries at war with that power. December 17,
1807, Napoleon retorted by the Milan decree, which declared
denationalized and subject to capture and condemnation every vessel,
to whatsoever nation belonging, which should have submitted to search
by an English ship, or should be on a voyage to England, or should
have paid any tax to the English government. All these regulations,
though purporting to be aimed at neutrals generally, in fact bore
almost exclusively upon the United States, who alone were undertaking
to conduct any neutral commerce worthy of mention. As Mr. Adams
afterwards remarked, the effect of these illegal proclamations and
unjustifiable novel doctrines "placed the commerce and shipping of the
United States, with regard to all Europe and European colonies (Sweden
alone excepted), in nearly the same state as it would have been, if,
on that same 11th of November, England and France had both declared
war against the United States." The merchants of this country might as
well have burned their ships as have submitted to these decrees. (p. 043)
All this while the impressment of American seamen by British ships of
war was being vigorously prosecuted. This is one of those outrages so
long ago laid away among the mouldering tombs in the historical
graveyard that few persons now appreciate its enormity, or the extent
to which it was carried. Those who will be at the pains to ascertain
the truth in the matter will feel that the bloodiest, most costly, and
most disastrous war would have been better than tame endurance of
treatment so brutal and unjustifiable that it finds no parallel even
in the long and dark list of wrongs which Great Britain has been wont
to inflict upon all the weaker or the uncivilized peoples with whom
she has been brought or has gratuitously forced herself into unwelcome
contact. It was not an occasional act of high-handed arrogance that
was done; there were not only a few unfortunate victims, of whom a
large proportion might be of unascertained nationality. It was an
organized system worked upon a very large scale. Every American seaman
felt it necessary to have a certificate of citizenship, accompanied by
a description of his features and of all the marks upon his person, as
Mr. Adams said, "like the advertisement for a runaway negro slave."
Nor was even this protection by any means sure to be always (p. 044)
efficient. The number of undoubted American citizens who were seized
rose in a few years actually to many thousands. They were often taken
without so much as a false pretence to right; but with the acknowledgment
that they were Americans, they were seized upon the plea of a necessity
for their services in the British ship. Some American vessels were
left so denuded of seamen that they were lost at sea for want of hands
to man them; the destruction of lives as well as property,
unquestionably thus caused, was immense. When after the lapse of a
long time and of infinite negotiation the American citizenship of some
individual was clearly shown, still the chances of his return were
small; some false and ignoble subterfuge was resorted to; he was not
to be found; the name did not occur on the rolls of the navy; he had
died, or been discharged, or had deserted, or had been shot. The more
illegal the act committed by any British officer the more sure he was
of reward, till it seemed that the impressment of American citizens
was an even surer road to promotion than valor in an engagement with
the enemy. Such were the substantial wrongs inflicted by Great
Britain; nor were any pains taken to cloak their character; on the
contrary, they were done with more than British insolence and
offensiveness, and were accompanied with insults which alone (p. 045)
constituted sufficient provocation to war. To all this, for a long
time, nothing but empty and utterly futile protests were opposed by
this country. The affair of the Chesapeake, indeed, threatened for a
brief moment to bring things to a crisis. That vessel, an American
frigate, commanded by Commodore Barron, sailed on June 22, 1807, from
Hampton Roads. The Leopard, a British fifty-gun ship, followed her,
and before she was out of sight of land, hailed her and demanded the
delivery of four men, of whom three at least were surely native
Americans. Barron refused the demand, though his ship was wholly
unprepared for action. Thereupon the Englishman opened his broadsides,
killed three men and wounded sixteen, boarded the Chesapeake and took
off the four sailors. They were carried to Halifax and tried by
court-martial for desertion: one of them was hanged; one died in
confinement, and five years elapsed before the other two were returned
to the Chesapeake in Boston harbor. This wound was sufficiently deep
to arouse a real spirit of resentment and revenge, and England went so
far as to dispatch Mr. Rose to this country upon a pretended mission
of peace, though the fraudulent character of his errand was sufficiently
indicated by the fact that within a few hours after his departure the
first of the above named Orders in Council was issued but had not (p. 046)
been communicated to him. As Mr. Adams indignantly said, "the same
penful of ink which signed his instructions might have been used also
to sign these illegal orders." Admiral Berkeley, the commander of the
Leopard, received the punishment which he might justly have expected
if precedent was to count for anything in the naval service of Great
Britain,--he was promoted.
It is hardly worth while to endeavor to measure the comparative
wrongfulness of the conduct of England and of France. The behavior of
each was utterly unjustifiable; though England by committing the first
extreme breach of international law gave to France the excuse of
retaliation. There was, however, vast difference in the practical
effect of the British and French decrees. The former wrought serious
injury, falling little short of total destruction, to American
shipping and commerce; the latter were only in a much less degree
hurtful. The immense naval power of England and the channels in which
our trade naturally flowed combined to make her destructive capacity
as towards us very great. It was the outrages inflicted by her which
brought the merchants of the United States face to face with ruin;
they suffered not very greatly at the hands of Napoleon. Neither could
the villainous process of impressment be conducted by Frenchmen. (p. 047)
France gave us cause for war, but England seemed resolved to drive us
into it.
As British aggressions grew steadily and rapidly more intolerable, Mr.
Adams found himself straining farther and farther away from those
Federalist moorings at which, it must be confessed, he had long swung
very precariously. The constituency which he represented was indeed in
a quandary so embarrassing as hardly to be capable of maintaining any
consistent policy. The New England of that day was a trading
community, of which the industry and capital were almost exclusively
centred in ship-owning and commerce. The merchants, almost to a man,
had long been the most Anglican of Federalists in their political
sympathies. Now they found themselves suffering utterly ruinous
treatment at the hands of those whom they had loved overmuch. They
were being ruthlessly destroyed by their friends, to whom they had
been, so to speak, almost disloyally loyal. They saw their business
annihilated, their property seized, and yet could not give utterance
to resentment, or counsel resistance, without such a humiliating
devouring of all their own principles and sentiments as they could by
no possibility bring themselves to endure. There was but one road open
to them, and that was the ignoble one of casting themselves wholly (p. 048)
into the arms of England, of rewarding her blows with caresses, of
submitting to be fairly scourged into a servile alliance with her. It
is not surprising that the independent temper of Mr. Adams revolted at
the position which his party seemed not reluctant to assume at this
juncture. Yet not very much better seemed for a time the policy of the
administration. Jefferson was far from being a man for troubled
seasons, which called for high spirit and executive energy. His
flotillas of gunboats and like idle and silly fantasies only excited
Mr. Adams's disgust. In fact, there was upon all sides a strong dread
of a war with England, not always openly expressed, but now perfectly
visible, arising with some from regard for that country, in others
prompted by fear of her power. Alone among public men Mr. Adams, while
earnestly hoping to escape war, was not willing to seek that escape by
unlimited weakness and unbounded submission to lawless injury.
On November 17, 1807, Mr. Adams, who never in his life allowed fear to
become a motive, wrote, with obvious contempt and indignation: "I
observe among the members great embarrassment, alarm, anxiety, and
confusion of mind, but no preparation for any measure of vigor, and an
obvious strong disposition to yield all that Great Britain may (p. 049)
require, to preserve peace, under a thin external show of dignity and
bravery." This tame and vacillating spirit roused his ire, and as it
was chiefly manifested by his own party it alienated him from them
farther than ever. Yet his wrath was so far held in reasonable check
by his discretion that he would still have liked to avoid the perilous
conclusion of arms, and though his impulse was to fight, yet he could
not but recognize that the sensible course was to be content, for the
time at least, with a manifestation of resentment, and the most vigorous
acts short of war which the government could be induced to undertake.
On this sentiment were based his introduction of the aforementioned
resolutions, his willingness to support the administration, and his
vote for the Non-importation Act in spite of a dislike for it as a
very imperfectly satisfactory measure. But it was not alone his
naturally independent temper which led him thus to feel so differently
from other members of his party. In Europe he had had opportunities of
forming a judgment more accurate than was possible for most Americans
concerning the sentiments and policy of England towards this country.
Not only had he been present at the negotiations resulting in the
treaty of peace, but he had also afterwards been for several months
engaged in the personal discussion of commercial questions with (p. 050)
the British minister of foreign affairs. From all that he had thus
seen and heard he had reached the conviction, unquestionably correct,
that the British were not only resolved to adopt a selfish course
towards the United States, which might have been expected, but that
they were consistently pursuing the further distinct design of crippling
and destroying American commerce, to the utmost degree which their own
extensive trade and great naval authority and power rendered possible.
So long as he held this firm belief, it was inevitable that he should
be at issue with the Federalists in all matters concerning our policy
towards Great Britain. The ill-will naturally engendered in him by
this conviction was increased to profound indignation when illiberal
measures were succeeded by insults, by substantial wrongs in direct
contravention of law, and by acts properly to be described as of real
hostility. For Mr. Adams was by nature not only independent, but
resentful and combative. When, soon after the attack of the Leopard
upon the Chesapeake, he heard the transaction "openly justified at
noon-day," by a prominent Federalist,[1] "in a public insurance office
upon the exchange at Boston," his temper rose. "This," he afterward
wrote, "this was the cause ... which alienated me from that day (p. 051)
and forever from the councils of the Federal party." When the news
of that outrage reached Boston, Mr. Adams was there, and desired that
the leading Federalists in the city should at once "take the lead in
promoting a strong and clear expression of the sentiments of the
people, and in an open and free-hearted manner, setting aside all
party feelings, declare their determination at that crisis to support
the government of their country." But unfortunately these gentlemen
were by no means prepared for any such action, and foolishly left it
for the friends of the administration to give the first utterance to a
feeling which it is hard to excuse any American for not entertaining
beneath such provocation. It was the Jeffersonians, accordingly, who
convened "an informal meeting of the citizens of Boston and the
neighboring towns," at which Mr. Adams was present, and by which he
was put upon a committee to draw and report resolutions. These
resolutions pledged a cheerful coöperation "in any measures, however
serious," which the government might deem necessary and a support of
the same with "lives and fortunes." The Federalists, learning too late
that their backwardness at this crisis was a blunder, caused a town
meeting to be called at Faneuil Hall a few days later. This also (p. 052)
Mr. Adams attended, and again was put on the committee to draft
resolutions, which were only a little less strong than those of the
earlier assemblage. But though many of the Federalists thus tardily
and reluctantly fell in with the popular sentiment, they were for the
most part heartily incensed against Mr. Adams. They threatened him
that he should "have his head taken off for apostasy," and gave him to
understand that he "should no longer be considered as having any
communion with the party." If he had not already quite left them, they
now turned him out from their community. But such abusive treatment
was ill adapted to influence a man of his temper. Martyrdom, which in
time he came to relish, had not now any terrors for him; and he would
have lost as many heads as ever grew on Hydra, ere he would have
yielded on a point of principle.
[Footnote 1: Mr. John Lowell.]
His spirit was soon to be demonstrated. Congress was convened in extra
session on October 26, 1807. The administration brought forward the
bill establishing an embargo. The measure may now be pronounced a
blunder, and its proposal created a howl of rage and anguish from the
commercial states, who saw in it only their utter ruin. Already a
strong sectional feeling had been developed between the planters (p. 053)
of the South and the merchants of the North and East, and the latter
now united in the cry that their quarter was to be ruined by the
ignorant policy of this Virginian President. Terrible then was their
wrath, when they actually saw a Massachusetts Senator boldly give his
vote for what they deemed the most odious and wicked bill which had
ever been presented in the halls of Congress. Nay, more, they learned
with horror that Mr. Adams had even been a member of the committee
which reported the bill, and that he had joined in the report.
Henceforth the Federal party was to be like a hive of enraged hornets
about the devoted renegade. No abuse which they could heap upon him
seemed nearly adequate to the occasion. They despised him; they
loathed him; they said and believed that he was false, selfish,
designing, a traitor, an apostate, that he had run away from a failing
cause, that he had sold himself. The language of contumely was
exhausted in vain efforts to describe his baseness. Not even yet has
the echo of the hard names which he was called quite died away in the
land; and there are still families in New England with whom his
dishonest tergiversation remains a traditional belief.
Never was any man more unjustly aspersed. It is impossible to view all
the evidence dispassionately without not only acquitting Mr. (p. 054)
Adams but greatly admiring his courage, his constancy, his independence.
Whether the embargo was a wise and efficient or a futile and useless
measure has little to do with the question of his conduct. The emergency
called for strong action. The Federalists suggested only a temporizing
submission, or that we should avert the terrible wrath of England by
crawling beneath her lashes into political and commercial servitude.
Mr. Jefferson thought the embargo would do, that it would aid him in
his negotiations with England sufficiently to enable him to bring her
to terms; he had before thought the same of the Non-importation Act.
Mr. Adams felt, properly enough, concerning both these schemes, that
they were insufficient and in many respects objectionable; but that to
give the administration hearty support in the most vigorous measures
which it was willing to undertake, was better than to aid an opposition
utterly nerveless and servile and altogether devoid of so much as the
desire for efficient action. It was no time to stay with the party of
weakness; it was right to strengthen rather than to hamper a man so
pacific and spiritless as Mr. Jefferson; to show a readiness to
forward even his imperfect expedients; to display a united and
indignant, if not quite a hostile front to Great Britain, rather (p. 055)
than to exhibit a tame and friendly feeling towards her. It was for
these reasons, which had already controlled his action concerning the
non-importation bill, that Mr. Adams joined in reporting the embargo
bill and voted for it. He never pretended that he himself had any
especial fancy for either of these measures, or that he regarded them
as the best that could be devised under the circumstances. On the
contrary, he hoped that the passage of the embargo would allow of the
repeal of its predecessor. That he expected some good from it, and
that it did some little good, cannot be denied. It did save a great
deal of American property, both shipping and merchandise, from seizure
and condemnation; and if it cut off the income it at least saved much
of the principal of our merchants. If only the bill had been promptly
repealed so soon as this protective purpose had been achieved, without
awaiting further and altogether impossible benefits to accrue from it
as an offensive measure, it might perhaps have left a better memory
behind it. Unfortunately no one can deny that it was continued much
too long. Mr. Adams saw this error and dreaded the consequences. After
he had left Congress and had gone back to private life, he exerted all
the influence which he had with the Republican members of Congress to
secure its repeal and the substitution of the Non-intercourse (p. 056)
Act, an exchange which was in time accomplished, though much too tardily.
Nay, much more than this, Mr. Adams stands forth almost alone as the
advocate of threatening if not of actually belligerent measures. He
expressed his belief that "our internal resources [were] competent to
the establishment and maintenance of a naval force, public and
private, if not fully adequate to the protection and defence of our
commerce, at least sufficient to induce a retreat from hostilities,
and to deter from a renewal of them by either of the warring parties;"
and he insisted that "a system to that effect might be formed,
ultimately far more economical, and certainly more energetic," than
the embargo. But his "resolution met no encouragement." He found that
it was the embargo or nothing, and he thought the embargo was a little
better than nothing, as probably it was.
All the arguments which Mr. Adams advanced were far from satisfying
his constituents in those days of wild political excitement, and they
quickly found the means of intimating their unappeasable displeasure
in a way certainly not open to misapprehension. Mr. Adams's term of
service in the Senate was to expire on March 3, 1809. On June 2 and 3,
1808, anticipating by many months the customary time for filling (p. 057)
the coming vacancy, the legislature of Massachusetts proceeded to
choose James Lloyd, junior, his successor. The votes were, in the
Senate 21 for Mr. Lloyd, 17 for Mr. Adams; in the House 248 for Mr.
Lloyd, and 213 for Mr. Adams. A more insulting method of administering
a rebuke could not have been devised. At the same time, in further
expression of disapprobation, resolutions strongly condemnatory of the
embargo were passed. Mr. Adams was not the man to stay where he was
not wanted, and on June 8 he sent in his letter of resignation. On the
next day Mr. Lloyd was chosen to serve for the balance of his term.
Thus John Quincy Adams changed sides. The son of John Adams lost the
senatorship for persistently supporting the administration of Thomas
Jefferson. It was indeed a singular spectacle! In 1803 he had been
sent to the Senate of the United States by Federalists as a Federalist;
in 1808 he had abjured them and they had repudiated him; in 1809, as
we are soon to see, he received a foreign appointment from the
Republican President Madison, and was confirmed by a Republican
Senate. Many of Mr. Adams's acts, many of his traits, have been
harshly criticised, but for no act that he ever did or ever was
charged with doing has he been so harshly assailed as for this (p. 058)
journey from one camp to the other. The gentlemen of wealth, position,
and influence in Eastern Massachusetts, almost to a man, turned
against him with virulence; many of their descendants still cherish
the ancestral prejudice; and it may yet be a long while before the
last mutterings of this deep-rooted antipathy die away. But that they
will die away in time cannot be doubted. Praise will succeed to blame.
Truth must prevail in a case where such abundant evidence is
accessible; and the truth is that Mr. Adams's conduct was not ignoble,
mean, and traitorous, but honorable, courageous, and disinterested.
Those who singled him out for assault, though deaf to his arguments,
might even then have reflected that within a few years a large
proportion of the whole nation had changed in their opinions as he had
now at last changed in his, so that the party which under Washington
hardly had an existence and under John Adams was not, until the last
moment, seriously feared, now showed an enormous majority throughout
the whole country. Even in Massachusetts, the intrenched camp of the
Federalists, one half of the population were now Republicans. But that
change of political sentiment which in the individual voter is often
admired as evidence of independent thought is stigmatized in (p. 059)
those more prominent in politics as tergiversation and apostasy.
It may be admitted that there are sound reasons for holding party
leaders to a more rigid allegiance to party policy than is expected of
the rank and file; yet certainly, at those periods when substantially
new measures and new doctrines come to the front, the old party names
lose whatever sacredness may at other times be in them, and the
political fellowships of the past may properly be reformed. Novel
problems cannot always find old comrades still united in opinions.
Precisely such was the case with John Quincy Adams and the Federalists.
The earlier Federalist creed related to one set of issues, the later
Federalist creed to quite another set; the earlier creed was sound and
deserving of support; the later creed was not so. It is easy to see,
as one looks backward upon history, that every great and successful
party has its mission, that it wins its success through the substantial
righteousness of that mission, and that it owes its downfall to
assuming an erroneous attitude towards some subsequent matter which
becomes in turn of predominating importance. Sometimes, though rarely,
a party remains on the right side through two or even more successive
issues of profound consequence to the nation. The Federalist mission
was to establish the Constitution of the United States as a (p. 060)
vigorous, efficient, and practical system of government, to prove its
soundness, safety, and efficacy, and to defend it from the undermining
assaults of those who distrusted it and would have reduced it to
imbecility. Supplementary and cognate to this was the further task of
giving the young nation and the new system a chance to get fairly
started in life before being subjected to the strain of war and
European entanglements. To this end it was necessary to hold in check
the Jeffersonian or French party, who sought to embroil us in a
foreign quarrel. These two functions of the Federalist party were
quite in accord; they involved the organizing and domestic instinct
against the disorganizing and meddlesome; the strengthening against
the enfeebling process; practical thinking against fanciful theories.
Fortunately the able men had been generally of the sound persuasion,
and by powerful exertions had carried the day and accomplished their
allotted tasks so thoroughly that all subsequent generations of
Americans have been reaping the benefit of their labors. But by the
time that John Adams had concluded his administration the great
Federalist work had been sufficiently done. Those who still believe
that there is an overruling Providence in the affairs of men and
nations may well point to the history of this period in support (p. 061)
of their theory. Republicanism was not able to triumph till Federalism
had fulfilled all its proper duty and was on the point of going wrong.
During this earlier period John Quincy Adams had been a Federalist by
conviction as well as by education. Nor was there any obvious reason
for him to change his political faith with the change of party
success, brought about as that was before its necessity was apparent
but by the sure and inscrutable wisdom so marvellously enclosed in the
great popular instinct. It was not patent, when Mr. Jefferson
succeeded Mr. Adams, that Federalism was soon to become an unsound
political creed--unsound, not because it had been defeated, but
because it had done its work, and in the new emergency was destined to
blunder. During Mr. Jefferson's first administration no questions of
novel import arose. But they were not far distant, and soon were
presented by the British aggressions. A grave crisis was created by
this system of organized destruction of property and wholesale
stealing of citizens, now suddenly practised with such terrible
energy. What was to be done? What had the two great parties to advise
concerning the policy of the country in this hour of peril?
Unfortunately for the Federalists old predilections were allowed (p. 062)
now to govern their present action. Excusably Anglican in the bygone
days of Genet's mission, they now remained still Anglican, when to be
Anglican was to be emphatically un-American. As one reads the history
of 1807 and 1808 it is impossible not to feel almost a sense of
personal gratitude to John Quincy Adams that he dared to step out from
his meek-spirited party and do all that circumstances rendered
possible to promote resistance to insults and wrongs intolerable. In
truth, he was always a man of high temper, and eminently a patriotic
citizen of the United States. Unlike too many even of the best among
his countrymen in those early years of the Republic, he had no foreign
sympathies whatsoever; he was neither French nor English, but wholly,
exclusively, and warmly American. He had no second love; the United
States filled his public heart and monopolized his political
affections. When he was abroad he established neither affiliations nor
antipathies, and when he was at home he drifted with no party whose
course was governed by foreign magnets. It needs only that this
characteristic should be fully understood in order that his conduct in
1808 should be not alone vindicated but greatly admired.
At that time it was said, and it has been since repeated, that he (p. 063)
was allured by the loaves and fishes which the Republicans could
distribute, while the Federalists could cast to him only meagre and
uncertain crusts. Circumstances gave to the accusation such a
superficial plausibility that it was believed by many honest men under
the influence of political prejudice. But such a charge, alleged
concerning a single act in a long public career, is to be scanned with
suspicion. Disproof by demonstration is impossible; but it is fair to
seek for the character of the act in a study of the character of the
actor, as illustrated by the rest of his career. Thus seeking we shall
see that, if any traits can be surely predicated of any man,
independence, courage, and honesty may be predicated of Mr. Adams. His
long public life had many periods of trial, yet this is the sole
occasion when it is so much as possible seriously to question the
purity of his motives--for the story of his intrigue with Mr. Clay to
secure the Presidency was never really believed by any one except
General Jackson, and the beliefs of General Jackson are of little
consequence. From the earliest to the latest day of his public life,
he was never a party man. He is entitled to the justification to be
derived from this life-long habit, when, in 1807-8, he voted against
the wishes of those who had hoped to hold him in the bonds of (p. 064)
partisan alliance. In point of fact, so far from these acts being a
yielding to selfish and calculating temptation, they called for great
courage and strength of mind; instead of being tergiversation, they
were a triumph in a severe ordeal. Mr. Adams was not so dull as to
underrate, nor so void of good feeling as to be careless of, the storm
of obloquy which he had to encounter, not only in such shape as is
customary in like instances of a change of sides in politics, but, in
his present case, of a peculiarly painful kind. He was to seem
unfaithful, not only to a party, but to the bitter feud of a father
whom he dearly loved and greatly respected; he was to be reviled by
the neighbors and friends who constituted his natural social circle in
Boston; he was to alienate himself from the rich, the cultivated, the
influential gentlemen of his neighborhood, his comrades, who would
almost universally condemn his conduct. He was to lose his position as
Senator, and probably to destroy all hopes of further political
success so far as it depended upon the good will of the people of his
own State. In this he was at least giving up a certainty in exchange
for what even his enemies must admit to have been only an expectation.
But in fact it is now evident that there was not upon his part even an
expectation. At the first signs of the views which he was likely (p. 065)
to hold, that contemptible but influential Republican, Giles, of
Virginia, also one or two others of the same party, sought to approach
him with insinuating suggestions. But Mr. Adams met these advances in
a manner frigid and repellent even beyond his wont, and far from
seeking to conciliate these emissaries, and to make a bargain, or even
establish a tacit understanding for his own benefit, he held them far
aloof, and simply stated that he wished and expected nothing from the
administration. His mind was made up, his opinion was formed; no bribe
was needed to secure his vote. Not thus do men sell themselves in
politics. The Republicans were fairly notified that he was going to do
just as he chose; and Mr. Jefferson, the arch-enemy of all Adamses,
had no occasion to forego his feud to win this recruit from that
family.
Mr. Adams's Diary shows unmistakably that he was acting rigidly upon
principle, that he believed himself to be injuring or even destroying
his political prospects, and that in so doing he taxed his moral
courage severely. The whole tone of the Diary, apart from those few
distinct statements which hostile critics might view with distrust, is
despondent, often bitter, but defiant and stubborn. If in later life
he ever anticipated the possible publication of these private (p. 066)
pages, yet he could hardly have done so at this early day. Among
certain general reflections at the close of the year 1808, he writes:
"On most of the great national questions now under discussion, my
sense of duty leads me to support the Administration, and I find
myself, of course, in opposition to the Federalists in general. But I
have no communication with the President, other than that in the
regular order of business in the Senate. In this state of things my
situation calls in a peculiar manner for prudence; my political
prospects are declining, and, as my term of service draws near its
close, I am constantly approaching to the certainty of being restored
to the situation of a private citizen. For this event, however, I hope
to have my mind sufficiently prepared."
In July, 1808, the Republicans of the Congressional District wished to
send him to the House of Representatives, but to the gentleman who
waited upon him with this proposal he returned a decided negative.
Other considerations apart, he would not interfere with the reëlection
of his friend, Mr. Quincy.
Certain remarks, written when his senatorial term was far advanced,
when he had lost the confidence of the Federalists without obtaining
that of the Republicans, may be of interest at this point. He wrote,
October 30, 1807: "I employed the whole evening in looking over (p. 067)
the Journal of the Senate, since I have been one of its members. Of
the very little business which I have commenced during the four
sessions, at least three fourths has failed, with circumstances of
peculiar mortification. The very few instances in which I have
succeeded, have been always after an opposition of great obstinacy,
often ludicrously contrasting with the insignificance of the object in
pursuit. More than one instance has occurred where the same thing
which I have assiduously labored in vain to effect has been afterwards
accomplished by others, without the least resistance; more than once,
where the pleasure of disappointing me has seemed to be the prominent
principle of decision. Of the preparatory business, matured in
committees, I have had a share, gradually increasing through the four
sessions, but always as a subordinate member. The merely laborious
duties have been readily assigned to me, and as readily undertaken and
discharged. My success has been more frequent in opposition than in
carrying any proposition of my own, and I hope I have been
instrumental in arresting many unadvised purposes and projects. Though
as to the general policy of the country I have been uniformly in a
small, and constantly deceasing minority; my opinions and votes have
been much oftener in unison with the Administration than with (p. 068)
their opponents; I have met with at least as much opposition from
my party friends as from their adversaries,--I believe more. I know
not that I have made any personal enemies now in Senate, nor can I
flatter myself with having acquired any personal friends. There have
been hitherto two, Mr. Tracey and Mr. Plumer, upon whom I could rely,
but it has pleased Providence to remove one by death, and the changes
of political party have removed the other." This is a striking
paragraph, certainly not written by a man in a very cheerful or
sanguine frame of mind, not by one who congratulates himself on having
skilfully taken the initial steps in a brilliant political career;
but, it is fair to say, by one who has at least tried to do his duty,
and who has not knowingly permitted himself to be warped either by
passion, prejudice, party alliances, or selfish considerations.
As early as November, 1805, Mr. Adams, being still what may be
described as an independent Federalist, was approached by Dr. Rush
with tentative suggestions concerning a foreign mission. Mr. Madison,
then Secretary of State, and even President Jefferson were apparently
not disinclined to give him such employment, provided he would be
willing to accept it at their hands. Mr. Adams simply replied, (p. 069)
that he would not refuse a nomination merely because it came from Mr.
Jefferson, though there was no office in the President's gift for
which he had any wish. Perhaps because of the unconciliatory coolness
of this response, or perhaps for some better reason, the nomination
did not follow at that time. No sooner, however, had Mr. Madison
fairly taken the oath of office as President than he bethought him of
Mr. Adams, now no longer a Federalist, but, concerning the present
issues, of the Republican persuasion. On March 6, 1809, Mr. Adams was
notified by the President personally of the intention to nominate him
as Minister Plenipotentiary to Russia. It was a new mission, the first
minister ever nominated to Russia having been only a short time before
rejected by the Senate. But the Emperor had often expressed his wish
to exchange ministers, and Mr. Madison was anxious to comply with the
courteous request. Mr. Adams's name was accordingly at once sent to
the Senate. But on the following day, March 7, that body resolved that
"it is inexpedient at this time to appoint a minister from the United
States to the Court of Russia." The vote was seventeen to fifteen, and
among the seventeen was Mr. Adams's old colleague, Timothy Pickering,
who probably never in his life cast a vote which gave him so much (p. 070)
pleasure. Mr. Madison, however, did not readily desist from his
purpose, and a few months later, June 26, he sent a message to the
Senate, stating that the considerations previously leading him to
nominate a minister to Russia had since been strengthened, and again
naming Mr. Adams for the post. This time the nomination was confirmed
with readiness, by a vote of nineteen to seven, Mr. Pickering, of
course, being one of the still hostile minority.
At noon on August 5, 1809, records Mr. Adams, "I left my house at the
corner of Boylston and Nassau streets, in Boston," again to make the
tedious and uncomfortable voyage across the Atlantic. A miserable and
a dangerous time he had of it ere, on October 23, he reached St.
Petersburg. Concerning the four years and a half which he is now to
spend in Russia very little need be said. His active duties were of
the simplest character, amounting to little more than rendering
occasional assistance to American shipmasters suffering beneath the
severities so often illegally inflicted by the contesting powers of
Europe. But apart from the slender practical service to be done, the
period must have been interesting and agreeable for him personally,
for he was received and treated throughout his stay by the Emperor
and his courtiers with distinguished kindness. The Emperor, who (p. 071)
often met him walking, used to stop and chat with him, while Count
Romanzoff, the minister of foreign affairs, was cordial beyond the
ordinary civility of diplomacy. The Diary records a series of court
presentations, balls, fêtes, dinners, diplomatic and other, launches,
displays of fireworks, birthday festivities, parades, baptisms, plays,
state funerals, illuminations, and Te Deums for victories; in short,
every species of social gayety and public pageant. At all these Mr.
Adams was always a bidden and apparently a welcome guest. It must be
admitted, even by his detractors, that he was an admirable
representative of the United States abroad. Having already seen much
of the distinguished society of European courts, but retaining a
republican simplicity, which was wholly genuine and a natural part of
his character and therefore was never affected or offensive in its
manifestations, he really represented the best element in the politics
and society of the United States. Winning respect for himself he won
it also for the country which he represented. Thus he was able to
render an indirect but essential service in cementing the kindly
feeling which the Russian Empire entertained for the American Republic.
Russia could then do us little good and almost no harm, yet the (p. 072)
friendship of a great European power had a certain moral value in
those days of our national infancy. That friendship, so cordially
offered, Mr. Adams was fortunately well fitted to conciliate, showing
in his foreign callings a tact which did not mark him in other public
relations. He was perhaps less liked by his travelling fellow
countrymen than by the Russians. The paltry ambition of a certain
class of Americans for introduction to high society disgusted him
greatly, and he was not found an efficient ally by these would-be
comrades of the Russian aristocracy. "The ambition of young Americans
to crowd themselves upon European courts and into the company of
nobility is a very ridiculous and not a very proud feature of their
character," he wrote; "there is nothing, in my estimate of things,
meaner than courting society where, if admitted, it is only to be
despised." He himself happily combined extensive acquirements,
excellent ability, diplomatic and courtly experience, and natural
independence of character without ill-bred self-assertion, and never
failed to create a good impression in the many circles into which his
foreign career introduced him.
The ambassadors and ministers from European powers at St. Petersburg
were constantly wrangling about precedence and like petty matters of
court etiquette. "In all these controversies," writes Mr. Adams, (p. 073)
"I have endeavored to consider it as an affair in which I, as an
_American_ minister, had no concern; and that my only principle is to
dispute upon precedence with nobody." A good-natured contempt for
European follies may be read between the lines of this remark; wherein
it may be said that the Monroe Doctrine is applied to court etiquette.
He always made it a point to live within the meagre income which the
United States allowed him, but seems to have suffered no diminution of
consideration for this reason. One morning, walking on the Fontanka,
he met the Emperor, who said: "Mons. Adams, il y a cent ans que je ne
vous ai vu;" and then continuing the conversation, "asked me whether I
intended to take a house in the country this summer. I said, No....
'And why so?' said he. I was hesitating upon an answer when he
relieved me from embarrassment by saying, 'Peut-être sont-ce des
considerations de finance?' As he said it with perfect good humor and
with a smile, I replied in the same manner: 'Mais Sire, elles y sont
pour une bonne part.'"[2]
[Footnote 2: An interesting sketch of his household
and its expenses is to be found in ii. Diary, 193.]
The volume of the journal which records this residence in St. Petersburg
is very interesting as a picture of Russian life and manners in high
society. Few travellers write anything nearly so vivid, so (p. 074)
thorough, or so trustworthy as these entries. Moreover, during the
whole period of his stay the great wars of Napoleon were constantly
increasing the astonishment of mankind, and created intense excitement
at the Court of Russia. These feelings waxed stronger as it grew daily
more likely that the Emperor would have to take his turn also as a
party defendant in the great conflict. Then at last came the fact of
war, the invasion of Russia, the burning of Moscow, the disastrous
retreat of the invaders ending in ignominious flight, the advance of
the allies, finally the capture of Paris. All this while Mr. Adams at
St. Petersburg witnessed first the alarm and then the exultation of
the court and the people as the rumors now of defeat, anon of victory,
were brought by the couriers at tantalizing intervals; and he saw the
rejoicings and illuminations which rendered the Russian capital so
brilliant and glorious during the last portion of his residence. It
was an experience well worth having, and which is pleasantly depicted
in the Diary.
In September, 1812, Count Romanzoff suggested to Mr. Adams the
readiness of the Emperor to act as mediator in bringing about peace
between the United States and England. The suggestion was promptly
acted upon, but with no directly fortunate results. The American (p. 075)
government acceded at once to the proposition, and at the risk of an
impolitic display of readiness dispatched Messrs. Gallatin and Bayard
to act as Commissioners jointly with Mr. Adams in the negotiations.
These gentlemen, however, arrived in St. Petersburg only to find
themselves in a very awkward position. Their official character might
not properly be considered as attaching unless England should accept
the offer of mediation. But England had refused, in the first
instance, to do this, and she now again reiterated her refusal without
regard for the manifestation of willingness on the part of the United
States. Further, Mr. Gallatin's nomination was rejected by the Senate
after his departure, on the ground that his retention of the post of
Secretary of the Treasury was incompatible, under the Constitution,
with this diplomatic function. So the United States appeared in a very
annoying attitude, her Commissioners were uncomfortable and somewhat
humiliated; Russia felt a certain measure of vexation at the brusque
and positive rejection of her friendly proposition on the part of
Great Britain; and that country alone came out of the affair with any
self-satisfaction.
But by the time when all hopes of peace through the friendly offices
of Russia were at an end, that stage of the conflict had been (p. 076)
reached at which both parties were quite ready to desist. The United
States, though triumphing in some brilliant naval victories, had been
having a sorry experience on land, where, as the Russian minister
remarked, "England did as she pleased." A large portion of the people
were extremely dissatisfied, and it was impossible to ignore that the
outlook did not promise better fortunes in the future than had been
encountered in the past. On the other hand, England had nothing
substantial to expect from a continuance of the struggle, except heavy
additional expenditure which it was not then the fashion to compel the
worsted party to recoup. She accordingly intimated her readiness to
send Commissioners to Göttingen, for which place Ghent was afterwards
substituted, to meet American Commissioners and settle terms of
pacification. The United States renewed the powers of Messrs. Adams,
Bayard, and Gallatin, a new Secretary of the Treasury having in the
meantime been appointed, and added Jonathan Russell, then Minister to
Sweden, and Henry Clay. England deputed Lord Gambier, an admiral, Dr.
Adams, a publicist, and Mr. Goulburn, a member of Parliament and Under
Secretary of State. These eight gentlemen accordingly met in Ghent on
August 7, 1814.
It was upwards of four months before an agreement was reached. (p. 077)
During this period Mr. Adams kept his Diary with much more even than
his wonted faithfulness, and it undoubtedly presents the most vivid
picture in existence of the labors of treaty-making diplomatists. The
eight were certainly an odd assemblage of peacemakers. The ill-blood
and wranglings between the opposing Commissions were bad enough, yet
hardly equalled the intestine dissensions between the American
Commissioners themselves. That the spirit of peace should ever have
emanated from such an universal embroilment is almost sufficiently
surprising to be regarded as a miracle. At the very beginning, or even
before fairly beginning, the British party roused the jealous ire of
the Americans by proposing that they all should meet, for exchanging
their full powers, at the lodgings of the Englishmen. The Americans
took fire at this "offensive pretension to superiority" which was "the
usage from Ambassadors to Ministers of an inferior order." Mr. Adams
cited Martens, and Mr. Bayard read a case from Ward's "Law of Nations."
Mr. Adams suggested sending a pointed reply, agreeing to meet the
British Commissioners "at any place other than their own lodgings;"
but Mr. Gallatin, whose valuable function was destined to be the
keeping of the peace among his fractious colleagues, as well as (p. 078)
betwixt them and the Englishmen, substituted the milder phrase, "at
any place which may be mutually agreed upon." The first meeting
accordingly took place at the Hôtel des Pays Bas, where it was
arranged that the subsequent conferences should be held alternately at
the quarters of the two Commissions. Then followed expressions,
conventional and proper but wholly untrue, of mutual sentiments of
esteem and good will.
No sooner did the gentlemen begin to get seriously at the work before
them than the most discouraging prospects were developed. The British
first presented their demands, as follows: 1. That the United States
should conclude a peace with the Indian allies of Great Britain, and
that a species of neutral belt of Indian territory should be
established between the dominions of the United States and Great
Britain, so that these dominions should be nowhere conterminous, upon
which belt or barrier neither power should be permitted to encroach
even by purchase, and the boundaries of which should be settled in
this treaty. 2. That the United States should keep no naval force upon
the Great Lakes, and should neither maintain their existing forts nor
build new ones upon their northern frontier; it was even required that
the boundary line should run along the southern shore of the (p. 079)
lakes; while no corresponding restriction was imposed upon Great
Britain, because she was stated to have no projects of conquest as
against her neighbor. 3. That a piece of the province of Maine should
be ceded, in order to give the English a road from Halifax to Quebec.
4. That the stipulation of the treaty of 1783, conferring on English
subjects the right of navigating the Mississippi, should be now
formally renewed.
The Americans were astounded; it seemed to them hardly worth while to
have come so far to listen to such propositions. Concerning the
proposed Indian pacification they had not even any powers, the United
States being already busied in negotiating a treaty with the tribes as
independent powers. The establishment of the neutral Indian belt was
manifestly contrary to the established policy and obvious destiny of
the nation. Neither was the answer agreeable, which was returned by
Dr. Adams to the inquiry as to what was to be done with those citizens
of the United States who had already settled in those parts of
Michigan, Illinois, and Ohio, included within the territory which it
was now proposed to make inalienably Indian. He said that these
people, amounting perhaps to one hundred thousand, "must shift for
themselves." The one-sided disarmament upon the lakes and along the
frontier was, by the understanding of all nations, such an (p. 080)
humiliation as is inflicted only on a crushed adversary. No return was
offered for the road between Halifax and Quebec; nor for the right of
navigating the Mississippi. The treaty of peace of 1783, made in
ignorance of the topography of the unexplored northern country, had
established an impossible boundary line running from the Lake of the
Woods westward along the forty-ninth parallel to the Mississippi; and
as appurtenant to the British territory, thus supposed to touch the
river, a right of navigation upon it was given. It had since been
discovered that a line on that parallel would never touch the
Mississippi. The same treaty had also secured for the United States
certain rights concerning the Northeastern fisheries. The English now
insisted upon a re-affirmance of the privilege given to them, without
a re-affirmance of the privilege given to the United States; ignoring
the fact that the recent acquisition of Louisiana, making the
Mississippi wholly American, materially altered the propriety of a
British right of navigation upon it.
Apart from the intolerable character of these demands, the personal
bearing of the English Commissioners did not tend to mitigate the
chagrin of the Americans. The formal civilities had counted with the
American Commissioners for more than they were worth, and had (p. 081)
induced them, in preparing a long dispatch to the home government,
to insert "a paragraph complimentary to the personal deportment" of
the British. But before they sent off the document they revised it and
struck out these pleasant phrases. Not many days after the first
conference Mr. Adams notes that the tone of the English Commissioners
was even "more peremptory, and their language more overbearing, than
at the former conferences." A little farther on he remarks that "the
British note is overbearing and insulting in its tone, like the two
former ones." Again he says:--
"The tone of all the British notes is arrogant, overbearing, and
offensive. The tone of ours is neither so bold nor so spirited as
I think it should be. It is too much on the defensive, and too
excessive in the caution to say nothing irritating. I have seldom
been able to prevail upon my colleagues to insert anything in the
style of retort upon the harsh and reproachful matter which we
receive."
Many little passages-at-arms in the conferences are recited which
amply bear out these remarks as regards both parties. Perhaps,
however, it should be admitted that the Americans made up for the
self-restraint which they practised in conference by the disagreements
and bickerings in which they indulged when consulting among (p. 082)
themselves. Mr. Gallatin's serene temper and cool head were hardly
taxed to keep the peace among his excited colleagues. Mr. Adams and
Mr. Clay were especially prone to suspicions and to outbursts of
anger. Mr. Adams often and candidly admits as much of himself,
apparently not without good reason. At first the onerous task of
drafting the numerous documents which the Commission had to present
devolved upon him, a labor for which he was well fitted in all
respects save, perhaps, a tendency to prolixity. He did not, however,
succeed in satisfying his comrades, and the criticisms to which they
subjected his composition galled his self-esteem severely, so much so
that erelong he altogether relinquished this function, which was
thereafter performed chiefly by Mr. Gallatin. As early as August 21,
Mr. Adams says, not without evident bitterness, that though they all
were agreed on the general view of the subject, yet in his "exposition
of it, one objects to the form, another to the substance, of almost
every paragraph." Mr. Gallatin would strike out everything possibly
offensive to the Englishmen; Mr. Clay would draw his pen through every
figurative expression; Mr. Russell, not content with agreeing to all
the objections of both the others, would further amend the construction
of every sentence; and finally Mr. Bayard would insist upon (p. 083)
writing all over again in his own language. All this nettled Mr. Adams
exceedingly. On September 24 he again writes that it was agreed to
adopt an article which he had drawn, "though with objections to almost
every word" which he had used. "This," he says, "is a severity with
which I alone am treated in our discussions by all my colleagues.
Almost everything written by any of the rest is rejected, or agreed to
with very little criticism, verbal or substantial. But every line that
I write passes a gauntlet of objections by every one of my colleagues,
which finally issues, for the most part, in the rejection of it all."
He reflects, with a somewhat forced air of self-discipline, that this
must indicate some faultiness in his composition which he must try to
correct; but in fact it is sufficiently evident that he was seldom
persuaded that his papers were improved. Amid all this we see in the
Diary many exhibitions of vexation. One day he acknowledges, "I cannot
always restrain the irritability of my temper;" another day he
informed his colleagues, "with too much warmth, that they might be
assured I was as determined as they were;" again he reflects, "I, too,
must not forget to keep a constant guard upon my temper, for the time
is evidently approaching when it will be wanted." Mr. Gallatin alone
seems not to have exasperated him; Mr. Clay and he were constantly (p. 084)
in discussion, and often pretty hotly. Instead of coming nearer
together, as time went on, these two fell farther apart. What Mr. Clay
thought of Mr. Adams may probably be inferred from what we know that
Mr. Adams thought of Mr. Clay. "Mr. Clay is losing his temper, and
growing peevish and fractious," he writes on October 31; and constantly
he repeats the like complaint. The truth is, that the precise New
Englander and the impetuous Westerner were kept asunder not only by
local interests but by habits and modes of thought utterly dissimilar.
Some amusing glimpses of their private life illustrate this
difference. Mr. Adams worked hard and diligently, allowing himself
little leisure for pleasure; but Mr. Clay, without actually neglecting
his duties, yet managed to find ample time for enjoyment. More than
once Mr. Adams notes that, as he rose about five o'clock in the
morning to light his own fire and begin the labors of the day by
candle-light, he heard the parties breaking up and leaving Mr. Clay's
rooms across the entry, where they had been playing cards all night
long. In these little touches one sees the distinctive characters of
the men well portrayed.
The very extravagance of the British demands at least saved the (p. 085)
Americans from perplexity. Mr. Clay, indeed, cherished an "inconceivable
idea" that the Englishmen would "finish by receding from the ground
they had taken;" but meantime there could be no difference of opinion
concerning the impossibility of meeting them upon that ground. Mr.
Adams, never lacking in courage, actually wished to argue with them
that it would be for the interests of Great Britain not less than of
the United States if Canada should be ceded to the latter power.
Unfortunately his colleagues would not support him in this audacious
policy, the humor of which is delicious. It would have been infinitely
droll to see how the British Commissioners would have hailed such a
proposition, by way of appropriate termination of a conflict in which
the forces of their nation had captured and ransacked the capital city
of the Americans!
On August 21 the Englishmen invited the Americans to dinner on the
following Saturday. "The chance is," wrote Mr. Adams, "that before
that time the whole negotiation will be at an end." The banquet,
however, did come off, and a few more succeeded it; feasts not marked
by any great geniality or warmth, except perhaps occasionally warmth
of discussion. So sure were the Americans that they were about to
break off the negotiations that Mr. Adams began to consider by (p. 086)
what route he should return to St. Petersburg; and they declined to
renew the tenure of their quarters for more than a few days longer.
Like alarms were of frequent occurrence, even almost to the very day
of agreement. On September 15, at a dinner given by the American
Commissioners, Lord Gambier asked Mr. Adams whether he would return
immediately to St. Petersburg. "Yes," replied Mr. Adams, "that is, if
you send us away." His lordship "replied with assurances how deeply he
lamented it, and with a hope that we should one day be friends again."
On the same occasion Mr. Goulburn said that probably the last note of
the Americans would "terminate the business," and that they "must
fight it out." Fighting it out was a much less painful prospect for
Great Britain just at that juncture than for the United States, as the
Americans realized with profound anxiety. "We so fondly cling to the
vain hope of peace, that every new proof of its impossibility operates
upon us as a disappointment," wrote Mr. Adams. No amount of pride
could altogether conceal the fact that the American Commissioners
represented the worsted party, and though they never openly said so
even among themselves, yet indirectly they were obliged to recognize
the truth. On November 10 we find Mr. Adams proposing to make (p. 087)
concessions not permitted by their instructions, because, as he said:--
"I felt so sure that [the home government] would now gladly take
the state before the war as the general basis of the peace, that
I was prepared to take on me the responsibility of trespassing
upon their instructions thus far. Not only so, but I would at
this moment cheerfully give my life for a peace on this basis. If
peace was possible, it would be on no other. I had indeed no hope
that the proposal would be accepted."
Mr. Clay thought that the British would laugh at this: "They would say,
Ay, ay! pretty fellows you, to think of getting out of the war as well
as you got into it." This was not consoling for the representatives of
that side which had declared war for the purpose of curing grievances
and vindicating alleged rights. But that Mr. Adams correctly read the
wishes of the government was proved within a very few days by the
receipt of express authority from home "to conclude the peace on the
basis of the _status ante bellum_." Three days afterwards, on November
27, three and a half months after the vexatious haggling had been
begun, we encounter in the Diary the first real gleam of hope of a
successful termination: "All the difficulties to the conclusion of a
peace appear to be now so nearly removed, that my colleagues all (p. 088)
consider it as certain. I myself think it probable."
There were, however, some three weeks more of negotiation to be gone
through before the consummation was actually achieved, and the ill
blood seemed to increase as the end was approached. The differences
between the American Commissioners waxed especially serious concerning
the fisheries and the navigation of the Mississippi. Mr. Adams
insisted that if the treaty of peace had been so far abrogated by the
war as to render necessary a re-affirmance of the British right of
navigating the Mississippi, then a re-affirmance of the American
rights in the Northeastern fisheries was equally necessary. This the
English Commissioners denied. Mr. Adams said it was only an exchange
of privileges presumably equivalent. Mr. Clay, however, was firmly
resolved to prevent all stipulations admitting such a right of
navigation, and the better to do so he was quite willing to let the
fisheries go. The navigation privilege he considered "much too
important to be conceded for the mere liberty of drying fish upon a
desert," as he was pleased to describe a right for which the United
States has often been ready to go to war and may yet some time do so.
"Mr. Clay lost his temper," writes Mr. Adams a day or two later, (p. 089)
"as he generally does whenever this right of the British to navigate
the Mississippi is discussed. He was utterly averse to admitting it as
an equivalent for a stipulation securing the contested part of the
fisheries. He said the more he heard of this [the right of fishing],
the more convinced he was that it was of little or no value. He should
be glad to get it if he could, but he was sure the British would not
ultimately grant it. That the navigation of the Mississippi, on the
other hand, was an object of immense importance, and he could see no
sort of reason for granting it as an equivalent for the fisheries."
Thus spoke the representative of the West. The New Englander--the son
of the man whose exertions had been chiefly instrumental in originally
obtaining the grant of the Northeastern fishery privileges--naturally
went to the other extreme. He thought "the British right of navigating
the Mississippi to be as nothing, considered as a grant from us. It
was secured to them by the peace of 1783, they had enjoyed it at the
commencement of the war, it had never been injurious in the slightest
degree to our own people, and it appeared to [him] that the British
claim to it was just and equitable." Further he "believed the right to
this navigation to be a very useless thing to the British.... But
their national pride and honor were interested in it; the (p. 090)
government could not make a peace which would abandon it." The
fisheries, however, Mr. Adams regarded as one of the most inestimable
and inalienable of American rights. It is evident that the United
States could ill have spared either Mr. Adams or Mr. Clay from the
negotiation, and the joinder of the two, however fraught with
discomfort to themselves, well served substantial American interests.
Mr. Adams thought the British perfidious, and suspected them of not
entertaining any honest intention of concluding a peace. On December
12, after an exceedingly quarrelsome conference, he records his belief
that the British have "insidiously kept open" two points, "for the
sake of finally breaking off the negotiations and making all their
other concessions proofs of their extreme moderation, to put upon us
the blame of the rupture."
On December 11 we find Mr. Clay ready "for a war three years longer,"
and anxious "to begin to play at _brag_" with the Englishmen. His
colleagues, more complaisant or having less confidence in their own
skill in that game, found it difficult to placate him; he "stalked to
and fro across the chamber, repeating five or six times, 'I will never
sign a treaty upon the _status ante bellum_ with the Indian article.
So help me God!'" The next day there was an angry controversy (p. 091)
with the Englishmen. The British troops had taken and held Moose
Island in Passamaquoddy Bay, the rightful ownership of which was in
dispute. The title was to be settled by arbitrators. But the question,
whether the British should restore possession of the island pending
the arbitration, aroused bitter discussion. "Mr. Goulburn and Dr.
Adams (the Englishman) immediately took fire, and Goulburn lost all
control of his temper. He has always in such cases," says the Diary,
"a sort of convulsive agitation about him, and the tone in which he
speaks is more insulting than the language which he uses." Mr. Bayard
referred to the case of the Falkland Islands. "'Why' (in a transport
of rage), said Goulburn, 'in that case we sent a fleet and troops and
drove the fellows off; and that is what we ought to have done in this
case.'" Mr. J. Q. Adams, whose extensive and accurate information more
than once annoyed his adversaries, stated that, as he remembered it,
"the Spaniards in that case had driven the British off,"--and Lord
Gambier helped his blundering colleague out of the difficulty by
suggesting a new subject, much as the defeated heroes of the Iliad
used to find happy refuge from death in a god-sent cloud of dust. It
is amusing to read that in the midst of such scenes as these the (p. 092)
show of courtesy was still maintained; and on December 13 the
Americans "all dined with the British Plenipotentiaries," though "the
party was more than usually dull, stiff, and reserved." It was
certainly forcing the spirit of good fellowship. The next day Mr. Clay
notified his colleagues that they were going "to make a damned bad
treaty, and he did not know whether he would sign it or not;" and Mr.
Adams also said that he saw that the rest had made up their minds "at
last to yield the fishery point," in which case he also could not sign
the treaty. On the following day, however, the Americans were
surprised by receiving a note from the British Commissioners, wherein
they made the substantial concession of omitting from the treaty all
reference to the fisheries and the navigation of the Mississippi. But
Mr. Clay, on reading the note, "manifested some chagrin," and "still
talked of breaking off the negotiation," even asking Mr. Adams to join
him in so doing, which request, however, Mr. Adams very reasonably
refused. Mr. Clay had also been anxious to stand out for a distinct
abandonment of the alleged right of impressment; but upon this point
he found none of his colleagues ready to back him, and he was compelled
perforce to yield. Agreement was therefore now substantially (p. 093)
reached; a few minor matters were settled, and on December 24, 1814,
the treaty was signed by all the eight negotiators.
It was an astonishing as well as a happy result. Never, probably, in
the history of diplomacy has concord been produced from such discordant
elements as had been brought together in Ghent. Dissension seemed to
have become the mother of amity; and antipathies were mere
preliminaries to a good understanding; in diplomacy as in marriage it
had worked well to begin with a little aversion. But, in truth, this
consummation was largely due to what had been going on in the English
Cabinet. At the outset Lord Castlereagh had been very unwilling to
conclude peace, and his disposition had found expression in the
original intolerable terms prepared by the British Commissioners. But
Lord Liverpool had been equally solicitous on the other side, and was
said even to have tendered his resignation to the Prince Regent, if an
accommodation should not be effected. His endeavors were fortunately
aided by events in Europe. Pending the negotiations Lord Castlereagh
went on a diplomatic errand to Vienna, and there fell into such
threatening discussions with the Emperor of Russia and the King of
Prussia, that he thought it prudent to have done with the American (p. 094)
war, and wrote home pacific advices. Hence, at last, came such
concessions as satisfied the Americans.
The treaty established "a firm and universal peace between his
Britannic Majesty and the United States." Each party was to restore
all captured territory, except that the islands of which the title was
in dispute were to remain in the occupation of the party holding them
at the time of ratification until that title should be settled by
commissioners; provision was made also for the determination of all
the open questions of boundary by sundry boards of commissioners; each
party was to make peace with the Indian allies of the other. Such
were, in substance, the only points touched upon by this document. Of
the many subjects mooted between the negotiators scarcely any had
survived the fierce contests which had been waged concerning them. The
whole matter of the navigation of the Mississippi, access to that
river, and a road through American territory, had been dropped by the
British; while the Americans had been well content to say nothing of
the Northeastern fisheries, which they regarded as still their own.
The disarmament on the lakes and along the Canadian border, and the
neutralization of a strip of Indian territory, were yielded by the (p. 095)
English. The Americans were content to have nothing said about
impressment; nor was any one of the many illegal rights exercised by
England formally abandoned. The Americans satisfied themselves with
the reflection that circumstances had rendered these points now only
matters of abstract principle, since the pacification of Europe had
removed all opportunities and temptations for England to persist in
her previous objectionable courses. For the future it was hardly to be
feared that she would again undertake to pursue a policy against which
it was evident that the United States were willing to conduct a
serious war. There was, however, no provision for indemnification.
Upon a fair consideration, it must be admitted that though the treaty
was silent upon all the points which the United States had made war
for the purpose of enforcing, yet the country had every reason to be
gratified with the result of the negotiation. The five Commissioners
had done themselves ample credit. They had succeeded in agreeing with
each other; they had avoided any fracture of a negotiation which, up
to the very end, seemed almost daily on the verge of being broken off
in anger; they had managed really to lose nothing, in spite of the
fact that their side had had decidedly the worst of the struggle. (p. 096)
They had negotiated much more successfully than the armies of their
countrymen had fought. The Marquis of Wellesley said, in the House of
Lords, that "in his opinion the American Commissioners had shown a
most astonishing superiority over the British during the whole of the
correspondence." One cannot help wishing that the battle of New Orleans
had taken place a little earlier, or that the negotiation had fallen a
little later, so that news of that brilliant event could have reached
the ears of the insolent Englishmen at Ghent, who had for three months
been enjoying the malicious pleasure of lending to the Americans
English newspapers containing accounts of American misfortunes. But
that fortunate battle was not fought until a few days after the eight
Commissioners had signed their compact. It is an interesting
illustration of the slowness of communication which our forefathers
had to endure, that the treaty crossed the Atlantic in a sailing ship
in time to travel through much of the country simultaneously with the
report of this farewell victory. Two such good pieces of news coming
together set the people wild with delight. Even on the dry pages of
Niles's "Weekly Register" occurs the triumphant paragraph: "Who would
not be an American? Long live the Republic! All hail! last asylum (p. 097)
of oppressed humanity! Peace is signed in the arms of victory!" It was
natural that most of the ecstasy should be manifested concerning the
military triumph, and that the mass of the people should find more
pleasure in glorifying General Jackson than in exalting the Commissioners.
The value of their work, however, was well proved by the voice of
Great Britain. In the London "Times" of December 30 appeared a most
angry tirade against the treaty, with bitter sneers at those who
called the peace an "honorable" one. England, it was said, "had
attempted to force her principles on America, and had failed." Foreign
powers would say that the English "had retired from the combat with
the stripes yet bleeding on their backs,--with the recent defeats at
Plattsburgh and on Lake Champlain unavenged." The most gloomy
prognostications of further wars with America when her naval power
should have waxed much greater were indulged. The loss of prestige in
Europe, "the probable loss of our trans-Atlantic provinces," were
among the results to be anticipated from this treaty into which the
English Commissioners had been beguiled by the Americans. These latter
were reviled with an abuse which was really the highest compliment. The
family name of Mr. Adams gained no small access of distinction in (p. 098)
England from this business.
After the conclusion of the treaty Mr. Adams went to Paris, and
remained there until the middle of May, 1815, thus having the good
fortune to witness the return of Napoleon and a great part of the
events of the famous "hundred days." On May 26 he arrived in London,
where there awaited him, in the hands of the Barings, his commission
as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Great Britain.
His first duty was, in connection with Mr. Clay and Mr. Gallatin, to
negotiate a treaty of commerce, in which business he again met the
same three British Commissioners by whom the negotiations at Ghent had
been conducted, of whose abilities the government appeared to
entertain a better opinion than the Marquis of Wellesley had
expressed. This negotiation had been brought so far towards conclusion
by his colleagues before his own arrival that Mr. Adams had little to
do in assisting them to complete it. This little having been done,
they departed and left him as Minister at the Court of St. James. Thus
he fulfilled Washington's prophecy, by reaching the highest rank in
the American diplomatic service.
Of his stay in Great Britain little need be said. He had few duties of
importance to perform. The fisheries, the right of impressment, (p. 099)
and the taking away and selling of slaves by British naval officers
during the late war, formed the subjects of many interviews between
him and Lord Castlereagh, without, however, any definite results being
reached. But he succeeded in obtaining, towards the close of his stay,
some slight remission of the severe restrictions placed by England
upon our trade with her West Indian colonies. His relations with a
cabinet in which the principles of Castlereagh and Canning
predominated could hardly be cordial, yet he seems to have been
treated with perfect civility. Indeed, he was not a man whom it was
easy even for an Englishman to insult. He remarks of Castlereagh,
after one of his first interviews with that nobleman: "His deportment
is sufficiently graceful, and his person is handsome. His manner was
cold, but not absolutely repulsive." Before he left he had the
pleasure of having Mr. Canning specially seek acquaintance with him.
He met, of course, many distinguished and many agreeable persons
during his residence, and partook of many festivities, especially of
numerous civic banquets at which toasts were formally given in the
dullest English fashion and he was obliged to display his capacity for
"table-cloth oratory," as he called it, more than was agreeable to
him. He was greatly bored by these solemn and pompous feedings. (p. 100)
Partly in order to escape them he took a house at Ealing, and lived
there during the greater part of his stay in England. "One of the
strongest reasons for my remaining out of town," he writes, "is to
escape the frequency of invitations at late hours, which consume so
much precious time, and with the perpetually mortifying consciousness
of inability to return the civility in the same manner." The
republican simplicity, not to say poverty, forced upon American
representatives abroad, was a very different matter in the censorious
and unfriendly society of London from what it had been at the kindly
disposed Court of St. Petersburg. The relationship between the mother
country and the quondam colonies, especially at that juncture, was
such as to render social life intolerably trying to an under-paid
American minister.
Mr. Adams remained in England until June 15, 1817, when he sailed from
Cowes, closing forever his long and honorable diplomatic career, and
bidding his last farewell to Europe. He returned home to take the post
of Secretary of State in the cabinet of James Monroe, then lately
inaugurated as President of the United States.
CHAPTER II (p. 101)
SECRETARY OF STATE AND PRESIDENT
From the capitals of Russia and Great Britain to the capital of the
United States was a striking change. Washington, in its early struggle
for existence, was so unattractive a spot, that foreigners must have
been at a loss to discover the principle which had governed the
selection. It combined all the ugliness with all the discomfort of an
unprosperous frontier settlement on an ill-chosen site. What must
European diplomats have thought of a capital city where snakes two
feet long invaded gentlemen's drawing-rooms, and a carriage, bringing
home the guests from a ball, could be upset by the impenetrable depth
of quagmire at the very door of a foreign minister's residence. A
description of the city given by Mr. Mills, a Representative from
Massachusetts, in 1815, is pathetic in its unutterable horror:--
"It is impossible [he writes] for me to describe to you my
feelings on entering this miserable desert, this scene of
desolation and horror.... My anticipations were almost (p. 102)
infinitely short of the reality, and I can truly say that the
first appearance of this seat of the national government has
produced in me nothing but absolute loathing and disgust."
If the place wore such a dreadful aspect to the simple denizen of a
New England country town, what must it have seemed to those who were
familiar with London and Paris? To them the social life must have been
scarcely less dreary than the rest of the surroundings. Accordingly,
with this change of scene, the Diary, so long a record of festivities
sometimes dull and formal, but generally collecting interesting and
distinguished persons, ceases almost wholly to refer to topics of
society. Yet, of course, even the foul streets could not prevent
people from occasionally meeting together. There were simple
tea-drinkings, stupid weekly dinners at the President's, infrequent
receptions by Mrs. Monroe, card-parties and conversation-parties,
which at the British minister's were very "elegant," and at the French
minister's were more gay. Mons. de Neuville, at his dinners, used to
puzzle and astound the plain-living Yankees by serving dishes of
"turkeys without bones, and puddings in the form of fowls, fresh cod
disguised like a salad, and celery like oysters;" further, he
scandalized some and demoralized others by having dancing on (p. 103)
Saturday evenings, which the New England ladies had been "educated to
consider as holy time." Mr. and Mrs. Adams used to give weekly parties
on Tuesday evenings, and apparently many persons stood not a little in
awe of these entertainments and of the givers of them, by reason of
their superior familiarity with the manners and customs of the best
society of Europe. Mrs. Adams was, "on the whole, a very pleasant and
agreeable woman; but the Secretary [had] no talent to entertain a
mixed company, either by conversation or manners;" thus writes this
same Mr. Mills, whose sentiments towards Mr. Adams were those of
respect rather than of personal liking. The favorite dissipation then
consisted in card-playing, and the stakes were too often out of all
just proportion to the assets of the gamesters. At one time Mr. Clay
was reputed to have lost $8,000, an amount so considerable for him as
to weigh upon his mind to the manifest detriment of his public
functions. But sometimes the gentlemen resident in the capital met for
purposes less innocent than Saturday evening cotillons, or even than
extravagant betting at the card-table, and stirred the dulness of
society by a duel. Mr. Adams tells of one affair of this sort, fought
between ex-Senator Mason, of Virginia, and his cousin, wherein the
weapons used were muskets, and the distance was only six paces. (p. 104)
Mason was killed; his cousin was wounded, and only by a lucky
accident escaped with his life. Mr. Adams had little time and less
taste for either the amusements or the dangers thus offered to him; he
preferred to go to bed in good season, to get up often long before
daybreak, and to labor assiduously the livelong day. His favorite
exercise was swimming in the Potomac, where he accomplished feats
which would have been extraordinary for a young and athletic man.
The most important, perplexing, and time-consuming duties then called
for by the condition of public affairs happened to fall within Mr.
Adams's department. Monroe's administration has been christened the
"era of good feeling;" and, so far as political divisions among the
people at large were concerned, this description is correct enough.
There were no great questions of public policy dividing the nation.
There could hardly be said to be two political parties. With the close
of the war the malcontent Federalists had lost the only substantial
principle upon which they had been able vigorously to oppose the
administration, and as a natural consequence the party rapidly shrank
to insignificant proportions, and became of hardly more importance
than were the Jacobites in England after their last hopes had (p. 105)
been quenched by the failure of the Rebellion of '45. The Federalist
faith, like Jacobitism, lingered in a few neighborhoods, and was
maintained by a few old families, who managed to associate it with a
sense of their own pride and dignity; but as an effective opposition
or influential party organization it was effete, and no successor was
rising out of its ruins. In a broad way, therefore, there was
political harmony to a very remarkable degree.
But among individuals there was by no means a prevailing good feeling.
Not held together by the pressure exerted by the antagonism of a
strong hostile force, the prominent men of the Cabinet and in Congress
were busily employed in promoting their own individual interests.
Having no great issues with which to identify themselves, and upon
which they could openly and honorably contend for the approval of the
nation, their only means for securing their respective private ends
lay in secretly overreaching and supplanting each other. Infinite
skill was exerted by each to inveigle his rival into an unpopular
position or a compromising light. By a series of precedents Mr. Adams,
as Secretary of State, appeared most prominent as a candidate for the
succession to the Presidency. But Mr. Crawford, in the Treasury
Department, had been very near obtaining the nomination instead (p. 106)
of Monroe, and he was firmly resolved to secure it so soon as Mr.
Monroe's eight years should have elapsed. He, therefore, finding much
leisure left upon his hands by the not very exacting business of his
office, devoted his ingenuity to devising schemes for injuring the
prestige of Mr. Adams. Mr. Clay also had been greatly disappointed
that he had not been summoned to be Secretary of State, and so made
heir apparent. His personal enmity was naturally towards Mr. Monroe;
his political enmity necessarily also included Mr. Adams, whose
appointment he had privately sought to prevent. He therefore at once
set himself assiduously to oppose and thwart the administration, and
to make it unsuccessful and unpopular. That Clay was in the main and
upon all weighty questions an honest statesman and a real patriot must
be admitted, but just at this period no national crisis called his
nobler qualities into action, and his course was largely influenced by
selfish considerations. It was not long before Mr. Calhoun also
entered the lists, though in a manner less discreditable to himself,
personally, than were the resources of Crawford and Clay. The daily
narrations and comments of Mr. Adams display and explain in a manner
highly instructive, if not altogether agreeable, the ambitions (p. 107)
and the manoeuvres, the hollow alliances and unworthy intrigues, not
only of these three, but also of many other estimable gentlemen then
in political life. The difference between those days and our own seems
not so great as the _laudatores temporis acti_ are wont to proclaim
it. The elaborate machinery which has since been constructed was then
unknown; rivals relied chiefly upon their own astuteness and the aid
of a few personal friends and adherents for carrying on contests and
attaining ends which are now sought by vastly more complex methods.
What the stage-coach of that period was to the railroads of to-day, or
what the hand-loom was to our great cotton mills, such also was the
political intriguing of cabinet ministers, senators, and
representatives to our present party machinery. But the temper was no
better, honor was no keener, the sense of public duty was little more
disinterested then than now. One finds no serious traces of vulgar
financial dishonesty recorded in these pages, in which Mr. Adams has
handed down the political life of the second and third decades of our
century with a photographic accuracy. But one does not see a much
higher level of faithfulness to ideal standards in political life than
now exists.
[Illustration: Wm. H. Crawford.]
As has been said, it so happened that in Mr. Monroe's (p. 108)
administration the heaviest burden of labor and responsibility rested
upon Mr. Adams; the most important and most perplexing questions fell
within his department. Domestic breaches had been healed, but foreign
breaches gaped with threatening jaws. War with Spain seemed imminent.
Her South American colonies were then waging their contest for
independence, and naturally looked to the late successful rebels of
the northern continent for acts of neighborly sympathy and good
fellowship. Their efforts to obtain official recognition and the
exchange of ministers with the United States were eager and persistent.
Privateers fitted out at Baltimore gave the State Department scarcely
less cause for anxiety than the shipbuilders of Liverpool gave to the
English Cabinet in 1863-64. These perplexities, as is well known,
caused the passage of the first "Neutrality Act," which first
formulated and has since served to establish the principle of
international obligation in such matters, and has been the basis of
all subsequent legislation upon the subject not only in this country
but also in Great Britain.
The European powers, impelled by a natural distaste for rebellion by
colonists, and also believing that Spain would in time prevail over
the insurgents, turned a deaf ear to South American agents. But in the
United States it was different. Here it was anticipated that the (p. 109)
revolted communities were destined to win; Mr. Adams records this as
his own opinion; besides which there was also a natural sympathy felt
by our people in such a conflict in their own quarter of the globe.
Nevertheless, in many anxious cabinet discussions, the President and
the Secretary of State established the policy of reserve and caution.
Rebels against an established government are like plaintiffs in
litigation; the burden of proof is upon them, and the neutral nations
who are a sort of quasi-jurors must not commit themselves to a
decision prematurely. The grave and inevitable difficulties besetting
the administration in this matter were seriously enhanced by the
conduct of Mr. Clay. Seeking nothing so eagerly as an opportunity to
harass the government, he could have found none more to his taste than
this question of South American recognition. His enthusiastic and
rhetorical temperament rejoiced in such a topic for his luxuriant
oratory, and he lauded freedom and abused the administration with a
force of expression far from gratifying to the responsible heads of
government in their troublesome task.
Apart from these matters the United States had direct disputes of a
threatening character pending with Spain concerning the boundaries of
Louisiana. Naturally enough boundary lines in the half explored (p. 110)
wilderness of this vast continent were not then marked with that
indisputable accuracy which many generations and much bloodshed had
achieved in Europe; and of all uncertain boundaries that of Louisiana
was the most so. Area enough to make two or three States, more or
less, might or might not be included therein. Such doubts had proved a
ready source of quarrel, which could hardly be assuaged by General
Jackson marching about in unquestionable Spanish territory, seizing
towns and hanging people after his lawless, ignorant, energetic
fashion. Mr. Adams's chief labor, therefore, was by no means of a
promising character, being nothing less difficult than to conclude a
treaty between enraged Spain and the rapacious United States, where
there was so much wrong and so much right on both sides, and such a
wide obscure realm of doubt between the two that an amicable agreement
might well seem not only beyond expectation but beyond hope.
Many and various also were the incidental obstacles in Mr. Adams's
way. Not the least lay in the ability of Don Onis, the Spanish
Minister, an ambassador well selected for his important task and whom
the American thus described:--
"Cold, calculating, wily, always commanding his own temper, (p. 111)
proud because he is a Spaniard, but supple and cunning,
accommodating the tone of his pretensions precisely to the degree
of endurance of his opponent, bold and overbearing to the utmost
extent to which it is tolerated, careless of what he asserts or
how grossly it is proved to be unfounded, his morality appears to
be that of the Jesuits as exposed by Pascal. He is laborious,
vigilant, and ever attentive to his duties; a man of business and
of the world."
Fortunately this so dangerous negotiator was hardly less anxious than
Mr. Adams to conclude a treaty. Yet he, too, had his grave difficulties
to encounter. Spanish arrogance had not declined with the decline of
Spanish strength, and the concessions demanded from that ancient
monarchy by the upstart republic seemed at once exasperating and
humiliating. The career of Jackson in Florida, while it exposed the
weakness of Spain, also sorely wounded her pride. Nor could the
grandees, three thousand miles away, form so accurate an opinion of
the true condition and prospects of affairs as could Don Onis upon
this side of the water. One day, begging Mr. Adams to meet him upon a
question of boundary, "he insisted much upon the infinite pains he had
taken to prevail upon his government to come to terms of accommodation,"
and pathetically declared that "the King's Council was composed (p. 112)
of such ignorant and stupid _nigauds_, grandees of Spain, and priests,"
that Mr. Adams "could have no conception of their obstinacy and
imbecility."
Other difficulties in Mr. Adams's way were such as ought not to have
been encountered. The only substantial concession which he was willing
to make was in accepting the Sabine instead of the Rio del Norte as
the southwestern boundary of Louisiana. But no sooner did rumors of
this possible yielding get abroad than he was notified that Mr. Clay
"would take ground against" any treaty embodying it. From Mr. Crawford
a more dangerous and insidious policy was to be feared. Presumably he
would be well pleased either to see Mr. Adams fail altogether in the
negotiation, or to see him conclude a treaty which would be in some
essential feature odious to the people.
"That all his conduct [wrote Mr. Adams] is governed by his views
to the Presidency, as the ultimate successor to Mr. Monroe, and
that his hopes depend upon a result unfavorable to the success or
at least to the popularity of the Administration, is perfectly
clear.... His talent is intrigue. And as it is in the foreign
affairs that the success or failure of the Administration will be
most conspicuous, and as their success would promote the
reputation and influence, and their failure would lead to (p. 113)
the disgrace of the Secretary of State, Crawford's personal
views centre in the ill-success of the Administration in its
foreign relations; and, perhaps unconscious of his own motives,
he will always be impelled to throw obstacles in its way, and to
bring upon the Department of State especially any feeling of
public dissatisfaction that he can, ... and although himself a
member of the Administration, he perceives every day more clearly
that his only prospect of success hereafter depends upon the
failure of the Administration by measures of which he must take
care to make known his disapprobation."
President Monroe was profoundly anxious for the consummation of the
treaty, and though for a time he was in perfect accord with Mr. Adams,
yet as the Spanish minister gradually drew nearer and nearer to a full
compliance with the American demands, Monroe began to fear that the
Secretary would carry his unyielding habit too far, and by insistence
upon extreme points which might well enough be given up, would allow
the country to drift into war.
Fortunately, as it turned out, Mr. Adams was not afraid to take the
whole responsibility of success or failure upon his own shoulders,
showing indeed a high and admirable courage and constancy amid such
grave perplexities, in which it seemed that all his future political
fortunes were involved. He caused the proffered mediation of (p. 114)
Great Britain to be rejected. He availed himself of no aid save only
the services of Mons. de Neuville, the French minister, who took a
warm interest in the negotiation, expostulated and argued constantly
with Don Onis and sometimes with Mr. Adams, served as a channel of
communication and carried messages, propositions, and denials, which
could better come filtered through a neutral go-between than pass
direct from principal to principal. In fact, Mr. Adams needed no other
kind of aid except just this which was so readily furnished by the
civil and obliging Frenchman. As if he had been a mathematician
solving a problem in dynamics, he seemed to have measured the precise
line to which the severe pressure of Spanish difficulties would compel
Don Onis to advance. This line he drew sharply, and taking his stand
upon it in the beginning he made no important alterations in it to the
end. Day by day the Spaniard would reluctantly approach toward him at
one point or another, solemnly protesting that he could not make
another move, by argument and entreaty urging, almost imploring, Mr.
Adams in turn to advance and meet him. But Mr. Adams stood rigidly
still, sometimes not a little vexed by the other's lingering manoeuvres,
and actually once saying to the courtly Spaniard that he "was so (p. 115)
wearied out with the discussion that it had become nauseous;" and,
again, that he "really could discuss no longer, and had given it up in
despair." Yet all the while he was never wholly free from anxiety
concerning the accuracy of his calculations as to how soon the Don
might on his side also come to a final stand. Many a tedious and
alarming pause there was, but after each halt progress was in time
renewed. At last the consummation was reached, and except in the
aforementioned matter of the Sabine boundary no concession even in
details had been made by Mr. Adams. The United States was to receive
Florida, and in return only agreed to settle the disputed claims of
certain of her citizens against Spain to an amount not to exceed five
million dollars; while the claims of Spanish subjects against the
United States were wholly expunged. The western boundary was so
established as to secure for this country the much-coveted outlet to
the shores of the "South Sea," as the Pacific Ocean was called, south
of the Columbia River; the line also was run along the southern banks
of the Red and Arkansas rivers, leaving all the islands to the United
States and precluding Spain from the right of navigation. Mr. Adams
had achieved a great triumph.
On February 22, 1819, the two negotiators signed and sealed the (p. 116)
counterparts of the treaty. Mr. Adams notes that it is "perhaps
the most important day of my life," and justly called it "a great
epoch in our history." Yet on the next day the "Washington City
Gazette" came out with a strong condemnation of the Sabine concession,
and expressed the hope that the Senate would not agree to it. "This
paragraph," said Mr. Adams, "comes directly or indirectly from Mr.
Clay." But the paragraph did no harm, for on the following day the
treaty was confirmed by an unanimous vote of the Senate.
It was not long, however, before the pleasure justly derivable from
the completion of this great labor was cruelly dashed. It appeared
that certain enormous grants of land, made by the Spanish king to
three of his nobles, and which were supposed to be annulled by the
treaty, so that the territory covered by them would become the public
property of the United States, bore date earlier than had been
understood, and for this reason would, by the terms of the treaty, be
left in full force. This was a serious matter, and such steps as were
still possible to set it right were promptly taken. Mr. Adams appealed
to Don Onis to state in writing that he himself had understood that
these grants were to be annulled, and that such had been the intention
of the treaty. The Spaniard replied in a shape imperfectly (p. 117)
satisfactory. He shuffled, evaded, and laid himself open to suspicion
of unfair dealing, though the charge could not be regarded as fully
proved against him. Mr. Adams, while blaming himself for carelessness
in not having more closely examined original documents, yet felt
"scarce a doubt" that Onis "did intend by artifice to cover the grants
while we were under the undoubting impression they were annulled;" and
he said to M. de Neuville, concerning this dark transaction, that "it
was not the ingenious device of a public minister, but '_une fourberie
de Scapin_.'" Before long the rumor got abroad in the public prints in
the natural shape of a "malignant distortion," and Mr. Adams was
compelled to see with chagrin his supposed brilliant success
threatening to turn actually to his grave discredit by reason of this
unfortunate oversight.
What might have been the result had the treaty been ratified by Spain
can only be surmised. But it so befell--happily enough for the United
States and for Mr. Adams, as it afterwards turned out--that the
Spanish government refused to ratify. The news was, however, that they
would forthwith dispatch a new minister to explain this refusal and to
renew negotiations.
For his own private part Mr. Adams strove to endure this buffet (p. 118)
of unkindly fortune with that unflinching and stubborn temper,
slightly dashed with bitterness, which stood him in good stead in many
a political trial during his hard-fighting career. But in his official
capacity he had also to consider and advise what it behooved the
administration to do under the circumstances. The feeling was
widespread that the United States ought to possess Florida, and that
Spain had paltered with us long enough. More than once in cabinet
meetings during the negotiation the Secretary of State, who was always
prone to strong measures, had expressed a wish for an act of Congress
authorizing the Executive to take forcible possession of Florida and
of Galveston in the event of Spain refusing to satisfy the reasonable
demands made upon her. Now, stimulated by indignant feeling, his
prepossession in favor of vigorous action was greatly strengthened,
and his counsel was that the United States should prepare at once to
take and hold the disputed territory, and indeed some undisputed
Spanish territory also. But Mr. Monroe and the rest of the Cabinet
preferred a milder course; and France and Great Britain ventured to
express to this country a hope that no violent action would be
precipitately taken. So the matter lay by for a while, awaiting the
coming of the promised envoy from Spain.
At this time the great question of the admission of Missouri into (p. 119)
the Union of States began to agitate Congress and the nation. Mr.
Adams, deeply absorbed in the perplexing affairs of his department,
into which this domestic problem did not enter, was at first careless
of it. His ideas concerning the matter, he wrote, were a "chaos;" but
it was a "chaos" into which his interest in public questions soon
compelled him to bring order. In so doing he for the first time fairly
exposes his intense repulsion for slavery, his full appreciation of
the irrepressible character of the conflict between the slave and the
free populations, and the sure tendency of that conflict to a
dissolution of the Union. Few men at that day read the future so
clearly. While dissolution was generally regarded as a threat not
really intended to be carried out, and compromises were supposed to be
amply sufficient to control the successive emergencies, the underlying
moral force of the anti-slavery movement acting against the
encroaching necessities of the slave-holding communities constituted
an element and involved possibilities which Mr. Adams, from his
position of observation outside the immediate controversy, noted with
foreseeing accuracy. He discerned in passing events the "title-page to
a great tragic volume;" and he predicted that the more or less distant
but sure end must be an attempt to dissolve the Union. His own (p. 120)
position was distinctly defined from the outset, and his strong
feelings were vigorously expressed. He beheld with profound regret the
superiority of the slave-holding party in ability; he remarked sadly
how greatly they excelled in debating power their lukewarm opponents;
he was filled with indignation against the Northern men of Southern
principles. "Slavery," he wrote, "is the great and foul stain upon the
North American Union, and it is a contemplation worthy of the most
exalted soul whether its total abolition is or is not practicable." "A
life devoted to" the emancipation problem "would be nobly spent or
sacrificed." He talks with much acerbity of expression about the
"slave-drivers," and the "flagrant image of human inconsistency"
presented by men who had "the Declaration of Independence on their
lips and the merciless scourge of slavery in their hands." "Never," he
says, "since human sentiments and human conduct were influenced by
human speech was there a theme for eloquence like the free side of
this question.... Oh, if but one man could arise with a genius capable
of comprehending, and an utterance capable of communicating those
eternal truths that belong to this question, to lay bare in all its
nakedness that outrage upon the goodness of God, human slavery; (p. 121)
now is the time and this is the occasion, upon which such a man would
perform the duties of an angel upon earth." Before the Abolitionists
had begun to preach their great crusade this was strong and ardent
language for a statesman's pen. Nor were these exceptional passages;
there is much more of the same sort at least equally forcible. Mr.
Adams notes an interesting remark made to him by Calhoun at this time.
The great Southern chief, less prescient than Mr. Adams, declared that
he did not think that the slavery question "would produce a
dissolution of the Union; but if it should, the South would be from
necessity compelled to form an alliance offensive and defensive with
Great Britain."
Concerning a suggestion that civil war might be preferable to the
extension of slavery beyond the Mississippi, Adams said: "This is a
question between the rights of human nature and the Constitution of
the United States"--a form of stating the case which leaves no doubt
concerning his ideas of the intrinsic right and wrong in the matter.
His own notion was that slavery could not be got rid of within the
Union, but that the only method would be dissolution, after which he
trusted that the course of events would in time surely lead to
reorganization upon the basis of universal freedom for all. He (p. 122)
was not a disunionist in any sense, yet it is evident that his strong
tendency and inclination were to regard emancipation as a weight in
the scales heavier than union, if it should ever come to the point of
an option between the two.
Strangely enough the notion of a forcible retention of the slave
States within the Union does not seem to have been at this time a
substantial element of consideration. Mr. Adams acknowledged that
there was no way at once of preserving the Union and escaping from the
present emergency save through the door of compromise. He maintained
strenuously the power of Congress to prohibit slavery in the
Territories, and denied that either Congress or a state government
could establish slavery as a new institution in any State in which it
was not already existing and recognized by law.
This agitation of the slavery question made itself felt in a way
personally interesting to Mr. Adams, by the influence it was exerting
upon men's feelings concerning the still pending and dubious treaty
with Spain. The South became anxious to lay hands upon the Floridas
and upon as far-reaching an area as possible in the direction of
Mexico, in order to carve it up into more slave States; the North, on
the other hand, no longer cared very eagerly for an extension of the
Union upon its southern side. Sectional interests were getting to (p. 123)
be more considered than national. Mr. Adams could not but recognize
that in the great race for the Presidency, in which he could hardly
help being a competitor, the chief advantage which he seemed to have
won when the Senate unanimously ratified the Spanish treaty, had
almost wholly vanished since that treaty had been repudiated by Spain
and was now no longer desired by a large proportion of his own
countrymen.
Matters stood thus when the new Spanish envoy, Vivês, arrived. Other
elements, which there is not space to enumerate here, besides those
referred to, now entering newly into the state of affairs, further
reduced the improbability of agreement almost to hopelessness. Mr.
Adams, despairing of any other solution than a forcible seizure of
Florida, to which he had long been far from averse, now visibly
relaxed his efforts to meet the Spanish negotiator. Perhaps no other
course could have been more effectual in securing success than this
obvious indifference to it. In the prevalent condition of public
feeling and of his own sentiments Mr. Adams easily assumed towards
General Vivês a decisive bluntness, not altogether consonant to the
habits of diplomacy, and manifested an unchangeable stubbornness which
left no room for discussion. His position was simply that Spain might
make such a treaty as the United States demanded, or might take (p. 124)
the consequences of her refusal. His dogged will wore out the
Spaniard's pride, and after a fruitless delay the King and Cortes
ratified the treaty in its original shape, with the important addition
of an explicit annulment of the land grants. It was again sent in to
the Senate, and in spite of the "continued, systematic, and laborious
effort" of "Mr. Clay and his partisans to make it unpopular," it was
ratified by a handsome majority, there being against it "only four
votes--Brown, of Louisiana, who married a sister of Clay's wife;
Richard M. Johnson, of Kentucky, against his own better judgment, from
mere political subserviency to Clay; Williams, of Tennessee, from
party impulses connected with hatred of General Jackson; and Trimble,
of Ohio, from some maggot of the brain." Two years had elapsed since
the former ratification, and no little patience had been required to
await so long the final achievement of a success so ardently longed
for, once apparently gained, and anon so cruelly thwarted. But the
triumph was rather enhanced than diminished by all this difficulty and
delay. A long and checkered history, wherein appeared infinite labor,
many a severe trial of temper and hard test of moral courage, bitter
disappointment, ignoble artifices of opponents, ungenerous (p. 125)
opposition growing out of unworthy personal motives at home, was now
at last closed by a chapter which appeared only the more gratifying by
contrast with what had gone before. Mr. Adams recorded, with less of
exultation than might have been pardonable, the utter discomfiture of
"all the calculators of my downfall by the Spanish negotiation," and
reflected cheerfully that he had been left with "credit rather augmented
than impaired by the result,"--credit not in excess of his deserts.
Many years afterwards, in changed circumstances, an outcry was raised
against the agreement which was arrived at concerning the southwestern
boundary of Louisiana. Most unjustly it was declared that Mr. Adams
had sacrificed a portion of the territory of the United States. But
political motives were too plainly to be discerned in these tardy
criticisms; and though General Jackson saw fit, for personal reasons,
to animadvert severely upon the clause establishing this boundary
line, yet there was abundant evidence to show not only that he, like
almost everybody else, had been greatly pleased with it at the time,
but even that he had then upon consultation expressed a deliberate and
special approval.
The same day, February 22, 1821, closed, says Mr. Adams, "two of the
most memorable transactions of my life." That he should speak thus (p. 126)
of the exchange of ratifications of the Spanish treaty is natural; but
the other so "memorable transaction" may not appear of equal magnitude.
It was the sending in to Congress of his report upon weights and
measures. This was one of those vast labors, involving tenfold more
toil than all the negotiations with Onis and Vivês, but bringing no
proportionate fame, however well it might be performed. The subject
was one which had "occupied for the last sixty years many of the
ablest men in Europe, and to which all the power and all the
philosophical and mathematical learning and ingenuity of France and of
Great Britain" had during that period been incessantly directed. It
was fairly enough described as a "fearful and oppressive task." Upon
its dry and uncongenial difficulties Mr. Adams had been employed with
his wonted industry for upwards of four years; he now spoke of the
result modestly as "a hurried and imperfect work." But others, who
have had to deal with the subject, have found this report a solid and
magnificent monument of research and reflection, which has not even
yet been superseded by later treatises. Mr. Adams was honest in labor
as in everything, and was never careless at points where inaccuracy or
lack of thoroughness might be expected to escape detection. (p. 127)
Hence his success in a task upon which it is difficult to imagine other
statesmen of that day--Clay, Webster, or Calhoun, for example--so much
as making an effort. The topic is not one concerning which readers
would tolerate much lingering. Suffice it then to say that the
document illustrated the ability and the character of the man, and so
with this brief mention to dismiss in a paragraph an achievement
which, had it been accomplished in any more showy department, would
alone have rendered Mr. Adams famous.
It is highly gratifying now to look back upon the high spirit and
independent temper uniformly displayed by Mr. Adams abroad and at home
in all dealings with foreign powers. Never in any instance did he
display the least tinge of that rodomontade and boastful extravagance
which have given an underbred air to so many of our diplomats, and
which inevitably cause the basis for such self-laudation to appear of
dubious sufficiency. But he had the happy gift of a native pride which
enabled him to support in the most effective manner the dignity of the
people for whom he spoke. For example, in treaties between the United
States and European powers the latter were for a time wont to name
themselves first throughout the instruments, contrary to the custom of
alternation practised in treaties between themselves. With some (p. 128)
difficulty, partly interposed, it must be confessed, by his own
American coadjutors, Mr. Adams succeeded in putting a stop to this
usage. It was a matter of insignificant detail, in one point of view;
but in diplomacy insignificant details often symbolize important
facts, and there is no question that this habit had been construed as
a tacit but intentional arrogance of superiority on the part of the
Europeans.
For a long period after the birth of the country there was a strong
tendency, not yet so eradicated as to be altogether undiscoverable, on
the part of American statesmen to keep one eye turned covertly askance
upon the trans-Atlantic courts, and to consider, not without a certain
anxious deference, what appearance the new United States might be
presenting to the critical eyes of foreign countries and diplomats.
Mr. Adams was never guilty of such indirect admissions of an inferiority
which apparently he never felt. In the matter of the acquisition of
Florida, Crawford suggested that England and France regarded the
people of the United States as ambitious and encroaching; wherefore he
advised a moderate policy in order to remove this impression. Mr.
Adams on the other side declared that he was not in favor of our
giving ourselves any concern whatever about the opinions of any (p. 129)
foreign power. "If the world do not hold us for Romans," he said,
"they will take us for Jews, and of the two vices I would rather be
charged with that which has greatness mingled in its composition." His
views were broad and grand. He was quite ready to have the world
become "familiarized with the idea of considering our proper dominion
to be the continent of North America." This extension he declared to
be a "law of nature." To suppose that Spain and England could, through
the long lapse of time, retain their possessions on this side of the
Atlantic seemed to him a "physical, moral, and political absurdity."
The doctrine which has been christened with the name of President
Monroe seems likely to win for him the permanent glory of having
originated the wise policy which that familiar phrase now signifies.
It might, however, be shown that by right of true paternity the
bantling should have borne a different patronymic. Not only is the
"Monroe Doctrine," as that phrase is customarily construed in our day,
much more comprehensive than the simple theory first expressed by
Monroe and now included in the modern doctrine as a part in the whole,
but a principle more fully identical with the imperial one of to-day
had been conceived and shaped by Mr. Adams before the delivery of (p. 130)
Monroe's famous message. As has just been remarked, he looked forward
to the possession of the whole North American continent by the United
States as a sure destiny, and for his own part, whenever opportunity
offered, he was never backward to promote this glorious ultimate
consummation. He was in favor of the acquisition of Louisiana, whatever
fault he might find with the scheme of Mr. Jefferson for making it a
state; he was ready in 1815 to ask the British plenipotentiaries to
cede Canada simply as a matter of common sense and mutual convenience,
and as the comfortable result of a war in which the United States had
been worsted; he never labored harder than in negotiating for the
Floridas, and in pushing our western boundaries to the Pacific; in
April, 1823, he wrote to the American minister at Madrid the significant
remark: "It is scarcely possible to resist the conviction that the
annexation of Cuba to our Federal Republic will be indispensable to
the continuance and integrity of the Union." Encroachments never
seemed distasteful to him, and he was always forward to stretch a
point in order to advocate or defend a seizure of disputed North
American territory, as in the cases of Amelia Island, Pensacola, and
Galveston. When discussion arose with Russia concerning her (p. 131)
possessions on the northwest coast of this continent, Mr. Adams
audaciously told the Russian minister, Baron Tuyl, July 17, 1823,
"that we should contest the rights of Russia to _any_ territorial
establishment on this continent, and that we should assume distinctly
the principle that the American continents are no longer subjects for
any new European colonial establishments." "This," says Mr. Charles
Francis Adams in a footnote to the passage in the Diary, "is the first
hint of the policy so well known afterwards as the Monroe Doctrine."
Nearly five months later, referring to the same matter in his message
to Congress, December 2, 1823, President Monroe said: "The occasion
has been judged proper for asserting, as a principle in which the
rights and interests of the United States are involved, that the
American continents, by the free and independent condition which they
have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as
subjects for future colonization by any European powers."
It will be observed that both Mr. Adams and President Monroe used the
phrase "continents," including thereby South as well as North America.
A momentous question was imminent, which fortunately never called for
a determination by action, but which in this latter part of 1823
threatened to do so at any moment. Cautious and moderate as the (p. 132)
United States had been, under Mr. Adams's guidance, in recognizing
the freedom and autonomy of the South American states, yet in time the
recognition was made of one after another, and the emancipation of
South America had come, while Mr. Adams was yet Secretary, to be
regarded as an established fact. But now, in 1823-24, came mutterings
from across the Atlantic indicating a strong probability that the
members of the Holy Alliance would interfere in behalf of monarchical
and anti-revolutionary principles, and would assist in the resubjugation
of the successful insurgents. That each one of the powers who should
contribute to this huge crusade would expect and receive territorial
reward could not be doubted. Mr. Adams, in unison with most of his
countrymen, contemplated with profound distrust and repulsion the
possibility of such an European inroad. Stimulated by the prospect of
so unwelcome neighbors, he prepared some dispatches, "drawn to
correspond exactly" with the sentiments of Mr. Monroe's message, in
which he appears to have taken a very high and defiant position. These
documents, coming before the Cabinet for consideration, caused some
flutter among his associates. In the possible event of the Holy
Alliance actually intermeddling in South American affairs, it was (p. 133)
said, the principles enunciated by the Secretary of State would
involve this country in war with a very formidable confederation. Mr.
Adams acknowledged this, but courageously declared that in such a
crisis he felt quite ready to take even this spirited stand. His
audacious spirit went far in advance of the cautious temper of the
Monroe administration; possibly it went too far in advance of the
dictates of a wise prudence, though fortunately the course of events
never brought this question to trial; and it is at least gratifying to
contemplate such a manifestation of daring temper.
But though so bold and independent, Mr. Adams was not habitually
reckless nor prone to excite animosity by needless arrogance in action
or extravagance in principle. In any less perilous extremity than was
presented by this menaced intrusion of combined Europe he followed
rigidly the wise rule of non-interference. For many years before this
stage was reached he had been holding in difficult check the
enthusiasts who, under the lead of Mr. Clay, would have embroiled us
with Spain and Portugal. Once he was made the recipient of a very
amusing proposition from the Portuguese minister, that the United
States and Portugal, as "the two great powers of the western hemisphere,"
should concert together a grand American system. The drollery pf (p. 134)
this notion was of a kind that Mr. Adams could appreciate, though
to most manifestations of humor he was utterly impervious. But after
giving vent to some contemptuous merriment he adds, with a just and
serious pride: "As to an American system, we have it; we constitute
the whole of it; there is no community of interests or of principles
between North and South America." This sound doctrine was put forth in
1820; and it was only modified in the manner that we have seen during
a brief period in 1823, in face of the alarming vision not only of
Spain and Portugal restored to authority, but of Russia in possession
of California and more, France in possession of Mexico, and perhaps
Great Britain becoming mistress of Cuba.
So far as European affairs were concerned, Mr. Adams always and
consistently refused to become entangled in them, even in the slightest
and most indirect manner. When the cause of Greek liberty aroused the
usual throng of noisy advocates for active interference, he contented
himself with expressions of cordial sympathy, accompanied by perfectly
distinct and explicit statements that under no circumstances could any
aid in the way of money or auxiliary forces be expected from this
country. Neutrals we were and would remain in any and all (p. 135)
European quarrels. When Stratford Canning urged, with the uttermost
measure of persistence of which even he was capable, that for the
suppression of the slave trade some such arrangement might be made as
that of mixed tribunals for the trial of slave-trading vessels, and
alleged that divers European powers were uniting for this purpose, Mr.
Adams suggested, as an insuperable obstacle, "the general extra-European
policy of the United States--a policy which they had always pursued as
best suited to their own interests, and best adapted to harmonize with
those of Europe. This policy had also been that of Europe, which had
never considered the United States as belonging to her system.... It
was best for both parties that they should continue to do so." In any
European combinations, said Mr. Adams, in which the United States
should become a member, she must soon become an important power, and
must always be, in many respects, an uncongenial one. It was best that
she should keep wholly out of European politics, even of such leagues
as one for the suppression of the slave trade. He added, that he did
not wish his language to be construed as importing "an unsocial and
sulky spirit on the part of the United States;" for no such temper
existed; it had simply been the policy of Europe to consider (p. 136)
this country as standing aloof from all European federations, and in
this treatment "we had acquiesced, because it fell in with our own
policy."
In a word, Mr. Adams, by his language and actions, established and
developed precisely that doctrine which has since been adopted by this
country under the doubly incorrect name of the "Monroe Doctrine,"--a
name doubly incorrect, because even the real "Monroe Doctrine" was not
an original idea of Mr. Monroe, and because the doctrine which now
goes by that name is not identical with the doctrine which Monroe did
once declare. Mr. Adams's principle was simply that the United States
would take no part whatsoever in foreign politics, not even in those
of South America, save in the extreme event, eliminated from among
things possible in this generation, of such an interference as was
contemplated by the Holy Alliance; and that, on the other hand, she
would permit no European power to gain any new foothold upon this
continent. Time and experience have not enabled us to improve upon the
principles which Mr. Adams worked out for us.
Mr. Adams had some pretty stormy times with Mr. Stratford Canning--the
same gentleman who in his later life is familiar to the readers of (p. 137)
Kinglake's "History of the Crimean War" as Lord Stratford de
Redclyffe, or Eltchi. That minister's overbearing and dictatorial
deportment was afterwards not out of place when he was representing
the protecting power of Great Britain in the court of the "sick man."
But when he began to display his arrogance in the face of Mr. Adams he
found that he was bearding one who was at least his equal in pride and
temper. The naïve surprise which he manifested on making this
discovery is very amusing, and the accounts of the interviews between
the two are among the most pleasing episodes in the history of our
foreign relations. Nor are they less interesting as a sort of
confidential peep at the asperities of diplomacy. It appears that
besides the composed and formal dignity of phrase which alone the
public knows in published state papers and official correspondence,
there is also an official language of wrath and retort not at all
artificial or stilted, but quite homelike and human in its sound.
One subject much discussed between Mr. Adams and Mr. Canning related
to the English propositions for joint efforts to suppress the slave
trade. Great Britain had engaged with much vigor and certainly with an
admirable humanity in this cause. Her scheme was that each power
should keep armed cruisers on the coast of Africa, that the (p. 138)
war-ships of either nation might search the merchant vessels of the
other, and that mixed courts of joint commissioners should try all
cases of capture. This plan had been urged upon the several European
nations, but with imperfect success. Portugal, Spain, and the
Netherlands had assented to it; Russia, France, Austria, and Prussia
had rejected it. Mr. Adams's notion was that the ministry were, in
their secret hearts, rather lukewarm in the business, but that they
were so pressed by "the party of the saints in Parliament" that they
were obliged to make a parade of zeal. Whether this suspicion was
correct or not, it is certain that Mr. Stratford Canning was very
persistent in the presentation of his demands, and could not be
persuaded to take No for an answer. Had it been possible to give any
more favorable reply no one in the United States in that day would
have been better pleased than Mr. Adams to do so. But the obstacles
were insuperable. Besides the undesirability of departing from the
"extra-European policy," the mixed courts would have been
unconstitutional, and could not have been established even by act of
Congress, while the claims advanced by Great Britain to search our
ships for English-born seamen in time of war utterly precluded the
possibility of admitting any rights of search whatsoever upon her (p. 139)
part, even in time of peace, for any purpose or in any shape. In vain
did the Englishman reiterate his appeal. Mr. Adams as often explained
that the insistence of England upon her outrageous claim had rendered
the United States so sensitive upon the entire subject of search that
no description of right of that kind could ever be tolerated. "All
concession of principle," he said, "tended to encourage encroachment,
and if naval officers were once habituated to search the vessels of
other nations in time of peace for one thing, they would be still more
encouraged to practise it for another thing in time of war." The only
way for Great Britain to achieve her purpose would be "to bind herself
by an article, as strong and explicit as language can make it, never
again in time of war to take a man from an American vessel." This of
course was an inadmissible proposition, and so Mr. Stratford Canning's
incessant urgency produced no substantial results. This discussion,
however, was generally harmonious. Once only, in its earlier stages,
Mr. Adams notes a remark of Mr. Canning, repeated for the second time,
and not altogether gratifying. He said, writes Mr. Adams, "that he
should always receive any observations that I may make to him with a
just deference to my advance of years--over him. This is one of (p. 140)
those equivocal compliments which, according to Sterne, a Frenchman
always returns with a bow."
It was when they got upon the matter of the American settlement at the
mouth of the Columbia River, that the two struck fire. Possession of
this disputed spot had been taken by the Americans, but was broken up
by the British during the war of 1812. After the declaration of peace
upon the _status ante bellum_, a British government vessel had been
dispatched upon the special errand of making formal return of the port
to the Americans. In January, 1821, certain remarks made in debate in
the House of Representatives, followed soon afterward by publication
in the "National Intelligencer" of a paper signed by Senator Eaton,
led Mr. Canning to think that the Government entertained the design of
establishing a substantial settlement at the mouth of the river. On
January 26 he called upon Mr. Adams and inquired the intentions of the
Administration in regard to this. Mr. Adams replied that an increase
of the present settlement was not improbable. Thereupon Mr. Canning
dropping the air of "easy familiarity" which had previously marked the
intercourse between the two, and "assuming a tone more peremptory"
than Mr. Adams "was disposed to endure," expressed his great (p. 141)
surprise. Mr. Adams "with a corresponding change of tone" expressed
equal surprise, "both at the form and substance of his address." Mr.
Canning said that "he conceived such a settlement would be a direct
violation of the article of the Convention of 20th October, 1818." Mr.
Adams took down a volume, read the article, and said, "Now, sir, if
you have any charge to make against the American Government for a
violation of this article, you will please to make the communication
in writing." Mr. Canning retorted, with great vehemence:--
"'And do you suppose, sir, that I am to be dictated to as to the
manner in which I may think proper to communicate with the
American Government?' I answered, 'No, sir. We know very well
what are the privileges of foreign ministers, and mean to respect
them. But you will give us leave to determine what communications
we will receive, and how we will receive them; and you may be
assured we are as little disposed to submit to dictation as to
exercise it.' He then, in a louder and more passionate tone of
voice, said: 'And am I to understand that I am to be refused
henceforth any conference with you upon the subject of my
mission?' 'Not at all, sir,' said I, 'my request is, that if you
have anything further to say to me _upon this subject_, you would
say it in writing. And my motive is to avoid what, both from the
nature of the subject and from the manner in which you (p. 142)
have thought proper to open it, I foresee will tend only to
mutual irritation, and not to an amicable arrangement.' With some
abatement of tone, but in the same peremptory manner, he said,
'Am I to understand that you refuse any further conference with
me on this subject?' I said, 'No. But you will understand that I
am not pleased either with the grounds upon which you have sought
this conference, nor with the questions which you have seen fit
to put to me.'"
Mr. Adams then proceeded to expose the impropriety of a foreign
minister demanding from the Administration an explanation of words
uttered in debate in Congress, and also said that he supposed that the
British had no claim to the territory in question. Mr. Canning
rejoined, and referred to the sending out of the American ship of war
Ontario, in 1817, without any notice to the British minister[3] at
Washington,--
"speaking in a very emphatic manner and as if there had been an
intended secret expedition ... which had been detected only by
the vigilance and penetration of the British minister. I
answered, 'Why, Mr. Bagot did say something to me about it; but I
certainly did not think him serious, and we had a good-humored
laughing conversation on the occasion.' Canning, with great
vehemence: 'You may rely upon it, sir, that it was no laughing
matter to him; for I have seen his report to his government and
know what his feelings concerning it were.' I replied, (p. 143)
'This is the first intimation I have ever received that Mr. Bagot
took the slightest offence at what then passed between us, ...
and you will give me leave to say that when he left this
country'--Here I was going to add that the last words he said to
me were words of thanks for the invariable urbanity and
liberality of my conduct and the personal kindness which he had
uniformly received from me. But I could not finish the sentence.
Mr. Canning, in a paroxysm of extreme irritation, broke out: 'I
stop you there. I will not endure a misrepresentation of what I
say. I never said that Mr. Bagot took offence at anything that
had passed between him and you; and nothing that I said imported
any such thing.' Then ... added in the same passionate manner: 'I
am treated like a school-boy.' I then resumed: 'Mr. Canning, I
have a distinct recollection of the substance of the short
conversation between Mr. Bagot and me at that time; and it was
this'--'No doubt, sir,' said Canning, interrupting me again, 'no
doubt, sir, Mr. Bagot answered you like a man of good breeding
and good humor.'"
[Footnote 3: Then Mr. Bagot.]
Mr. Adams began again and succeeded in making, without further
interruption, a careful recital of his talk with Mr. Bagot. While he
was speaking Mr. Canning grew cooler, and expressed some surprise at
what he heard. But in a few moments the conversation again became warm
and personal. Mr. Adams remarked that heretofore he had thrown off (p. 144)
some of the "cautious reserve" which might have been "strictly
regular" between them, and that
"'so long as his (Canning's) professions had been supported by
his conduct'--Here Mr. Canning again stopped me by repeating with
great vehemence, 'My conduct! I am responsible for my conduct
only to my government!'"
Mr. Adams replied, substantially, that he could respect the rights of
Mr. Canning and maintain his own, and that he thought the best mode of
treating this topic in future would be by writing. Mr. Canning then
expressed himself as
"'willing to forget all that had now passed.' I told him that I
neither asked nor promised him
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