accredited on any fubject refpecting our miffion, and communicate to the government of the United States the refult of fuch conferences; being in my individual capacity unauthorized to give them an official ftamp. Nevertheless, every measure in my power, and in conformity with the duty I owe my country, fhall be zealously purfued, to restore harmony and a cordial friendship between the two republics. I had the honour of calling on you laft evening for the purpose of making this communication verbally; but, as you were abfent, to prevent mifconceptions I have thought it best to reduce it to writing. Accept, I pray you, citizen minifter, the assurances of iny perfect efteem and refpect. E. GERRY. To the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the French Republic. To Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, John Marshall, and Elbridge Gerry, Envoys extraordinary and Ministers plenipotentiary from the United States of America to the French Republic. Gentlemen, ON the 4th inftant came to hand your first dispatches fince you arrived at Paris: thefe were your numbers 1, 4, and 5; and on the 6th inftant your numbers 2 and 3 were received. On the 5th, your number 5, dated the 8th of January, and a translation of the meffage of January 4th from the directory to the council of five hundred, were laid before congrefs. In this letter you 66 repeat, that there exifts no hope of your being officially received by that government, or that the objects of your miffion will be in any way accomplished." This opinion is fanctioned by the whole tenor of your communications; and we truft, that, foon after the date of your number 5, you clofed your miffion by demand ing paffports to leave the territories of the French republic. An official copy of your letters of credence having been delivered to the minister of foreign affairs, and by him laid before the directory, they were fufficiently informed of the great objects of your miffion; and, confidering that you were an extraordinary delegation from an independent nation, you had a right to expect a prompt and refpectful reception. The fair and honourable views of the American government, which dictated your appointment and your powers, entitled you to expect the early appointment of a commiffion by the French government, with equal powers, to negotiate on all the matters in controversy between them. Had the French government been influenced by fimilar views, the objects of your miffion would long fince have been accomplished, to the advantage and of both nations. But, inpeace ftead of coming forward on fuch equal and proper ground, they have treated you, and through you your country, with extreme neglect. Under thefe circumstances, the prefident prefumes that you have long fince quitted Paris and the French dominions; yet, actuated as you were with an ardent defire to preferve peace, which you knew would be fo grateful to your country; and hav. ing for this object manifested unexampled patience, and submitted to a feries of mortifications; as you also proposed to make one more direct attempt, fubfequent to the date of your last letter, to draw the French government to an open negotiation; there is a bare poffibility that this laft effort may have fucceeded :— The prefident therefore thinks it proper to direct 1. That if you are in treaty, with perfons duly authorized by the directory, on the fubjects of your misfion, then you are to remain and ex, pedite the completion of the treaty, if it fhould not have been concluded. Before this letter gets to hand, you will have afcertained whether the negotiation is or is not conducted with candour on the part of the French government and if you shall have discovered a clear defign to procraftinate, you are to break off the negotiation, demand your paffports, and return. For you will confider, that suspense is ruinous to the effential interests of your country. 2. That if, on the receipt of this letter, you shall not have been received; or, whether received or not, if you fhall not be in treaty with perfons duly authorized by the directory, with full and equal powers, you are to demand your paffports and return. 3. In no event is a treaty to be purchased with money, by loan or otherwife. There can be no fafety in a treaty fo obtained. A loan to the republic would violate our neutrality and a douceur, to the men now in power, might by their fucceffors be urged as a reafon for annulling the treaty, or as a precedent for further and repeated demands. It is proper to apprize you, that a motion has been made in the fenate, and will doubtlefs be repeated in the houfe of reprefentatives, to defire the prefident to lay before them your communications; and he will probably be under the neceffity of doing it; only withholding the two names which you promifed fhould, in no event, be made public. I have the honour to be, your obedient fervant, TIMOTHY PICKERING. Department of State, Philadel phia, March 23, 1798. tional executive, we rejoice, that we are men, we boast that we are AMERICANS! When Britain treated America with more than ftep-dame cruelty, the daring infant manfully afferted her rights, and bade defiance to her foe. A furviving few of us acted on the memorable 19th of April-we saw unfheathed the firft conquering fword; Concord drank the first blood of martyred freemen-here commenced a contest, dubious for Columbia; but by the perilous patriotism of her sons, and the all-conquering sword of GOD and WASHINGTON, fhe won her sovereign independence, and founded a growing empire on the indeftructible bafis of justice and equal rights. We, fir, having kept a watchful eye on your active mérit, from the first dawn of your political exiftence, until you rofe to the acme of political greatnefs, recognize with warmest gratitude your fignal fervices, during the tempeft of a revolution, which challenges obliterating time to blot it from the fcroll of fame. We revere your inviolable attachment to the interefts of our country, which fhone. with eclat, in framing and defending our immortal constitution, which exhibits wisdom, inferior only to divine. While we view, with fulleft fatisfaction, peerless WASHINGTON'S equitable administration, we cordially acquiefce in the unshaken rectitude, the amicable disposition, and the vigorous measures now adopted by our executive towards an afpiring power, who, unprovoked, has outraged the piracy and perfidy of Gothic darkness and Vandal barbarity; who has perpetrated crimes unparalleled in the hiftory of man! France, grafping at univerfal domination and aggrandizement, has abandoned every moral and religious principle; trampled on facred faith, fported with national laws, and demanded pecuniary exactions, which would bankrupt our nation, and render us flaves, instead of a free, sovereign, and independent people. Shall we fubmit to these repeated in fults, and humiliating demands, or refolve, in holy remembrance of thofe who bled, that we will defend by our valor, what they won by their blood? We would not dictate; but should the crifis demand, we will rally round the standard of our government, and under the direction of the concentrated wisdom of the union, make a freewill offering of our lives and fortunes, fooner than truckle to the mandates of a foreign power. We will glorioufly perish in the attempt; or, un At a meeting of the Students of William and Mary College, Virginia, on Friday 8th of June, 1798, John Bofwell Johnfon being appointed to the chair, and John Tayloe Loman, secretary, the following address, to the Virginia delegation in Congress, was agreed to, (there being only one dissenting voice) and ordered to be published: Gentlemen, sullied, tranfmit to pofterity, what THE ftudents of William and we received in earlier days, from those who are now tranfinitted to brighter worlds, or trembling beneath the weight of age. We, in unifon with the Union, will convince France and the world, that the divine enthufiafm of '75, glows in the bofom of each genuine American, and, under providence, will render Columbia as formidable to her foes, as was Michael's fword from the armory of God, to the rebel angels of Heaven!! To the Inhabitans of the town of Cam-bridge, in the state of Massachu setts. Gentlemen, I thank you for this addrefs, fubfcribed by fo large a number of refpectable names, and for the expreffion of your fatisfaction in my adminif tration. Difficulties were the inheritance to which I was born; and a double portion has been allotted to me. I have hitherto found in my integrity, an impenetrable shield; and I trust it will continue to preserve me. I pity the town, which, under the guidance of rafh or defigning men, affembled without the neceffary information, paffed refolutions, which have expofed them to cenfure. I receive and return with pleasure your congratulations on the prefent appearances of national union, and thank you for your affurances of fupport. JOHN ADAMS. Philad. June 2, 1798. Mary college regard the brooding hoftilities, between the United States of America and the republic of France, as forming a crifis in our political affairs, which involves the future destiny of our country. Although we do not yet, by the laws of this ftate, poffefs the full powers of conftituents, yet, on a subject fo interefting to ourfelves, we conceive it but reasonable and just that our opinions fhould be heard and refpected by the representatives of the people. War between the two republics, meafures of our government. Thofe feems daily denounced to us in the meafures appear to us not the inevitable offsprings of neceffity; we are, therefore, left at full liberty to offer you fome of our objections to being plunged into a state of hoftility. Our wishes for a temper of pacification, on the part of our government, are grounded, not on any juvenile predilections, or preference of the intereft of one foreign nation to that of any other; but on a conviction of the injuries which would refult to our own from a contary conduct. One of the principal of thefe is, the unavoidable and acknowledg ed accumulation of our national debt. Though we do not pretend to an intimate acquaintance with the existing revenues of the nation, or the refources by which those revenues may be augmented; yet, we think, we cannot be deceived, when we fay, that that debt must be increased to an enormous and infupportable amount. Hence, too, will arife a proportion ate increase in the taxes of our citi zens. We fubmit it, however, to your confideration, whether it would be advantageous to the people, or prudent for their reprefentatives, to encrease them, whilft their prefent weight is already the subject of murmurs and complaints. Nor will the effects of a war on commerce and agriculture, have a lefs pernicious tendency. Though our merchants have been confiderably injured by the depredations on our commerce; yet, from a declaration of war, and the confequent ftoppage of all commercial intercourfe, their fufferings, inftead of redrefs, would be increafed and aggravated in the highest degree. They would, in that cafe, lofe the whole profits of their stock; whereas, in the prefent, many of their loffes are compenfated by the advanced prices of their goods. Thefe advanced prices are now paid by the agricultural intereft, which, therefore, experiences a real injury from the prefent fituation of our country: but, in cafe of a war, and the interruption of commerce, the home market will, of courfe, be the only one remaining for the purchafing and confumption of the produce of the farmers. Now, it is evident that the number of farmers, remain ing in our country during the continuance of the war, notwithstanding the numbers drafted off for the fupply of the army and navy, would bear a much greater proportion to the then existing demand, than the number of farmers before the war would bear to the demand which at that time existed. The demand will not be fufficient to give employment to the farmers who will remain; or, in other words, there will be a greater competition amongst the fellers than among the buyers; in which cafe, we may ever look for the lowest poffible price of any commodity.-This low price of produce will inevitably tend to discourage the further improvement of land, and confequently retard the growing improvement of our country. We conceive, that We believe an increase of power to answer the ends of efficient government. To increase them, will be to weaken the co-ordinate branches, legislative and judiciary, to turn the balance of powers between the three departinents, and to take away the only fupport of liberty. Power, moreover, we believe, to be of a rooted and increafing, rather than of an unftable and decreafing nature. The executive, acquiring an additional energy in time of war, is too apt, upon the return of peace, to preferve, exert, and augment that energy; although the neceffity of its exiftence has paffed away. By our conftitution, the prefident poffeffes the command of the army and navy, the appointment of officers in both, and the management of the monies neceffary for their equipment and maintenance. That love which the foldier bears to his commander, will ever operate in making him a powerful friend to the executive. The fplendor of office, and rewards for fervices, alfo, are too gratifying to man, not to create in him, who receives them, the strongest and most permanent attachment to his benefactor. The army of Cefar was, at first, the arthy of Rome; but they were foon taught to kifs the hand that cherished them. We would wish to believe that the prefident feels too much the dignity of being the chief magiftrate of a FREE PEOPLE, ever to make ufe of an army, committed to his care for the welfare of his country, as an engine for the deftruction of our liberties, fo dearly purchafed, and of exchanging the honourable appellation, at prefent enjoyed, for the degraded one of a tyrant; did not the nature of man, did not the hiftory of all men entrusted with power, did not the general conduct of our own adminiftration itself, forbid us to entertain the flattering idea. We confider, moreover, an implicit confidence in any government whatever, however well adminiftered, as the certain harbinger of oppreffion, as being incompatible with that political fufpicion, the only true fafeguard of liberty. An alliance with Great Britain feems too evidently to be the inevitable offspring of a war with France, for us to refift the belief that it will be-nay, it is daily proclaimed to us by thofe who feem to be fecret advocates of the war, that an alliance with that government must be formed. Of all the evils refulting from a war, none appears to us to be more ferious, more alarming than this. It will be well recollected, that our conftitution is formed on the plan of, what is commonly termed, the conftitution of Great Britain. The abufes and corruptions which have crept into the British government, fhould, therefore, ftand as useful monitors, to warn us, how we pursue that courfe which has already proved fatal to that nation. If a stronger affimilation of the American government to that of the British, would tend to introduce the fame abuses here; it would be madnefs to difobey that voice, which fo loudly calls upon us to change our courfe-it would be a voluntary devotion of ourselves, as victims, at that altar on which Great Britainbleeds. We need not, we trust, attempt to prove, that an alliance between the two nations will foon beget a strong attachment between the people of the one nation and those of the other, and equally as strong a one between the two governments. But friendships between nations, like those between individuals, will ever generate a fimilarity of views and difpofitions. This fimilarity would foon diffipate those horrors, which we have hitherto felt at monarchical governments, and might quickly involve the people of this country in a common fate, with those of Great Britain. Moreover, by establishing a connexion with a nation, of so much importance on the political theatre of Europe, we would be led into those troubles, difcords, and contentions, by which Europe is continually torn, diftracted, and divided; which muft |