The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 4 (of 9)

[Statement of Dr. Stevens' case, referred to in preceding letter.]

The Constitution having provided that the President should appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and all other officers which shall be established by law, the first Congress which met passed a law (July 1, 1790) authorizing him to draw from the treasury $40,000 annually for the support of such persons as he shall commission to serve the United States in foreign parts, and for the expense incident to the business in which they may be employed; with a proviso that, exclusive of an outfit to a Minister Plenipotentiary or Chargé, not exceeding a year's salary, he should allow to any Minister Plenipotentiary not more than $9,000 a year, for all his personal services and other expenses; to a Chargé not more than $4,500; to a Secretary not more than $1,350; and with a second proviso as to the mode of settlement. This act, which was temporary, was continued by those of 1793, February 9, 1794, March 20, 1796, May 30, 1798, March 19, till 1800, May 10, when they turned the two provisos into enacting clauses, and made them permanent, and the appropriating clause which made the body of the law before, is now annually inserted in the general appropriating law. See 1800, May 7, 1801, March 3, 1802, May 1, 1803, March 2, and 1804, March —. As Congress, in order to limit the discretion of officers as far as is safe, is in the practice of throwing the objects of appropriations into groups, e. g. to the Secretary of State, and clerks, and other persons in that department so much; Secretary of Treasury, &c., so much; clothing for the army so much; subsistence so much; pay so much, &c. So they might have analysed the foreign appropriation by allowing for outfits of ministers so much; salaries of ministers so much; contingent expenses so much, &c. But they chose to throw it all into one mass, only providing that no outfit should exceed a year's salary, and no salary of a minister be more than $9,000; of a Chargé $4,500; Secretary $1,350, &c.; leaving the President free to give them less if he chose, and to give to Ambassadors, Envoys, and other agents, what he thought proper. From the origin of the present government to this day, the construction of the laws, and the practice under them, has been to consider the whole fund (with only the limitations before mentioned) as under the discretion of the President as to the persons he should commission to serve the United States in foreign parts, and all the expenses incident to the business in which they may be employed. The grade consequently or character in which they should be employed, their allowance, &c. Thus Governor Morris was appointed by General Washington informally and without a commission to confer with the British ministers, and was allowed for eight months (I think) $1,000. Colonel Humphreys was appointed in 1790, to go as an agent to Madrid, and was allowed at the rate of $2,250 per annum. Dumas was kept at the Hague many years as an agent at $1,300 a year. Mr. Cutting was allowed disbursements for sailors in London in 1791, $233 33. Presents were made to the Chevalier Luzerne, on taking leave, worth $1,062. Van Berkel $697. Du Moustier $555, in 1791. Mr. Short was sent to Amsterdam as an agent in 1792, and allowed $444 43. James Blake was sent as agent to Madrid in 1793, and received an advance of $800. I know not how much afterwards, as I left the office of Secretary of State at the close of that year. In 1794, Mr. Jay was appointed Envoy Extraordinary, a grade not particularly named in the Constitution, or any law, yet General Washington fixed his allowance. During the present administration Mr. Dawson and Lieutenant Leonard have been sent on special agencies. From the beginning of the government it has been the rule when one of our ministers is ordered to another place on a special business, to allow his expenses on that special mission, his salary going on at his residence where his family remains. Mr. Short's mission from Paris to Amsterdam, from Paris to Madrid; Mr. Pinckney from London to Madrid; Mr. Murray's from the Hague to Paris, and others not recollected by me, are instances of this. These facts are stated to show that it has been the uniform opinion and practice that the whole foreign fund was placed by the Legislature on the footing of a contingent fund, in which they undertake no specifications, but leave the whole to the discretion of the President. The whole is but from forty to sixty or seventy thousand dollars. After the establishment of the general fund for foreign intercourse, Congress found it necessary to make a separate branch for the Barbary powers. This was done covertly in the beginning, to wit, in 1792, they gave $50,000 additional to the foreign fund, in 1794, $1,000,000 additional without limiting it to Barbary. Yet it was secretly understood by the President, and his discretion was trusted. In 1796, they gave $260,000 for treaties with the Mediterranean powers, in 1797, $280,259 03, for the expenses of negotiation with Algiers. They did not undertake a more minute analysis or specification, but left it to the President. The laws of 1796, May 6, 1797, March 3, 1799, March 2, give sums for specific purposes because these purposes were simple and understood by the Legislature. But in general, in this branch of the foreign expenses, as in the former one, the Legislature has thought that to cramp the public service by too minute specifications in cases which they could not foresee, might do more evil than a temporary trust to the President, which could be put an end to if abused.

In our western governments, heretofore established, they were so well understood by Congress, that they could and did specify every item of expense, except a very small residuum for which they made contingent appropriations. But when they came to provide at this session for the Louisiana government, with which they were not acquainted, they gave twenty thousand dollars for compensation to the officers of the government employed by the President, and for other civil expenses under the direction of the President. And their first step towards the acquisition of that country was to confide to the President two millions of dollars under the general appropriation for foreign intercourse. These facts show that so far from having experienced evil from confiding the forty thousand dollars foreign fund to the discretion of the executive without a specific analysis of its application, they have continued it on that footing, and in many other great cases where analysis was difficult or inexpedient they have given the sums in mass, and left the analysis to him, only requiring an account to be rendered.

This statement has been made in order to place on its true ground the case of Doctor Stevens. He was employed by Mr. Adams as Agent to St. Domingo, and was to be allowed his expenses, though these were not limited, yet the law limits them in such case to what were reasonable. Doubts have arisen at the treasury whether the executive had a right to make such a contract, and whether there be any fund out of which it can be paid? Some doubt has been expressed whether an appropriation law gives authority to pay for the purpose of the appropriation without some particular law authorizing it. If this be the case, the forty thousand dollar fund has been paid away without authority from its first establishment; for it never has been given but by a clause of appropriation. The executive believes this sufficient authority, and so we presume did the Legislature, or they would have given authority in some other sufficient form. And where is the rule of legal construction to be found which ascribes less effect to the words of an appropriation law, than of any other law? It is also doubted whether the estimate on which an appropriation is founded does not restrain the application to the specific articles, their number and amount as stated in the estimate? Were an appropriation law to come before a judge would he decide its meaning from its text, or would he call on the officer to produce their estimates as being a part of the law? On the whole, the following questions are to be determined: 1. Whether the laws do not justify the construction which has been uniformly given, either strictly, or at least so ambiguously, that, as in judiciary cases, the decisions which have taken place have fixed their meaning and made it law? 2. Whether they are so palpably against law that the practice must be arrested? 3. Whether it shall be arrested retrospectively as to moneys engaged but not yet actually paid, or only as to future contracts? 4. Whether any circumstances take Dr. Stevens' case out of the conditions and rights of other foreign agencies?

March 23, 1804.

TO MR. LATROBE

Washington, February 28, 1804.

Dear Sir,—I am sorry the explanations attempted between Dr. Thornton and yourself, on the manner of finishing the chamber of the House of Representatives, have not succeeded. At the original establishment of this place advertisements were published many months offering premiums for the best plans for a Capitol and a President's house. Many were sent in. A council was held by General Washington with the board of Commissioners, and after very mature examination two were preferred, and the premiums given to their authors, Doctor Thornton and Hobens, and the plans were decided on. Hobens' has been executed. On Doctor Thornton's plan of the Capitol the north wing has been extended, and the south raised one story. In order to get along with any public undertaking it is necessary that some stability of plan be observed—nothing impedes progress so much as perpetual changes of design. I yield to this principle in the present case more willingly because the plan begun for the Representative room will, in my opinion, be more handsome and commodious than anything which can now be proposed on the same area. And though the spheroidical dome presents difficulties to the executor, yet they are not beyond his art; and it is to overcome difficulties that we employ men of genius. While however I express my opinion that we had better go through with this wing of the Capitol on the plan which has been settled, I would not be understood to suppose there does exist sufficient authority to control the original plan in any of its parts, and to accommodate it to changes of circumstances. I only mean that it is not advisable to change that of this wing in its present stage. Though I have spoken of a spheroidical roof, that will not be correct by the figure. Every rib will be a portion of a circle of which the radius will be determined by the span and rise of each rib. Would it not be best to make the internal columns of well-burnt brick, moulded in portions of circles adapted to the diminution of the columns? 2d. Burlington, in his notes on Palladio, tells us that he found most of the buildings erected under Palladio's direction, and described in his architecture, to have their columns made of brick in this way and covered over with stucco. I know an instance of a range of six or eight columns in Virginia, twenty feet high, well proportioned and properly diminished, executed by a common bricklayer. The bases and capitols would of course be of hewn stone. I suggest this for your consideration, and tender you my friendly salutations.

TO ELBRIDGE GERRY

Washington, March 3, 1804.

Dear Sir,—Although it is long since I received your favor of October the 27th, yet I have not had leisure sooner to acknowledge it. In the middle and southern States, as great an union of sentiment has now taken place as is perhaps desirable. For as there will always be an opposition, I believe it had better be from avowed monarchists than republicans. New York seems to be in danger of republican division; Vermont is solidly with us; Rhode Island with us on anomalous grounds; New Hampshire on the verge of the republican shore; Connecticut advancing towards it very slowly, but with steady step; your State only uncertain of making port at all. I had forgotten Delaware, which will be always uncertain, from the divided character of her citizens. If the amendment of the Constitution passes Rhode Island, (and we expect to hear in a day or two,) the election for the ensuing four years seems to present nothing formidable. I sincerely regret that the unbounded calumnies of the federal party have obliged me to throw myself on the verdict of my country for trial, my great desire having been to retire, at the end of the present term, to a life of tranquillity; and it was my decided purpose when I entered into office. They force my continuance. If we can keep the vessel of State as steadily in her course for another four years, my earthly purposes will be accomplished, and I shall be free to enjoy, as you are doing, my family, my farm, and my books. That your enjoyments may continue as long as you shall wish them, I sincerely pray, and tender you my friendly salutations, and assurances of great respect and esteem.

TO WILLIAM DUNBAR, ESQ

Washington, March 13, 1804.

Dear Sir,—Your favor of January 28 has been duly received, and I have read with great satisfaction your ingenuous paper on the subject of the Mississippi, which I shall immediately forward to the Philosophical Society, where it will be duly prized. To prove the value I set on it, and my wish that it may go to the public without any imperfection about it, I will take the liberty of submitting to your consideration the only passage which I think may require it. You say, page 9, "The velocity of rivers is greatest at the surface, and gradually diminishes downwards." And this principle enters into some subsequent parts of the paper, and has too much effect on the phenomena of that river not to merit mature consideration. I can but suppose it at variance with the law of motion in rivers. In strict theory, the velocity of water at any given depth in a river is (in addition to its velocity at its surface) whatever a body would have acquired by falling through a space equal to that depth. If, in the middle of a river, we drop a vertical line, a e, from its surface to its bottom, and (using a perch, or rather a measure of 16.125 feet, for our unit of measure) we draw, at the depths, b c d e, (which suppose = 1.4 9.16 perch ordinates in the direction of the stream, equal to the odd numbers, 3, 5, 7, 9 perch, these ordinates will represent the additional velocities of the water per second of time, at the depth of their respective abscissæ, and will terminate in a curve, a f g h i,) which will represent the velocity of their current in every point, and the whole mass of water passing on in a second of time.19 This would be the theory of the motion of rivers, were there no friction; but the bottom being rough, its friction with the lower sheet or lamina of water will retard that lamina; the friction or viscosity of the particles of which, again, with those of the one next above, will retard that somewhat less, the 2d retard the 3d, the 3d the 4th, and so on upwards, diminishing till the retardation becomes insensible; and the theoretic curve will be modified by that cause, as at n o, removing the maximum of motion from the bottom somewhere upwardly. Again, the same circumstances of friction and viscosity of the particles of water among themselves, will cause the lamina at the surface to be accelerated by the quicker motion of the one next below it, the 2d still more by the 3d, the 3d by the 4th, and so on downwards, the acceleration always increasing till it reached the lamina of greatest motion. The exact point of the maximum of motion cannot be calculated, because it depends on friction; but it is probably much nearer the bottom than top, because the greater power of the current there sooner overcomes the effect of the friction. Ultimately, the curve will be sensibly varied by being swelled outwardly above, and retracted inwardly below, somewhat like a k l m n o, in the preceding diagram.

Indulging corollaries on this theory, let us suppose a plane surface, as a large sheet of cast-iron, let down by a cable from a boat, and made to present its surface to the current by a long vane fixed on its axis in the direction of the current. Would not the current below, laying hold of this plate, draw the boat down the stream with more rapidity than that with which it otherwise moves on the surface of the water? Again, at the cross current of the surface which flows into the Chafaleya, and endangers the drawing boats into that river, as you mention, page 18, would not the same plane surface, if let down into the under current, which moves in the direction of the bed of the main river, have the effect of drawing the vessel across the lateral current prevailing at its surface, and conduct the boat with safety along the channel of the river?

The preceding observations are submitted to your consideration. By drawing your attention to the subject, they will enable you, on further reflection, to confirm or correct your first opinion. If the latter, there would be time, before we print a volume, to make any alterations or additions to your paper which you might wish. We were much indebted for your communications on the subject of Louisiana. The substance of what was received from you, as well as others, was digested together and printed, without letting it be seen from whom the particulars came, as some were of a nature to excite ill-will. Of these publications I sent you a copy. On the subject of the limits of Louisiana, nothing was said therein, because we thought it best first to have explanations with Spain. In the first visit, after receiving the treaty, which I paid to Monticello, which was in August, I availed myself of what I have there, to investigate the limits. While I was in Europe, I had purchased everything I could lay my hands on which related to any part of America, and particularly had a pretty full collection of the English, French and Spanish authors, on the subject of Louisiana. The information I got from these was entirely satisfactory, and I threw it into a shape which would easily take the form of a memorial. I now enclose you a copy of it. One single fact in it was taken from a publication in a newspaper, supposed to be written by Judge Bay, who had lived in West Florida. This asserted that the country from the Iberville to the Perdido was to this day called Louisiana, and a part of the government of Louisiana. I wrote to you to ascertain that fact, and received the information you were so kind as to send me; on the receipt of which, I changed the form of the assertion, so as to adapt it to what I suppose to be the fact, and to reconcile the testimony I have received, to wit, that though the name and division of West Florida have been retained; and in strictness, that country is still called by that name; yet it is also called Louisiana in common parlance, and even in some authentic public documents. The fact, however, is not of much importance. It would only have been an argumentum ad hominem. Although I would wish the paper enclosed never to be seen by anybody but yourself, and that it should not even be mentioned that the facts and opinions therein stated are founded in public authority, yet I have no objections to their being freely advanced in conversation, and as private and individual opinion, believing it will be advantageous that the extent of our rights should be known to the inhabitants of the country; and that however we may compromise on our Western limits, we never shall on the Eastern.

I formerly acquainted you with the mission of Captain Lewis up the Missouri, and across from its head to the Pacific. He takes about a dozen men with him, is well provided with instruments, and qualified to give us the geography of the line he passes along with astronomical accuracy. He is now hutted opposite the mouth of the Missouri, ready to enter it on the opening of the season. He will be at least two years on the expedition. I propose to charge the Surveyor-general N. of Ohio, with a survey of the Mississippi from its source to the mouth of the Ohio, and with settling some other interesting points of geography in that quarter. Congress will probably authorize me to explore the greater waters on the western side of the Mississippi and Missouri, to their sources. In this case I should propose to send one party up the Panis river to its source, thence along the highlands to the source of the Radoneas river and down it to its mouth, giving the whole course of both parties, corrected by astronomical observation. These several surveys will enable us to prepare a map of Louisiana, which in its contour and main waters will be perfectly correct, and will give us a skeleton to be filled up with details hereafter. For what lies north of the Missouri, we suppose British industry will furnish that. As you live so near to the point of departure of the lowest expedition, and possess and can acquire so much better the information, which may direct that to the best advantage, I have thought, if Congress should authorize the enterprise, to propose to you the unprofitable trouble of directing it. The party would consist of ten or twelve picked soldiers, volunteers with an officer, under the guidance of one or two persons qualified to survey and correct by observations of latitude and longitude, the latter lunar, and as well informed as we can get them in the departments of botany, natural history, and mineralogy. I am told there is a Mr. Walker in your town, and a Mr. Gillespie in North Carolina, possessing good qualifications. As you know them both, you can judge whether both are qualified, should two persons go, or which is best, should but one be sent, or whether there is any other person better qualified than either. Their pay would probably not exceed $1000 a year, to which would be added their subsistence. All preparations would be to be made at Natchez and New Orleans on your order. Instructions similar to those of Captain Lewis would go from here, to be added to by what should occur to yourself, and you would be the centre for the communications from the party to the government. Still this is a matter of speculation only, as Congress are hurrying over their business for adjournment, and may leave this article of it unfinished. In that case what I have said will be as if I had not said it.

There is such a difference of opinion in Congress as to the government to be given to Louisiana, that they may continue the present one another year. I hope and urge their not doing it, and the establishment of a government on the spot capable of meeting promptly its own emergencies. Accept my friendly salutations, and assurances of great esteem and respect.

TO GIDEON GRANGER

Monticello, April 16, 1804.

Dear Sir,—* * * * *

In our last conversation you mentioned a federal scheme afloat, of forming a coalition between the federalists and republicans, of what they called the seven eastern States. The idea was new to me, and after time for reflection I had no opportunity of conversing with you again. The federalists know, that eo nomine, they are gone forever. Their object, therefore, is how to return into power under some other form. Undoubtedly they have but one means, which is to divide the republicans, join the minority, and barter with them for the cloak of their name. I say, join the minority; because the majority of the republicans not needing them, will not buy them. The minority, having no other means of ruling the majority, will give a price for auxiliaries, and that price must be principle. It is true that the federalists, needing their numbers also, must also give a price, and principle is the coin they must pay in. Thus a bastard system of federo-republicanism will rise on the ruins of the true principles of our revolution. And when this party is formed, who will constitute the majority of it, which majority is then to dictate? Certainly the federalists. Thus their proposition of putting themselves into gear with the republican minority, is exactly like Roger Sherman's proposition to add Connecticut to Rhode Island. The idea of forming seven eastern States is moreover clearly to form the basis of a separation of the Union. Is it possible that real republicans can be gulled by such a bait? And for what? What do they wish that they have not? Federal measures? That is impossible. Republican measures? Have they them not? Can any one deny, that in all important questions of principle, republicanism prevails? But do they want that their individual will shall govern the majority? They may purchase the gratification of this unjust wish, for a little time, at a great price; but the federalists must not have the passions of other men, if, after getting thus into the seat of power, they suffer themselves to be governed by their minority. This minority may say, that whenever they relapse into their own principles, they will quit them, and draw the seat from under them. They may quit them, indeed, but, in the meantime, all the venal will have become associated with them, and will give them a majority sufficient to keep them in place, and to enable them to eject the heterogeneous friends by whose aid they get again into power. I cannot believe any portion of real republicans will enter into this trap; and if they do, I do not believe they can carry with them the mass of their States, advancing so steadily as we see them, to an union of principle with their brethren. It will be found in this, as in all other similar cases, that crooked schemes will end by overwhelming their authors and coadjutors in disgrace, and that he alone who walks strict and upright, and who, in matters of opinion, will be contented that others should be as free as himself, and acquiesce when his opinion is fairly overruled, will attain his object in the end. And that this may be the conduct of us all, I offer my sincere prayers, as well as for your health and happiness.