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Subject Area: Economics
Subject Area: Political Theory

LA FAYETTE TO GALLATIN. - Albert Gallatin, The Writings of Albert Gallatin, vol. 1 [1879]

Edition used:

The Writings of Albert Gallatin, ed. Henry Adams (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott, 1879). 3 vols.

Part of: The Writings of Albert Gallatin, 3 vols.

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LA FAYETTE TO GALLATIN.

Paris, 25th May, 1814.

My dear Sir,—

I am much obliged to you for the care you have been pleased to take of my patents, and still more grateful for the beneficial kindness I have experienced from you in the whole course of that transaction. The munificence of Congress, its importance to me, the assent of the people, and the goodness of my friends shall ever live in my heart as objects of the most happy feelings. Let me hope, my dear sir, you will not leave Europe before I have had the satisfaction to express the sense I have of my obligations to you, and all the sentiments which made me your affectionate friend before I had the honor of a personal acquaintance.

You have done me the justice to think of the patriotic concern I could not help to feel for the United States amidst the joys and congratulations of an European peace. The British Ministerial papers are so outrageous, the warlike preparations so threatening, that it would seem the soldiers of America, young and veterans, have nothing left to do but to join their colors and again to fight for liberty and independence. Yet I hope the able and respectable commission from the United States will succeed in securing for her the blessings of a timely pacification.

Mr. Crawford is better qualified than I am to give you all the information from this quarter which relates to American concerns. The confidence with which he honors my zeal has enabled me to discuss the matter with some influencing characters among the allied generals and diplomates. Two of the latter act a great part in the present negotiations. I found them well acquainted with British arguments and impressed with British prejudices, which convinced me that care had been taken to influence their opinion. I have endeavored to dispel those notions and urge the propriety of a general intervention of the European powers to insure an American peace. An opportunity has been seeked, which I am bound not to name, for putting directly under the eyes of Emperor Alexander a note of Mr. Crawford. You may depend it has been faithfully delivered, with proper comments, along with a letter, the copy of which Mr. Crawford has desired me to enclose. I expect this evening to meet the Emperor of Russia at a friend’s house, and shall try to obtain some conversation on the subject. How could we not hope for a peace when all the objects of litigation are at an end? Don’t you think, my dear sir, that peculiar circumstance is for the United States an honorable way to get out of a formidable war and to leave no excuse to the enemy for the prosecution of it? Permit me to add that from my conversation with foreigners, including some Englishmen, I have had to combat the idea of a Bonapartian partiality imputed to the American Cabinet, and that my explanations on the subject have been such as to furnish new arguments to such of those statesmen as may be disposed in our favor.

I must apologize to you, my dear sir, for those details, which look as if I would give to my private endeavors an undue and exaggerated importance. But the cause has such a hold of my heart, and I am so happy in the hope to render some service to it, that you will readily excuse me.

The newspapers give you an account of French interior politics, with this difference, that the spirit of liberty is more alive than you could infer from the addresses and paragraphs to which the provisory censure upon the journals does not permit to publish proper antidotes. In the enclosed collection you will find what has hitherto been done officially. Commissioners of the King are now debating constitutional articles with a committee of Senators and members of the Legislative Corps, equally named by him. But the last resort is to those two bodies and the public opinion. Some good pamphlets, amidst several bad ones, have been published. I am so taken up with this great concern that it does in great measure divert my thoughts from the preliminaries which deprive France of those natural, proper, well-earned frontiers which, under the tricolor cockade, had been secured, I thought, forever.

I feel a lively gratitude for the obligations conferred on Victor Tracy by my friend Mr. Quincy Adams. His family and mine partake in that sentiment, and join with my thanks for your particular attentions to him.

Begging my best respects to be presented to your worthy colleagues, I have the honor to offer you the assurances of my high regard and grateful attachment.