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Subject Area: Political Theory
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

JAY TO JUDGE PETERS. - John Jay, The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, vol. 4 (1794-1826) [1893]

Edition used:

The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, ed. Henry P. Johnston, A.M. (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1890-93). Vol. 4 (1794-1826).

Part of: The Correspondence and Public Papers of John Jay, 4 vols.

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JAY TO JUDGE PETERS.

Bedford, Westchester County,
14th March, 1815.

Dear Sir:

On reading your interesting letter of the 19th January, I observed with particular pleasure, from the manner and matter of it, that, notwithstanding the winter of life, and snow falling on your head, you endure like an evergreen.

Your impression that “we should, ere long, have peace” has been verified. If I remember right, you had heretofore an impression that Spain, although her case was apparently desperate, would get safe through her danger; and so it came to pass. Events having justified both these impressions or opinions, I wish you may have another, viz., that the peace will terminate the delusion which caused the war. Several considerations incline me to expect that the peace will diminish it, and particularly these:

Unless discontents should arise between France and Britain, French influence will not soon be very active in America; and, consequently, will not administer much fuel to renew and feed a flame against England. The peace will deprive the delusion of the sustenance it derived from the patronage which the war created.

The abandonment of the professed objects of the war, and that without compensation either in fact or expectation—the manifest incapacity and profusion with which the war has been conducted—the attempts to force supplies of men and money by conscription, etc.—and the immense debt incurred and to be paid, without any value received,—all tend to withdraw confidence and good-will from our political projectors; nor can the continuance and operation of war-taxes be congenial with the feelings of a people who, if pagans, would dedicate more temples to Plutus than to Minerva.

These, and the like facts and considerations, will doubtless have the most weight with that portion of the community who have been misled, but who really mean well. They will probably have some effect also on the more considerate of the others. As to the position, that “the people always mean well,” or, in other words, that they always mean to say and to do what they believe to be right and just,—it may be popular, but it cannot be true. The word people, you know, applies to all the individual inhabitants of a country, collectively considered. That portion of them who individually mean well never was, nor until the millennium will be, considerable. We have not heard of any country, in which the great mass of the inhabitants individually and habitually adhere to the dictates of their consciences. We know how well demagogues and pharisaical patriots mean. Having much of the wisdom of this world, and little of that of the other, they will, like their great predecessor Absalom, always mean and act accordingly.

Besides, Providence sometimes chastises nations with physical epidemics, and sometimes (by “choosing their delusions”) with moral epidemics, and after a while removes them. This encourages hope; for if we have arrived at or near the pessimum of this evil, the melius cannot be far distant.

Accept my thanks for the book you were so kind as to send me. I have found some good things in it, and shall doubtless find more. Many of our citizens, who are more than mere farmers, have of late years improved our agriculture. Would not a good American edition of “Columella” be acceptable to them? It gratifies curiosity, by showing the state of agriculture at a remote period; and, on several topics, affords information which will be useful at any period.

I am glad you escaped and recovered so well from the accident you mention. Kentucky racers, both literal and figurative, will, it seems, have their capers. It would be no loss to the public if some of them were at the plough. Seek for “some honest, sober beast, that full softly treads,” and will not mar your meditations.

Adieu, my dear sir,
Yours affectionately,

John Jay.

1816.