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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, 12th March, 1821.

Dear Sir:

My letter to you of the 26th December last, contained some remarks relative to the perversions and obliquities which you had noticed, and which I observed were neither recent nor unexpected. In that letter there was not room for explanatory details. Those remarks were therefore concise and general. To supply that deficiency is the design of this letter

These perversions and obliquities began on the receipt of a letter which I wrote to Congress, and of which the following is a copy.

[Here was inserted the letter of 20th September, 1781, relative to the instruction to the American commissioners appointed to negotiate the treaty of peace. See vol. ii., p. 69.]

This letter was written under the influence of indignant feelings, and in some respects with too little of deliberate consideration. The impressions it made on those who had originated and urged the instruction mentioned in it may easily be conceived.

That this instruction was more complimentary than wise was afterward evinced by the circumstances which constrained the American commissioners at Paris to disobey it. That disobedience gave additional excitement to the displeasure and to the complaints of the French and their consociates. Nor were they pleased with the implied approbation of that disobedience, which resulted from my appointment to the office of Secretary for Foreign Affairs, before my arrival in 1784. From time to time after my return, I was informed of various incidents which showed that their malevolence was far from being dormant.

The presumptuous attempts of the republican minister Genet, to facilitate the designs of France at the hazard of our peace and neutrality, gave occasion to the measures of President Washington on that subject. Disappointed and irritated by these impediments, Genet and his partisans indulged themselves in animadversions on the administration and its advocates, which were neither candid nor decorous.

The treaty with England in 1794, did not accord with the views and wishes of France, nor with the views and wishes of sundry individuals among us. Although the strenuous efforts made to defeat it did not succeed, yet the feelings and motives which prompted those efforts continued to operate.

Certain politicians, desirous to give a new direction to public opinion, finally succeeded in forming a party for the purpose, and in introducing a policy varying from that which President Washington and his friends had preferred. Those friends were not regarded with a friendly eye.

They who censured the precipitate commencement and the unsuccessful conduct of the late war with England incurred the resentment of those by whom these errors were committed.

Among those who had been active Federalists, there were individuals who, at subsequent periods, were induced to think it expedient for them to join the opposing party. They who thus pass from one side to the other are apt to mistake cunning for wisdom, and to act accordingly.

These details will suffice to explain the concise remarks in my letter. Many more might be added, and I could fill much paper with apposite anecdotes; but I forbear to enlarge on topics which (mutatis mutandis) the history of Greece and other countries, as well as observation and experience, have rendered familiar to us both.

In the course of my public life, I have endeavoured to be uniform and independent; having, from the beginning of it in 1774, never asked for an office or a vote, nor declined expressing my sentiments respecting such important public measures as, in my opinion, tended to promote or retard the welfare of our country.

You will, I am persuaded, pardon this egotism, and believe me to be, dear sir,

Your constant and affectionate friend,

John Jay.