Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power (104 page)

“T
HIS
TREATY
MUST
OF
COURSE
”
TJ to John Breckinridge, August 12, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“T
HE
E
XECUTIVE
IN
SEIZING
”
Ibid.

“I
T
IS
THE
CASE
”
Ibid.

“I
WR
OTE
YOU
”
TJ to John Breckinridge, August 18, 1803, Breckinridge Family Papers, LOC.

T
HE
UNWELCO
ME
LETTER
OF
A
UGUST
17
TJ to Albert Gallatin, August 23, 1803, Gallatin Papers, New-York Historical Society, New York City. The letter itself is Robert R. Livingston to TJ, June 2, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“Y
OU
WILL
FIND
THAT
”
Ibid.

“W
HATEVER
C
ONGRESS
SHAL
L
THINK
”
TJ to Wilson Cary Nicholas, September 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I
S
THERE
NO
T
DANGER
”
PTJ,
XXXIX, 304.

T
HOMAS
P
AI
NE
SUGGESTED
Thomas Paine to TJ, September 23, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. Paine also wrote Jefferson a compelling brief against seeking an amendment for Louisiana. “It appears to me to be one of those cases with which the Constitution had nothing to do, and which can be judged of only by the circumstances of the times when such a case shall occur,” Paine wrote from Stonington, Connecticut, on September 23, 1803. (Ibid.)

“I
CONFE
SS
 … 
I
THINK
IT
”
TJ to Wilson Cary Nicholas, September 7, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC. He also had to figure out how to pay the bills. To Robert Smith, he wrote:

You know the importance of our being enabled to announce in the message that the interest of the Louisiana purchase (800,000.d) can be paid without a new tax, and what advantage the necessity of a new tax would give the opposition to the ratification of the treaty, where two or three desertions would reject it. To avoid a new tax we had a deficiency (on the estimates as given in) of about 400,000. D. Our colleagues have set their shoulders heartily to the work: Mr. Madison has struck us off 100,000. D. Genl Dearborn something upwards of that, and we still want 180,000. D. to be quite secure. The estimate received from your office, which I enclose you, amounts probably to 770, or 780. And were it possible to reduce it to 600. it would place us at ease. (TJ to Robert Smith, October 10, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.)

UP
TO
TWO
HUNDRED
T
HOUSAND
SQUARE
MILES
Wallace,
Jefferson and the Indians,
239.

ENCOURAGE
WHITE
SETTLEMENT
Ibid., 206–7.

THE
I
NDIA
NS
“
WILL
IN
TIME
”
Ibid., 273.

ANY
ATTACKING
TRIBES
BY
“
SEIZING
”
Ibid.

“O
UR
BUSINE
SS
IS
TO
MARCH
”
TJ to George Clinton, December 31, 1803, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“T
HE
[R
EPUBLICANS
]
HAVE
”
Gouverneur Morris to Roger Griswold, November 25, 1803, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University. Of a planned festival to celebrate the Purchase, Simeon Baldwin wrote on January 22, 1804: “It will be a great day among the Democrats here. Few or none of the Federalists will join them—they are not yet satisfied there is occasion for joy—They fear the effect of so great an extension of our territory.… They fear the easy introduction of French men, French politics and French intrigue. Northern men fear the influence of such an additional weight to the politics of the South.”

“I
F
, I
SAY
, F
EDERALISM
IS
CRUMBL
ING
”
Pickering to George Cabot, January 29, 1804, Henry Adams, ed.,
Documents Relating to New-England Federalism
:
1800–1815
(Boston, 1905), 341.

“
A
REUNION
OF
THE
N
ORTHERN
STATE
S
”
Ibid., 357.

“T
HE
PEOPLE
OF
THE
E
AST
”
Ibid., 339.

“M
ANY
PERSONS
A
RE
AT
THIS
MOMENT
”
Letter of Roger Griswold, January 10, 1804, William Lane Griswold Memorial Collection, Yale University.

THIRTY
-
SIX
·
THE PEOPLE WERE NEVER MORE HAPPY

“I
F
WE
CAN
KEEP
”
TJ to Elbridge Gerry, March 3, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

“I
THINK
YOU
OUGHT
”
Anonymous to Thomas Jefferson, on or before June 15, 1804, Thomas Jefferson Papers, LOC.

AROUN
D
THREE
THIRTY
OR
FO
UR
O
'
CLOCK
JHT,
IV, 370.

H
E
ENTE
RTAINED
CONSTANTLY
Merry Ellen Scofield, “The Fatigues of His Table: The Politics of Presidential Dining During the Jefferson Administration,”
Journal of the Early Republic
26, no. 3 (Fall 2006): 449–69. Scofield made a particular study of records of Jefferson's dinner guests from 1804 to 1809.

SOCIABILITY
WAS
ES
SENTIAL
See, for instance, Wood,
Revolutionary Characters,
105–7.

J
EFFERSON
DISLIKED
CONFRONTAT
ION
Scofield, “Fatigues of His Table,” 465–66.

HE
PREFERRED
“
PE
LL
-
MELL
”
Selected Letters of Dolley Payne Madison,
44.

REVELED
IN
HIS
FIRST
DINNER
TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/dinner-etiquette (accessed 2011). Louisa Catherine Adams, wife of John Quincy, was also impressed. “The entertainment was handsome,” she said. “French servants in livery, a French butler, a French cuisine, and a buffet full of choice wine.” (
JHT,
IV, 374.) Margaret Bayard Smith saw the Jefferson dinners as democratic metaphors. “At Mr. Jefferson's table the conversation was general; every guest was entertained and interested in whatever topic was discussed,” she wrote. “To each an opportunity was offered for the exercise of his colloquial powers and the stream of conversation thus enriched by such various contributions flowed on full, free and animated.” (Margaret Bayard Smith,
First Forty Years,
389.)

“I
T
IS
A
LONG
TIME
S
INCE
”
TJF, http://www.monticello.org/site/research-and-collections/dinner-etiquette (accessed 2011).

THE
RAPIDLY
DE
PLETING
NUMBER
OF
TR
EES
Margaret Bayard Smith,
First Forty Years,
11.

“S
UCH
AS
GREW
”
Ibid.

“H
OW
I
WISH
”
Ibid.

“A
ND
HAVE
YOU
NOT
”
Ibid., 12.

“N
O
,”
SAID
J
EFF
ERSON
Ibid.

HAD
BEGUN
HIS
W
ASHINGTON
CAREER
Lynn W. Turner, “Thomas Jefferson Through the Eyes of a New Hampshire Politician,”
Mississippi Valley Historical Review
30, no. 2 (September 1943): 205–14, charts Plumer's shifting opinion of Jefferson. “At the end of his five years in Congress,” Turner writes, “he had sloughed off most of [his] bias and was, indeed, about to transfer his political allegiance to Jefferson's party. Because he recorded this transformation in shrewd and faithful detail, Plumer's story provides an interesting study of the impact of Jefferson's personality upon his own.” (Ibid., 206.)

“I
HAVE
A
CURIOSITY
”
Ibid., 211.

J
EFFERSON
GAVE
P
LUMER
SOME
“I
LLINOIS
NUTS
”
Ibid., 210.

“I
SHALL
,
THEN
”
Ibid., 211.

T
HE
WIFE
OF
THE
MAYOR
OF
G
EORGETOWN
Margaret Bayard Smith,
First Forty Years,
390.

SHE
ASKED
J
EFFERSON
IF
H
E
LIVED
NEAR
C
ARTERS
M
OUNTAIN
Ibid.

“V
ERY
CLOSE
”
Ibid.

“I
SUPPOSE
IT
'
S
”
Ibid.

“W
HY
,
YES
”
Ibid., 391.

DESCRIBED
AS
“
DI
STINGUISHED
PERSONS
”
Ibid., 389.

“
EARNEST
AND
ANIMATED
”
Ibid.

ONE
GUEST
,
WHO
HAD
LI
VED
IN
E
UROPE
Ibid.

“
SILEN
T
AND
UNNOTICED
”
Ibid.

“
A
STRANGER
IN
HIS
OWN
COUNTRY
”
Ibid.

“T
O
YOU
, M
R
. C.,
WE
ARE
INDEBTED
”
Ibid. The guest was Nathaniel Cutting.

SUDDE
NLY
ATTENTION
WARMED
Ibid., 389–90.

“Y
ES
,
SIR
”
Ibid., 390.

“
A
PERSON
OF
IMPORTANCE
”
Ibid.

A
NTH
ONY
M
ERRY
,
THE
NEW
MIN
ISTER
FROM
B
RITAIN
JHT,
IV, 367–92, covers the Merry affair.

T
HE
PRESIDENT
'
S
RECE
PTION
Henry Adams,
History,
549–51.

M
RS
. M
ADISON
WAS
THE
HOSTESS
Ibid., 551–52.

“
A
VIRAGO
,
AND
IN
THE
SH
ORT
COURSE
”
TJ to James Monroe, January 8, 1804, James Monroe Papers, LOC. The Madisons asked the Merrys to dinner after the evening at the president's; the secretary of state also practiced “pell-mell,” but the Merrys were not to be stymied a second time. As Jefferson heard the story, Mrs. Merry was “not to be the foremost,” prompting her husband to action. Merry “seized her by the hand, led her to the head of the table, where Mrs. Gallatin … politely offered her place to Mrs. Merry, who took it without … apology.” That was enough for Mrs. Merry, who thereafter, Jefferson said, “declined dining, except at one or two private citizens', where it is said there were previous stipulations.” TJ to William Short, January 23, 1804, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore.