Thomas Jefferson's Qur'an: Islam and the Founders (41 page)

The visit would be Jefferson’s second encounter with a Muslim ambassador and Madison’s first. Senator
William Plumer of New Hampshire recorded in his journal the most detailed observations of the Tunisian, along with some of his conversations about the visitor with President Jefferson. The senator was with Jefferson at the White House when cannon fire at Alexandria, Virginia, announced the ambassador’s arrival. Though Plumer thought the visit a “mark of respect,” Jefferson countered that the Tunisians undertook it “unwillingly,”
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also telling Plumer that he would “Pay no tribute to Tunis.”
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It was a touchy point. Newspapers such as the
Hampshire Federalist
carried Jefferson’s announcement of the visit, which he represented “as proof of friendship” that the Tunisian vessels would be “restored,” which, he implied, was not tribute but rather reparations.
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Jefferson had rented Stelle’s Hotel in Washington, D.C., to house the envoy and his eleven-person entourage, plus his Italian band.
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He hoped to recoup these entertainment expenses by selling or putting out to stud the four horses brought by the ambassador as a gift.
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What the president did not share with Senator Plumer, who found out anyway, was that Mellimelli had requested “one or more women” with whom to spend a portion of the night.
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It was Secretary Madison who would procure for the ambassador one “Georgia a Greek,” billing the Department of State with the droll notation, “Appropriations to foreign intercourse,” as required by “very urgent and unforeseen occurrences.”
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He could not have done so without consulting the president, whose own private life, after all, still included the slave concubine Sally Hemings.
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Jefferson suffers by comparison with the Tunisian in Senator Plumer’s review of the president’s attire and the envoy’s.
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The senator writes that the president wore a “blue coat, red vest,” and “white hose ragged slippers with his toes out—clean linen—but hair disheveled.”
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When the senator visited Mellimelli, he noted that “his military robes” shone in “fine scarlet,” which was “inwrought with much gold” and complemented by “yellow shoes” and a “turban of fine white muslin,” the entire aspect “elegant and rich” alongside Jefferson’s shabbiness. Plumer further reports of the Muslim ambassador that “his complexion is about as dark as that of a Molatto [Mulatto]”
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and that he described himself as “a
Turk.”
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As for Mellimelli’s retainers, they were all “large black men.”
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Plumer was most impressed by the ambassador’s “elegant” gold and diamond snuff box, from which his guest would later enjoy a snort with his host.
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Like the ambassador from Tripoli, the ambassador from Tunis smoked a pipe that was “four feet long.” For all this luxurious display, Plumer initially concluded of the Tunisian that he was “a man, between the Savage & civilized state.” Despite these prejudices, he remained impressed to see that Mellimelli’s “manners were easy & really graceful” and his “countenance is good—it bespeaks intelligence and integrity.”
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When the secretary of the navy paid a call, he observed that because it was
Ramadan, the Tunisian envoy was praying “on his hands & knees on a very fine skin that was spread on the carpet.”
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Actually, the ambassador’s prayer times would have remained the same, even during the month-long holiday when all Muslims fast and abstain from liquids from dawn to dusk in remembrance of God’s revelation of the Qur’an to the Prophet Muhammad.

Since the Tunisian explained to his visitor that “he could not eat this month until after sunset,” the two met after sundown for coffee.
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Mellimelli was, by his own account, “a very firm believer in the Alcoran—he reads and expounds a lesson from it every day to his household.”
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Recognizing the importance of Ramadan, Jefferson too made accommodations for his guest, changing the time of the state dinner accordingly. The original invitation, probably issued December 6, had dinner scheduled for “half after three,” when all Washington would
have typically supped.
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Jefferson moved it to “precisely at sunset,” although this still did not allow the Muslim ambassador time enough to mark the end of daylight before breaking his fast.
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Ironically, the most detailed account of this “Ramadan” dinner at the White House was recorded by John Quincy Adams, author of Publicola’s anti-Islamic invective against Jefferson fourteen years earlier:

During dinner, Mellimelli’s two secretaries left and seized the opportunity “to take each a glass of wine.” (They sipped surreptitiously, because alcohol was prohibited by their faith.) Adams added that their “manners are courteous,” though an interpreter was needed, as usual, to facilitate communication in Italian.
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The Tunisian ambassador was in Washington at the same time as a delegation of
Native Americans, also negotiating treaties with the United States. When they visited Mellimelli to pay their diplomatic respects, he asked them about their religion. Plumer recounts the ex- change:

The Tunisian immediately condemned them as “all vile Hereticks.” Later, Plumer also reports an exchange between Jefferson and the Tunisian concerning Native American religion. Mellimelli asked Jefferson “how he could prove Indians were the descendants of Adam?” Jefferson
answered both diplomatically and as a man who would never take scripture literally: “it was difficult.”
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It wasn’t until later in his stay that the Tunisian would reconsider the beliefs of the
Native Americans. Attending the funeral oration of an Osage chief, Mellimelli heard an affirmation “that God was God, it was his work.” This utterance Mellimelli understood as a declaration of the divine unity. It prompted him to allow these people into the monotheist fold, even to suggest that they were probably originally from Yemen.
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Ultimately, Mellimelli would declare the Native Americans to be “descendants of Arabs” and “his brethren.”
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How he viewed Jefferson, Madison, Plumer, and other white Americans remains a mystery, though the president would express his own views of the Tunisian envoy in a letter of 1806.

Secretary Madison had planned Mellimelli’s departure for home from Boston after sojourns in various East Coast cities, among them Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York.
James Cathcart, a former prisoner in Algiers and a former U.S. consul, accompanied the ambassador on these travels.
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In May 1806, Jefferson wrote Madison about his anxiety that the ambassador “should go away personally favorable to us,” but his imminent departure left several problems unresolved.
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For one, Jefferson had refused Mellimelli’s persistent demands for tribute in exchange for a peace treaty. (The president was unmoved even by the envoy’s claims that he feared for his life if he returned without substantial American monies.) Jefferson did, however, eventually send back with Mellimelli a U.S.-built ship as compensation for the one seized by the navy, together with a gift of $10,000 to cover the Tunisian ruler’s losses.
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In September 1806, the ambassador finally left Boston so laden with presents that they had to be shipped separately to Tunis by chartered vessel.
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(Room on his personal transport was limited by the large quantity of commodities like coffee and sugar the envoy had acquired in the hope of turning a profit.)
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But the most diplomatically precious thing Mellimelli carried was a letter from Jefferson to
Hammuda Bey, the Tunisian ruler, dated June 28, 1806.
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Jefferson’s correspondence with the ruler of Tunis, begun earlier in 1801, provides greater insight into his personal view of the
relationship between the two countries. While emphasizing recognition and respect between the two powers, these exchanges also mark the culmination of Jefferson’s references to spiritual common ground in pursuit of a lasting peace.
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Jefferson was not the first president to mention God in his correspondence with Tunis. In 1800, President John Adams had written expressing hope that “Almighty God would cause to reign between our two nations, a peace firm and durable
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But Jefferson went further in his personal entreaties for a religiously based amity.

In April 1801, a month after the inauguration, the first letter from the bey arrived at the White House entreating Jefferson to send the presents agreed upon in the peace treaty the previous year, as well as renewing a request for the forty cannon also stipulated, as “real proof of friendship.” In closing Hammuda Bey wrote, “I pray Almighty God to preserve you, and I assure you, Mr. President, of all the extent of my esteem and my most distinguished consideration.”
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Doubtless, Jefferson would have noted the presumption of a shared God and God’s presence blessing relations between the two men. The president duly responded in September, with regrets that the agreed presents had been delayed because of “distance,” but with assurance that they would duly arrive, and a warning of his country’s new problems with Tunis’s neighbor Tripoli. In closing, Jefferson followed the bey’s example in invoking the Almighty, expressing hope for the “continuance of your friendship in return for that which we sincerely bear to you; and pray to God that he may long preserve your life, and have you under the safeguard of his holy keeping.”
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Jefferson had recapitulated the bey’s formula, as well as adding his own prayer for “safeguard” of the Muslim ruler’s life, which had a pious ring, but might also be considered in purely pragmatic terms: Anytime a North African ruler died, previous peace treaties were abrogated and needed to be renegotiated by the new Muslim sovereign. In wishing long life to Hammuda Bey, whose rule would run from 1777 to 1814, Jefferson was also praying that America would be spared further financial demands. His relationship with Hammuda and the bey’s rule would endure through both of Jefferson’s presidential terms.

On September 8, 1802, the Tunisian ruler responded to Jefferson with thanks for the receipt of “all the military and naval stores” and the “superb jewels” guaranteed by treaty. Hammuda Bey then praised the “harmony and alliance which, thank God, have been established and
actually subsist between us.” This did not keep the North African ruler from requesting “a good frigate of 36 guns” from the Americans. Nor would he refrain from aiding Tripoli in its war with the United States. Nevertheless, the bey concluded, “I pray Almighty God to have you in his holy keeping.”
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The bey had adopted a key part of Jefferson’s formula for a personal benediction in his closing.

When, in the course of this correspondence with Tunis, Tripoli had declared war on the United States on May 14, 1801, Jefferson responded by ordering a U.S. naval squadron to the Mediterranean within a week. Even so, writing the Tripolitan ruler for the first time as president seven days after the declaration of war, Jefferson still expressed hope for “peace and friendship with all nations,” signing his missive, “I pray God, very great and respected friend, to have you always in his holy keeping.”
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Jefferson the Deist’s belief in a unitary God would be consonant with this assertion, even in the midst of his blockade of Tripoli’s harbor. But invoking God’s protection for an avowed enemy? It would appear that Jefferson was attempting to see whether the religious formula he had included in his response to the bey of Tunis might gain him anything in diplomacy with Tripoli. Jefferson’s letters to the ruler of Tunis in 1803 and 1804, during the war with Tripoli, a period when Tunis offered military aid to that neighboring power, continued to invoke God in his final benedictions. These expressions had become a consistent part of the president’s foreign policy.
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These letters must be understood in context. When Jefferson dispatched a letter in 1806 to the bey in the care of his ambassador, the American navy had already seized Tunisian vessels for assisting Tripoli. Despite conflict with Tunis, the need for conciliation with them was great, now that war against Tripoli was at last concluded, and the president’s solicitous words reflect the fragility of the bilateral relationship, at a time when the United States was in no position of naval or diplomatic advantage. What is perhaps most interesting was that Jefferson, whatever his innermost intent, should express repeatedly a personal belief in God to a Muslim ruler at a time when many of his own countrymen considered their president an atheist, an infidel, or even a Muslim outright. These letters dare to assert that Jefferson, at least, agreed that North Africans and Americans worshipped the same deity, and that this common belief would enhance their diplomatic relations.