What this initiative could produce, Jefferson could not say. Monroe would therefore take “discretionary powers.” He knew the thinking of Jefferson and Madison well and in detail, and to that he added “the unlimited confidence of … the Western people; & generally of the republicans everywhere.…” No one else would fit the bill. In fact congressional Federalists had been “silenced” by the appointment already, and “the country will become calm as fast as the information extends over it.” To flattery Jefferson added the warning that “were you to decline, the chagrin would be universal, and would shake under your feet the high ground on which you stand with the public. indeed I know nothing which would produce such a shock. for on the event of this mission depends the future destinies of this republic.” Failing to purchase New Orleans, Monroe might have “to cross the channel (that is, make arrangements with Britain) as a prelude to inevitable war”: “we shall get entangled in European politics.…”

  Jefferson closed by noting that France’s problems in the West Indies made this a particularly propitious moment for Monroe to go thither. Napoleon’s problems on St. Domingue, a hitherto highly lucrative slave colony whose slaves were in full revolt, meant he needed money, and quick.

  The Republican high command put on quite a show in sending Monroe to France. Monroe told the chief French diplomat in Washington, Louis Pichon, that failure in Paris would lead Monroe to depart immediately for London. Pichon also received an invitation to a public dinner at which Senator Samuel Smith toasted Monroe with, “Peace if peace is honorable, war if war is necessary.” Pichon, impressed, recounted these developments for Talleyrand.3

  Meanwhile the British prime minister, Henry Addington, approached the American minister to the U.K., Rufus King.4 He asked how the United States would receive British occupation of New Orleans in case of a renewal of the European war. King replied that while happy to see any French design on that territory thwarted, the American government would “see it in the possession of England” only “with much concern.” Spain remained America’s preferred neighbor, particularly as the administration expected Spanish possession of New Orleans to lead to American “in the ordinary course of things.” Even if that occupation resulted in a transfer of Louisiana to the United States, King said, this apparent collusion between the United States and Great Britain would implicate America in an anti-French gambit, thus potentially damaging America’s relations with France—an outcome America wanted to avoid. In King’s account Addington concluded by saying that England had no intention of claiming the territory and would indeed prefer for it to end up in the possession of the United States. Despite this news from King, James Madison, for one, found the notion of Britain giving New Orleans to the United States unbelievable.

  King concluded that Britain would have no part in pressuring either France or Spain on America’s behalf. As he explained to Madison, “England abstains from mixing herself in it, precisely from those considerations which have led her to acquiesce in others of great importance to the Balance of Europe, as well as her own repose.” Britain in fact saw advantage to herself in ongoing proximity between France and the United States, because it “would keep the latter in a perpetual state of jealousy with respect to the former, and of consequence unite [the United States] in closer bonds of amity with Great Britain.”5 Jefferson privately conceded, “The day that France takes possession of New Orleans … seals the union of two nations who in conjunction can maintain exclusive possession of the ocean. From that moment we must marry ourselves to the British fleet and nation.”6

  So long as the peace endured, then, America could hope for nothing in particular in regard to Louisiana. If the war did recommence, however, and if France denied America the right of deposit at New Orleans, Livingston and James Monroe (who was sent to Paris with the special mission of resolving the Louisiana issue) should press the British for “concurrence” in it. The American diplomats were to offer King George’s government nothing in particular, but a vague promise of special commercial access to Louisiana. None of this seemed likely, as France had avowed its intention to leave America in possession of the same commercial rights at New Orleans as it had enjoyed during the Spanish intendancy there. Why Britain would agree to what the Americans were to offer remains unclear; they had nothing much to gain from it.7

  Livingston advised Madison in May 1802 that French forces’ departure for Louisiana had been delayed by a dispute between that country and Spain over Louisiana’s boundaries. France held that Louisiana included the Floridas, he advised, while Spain excluded that portion of the Spanish Empire.8 From February 1802 to the end of the year, Napoleon’s plans for North America had to be kept on the back burner. More pressing matters intervened.

  Bonaparte’s vision for French Louisiana was characteristically grand. Its colonization was “among the most favourite projects of the first Consul.” As Livingston found on arriving in Paris, Napoleon “Saw in it a new Egypt; he Saw in it a Colony that was to counterbalance the Eastern establishments of Britain; he Saw in it a provision for his Generals, and what was more important in the then State of things he Saw in it a pretence for the ostracism of Suspected enemies,” who could be stationed in Louisiana to get them away from Paris.9

  In the end Bonaparte’s grand strategy collapsed. Hoping to resuscitate France’s Western Hemisphere empire, he had dispatched the first of what would be over thirty thousand soldiers and sailors under the command of his brother-in-law, General Victor Emmanuel Leclerc, to St. Domingue. Leclerc and his men were to restore French government there and to re-enslave the rebels who had seized control of France’s most lucrative colony.10 What neither the general nor his master knew, however, was that tropical disease would ravage their expeditionary force, leaving only a few thousand fit for service, and in the end driving Leclerc to tell Bonaparte that both substantial reinforcements and a policy of outright butchery would be necessary to reestablishment of French authority on the island. Disease claimed his life too before the first consul’s rejection of Leclerc’s advice could become known to him.11

  It was as a result of this that Napoleon’s North American ambition was thwarted, the future of Anglophone culture on that continent made secure. Seeing that re-subjugation of the colony’s Africans would require several tens of thousands of soldiers and a long, hard military campaign, and realizing in light of British naval superiority that renewal of European war could at any moment render St. Domingue impossible to defend anyway, Napoleon at a stroke decided to cut his losses. “Damn sugar, damn coffee, damn colonies!” he yelled.12 “Irresolution and deliberation are no longer in season; I renounce Louisiana. It is not only New Orleans that I cede; it is the whole colony, without reserve.”13 France would take what it could get from the bothersome American diplomats who had been nagging his foreign minister, Catholic bishop-turned-republican-revolutionary-cum-Bonapartist-for-the-nonce (with more than one change in posture still ahead of him) Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord.

  Livingston was Johnny-on-the-spot, then, when news arrived in Europe of the Spanish intendant’s unilateral move on October 18, 1802, as the Kentucky Legislature communicated it to Jefferson, “forbid[ding] American Citizens to deposit their merchandizes and effects in the said Port, without having assigned to the United States an equivalent establishment on another part of the banks of the Mississippi.” The Kentuckians closed their warlike communiqué by “pledg[ing] [them]selves to support, at the expense of [their] lives and fortunes, such measures as the honor, and interest of the United States [might] require.”14

  On March 2, 1803, Madison sent Monroe and Livingston what proved to be their ultimate instructions for negotiation with Talleyrand.15 They might spend as much as ten million dollars (fifty million French “livres tournois,” plus assumption of responsibility for some debts the French owed to Americans), he advised. They should obtain New Orleans and the Floridas (today’s state of Florida, plus the coastal regions of Alabama and Mississippi, in addition to the portion of today’s state of Louisiana east of the Mississippi River) “or as much thereof as the actual proprietor can be prevailed on to part with.” As had become customary among Republicans, Madison classified American aims as “natural and … convenient” (which was alternative to “imperial”). Though the administration had undertaken a program of severe military retrenchment, France likely would see the wisdom of avoiding having America’s “Colossal growth” thrown into the British scale—that is, America could have her cake (spending and tax reductions) and eat it too (expect France to accede to American demands because of the United States’ military potential).

  France would have noticed the great uproar in the United States over the Spanish intendant’s decision to revoke America’s right of deposit. It would want to avoid any conflict with America, and so hope to resolve the looming issue. The conjuncture of the St. Domingue difficulty and “the languishing state of the French finances” should ease the negotiators’ path. Madison went on to explain how the French government’s evident calculation that the Western states ultimately would become friendly to France’s government at New Orleans instead of to the United States was mistaken. Then he laid out the proposal his agents should tender to Talleyrand, the main elements of which were that France would cede the Floridas and New Orleans, besides various related islands; the two powers would share the Mississippi navigation; and the inhabitants of the ceded territory would ultimately be incorporated into the American population “on an equal footing.” While he could wish Spain would be party to the pact, Madison said, the potential for delay meant the United States would not insist on that. This last point would have serious consequences through the nineteenth century’s second decade.

  Though loath to grant it, Madison said Livingston and Monroe might guarantee the west bank of the river to France rather than “have the negotiation fail.” Absent any sale, the Americans were at least to obtain a guarantee of the right of deposit. So too the negotiators should endeavor to regularize American access to “suitable deposits at the mouths of the other Rivers passing from the United States thro’ the Floridas,” besides “the free navigation of those rivers by Citizens of the United States.” In a letter of April 18th, Madison clarified that war would only be necessary if France seemed determined to deny American navigation of the Mississippi or the right of deposit.

  By the time these instructions reached Livingston and Monroe, the matter had already been resolved. François Barbé-Marbois, another of Bonaparte’s ministers, offered Livingston “the whole of Louisiana” on the day of Monroe’s arrival—thus before Monroe could play any role in the matter.16 As Livingston rushed to tell Madison, he had taken the Spanish intendant’s revocation of the American right of deposit at New Orleans as an opportunity to impress upon Bonaparte’s mind the likelihood that America would use that as an occasion to seize New Orleans and the Floridas and that “Britain would never suffer Spain to grant the Floridas to France even were she so disposed, but would immediately seize upon them as soon as the transfer was made.…” Once deprived of the Floridas, France would lose any benefit from possession of Louisiana, which anyway would be “indefensible as it possesses not one port even for Frigates.”17

  Livingston went on to explain that he had developed for French consideration the effect on the European balance of power, particularly the balance of naval power, should Britain seize Louisiana and the Floridas. “These reasons,” he scribbled excitedly, “have had I trust the desired effect. Mr. Talleyrand asked me this day … whether we wished to have the whole of Louisiana.” Somewhat discombobulated, Livingston “told him no, that our wishes extended only to New Orleans & the Floridas.…” Pressing the point, the wily Frenchman, no doubt amused at Livingston’s error, “said that if they gave New Orleans the rest would be of little value, & that he would wish to know ‘what we would give for the whole.’” When Livingston spat out the figure “twenty Millions,” Talleyrand answered “that this was too low an offer” and Livingston should mull it over and “tell him to morrow.” Knowing of Monroe’s arrival, Livingston asked for time to consult with him, then see Talleyrand again the second day. The conversation ended with Talleyrand saying that “he did not speak from authority, but that the idea had struck him.”

  Livingston sent Monroe an enthusiastic letter of welcome on hearing of his arrival in France.18 Livingston told Madison that he had made clear to the French the possibility that Americans had already seized New Orleans, as Senator James Ross, F-PA, had proposed resolutions in the Senate authorizing Madison to raise fifty thousand militiamen to seize New Orleans for a deposit.19 With Monroe’s arrival Livingston told his French interlocutors that they should push “the train we are now in” (that is, the process that had nearly reached a conclusion before Monroe’s arrival) “& which I flatter myself we shall be able on the arrival of Mr. Monroe to pursue to effect. I think from every appearance that war is very near at hand, & under these circumstances I have endeavored to impress the government that not a moment should be lost least Britain should anticipate us.”

  Livingston still did not attach much significance to Louisiana Territory outside New Orleans. Rather, he told Madison that in case the deal were closed, they should immediately try to trade Spain “the west bank of the Mississippi … for the Floridas reserving New Orleans.”

  Monroe, a bit irked, considered the behavior both of Livingston and of the Frenchman in advancing the negotiation after learning of Monroe’s mission but prior to Monroe’s arrival contrary to “strict diplomatic etiquette,” and thus a weak reed on which to rest the negotiation. While Monroe’s notes showed that he hoped to spare himself and the administration “the charge of having lost by the measure taken, a brilliant opportunity of securing all our objects here,” one might also infer that Monroe, ever alert to the possibility of political advancement, wanted to ensure that he reaped some of the glory of impending events.20 Livingston too chafed at being in tandem, taking time both to gripe to the secretary of state about the titles assigned to him and Monroe and to confide to Madison that “Mr. Monroe having been compelled when here to be well with the party then uppermost and who are detested by the present rulers it will be some time before they know how to estimate his worth.…”21

  In the end, though he thought of them as representing “the Jacobin Government of America, so dangerous to the repose & safety of European Systems,”22 Bonaparte did the deed with Livingston and Monroe.23 Thrilled, they covered the treaty with a letter to Secretary of State Madison conceding that “[a]n acquisition of so great an extent was … not contemplated by [their] appointment,” but insisting the offer had been too good to refuse.24 By removing the threat of France or Britain as a neighbor, they hoped that they had not only obtained the territory, but separated America from the European state system. “We make in fine,” they concluded, “a great stride to real and substantial independence.…” In doing so they also bade fair to cement the American Union.

  In a private letter Monroe told Madison that Bonaparte had presented the American ministers an all-or-nothing choice. Anyway, he continued, the navigation fees and real estate value would have made it a good deal even at as much as three times the price. Perhaps now, he mused, the Federal Government could keep the Louisiana Territory unsettled until the American lands east of the river had been filled with population. He guessed, rightly as it turns out, that Federalists who had clamored for forcibly seizing the desired territory would “declaim ag[ain]st the govt. & its agents for getting too much. But the clamor will not avail them,” he concluded. “It will disgrace them.” Rufus King had stayed on in Britain, Monroe heard, awaiting the outcome of the Louisiana negotiation. An American in Paris had told Monroe that while “we could not give too much for this territory; that the object was vast and ought to be embraced; that it wod. not be, by our admn. from the want of spirit to such an enterprize.” Livingston had been difficult, and seemed perturbed, but unless he took a hostile tack deserved all the plaudits flowing from his role in achieving this outcome.

  As he pondered the Louisiana Purchase, Monroe arrived at the conclusion that not Livingston, he, or the two of them, but the Jefferson administration deserved the credit. As he said, France decided on the measure before he arrived, and if Livingston had been the spur must have decided on it much sooner. “I consider this transaction as resulting from the wise and firm tho’ moderate measures of the Executive & congress during the last Session,” he told three sympathetic senators. Maintaining friendly relations with France had yielded this result.25

  Yet the weary received no rest: asked to clarify Louisiana’s eastern boundary, Talleyrand replied only, “you have made a noble bargain for yourselves & I suppose you will make the most of it.”26 Likely Talleyrand calculated that the United States and Spain would disagree whether Louisiana included any or all of West Florida, which would be a bone of contention between the two—to France’s benefit—for the foreseeable future. Monroe left immediately for Spain, where he was “to treat with his Catholic Majesty for such portions as he owns of Florida.”27 He thought the Louisiana Purchase reduced the Floridas’ value to Spain, which should be reflected in their price.28 The problem would not be resolved anytime soon.

  17

  While the French mission proceeded, President Jefferson had raised a point of discussion in his Cabinet.1 He wanted to know whether the Federal Government had authority to purchase New Orleans and the Floridas from France.2

  Attorney General Lincoln thought the problem could be avoided by the simple expedient of having France agree to extend the boundaries of the Mississippi Territory and Georgia. If the U.S. Government did not purchase the territory itself, he contended, no constitutional issue would arise. This would avoid “risking the doubtful attempt, so to amend the constitution, as to embrace the object; or hazarding the ratification of the treaty, from an opposition to such an amendment.…” It would also dodge the question of the status of the newly incorporated people in the United States, as they would be citizens of the affected states.