MISCELLANY
by Thomas Jefferson
Reply to the Representations of Affairs in America by British
Newspapers
[before November 20, 1784]
I am an officer lately returned from service & residence in the
U.S. of America. I have fought & bled for that country because I
thought it's cause just. From the moment of peace to that in which I
left it, I have seen it enjoying all the happiness which easy
government, order & industry are capable of giving to a people. On
my return to my native country what has been my astonishment to find
all the public papers of Europe filled with accounts of the anarchy &
destractions supposed to exist in that country. I have received
serious condolances from all my friends on the bitter fruits of so
prosperous a war. These friends I know to be so well disposed
towards America that they wished the reverse of what they repeated
from the public papers. I have enquired into the source of all this
misinformation & have found it not difficult to be traced. The
printers on the Continent have not yet got into the habit of taking
the American newspapers. Whatever they retail therefore on the
subject of America, they take from the English. If your readers will
reflect a moment they will recollect that every unfavourable account
they have seen of the transactions in America has been taken from the
English papers only. Nothing is known in Europe of the situation of
the U.S. since the acknowlegement of their independance but thro' the
channel of these papers.
But these papers have been under the influence of two ruling
motives 1. deep-rooted hatred springing from an unsuccesful attempt
to injure 2. a fear that their island will be depopulated by the
emigration of it's inhabitants to America. Hence no paper comes out
without a due charge of paragraphs manufactured by persons employed
for that purpose. According to these America is a scene of continued
riot & anarchy. Wearied out with contention, it is on the verge of
falling again into the lap of Gr. Br. for repose. It's citizens are
groaning under the oppression of heavy taxes. They are flying for
refuge to the frozen regions which still remain subject to Gr. Br.
Their assemblies and congresses are become odious, in one paragraph
represented as tyrranising over their constituents, & in another as
possessing no power or influence at all, &c. &c. The truth is as
follows without aggravation or diminution. There was a mutiny of 300
souldiers in Philadelphia soon after the peace; & Congress thinking
the executive of that state did not act with proper energy to
suppress & punish it they left that city in disgust. Yet in this
mutiny there neither was blood shed nor a blow struck. There has
lately been a riot in Charlestown, occasioned by the feuds between
the whigs who had been driven from their country by the British while
they possessed it, and the tories who were permitted to remain by the
Americans when they recovered it. There were a few instances in
other states where individuals disgusted with some articles in the
peace undertook to call town meetings, published the resolves of the
few citizens whom they could prevail upon to meet as if they had been
the resolves of the whole town, and endeavored unsuccesfully to
engage the people in the execution of their private views. It is
beleived that these attempts have not been more than ten or a dozen
thro' the whole 13 states & not one of them has been succesful: on
the contrary where any illegal act has been committed by the
demagogues they have been put under a due course of legal
prosecution. The British when they evacuated New York having carried
off, contrary to the express articles of the treaty of peace, a great
deal of property belonging to the citizens of the U.S. & particularly
to those of the state of Virginia, amounting as has been said to half
a million of pounds sterling, the assembly of that state lately
resolved that till satisfaction was made for this, the article
respecting British debts ought not to be carried into full execution,
submitting nevertheless this their opinion to Congress and declaring
that if they thought otherwise, all laws obstructing the recovery of
debts should be immediately repealed. Yet even this was opposed by a
respectable minority in their senate who entered a protest against it
in strong terms. The protest as it stands in the records follows
immediately the resolutions protested against & therefore does not
recite them. The English papers publish the protest without the
resolutions and thus lead Europe to beleive that the resolutions had
definitively decided against the paiment of British debts. Yet
nothing is less true. This is a faithful history of the high sounded
disturbances of America. Those who have visited that country since
the peace will vouch that it is impossible for any governments to be
more tranquil & orderly than they are. What were the mutiny of 300
souldiers in Philada, the riot of whigs & tories in Charlestown to
the riots of London under L'd. G. Gordon, and of London & the country
in general in the late elections? Where is there any country of
equal extent with the U.S. in which fewer disturbances have happened
in the same space of time? Where has there been an instance of an
army disbanded as was that of America without receiving a shilling of
the long arrearages due them or even having their accounts settled &
yet disbanded peaceably? Instead of resorting as is too often the
case with disbanded armies to beggary or robbery for a livelihood
they returned every man to his home & resumed his axe & spade; & it
is a fact as true as it is singular that on the disbanding of an army
of 30,000 men in America there have been but two or three instances
of any of those who composed it being brought to the bar of justice
as criminals: and that you may travel from one end to the other of
the continent without seeing a beggar. With respect to the people
their confidence in their rulers in general is what common sense will
tell us it must be, where they are of their own choice annually,
unbribed by money, undebauched by feasting, & drunkenness. It would
be difficult to find one man among them who would not consider a
return under the dominion of Gr. Br. as the greatest of all possible
miseries. Their taxes are light, as they should be with a people so
lately wasted in the most cruel manner by war. They pay in
proportion to their property from one half to one & a half per cent
annually on it's whole value as estimated by their neighbors, the
different states requiring more or less as they have been less or
more ravaged by their enemies. Where any taxes are imposed they are
very trifling & are calculated cheifly to bring merchants into
contribution with the farmers. Against their emigration to the
remaining British dominions the superior rigor of their climate, the
inferiority of their soil, the nature of their governments and their
being actually inhabited by their most mortal enemies the tory
refugees, will be an eternal security. During the course of the war
the English papers were constantly filled with accounts of their
great victories, their armies were daily gaining. Yet Europe saw
that they were daily losing ground in America, & formed it's idea of
the truth not from what it heard but from what it saw. They wisely
considered an enlargement of territory on the one side & contraction
of it on the other as the best indication on which side victory
really was. It is hoped that Europe will be as wise & as just now:
that they will not consider the fabricated papers of England as any
evidence of truth; but that they will continue to judge of causes
from effects. If the distractions of America were what these papers
pretend, some great facts would burst out & lay their miseries open
to the eyes of all the world: no such effects appear, therefore no
such causes exist. If any such existed they would appear in the
American newspapers which are as free as any on earth. But none such
can be found in them. These are the testimonials to which I appeal
for beleif. To bring more home to every reader the reliance which
may be put on the English papers let him examine, if a Frenchman,
what account they give of the affairs of France, if a Dutchman, what
of the United Netherl'ds., if an Irishman, what of Ireland &c. If he
finds that those of his own country with which he happens to be
acquainted are wickedly misrepresented, let him consider how much
more likely to be so are those of a nation so hated as America.
America was the great pillar on which British glory was raised:
America has been the instrument for levelling that glory with the
dust. A little ill humour therefore might have found excuse in our
commiseration: but an apostasy from truth, under whatever
misfortunes, calls up feelings of a very different order.
Answers and Observations for Demeunier's Article on the United
States in the Encyclopedie
Methodique, 1786
I. From
Answers to Demeunier's First Queries
January 24, 1786
II. The Confederation is a wonderfully perfect instrument,
considering the circumstances under are however some alterations
which experience proves to be wanting. These are principally three.
1 To establish a general rule for the admission of new states into
the Union. By the Confederation no new state, except Canada, can be
permitted to have a vote in Congress without first obtaining the
consent of all the thirteen legislatures. It becomes necessary to
agree what districts may be established into separate states, and at
what period of their population they may come into Congress. The act
of Congress of April 23, 1784, has pointed out what ought to be
agreed on, to say also what number of votes must concur when the
number of voters shall be thus enlarged. 2. The Confederation in
it's eighth article, decides that the quota of money to be
contributed by the several states shall be proportioned to the value
of landed property in the state. Experience has shown it
impracticable to come at this value. Congress have therefore
recommended to the states to agree that their quotas shall be in
proportion to the number of their inhabitants, counting 5 slaves
however but as equal to 3 free inhabitants. I believe all the states
have agreed to this alteration except Rhode island. 3. The
Confederation forbids the states individually to enter into treaties
of commerce, or of any other nature, with foreign nations: and it
authorizes Congress to establish such treaties, with two reservations
however, viz., that they shall agree to no treaty which would 1.
restrain the legislatures from imposing such duties on foreigners, as
natives are subjected to; or 2. from prohibiting the exportation or
importation of any species of commodities. Congress may therefore be
said to have a power to regulate commerce, so far as it can be
effected by conventions with other nations, & by conventions which do
not infringe the two fundamental reservations before mentioned. But
this is too imperfect. Because till a convention be made with any
particular nation, the commerce of any one of our states with that
nation may be regulated by the State itself, and even when a
convention is made, the regulation of the commerce is taken out of
the hands of the several states only so far as it is covered or
provided for by that convention or treaty. But treaties are made in
such general terms, that the greater part of the regulations would
still result to the legislatures. Let us illustrate these
observations by observing how far the commerce of France & of England
can be affected by the state legislatures. As to England, any one of
the legislatures may impose on her goods double the duties which are
paid other nations; may prohibit their goods altogether; may refuse
them the usual facilities for recovering their debts or withdrawing
their ...
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