A Republic, Not an Empire: Reclaiming America's Destiny

by Patrick J. Buchanan

It was under our second president that America fought an undeclared naval war with France. The cause was the treaty John Jay brought home from England, which allowed the British to seize U.S. ships carrying goods bought by its enemy, France. Paris saw this as ingratitude, treachery, and a dishonoring of the Alliance of 1778, and retaliated by ordering warships to follow the British example and seize merchant ships flying the American flag. Between July 1796 and June 1797, French cruisers seized more than three hundred. To head off a war, Adams sent three delegates to Paris to negotiate. There they were met with an offer of women and demands for a large bribe and for a U.S. apology for Adams’s allegedly anti-French statements to Congress. Only then might negotiations begin. When word of the insult reached the United States, a national outcry went up—“Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute!” Congress authorized the seizure of armed French ships, and the president recalled Washington to lead the defense of his country. Washington wanted to put Hamilton, a hero of Yorktown, in active command. Hamilton envisioned a campaign to seize Florida, New Orleans, and Texas from France’s ally, Spain. With the Federalists elated to be aligned with Britain, the robust little U.S. Navy began attacking and seizing armed French cruisers.2 But Adams wanted no full-dress war. He sent a delegation to negotiate with the French first consul, who did not want America aligned with the Br...