America’s fervent attachment to France arose from gratitude for its indispensable help during the Revolutionary War, and no country saluted its revolution with more fraternal warmth. In a variety of ways, the French Revolution had been spawned by its American predecessor, which had bred dreams of liberty among French aristocrats who fought in the war, then tried to enshrine its principles at home. The most visible standard-bearer of these hopes was the Marquis de Lafayette, who told Washington from Paris that the “ideas of liberty have been, since the American Revolution, spreading very fast.”
