Jefferson Foreign policy Spring1990 FA

8/14/2019 Jefferson Foreign policy Spring1990 FA

1/23

TRobert W. TuckerDavid C. Hendrickson

THOMAS JEFFERSON ANDAMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

hundred years ago, on March 21, 1790, ThomasJefferson arrived in New York City to assume his duties assecretary of state, the flrst under the new national govern-ment. No man had a greater impact on the day-to-day conductof American foreign policy than Jefferson during his long lifeof public service. And throughout the course of Americanhistory few can rival Jefferso n as a living symbol of the na tion 'spurpose. That his writings might be invoked on every side ofa given controversy has always added to the uses of theJeffersonian past; all the great conflicts of the nineteenthcenturyover slavery, union and democracyfound parti-sans on either side appealing to the "sagacious aphorisms andoracular sayings" of the great Virginian^' The same has beentru e in foreign policy, where Jefferson's na m e has beeninvoked on all sides of the ever-recurring debates on thenation 's diplom atic stance. /It is in Jeffe rson 's sense of values' that the deepes t associationexists between his own outlook and the American mind. Theinstitutions that characterize American public life todaythestand ing m ilitary establishments, the ballooning de bt an d hightaxes, the whole complex of.banks, corporations and hnancialmarkets, the subordinate/position of state governments inrelation to national power, the exalted status of federaljudicatureall this he would have beheld with a kind of sacredhorror, as constituting the victory of Alexander Hamilton'sFederalist vision of American life. Uncannily, however, theideals of American Ufe remain Jeffersonian, even in the midst


2/23

136 FOR EIGN AFFAIRSof all these powerful and corrupting institutions; we cannothelp but turn to Jefferson, even with the knowledge that thevalues he championed can often be made a subject of reproachagainst him.T h e m ain source of Jefferson's con tinuing app eal lies in thefacility with which he evoked the meaning of the Americanexper iment in self-government. He thought of America theway we like to think of ourselves, and saw its signiflcance, aswe still now tend to do, in terms larger than itself. Whethe r inrelation to the domestic experiment at h o m e or the conductof the republic toward foreign powers, his most characteristicut terance was the contrast he drew between the high moralpurpose that animated our own national life and action, andthe low motives of power and expediency that drove othernations. Even the labor of the farm had a meaning beyondthe hard drudgeries of existenceof clearing the forest,tending to crops and providing shelter. To the meanest dir tf a rm er Je f f e r son gave the c o n v i c t i o n t h a t h e t h eAmericanwas part of a form of civilization higher than thepolished societies of Europe, with their artiflcial distinctionsbetween social classes, their oppressive restrictions on h u m a nfreedom, and their crushing burden of debt and taxes. Thata republic so constituted should be guided in its foreignpolicy by the same calculations of power and expedience asanimated the states of Europe was unthinkable . Those whofelt power and forgot right could teach only negative lessons,by showing the path by which America might become cor-rup ted .Jefferson's vision was not without its critics, then or later.Europeans found laughable the notion that American civili-zation, with no art or l i terature considered worthy of men-tion, and animated in its daily hfe by the drives of "sordidavarice," might be held to represent a higher form ofcommunal life; European diplomats gave no credence to theview that the external policy of the young republic wasinspired by a noble moral purpose. The denuncia t ions didnot matter, and barely disturbed the American in his illu-


3/23

JEFFERSON AND FORE IGN POLICY 137human hope and happiness" involved for Jefferson "every-thing dear to man." '

IIJefferson is the great exemplar, along with Woodrow Wil-son, of the national conviction so persistent an d pro fou nd that we have rejected an ancient reason of state, that we standfor something new under the sun, and that our destiny as anation is to lead the world from the old to the new. No onegave more fervent and eloquent expression to this conviction

than Wilson, at a time when the nation's star, though alreadyvery high, was still rising. But the same conviction was appar-en t from the outset, as Jefferson testifies, thou gh the circum-stances attending it were quite modest. America was destinedto set an example to the world both in the principles of societyit entertained at home and in the policies it followed abroad."We are firmly convinced, and we act on that conviction,"Jefferson declared in his second inaugural address, "that withnations, as with individuals, our interests soundly calculatedwill ever be found inseparable from our moral duties."^ Theforeign policy that faithfully reflected this conviction wasbound to be radically different from the foreign policies of theEuropean states.The origins of the belief that this nation had rejected anancient reason of state must be found in the first instance inthe differences seen to separate republics from monarchies.T h e logic of reason of state was the logic of m onarch ies, not ofrepublics. It was the logic of those who found in war theprincipal outlet for their passions and energies, who made ofthe "military system" the first principle of government. "Whyare not republics plunged into war," Thomas Paine had asked,"but because the nature of their government does not admit ofan interest distinct from that of the nation?"^ Paine's answerm ight ju st as well have been given by Jefferson . Only w hen thedecision for war rested on the will of the community ratherthan the will of an unrepresentative government would thisever-present specter of the old diplomacy begin to recede and


4/23

138 FOR EIGN AFEAIRSa great step toward permanent peace be taken. Hamilton hadinveighed against the view that the "genius of republics ispacific," ju st as he had objected to the equ ation of peace w iththe spirit of comm erce. "T he causes of hostility am on g nationsare innumerable," he had argued; they operate independentlyof forms of government. ' 'The argument found no favor with Republicans. Indeed, itwas generally at odd s with the p rogressive th ou gh t of the tim e,and certainly at odds with the thought of the philosophes whichJefferson found so congenial. A nd if Jefferson, and Ja m esMadison as well, did not share the extreme view that saw in aworld of republics the guarantee of universal and perpetualpeace, they, and Republicans generally, did find in the adventof republican governments not only the prospect of a radicaldecline in the role played by war but the prospect as well of avirtual revolution in the conduct of diplomacy.The belief that America had rejected a traditional reason ofstate was deepened still further by the identification of thenation 's fate with the fate of freedom in the world, by the sensethat the security and well-being of the United States wereinseparable from the prospects of free government every-where. This outlook, it seems almost redundant to observe,became deeply embedded in the nation's psyche early on andis today more triumphant than ever. America's national pur-pose is seen not only to distinguish it from othe r n ations b ut togive its interests a special charac ter. T h e vital interests of o th erstates, even of great states, are bou nd ed ultim ately by the stateitself. But the same cannot be said of the state that stands forthe freedom of people everywhere, on whose continuedstrength and well-being the hopes and future of freedom rest.The equation of America's security and survival with that offreedom in the world has not only given to Am erican statecrafta dimension above and beyond a conventional reason of state,bu t has m ade the two seem somehow qualitatively different.Jefferson was not the only early American statesman to artic-ulate this cred o. Yet no ne gave it m ore eloqu ent and en d u rin g


5/23

JEFFERSO N AND FOR EIGN POLICY 139omous realm governed by its own rules, that the vital interestsof the state were s up rem e over the in terests of civil society, an dtha t the restra ints of legality m ust give way before necessity. Inplace of the dual standard of the reason of state, he had "butone system of ethics for men and for nationsto be grateful,to be faithful to all eng agem en ts u n der all circum stance s, to beopen and generous, promoting in the long run even theinterests of both."^

Against the assertion of the primacy of foreign over domes-tic policy, he insisted that the objectives of foreign policy werebut a means to the end of protecting and promoting the goalsof domestic society, that is, the individual's freedom andsociety's well-being. And as against the view that necessitym ight ove rride legal obligation, Jefferson held th at the chiefsecurity of liberty lay in the iron constraints of a writtenconstitution.T h e re are m om ents in Jefferson's life when his rejection ofreason of state appears final and irrevocable, when the wholesoul of his political existence seems directed against statepow er and its insidious auxiliaries. T h a t rejection w ent de ep erthan an insistence on a strict construction of the Constitutionand a belief that to take a single step beyond those limitedgrants of authority was to open wide the field to unboundedpower and ambition. He rejected, in fact, the whole apparatusof the modern state that had emerged in Europe in theeighteenth century. The combination of funded debt, execu-t ive power, burdensome taxation, government-supportedmanufactures and standing military establishments that char-acterized the great powers in the eighteenth century (and thatcontinues to characterize the modern state today, only moreso) was thou gh t by Jefferson to con stitute the very essence oftyrannical government.In the Jeffersonian scheme of thing s, America was to bedifferent. It was meant to escape the corruptions of Europe,som ething it could not do if it succum bed to the blan dishm entsof the power state. When Hamilton threw his support behindmeasures designed to bolster the state in the approved Euro-


6/23

140 FOR EIGN AFFAIRSnational bank, secure bounties for domestic man ufactures an dexpand the army and navy beyond the merest of constabularyfunctions, Jefferson was passionately and systematically op-posed.These considerations go far toward explaining Jefferson'sattitude toward war, that great instrument of reason of state.War, and the necessities that were regularly alleged to attendits conduct, constantly threatened the very institutions andvalues tha t provided its ultima te justification and above allfor republics. Hence, for Jefferson and for Republicans gen-erally, war was the great nemesis. In Political Observation(1795), an essay that stands out as a classic expression of theRepublican credo, Madison wrote:Of all the enem ies to public liberty, war is, perha ps, the most to be dr ead ed,because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is theparent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, anddebts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many underthe domination of the few.^

Th is outlook did not preve nt the Jeffersonians from em-bracing what would now be called police actions against eitherAmerican Indians or Algerines; it did, however, make theprospect of war with the great powerspreeminently Britainand Francesomething to be avoided save in the worstextremity. War would introduce into the republic all theelements of its corruptiondebt, taxes, standing armies, arti-ficial privileges of all kinds, ultimately an enlargement ofexecutive power that would lead to the reintroduction ofm onarch y. This was Jefferson's deepest instinct, and tho ug hhe drew close to war on many occasions throughout his lifeand indeed sometimes wished dearly that it might come topurge his rage against foreign transgression, in the end henearly always drew back.If do ub t must nevertheless persist tha t Jefferson rejectedthe cen tral contentions of a trad itiona l rea son of state, it is notonly because he emp loyed most of the m eans cha racteristic ofthe old statecraft but also because of the ambitious objectives


7/23

JEFFERSON AND FOREIGN POLICY 141honest dealing and a strict observance of legal obligations.The ends that he embraced, moreover, were scarcely modest.The belief in the necessity of territorial expansion, alongsidethe conviction that no constitution was as well suited asAmerica's for "extensive empire and self-government"; theprinciple of freedom of commerce, which sought to freetrade from the shackles of mercantilism; the attachment toneutral r ights, or freedom of commerce in war, which aimedat mitigating the hardships that war imposed on neutralstates while extending the benefits war brought to them;finally, the idea of the two hemispheres, which found its wayinto the Monroe Doctrine and declared the American conti-nents beyond the reach of European war and despotismallthese objectives run throughout Jefferson's career as anAmerican statesman. They constituted an imposing edifice;they described a structure of power that, if realized, wouldplace few obstacles in the way of the territorial and commer-cial expansion of the United States. What Montesquieu andFrederick the Great said of the diplomacy of the ancien regimem ight also be said of Jefferson 's. In both cases, "the funda -mental rule of governments" was "the principle of extendingtheir territories."

I l l

T h e gre at dilemm a of Jefferson's statecraft lay in his ap pa r-ent renunciation of the means on which states had alwaysultimately relied to ensure their security and to satisfy theiram bitions, an d his simultaneous unw illingness to ren ou nc e theambitions that normally led to the use of these means. Hewished, in oth er w ords, that A merica could have it both w aysthat it could enjoy the fruits of power without falling victim tothe normal consequences of its exercise.He had good reasons for wanting both of these things,because both were indispensable to the realization of his visionof the American future. Both sprang from his vision ofAmerican society, and reflected classic instances of the primacyof domestic policy. But to pursue them together created for


8/23

142 FOR EIGN AFFAIRSan d so it w as. 'Jeffe rson was not the first statesman to think ofconquering without war. But he was the first to take thethought seriously and to seek to put it into practice. How hemight do so constituted the essence of his problem in dealingwith the external world.The threats of war and alliance represented one way ofco nq uerin g without war, and Jefferson rec ur red frequently tothese altogether traditional diplomatic means. He was neveraverse to securing his aims by conjuring up before his adversarya diplomatic combination on the enemy's opposite flank, and heoften threatened war against Spain. But this was playing at thedevil's game, and he knew it. If forced to make good on eitherthreat, he understood that his enemies m ight have the "consola-tion of Satan in removing our first parents from Paradise."^The core of his diplomatic method lay elsewhere, in theinstrument of "peaceable coercion." By this he meant anordering of American economic relations that would leave themercantilist states of Europe no choice but to succumb toAmerican demands. Premised on the great advantages theEuropean powers derived from their commerce with America,he th ou gh t tha t by mere dom estic legislation he could w ork hiswill upon other powers, despite their hostility.T h e p rom ise of Jefferson's statecraft was thu s of a newdiplomacy, based on the confidence of a free and virtuouspeople, that would secure ends founded on the natural anduniversal rights of man, by means that escaped war and itscorruptions. He himself never employed the term "new diplo-macy," pe rha ps because the French had already m ad e use of it.But that it was in substance new, that it constituted a radicalbreak from the traditions of Old World diplomacyof this hewas utterly persuaded. America stood against force in tworespects. IJnlike other states, it did not make the fatal confu-sion between m ight and righ t. In its stance toward the ex tern alworld, no less than in its constitutional order at home, it stoodon principles that were freely accessible to all men throughreason, and that did not depend for their validity on local


9/23

JEFFERSON AND FOREIGN POLIGY 143These principles were to be validated, in turn, by a new diplo-matic method that was coercive yet eschewed force. The tradi-tional view, shared by Hamilton, had been stated most succinctlyby Frederick the Great: diplomacy without armaments, he hadheld, was like music without instrum ents. Jefferson m ean t toshow the falsity of this doc trine, and he would ultimately cometo stake the whole of his statecraft on the demonstrat ion.

I VT h e Jeffersonian legacy in foreign policy has always been

identified with a distinctive conception of the role that externalaffairs ought to play in the American scheme of things. In thisview, the purposes and objectives of foreign policy may beproperly understood only as a means to the end of protectingand promoting individual freedom and well-being. No end offoreign policy can be morally autonomous, self-justifying, anend in itself. Instead, all the ends of foreign policy must beseen as means to the ends of society, which are in turnultimately the ends of individuals.In this respect, as in so many othe rs, the outlook of Jeffersonhas been contrasted regularly with that of Hamilton. Yet theprinciple that subordinated foreign to domestic policy was notcharacteristic only of Jefferson and of those sharing his posi-tion. It did not as such distinguish Republican thought andconviction. Federalists, too, believed that the ends of foreignpolicy were not morally auton om ous or self-justifying but hadto be seen as means to the ends of society, that is, the ends ofindividuals. Gertainly, Hamilton believed this. As much asJefferson, he belonged to those who, in George Kennan'stelling division, wish to conduct foreign policy in order to liverather than live in order to conduct foreign policy. WhenHamilton replied toGharles Pinckney of South Garolina in theFederal Gonvention that the distinction Pinckney had soughtto draw between a government capable of making its citizens"happy at home" and one that made them "respectableabroad" was an "ideal distinction," he said nothing that sup-ported the principle endorsing the primacy of foreign policy.


10/23

144 FOR EIGN AFFAIRSThe difference in this critical respect between Hamilton andJefferson did not arise over the desirability, in principle, of

subordinating foreign to domestic policy, but over the pros-pects for do ing so in practice. Jefferson saw the circum stancesmarking the early life of the republic as placing the UnitedStates in a far stronger international position than didHam ilton an optimistic ju dg m en t that rested on the value ofAm erican com merce to the Europ ean powers. Th is convictionun de rlay th e strategy of peaceable coercion Jefferso n followedin his second administration, a strategy that, in the form of theembargo of 1807-09, led to such disastrous results. Had hebeen right about the nature of the American position, the newrepublic clearly would have been in a far stronger position inrelation to Britain and France, the chief rivals in the greatarmed struggle then raging, than proved to be the case. In theevent, the embargo demonstrated that the leverage Jeffersonhad expected to enjoy from commerce was misplaced and thatthe attempt to exploit such leverage as the nation did possessworked a harder necessity than did war itself.

The logic of the embargo was to give a primacy to foreignpolicy that has remained to this day as onerous as any thenation has experienced. T he measures taken to imp leme nt theembargo brought much of the economy to a virtual standstill,whereas the measures taken to enforce it brought Massachu-setts and Gonnecticut to the verge of rebellion. Yet grea t as thefinancial, political and moral costs of the embargo were, itproved a failure. Taken to escape the alternatives of nationalhumiliation or war, it led first to humiliation and then,ultimately, to war. T h e system of war that Jefferson had ho pe dbeyond ho pe to reform by the embargo was not reform ed, andthis despite his commitment to take any and all measuresnecessary to give effect to the embargo. That in the endJefferson came close to embracing measures which called intoquestion almost every principle of gov ern m ent h e professed tobelieve was the ironic though inevitable result of attempting todefy the limits imposed on the statesman.In part, of course, this ironic outcome must be traced to


11/23

JEFFERSON AND FOREIGN POLIGY 145expected to lead to passivity and avoidance of conflict inforeign policy, his vision of domestic society was contingentupon the fulfillment of expansive territorial and commercialgoals.By contrast, his great Federalist adversary, Hamilton, enter-tained a view of the nation's internal development that was farbetter suited to a policy of isolation. It was the Republicansrather than the Federalists who had, by virtue of their domes-tic vision, a greater dependence on foreign policy and, accord-ingly, a greater need to accept the primacy of foreign policy.For it was the Republicans who defined domestic welfare andhappiness in such a way as to make the realization of theseendsends that were equated with the very continuity of thenationdependent largely upon external change.Did the primacy of foreign policy nevertheless have am eanin g in Jefferson's statecraft th at was essentially differentfrom the m eaning given it in the statecraft of the ancien regime}In its classic meaning, the necessities imposed by the vitalinterests of the state overrode all other interests. In Jefferson'shand, the primacy of foreign policy took on much the samemeaning. What he regarded as the necessities of the state andnation overrode other principles and interests that appearedto jeo pa rd ize these necessities, includ ing principles th at h adotherwise commanded his undeviating allegiance.Thus it was that, as president, Jefferson abandoned hisconstitutional scruples rather than run the risk that Louisiana,purchased from France in 1803, might be lost as a conse-quence of adhering to them. So, too, the subsequent diplo-macy over East and West Florida demonstrated the ingenuityand single-m indedness of Jefferson in the cause of ex pa nd ingthe nation's territory, but scarcely showed devotion to princi-ple, particularly such principle as might operate to inhibitexpansion.In his determination to acquire the Floridas, Jeffersonevidenced not the slightest hesitation in siding with Napoleonagainst the freedom of those who were resisting the greatGorsican's efforts to reduce them to submission. Although the


12/23

146 FOR EIGN AFFAIRSican claims to West Florida by appearing to embargo Amer-ican trade with the island. Again, when the Spanish nation inMay 1808 rose up in resistance to Nap oleo n, Jeffers on , whilevoicing in private his sympathy for Spain's struggle, did notseriously consider deviating from a policy that in effectsupported the French effort. In this instance as well, aresponse that appeared indifferent to the cause of a nation'sfreedom was motivated in large part by the hope thatNapoleon might at last favor the American aspiration to theFloridas.

In national memory, no association comes more readily tom ind tha n that between Jefferson and liberty; yet from thevantage point of 1808, nothing seems more absurd. For then aforeign policy dedicated to the vindication of neutral rightsranged the United States against the Spanish patriots fightingfor their freedom against Napoleonand as it would later,under Madison's administration, place the United Statesagainst the whole European movement to throw off Napo-leon's domination. At home it produced violations of civilliberties on a scale that would not be equaled in Americanhistory until the Givil War.

VFor most of his life, Jefferson cham pio ned a policy ofisolation for th e new n ation . In do ing so he jo in ed his voice tothat of many others. The desire to pursue a political destiny

separate from Europe enjoyed a virtual consensus among thefounding generation of American statesmen.T h e classic expression of the desirability of p ur su in g a policyof isolation from Europe is George Washington's FarewellAddress of 1796. In it, Washington declared:The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, inextending our commercial relations, to have with them as little politicalconnection as possible. . . . Europe has a set of primary interests which tous have none or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged infrequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our


13/23

JEFFERSO N AND FOR EIGN POLICY 147as we are now at liberty to do it" and to "safely trust totemporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies."' '^Drafted by Hamilton, Washington's advice was cast in qual-ified and tentative terms. The "great rule of conduct" was notset forth as an absolute principle that represented, whateverthe circumstances, the timeless interests of the nation, but as apolicy for a state of only modest power that was consolidatinga newly won independence and a still precarious security. Itexpressed what W ashington and Ham ilton considered the trueinterest of the nation in the given circumstances ("our de-tached and distant situation"). It reflected no expectation thatthe system of European politics might soon be changed.Instead, it intimated that the European system would persistand that this country should take such advantages as it couldfrom "so peculiar a situation."Was the outlook embodied in the Farewell Address theoutlook of Jefferson as well? Certainly, Jefferson may reason-ably be cited to the sam e effect with respe ct to policy. In M archof 1799 he wrote to a friend:I sincerely join you in ab juring all political connection with every foreignpow er; an d tho I cordially wish well to the p rogre ss of liberty in all natio ns,and would forever give it the weight of our countenance, yet they are notto be touched without contamination from their other bad principles.Commerce with all nations, alliance with none, should be our motto."

Jefferson would not have expressed himself thus in the earlyyears of the decade: he would not have spoken in terms thatimplied the moral equivalence of "all nations," includingFrance. Then, as secretary of state, he had equated the fate ofthe French Revolution with that of liberty everywhere. WereFrance to go down before the might of the First Coalition, hehad believed, its defeat could be expected to result in thepermanent ascendancy of the enemies of liberty in America.The cause of republicanism would seriously decline and per-haps even perish.It was largely ou t of this same conviction that Jeffe rson in


14/23

148 FO RE ICN AFFAIRStage. That the course he favored would presumably alsoaccomplish the goal of freeing this country from Britain'seconomic domination made it doubly desirable. But Washing-ton did not respond in the way Jefferson desired. Unwilling toplay a high-stakes game that might draw the country into war,he did n ot accept Jefferson's strategy of makin g Am ericanneutrality contingent upon a British acceptance of an expan-sive definition of neutral rights. Nor did Congress adopt theRepublicans' proposals to discriminate against British com-merce. Confronted by a possible war with Creat Britain, theWashington administration ultimately settled on a less ambi-tious un de rstan din g of neutral r ights than Jefferson desired,and entered into an accommodation with Englandthe JayTrea ty that Jefferson detested.

T h e year 1793 ma rks Jefferson's first attem pt tentativ eand qualified as it wasto intervene in the great conflictbrought on by the French Revolution. The second occurredin 1807-09 and took the form of the embargo, Jefferson'sgreat experiment in peaceable coercion. As before, a partic-ular interpretation of the rights of neutrals was championedthat tilted heavily in support of France. In this second effort,however, the hope and expectation that informed the firstwas gone. With the coming to power of Napoleon in 1799,Jefferson no longer found moral imp ortance in the E uro pe anwar. A conflict once endowed with profound moral signifi-cance, the outco m e of which Jefferson ha d identified with thefuture of liberty, was now viewed as a mere struggle forpower between the "tyrant on land" and the "tyrant of theocean."

Jefferson continued to insist on the moral equivalence ofFrance and Creat Britain to the end of their armed struggle.In his view, there was no room for the consideration that theone belligerentthe "tyrant of the ocean"was defending theinternational order within which America could enjoy a basicsecuri ty, whereas the other bell igerentthe "tyrant onland"was intent on destroying this order and the security of


15/23

JEFFERSON AND FOR EICN POLICY 149dom inion of the sea may be one who has no armies."'^ But the"wish" that he expressed in 1806 did not inform the policy hepursued in 1807-09. So enraged was he over English trans-gressions of neutral rights that he no longer troubled himselfover the danger that "he who has armies" might gain "thedominion of the sea." He acknowledged his change of attitudeby confessing that it was "mortifying that we should be forcedto wish success to B on ap arte , and to look to his victories as ou rsalvation." He had never expected that he would be placed inthis position. "B ut the English be ing equally ty rannica l at sea ashe is on lan d, & that tyranny b earing on us in every poin t ofeither honor or interest, I say, 'down with England' and as forwh at Bo na pa rte is the n to do with us, let us trust to the ch ap terof accidents." Dismissing the prospect of danger from Napo-leon even in the event of a conquest of Britain as "hypotheti-cal" an d "chim erical," Jefferson's tru e policy was to asse rtneutral rights against England and otherwise trust to "thechapter of accidents" to preserve a balance of power. Civenthat outlook, there could be no outcome other than a policythat objectively favored the "tyrant on land."'^

Though separated by a decade and a half, these two criticalepisodes illuminate the tension in Jefferson between the desireto reform the international system and the desire to remainseparate from it. Reformation could come only as a result ofsuccessfully imposing o ne 's will on the system, or, at least, on asignificant part of it. But this could prove difficult and dan-gerous. Men and nations being what they are, the world isresistant to reform . W hatever the ir initial inten tion, those b en ton reform, and therefore on intervention, have generally hadto reso rt to the sword. Th is Jefferson did no t want and had nointention of doing. Force threatened the very interests forwhich he had sought reform.The result of this reasoning could only lead to withdrawal. Ifthe state system could not be reformed, it had to be aban-doned. Then Jefferson could speak of the desirability of"Chinese isolation" and of the need to place "an ocean of firebetween us and the old world."


16/23

150 FO REICN AFFAIRSing to come to terms with the political world of his time. In itsessential features, this outlook expressed a true isolation, a realseparateness, from the international system. In this vital re-spect, as in others, it was profoundly parochial. Unable toadjust to the existing world, it pointed either to the withdrawalfrom that world or to the attempt to reform it by imposingone's will on it.Jefferson was the first president who sought to reform theinternational system. He was not the last. In the history of thenation's encounter with the world, the themes of withdrawaland reformation are deeply embedded and apparent through-out. They have formed the enduring characteristics of theAm erican ou tlook on the w orld. For Jefferson, as for subse-quent American statesmen, the desire to change the world wasat war with the desire not to be corrupted by the world. Thedesire to chan ge the world spra ng , for the most part, from theconviction that only in a changed world could republicaninstitutions in America flourish and be secure. But the veryattempt to change the world incurred the risk of contamina-tion by it, for the methods by which it had been changed in thepast were those that held out the greatest threat to republicaninstitutions.

VIOf all the nation's en du rin g traditions tha t Jefferson soinfluenced, none is more striking in its significance than thedeeply ingrained inwardness of national feeling that marks tothis day the American outlook. Foreign observers have alwaysbeen impressed by this trait, which they have not hesitated toidentify with the parochialism of Americans. That it should betraced in part to so cosm opolitan a figure as Jefferson cann otbu t app ea r paradox ical. Yet in this as in so man y o the r respectsthe re w ere two quite different sides to Jefferson, ju st as th erehave been two quite different sides to the nation.A vision of m an's future that was as gr an d as it was timeless

was jo ined to a view tha t seem ed not only unwilling but almo stunable to transcend, however modestly, the particular inter-


17/23

JEFFERSO N AND FOR EICN POLICY 151is too self-centered to achieve the kind of compromise diplo-matic solutions norm ally req uir e. Jefferson's diplomacy never-theless encompassed both of these perspectives and on morethan one occasion sought to combine them in a manner thatwould give the nation's particular interests a universal signif-icance.T h e m aritime crisis in Jefferson's second adm inistrationillustrates these two sides of Jefferson's diplom atic ou tlook ju stas it illustrates his almost inveterate propensity to convertissues of interest into matters in which great moral principleswere held to be at stake. The conflict with England overimpressment and neutral rights was marked from first to lastby a view that seem ed incapable of giving serious con sidera tionto any interests, let alone to the possible legitimacy of anyinterests, save those of the ne utral. Th at E ngland was engag edin a war for its very survival as a great power, that the ferocityof the hegemonic struggle with France made British adher-ence to ne utra l rights as defined by the Jefferson adm inistra-tion difficult to reconcile with survival, and that on the out-come of the conflict depended the preservation of the balanceof power, which was the only safeguard, inadequate though ithad always been, of any neutral rightsall of these consider-ations counted for very little against the rights America insis-tently advanced.Unwilling to consider these rights in relation to a largerdiplom atic constellation, Jefferson rem ain ed equally unwillingto consider the kinds of compromise that might have substan-tially eased, if not entirely resolved, the conflict with CreatBritain. Such compromise was viewed as a betrayal not merelyof interest but of "the laws of natu re on the ocean" that intere stpresumably reflected. There was no room for normal diplo-matic give and take in the position Jefferson came to embrace.For that position identified the pursuit of self-interest with thevindication of sacred right.It was not only the maritime crisis with England thatrevealed these traits. They were equally apparent in thediplomacy of American territorial expansion. No chapter of


18/23

152 FO REICN AFFAIRStactics (which had stopped short of the use of force). Theyreflected, he insisted, America's respect for the France ofNapoleon and, of course, this nation's sense of forbearanceeven against a Spanish nation that had supposedly, in thecourse of the dispute over the Floridas, set a record in perfidyand injustice.What may account for a diplomatic outlook that combinedsuch disparate perspectives? In large measure, surely, theexplanation must be found in the conviction that identified thenation's fate with the fate of freedom in the world. If thesecurity and well-being of the United States were inseparablefrom the prospects of free government everywhere, as Jef-ferson was so deeply persuaded, it followed that Americaninterests were invested with a sanctity that exempted themfrom the kind of compromise endemic to diplomacy. IfAmerica was the last, best ho pe for the cause of freedom in theworld, it was ap pa re nt that th e justice an d rectitud e of itsdiplomatic behavior followed by virtue of this historic role.The combination of universalism and parochialism is theresult of a self-consciousness over role that forms a consta nt inthe nation's history.A belief in the justice of Am erican behavior does no t settlethe issue of what that behav ior shou ld be. A conviction tha t th erole of the nation is to promote the cause of liberty does notsettle the issue of how th at cause is to be served. N or was th e reneed to resolve this matter in the early history of the republic.Whether the United States should serve as an exemplar or acrusader on freedom's behalf could scarcely prove a meaning-ful question then, given the precarious position of the newnation and the modest power at its disposal. It is only in thetwentieth century that this question has taken on a meaningand relevance it could not earlier possess.T h e case for concluding that Jefferson inte nd ed the n ationto serve in the role of exemplar of freedom rather thancrusader for freedom may be summarized thus. Civen what hesaw as the conditions of other peoples and the circumstancesm arkin g their deve lopm ent, Jefferson becam e increasingly


19/23

JEFFERSO N AND FO REICN POLICY 153T h at do ub t was not consistently ad he red to even in later years;from time to time his innate optimism would have ou t. Still, hisdisillusionment over the course of the French Revolutionended the only real "enthusiasm" he ever entertained regard-ing the imminent prospects for liberty among the nations ofEurope. Of the governments of Europe, he wrote to JamesMonroe in 1823, "All their energies are expended in thedestruction of the labor, property and lives of their people."'"^T h u s it was, thu s it always had been a nd , Jefferson finally cam eclose to believing, thus it always would be. A continent thenations of which were doomedif only by virtue of theirproximityto never-ending rivalries and wars was one thatalso afforded small prospects for the development of freeinstitutions.Nor did he think these prospects any better among thepeoples of this hemisphere. "What kind of government willthey establish? How much liberty can they bear withoutintoxication?"'^ Th ese questions Jefferson pu t to Alex and ervon Hu m bo ldt in 1811, at a time when th e revolutionarymovement in Latin America promised to result in severalindependent nations. The answer he eventually gave waspessimistic. While wars were the "natural state of man" inEurope, in Central and South America the new nations werem ade up of "priest-ridden" p eoples." ' W riting in 1818 to Jo h nAdams, who shared his views on this matter, Jefferson ob-served tha t while the pe oples to the so uth "will succeed againstSpain . . . the da ng erou s enem y is within their own breasts.Ignorance and superstition will chain their minds and bodiesunder religious and military despotism."'^ At the same time,he went on to declare that "it is our duty to wish themindependence and self-government, because they wish itthemselves; and they have the right, and we none, to choosefor themselves, and I wish, moreover, that our ideas may beerroneous, and theirs prove well founded."Even if Jefferson had seen the world as being m or e recep tiveto the institutions of freedom than he did in his later years,


20/23


21/23

JFFFFR SO N AND FOREIGN POLICY 155arbitrary power, the fate of free institutions in America wouldnever be quite assured, however much we might try to isolateourselves from the world. For monarchy meant war and,despite our best efforts, Europe's wars might always spreadtheir deadly virus to this hem isph ere. Only a world m ade u p ofrepublics would be a world where peace was truly possible.The great and indispensable step toward promoting a lastingpeace, as Madison had written in 1792 in an essay on "Univer-sal Peace," was the replacement of monarchical governmentsby governments that rested on consent.^^ A world made safefor republican government was a world made safe for, as wellas by, peace.The logic of arbitrary power was not only that of war, it wasalso the logic of a closed system. By contrast, the logic ofrepublics was not only that of peace, but of an open system.T h e en du rin g issue that thru st an unwilling Jefferson on to theworld was not political or ideological but commercial. Per-suaded that the health and well-being of the American repub-lic required an openthat is, freetrading system, Jeffersonalso believed tha t he could isolate the com mercial interes t fromthe political entanglement he was determined to avoid. Butevents were to show that the insistence on preserving an opentrading system entailed the need to intervene against thosewhose efforts were directed to keeping the system closed. Itdid so then just as it did so again in the years that led toAmerican intervention in the First World War.

Certainly Jefferson never consciously contem pla ted castingthe na tion in the role of crusade r. H e did n ot do so in his ownday and for the most apparent and compelling of reasons. Butwhat of the day that he was sure would come, a day whenAmerica might "shake a rod over the heads of all" and do sowith relative impunity? Why should it not do so then, if doingso might contribute to America's security and well-being whilealso striking a blow for the cause of liberty? It was one thing toreject "a war to reform Europe" and quite another to eschew"shaking a rod" over others ' heads. The former implied a


22/23

156 FO RE IGN AFFA IRSm ent based on consent. T h e latter held out a far differentcourse, one that promised reformation of the internationalsystem at but m odest cost. Such a cou rse was in the tr ad ition of"peaceable coercion," and it is difficult to understand whyJefferson should reject it.To the deg ree that Jefferson never aban do ned his earlierconviction of America serving as an ex em plar to the wo rld, th etemptation persisted to equate, at some point and in somecircumstances, the role of exe m plar w ith m ore th an ju st apassive stance. The conventional contrast of the roles ofexemplar and crusader has often obscured the affinity thatmay also exist between th em . A ma rke d self-consciousnessabout serving as an exemplar may well act, under the propercircumstances, as a stand ing tem ptation to go beyond that role .The same sentiments that find gratification or fulfillment byserving in the role of exemplar also sustain at some point therole of crusader.On the issue of the nation's proper role in the world, then,Jefferson's legacy remains ultimately ambiguous. It is thisamb iguity, am on g others , that lends Jefferson's na m e to suchconflicting uses in the never-ending debate over the purposesof A m erican foreign policy. A m ong the statesmen of the earlyrepublic, he is more responsible than any for warning of thehaza rds tha t m ust attend the role of crusad er. Yet he is also thestatesman more responsible than any for evoking the peren-nial attractions of this role.


23/23

Documents

Jefferson Foreign policy Spring1990 FA