The Purchase of Louisiana: France and Mississippi
No sooner had American settlements extended to the region of the Mississippi and its eastern affluents than the importance of having free use of this river as a channel of transportation to the sea was strongly felt. This sentiment intensified as the settlements increased and the Spanish authorities manifested a hostile policy. That a foreign power should restrict the use of the mouth of such a river as the Mississippi was intolerable, and had it not been ceded peacefully it must eventually have been taken by force. From McMaster's admirable "History of the People of the United States" we select an account of the acquisition of this vast and valuable territory.]
ON October first, 1800, by the secret treaty of San Ildefonso, Spain gave back to France that province of Louisiana which, in 1762, France had given to her. It was long before the existence of this treaty was known; but the moment it was known Jefferson saw most clearly that trouble with France was not at an end. There was, he said, one spot on the face of the earth so important to the United States that whoever held it was, for that very reason, naturally and forever our enemy; and that spot was New Orleans. He could not, therefore, see it transferred to France but with deep regret. The day she took possession of the city the ancient friendship between her and the United States ended; alliance with Great Britain became necessary, and the sentence that was to keep France below low-water mark became fixed. This day seemed near at hand, for in November, 1802, word came that an expedition was making all haste to cross the ocean and occupy Louisiana.
Meanwhile, the Spanish intendant of the province put forth a proclamation, closed the navigation of the Mississippi to American citizens, forbade all trade, and took away the right of deposit at New Orleans. Protected by this right, the inhabitants of Kentucky and Ohio had for seven years past been floating tobacco and flour, bacon and hams, down the Mississippi in rude arks, and depositing them in the warehouses of New Orleans, there to await the arrival of the sloops and scows to carry them to the West Indies, or to points along the Atlantic coast. The intendant could, at any time, shift the place of deposit; but, by the terms of the treaty of 1795, some convenient port near the mouth of the river must always be open for the deposit of goods and produce. In this respect, therefore, the treaty had been violated; for, when New Orleans was shut, no other town was opened.
The state of affairs here indicated was earnestly debated in Congress, and a resolution passed which, while not accusing Spain, declared that the rights of navigation and deposit should be maintained.
Jefferson was now free to act without fear of meddling from the House, and he speedily did so. The Senate, in a special message, was informed that he had not been idle; that such measures had been promptly taken as seemed likely to bring a friendly settlement about, and that the purpose of these measures was the buying of so much territory on the east bank of the river as would put at rest forever the vexed question of the use of its mouth. His confidence in the ability of the minister at the court of France to accomplish this was unlimited. Yet he could not but believe that the end would be hastened by sending to his aid a man fresh from the United States and bearing with him a just and lively sense of the feeling late events had aroused in the great mass of the people. He therefore nominated James Monroe to be minister extraordinary and plenipotentiary to France, and minister extraordinary and plenipotentiary to Spain; for, Louisiana not having been actually transferred to France, it seemed proper that his Catholic majesty should also be consulted. The Senate confirmed the nomination, and gave Monroe full power, in conjunction with Livingston in France and Pinckney in Spain, to frame any treaty or convention that extended and secured the rights of the United States on the Mississippi, and set apart two millions of dollars to be used, it was understood, for the purchase of the island of New Orleans.
The Federalists in Congress strongly opposed these measures, and offered resolutions tending towards war with Spain. They declared that the free navigation of the river was a clear right of the United States, and that interference with it by Spain was a hostile aggression. They demanded that the President should take possession of some fit place of deposit, and that, if necessary, fifty thousand militia should be called out, and five millions of dollars appropriated for this purpose. These resolutions were opposed and voted down by the Republican party, but in their place a bill was passed authorizing the President to call out a provisional army of eighty thousand militia, and to spend twenty-five thousand dollars in building arsenals in the West.