The
Secretary's Quaker-like protest offers a ludicrous contrast to the
wolf-to-lamb swagger of our modern diplomacy. What faithful Democrat of
1801 would have believed that the day would come of the Kostza affair,
of the African right-of-search quarrel, the Greytown bombardment, and
the seizure of Miramon's steamers?
It is clear that our President and people were in no danger of being led
into acts of undue violence by "deeply affected sensibility" or the
"vindication of the national honor," when a violent blow aimed by the
Pacha of Tripoli at their Mediterranean trade roused them to a show of
self-defence. Early in May he declared war against the United States,
although Consul Cathcart offered him ten thousand dollars to leave the
American flag-staff up for a short time longer. Even then, if Mr.
Jefferson could have consulted no one but himself, not a ship would have
sailed from these shores. But the merchants were too powerful for him;
they insisted upon protection in the Mediterranean. A squadron of three
frigates and a sloop under Commodore Dale was fitted out and despatched
to Gibraltar; and the nations of the earth were duly notified by our
diplomatic agents of our intentions, that they might not be alarmed by
this armada.
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