lf unobserved, and give its own hue to the
communications of the French government, of whose participation there was
neither proof nor probability." And again: "But as I view a peace between
France and England the ensuing winter to be certain, I have thought it
would have been better for us to have contrived to bear from France
through the present summer what we have been bearing both from her and
from England these four years, and still continue to bear from England,
and to have required indemnification in the hour of peace, when, I firmly
believe, it would have been yielded by both."

But this is bad political philosophy. A nation cannot obtain justice by
submitting to wrongs or insults even for a time. Jefferson himself had
written long before: "I think it is our interest to punish the first
insult, because an insult unpunished is the parent of many others." It is
possible that he was misled at this juncture by his liking for France, and
by his dislike of the Federalists and of their British proclivities. It is
true that the bribe demanded by Talleyrand's agents might be considered,
to use Mr. Jefferson's words, as "the turpitude of private swindlers;" but
the demand for a loan and for a retraction could be regarded only as
national acts, being acts of the French government, although the bulk of
the French people might repudiate them.

Whether Jefferson was right or wrong in the position which he took, he
maintained it with superb self-confidence and aplomb. For the moment, the
Federalists had everything their own way. They carried the election.
Hamilton's oft-anticipated "crisis" seemed to have arrived at last. But
Jefferson coolly waited till the storm should blow over. "Our countrymen,"
he wrote to a friend, "are essentially Republicans. They retain
unadulterated the principles of '76, and those who are conscious of no
change in themselves have nothing to fear in the long run."

And so it proved. The ascendency of the Federalists was soon destroyed,
and destroyed forever, by the political crimes and follies which they
committed; and especially by the alien and sedition laws. The reader need
hardly be reminded that the alien law gave the President authority to
banish from the country "all such aliens as _he_ should judge dangerous to
the peace and safety of the United States,"--a despotic power which no king
of England ever possessed. The sedition act made it a crime, punishable by
fine and imprisonment, to speak