his proposed
international Association to the Minister of Foreign
Relations, Talleyrand, who responded with a cordial letter.
The articles of "Maritime Compact," translated into French
by Nicolas Bouneville, were, in 1800, sent to all the
Ministers of Foreign Affairs in Europe, and to the
ambassadors in Paris.--_Editor._,

XXX. THE RECALL OF MONROE. (1)

1 Monroe, like Edmund Randolph and Thomas Paine, was
sacrificed to the new commercial alliance with Great
Britain. The Cabinet of Washington were entirely hostile to
France, and in their determination to replace Monroe were
assisted by Gouverneur Morris, still in Europe, who wrote to
President Washington calumnies against that Minister. In a
letter of December 19, 1795, Morris tells Washington that he
had heard from a trusted informant that Monroe had said to
several Frenchmen that "he had no doubt but that, if they
would do what was proper here, he and his friends would turn
out Washington." On July 2, 1796, the Cabinet ministers,
Pickering, Wolcott, and Mo-Henry, wrote to the President
their joint opinion that the interests of the United States
required Monroe's recall, and slanderously connected him
with anonymous letters from France written by M.
Montflorence. The recall, dated August 22, 1796, reached
Monroe early in November. It alluded to certain "concurring
circumstances," which induced his removal, and these "hidden
causes" (in Paine's phrase) Monroe vainly demanded on his
return to America early in 1797. The Directory, on
notification of Monroe's recall, resolved not to recognize
his successor, and the only approach to an American Minister
in Paris for the remainder of the century was Thomas Paine,
who was consulted by the Foreign Ministers, De la Croix and
Talleyrand, and by Napoleon. On the approach of C. C.
Pinckney, as successor to Monroe, Paine feared that his
dismissal might entail war, and urged the Minister (De la
Croix) to regard Pinckney,--nominated in a recess of the
Senate,--as in "suspension" until confirmed by that body.
There might be unofficial "pourparlers," with him. This
letter (State Archives, Paris, Etats Unis, vol. 46, fol. 425)
was considered for several days before Pinckney reached
Paris (December 5, 1796), but the Directory consid