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 | The Jeffersonian cyclopedia; |  |
3132. FRANCE, Debt to.—[continued].
I told [President Washington]
I had meant on that day to take his
orders for removing the suspension of payments
to France, which had been imposed by
my last letter to Gouverneur Morris, but was
meant, as I supposed, only for the interval
between the abolition of the late constitution
by the dethronement of the King, and the
meeting of some other body, invested by the
will of the nation with powers to transact
their affairs; that I considered the National
Convention, then assembled, as such a body;
and that, therefore, we ought to go on with
the payments to them, or to any government
they should establish. [198]
—
The Anas. Washington ed. ix, 128.
Ford ed., i, 213.
(Dec. 27, 1792)
See Debts (French).
There had been a consultation at the President's
(about the first week in November) on the expediency
of suspending payments to France under her
present situation. I had admitted that the late constitution
was dissolved by the dethronement of the
King; and the management of affairs surviving to
the National Assembly only, this was not an integral
legislature, and, therefore, not competent to give a
legitimate discharge for our payments: that I
thought, consequently, that none should be made
till some legitimate body came into place, and that I
should consider the National Convention called, but
not met as we had yet heard, to be a legitimate
body. Hamilton doubted whether it would be a
legitimate body, and whether, if the King should be
reestablished, he might not disallow such payments
on good grounds. Knox, for once, dared to differ
from Hamilton, and to express, very submissively,
an opinion that a convention named by the whole
body of the nation, would be competent to do anything.
It ended by agreeing that I should write to
Gouverneur Morris, to suspend payment generally,
till further orders.
—Note by Jefferson. Washington ed. ix, 125.
Ford ed., i, 208.
1792.
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