7895. SHORT (William), Rejected by Senate.—
It is with much concern I inform
you that the Senate has negatived your appointment.
We thought it best to keep back
the nomination to the close of the session, that
the mission might remain secret as long as
possible, which you know was our purpose from
the beginning. It was then sent in with an
explanation of its object and motives. We
took for granted, if any hesitation should arise,
that the Senate would take time, and that our
friends in that body would make inquiries of
us, and give us the opportunity of explaining
and removing objections. But to our great
surprise, and with an unexampled precipitancy,
they rejected it at once. This reception of the
last of my official communications to them
could not be unfelt, nor were the causes of it
spoken out by them. Under this uncertainty,
Mr. Madison, on his entering into office, proposed
another person (John Quincy Adams).
He also was negatived, and they adjourned sine
die. Our subsequent information was that, on
your nomination, your long absence from this
country, and their idea that you do not intend
to return to it, had very sensible weight; but
that all other motives were superseded by an
unwillingness to extend our diplomatic connections,
and a desire even to recall the foreign
ministers we already have. All were sensible
of the great virtues, the high character.
the powerful influence, and valuable friendship
of the Emperor. But riveted to the system of
unentaglement with Europe, they declined the
proposition. * * * I pray you to place me
rectus in curiâ in this business with the Emperor,
and to assure him that I carry into my
retirement the highest veneration for his virtues,
and fondly cherish the belief that his dispositions
and power are destined by heaven to
better, in some degree at least, the condition of
oppressed man.—
To William Short Washington ed. v, 435.
Ford ed., ix, 249.
(W.
March. 1809)
See 261.
