“Peace is our passion!” This phrase of President Jefferson, taken from a letter written a few months later,[174] expressed his true policy. In spite of his frequent menaces, he told Livingston in October, 1802, that the French occupation of Louisiana was not “important enough to risk a breach of peace.” Within a week after this letter was written, New Orleans was closed to American commerce, and a breach of peace seemed unavoidable. Down to that time the Executive had done nothing to check Napoleon. The President had instructed his agents at Paris and Madrid to obtain, if they could, the cession of New Orleans and West Florida, and had threatened an alliance with England in case this request were refused; but England was at peace with France, and Bonaparte was not likely to provoke another war until he should be able to defend Louisiana. So far as any diplomatic action by the United States government was concerned, Madison and Jefferson might equally well have written nothing; and when news arrived that the Mississippi was closed, alarming as the situation became, no new action was at first suggested. The President was contented to accept the assistance of the Spanish and French representatives at Washington. In Jefferson’s domestic as well as in his political household Don Carlos Martinez de Yrujo,--created in 1802 Marquis of Casa Yrujo,--the minister of Spain, was thoroughly at home, for he had a double title to confidence, and even to affection. His first claim was due to his marriage with a daughter of Governor McKean of Pennsylvania, whose importance in the Republican party was great. His second claim was political. Some years earlier he had so exasperated Timothy Pickering, then Secretary of State, as to provoke a demand for his recall. One of President Jefferson’s first diplomatic acts was to ask from the Spanish government that Yrujo should be allowed to remain at Washington; and Godoy, who knew even better than Jefferson the character and merits of Yrujo, readily granted the favor.