Strenuously as the President exerted himself to stifle the warlike feeling in Congress, his influence did not extend far enough to check the same feeling elsewhere. Successful in Washington, he found himself exposed to an alarming pressure from the West. One State legislature after another adopted resolutions which shook the ground under his feet. Eighteen months had passed since the seriousness of Napoleon’s schemes became known to him, but as yet he had done nothing that could be construed as an attempt to represent the demands of the western country; all his ingenuity had, in fact, been exerted to evade these demands. The West wanted troops at Natchez, to seize New Orleans at the first sign of a French occupation; but the use of force at that stage was not in Jefferson’s thoughts. To quiet Kentucky and Tennessee without satisfying them was a delicate matter; but, delicate as it was, Jefferson succeeded in doing it. He explained his plan in a letter to Monroe, written at the moment when everything depended on Monroe’s aid:[183]-- “The agitation of the public mind on occasion of the late suspension of our right of deposit at New Orleans is extreme. In the western country it is natural, and grounded on honest motives; in the seaports it proceeds from a desire for war, which increases the mercantile lottery; in the Federalists generally, and especially those of Congress, the object is to force us into war if possible, in order to derange our finances; or if this cannot be done, to attach the western country to them as their best friends, and thus get again into power. Remonstrances, memorials, etc., are now circulating through the whole of the western country, and signed by the body of the people. The measures we have been pursuing, being invisible, do not satisfy their minds. Something sensible, therefore, has become necessary.” This sensible, or rather this tangible, measure was the appointment of a minister extraordinary to aid Livingston in buying New Orleans and the Floridas. The idea was adopted after the secret debate in the House. As Madison wrote soon afterward to Livingston,[184] “such has been the impulse given to the public mind” by these debates and by the press, “that every branch of the government has felt the obligation of taking the measures most likely not only to re-establish our present rights, but to promote arrangements by which they may be enlarged and more effectually secured.” According to this view, the impulse of Congress and the Press alone made the Executive feel its obligation. For more than a year the Executive had known the danger and had done nothing; being obliged to do something, its first object was to avoid doing too much.