History of the United States of America, Volume 3 (of 9) : $b During the second administration of Thomas JeffersonAdams, Henry
History
History of the United States of America, Volume 3 (of 9) : $b During the second administration of Thomas Jefferson
Adams, Henry
United States -- History -- 1801-1809; United States -- History -- 1809-1817
“As the object of my journey is not with a view to hatch plots,”
said he, with a side-blow at Madison which the secretary soon
understood, “my arrival here is an innocent and legal act, which
leaves me in the full enjoyment of all my rights and privileges,
both as a public character or a private individual. Making use
therefore of these rights and privileges, I intend remaining in
the city, four miles square, in which the Government resides, as
long as it may suit the interest of the King my master or my own
personal convenience. I must at the same time add that I shall
not lose sight of these two circumstances as respects the period
and season in which our mutual desires for my departure from the
United States are to be accomplished.”
Having thus retaliated Madison’s insult, Yrujo next made his revenge
public. January 19 he sent to the Department a formal protest, couched
in language still more offensive than that of his letter:--
“Having gone through the personal explanations which for just
motives I was compelled to enter into in my first answer to
your letter of the 15th inst., I must now inform you, sir, what
otherwise would then have constituted my sole reply; namely,
that the envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of
his Catholic Majesty near the United States receives no orders
except from his sovereign. I must also declare to you, sir,
that I consider both the style and tenor of your letter as
indecorous, and its object an infraction of the privileges
attached to my public character.”
Finally he sent to his colleagues copies of this correspondence, which
soon afterward was printed in every Federalist newspaper, together with
the note criticising the Annual Message, the reception of which had
never been acknowledged by the Secretary of State.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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