The new Government fell heir to all the unsettled diplomatic problems of the Confederation. The political destiny of the thirteen States seemed fixed when they ratified the Constitution; the fate of the Western communities beyond the Alleghanies still hung in the balance. In Kentucky, General Wilkinson still intrigued in behalf of Spain. Sevier and Robertson, in Tennessee, were not averse to separation from the Eastern States nor to a Spanish protectorate. From New Orleans, Mobile, St. Marks, and Pensacola, the Spanish authorities supplied the Indians of the Southwest with arms and ammunition, counting on these uncertain allies to maintain their long frontier, for Spain still claimed Florida with its most northern boundary and refused to accept the validity of the British cession of 1783. More than this: Spain was disposed to claim both sides of the Mississippi, at least as far north as the Ohio. In the Northwest, British garrisons still held Michilimackinac, Detroit, Niagara, Oswego, and other posts. The policy of Great Britain was dictated by much the same considerations as was that of Spain. Lord Dorchester, Governor of Canada, assured the home Government that "the flimsy texture of republican government" could not long hold the Western settlements in the Union. In 1789, the Lords of Trade reported that it was a matter of interest for Great Britain "to prevent Vermont and Kentucke, and all other settlements now forming in the Interior parts of the great Continent of North America, from becoming dependent upon the Government of the United States, or of any other Foreign Country, and to preserve them on the contrary in a State of Independence and to induce them to form Treaties of Commerce and Friendship with Great Britain." President Washington had hardly taken the oath of office when a war cloud appeared on the western horizon. Certain British vessels, bound for Nootka Sound to establish a trading-post, were seized by Spanish authorities in a way which provoked bitter resentment. In the early months of 1790, war seemed imminent. The situation was full of peril for the United States, for war would inevitably bring about military operations directed against Florida and Louisiana, and neither party was likely to respect the neutrality of the United States. The prospect of a conquest of the Spanish colonies by Great Britain alarmed the Administration. "Embraced from the St. Croix to the St. Mary's on the one side by their possessions, on the other side by their fleet," wrote Jefferson, "we need not hesitate to say that they would soon find means to unite to them all the territory covered by the ramifications of the Mississippi." Representations were therefore made to the British Government that "a due balance on our borders is not less desirable to us than a balance of power in Europe has always appeared to them."