The Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson
By Subject
FOREIGN RELATIONS / RUSSIA
Great and Good Friend, Your friendly interposition for the relief of
the crew of an American frigate stranded on the coast of Tripoli has
been recently made known to me. For this act of benevolence and proof
of your disposition to befriend our young republic, its Secretary of
State conveys the official expression of its sensibility. But I should
illy satisfy my own feelings did I not add my individual
acknowledgments for a favor directly tending to facilitate the
administration of affairs of my country with which I am personally
charged.
To the barbarians whose habitual violations of the laws of nature
have produced the occasion of this friendly office, we have sent
expressions of very different feelings by the squadron which has just
left our ports destined for theirs. Should the Commodore find that in
consequence of your Imperial Majesty's interposition, they shall
already have done us voluntary justice, he will let them owe to your
favor his abstinence from every act of force. Otherwise he will
endeavor, by the means he is furnished with, to convince them it will
be their interest to injure us no more.
I see with great pleasure the rising commerce between our two
countries. We have not gone into the policy which the European nations
have so long tried and to so little effect of multiplying commercial
treaties. In national as in individual dealings, more liberality will,
perhaps, be found in voluntary regulations than in those which are
measured out by the strict letter of a treaty, which, whenever it
becomes onerous, is made by forced construction to mean anything or
nothing, engenders disputes and brings on war. But your flag will find
in our harbors hospitality, freedom and protection and your subjects
enjoy all the privileges of the most favored nation. The favorable
reception of our consul at St. Petersburg, and the friendly sentiments
conveyed through your Minister of Foreign Affairs, is an earnest that
our merchants also will meet due favor in your ports.
I avail myself of this occasion of expressing the exalted pleasure I
have felt in observing the various acts of your administration during
the short time you have yet been on the throne of your country, and
seeing in them manifestations of the virtue and wisdom from which they
flow. What has not your country to hope from a career which has begun
from such auspicious developments! Sound principles, pursued with a
steady step, dealing out good progressively as your people are
prepared to receive and to hold it fast, cannot fail to carry them and
yourself far in the improvement of their condition during the course
of your life.
to Alexander I, 15 June 1804
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