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The Rights of Nations
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The relationship of one nation
with a foreign nation rests on natural law and moral principles as well as on recognized
international law. We owe other nations a respect for their chosen form of government as
we expect our own form to be respected, and we have no right to interfere in another
people's choice of government or internal policy any more than they have to interfere in
ours.
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"We certainly cannot deny
to other nations that principle whereon our government is founded, that every nation has a
right to govern itself internally under what forms it pleases, and to change these forms
at its own will; and externally to transact business with other nations through whatever
organ it chooses, whether that be a King, Convention, Assembly, Committee, President, or
whatever it be. The only thing essential is, the will of the nation." --Thomas
Jefferson to Thomas Pinckney, 1792. ME 9:7
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"I freely admit the right of
a nation to change its political principles and constitution at will, and the impropriety
of any but its own citizens censuring that change." --Thomas Jefferson to the Earl of
Buchan, 1803. ME 10:400
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"We will never be angry with
others for exercising their own rights according to what they think their own
interests." --Thomas Jefferson: Address to Indian Nations, 1808. ME 16:429
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"It accords with our
principles to acknowledge any government to be rightful which is formed by the will of the
nation substantially declared... With such a government every kind of business may
be done. But there are some matters which, I conceive, might be transacted with a
government de facto; such, for instance, as the reforming the unfriendly
restrictions on our commerce and navigation." --Thomas Jefferson to Gouverneur
Morris, 1792. ME 8:437
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"[Two] nations being in
character and practice essentially pacific, a common interest in the rights of peaceable
nations gives [them] a common cause in their maintenance." --Thomas Jefferson to
Andre de Daschkoff, 1809. ME 12:303
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Attributes of National
Sovereignty
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"It is an essential
attribute of the jurisdiction of every country to preserve peace, to punish acts in breach
of it, and to restore property taken by force within its limits." --Thomas Jefferson
to Gouverneur Morris, 1793.
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"The right of
self-government does not comprehend the government of others." --Thomas Jefferson:
Opinion on Residence Bill, 1790.
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"No court can have
jurisdiction over a sovereign nation." --Thomas Jefferson to William Short, 1791. ME
8:221
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"Every nation has of natural
right, entirely and exclusively, all the jurisdiction which may be rightfully exercised in
the territory it occupies. If it cedes any portion of that jurisdiction to judges
appointed by another nation, the limits of their power must depend on the instrument of
cession." --Thomas Jefferson to Gouverneur Morris, 1793. ME 9:192
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"In stipulating that consuls
shall be permitted on both sides, [a convention] could not mean to supersede reasonable
objections to particular persons, who might at the moment be obnoxious to the nation to
which they were sent, or whose conduct might render them so at any time after. In fact,
every foreign agent depends on the double will of the two governments, of that which sends
him, and of that which is to permit the exercise of his functions within their territory;
and when either of these wills is refused or withdrawn, his authority to act within that
territory becomes incomplete. By what member of the government the right of giving or
withdrawing permission is to be exercised here, is a question on which no foreign agent
can be permitted to make himself the umpire. It is sufficient for him, under our
government, that he is informed of it by the executive." --Thomas Jefferson to Edmond
C. Genet, 1793. ME 9:264
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"For a foreign agent,
addressed to the Executive, to embody himself with the lawyers of a faction whose sole
object is to embarrass and defeat all the measures of the country, and by their opinions,
known to be always in opposition, to endeavor to influence our proceedings is a conduct
not to be permitted." --Thomas Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:168
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"I have it in charge to
observe, that [a consul's] functions as the missionary of a foreign nation here, are
confined to the transactions of the affairs of [his] nation with the Executive of the
United States; that the communications which are to pass between the Executive and
Legislative branches cannot be a subject for [his] interference, and that the President
must be left to judge for himself what matters his duty or the public good may require him
to propose to the deliberations of Congress." --Thomas Jefferson to Edmond C. Genet,
1793. ME 9:278
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"No government can disregard
formalities more than ours. But when formalities are attacked with a view to change
principles, and to introduce an entire independence of foreign agents on the nation with
whom they reside, it becomes material to defend formalities. They would be no longer
trifles, if they could, in defiance of the national will, continue a foreign agent among
us whatever might be his course of action." --Thomas Jefferson to Edmond C. Genet,
1793. ME 9:266
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Non-interference with Other
Nations
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"With respect to [a foreign
nation's] government or policy as concerning themselves or other nations, we wish not to
intermeddle in word or deed, and that it be not understood that our government permits
itself to entertain either a will or opinion on the subject." --Thomas Jefferson to
Thomas Pinckney, 1792. ME 8:369
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"Unmeddling with the affairs
of other nations, we presume not to prescribe or censure their course, happy could we be
permitted to pursue our own in peace, and to employ all our means in improving the
condition of our citizens." --Thomas Jefferson to Mme de Stael, 1807. ME 11:282
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"The condition of different
descriptions of inhabitants in any country is a matter of municipal arrangement, of which
no foreign country has a right to take notice. All its inhabitants are as men to
them." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:72
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"The republic of the United
States allied itself with France when under a despotic government." --Thomas
Jefferson: Opinion on French Treaties, 1793. ME 3:242
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"The presumption of
dictating to an independent nation the form of its government is so arrogant, so
atrocious, that indignation as well as moral sentiment enlists all our partialities and
prayers in favor of one and our equal execrations against the other. I do not know,
indeed, whether all nations do not owe to one another a bold and open declaration of their
sympathies with the one party and their detestation of the conduct of the other. But
farther than this we are not bound to go; and, indeed, for the sake of the world, we ought
not to increase the jealousies or draw on ourselves the power of [a] formidable
confederacy." --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1823. ME 15:435
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"Nor is the occasion to be
slighted... of declaring our protest against the atrocious violations of the rights of
nations by the interference of any one in the internal affairs of another." --Thomas
Jefferson to James Monroe, 1823. ME 15:478
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"It is the right of
every nation to prohibit acts of sovereignty from being exercised by any other within its
limits, and the duty of a neutral nation to prohibit such as would injure one of
the warring powers." --Thomas Jefferson to Edmond C. Genet, 1793. ME 9:110
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"Although we have no right
to intermeddle with the form of government of other nations, yet it is lawful to wish to
see no emperors nor kings in our hemisphere." --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe,
1823.
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"Countries... have a right
to be free, and we a right to aid them, as a strong man has a right to assist a weak one
assailed by a robber or murderer." --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1816. ME
14:432
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"The right of nations to
self-government being my polar star, my partialities are steered by it without asking
whether it is a Bonaparte or an Alexander [Emperor of Russia] toward whom the helm is
directed." --Thomas Jefferson to M. Correa de Serra, 1815. ME 14:330
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"[We would be] guilty of
great [error] in [our] conduct toward other nations [if we endeavored] to force liberty on
[our] neighbors in [our] own form." --Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jun
24, 1793. (*)
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"How easily we prescribe for
others a cure for their difficulties, while we cannot cure our own." --Thomas
Jefferson to John Adams, 1821. ME 15:310
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"The people wish for
peace... They feel no incumbency on them to become the reformers of the other hemisphere,
and to inculcate, with fire and sword, a return to moral order." --Thomas Jefferson
to James Monroe, 1811. ME 13:60
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"I do not indeed wish to see
any nation have a form of government forced on them; but if it is to be done, I should
rejoice at its being a free one." --Thomas Jefferson to Peregrine Fitzhugh, 1798. ME
10:4
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"Wretched, indeed, is the
nation in whose affairs foreign powers are once permitted to intermeddle." --Thomas
Jefferson to Benjamin Vaughan, 1787. ME 6:153
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Non-Dependence on Other
Nations
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"No circumstances of
morality, honor, interest or engagement are sufficient to authorize a secure reliance on
any nation at all times and in all positions. A moment of difficulty or a moment of error
may render forever useless the most friendly dispositions in the King, in the major part
of his ministers and the whole of his nation." --Thomas Jefferson to John Jay, 1787.
ME 6:352
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"We have seldom seen
neighborhood produce affection among nations. The reverse is almost the universal
truth." --Thomas Jefferson to John Breckinridge, 1803. ME 10:409
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"What a crowd of lessons do
the present miseries of Holland teach us! Never to have an hereditary officer of any sort;
never to let a citizen ally himself with kings; never to call in foreign nations to settle
domestic differences; never to suppose that any nation will expose itself to war for us,
etc." --Thomas Jefferson to John Adams, 1787. ME 6:322
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"All a friendly power can
ask from another is, to extend to her the same indulgences which she extends to other
friendly powers." --Thomas Jefferson to George Hammond, 1793. ME 9:231
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"We owe gratitude to France,
justice to England, good will to all, and subservience to none. All this must be brought
about by the people, using their elective rights with prudence and self-possession, and
not suffering themselves to be duped by treacherous emissaries." --Thomas Jefferson
to Arthur Campbell, 1797. ME 9:421
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Ethics and Morality in Foreign
Relations
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"We are firmly convinced,
and we act on that conviction, that with nations as with individuals, our interests
soundly calculated will ever be found inseparable from our moral duties; and history bears
witness to the fact that a just nation is taken on its word when recourse is had to
armaments and wars to bridle others." --Thomas Jefferson: 2nd Inaugural Address,
1805. ME 3:376
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"Moral obligations
constitute a law for nations as well as individuals." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to
New York Tammany Society, 1808.
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"A nation like ours,
recognizing no arrogance of language or conduct, can never enjoy the favor of [a Chief
Magistrate whose domineering temper deafens him to the dictates of interest, of honor and
of morality]." --Thomas Jefferson to Joel Barlow, 1811. ME 13:65
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"My answer to [an
individual's offer to divulge secret communications between a consulate and its home
government] was that the Government would never be concerned in any transactions of that
character; that moral duties were as obligatory on nations as on individuals, that even in
point of interest a character of good faith was of as much value to a nation as an
individual, and was that by which it would gain most in the long run." --Thomas
Jefferson: The Anas, 1808. ME 1:480
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"Let us hope that our new
government will take... occasion to show, that they mean to proscribe no virtue from the
canons of their conduct with other nations." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison,
1789. ME 7:450, Papers 15:367
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"What might be wise and good
for a nation essentially commercial and entangled in complicated intercourse with numerous
and powerful neighbors, might not be so for one essentially agricultural and insulated by
nature from the abusive governments of the old world." --Thomas Jefferson to William
H. Crawford, 1816. ME 15:27
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"Compacts... between nation
and nation are obligatory on them by the same moral law which obliges individuals to
observe their compacts. There are circumstances, however, which sometimes excuse the
non-performance of contracts between man and man: so are there also between nation and
nation. When performance, for instance, becomes impossible, non-performance is not
immoral. So if performance becomes self-destructive to the party, the law of
self-preservation overrules the laws of obligation in others. For the reality of these
principles I appeal to the true fountains of evidence, the head and heart of every
rational and honest man. It is there Nature has written her moral laws, and where every
man may read them for himself. He will never read there the permission to annul his
obligations for a time or forever whenever they become dangerous, useless, or
disagreeable, certainly not when merely useless or disagreeable... And though he may,
under certain degrees of danger, yet the danger must be imminent and the degree great. Of
these, it is true that nations are to be judges for themselves; since no one nation has a
right to sit in judgment over another, but the tribunal of our consciences remains, and
that also of the opinion of the world. These will revise the sentence we pass in our own
case, and as we respect these, we must see that in judging ourselves we have honestly done
the part of impartial and rigorous judges." --Thomas Jefferson: Opinion on French
Treaties, 1793. ME 3:228
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"It is not the
possibility
of danger
which absolves a party from his contract, for that possibility always
exists, and in every case... If possibilities would void contracts, there never
could be a valid contract, for possibilities hang over everything. Obligation is not
suspended till the danger is become real and the moment of it so imminent that we can no
longer avoid decision without forever losing the opportunity to do it." --Thomas
Jefferson: Opinion on French Treaties, 1793.
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"The will of our citizens to
countenance no injustice towards a foreign nation [fills] me with comfort as to our future
course." --Thomas Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, 1818. (*)
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"A character of justice...
is valuable to a nation as to an individual." --Thomas Jefferson to Noah Worcester,
1816. ME 14:416
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"There is a moral law which
ought to govern mankind." --Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Cooper, 1810. ME 12:402
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"Indeed it is high time to
withdraw all respect from courts acting under the arbitrary orders of governments who avow
a total disregard to those moral rules which have hitherto been acknowledged by nations,
and have served to regulate and govern their intercourse." --Thomas Jefferson to
Thomas Cooper, 1810. ME 12:401
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"Willing ourselves to do
justice to others, we ought to expect it from them." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to
Washington Tammany Society, 1807. ME 16:297
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"I love [the] proposition of
cutting off all communication with [a] nation which has conducted itself... atrociously.
This may bring on war. If it does, we will meet it like men; but it may not bring on war,
and then the experiment will have been a happy one." --Thomas Jefferson to Tench
Coxe, 1794. (*)
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"Nations may be brought to
justice by appeals to their interests as well as by appeals to arms." --Thomas
Jefferson to James Madison, 1793. ME 9:34
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"We must make the interest
of every nation stand surety for their justice, and their own loss to follow injury to us
as effect follows its cause. As to everything except commerce, we ought to divorce
ourselves from them all. But this system would require time, temper, wisdom, and
occasional sacrifice of interest." --Thomas Jefferson to Edward Rutledge, 1797. ME
9:410
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"There are peaceable means
of repressing injustice by making it in the interest of the aggressor to do what is just
and abstain from future wrong." --Thomas Jefferson to William H. Cabell, 1807. ME
11:257
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"I hope... that when in a
state of peace our Legislature and Executive will endeavor to provide peaceable means of
obliging foreign nations to be just to us and of making their injustice recoil on
themselves. The advantages of our commerce to them may be made the engine for this
purpose, provided we shall be willing to submit to occasional sacrifices, which will be
nothing in comparison with the calamities of war." --Thomas Jefferson to Peregrine
Fitzhugh, 1798. ME 10:2
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"Justice and good
neighborhood would dictate that those who have no part in imposing [a] restriction on us,
should not be the victims of measures adopted to defeat its effect." --Thomas
Jefferson: Report on Foreign Commerce, 1793. ME 3:280
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"The interests of a nation,
when well understood, will be found to coincide with their moral duties. Among these it is
an important one to cultivate habits of peace and friendship with our neighbors. To do
this we should make provisions for rendering the justice we must sometimes require from
them. I recommend, therefore, to your consideration whether the laws of the Union should
not be extended to restrain our citizens from committing acts of violence within the
territories of other nations, which would be punished were they committed within our
own." --Thomas Jefferson: Draft, Presidential Message, 1792.
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The Practice of National
Morality
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"A character of good faith
[is] of as much value to a nation as to an individual." --Thomas Jefferson: The Anas,
1808. ME 1:480
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"[It is my] belief that a
just and friendly conduct on our part will procure justice and friendship from
others." --Thomas Jefferson to Earl of Buchan, 1803.
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"We believe that the just
standing of all nations is the health and security of all." --Thomas Jefferson to
James Maury, 1812. ME 13:146
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"Not in [my] day, but at no
distant one, we may shake a rod over the heads of all which may make the stoutest of them
tremble. But I hope our wisdom will grow with our power and teach us that the less we use
our power the greater it will be." --Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Leiper, 1815. ME
14:308
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"I think with others that
nations are to be governed according to their own interest, but I am convinced that it is
their interest in the long run to be grateful, faithful to their engagements, even in the
worst of circumstances, and honorable and generous always." --Thomas Jefferson to
Lafayette, 1790. ME 8:12
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"I have but one system of
ethics for men and for nations. To be grateful, to be faithful to all engagements and
under all circumstances, to be open and generous, promoting in the long run even the
interest of both; and I am sure it promotes their happiness." --Thomas Jefferson to
Mme d'Auville, 1790. ME 8:17
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"To say... that gratitude is
never to enter into the motives of national conduct is to revive a principle which has
been buried for centuries with its kindred principles of the lawfulness of assassination,
poison, perjury, etc. All of these were legitimate principles in the dark ages which
intervened between ancient and modern civilization, but exploded and held in just horror
in the eighteenth century." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1789. ME 7:449,
Papers 15:367
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"Let us hope that our
government will take [occasion] to show that they mean to proscribe no virtue from the
canons of their conduct with other nations." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison,
1789.
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"A nation, by establishing a
character of liberality and magnanimity, gains in the friendship and respect of others
more than the worth of mere money." --Thomas Jefferson: Special Message, Jan. 13,
1806. ME 3:406
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"I am in all cases for a
liberal conduct towards other nations, believing that the practice of the same friendly
feelings and generous dispositions which attach individuals in private life will attach
societies on the larger scale, which are composed of individuals." --Thomas Jefferson
to Albert Gallatin, 1803.
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"A people... who sincerely
desire the happiness and prosperity of other nations... justly calculate that their own
well-being is advanced by that of the nations with which they have intercourse."
--Thomas Jefferson: 4th Annual Message, 1804. ME 3:366
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"I deem it the duty of every
man to devote a certain portion of his income for charitable purposes, and that it is his
further duty to see it so applied as to do the most good of which it is capable. This I
believe to be best insured by keeping within the circle of his own inquiry and information
the subjects of distress to whose relief his contributions shall be applied. If this rule
be reasonable in private life, it becomes so necessary in my situation [as President] that
to relinquish it would leave me without rule or compass. The applications of this kind
from different parts of our own and foreign countries are far beyond any resources within
my command... However disposed the mind may feel to unlimited good, our means having
limits, we are necessarily circumscribed by them. They are too narrow to relieve even the
distresses under my own eye, and to desert these for others which we neither see nor know
is to omit doing a certain good for one which is uncertain. I know indeed there have been
splendid associations for effecting benevolent purposes in remote regions of the earth.
But no experience of their effect has proved that more good would not have been done by
the same means employed nearer home." --Thomas Jefferson to Drs. Rogers and
Slaughter, 1806. ME 11:93
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