The Continental Monthly, Vol. 5, Issue 2, February, 1864

uld be adopted in the United States, Jefferson, in 1788, had recommended the English form to Lafayette for the use of France. And in spite of the admiration for France, which with him and the Democrats was an essential article of the party faith, he took offence with the French Government because they sided with Spain in the dispute on the boundary line between Louisiana and Florida, and proposed to Madison an alliance with England against France and Spain. But Madison kept him steady. Six months later he accused John Randolph, who had abandoned the party, of entertaining the intolerable heresy of a league with England.

Mr. Jefferson once thought it necessary that the United States should possess a naval force. It would be less dangerous to our liberties than an army, and a cheaper and more effective weapon of offence. 'The sea is the field on which we should meet a European enemy.' 'We can always have a navy as strong as the weaker nations.' And he suggested that thirty ships, carrying 1,800 guns, and