The XYZ Affair was a diplomatic incident that occurred in 1797-98, involving diplomats from the United States and Revolutionary France. Amidst rising tensions between the two nations, President John Adams sent envoys to Paris to negotiate a treaty, only to find that the French would not open negotiations unless the US paid a bribe. This helped to incite the Quasi-War.
The affair came at a time when the concurrent French Revolution (1789-1799) was already creating divisions within American politics. The nationalist Federalist Party – of which President Adams was a member – was horrified by the violence of the French Revolution and wanted to move the United States away from France's sphere of influence. To do this, they sought to foster closer political and economic ties with Great Britain, which they viewed as the natural ally of the US. This caused outrage amongst the rival political faction, the Democratic-Republican Party (Jeffersonian Democrats), who believed that closer ties with Britain would only undermine republicanism in the United States. At the same time, the French Republic viewed the budding relationship between the US and Britain as an act of aggression and authorized attacks on American merchant vessels in late 1796.
In 1797, President Adams sought to resolve the issue diplomatically and sent three envoys to France. These envoys had expected to be received by the French foreign minister, Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord; instead, they were met by three French intermediaries (referred to in coded dispatches as agents 'X', 'Y', and 'Z') who insisted that the United States pay a large bribe in order to meet with Talleyrand and begin negotiations. When this became public knowledge in the US, it inflamed public opinion against the French, leading to increased support for Adams and the anti-French Federalists. Rising Franco-American tensions led to a brief, undeclared naval conflict called the Quasi-War (1798-1800), as well as the passage of the controversial Alien and Sedition Acts (1798).
Background
In 1778, the Kingdom of France signed a Treaty of Alliance with the fledgling United States. The American Revolutionary War had been ongoing for three years, and the Americans had time and again proven their resilience and determination in battle against the British; however, it was clear to all that the American rebellion would falter if they did not receive support from a European power. France was happy to oblige, seeing that a victory in America would humiliate and weaken its rival, Great Britain. France provided the Americans with arms, ammunition, uniforms, troops, and ships, and it turned the war into a global conflict by threatening the valuable British colonies in India and the West Indies, forcing Britain to spread its military resources thin. French soldiers and ships proved vital to the decisive American victory at the Siege of Yorktown, the engagement that solidified American independence. Certainly, the French contributed greatly to the ultimate American victory and succeeded in striking a blow to British prestige in the process.
But such a war came with a monstrous cost, and France soon found itself drowning in debt. Attempts to tackle the problem failed, and France's economic misfortunes blossomed into a revolution. News of the Storming of the Bastille in July 1789 was sweet to American ears, as was the proclamation of the First French Republic three years later. Americans were jubilant that their French brothers-in-arms were following their lead and casting off the shackles of monarchism, with Thomas Jefferson and his supporters even welcoming the new French Republic as "our younger sister" (Wood, 182). But then came the violence: the September Massacres, the trial and execution of Louis XVI, and the start of the Reign of Terror made the streets of Paris slick with blood and plunged the young French Republic deeper into chaos. Under the new Jacobin regime, hundreds of thousands of French citizen-soldiers swept into Europe, vowing to deliver liberty and equality at the point of a bayonet. The French Revolutionary Wars were soon underway as the great powers of Europe – Austria, Prussia, Spain, Portugal, and Great Britain among them – took up arms against the French.
Even now, the French Revolution had support in the United States, with men like Jefferson believing that a little violence was the price to pay for liberty. They believed that the 1778 Treaty of Alliance was still in effect and urged the Washington Administration to offer support to their sister republic. However, President George Washington was reluctant to offer any such support. He knew that doing so would risk antagonizing Great Britain, with whom relations were already low, at a time when the United States was completely unprepared for war. Instead, Washington issued a Proclamation of Neutrality on 22 April 1793, in which he promised to keep the United States out of the French Revolutionary Wars. The following year, his administration negotiated a deal with Britain – the controversial Jay Treaty, ratified by Congress in 1795, created stronger economic and political ties between Britain and the United States. While this achieved the goal of the Washington Administration and the Federalist Party of avoiding another war with England, it outraged the Jeffersonian faction of Americans (Democratic-Republicans), who still wanted to support France and feared that the treaty placed the US too closely within Britain's sphere of influence.
The French Republic itself was also incensed by the Jay Treaty, which it interpreted as a British-American alliance. The French felt especially double-crossed because they believed the 1778 Treaty of Alliance was still in effect and had been expecting American support. They retaliated in 1796 when French privateers began attacking American shipping in the British West Indies. Within the next year, nearly 300 American merchant ships were captured, their crews often subjected to maltreatment; in one instance, the French tortured the American captain of the Cincinnatus with thumb screws to get him to confess that he was carrying British goods. Amidst these rising tensions, Washington, who was preparing to leave office, recalled James Monroe as ambassador to France, feeling that Monroe was too pro-French. In his place, Washington sent Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, a hardline Federalist from South Carolina; but when Pinckney arrived in Paris, the French refused to even receive him. This was how matters stood when John Adams was inaugurated as the second US president on 4 March 1797 – a discontented pro-French faction on American soil, and an aggressive French Republic looking to assert its will.
President Adams Addresses Congress
On 16 May 1797, President Adams called a special session of Congress to address the growing hostilities with France. He opened by stating that France had "inflicted a wound in the American breast", but it was his intention to heal any injury done by either party and to repair the friendship between the US and France. Just as Washington had avoided war with Britain by negotiating the Jay Treaty, Adams intended to send diplomats to Paris to negotiate an agreement of his own. Nevertheless, Adams stressed that the United States must be ready for war should such talks fail, and asked Congress to support a build-up of the American military:
While we are endeavoring to adjust our differences with France by amicable negotiation, with the progress of the war in Europe, the depredations on our commerce, the personal injuries to our citizens, and the general complexion of our affairs, render it my duty to recommend your consideration of effectual measures of defense (McCullough, 484).
Adams was no warmonger, but he knew a stronger US military would add weight to the diplomats he was about to send to Paris and could perhaps deter the French from doing anything too rash. For this sensitive diplomatic mission, Adams chose John Marshall, a 42-year-old lawyer from Virginia, and Elbridge Gerry, a 53-year-old Massachusetts politician who had signed the Declaration of Independence. Marshall and Elbridge were to link up with Pinckney, who was still in Paris, before negotiating a treaty with the French in which American neutrality would be asserted and commercial relations obtained. The three American commissioners knew that they would have to deal with the French Directory, the five-man assembly that governed France and was known for its corruption, as well as with the French Foreign Minister, Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord. Once a Catholic bishop, Talleyrand had briefly lived in exile in Philadelphia at the height of the Reign of Terror but had returned to France after the fall of Maximilien Robespierre in 1794. Neither Adams nor the commissioners had spent much time with him when he was in America and therefore did not know what to expect.
The Affair
Marshall and Elbridge arrived in Paris in early October 1797 and, after being joined by Pinckney, went to request an audience with Talleyrand. They were kept waiting for several days before they were finally granted an appointment with the foreign minister. The meeting lasted only 15 minutes, during which Talleyrand demanded an explanation for President Adams' belligerent speech in May, in which he had called for a military build-up; Talleyrand said that the president's speech had angered the Directors, who were already dealing with enemies on all fronts, and told the envoys that Adams' rhetoric was much too hostile. The commissioners insisted that they only desired neutrality, and the meeting came to an end. For the next several days, the Americans were left to wait for another meeting, but each of their requests to see Talleyrand again was answered with silence.
Then, the silence was abruptly broken by three French agents who claimed to be secret intermediaries working for Talleyrand. Their names were Jean Conrad Hottinguer, Pierre Bellamy, and Lucien Hauteval – the American envoys referred to these secret agents as 'X, Y, and Z' in their coded dispatches back to Secretary of State Timothy Pickering. The intermediaries informed the envoys that Talleyrand was willing to help the United States win favor with his government but could only do so if certain conditions were met. In order for negotiations to begin, the Americans would first need to issue a formal apology for Adams' bellicose anti-French speech of 16 May. Next, they would need to pay a douceur (sweetener) to Talleyrand personally as a show of goodwill, an amount that the intermediaries placed at $250,000. Additionally, the French Republic would require a loan of $10 million as compensation for the 'insults' of President Adams' speech. Only after all of these payments were made would Talleyrand consent to meet with the envoys again to negotiate a treaty.
The envoys recognized these terms for what they were: a demand for a bribe. On 22 October and 8 November, Marshall wrote lengthy, coded dispatches to Secretary of State Pickering in which he explained the situation. In the meantime, the Americans tried to persuade the French agents to open negotiations without having to pay such hefty sums, but the agents refused. Instead, they grew impatient and even resorted to threatening the United States, stating that every nation that did not actively aid France was to be treated as an enemy. When 'X', 'Y', and 'Z' again asked whether the Americans were going to pay, Pinckney lost his temper, shouting, "No! No! Not a sixpence!" (McCullough, 496). These fruitless, informal talks continued into the next spring, but it was soon clear that nothing would come of them. On 24 April 1798, Marshall and Pinckney set sail for home. Gerry, who had fallen out with his colleagues, decided to stay in Paris to keep trying to reach an agreement. He remained in Europe until October 1798, at which point he, too, went home.
Reaction & Aftermath
On 4 March 1798, Marshall's coded dispatches landed on Adams' desk, alerting the president to the bribery and threats that the American envoys had experienced. Adams, believing the dispatches could cause unrest amongst the public, opted to keep their contents confidential. The next day, he informed Congress that the negotiations had failed and, two weeks later, formally requested that Congress begin arming American vessels and manufacturing arms. Vice President Thomas Jefferson, still viewed as a leader of the pro-French Democratic-Republican Party, was furious when he learned of this. He called Adams' message to Congress "insane" and began asking his friends in Congress to delay any act that might lead to war. "If we could but gain this season," he said to his ally James Madison, "we should be saved" (Wood, 242).
To delay the military build-up, the Democratic-Republicans in Congress began calling for Marshall's dispatches to be made public. Unaware of their true contents, the Democratic-Republicans believed that the dispatches would show that the French were indeed willing to negotiate and that Adams and his Federalist allies were overreacting. On 2 April 1798, the House of Representatives passed a resolution calling for Adams to publish the full text of the dispatches; the president announced that he would oblige as soon as the American envoys were safely out of France. In the meantime, he handed the dispatches off to the Senate for them to look at in private. Many senators were aghast by the behavior of the French agents, which showed an obvious contempt for the United States. Even ardent Democratic-Republican senators were at a loss to excuse the French behavior. The Senate voted in favor of publishing the dispatches, and soon the full text was printed in newspapers across the country.
The effect was to electrify the American public opinion against the French. The Federalists, who had for so long been warning about the evils of the French Revolution, appeared vindicated, and enjoyed a surge in popularity; Democratic-Republicans, meanwhile, could do little but keep on objecting to rhetoric that might lead to war. John Marshall received a hero's welcome when he arrived back in Philadelphia in June, and patriotic anti-French demonstrations broke out in every major city; such Francophobia would help lead to the passage of the controversial Alien and Sedition Acts that same summer. The slogan "Millions for defense but not a cent for tribute!" became a popular Federalist rallying cry, as American citizens clamored for war. On 7 July 1798, Congress finally approved the use of force against French warships in American waters, beginning a limited naval conflict known as the Quasi-War.
Despite this renewed support, Adams still refrained from asking Congress for an official declaration of war and, in early 1799, sent another delegation to Paris in a final attempt to reach a peace agreement before things escalated even further. By the time this new set of envoys arrived, a new government reigned in France; Napoleon Bonaparte had overthrown the French Directory in the Coup of 18 Brumaire and now ruled as First Consul. Bonaparte was much more eager to restore good relations with the United States than the Directors had been and instructed Talleyrand – who was retained as foreign minister – to enter negotiations. The resultant Convention of 1800 amended the insults of the XYZ Affair and ended the Quasi-War before it could escalate further. The restoration of good Franco-American relations allowed for the Louisiana Purchase, which would occur three years later. The XYZ Affair, therefore, was an important episode in the early history of the United States. It led to the build-up of the US military for the first time since the American Revolution, was a contributing factor to both the Quasi-War and the Alien and Sedition Acts, and helped fuel the bitter partisanship that was developing in US politics.
