[XYZ Affair]:

$1,000 · Offered by William Reese Company · No longer available

MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT...TO BOTH HOUSES OF CONGRESS. APRIL 3d, 1798. President John Adams' report to Congress on the infamous "XYZ Affair," in which the negotiators for the French government attempted to extort bribes from the American envoys in return for treaty concessions. Largely made up of the reports of the American envoys, including Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, John Marshall, and Elbridge Gerry, providing a blow-by-blow description of the whole sordid affair. First, Mr. X demanded that "a sum of money was required for the pocket of the Directory and ministers, which would be at the disposal of the M. Talleyrand: and that a loan would also be insisted on. Mr. X said, if we acceded to these measures, M. Talleyrand had no doubt that all our differences with France might be accommodated." Mr. Y then advised, "You must pay money, you must pay a great deal of money." The work also includes President Adams' letters credentialing the ministers. Adams asked Congress to keep this document secret while an appropriate response was considered; as such, only 500 copies were printed. Along with the "Genêt Affair," this event was the important Franco-American diplomatic crisis of the 1790s, and served to harden the differences between the two emergent American political parties, the "pro-French" Democratic Republicans, and the "pro-British" Federalists.

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