FRANCE, QUASI-WAR WITH

FRANCE, QUASI-WAR WITH. The Quasi-War, or naval war, with France, included a series of battles and diplomatic tensions between the U.S. government and the French as a result of attacks against American merchants shipping off the Barbary Coast and in the Caribbean. The brief undeclared war that occurred between 1798 and 1801 was one of the main catalysts for the building and support of the U.S. Navy. Under the Articles of Confederation, Congress lacked the power to maintain more than a token naval force. Furthermore, American suspicion of a standing army prohibited plans for organized forces. As a result of French pillaging and the demands of American merchants for protection, Congress found an increased naval force a necessity.

In consequence of the Franco-American misunderstanding of 1798–1800, the French, with no declaration of war, began to seize and plunder American merchant vessels. Despite U.S. attempts to settle the matter diplomatically, no solution could be reached. From March through July of 1798, Congress passed acts empowering the U.S. merchant marine to "repel by force any assault," to commission privateers, and to order the navy to seize all armed French craft found along the U.S. coast or molesting trade. George Washington was recalled from retirement and appointed commander in chief of the army. The American navy, consisting of only three ships, was rapidly enlarged by construction, purchase, and gifts to fifty-five vessels. The first went to sea on 24 May 1798. France sent no heavy vessels to the western Atlantic, because it was occupied with European wars. Rather, knowing the weakness of the untrained American navy, the French relied on privateers supported by a few frigates and sloops of war.

As American vessels were commissioned, they organized into small squadrons to guard the chief trade areas in the East and West Indies. The small American navy faced few engagements and mostly guarded against numerous privateers. Despite the hasty organization of the U.S. Navy, however, each of their three engagements against French forces resulted in victory. Those battles involved the Insurgente, 40 guns, and the Constellation, 36 guns; the Vengeance, 50 guns; and the Constellation, 36 guns, the Berceau, 24 guns, and the Boston, 32 guns. Congress presented Captain Thomas Truxtun, commander of the Constellation in both engagements, with two gold medals. Two vessels, the schooners Enterprise and Experiment, had especially notable careers—the former taking thirteen prizes on one cruise. Although the United States made no attempt to seize the French islands, on 23 September 1800, Captain Henry Geddes, with the ship Patapsco, successfully dislodged the French forces that had taken possession of the Dutch island of Curaçao. About eighty-five French vessels were captured, not including recaptures of American craft and small boats. Although the French took only one American naval vessel, the schooner Retaliation, France seized several hundred American merchant vessels both abroad and in home waters. These were condemned at farcical admiralty trials, and in most instances the crews were imprisoned and brutally treated.

On 30 September 1800, France and the United States concluded a convention of peace, commerce, and navigation, and shortly thereafter, hostilities ceased.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

De Conde, Alexander. The Quasi-War: The Politics and Diplomacy of the Undeclared War with France, 1797–1801. New York: Scribner, 1966.

Fowler, William M. Jack Tars and Commodores: The American Navy, 1783–1815. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1984.

Nash, Howard Pervear. The Forgotten Wars: The Role of the U.S. Navy in the Quasi War with France and the Barbary Wars, 1798–1805. South Brunswick, N.J.: Barnes, 1968.

Palmer, Michael A. Stoddert's War: Naval Operations during the Quasi-War with France, 1798–1801. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1987.

Marion V.Brewington/h. s.

See alsoConvention of 1800 ; France, Relations with ; French Decrees .

Quasi‐War with France. In 1797, during the Anglo‐French war that had started four years earlier, France began capturing American ships and cargoes in retaliation for the failure of the United States to protect its neutral commerce with France against British searches and seizures.France was dependent on American shipping to supply its empire because the superior British navy had swept French merchant vessels from the seas. When Jay's Treaty between the United States and Great Britain was ratified and implemented in 1796 with no guarantee of American neutral rights, France announced that it would henceforth seize neutral American shipping just as the British did.

President John Adams sent a delegation to France to try to resolve the dispute. But the French foreign minister, Talleyrand, demanded a bribe and treated the delegation with contempt. This so‐called XYZ Affair led Adams and Congress to prepare for war by increasing military appropriations and permitting American ships to fire on marauding French vessels. Neither the United States nor France formally declared war, hence the term “Quasi‐War.” Hostilities were limited to a few ship‐to‐ship battles. But Talleyrand had not wished the conflict to go even that far. He informed American diplomats that France would accept another American mission. Against the wishes of many in his own Federalist party, Adams authorized William Vans Murray, Oliver Ellsworth, and William R. Davie to negotiate a settlement. In the resulting Treaty of Mortefontaine (also known as the Convention of 1800), France agreed to stop illegal seizures.

France also agreed to suspend the Franco‐American alliance that had been in effect since the Revolutionary War. The United States would avoid all further “entangling alliances” (a phrase used by Thomas Jefferson in his first inaugural address in 1801) until World War II. Meanwhile, although most Americans supported Adams's peace, the president's peacemaking divided his party and Republican Thomas Jefferson defeated him for the presidency in 1800.
See also Early Republic, Era of the; Foreign Relations: U.S. Relations with Europe.

Bibliography

Alexander DeConde , The Quasi‐War, 1966.
Daniel G. Lang , Foreign Policy in the Early Republic, 1985.

Jerald A. Combs

Quasi-War with France (1797–1801) an undeclared naval war with France resulting from the taking of U.S. ships by French privateers, and French insistence that the U.S. not trade with Britain. France also refused to negotiate with the U.S. minister when he arrived in Paris, and hinted that a large bribe needed to be paid to restore good relations (the XYZ Affair). The USS Constitution won two victories over French men-of-war during the conflict. U.S. ships attacked French privateers until France agreed to settle the conflict.

Quasi‐War With France. See France, Undeclared Naval War with (1798–1800).