Ottoman Algeria in Western Diplomatic History with ... - Bibliothèque

Constantinople, the new American consul and the captain of the ship in
question “immediately complied with the request.” 46 But one man seemed not
to be ready to forget what he considered as national humiliation; he was James
Madison. Seven months later after the incident, and shortly after becoming
Secretary of State, Madison wrote O’Brien:
The sending to Constantinople the national ship of war, the George
Washington, by force, under the Algerine flag, and for such a purpose,
has deeply affected the sensibility, not only of the President, but of the
people of the United States. Whatever temporary effects it may have had
favorable to our interests, the indignity is of so serious a nature that it is
not impossible that it may be seemed necessary, on a fit occasion, to
revive the subject. 47
More, Madison, on behalf of Jefferson, ordered O’Brien not to take any action
that might jeopardize future reprisal of the American government, which in fact
explains why the Americans acquiesced to the Dey’s demand on a similar
occasion in 1809. Madison had already settled to the idea of avenging
American national honor:
Viewing in this light, the President Wishes that nothing may be said or
done by you that unnecessarily preclude the competent authority from
Animadverting on that transaction in any way that a vindication of the
national honor may be thought to prescribe.
The Secretary of State, who later became the president of the United States,
would meet a ‘fit occasion’ for ‘punishing’ Algiers in what seemed to be a
‘forced’ departure of the American consul from Algiers in 1812. By then, he
would transform the already existing tensions to gunboat diplomacy.
46 Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, p. 171.
47 ASP/FA, 2:348, Secretary of State to O’Brien, May 20, 1801.
349