I
MAKING READY
When in 1801 Thomas Jefferson became third
President of the United States the nation was young.
The War for Independence had been won only twenty
years previous. George Washington himself had been
gone but a year and four months. The Capitol was
being erected on the site that he had chosen. And the
western boundary of the nation was the Mississippi
River.
Beyond the Mississippi extended onward to the Rocky Mountains the foreign territory of Louisiana Province. New Orleans was the capital of its lower portion, St. Louis was the capital of its upper portion. It all was assumed to be the property of Spain, until, before President Jefferson had held office a year, there spread the rumor that by a secret treaty in 1800 Spain had ceded Louisiana back to France, the first owner.
Almost another year passed. The treaty transferring Louisiana Province from Spain to France seemed to be hanging fire. The Spanish flag still floated over New Orleans and St. Louis. Then, in October, 1802, the Spanish governor at New Orleans informed the American traders and merchants that their flat-boats no longer might use the Mississippi River. New Orleans, the port through which the
