Note 54 — Chapter I
Reading edition
Jefferson to Rush, Oct. 4, 1803, Works: Ford, x, 32.
Immediately after his inauguration, Jefferson restated the American foreign policy announced by Washington. It was the only doctrine on which he agreed with Marshall.
"It ought to be the very first object of our pursuits to have nothing to do with European interests and politics. Let them be free or slaves at will, navigators or agricultural, swallowed into one government or divided into a thousand, we have nothing to fear from them in any form.... To take part in their conflicts would be to divert our energies from creation to destruction." (Jefferson to Logan, March 21, 1801, Works: Ford, ix, 219-20.)