The following letter to Mr. Monroe from his uncle, Joseph Jones, furnished by Mrs. Gouverneur, will also throw some light on his affairs at this time:

"DEAR SIR,-I received your favor of the 18th instant yesterday, owing to my not sending to town the last post day. This post will bring you a letter from me accounting for your not hearing sooner what I have done in regard to your affairs. If your overseer sends up before next post day you shall have the particulars. Charles Lewis going down to the college gives me an oppor⚫tunity of answering by him your inquiry respecting your removal with the Governor, as attending Mr. Wythe's lectures. If Mr. Wythe means to pursue Mr. Blackstone's method, I should think you ought to attend him from the commencement of his course, if at all, and to judge with this want of proper information is difficult indeed I incline to think Mr. Wythe under the present state of our laws will be much embarrassed to deliver lectures with that perspicuity and precision that might be expected from him under a more established and settled state of them. The undertaking is arduous, and the subject intricate at the best, but is rendered much more so from the circumstances of the country and the imperfect system now in use, inconsistent in some in stances with the principles of the new Government. Should the revision be passed the next session, it would I think lighten his labors, and render them more useful to the student; otherwise he will be obliged to pursue the science under the old form, pointing out in his course the inconsistency with the present established Government and the proposed alterations. Whichever method he may take, or whatever plan he may lay down to govern him, I doubt not it will be executed with credit to himself and satisfaction and benefit to his auditors. The Governor need not fear the favor of the community as to his future appointment while he continues to make the common good his study. I have no intimate acquaintance with Mr. Jefferson, but from the knowledge I have of him, he is in my opinion as proper a man as can be put in the office, having the requisites of firmness, ability, and diligence. You do well to cultivate his friendship, and can not fail to entertain a grateful sense of the favors he has conferred upon you, and while you continue to deserve his esteem, he will not withdraw his countenance. If therefore upon conferring with him upon the subject he wishes or shows a desire

that you go with him, I would gratify him. Should you remain to attend Mr. Wythe, I would do it with his approbation, and under the expectation that when you come to Richmond you shall hope for the continuance of his friendship and assistance. As there is likelihood the campaign will this year be to the South, and in the course of it events may require the exertions of the militia of this State, in which case should a considerable body be called for, I hope Mr. Jefferson will head them himself, and you no doubt will be ready cheerfully to give him your company and assistance, as well to make some return of civility to him, as to satisfy your own feelings for the common good. I wish you to be happy, and believe me your friend,

"1st March, 1780."

"Jos. JONES.

CHAPTER II.

MR. MONROE BEGINS HIS LONG POLITICAL CAREER-HIS EARLY SERVICE IN THE CONGRESS-HIS MARRIAGE.

R. MONROE had barely finished his preparations

MR

for a profession, then little in demand, when, in 1782, he was elected a member of the Virginia Legislature, and entered upon the extraordinary public career which mainly occupied the rest of his life. Soon after beginning his service in the Legislature, that body appointed him a member of the Governor's Council; and on the 9th of June, 1783, he was elected to a seat in the Continental Congress, and took his place at Annapolis on the 13th of the following December. There can be no question that these rapid advances at that day were indicative of the character and worth of the man.

John Quincy Adams said that at this point Mr. Monroe had done enough " to illustrate an ordinary life.” And however extravagant this statement may appear, there has, perhaps, never been a similar case up to the present time to which it was not equally applicable. But a few generations later, when these offices were conferred for mere partisan, and often much less reputable considerations, Mr. Adams would not have employed this ambiguous expression. In his mouth it was used to convey a sense of the high standard of the times. The construction of the Governor's Council

was based on the knowledge the Legislature was supposed to possess of the intrinsic fitness of men for the position. And although the Continental Congress was a comparatively powerless body at that time, the attempt was usually made to send to it, as delegates, able and reliable men. And while at an earlier day the necessities were greater, perhaps, at the period when Mr. Monroe appeared in the Congress the especial demand for sound and skillful men was again quite generally felt. The foreign relations of the Confederacy were to be established, and the best possible regulations were to be made under the uncertain system of government provided for in the Articles of Confederation.

Still it would be far from the truth to suppose that in view of this condition of affairs, Virginia had her most able men in the Congress at this period. Mr. Monroe did not certainly then, at all events, stand in that class. But the inclination and necessity were becoming strong to put men there who had qualities fitting them for grasping calmly the public difficulties; and it must be supposed that Mr. Monroe's election to the Congress at this time was not without reference to this fact. His own account of this first national employment does not, however, do credit to the reputation he subsequently sustained, mainly, for a wide and comprehensive patriotism. Indeed, at that early period sectional and State interests were paramount. The Union had been able to achieve independence, but its affairs were not satisfactory. The great work of the Government and the Union as a whole was not yet felt as securing the foundations of a national patriotism which would be above the taint of local and social

considerations. To be a citizen of the "Republic," an American citizen, never signified less than it did from 1783 to 1786, while James Monroe was a member of the powerless old Continental Congress under the Articles of Confederation.

Mr. Monroe's activity in the Congress and the demands made upon him constantly were indications of the estimate in which he was held both there and at home. He took part in all the proceedings preparatory to the ratification of the treaty of Paris, and in the difficult questions that arose as to the army, the public debts, and various other matters then of moment to the country, and had every opportunity to see how weak and inefficient was the Confederacy under the articles of union.

At this time a resolution was passed asking the States to sanction an alteration in the Articles of Confederation, giving power to the Congress to levy taxes and regulate commerce. These articles of union had not gone into operation until two years before Mr. Monroe appeared in the Congress, Maryland holding out against ratification until March, 1781, although ten of the States had accepted this loose form of union by the middle of 1778.

Mr. Monroe favored a limited enlargement of the powers of the Congress, yet he did not appear to realize that the way out of the difficulties then threatening the very existence of any kind of government, lay through the strengthening of the Congress at the very material expense of the States which only borrowed their force and respectability from the Central Government. He proposed giving the Congress entire control over the commerce of the whole country, and