In 1796, George Washington signed a peace treaty with Algiers to release current hostages and pay tribute of up to $1 million annually to protect ships from piracy. 6 years later when Thomas Jefferson became President, Thomas Jefferson, Yusuf Karamanli the Pasha of Tripoli, demanded that the tribute be paid in the amount of $225,000. Jefferson refused this demand and the Pasha declared war on the U.S. by cutting down the flagstaff in front of the U.S. Consulate.
Before learning of this declaration, Jefferson sent a small squadron of three frigates and one schooner to negotiate peace with the Barbary powers. However, in the event war had been declared, the commanding officer Commodore Richard Dale was sent "with orders to protect our commerce against the threatened attack". By time the squadron had arrived, the Pasha of Tripoli had already declared war and the Pasha had already sent his cruises out to blockade commerce in the Mediterranean. According to Jefferson, "the arrival of our squadron dispelled the danger". One of the Tripolitan cruisers engaged in conflict with the American schooner Enterprise, was captured and her men had been slaughtered. It was a resounding defeat with not one American life lost. President Jefferson stated that the bravery of these men was a testimony not to violence, but to the peaceful advancement of human civilization. Yet, the action had not been authorized by the Constitution. Congress had not declared war, and the squadron had not been authorized "to go beyond the line of defense." Therefore, the captured vessel was "disabled from committing further hostilities" and the surviving crew was released..
But since Congress had not declared war, the squadron was handicapped in it's ability to take on the remaining Tripolitan cruisers. So Jefferson urged Congress to consider "authorizing measures of offense also". This in Jefferson's words would place "our force on an equal footing with that of its adversaries".
Here is President Thomas Jefferson's full account of the situation to Congress in his first annual address of 1801.
"To this state of general peace with which we have been blessed, one only exception exists. Tripoli, the least considerable of the Barbary States, had come forward with demands unfounded either in right or in compact, and had permitted itself to denounce war on our failure to comply before a given day. The style of the demand admitted but one answer.http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29443
I sent a small squadron of frigates into the Mediterranean, with assurances to that power of our sincere desire to remain in peace, but with orders to protect our commerce against the threatened attack. The measure was seasonable and salutary. The Bey had already declared war. His cruisers were out. Two had arrived at Gibraltar. Our commerce in the Mediterranean was blockaded and that of the Atlantic in peril.
The arrival of our squadron dispelled the danger. One of the Tripolitan cruisers having fallen in with and engaged the small schooner Enterprise, commanded by Lieutenant Sterret, which had gone as a tender to our larger vessels, was captured, after a heavy slaughter of her men, without the loss of a single 1 on our part. The bravery exhibited by our citizens on that element will, I trust, be a testimony to the world that it is not the want of that virtue which makes us seek their peace, but a conscientious desire to direct the energies of our nation to the multiplication of the human race, and not to its destruction. Unauthorized by the Constitution, without the sanction of Congress, to go beyond the line of defense, the vessel, being disabled from committing further hostilities, was liberated with its crew.
The Legislature will doubtless consider whether, by authorizing measures of offense also, they will place our force on an equal footing with that of its adversaries. I communicate all material information on this subject, that in the exercise of this important function confided by the Constitution to the Legislature exclusively their judgment may form itself on a knowledge and consideration of every circumstances of weight."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Barbary_War
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