1790 George Washington - Bastille Key

In the summer of 1789, angry citizens stormed the Bastille, a fortress built to defend the eastern approach to Paris and took over the Bastille main prison.  The French revolution had begun.  Marquis de Lafayette, a 32 year old French aristocrat and military officer who fought for the United States in the American Revolutionary war, was was placed in command of a local guard formed to keep order through out France.  Lafayette remained optimistic about the fate of the revolution, and in admiration of the leader of the American Revolution he shipped the Bastille key to George Washington.   The key was formally presented to the President late in the summer of 1790.   Lafayette was a close friend of George Washington and along with Thomas Jefferson provided Washington with a keen understanding of the French Revolution and what it meant to the world.  One can only imagine the sense of pride this must have given not only Washington but all Americans.   They had ignited a revolution of freedom around the World.  

But, instead Washington spoke of a "disturbed situation of Europe" and tendencies of war. Why was Washington being so cautious.   It is because he understood dangers of political unrest in Europe, and the tendencies of war.   War in Europe meant that the great maritime powers of Britain, France and Spain would use this as an excuse to close the seas to open trade.   If America wanted to trade it's goods with France, they would have to pay Great Britain for protection.  America had no navy, and American merchants would be at the mercy of Great Britain or Spain to trade with Europe.  Like oil in the Middle East today, America was dependent upon the products of Europe.   Out of necessity, America had to become less dependent upon Europe.  "Our fisheries and the transportation of our own produce offer us abundant means for guarding ourselves against this evil."  In his second annual address, just months after he had been presented the key to Bastille prison, President George Washington spoke these words of caution to Congress and the young nation.

"The disturbed situation of Europe, and particularly the critical posture of the great maritime powers, whilst it ought to make us the more thankful for the general peace and security enjoyed by the United States, reminds us at the same time of the circumspection with which it becomes us to preserve these blessings. It requires also that we should not overlook the tendency of a war, and even of preparations for a war, among the nations most concerned in active commerce with this country to abridge the means, and thereby at least enhance the price, of transporting its valuable productions to their markets. I recommend it to your serious reflections how far and in what mode it may be expedient to guard against embarrassments from these contingencies by such encouragements to our own navigation as will render our commerce and agriculture less dependent on foreign bottoms, which may fail us in the very moments most interesting to both of these great objects. Our fisheries and the transportation of our own produce offer us abundant means for guarding ourselves against this evil."

But as the revolution boiled over, and as France and Great Britain began to wage war on each other,  the Untied States benefited from the void left by the combatants in shipping goods from North America and the Caribbean to Western Europe.   American re-exports boomed, growing from about $1 million in 1792 to almost $40 million in 1800.    Unfortunately, as the hostilities in Europe intensified, the United States became embroiled in the conflict.  British and French navies began harassing American merchants, stealing their cargoes and impressing American sailors.

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29432
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_history_of_the_United_Stat
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storming_of_the_Bastille
http://www.mountvernon.org/research-collections/digital-encyclopedia/article/bastille-key/
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/Anonymous_-_Prise_de_la_Bastille.jpg

For more info read George Washington's Bastille Key "The Liberty Key" by William J. Bahr www.LibertyKey.US