Dft (photostat at Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Princeton, New Jersey); undated, but see note below; entirely in TJ’s hand; torn at margin, with letters and numerals in brackets supplied by consulting source texts, described below.

In compiling these notes TJ meticulously organized the sentiments, he believed, John Adams expressed as he penned replies to the addresses that came to him from all over the country in support of his administration following the publication of the XYZ dispatches in April 1798. Many newspapers printed the addresses and Adams’s replies. On 18 May Abigail Adams observed, “he answers all of them and by this means has an opportunity of diffusing his own sentiments, more extensively & probably where they will be more read and attended to than they would have been through any other channel.” In his correspondence TJ criticized the president for increasing the XYZ hysteria and further damaging relations with France. TJ observed that the president’s answers were “full of extraordinary things” and were “more Thrasonic than the addresses” themselves (Stewart Mitchell, ed., New Letters of Abigail Adams, 1788–1801 [Boston, 1947], 174–5; Vol. 30:322–3, 326, 331, 353).

In his compilation above TJ referred to three sources for the texts of the president’s responses. The Republican editor Samuel H. Smith had printed a number of the XYZ addresses and the president’s replies in his weekly Philadelphia Universal Gazette. Late in 1798, William Austin edited and John W. Folsom (Folsome) printed A Selection of the Patriotic Addresses, to the President of the United States. Together with the President’s Answers (Boston, 1798; Sowerby, description begins E. Millicent Sowerby, comp., Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson, Washington, D.C., 1952–59, 5 vols. description ends No. 3525). The publication included 107 addresses arranged by state of origin, along with Adams’s replies to about 90 of them.

The edition did not include the dates of the addresses. TJ’s third source was John and John Ward Fenno, who had printed 87 addresses in the Gazette of the United States, more than any other newspaper (Thomas M. Ray, “‘Not One Cent for Tribute’: The Public Addresses and American Popular Reaction to the XYZ Affair, 1798–1799,” Journal of the Early Republic, 3 [1983], 408).

TJ communicated the notes above to William Duane. Perhaps William Bache carried the manuscript to Philadelphia along with TJ’s memorandum on the postal service (printed above at 15 Aug.). The document above perhaps served as TJ’s retained copy, with the manuscript taken to Philadelphia being in Bache’s or some other hand so that TJ would not be associated with the document. Selections from Adams’s addresses as compiled by TJ appeared in the Philadelphia Aurora on 6, 8, 9, 10, and 13 Oct. 1800. Duane captioned the series “The Beauties of John Adams’s Political Opinions.” He introduced it by stating, “We now, take up Mr. Adams’s answers to the memorable addresses of the reign of terror in 1798 when Mr. Adams exposed himself to the condemnation of history, by his Fast day and the furious denunciation of his fellow citizens; when he insulted religion while he breathed War.” He consistently began the column with selections from TJ’s third category, libels against his fellow citizens, changed slightly by Duane to “Libels on His Fellow Citizens.” Anti-republican heresies: Duane’s caption, “Hostility to Republican Government,” usually appeared second in the column. Duane always ended, as TJ did, with egotisms. All but thirteen of the passages selected by TJ were printed in the Aurora.