RC (DLC: Madison Papers); unsigned; endorsed by TJ as received 31 July 1797 and so recorded in SJL.

The friend of Mr. or Mrs. R.: Alexander Hamilton, whose adulterous relationship with Maria Reynolds and alleged connection to the financial speculations of her former husband, James Reynolds, had recently been made public by James Thomson Callender in pamphlets that he subsequently collected as The History of the United States for 1796; including a Variety of Interesting Particulars Relative to the Federal Government Previous to that Period (Philadelphia, 1797). See Sowerby, description begins E. Millicent Sowerby, comp., Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson, Washington, D.C., 1952–59, 5 vols. description ends No. 3515. Hamilton hoped to discover Callender’s source of detailed information about the Reynolds controversy (Monroe himself presumed it was John Beckley). He also wanted Monroe, a member of an ad hoc committee of three members of the House and Senate to whom he had made an explanation of the matter in December 1792, to state categorically that he accepted Hamilton’s version of the events, which admitted adultery with Mrs. Reynolds but disclaimed involvement in any financial improprieties (Syrett, Hamilton description begins Harold C. Syrett and others, eds., The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, New York, 1961–87, 27 vols. description ends , xxi, 121–3, 1309; Notes on the Reynolds Affair, 17 Dec. 1792; note on the first conflict in the cabinet, above in this series in Vol. 18: 611–88).

Each of us having a friend present: New York merchant David Gelston and Hamilton’s brother-in-law, John Barker Church, were present at Monroe’s lodgings in New York City on 11 July 1797 when an angry Hamilton confronted Monroe, who had delayed replying to a letter from the former Treasury secretary until he could confer with Muhg. and Venable—Frederick A. C. Muhlenberg and Abraham B. Venable, who with Monroe had heard Hamilton’s explanations in 1792 (Syrett, Hamilton description begins Harold C. Syrett and others, eds., The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, New York, 1961–87, 27 vols. description ends , xxi, 146–8, 152, 157–62). According to Gelston’s record of the details of this interview, Hamilton refused to accept Monroe’s denial of involvement in the furnishing of papers to Callender, whereupon Monroe called him “a Scoundrel.” “I will meet you like a Gentleman,” Hamilton replied, to which Monroe rejoined, “I am ready get your pistols” (same, 161). Church and Gelston stepped in to cool the situation, but the threat of a duel lingered through a protracted written exchange between Hamilton and Monroe (same, 168–75, 176–7, 178–81, 184–7, 192–3, 200, 204–5, 208–9, 211–12).

Rather than communicate with Hamilton directly, Monroe soon used Aaron Burr as an intermediary—an oblique form of communication that Burr later in the year dubbed a “childish mode of writing.” By mid-August 1797 Monroe assumed with Burr that there was “no prospect of a challenge” from Hamilton (same, 319n; Kline, Burr, description begins Mary-Jo Kline, ed., Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr, Princeton, 1983, 2 vols. description ends i, 313). Nevertheless, that fall after the publication of Hamilton’s pamphlet on the Reynolds affair (see TJ to James Madison, 24 July 1797), Monroe concluded that Hamilton had not exonerated him from involvement in supplying information to Callender. In letters to Burr and John Dawson that he enclosed in one to TJ of 2 Dec. 1797, Monroe rekindled the issue. Both TJ on 27 Dec. and Dawson, who consulted others in Philadelphia, advised Monroe to leave the matter alone. On 1 Jan. 1798, probably before he received that advice, Monroe wrote his rival a letter that has not been found but which provoked Hamilton to draft a reply calling unequivocally for a duel. Yet Hamilton did not send that letter, and there the matter ended (Syrett, Hamilton description begins Harold C. Syrett and others, eds., The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, New York, 1961–87, 27 vols. description ends , xxi, 316–20, 346; Kline, Burr description begins Mary-Jo Kline, ed., Political Correspondence and Public Papers of Aaron Burr, Princeton, 1983, 2 vols. description ends , i, 306–14, 320–1).

Your letter to Mezzai: Jefferson’s Letter to Philip Mazzei, 24 Apr. 1796. A numerous and respectable assemblage: on 14 July 1797 Monroe attended a dinner of Republicans in New York that was presided over by Horatio Gates (New York Daily Advertiser, 15 July 1797; Ammon, Monroe, description begins Harry Ammon, James Monroe: The Quest for National Identity, New York, 1971 description ends 159).