e expenses of the government and to pay as much as possible
of the national debt. Madison and Gallatin worked heartily with him to
carry out this policy. The repeal of the Internal Revenue Act took much
revenue from the government. But it also did away with the salaries of a
great many officials. The repeal of the Judiciary Act also put an end to
many salaries. Now that the dispute with France was ended, Jefferson
thought that the army and navy might safely be reduced. Most of the
naval vessels were sold. A few good ships were kept at sea, and the rest
were tied up at the wharves. The number of ministers to European states
was reduced to the lowest possible limit, and the civil service at home
was also cut down. The expenses of the government were in these ways
greatly lessened. At the same time the revenue from the customs service
increased. The result was that in the eight years of Jefferson's
administrations the national debt shrank from eighty-three million
dollars to forty-five million dollars. Yet in the same time the United
States paid fifteen million dollars for Louisiana, and waged a series of
successful and costly wars with the pirates of the northern coast
of Africa.

[Sidenote: The Spaniards in Louisiana and Florida. _McMaster_, 218-219.]

[Sidenote: France secures Louisiana.]

241. Louisiana again a French Colony.--Spanish territory now
bounded the United States on the south and the west. The Spaniards were
not good neighbors, because it was very hard to make them come to an
agreement, and next to impossible to make them keep an agreement when
it was made. But this did not matter very much, because Spain was a weak
power and was growing weaker every year. Sooner or later the United
States would gain its point. Suddenly, however, it was announced that
France had got back Louisiana. And almost at the same moment the Spanish
governor of Louisiana said that Americans could no longer deposit their
goods at New Orleans (p. 170). At once there was a great outcry in the
West. Jefferson determined to buy from France New Orleans and the land
eastward from the mouth of the Mississippi.

[Illustration: JACKSON SQUARE, NEW ORLEANS.]

[Illustration: ROBERT R. LIVINGSTON.]

[Sidenote: Napoleon's policy.]

[Sidenote: He offers to sell Louisiana.]

242. The Louisiana Purchase, 1803.--When Napoleon got Louisiana
from Spain, he had an idea of again founding a great French colony in
America. At the moment France and G