Au revoir au grand ami de l'Amérique

A Century Since Amb. Jean Jules Jusserand's Farewell to Washington

This month marks 100 years since M. Jean Jules Jusserand left Washington, D.C. Arriving in 1903, he was French Ambassador for nearly a quarter-century, having served during the terms of five U.S. presidents: Teddy Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, and Calvin Coolidge. Jusserand ranks as one of the greatest foreign ambassadors in American history, along with his British contemporary James Bryce, 1st Viscount Bryce. Born to a wealthy French family in 1855 and trained as an historian, Jusserand turned to the diplomatic corps. He witnessed an unprecedented period in American history, arriving just after the Spanish-American War turned the United States into a colonial power and leaving after post-World War I America had taken on the trappings of a great power.

Perhaps more than any of his peers, save Bryce, Jusserand appreciated what he called “broad-minded, strenuous America.” He contributed, not only to its diplomatic affairs, but to its intellectual and cultural life. He was elected to membership in both the American Philosophical Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the two most prestigious learned societies in the country. Even more impressively, he was awarded the first Pulitzer Prize in History, for his work With Americans of Past and Present Days, which included a chapter on “Major L’Enfant and the Federal City,” a study of the planning for Washington. Perhaps the capstone of his intellectual endeavors was to serve as president of the American Historical Association, in 1921, the first foreigner to do so.

Like few other envoys, Jusserand embraced Washington, D.C. He lived here during the decades Washington transformed from a sleepy capital into a modern centralized nerve center for the nation, with “tempo” buildings crowding the Mall and hundreds of thousands of new government workers cramming the city. He was known for his love of the peaceful retreat of Rock Creek Park, often taking tea with his wife at the Peirce Mill Tea House. His attachment to the park was commemorated in 1936 with a memorial bench made of pink granite, the first foreign diplomat to be so honored on federal property; the unveiling ceremony was addressed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The bench still sits, often overlooked and in need of some repair, on Beach Drive, overlooking the Rock Creek.

(The Jean Jules Jusserand Memorial bench; image from National Park Service)

Jusserand was a uniquely effective envoy largely due to the personal relationships he forged with U.S. presidents, something that may well be on the mind of foreign diplomats in Washington this week. He served in perhaps the last era when ambassadors were the cornerstone of diplomatic ties. In the days before airplanes and telecommunications allowed national leaders to see or speak to each other with ease, ambassadors were the primary go-betweens for national governments. Jusserand was only forty-eight when he arrived in the Capital, and he quickly bonded with the 45-year-old Teddy Roosevelt. The two often hiked in Rock Creek Park, and Jusserand was one of the few who could keep up with the energetic and restless Roosevelt.

Perhaps Jusserand’s signal service to his country while ambassador was in urging the United States to enter World War I in support of France. He later called the American decision to declare war on Germany “an event of immense importance for mankind.” So close was Jusserand to President Woodrow Wilson that he accompanied Wilson to Versailles for the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. In his writings and speeches, he tied the destinies of the two transatlantic Republics to each other, which today is a reminder of how much America and France once felt they had in common as anti-monarchical democratic states.

I’m not sure there have been any ambassadors since Jusserand with such close ties to American leaders, and certainly few who approached his longevity. In the 2000s, Japanese ambassador Ryozo Kato bonded with then-President George W. Bush over a shared love of baseball; Kato arrived in September 2001 and his seven-year term in Washington covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, with Japan becoming an increasingly important ally during that period. British Ambassador Dame Karen Pierce, who will be leaving her post this month after five years, has been one of the most popular hostesses and presences in D.C.’s social scene. As for longevity, the current dean of the diplomatic corps is Ambassador Hersey Kyota of the Republic of Palau, who has been resident in Washington since 1997, and Ashok Kumar Mirpuri, of Singapore, served for eleven years, from July 2012 to June 2023. But Jusserand’s deep immersion in American life still remains unrivaled, as far as I can determine.

As much as he may have embraced America, Jusserand remained a loyal Frenchman, and his efforts were focused on maintaining and deepening ties between France and America to support French policies. The centenary of his returning home affords an opportunity to remember how close France and the United States were for much of American history. Those ties go back to the Revolutionary War, the outbreak of which occurred 250 years ago this April. The Declaration of Independence itself was passed as the first step in gaining recognition and aid from France in the conflict with Great Britain, and we signed our first alliance with a great power with France, in February 1778.

While geopolitical intrigues attended those early years of Franco-American ties (since anything Paris did to weaken London was to its global benefit), there were also genuine ties between the two countries from the start. Above all, the personal commitment of the Marquis de Lafayette to the American cause, and his intimate relationship with George Washington, was unimpeachable. For the rest of his life, Lafayette remained beloved by Americans. Since last August, the American Friends of Lafayette has organized a national commemoration of the bicentennial of his farewell tour of America, in 1824 and 1825 (you can still catch events and the Marquis’ “tour” through April of this year).

Lafayette’s visit was a national sensation two hundred years ago, and interest today remains high, as witnessed by events in multiple states and a popular exhibit and lecture series held at the American Revolution Institute, in Washington. Jules Jusserand remains far less known, and though there are no public events (yet) scheduled to remember his service, the centenary of Jusserand’s ambassadorship coming to a close offers another opportunity to reflect on the long history of Franco-American ties, the rise of America to great power status, and a lost world of diplomacy.

Futher Reading: Robert J. Young, An American by Degrees: The Extraordinary Lives of French Ambassador Jules Jusserand (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2009).