How did John Marshall, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, and Elbridge Gerry advance freedom for themselves and others during the XYZ Affair?

The XYZ affair was a diplomatic conflict between America and France that lasted from March 1797 to 1800. The French government saw the Jay Treaty as evidence of an Anglo-American alliance. Therefore, in the Atlantic Ocean, the Caribbean and the Mediterranean, the French hijacked nearly 300 American ships that were on their way to British ports. When Americans went to France to negotiate peace, the French made ridiculous demands that were not accepted by the Americans.

The United States offered France many of the same concessions that were in the Jay Treaty with Great Britain. However, France responded by sending Marshall and Pinckney back to America and rejecting any proposal in which these two delegates were involved. Gerry, who hoped to prevent a declaration of war, stayed in France. Officially, however, he no longer negotiated.   Despite diplomatic efforts and the lack of a formal declaration of war, further attacks on American merchant ships led to the Quasi-War.