Of the character and effect of the recent measure of the American Congress, Mr McLane observes that "it concedes in its terms all the power in the regulation of the colonial trade, and authorizes the President to confer on British subjects all those privileges, as well in the circuitous as the direct voyage, which Great Britain has at any time demanded or desired."

In this declaration the undersigned is happy to observe the same spirit and disposition which dictated Mr. McLane's former communications, wherein he announced the readiness and desire of the American Government "to comply with the conditions of the act of Parliament of 1825," and also that the claims advanced in justification of the omission of the United States to embrace the offers of this country, have been abandoned by those who urged them, and have received no sanction from the people of the United States:" and the undersigned readily admits, that if the bill passed by the American Legislature be well calculated practically to fulfil the expressed intentions of its framers, it must have the effect of removing all those grounds of difference between the two Governments, with relation to the trade between the United States and the British colonies, which have been the subject of so much discussion, and which have constituted the main cause of the suspension of the intercourse by those restrictive acts of the United States which the American Government is now prepared to repeal.

The proposition now made by Mr. McLane for the revocation of the order in Council of 1826 stands upon a ground materially different from that on which the same question was brought forward in the notes of Mr. Gallatin in 1827, and and even in the more explanatory overtures of Mr. McLane contained in his communications of December 1829, and March, 1830.

Those several proposals were, all of them, invitations to the British Government to pledge itself, hypothetically, to the revocation of the order in Council, in the event of a repeal of those acts of the American Congress which gave occasion to it. His Majesty's Government declined to give that prospective pledge or assurance, on the grounds stated in Lord Dudley's note of the 1st October, 1827. But the objections then urged are not applicable to the present overture. Provision has now been made by an act of the American Legislature for the re-establishment of the suspended intercourse upon certain terms and conditions; and that act being now before his Majesty's Government, it is for them to decide whether they are prepared to adopt a corresponding measure on the part of Great Britain for that object.

The undersigned is ready to admit that, in spirit and substance, the bill transmitted by Mr. McLane is conformable to the view which he takes of it in the expression before quoted from his note of the 12th July; and that it is calculated, therefore, to afford to Great Britain complete satisfaction on the several points which have been heretofore in dispute between the two countries. He has also received, with much satisfaction, the explanation which Mr. McLane has afforded him verbally, in the last conference which the undersigned had the honor of holding with him, upon those passages in which the wording of the bill appears obscure, and in which it seems at least doubtful whether the practical construction of it would fully correspond with the intentions of the American Government, as expressed by Mr. McLane. But it is nevertheless necessary, in order to remove all possibility of future misapprehension upon so important a subject, that he

should recapitulate the points upon which those doubts have arisen, and distinctly state the sense in which the undersigned considers Mr McLane as concurring with him in the interpretation of them:

The first point in which a question might arise is in that passage of the bill wherein it is declared, as one of the conditions on which the restrictions now imposed by the United States may be removed, "that the vessels of the United States, and their cargoes, on entering the ports of the British possessions, as aforesaid, (viz: in the West Indies, on the continent of America, the Bahama islands, the Caicos, and the Bermuda or Somer islands,) shall not be subject to other or higher duties of tonnage or impost, cr charges of any other description, than would be imposed on British vessels, or their cargoès, arriving in the said colonial possession from the United States of America." It is not quite clear whether the concluding words "from the United States of America," are meant to apply to the ves sels of the United States, and their cargoes, in the first part of the paragraph, as well as to those of Great Britain or her colonies in the latter part.

It can scarcely, indeed, have been intended that this stipulation should extend to American vsssels coming with cargoes from any other places than the United States, because it is well known that, under the navigation laws of Great Britain, no foreign vessel could bring a cargo to any British colonial port from any other country than its own.

The next condition expressed in the act is, "that the vessels of the United States may import into the said colonial possessions from the United States, any article or articles which could be imported in a British vessel into the said possessions from the United States.

In this passage, it is not made sufficiently clear that the articles to be imported on equal terms by British or American vessels from the United States, must be the produce of the United States. The undersigned, however, cannot but suppose that such a limitation must have been contemplated, because the clause of the navigation act already adverted to, whereby an American vessel would be precluded from bringing any article not the produce of America to a British colonial port, is not only a subject of universal notoriety, but the same provision is distinctly made in the act of Parliament of 1825, which has been so often referred to in the discussions on this subject.

It was also necessary that the undersigned should ask for some explanation of that section of the bill which has reference to the entry of vessels into the ports of the United States from the continental colonies of Great Britain in North America. These are not placed, in the terms of the act, on the same footing as the ships coming from the colonies of the West Indies.

With respect to the latter, the express provision made for the direct intercourse with those colonies, together with the simultaneous repeal of the several American acts which interdict, at present, the carriage of goods from the United States to West Indian ports, in ships having arrived from other ports in the British dominions, appear fully to warrant the expression, before quoted, of Mr McLane, "that the act would confer on British vessels all those privileges, as well in the circuitous as in the direct voyage, which Great Britain has at any time demanded." But, with regard to the continental colonies, there is merely a provision for "admitting to entry, in the ports of the United States, British vessels or their car

goes from the islands, provinces, or colonies of Great Britain, on or near the North American continent, and north or east of the United States." It must indeed be presumed that vessels from these colonies are intended to be admitted upon the same terms, in all respects, and to be entitled to the same privileges, as British ships from any other British colony.

The act of Congress requires, as a further condition, that, when the intercourse with the West India colonies shall be opened by Great Britain," the commercial intercourse of the United States with all other parts of the British dominions or possessions shall be left on a footing not less favorable to the United States than it now is."

Although it may be most truly stated that there exists, at this time, no intention to make any alteration in the commercial policy of Great Britain, and equally that there is no disposition on the part of His Majesty's Government to restrict, in any measure, the commercial relations between this country and the United States, yet the positive condition to maintain unchanged, or upon any particular footing of favor, every part of our system of trade affecting our intercourse with America, could not, with propriety, be made the subject of any specific engage ment, connected with the renewal of the colonial intercourse. Whether that intercourse be renewed or not, it ought to remain at all times as free as it now is, both to the government of Great Britain and to that of the United States, to adopt, from time to time, such commercial regulations as either State may deem to be expedient for its own interests, consistently with the obligations of existing treaties.

It is due to the candor with which the communications of Mr McLane have been made on this subject, that the undersigned should be thus explicit in noticing the passage in the bill to which he has now adverted.

Mr McLane, in his note of the 12th ultimo, has described and explained the material diminution which has been made in the duties payable in the U. States on the importation of certain articles of colonial produce. This measure has been viewed by his Majesty's Government with sincere satisfaction, as indicating a disposition to cultivate a commercial intercourse with his Majesty's colonies upon a footing of greater freedom and reciprocal advantage than has hitherto existed. But the undersigned must frankly state, that, in the general consideration of the question now to be determined, no weight ought to be assigned to the reduction of those duties, as forming any part of the grounds on which the re-establishment of the intercourse may be acceded to. Those changes are part of the general scheme of taxation which the government of America may, at all times, impose or modify, with the same freedom as that which Great Britain may exercise in the regulation of any part of its system of duties; and it is the more essential that his Majesty's Government should not contract, by implication, any engagement towards that of the United States with respect to such alterations, because his Majesty's Government have already had under their consideration the expediency of introducing some modifications into the schedule of duties attached to the act of Parliament of 1825, with a view more effectually to support the interests of the British North American colonies.* To those interests, fostered, as they have incidentally been, by the suspension of the intercourse between the United States and

*See page 159, of this volume.

the West Indies, his Majesty's government will continue to look with an earnest desire to afford them such protection by discriminating duties as may appear to be consistent with the interests of other parts of His Majesty's dominions, and with a sound policy in the commercial relations of this country with all other States.

The undersigned has thought it desirable that this point should be distinctly understood on both sides, in order that no doubt should exist of the right of Great Britain to vary those duties from time to time, according to her own views of expediency, unfettered by any obligation, expressed or implied, towards the United States or any other country.

The undersigned adverts again with satisfaction to the verbal explanations which he has received from Mr McLane of those passages in the act of Congress which have not appeared to the undersigned to be literally adapted to the provisions of the act of Parliament of 1825. He concurs with Mr McLane in thinking that these will be found to have been merely apparent deviations from the conditions of that statute, because the whole of the recent proceedings of the American Government and Legislature in this matter have been manifestly and expressly founded upon a determination to conform to it. Any other view of the subject would be entirely at variance with the tenor of the several communications from Mr McLane before adverted to, which have all been conformable to the explicit proposition contained in his note of the 12th December, 1829, "that the Government of the United States should now comply with the conditions of the act of Parliament of July 5, 1825; by an express law, opening their ports for the admission of British vessels, and by allowing their entry with the same kind of British colonial produce as may be imported in American vessels, the vessels of both countries paying the same charges; suspending the alien duties on British vessels and cargoes, and abolishing the restrictions in the act of Congress of 1823 to the direct intercourse between the United States and the British colonies, and that such a law should be immediately followed by a revocation of the British order in Council of the 27th July 1826, the abolition or suspension of all discriminating duties on American vessels in the British colonial ports, and the enjoyment, by the United States, of the advantages of the act of Parliament of the 5th July, 1825." It only remains, therefore, for the undersigned to assure Mr McLane that, if the President of the United States shall determine to give effect to the act of Congress, in conformity with the construction put upon its provisions both by Mr McLane and by the undersigned, all difficulty on the part of Great Britain, in the way of a renewal of the intercourse between the United States and the West Indies, according to the foregoing proposition made by Mr McLane, will thereby be removed.

The undersigned has the honor to renew to Mr LcLane the assurances of his highest consideration. ABERDEEN.

Louis McLane, Esq. &c. &c. &c.

125. Claims against the French Government, for Spoliations on American Commerce, since September, 1800.

Condensed from Lyman's Diplomacy, and from Official Papers.

In 1793, the French began to capture our vessels, irritated at the course, pursued by this government. And as early as September of the next year, we find the claims arranged under separate heads, though there are no means within reach of ascertaining the precise amount of each class.

1. Injuries by the embargo at Bordeaux, July 1793; the number of vessels detained under this act said to be 103.

2. For supplies furnished St. Domingo.

3. Cargoes of provisions, &c. detained for delay of payment.

4. Vessels detained by cruisers of the French republic in violation of the treaty of "78.

5. Vessels taken at sea as above.

The demands on France kept continually increasing to the close of the century, principally, however, for depredations in the West Indies. These claims, as created to the close of the century, were finally renounced on the part of the U.S. by the 2d article of the convention of 1800, provided France abandon all her pretensions on the score of a guaranty. By this act the American government virtually assumed the demands of its own citizens. Not only the constitution forbids the government from taking "private property" for public use "without just compensation," but, in this case, a full equivalent, the surrender of the guaranty, was made by France for the adoption of the claims by the United States. But hardly was the instrument signed, when fresh claims arose on the construction of the provision, intended to constitute a final settlement. No one would have supposed that an article, inserted in a convention for the purpose of bringing this troublesome business to a close, would have made it necessary for our own government to enter into immediate explanations in behalf of its own citizens, or that 20,000,000 of livres would have remained more than twenty years in the coffers of our treasury, expressly reserved, by a subsequent convention, for the payment of a portion of these claims. The restitutions, demanded by the United States, under the 4th article of the convention of 1800, comprised three descriptions of cases:

1. Cases of capture, where no judicial proceedings were held.

2. Cases not definitively decided on, in French tribunals, the 30th September, 1800.

3. Captures made, subsequent to that date.

Under the 3d and 4th articles these claims were just, and to withhold the property was, on the part of France, an act of complete injustice. It has been said, that by the 2d article of the convention of 1800, the United States adopted all the claims of its citizens, subject to the three reservations above written. This constitutes the first period in the history of these claims.

Then, as the next period, we have the third convention of 1803, by which this government agreed to assume claims on France, prior to the 30th September, 1800, for 20,000,000 livres, no settlement having been made of the disputed points under the convention of 1800.