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other nations, into an exclusive one, possessed by no other nation.

Here is the radical source of the error which pervades the arguments of your excellency. Your excellency seems constantly to suppose that the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty was intended to secure to France an exclusive privilege. But such was certainly not the fact. The seventh article secured, and was intended to secure, for a limited time, an exclusive privilege to France, in stipulating expressly that, during the term of twelve years, her vessels should be received on a better footing than those of any other nation, Spain only excepted. But, with the twelve years, the exclusive privilege ceased, and thence forward, by the eighth article of the treaty, her vessels are to be received on an equal footing with those of the most favoured of other nations, but not on a better footing than theirs.

Your excellency, however, remarks, that, as in the actual commercial policy of the United States, they offer the terms of reci procity alike to all nations, this construction of the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty would render it altogether unmeaning; that it must have been intended to secure to France some advantage, but that it would convey none, if it only entitled her to that which is refused to no power. Your excellency, however, does not seem to recollect that the commercial regulations of a country are, in general, subject entirely to its own discretion. It may, at its pleasure, grant favourable terms to one nation and withhold them from another. Though the United States, at the present day, have adopted a system of common and equal favour to all nations, they may, at any moment, depart from that system, and enter into

special arrangements, granting to one power advantages which they may choose not to grant to another.

The value of the stipulation contained in the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty consists in the protection it gives France against any discriminations of this sort; and in entitling her, as a matter of right, to claim from the United States on the same terms any advantages which they may grant to other na. tions-gratuitously, if they are granted to others gratuitously-on the performance of the same condi tions, if granted conditionally to others. This would be purely op tional on the part of the United States with regard to other powers, but, in relation to France, it be comes, by virtue of the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, bind. ing and imperative. If a stipulation of this sort be without advan. tage, and an unmeaning nullity, as your excellency has remarked, it is, nevertheless, such an one as the most enlightened commercial nations have been in the practice of contracting for, and which the illustri ous sovereign who was a party to our first treaty with France thought it important to obtain, when, by the second article of that treaty, it was stipulated that, whatever favour might be granted to other nations by the United States, should be enjoyed by France "freely, if the concession was freely made; for the same compensation, if the concession was conditional."

The French government, in urging its pretensions on this subject, has several times represented the stipulation in question as an es sential and substantive part of the price given by the United States for the cession of Louisiana, and your excellency speaks of it in the same manner. If it were so, I have already shown the real nature and

extent of that price, and that it has been faithfully rendered by the United States. But it is apparent from the form of the transaction itself, that this stipulation was not considered as forming any part of the equivalents for the cession. The cession, and the equivalents for it, were not included in the same treaty. The cession itself, its limits, all that related to the transfer of the territory, and its future political and commercial condition, formed the subject of one treaty; the equivalents were contained in two separate conventions of the same date. The stipulation in question is not found in the conventions which fixed the equivalents, but in the treaty of cession.

The obvious inference arising from the form of the transaction is, to-day, confirmed by the testimony of the French negotiator, who, in his recently published history of the negotiation, says, "the negotiation had three objects: the cession, the price, and the indemnities claimed by the United States; and that it was agreed to treat of those objects separately, and to make of them three distinct acts or treaties." The true price of the acquisition, there fore, must be looked for, not in the treaty of cession, but in the conventions accompanying it, which fixed that price at eighty millions of francs, being thirty millions more, as is proved by the same authentic authority, than was required by the chief of the French government, and which, in the extreme uncertainty then existing as to the limits of the cession, and the acknow. ledged impossibility of preserving the territory from the grasp of a powerful enemy in the moment of renewed hostilities, was signally ad. vantageous for France, and onerous to the United States. How forcibly, then, might I return a remark of

your excellency, and ask with what reason the United States, who have already paid for this acquisition almost double the price which was deemed sufficient by the vendor, can be now required to treble that price in the shape of commercial privileges, which have been shown, I trust, to have no sanction in a just interpretation of the treaty ?

It is not, surely, by a pretension of this sort that the loyalty of his majesty's government will seek to offset the just reclamations of our citizens for the flagrant and unde niable wrongs of which they have been the victims. Are the mem. bers of a friendly nation never to be indemnified for property of which they have been deprived by the most lawless acts, because the govern ments of the two countries cannot agree in their construction of some compact between them in relation to a different matter? Where is the relation or dependence between the two questions? Is it the less true that the citizens of the United States have suffered the grossest injuries from the authorities of France, for which they are entitled to redress, because the government of the United States cannot per suade itself that the interpretation which France chooses to put on the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty is correct? If a sovereign government can thus avoid its ob. ligations, then all national justice is an illusion, for nothing more would be necessary to repel the most incontestible claims, but for the government of which they are demanded to raise some disputable pretension against the government of the claimants: the more unfound. ed the better, as it would be so much more impossible for the latter to admit it.

But your excellency tells me that the rights of our citizens are

to be withheld as a reprisal upon the United States for not admitting the interpretation which France puts on the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty. In what code of national law this doctrine of reprisal is to be found, I am at a loss to know. Is reprisal, then, a legitimate remedy for a difference of opinion? Has one party to a compact an exclusive right of interpretation, which it can enforce by peInalties and confiscations? I need not say how little such a doctrine accords with the profession of mode. ration which accompanies it, or in what light it must be viewed by a government which, sincerely desiring the maintenance of the most friendly relations with that of his majesty, has not been wanting in

the proposition of amicable modes to adjust this and all other differences between them. A perseve rance in this position can be regard. ed in no other light than as a final denial of the justice which has been so long sought for the wrongs of our citizens. I entertain a firm confidence that your excellency's enlightened sense of justice, and the well-known loyalty of his majesty's government, will avert such a result.

I have the honour to be, with distinguished consideration, your excellency's most obedient and most humble servant,

W. C. RIVES. His Excellency the PRINCE DE POLIGNAC, &c., &c., &c.

No. 30.

SIR,

Mr. Rives to Mr. Van Buren.

Paris, June 8, 1830.

I have the honour to enclose the copy of a private note received from Prince Polignac, on the sub. ject of the suggestions contained in the informal paper I had address. ed to him on the 20th ult., and also a copy of my reply. You will perceive that I availed myself of the occasion to remind him of his commitments, and also to make an appeal to the personal sentiments of the king. I was the more induced to do this, because I had just heard that the commission had, a day or two before, contrary to the expectation previously entertained, made a report very unfavourable to our claims.

The history I have of it is this. Baron Mounier, the president of

the commission, had obtained a congé of two or three months' absence from Paris, and was to have taken his departure on the evening of the 30th ult. The note I had addressed to the minister on the 26th ult., however, having excited some inquietude, the minister, in meeting with Baron Mounier, in the morning of the thirtieth ult., at St. Cloud, (where the Baron attended the usual weekly reception for the pur pose of taking his leave of the king, previous to his departure from Paris,) insisted that the commission should make a report before the Baron left Paris. Baron Mounier, being thus delayed in the moment of his intended departure, assembled his colleagues the next day, in the course of which, possessing great influence over the rest of the

commission, he prevailed with them to join in a very hurried and ill-considered report, and the following morning left Paris.

The report, I understand, affirms that the king, having succeeded to the rights and engagements of Napoleon, ought not to pay that which Napoleon would not have paid, and arrives at the conclusion that the utmost amount which his majesty's government can be made responsible for, is eight millions of livres tournois, (francs,) subject to considerable deductions, too, on account of counter-claims of France. What respect the minister will pay to this report, if it be of this character, it is impossible to say. provide against such a contingency, I have repeatedly taken occasion, in conversation with him, to remark that the proceedings of the commis. sion being unilateral and exparte, it would be unjust that the rights of the American claimants should be, in any manner, concluded by them; and he has invariably answered, that their report would not be at all definitive, and was only intended to furnish materials upon which he would freely form his own judg.

ment.

In order to

I have not yet been able to obtain an interview with the minister, though I addressed him a note on the 1st instant, requesting one. I have this moment received the note of which a copy is enclosed, in answer to it, from which you will perceive that the minister again turns me over to Baron Deffandis. This, I

me of the benefit of what has been already agreed and settled in my interviews with the minister; and I cannot help thinking that it is to get rid of the embarrassment which the minister experiences from that circumstance, as well as on account of his "numerous occupations," that he refers me to Baron Deffandis.

It must be admitted, however, that his occupations are very numerous and very absorbing. As the head of the ministry, he must, of course, be very much occupied with all the various arrangements preparatory to the approaching elections, on which so much depends: the nomination of the presidents of the electoral colleges; the instructions to public functionaries in regard to their duties as electors: the royal proclamation to be issued on the eve of the elections; all of which matters, it is said, have of late very much employed and divided the councils of the ministers. At the same time, great anxiety prevails, as you may suppose, respecting the Algerine expedition, of the first operations of which they are every moment expecting intelligence. The circumstances of the crisis, therefore, are certainly very unfavourable for our objects. Whatever can be done, however, I shall continue to employ my best efforts to accomplish, however discouraging the prospect.

I have the honour to be,
With great respect,
Your obedient servant,
W. C. RIVES.

think, is unfortunate, as it deprives Hon. M. VAN Buren.

[PRIVATE-TRANSLATION.]

Paris, May 31, 1830.

SIR, I have received the private letter you did me the honour to

write me the 20th instant, in which you suggest to me the possibility of terminating, by a sort of compro. mise, the differences existing be.

to be done was, to resolve a doubt which has occurred to me on the nature of this proposition. You will find it stated in the accompany. ing note, and I hope you will be pleased to afford me the explanations necessary to elucidate it. I have the honour to be, &c. THE PCE. DE POLIGNAC.

tween our two governments. The conciliatory sentiments you express to me are too conformable to my own, for such a proposition not to have engaged all my attention. You will readily understand that a few days have not sufficed to enable me to form, with regard to it, even an approximative opinion. Besides, it appeared to me that the first thing Mr. RIVES, &c.

[TRANSLATION.]

It is proposed to the French government to renounce, in consideration of a reduction of the duties imposed in the United States on the wines of France, the privilege which it claims for her navigation under the eighth article of the treaty of cession of Louisiana.

Before proceeding to the examination, necessarily complicated, of the advantages which such a proposition, or any other of the same nature, may offer to French commerce, it is absolutely indispensable to resolve a preliminary question.

France could not exchange a privilege secured to her for ever, except for an advantage equally per

petual. She would not consent, therefore, to accept, as a compensation, any stipulation whatever which the mere will of a foreign govern. ment might, at any moment, revoke without her participation.

Would the proffered reduction of duties be of this character, or, on the contrary, would it take that of a sy. nallagmatic and obligatory engage. ment?

In the first case, (it is said with regret,) other modes must be sought to reconcile the differences existing between the two countries.

In the second, a thorough examina. tion of the intrinsic value of the pro. position might be entered into.

[PRIVATE.]

Paris, June 2, 1830.

MONSIEUR LE Prince,

I had the honour, yesterday, to receive the private letter your excellency addressed to me the day before, for the purpose of inquiring whether the reduction of the duties on French wines in the United States, which I had suggested as a friendly concession to the commerce

of France, in the event of a prompt and satisfactory settlement of the questions now pending, was to be regarded as revocable, at any mo. ment, at the pleasure of the American government, or whether it was proposed to give it the character of an obligatory and synallagmatic engagement. My idea certainly was to make it absolutely binding

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