The power of the new nation whose existence had been recognized by these Treaties, to regulate and control its commercial relations with Foreign Powers was uniformly asserted in this series of Treaties. They placed each of the other Powers, in respect of commerce and navigation within each and every State, on the footing of the most favored nation; and it was agreed with Prussia that the ports of each Power should be open to the other; and that the duties, charges, and fees, to be imposed by each upon articles the growth, produce, or manufacture of the other, should be only such as should be paid by the most favored nation.2

In the articles affecting the relations between the United States and the several States; these early Treaties asserted the nationality of the United States in a no less marked manner.

They prohibited the exaction in any State of the Droit d'Aubaine or other similar duty. They allowed aliens to hold personal property and to dispose of it by testament, donation, or otherwise, and to succeed to it, and they prohibited the exaction in such case by any State of dues, except such as the inhabitants of the country were subject to. They allowed aliens, without obtaining letters of naturalization, to inherit real estate and things immovable in every State, but in such case the Prussian alien was required to sell the real estate and withdraw the proceeds, which he was to be permitted to do without molestation; and in case of withdrawal no droit de détraction was to be exacted."

The right to aliens to frequent the coasts and countries of each and all the several States, and to reside there and to trade in all sorts of produce, manufactures, and merchandise was granted by the national government; and the States were prohibited from imposing upon such aliens any duties or charges to which the citizens of the most favored nation were not made subject. Resident aliens were also assured against State legislation to prevent the exercise of an entire and perfect liberty of conscience, and the performance of religious worship; and, when dying, they were guaranteed the right of decent burial, and undisturbed rest for their bodies.10

The Consular Convention concluded with France by Jefferson maintained a yet wider supremacy for the national authority. It authorized French Consuls to administer, in certain cases, upon the estates of their deceased countrymen in the several States; to exercise police over all the vessels of their nation in whatever American port they might discharge their functions; to arrest the officers or crews of such vessels; to

1 France, 1778, Art's 2 and 3; Netherlands, 1782, Art's 2 and 3; Sweden, 1783, Art's 2, 3, and 4; Prussia, 1785, Art's 2 and 3. Art. 14. France, 1778, Art. 11. France, 1778, Art. 11; Netherlands, 1782, Art. 6; Sweden, 1783, Art. 6; Prussia, 1785, Art. 10. 5 France, 1778, Art. 11; Netherlands, 1782, Art. 6; Sweden, 1783, Art. 6; Prussia, 1785, Art. 10. 6 Art. 10. 7 France, 1778, Art. 11; Sweden, 1783, Art. 6; Prussia, 1785, Art. 10. Prussia, 1785, Art. 2. ? France, 1778, Art. 3; Netherlands, 1782, Art. 2; Sweden, 1783, Art. 3; Prussia, 1785, Art. 2. 10 Netherlands, 1782, Art. 4; Sweden, 1783, Art. 5; Prussia, 1785, Art. 11.

require the Courts to aid them in the arrest of deserters; and it even elevated them into judges, and authorized them to determine all differences and disputes arising between their countrymen in the United States.1

The same statesmen contemplated at one time a postal convention between France and the United States. A scheme was submitted by the French Minister;2 after considering which Jay submitted a counter proposal. But nothing further appears to have been done. Had the scheme been carried out it would have anticipated by half a centuary the modern international postal convention of the United States. The several Treaties and Conventions, thus negotiated, have served as the basis or model of many of the commercial and general conventions entered into by the United States since the adoption of the Constitution.

The Treaty negotiated in London, in 1794, during the administration of President Washington, and commonly known as Jay's Treaty, contained several new features, some of which have since been adopted in other Treaties.

This Treaty, the first concluded with a Foreign Power under the new form of government, recognized the right of the United States, which had been asserted in the Treaties concluded under the old form of gov ernment, to authorize aliens to hold and dispose of real estate in the several States. It aimed to establish, as far as the British monopoly of that day would permit, reciprocity in trade on the American continent; and it declared that by reciprocity it was "intended to render in a great degree the local advantages of each party common to both, and thereby to promote a disposition favorable to friendship and good neighborhood." It made reciprocal provisions for the equalization of import and export duties. It provided a mode for settling by arbitration differences which had arisen between the two powers; and it also declared that it was "unjust and impolitic that debts and engagements contracted and made by individuals, having confidence in each other, and in their respective governments, should ever be destroyed or impaired by national authority on account of national differences;" and it, therefore, provided that there should be no confiscation or sequestration of debts, in event of war between the parties. By it the parties. agreed that an innocent neutral vessel, approaching a blockaded port, without knowledge of the blockade, should be warned and turned away without detention, and without confiscation of the vessel, or of the cargo unless contraband. It required each party to bring to the notice of the other any causes of complaint it might have before proceeding to the extremities of reprizals or of war; 10 and it made provisions, to a limited extent, for the extradition of persons charged with the commission of crimes."

1 France, 1788, Art's 5, 8, 9, and 12. 21 D. C. 1783-'89, 185. Ib., 201. 1794, Art. 9. Art. 3. 6 Art.15. 7 Art. 7. Art. 10. 9 Art. 18. 10 Art. 22.

Great Britain

11 Art. 27.

The Treaty of 1795, concluded with Spain during the same adminis tration, provided that the vessels or effects of citizens of either Power should not be embargoed or detained by the other for any purpose; that the courts of justice should be open alike to citizens of each Power; that seizures of the persons of citizens of one Power by the authorities of the other, within its jurisdiction, were to be made and prosecuted under the ordinary forms of law, and that the persons so arrested were to have the right to employ such advocates or attorneys as they pleased, who were to have the right of access to them, and of being present at all examinations and trials, all of which engagements have since been entered into with other Powers.

During the administration of the elder Adams two Treaties of note were made. The first, concluded with Prussia, in 1799, extended the principal provisions in the Treaty of 1785 with that Power, but, in doing it, several features of the early Treaty disappeared. The second was the Treaty concluded with France in 1800, which put an end to a state of quasi war between France and the United States.

The construction put by President Washington on the agreement of guaranty contained in the 11th article of the Treaty of 1778 with France. together with the conclusion of the Treaty of 1794 with England, had affected the relations of the two countries to such a degree that, in 1798, Congress had, by law, assumed to exonerate the nation from further obligation to observe the Treaties with France; and the Attorney-General had given an official opinion that there was a state of war. The Treaty of 1800 restored the good relations: but in the amendments on each side the old Treaties entirely disappeared. The subject will be further considered hereafter. This Treaty, although concluded during the administration of President Adams, was finally proclaimed by Jefferson after he became President.

By far the most important Treaty, in its results, concluded during the administration of President Jefferson, was the Treaty of 1803 with France, whereby Louisiana was annexed to the United States. This was the first Treaty which extended the territorial dominion of the United States, and which provided for the admission of aliens “to the enjoyments of all the rights, advantages, and the immunities of citizens of the United States."3

The subject of the Slave-Trade first appears in the Treaty of Peace with Great Britain, concluded in 1814, at Ghent, during the administration of President Madison. It was declared there that "the traffic in slaves is irreconcilable with the principles of humanity and justice.”* John Quincy Adams, James A. Bayard, Henry Clay, Jonathan Russell, and Albert Gallatin subscribed this declaration on the part of the United States.

At the close of the wars of Napoleon, the Treaty of 1795 with Spain

Art. 7. 21 Op. At.-Gen., 701, Wirt. 3 Art. 3. Art. 10.

alone, of all of the commercial Treaties, survived. President Madison contemplated using the opportunity to mould all the Treaties of this nature into a general system. Mr. Monroe, in an early stage of negotiations with Holland, for this purpose, informed the Dutch Minister at Washington that "the Treaties between the United States and some of the Powers of Europe having been annulled by causes proceeding from the state of Europe for some time past, and other Treaties having expired, the United States have now to form their system of commercial intercourse with every Power, as it were, at the same time." But the only general commercial Treaties which Monroe succeeded in concluding, either as Secretary of State under President Madison, or as President with John Quincy Adams as Secretary of State, were the Treaty of 1815 with Great Britain, the limited arrangements made with France in 1822, and the Treaty with Colombia in 1824.

In that Treaty with Great Britain, it was for the first time agreed that no higher or other duties or charges should be imposed in any of the ports of the United States on vessels of another Power than those payable in the same ports by vessels of the United States; that the same duties should be paid on the importation into the United States of any articles the growth, produce, or manufacture of a foreign Power, whether such importation should be made in vessels of the United States or in vessels of that Power, and that in all cases where drawbacks were or might be allowed upon the re-exportation of any goods the growth, produce, or manufacture of either country respectively, the amount of the drawback should be the same, whether the goods should have been imported in American vessels or in vessels of the Foreign Power. How frequently these principles have since been recognized in Treaties of the United States, an examination of the Index following these Notes will show.

The Convention with Colombia was the first of a long series of Treaties of Amity and Commerce with the several American States, of Spanish or Portuguese origin. It contained, in addition to most of the liberal provisions already noted, an agreement which has since been incorporated into many other Treaties, that infractions of the Treaty by citizens of either party should not interrupt the harmony and good correspondence between the two nations.

The most important Treaty made during the administration of President Monroe was the Treaty for the acquisition of Florida, concluded with Spain in 1819. Another important Convention was concluded in 1818, in London, by Mr. Gallatin and Mr. Rush, for the purpose, among other things, of settling the disputes which had arisen after the Treaty of Ghent, respecting the fisheries. In this the United States "renounced forever any liberty heretofore enjoyed or claimed by the inhabitants thereof to take, dry, or cure fish on or within three marine miles of any of the coasts, bays, creeks, or harbors of His Britannic Majesty's Domin

1 Monroe to Changuion, April 12. 1815. Ms. Dept. of State. Art. 2

ions in America not included in the above-mentioned limits," that is, the limits described in the Treaty. We have the authority of Rush for the assertion that this renunciation was inserted by the American Plenipotentiaries. "The British Plenipotentiaries," he says, "did not desire it." 2

During the administration of John Quincy Adams several Treaties were concluded, in which broader views in commercial matters began to prevail. It was agreed that whatever kind of produce, mauufacture, or merchandise of any foreign country could be from time to time lawfully imported into the United States in their own vessels might also be imported in vessels of the other Power. These Treaties were subscribed by Henry Clay, Secretary of State of the United States, and the provisions have often since been repeated in Conventions with other Powers. The expanding commerce of the United States induced the revival at this time of some of the powers respecting national vessels in foreign ports, and respecting disputes between the officers and crew of such vessels, and concerning deserters, which had been conferred upon Consuls by Jefferson's Convention with France in 1788. These important provisions were now inserted in the Treaties of Commerce, and continued to be until the revival of the practice of concluding exclusively Consular Conventions, which had lain dormant from the time of Jefferson's mission in Paris. Many commercial Treaties were concluded during the administrations of President Jackson and President Van Buren, through which the principles, which had become part of the policy of the United States, were extended in every quarter of the globe. By the former administration also, long-pending differences with France were set at rest by a Convention signed July 4, 1831; and a Treaty was concluded with the Ottoman Porte, under which, for nearty forty years, it was not doubted that the citizens of the United States within the dominions of the Porte enjoyed certain rights of exterritoriality.5 The doubts which have since arisen will be considered hereafter.

During the administration of President Tyler, Caleb Cushing as Plenipotentiary, negotiated a Treaty by which political relations were for the first time established between the United States and the Emperor of China. In this Treaty, the rights of exterritoriality were stated in unmistakable terms. "Citizens of the United States who may commit any crime in China shall be subject to be tried and punished only by the Consul or other public functionary of the United States thereto authorized, according to the law of the United States. All questions in regard to rights, whether of property or person, arising between citizens of the United States in China, shall be subject to the jurisdiction and regulated by the authorities of their own Government."8

The same administration also brought to a close the long-pending

1 Art. 1. 2S. Doc., Special Session, 1871, Executive, A. 48. 3 Central America, 1825. Art. 4; Denmark, 1826, Art. 3; Hanseatic Republic, 1827, Art. I; Prussia, 1828, Art, 3. Prussia, 1828, Art's 10 and 11. Ottoman Porte, 1830, Art. 4. 6 China, 1844. Art21. Art. 25.