By the general usage of nations, independent of treaty stipulations, the property of an enemy is liable to capture in the vessel of a friend. It is not possible to justify this rule upon any sound principle of the law of nature; for, by that law, the belligerent party has no right to pursue or attack his enemy without the jurisdiction of either of them. The high seas are a general jurisdiction common to all, qualified by a special jurisdiction of each nation over its own vessels. As the theatre of general and common jurisdiction, the vessels of one nation and their commanders have no right to exercise over those of another any act of authority whatsoever. This is universally admitted in time of peace. War gives the belligerent a right to pursue his enemy within the jurisdiction common to both; but not into the special jurisdiction of the neutral party. If the belligerent has a right to take the property of his enemy on the seas, the neutral has a right to carry and protect the property of his friend on the same

War gives the belligerent no natural right to take the property of his enemy from the vessel of his friend. But as the belligerent is armed, and the neutral, as such, is defenceless, it has grown into usage that the belligerent should take the property of his enemy; paying the neutral his freight, and submitting the question of facts to the tribunals of the belligerent party. It is evident, however, that this usage has no foundation in natural right, but has arisen merely from force, used by the belligerent, and which the neutral in the origin did not resist, because he had not the power. But it is a usage harsh and cruel in its opera

tion, and unjust in its nature: and it never fails, in time of maritime war, to produce irritation and animosity between the belligerent and the neutral. So universally has this been found to be its consequence, that all the maritime nations of modern Europe have shown their sense of it, by stipulating in treaties the contrary principle, namely, that the property of an enemy shall be protected in the vessel of a friend. Great Britain herself, the most unwilling to admit this principle, because the most enabled to use the force upon which the usage is founded, has recognized the superior justice and expediency of the other principle, by stipulating it at distant intervals of time, in two treaties with France; the treaty of Utrecht, and the treaty of commerce, of 1786. In the seven years' war, the king of Prussia resisted the capture, by British vessels, of the property of their enemies, in the vessels of his subjects, then neutrals, and made reprisals upon British property for such captures. The question was then ultimately settled by a compromise, under which the British government paid a large sum of money for indemnity to the Prussian subjects who had suffered by those captures. The armed neutrality of the American war, is a memorable example of the testimony by all the civilized nations of the world, to the principle, that the protection of all property, excepting contraband of war, on board of neutral vessels, by neutral force, is of natural right-and of this principle there can be no question. If, however, a belligerent power, founded upon the usage which has superseded the natural right, practices the seizure and condemna

tion of enemy's property found in the vessel of a friend, it remains for the neutral to decide, whether he will acquiesce in the usage, or whether he will maintain his natural right by force. No neutral nation is bound to submit to the usage for it has none of the properties which can give to any usage the sanction of obligatory law. It is not reasonable. It is not conformable to the law of nature. It is not uninterrupted. But reduced to the option of maintaining its right by force, or of acquiescing in the disturbance of it which has been usual, the neutral nation may yield at one time to the usage, with out sacrificing her right to vindicate by force the security of her flag at another. And the belligerent nation, although disposed to admit the right of neutrals to protect the property of her enemy upon the seas, may yet justly refuse the benefit of this principle, unless admitted also by the enemy, for the protection of her property, by the same neutral flag. Thus stands the state of this question upon the foundations of natural, voluntary, and customary law. How stands it between us and the republic of Colombia, on the ground of conventional law? By a treaty between the United States and Spain, concluded at a time when Colombia was a part of the Spanish dominions, and so far as the Spanish laws would admit, enjoyed the benefit of its stipulations, the principle that free ships make free goods, was expressly recognized and established. Is it asserted that by her declaration of independence, Colombia has been entirely released from all the obligations by which, as a part of the Spanish na

tion, she was bound to other nations? This principle is not tenable. To all the engagements of Spain with other nations, affecting their rights and interests, Colombia, so far as she was affected by them, remains bound in honor and in justice. The stipulation now referred to is of that character, and the United States, besides the natural right of protecting by force, in their vessels on the seas, the property of their friends, though enemies of the republic of Colombia, have the additional claim to the benefit of the principle, by an express compact with Spain, made when Colombia was a Spanish country. Again, by the late treaty of 22d February, 1819, between the United States and Spain, it is agreed, that the 15th article of the treaty of 1795, in which it is stipulated that the flag shall cover the property, shall be so understood with respect to those powers, who recognize the principle: but, if either of the two contracting parties shall be at war with a third party, and the other neutral, the flag of the neutral shall cover the property of enemies whose governments acknowledge the principle, and not of others.

This treaty having been concluded after the territories, now composing the republic of Colombia, had ceased to acknowledge the authority of Spain, they are not parties to it, but their rights and duties in relation to the subject matter remain as they had existed before it was made. Nor will she be affected by it at all, if she continues to acknowledge in her new national character, and with reference to the United States, the principle that free ships make

free goods, which was the conventional law between them while Colombia was a part of Spain.

You will urge all these considerations upon the Colombian minister of foreign affairs, to obtain restitution of the cargo of the Caravan, or indemnity for it. The claim rests upon foundations so solid, that it is earnestly hoped your representations in its favor will be successful; and in the negotiation of the treaty you will press, in like manner, for the insertion of an article of the same purport as that of our last treaty with Spain above recited. This principle can with safety be recognized only to that extent; and to that extent the United States would willingly assent to it with every other nation. It is a principle favorable to the rights of peace, and of a pacific spirit and tendency. It IS recommended by every humane and liberal consideration, as a rule of universal application. But the nation which would enjoy the benefit of it, as a neutral, or as a passive belligerent, resorting to the neutral flag, must also recognize it as an active belligerent, and suffer the property of her enemy to be conveyed safely by the same flag which safely conveys hers; otherwise the liberal principle of itself is turned to the advantage of the belligerent which rejects it, and the mild spirit of peace is made subservient to the unfeeling rapacity of war.

Our intercourse with the republic of Colombia, and with the territories of which it is composed, is of recent origin, formed while their own condition was altogether revolutionary, and continually changing its aspect. Our informa

tion concerning them is imperfect, and among the most important objects of your mission will be that of adding to its stores; of exploring the untrodden ground, and of collecting and transmitting to us the knowledge by which the friendly relations between the two countries may be extended and harmonized to promote the wel fare of both, with due regard to the peace and good will of the whole family of civilized man. It is highly important that the first foundations of the permanent future intercourse between the two countries should be laid in principles, benevolent and liberal in themselves, congenial to the spirit of our institutions, and consistent with the duties of universal philanthropy.

In all your consultations with the government to which you will be accredited, bearing upon its political relations with this union, your unvarying standard will be the spirit of independence and of freedom, as equality of rights and favors will be that of its commercial relations. The emancipation of the South American continent opens to the whole race of man prospects of futurity, in which this union will be called, in the discharge of its duties to itself and to unnumbered ages of posterity, to take a conspicuous and leading part. It involves all that is precious in hope, and all that is desirable in existence, to the countless millions of our fellow creatures, which, in the progressive revolution of time, this hemisphere is destined to rear and to maintain.

That the fabric of our social connections with our southern neighbours may rise, in the lapse of years, with a grandeur and har

mony of proportion corresponding with the magnificence of the means, placed by Providence in our power, and in that of our descendants, its foundations must be laid in principles of politics and morals, new and distasteful to the thrones and dominations of the elder world; but co-extensive with the surface of the globe, and lasting as the changes of time.

MR. CLAY to MR. MIDDLETON,

dated 10th May, 1825.

Sir-I am directed by the president to instruct you to endeavor to engage the Russian government to contribute its best exertions towards terminating the existing contest between Spain and her colonies.

Among the interests which, at this period, should most command the serious attention of the nations of the old and new world, no one is believed to have a claim so paramount as that of the present

war.

It has existed, in greater or less extent, seventeen years. Its earlier stages were marked by the most shocking excesses, and, throughout, it has been attended by an almost incalculable waste of blood and treasure. During its continuance, whole generations have passed away, without living to see its close, whilst others have succeeded them, growing up from infancy to majority, without ever tasting the blessings of peace. The conclusion of that war, whatever and whenever it may be, must have a great effect upon Europe and America. Russia is so situated as that, whilst she will be less directly affected than other parts of Christendom, her weight and her councils must have a controlling influence on its useless protraction

or its happy termination. If this peculiar attitude secures her impartiality, it draws to it great responsibility in the decision which she may feel it proper to make. The predominance of the power of the emperor is every where felt. Europe, America, and Asia, all own it. It is with a perfect knowledge of its vast extent and the profoundest respect for the wisdom and the justice of the august personage who wields it, that his enlightened and humane councils are now invoked.

In considering that war, as in considering all others, we should look back upon the past, deliberately survey its present condition, and endeavor, if possible, to catch a view of what is to come. With respect to the first branch of the subject, it is, perhaps, of the least practical importance. No statesman can have contemplated the colonial relations of Europe and continental America, without foreseeing that the time must come when they would cease. That time might have been retarded or accelerated, but come it must, in the great march of human events. An attempt of the British parliament to tax, without their consent, the former British colonies, now these United States, produced the war of our revolution, and led to the establishment of that independence and freedom which we now so justly prize. Moderation and forbearance, on the part of Great Britain, might have postponed, but could not have prevented our ultimate separation. The attempt of Bonaparte to subvert the ancient dynasty of Spain, and to place on its throne a member of his own family, no doubt hastened the independence of the Spanish colonies.

If he had not been urged by his ambition to the conquest of the peninsula, those colonies, for a long time to come, might have continued quietly to submit to the parental sway. But they must have inevitably thrown it off, sooner or later. We may imagine that a vast continent, uninhabited, or thinly peopled by a savage and untutored race, may be governed by a remote country, blessed with the lights and possessed of the power of civilization; but it is absurd to suppose that this same continent, in extent twenty times greater than that of the parent country, and doubling it in a population equally civilized, should not be able, when it chooses to make the effort, to cast off the distant authority. When the epoch of separation between a parent state and its colony, from whatever cause, arrives, the struggle for self-government on the one hand, and for the preservation of power on the other, produces mutual exasperation, and leads to a most embittered and ferocious war. It is then that it becomes the duty of third powers to interpose their humane offices, and calm the passions, and enlighten the councils of the parties. And the necessity of their efforts is greatest with the parent country, whose pride and whose wealth and power, swelled by the colonial contributions, create the most repugnance to an acquiescence in a severance which has been ordained by Providence.

In the war which has so long been raging between Spain and her colonies, the United States have taken no part either to produce or sustain it. They have been inactive and neutral spectators of the passing scenes. Their

frankness forbids, however, that they should say that they have beheld those scenes with feelings of indifference. They have, on the contrary, anxiously desired, that other parts of this continent should acquire and enjoy that independence with which, by the valor and the patriotism of the founders of their liberty, they have been, under the smiles of heaven, so greatly blessed.

But, in the indulgence of this sympathetic feeling, they have not, for one moment, been unmindful of the duties of that neutrality which they had deliberately announced. And the best proof of the fidelity with which they have strictly fulfilled its obligations, is furnished in the fact, that during the progress of the war, they have been unjustly accused, by both parties, of violating their declared neutrality. But it is now of little consequence to retrace the causes remote or proximate, of the revolt of the Spanish colonies. The great and much more important consideration which will, no doubt, attract the attention of his imperial majesty, is the present state of the contest. The principles which produced the war, and those which may be incorporated in the institutions of the new states, may divide the opinions of men. Principles, unhappily, are too often the subject of controversy. But notorious facts are incontestible. They speak a language which silences all speculation, and should determine the judgment and the conduct of states, whatever may be the school in which their rulers are brought up or practised, and whatever the social forms which they would desire to see established. And it is to the voice of such facts that Eu