claims of the citizens of the United States against France, as also for the like claims of French subjects against the United States, with such persons as may have a like authority from his most Christian majesty. As minister of the United States, I am authorized to discuss the question respecting the construction of the eighth aricle of the Louisiana treaty, and to give and to receive explanations on that subject. But the negotiation on that point having been transferred to Washington, no special powers, in that respect, have been transmitted to me. I had understood, in the course of the conference I had the honour to have with your excellency on the 23d of September, and had accordingly written to my government, that it was not intended to insist that that subject should be blended with that of private claims. It is indeed obvious that it would be utterly unjust to make the admission of these to depend on the result of a negotiation on a subject with which they have no connexion whatever, and the difficulties respecting which are of a date posterior to that of the claims.

"All the representations which his majesty's government has made to that of the United States, whether on private or on public subjects, have uniformly been taken into consideration, and received that attention to which they were so justly entitled. In no instance has the government of the United States declined to open a discussion on any subject thus offered to their consideration by France, or made it a preliminary condition that the discussion should also embrace some other subject on which they might happen to take a greater interest. The question concerning the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty has, in particular, been the subject of a voluminous

A a

correspondence; in the course of which, arguments, in support of the construction insisted on by each party respectively, were made known to the other. I have, in the mean while, for six years, made unceasing applications to his majesty's government for the settlement of claims to a vast amount, affecting the interests of numerous individuals, and arising from flagrant violations of the law of nations and of the rights of the United States, without having ever been able to obtain, to this day, satisfaction in a single instance, or even that the subject should be taken into consideration and discussed. After so many vexatious delays, for which different causes have, at different times, been assigned, it cannot now be intended again to postpone the investigation of that subject, by insisting that it shall be treated in connexion with one foreign to it, and which has already been discussed. The United States have, at least, the right to ask that their demands should also be examined and discussed; and I trust that, since I am authorized to treat, as well concerning the claims of French subjects against the United States, as respecting those of American citizens against France, a distinct negotiation to that effect will be opened without any further delay."

The reply of Mr. de Villele to this letter, continuing to insist that all the points of disagreement should be embraced in one negotiation, Mr. Gallatin had no alternative left but that of referring the whole affair to his government, which was accordingly done.

Mr. Gallatin, on his departure from Paris, left Mr. Sheldon in charge of the affairs of the United States, who, having received instructions to that effect, addressed a note to the Viscount Chateaubriand,

then his majesty's minister of foreign affairs, insisting on entering into a discussion of the American claims without connecting it with the question under the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, which note remained unanswered.

On the 28th of April, 1824, and soon after my arrival in France, I presented to the same minister a note to the same effect with the one presented by Mr. Sheldon, and on the 8th day of May, received his answer, in which he insists on connecting, in a single negotiation, all the points of difference between the two nations. Having communica. ted this answer to my government, it thought fit, after the accession of his present majesty to the throne, and your excellency's appointment to the office of minister of foreign affairs, to instruct me to make ano. ther effort to obtain a hearing of our claims, unconnected with the subject of the eighth article; and, accordingly, in conformity with my instructions, I addressed a note to your excellency to that effect, dated the 22d of October, 1824.

I shall not fatigue your excellency by reverting to the delays which interposed themselves between the date of this note and its answer, but shall content myself with expressing my regret that this answer adhered to the determination of your predecessor, and contained a refusal to discuss the claims otherwise than in connexion with all the other points of disagreement beween the two governments.

I have thus presented your ex. cellency with a brief but faithful review, derived from official correspondence, of the course of conduct pursued by France in relation to the claims of our citizens for spoliations on their property, amounting to many millions of dollars, and

founded on wrongs of the most aggravated character.

I shall forbear from repeating the arguments which have been urged at various times in support of those claims. They have never been answered by the government of France, and are believed to be unanswerable. Their justice has not yet been denied, nor in any way controverted, unless the letter of your excellency of the 11th of November, 1825, upon which I shall hereafter remark, shall be considered as intended for that purpose. The justice of a very large portion of them has been expressly acknow. ledged by more than one of his majesty's ministers of foreign affairs. An offer was made more than ten years ago by the Duke de Richelieu of indemnity for vessels burnt at sea, and for those of which the proceeds had only been sequestered and deposited in the caisse d'amortissement; which promise he expressed his intention to reduce to writing, but afterwards declined to do; stating, at the same time, that he was not willing to reject the claims of our citizens definitively, but that they could not be admitted at that time. He afterwards stated that he wished it to be clearly understood that a postponement did not amount to a rejection. Nearly six years ago the Viscount de Montmorency stated to Mr. Gallatin that he had read the papers relative to the Antwerp sequestrations, and that he had been impressed with a sense of the justice of the claim. On a subsequent occasion, the 18th May, 1822, a prospect, unfortunately not afterwards realized, was presented of a satisfactory arrangement by the payment of a stipulated sum, in full discharge of the demands of the United States for spoliations, to be distributed by the American go.

vernment, or by the reference of the whole case to a joint commission.

The causes which have hitherto delayed or obstructed the fulfilment of the well-founded expectations of the government of the United States, are far from being satisfactory. When these claims were first presented by Mr. Gallatin in 1816, and for some time afterwards, the embarrassed state of France was assigned as a motive for their postponement until a more auspicious period. This period arrives, when France is again rich, prosperous, and powerful, and her finances flourishing. It is then intimated by France that our claims might have been more favourably received had they been pressed forward at an earlier day. We have unfortunately, it would seem, always been too soon or too late.

The commercial difficulties which afterwards arose between the United States and France, and which originated with the latter, were made a cause for the further postponement of the American claims until those difficulties should be adjusted. These were happily removed by the convention concluded at Washington in June, 1822. The United States had then a right confidently to expect the long deferred indemnity. In this they were disappointed by the interposition, on the part of France, of a claim under the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, which, I am sorry to say, ap. pears to my government in the light only of another mode of procrastinating the adjustment of its claims. The claim of France under the Louisiana treaty has already been fully examined and elaborately discussed by the two governments: every argument has been exhaust ed, the most respectful and patient attention has been given to the pretensions of France, and the result

has been full conviction, on the part of my government, that those pretensions rest on no solid foundation. Even on the supposition that France entertains the opposite conviction, it is not easy to perceive how she can derive from it any just reason to withhold satisfaction of our claims. The two subjects are incongruous and unconnected. The one rests upon a contract, in the intrepretation of which the parties may sincerely differ; the other arises out of wrongs committed in notorious violation of the law of nations, the character of which admits of no difference of opinion. The one is national, the other individual. Supposing the respective claims of the two nations to be simi. lar, the priority of injury gives to the United States a right to prior redress. Nor can any adequate motive be perceived for withholding that redress from the consideration of settling all matters of difference.

The propriety of removing, if practicable, all causes of misunderstanding, is readily admitted; but if that be not attainable, it does not follow that none should be removed; and, especially, it does not follow that those should not be obviated which are attended with a deep sense of the injuries from which they have originated.

It may be true, as your excellency has alleged, that his majesty, on ascending the throne of his ancestors, could not take, nor has taker, the engagement to satisfy all the charges imposed on him as indemnity for the depredations committed by the usurping government, and yet the obligation of France to redress the injuries suffered by the citizens of the United States may be perfect. I do not consider it necessary to discuss the question of the usurpation which is presented in your excellency's letter. It is suf

cient for the United States that those wrongs and depredations proceed. ed from the actual government of France for the time being, and that the responsibility of France to make reparation for wrongs committed under the authority of any form of government which she may have established, or to which she may have submitted, from time to time, cannot be reasonably contested. The king of France, on ascending the throne of his ancestors, assumed the government with all the duties, rights and obligations, which appertained to the French nation, and, it is believed, cannot justly claim absolution from any of those obligations or duties. The com. plaint of my government is precisely that his majesty's government has not taken upon itself the engagement to make that indemnity to which American citizens are entitled in consequence of the wrongful acts committed under previous French governments. That engagement might have been voluntarily assumed by his majesty's govern. ment from a spontaneous sense of justice, and the claims of American citizens liquidated without the interposition of the government of the United States. It it because that has not been done, that the interposition of the United States became necessary, and has been constantly made during the last twelve years. The government of the United States is always ready to acknow. ledge any proofs of justice or benevolence which may be exhibited by other nations towards its citizens. It cannot, however, entirely concur with your excellency in estimating as among the number any consent which France has hitherto given to examine the claims of American citizens, connected as that consent has been with inadmis

sible conditions. Nor can my go. vernment admit the propriety of associating, in the same negotiation, the disputed demand under the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty with incontestible claims of American citizens, a large portion of which claims, as I have already had the honour to show, so far from being questioned, has been admitted by France to be just.

The president of the United States has seen, with surprise and regret, the adherence of France to the principle of such an unnatural connexion. But whilst my government must constantly protest against it, and reiterate its strong conviction that the claim of France under the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty has no just foundation, I have been instructed, with a view of affording a signal proof of the equitable and conciliatory disposition of the United States, to propose to you, as a basis for the settlement of the question arising under that article, that it be submitted to arbitration. I have now the honour of making to you, sir, distinctly, that proposal, and, should that basis be agreed to by his majesty's government, I am authorized, and shall be ready, in concert with your excellency, to proceed to agree upon and state the precise question to be submitted, and to arrange and prepare whatever may be necessary to carry the arbitration into effect. I sincerely hope that this proposal may be accepted in the same friendly and conciliatory spirit in which it is made, and that it may remove the great obstacle which has hitherto opposed itself to the adjustment of all the existing subjects of dispute between the two governments. Whatever may be your excellency's decision upon this proposal, I hope I shall be favoured with an

answer at as early a day as your convenience will permit, and I avail myself with pleasure of this occasion to renew to your excellency

the assurances of the high consideration with which I have the honour to be, &c. JAMES BROWN.

No. 80.

SIR,

Paris, 27th February, 1828.

The Baron de Damas, late minister of foreign affairs, not having returned any answer to the let ter which I addressed to him on the 19th of December last, I resolved to resume the subject with his successor, as soon as I could ascertain that the new ministry had found, in the disposition of the two chambers, some security for their continuance in office. The best view which I have been able to take of the temper and composition of the chambers, having satisfied me that no immediate changes would probably be made, at least none in the department of foreign affairs, I requested and obtained an interview with the Count de la Ferronnays, at which, after presenting him with a brief outline of the negotiation for indemnity, and the manner in which it had been unexpectedly arrested by the interposition, on the part of France, of her claim under the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, expressed my earnest wish that he would give me his answer to the proposal which I had made to submit the question under that article to arbitration. I told him that the president had always considered the delay occasioned by the claim of France, under that article, as a grievous hardship to such of our citizens as had been unjustly deprived of their property by acts of the French authorities, and there.

fore felt the most earnest solicitude to remove out of the way every pretext for the further postpone. ment of the adjustment of their claims. I observed that it was with this view, and also in order to afford France a striking proof of his conciliatory disposition, that he had instructed me to propose the submission of that question to arbitration. I added, that I could perceive no reasonable objection which France could urge againt the mode proposed, which seemed to be the only one left for deciding a question upon which, after the most elaborate discussions, and perhaps with an equally sincere desire of coming to a friendly understanding, the two governments had not been able to agree. I concluded by repeating, in the most earnest manner, my hope that I might be favoured with an early and definitive answer to the proposal contained in my letter.

In reply to my observations, Count de la Ferronnays remarked, that circumstances which he presumed were known to me, (alluding, as I believe, to his long absence from France as ambassador at the court of St Petersburg, and his recent appointment to the department of foreign affairs,) together with the urgency of business arising out of the present state of affairs, had hitherto prevented him from devoting his attention to the subject of our nego. tiation; that the mode I had proposed of deciding the question under