CORRESPONDENCE

WITH

THE SECRETARY OF STATE, MR. MARCY,

(UNDER AN OFFICIAL CALL,)

SETTING FORTH THE CONSTRUCTION PLACED UPON THE ARTICLE IN RELA TION TO THE NEWFOUNDLAND FISHERIES IN THE CONVENTION AT LONDON OF 1818 BY THE NEGOTIATORS OF THAT TREATY.

WITH AN EXPLANATORY LETTER

FROM THE AUTHOR TO HIS EXECUTORS.

19

EXPLANATORY LETTER.

TO MY EXECUTORS:

Having requested you in my will to publish a letter I wrote in July, 1853, to the Secretary of State, then Mr. Marcy, in answer to an official application from him for my views on the construction of the Fishery Article in the Convention with Great Britain of 1818, it seems proper I should give the reasons for this request.

I was the surviving negotiator of that Convention, all others officially sharing in it directly or otherwise, namely, President Adams, (the younger,) Mr. Gallatin, President Monroe and President Madison, having passed away. Hence the call upon me. It was made while negotiations were going on between the United States and Great Britain to arrange this and other matters of international concern. Great Britain, it may be inferred, expected equivalents if yielding anything to us on this Fishery Question. It was the most important and pressing of any then pending. How it ever became a question, and when, I have endeavored to show; but, once raised by Great Britain, she adhered to it,

to the extent of instructing her ships of war to order our fishing vessels away, if found on what she claimed as exclusively her fishing grounds. Lord Elgin, then Governor-General of the British Provinces north of us, was the British negotiator, and the Secretary of State, ours. The negotiations dragged heavily for some time, and, out of doors, were thought to have been on the brink of a fruitless termination. Finally, the "Reciprocity Treaty," for regulating our trade and fishing concerns with the Canadas and other British Provinces north of us, was concluded and signed at Washington on the fifth of June, 1854.

If asked, did not this Treaty put the question at rest? I answer that it did, for the time being. But the subject is open to other views. A future day may witness the revival of the question. We thought it at rest under the old Revolutionary Treaty of 1783; but it returned upon us after the war of 1812. That war over, we again thought it at rest forever, under the Convention of 1818; but again it came back upon us. It would be unwise to consider the Reciprocity Treaty perpetual, whatever its presumed or real merits. When it does come to an end, this question may be upon our hands once more. The power of England is not on the decline, by any evidences yet before us, but, on the contrary, increases; and her adherence in the future, as in the past, to the policy which

tends to foster her commercial interests and maritime strength, may naturally be inferred. It would hence seem no more than prudent that both countries, ours especially, should be in possession of all the lights still attainable, on the true nature of this Fishery Question; which, altogether, is a remarkable one in our diplomatic history.

For more than twenty years the Convention of 1818 was in full operation in the sense in which our Government understood the article relating to the Fisheries. After this long acquiescence, Great Britain applied a new and different rule for the operation of the article. Whether she had good grounds for this change in its construction, is the essential inquiry. High names, in the Senate and elsewhere, have so well defended our construction, that it might seem unnecessary for me to bring before the public the views presented in this letter to the Secretary of State, were they not derived from facts intrinsic to the negotiation itself. In directing its publication by my executors, 1 aim at rendering justice to revered names in our history, and whose humble associate I was in this portion of our public affairs. I aim at showing that this solemn international compact, made under their instructions, and receiving their sanction, did not give up American fishing rights of long existence and great magnitude, but, on the contrary, secured them with the greatest care. In here vindicating