Sen. and H. of R.] Annual Treasury Report. 19th CONGRESS, 1st SESSION. Government, has the exportation of American manufac-rising up a new class of capitalists, rivalling, in the extent tures reached an amount at all approaching to that of and usefulness of their operations, and in the amount of 1825, This is known from official documents as far back their gains, the wealthiest of our merchants; spreading too as 1803, and no doubt can be entertained of its being true by the education and habits for which their pursuits when for the remainder of the period. This fact, in conjunction | largely conducted make a call, useful knowledge and sciwith the increasing consumption of these manufactures at ence wherever those pursuits concentre. By a flourishing home, and not less of their improving quality, gives grati-state of manufactures, we shall see the gains of the mer fying assurance of the progress of this most important chant augmented even in bis trade of imports, since, for branch of the National Industry. It may be considered as every foreign fabric excluded from consumption by the marking the commencement of an epoch in the national ultimate use of the rival fabric at home, other fabrics will resources, since an intimate connexion is believed to exist find their way to us, consumption having no limits but the between the full encouragement and success of domestic ability to buy, and this ability invariably increasing as manufactures, and the wealth, the power, and the happi-home manufactures assume variety and attain perfection. ness of the country. The United States, would, it is It is then that they create and diffuse wealth by what is thought, overlook what is due to the essential interests of the only true foundation of it in a nation; the universal, their agriculture, which can never reach the full point of subdivided, and successful industry of the people. It is prosperity, but under the constant and various demand then that they make a call for an abundant circulating me. of the home market; of their foreign commerce, which dium, by quickening the operations of purchase and sale. can never expand to its full limit of activity, or reap its It is then that they attract the precious metals to a counfull measure of riches, but with the aids of an active home try, and, beyond any other power of retention, keep them trade, and of an export trade enhanced in its value by be- there. By numerous manufactures, we shall see agricul ing diversified in its objects; of the exuberance of their ture, the first pillar in the state, stand firm; for when they soil, yielding the best materials for so many of the fabrics shall have raised up new capitalists, who so sure to main which conduce to the wants, the comforts, and the refine- tain profitable dealing with them as the owner of the soil' ments of the social state; of the industry, the enterprize, For the treasures that cover its surface, and that lie bethe frugality of their people; of the unrivalled equality of neath it, he is then sure to find a market both regular and their laws, which, interdicting exclusive rights and mono- growing, whatever the political or mercantile vicissitudes polies, invites the most energetic exertions of every indi- at a distance; and as sure to buy at cheap rates the fabrics vidual in the field of competition; and, finally, of the ad- that he wants; cheapness being the necessary consequence vantages flowing from the absence of pecuniary exactions of full competition among a powerful class of artizans at by the hand of Government, upon the internal products home. By numerous manufactures, in fine, we shall sce and labor of the country- they do not vigorously up-reared up in the state that additional pillar, which, stand hold the manufactures of the country, now for the first ing in the middle, is indispensable to the stability of the time appearing to be on the eve of striking root. It is a other two; for the state must be in a false position, lying commencement that deserves every seasonable improve- perpetually at the mercy of extrinsic events, when reposment. The territorial size and fertility of a country de-ing only upon foreign commerce and agriculture. The pend upon nature or upon accident. Both the one and great intermediate interest, strengthening and upholding the other may exist upon the largest scale, but in vain, if a both the others, is manufactures. When to the complete provident government do not second these gifts; whilst establishment of these, the internal improvement of the nations destitute of them, and struggling against positive country shall have been superadded, the farmer of the obstacles of nature, are seen to arrive, through the wis- United States cannot but perceive that the measure of dom of their policy, at the heights of prosperity and re- his prosperity is made potentially full. Discouraging disnown. To give perfection to the industry of a country rich tances between himself and his customers exist no longer. in the gifts of nature, and blessed in the beneficence of its Through the wisdom of art the obstacles of nature disap. Government; to draw out its obvious resources, and seek pear. He sees combined with the advantages of a country. constantly for new ones, ever ready to unfold themselves of almost boundless extent and capacity of production, to diligent inquiry, urged on by adequate motives; to the facilities of a quick intercourse, which compensate to augment the number and variety of occupations for its in-small countries the want of these advantages. He sees habitants; to hold out to every degree of labor and to time anticipated in the effective augmentation of our num every modification of skill, its appropriate object and in-bers, for, as with machinery in manufactures, so, with ca. ducement-these rank amongst the highest ends of legis-nals and good highways, they change the relative weaklation. To organize the whole labor of a country, to en-ness of thin and scattered, into the activity and power of a tice into the widest ranges its mechanical and intellectual capabilities, instead of suffering them to slumber; to call forth, whenever bidden, latent ingenuity, giving to effort activity, and to emulation ardor; to create employment for the greatest amount of numbers, by adapting it to the di- In giving these opinions in favor of domestic manufacversified faculties, propensities, and situations of men, so tures, it is known that other opinions exist on this subject, that every particle of ability, every shade of genius, may claiming the support of distinguished names both at home come into requisition, is, in other words, to lift up the and abroad. For these opinions, as they have from time to condition of a country, to increase its fiscal energy, to mul- time been witnessed in the discussions of the legislative tiply the means and sources of its opulence, to imbue it hall at home, the utmost deference is felt. Nevertheless, with the elements of general, as well as lasting strength it is deemed proper to communicate with candor those and prosperity. It is in the destiny of nations that the high-contained in this report, deliberately weighed as they have est points of advancement are not to be arrived at, but been, and uttered as they also are, under the obligations through the complicated, yet harmonious action of these elements. That extensive and flourishing manufactures, with the train of useful arts allied to them, tend to propel nations in this onward course, is a maxim believed to be enforced by the best lights of experience, and to be of peculiar application to the United States under the present circumstances of their interior and external condition. By a flourishing state of manufactures, we shall see condensed population, thereby exemplifying the highest wisdom of legislation; the noblest works of government, guided by the intelligence and stimulated by the energy of freedom. of official duty. In the submission of plans for the improvement of the public revenue, none occur more likely to prove salutary than those that look to the fostering of manufactures, under the truth that, in the multiplied productions of nature and art in a country, the result of industry and skill every where diffused, lie the best and only foundations of finance. When the people of a country are universally and profitably employed, the aggregate 19th CONGRESS, 1st SESSION. Annual Treasury Report. [Sen, and H. of R. of individual becomes the surest measure of national pros- stronger reason should the United States act upon it. perity; and revenue for the public occasions will always Their remoteness from all the chief sources of supply of be at hand, under whatever forms the Government may manufactured articles, forms the additional motive; not to deem it most expedient and least burdensome to call it invoke that which might be drawn from the burdens, and forth. The facts of the world are on the side of these opi- even exclusions still in full existence in other countries, nions, it being incontestible, that nations which have against some of their primary productions. That a popu reached the most imposing heights of physical and intellec- lous and independent nation, a nation civilized since the tual power, are those in which manufactures have been moment of its existence, and whose institutions, by their the most numerous, and arrived at the greatest perfection. essential principle, tend to accelerate it in the career of It is more applicable to add. that this perfection, amongst intellectual and social, as already they have conferred upthe nations where it has been most conspicuous, has been on it political eminence, should have continued, as long achieved through the most comprehensive and vigorous as the United States have done, to derive from a distance, protection afforded to this kind of industry; a protection to be computed only by the space of Oceans, so many of persevered in throughout ages, and never given up whilst the fabrics which conduce to the necessary or tasteful acits objects remained unaccomplished. The speculative commodations of life, if not without precedent, has, pereconomists of Europe are in opposition to the experience haps, not before existed in the case of any other nation that surrounds them, and not less frequently to each upon the same extensive scale. Without adverting to the other, and to themselves, when they would hold up to contingencies which may diminish or cut of this supply any one nation the asserted benefits of an opposite sys- from remote hemispheres, the very deterioration to which tem. "France," says one of her most celebrated writers time, and more frequently casualty, expose no inconsiderof this class, (but who knows how to reconcile the enlight-able portion of these fabrics before the natural and inened ideas of free trade, with those first duties that every tended uses of them can be exhausted, and where the nation owes to itself,) "is, probably, indebted for the skill that made is too often alone competent to renovate "beauty of her silk and woollen manufactures, to the or repair, becomes, by so much, a dead loss to the capital "wise encouragement of that administration which ad- of the importer or consumer, and, consequently, to that "vanced to the manufacturers two thousand francs for of the nation. The amount of it would go far, it is believ"every loom at work." The same writer, (Say,) whilst ed, towards forming a fund for encouraging the equally describing the condition of some of the provinces of that perfect fabrication at home of most of the articles of forcountry, and which, as he says, wanted nothing but towns eign origin, consigned, by the cause alluded to, to premato bring them into high cultivation, adds, "that, hopeless, ture inutility or destruction. Besides the advantages of "indeed, would be their situation, were France to adopt manufactures for home use, the present moment is deem"the system which recommends the purchase of manu-ed to be peculiarly auspiciou, not to say urgent, for fos"factures from foreign countries, with the raw produce tering them, from the situation and circumstances of the "of domestic agriculture." France still adheres, in the rest of the world. An era has arrived, upon which after midst of her riches and power, to the practice on which ages are to look back as to a point in the commercial desthese sentiments are founded. Nor is the example of Bri- tinies of mankind. The colonial system is fast falling to tain, up to this very moment, less absolute, or less instruc- pieces: over immense regions it is totally gone, involving tive. The prohibitions, the bounties, the high duties, the the certainty of changes both in the channels and the obpenalties, by force of which, throughout a long tract of jects of trade, as vast as they will be various. The family time, the manufactures of that country have gained so of nations has been extended; new Continents, new much excellence, never, in anywise, abated, until by the Oceans, are opened to independent intercourse, to a just recent avowals of her statesmen, high in intelligence, as and equal participation in the benefits of which, the Unitauthority, British fabrics were not merely certain to con- ed States cannot but be alive. These benefits they can tinue the supply, immense as it is known to be, of the scarcely derive, to the full and proper extent, but by givhome demand, but to find their way, in a proportion far ing themselves to large fabrication of those works of art, greater that those from any other country, into all the for which their climate, their productions, and the skill markets of the world. The United States, with a combi- and capital of which their citizens are already in possesnation of natural and political advantages, as transcendent sion, especially qualify them. The course of their export in number as degree, have before them these and other trade, for the last two years, as stated in this report, is an examples; the lights of co-existent nations; the amplest de- encouraging omen of their ability and aptitude to enter monstrations of experience for building up their manufac- this new and great field of competition. Not to follow up tures; and by that vigilant legislative assistance, without such beginnings, by timely and judicious measures, might which they have never been known in any country to es- be to let opportunities pass not always to be recalled. tablish themselves, in large or durable pre-eminence. Nor Whilst nations, shut out by their limited territory from has this policy been found to interfere with an abundant agricultural products as the basis of foreign trade, have foreign commerce in the wealthiest and most industrious yet pushed the latter to its farthest limits, by manufactures nations. It has, on the contrary, carried its bounds still alone, as that basis, it is the favored lot of the United further, since every nation, by its habits and position, will States, to superadd to the extent and riches of their soil, always command superior facilities for excelling in cer- a state of social advancement and an amount of town pótain branches of labor and art, which it therefore chiefly pulation, already equal to the most extensive and varied cherishes, leaving to other nations the opportunity of ex- operations of manufacturing industry. Not to found estacelling in other branches, or of running the career of be- blishments by which this species of profitable industry neficial rivalry in the same; by which system the artificial may take life and spread over the land, would, it is beproductions of the world are augmented and improved, lieved, be to forget alike what is due to the best interests and the fields of traffic, through the increasing desires and of agriculture, on the one hand, and to the further enlargevarying tastes of mankind, as opulence and civilization make ment of our commercial power upon the other. new advances, more and more extended and enriched. If the nations of Europe, whose industry and interchanges move in circles geographically proximate to each other, have yet adopted this policy, or have fallen back in their prosperity by the fact of its absence; if those nations that have adopted it are still seen to keep to it, or have only swerved from it after its ends have been attained, by In expressing the convictions embraced in the foregoing remarks, it is not intended to close them by recommending any general revision of the tariff, as fixed by the act of Congress of the 22d May, 1824. But it is deemed proper, under cover of them, respectfully to submit the expediency of effectually increasing the existing duties upon all manufactures of cotton, of a fine quality. H. of R.] District Tonnage-Boundary on the Pacific. {19th CONGRESS, The facilities and inducements to the fabrication of cot- The registered tonnage, as corrected at this tons, of every description, in the United States, are so office, for the year 1824, is stated at great, that the most beneficial consequences may be anti-The enrolled and licensed tonnage is statcipated from the full establishment of this manufacture in ed at all its finer branches, in like manner as by the protection The fishing vessels at already afforded to cotton fabrics in the coarser branches, we have seen these latter established with advantages so manifold and decided. And, should we establish, completely, the former also, such is the quantity in which we produce the raw material of this prominent manufacture of modern times, and, what is still more important, such its quality, that there is no cause for apprehending that our immense exportations of it abroad will stop; on the contrary, it may be expected that they will go on progressively increasing. Concurrently with this recommendation for an augmentation of duties on all cotton manufactures, of fine quality, it is deemed advisable to submit also the expediency of lowering, to a small extent, the duties at present existing upon teas, upon coffee, and upon cocoa. 669,972 60 641,563 04 77,627 33 1,389,163 02 844,084 90 The tonnage on which duties were collected during the year 1824, amounted as follows: The registered tonnage employed in foreign The enrolled and licensed tonnage employ trade, paying duty on each voyage, ed in the coasting trade, paying an annual duty; also, registered tonnage employed in the coasting trade, paying duty on each entry, Fishing vessels the same, Duties were also paid on tonnage owned by These articles, especially the two former, are of such large consumption in the United States, as to take rank among the necessaries of life. They go to make up a part of the daily beverage of the poor as well as the rich, and should, therefore, not be pressed upon too heavily by the hand of taxation, in any form; the less as they trench upon no rival production at home. Their more enlarged consumption would tend to increase, in corresponding pro-Enrolled and licensed tonnage, also in the 606,893 25 81,533 09, 836 50 Total amount on which duties were collected 1,533,347 79 whale fishery, 33,165 70 180 08 Amounting to 38,345 78 portion, the demand for sugar, thereby fostering a valuable production of some of our own states. The more widely, also, the habit of their use can be extended, the greater, it is believed, would be the prospect of seeing lessened the consumption of ardent spirits, so baneful in their effects upon the industry, the health, and the morals, of I beg leave to subjoin a statement of the tonnage for the community. Under these views alone, regarding their the year 1824, compared with the amount thereof as exhiconnection with the public prosperity and individual hap-bited in the preceding annual statement for 1823, with piness, any temporary or partial loss to the revenue that notes in relation to the increase of the registered and enmight result from an adoption of this last recommenda- rolled tonnage, respectively, in the year 1824. By this tion, ought to be considered as compensated. It is not, statement it appears that the total amount of vessels built however, certain that such loss would result, from the in in the several districts of the United States, during the creased demand that might be expected to grow up for year 1824, was these articles, by a reduction of the present impositions Registered tonnage, Enrolled tonnage, upon them. As regards teas, it may be added, as an additional motive to the recommendation, that, under the present duties, there is reason to apprehend some falling off, ultimately, in our China trade, from the late laws and regulations of Britain, bearing upon this important article of merchandise. The interests of a valuable portion of our foreign trade, therefore, and of our shipping, appear to be at stake in fixing the duties upon teas of all kinds, at rates somewhat lower than as at present established. All which is respectfully submitted. RICHARD RUSH. 54,492 18 36.446 77 90.939 00 I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your most BOUNDARY ON THE PACIFIC OCEAN. DISTRICT TONNAGE OF THE UNITED STATES. To the House of Representatives of the United States: TREASURY DEPARTMENT, Jan. 5, 1826. SIR: I have the honor to transmit the Annual Statement of the District Tonnage of the United States, on the 31st of December, 1825, together with the explanatory letter of the Register of the Treasury. I have the honor to be, with great respect, your most obedient servant, WASHINGTON, 31st Jan. 1826. In compliance with a resolution of the House of Representatives, of the 18th instant, I transmit a report from the Secretary of State, with the Correspondence with the British Government, relating to the Boundary of the United States on the Pacific Ocean, desired by the Resolution. JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, 30th Jan. 1826. The Secretary of State, to whom was referred the resolution of the House of Representatives, of the 18th of January, 1826, requesting the President to communicate to that House all the correspondence between the GoSIR: I have the honor to transmit the Annual State-vernment of the United States and the Government of ment of the District Tonnage of the United States, on the 31st December, 1824, The Hon. the SPEAKER RICHARD RUSH. of the House of Representatives. TREASURY Department, Great Britain, respecting the boundary of that part of the 19th CONGRESS, 1st SESSION. Boundary on the Pacific. [H. of R. Pacific Ocean, and which has not already been communi-ropean Power who, prior to the discovery of the river, had cated, or so much thereof as may be compatible with the any pretensions to territorial rights on the Northwest public interest to disclose, has the honor to report to the Coast of America. President, as coming within the purview of the resolution, copies of i. A letter from Mr. Adams, late Secretary of State, to do. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, July 22d, 1823. SIR: Among the subjects of negotiation with Great Britain which are pressing upon the attention of this Government, is the present condition of the Northwest Coast of this Continent. This interest is connected, in a manner becoming from day to day more important, with our territorial rights; with the whole system of our intercourse with the Indian tribes; with the boundary relations between us and the British North American dominions; with the fur trade; the fisheries in the Pacific Ocean; the commerce with the Sandwich Islands and China; with our boundary upon Mexico; and, lastly, with our political standing and intercourse with the Russian Empire. 66 By the third article of the Convention between the United States and Great Britain, of 20th October, 1818, it is agreed that "any country that may be claimed by either party, on the Northwest Coast of America, Westward of "the Stoney Mountains, shall, together with its harbors, bays, and creeks, and the navigation of all rivers within the same, be free and open for the term of ten years "from the date of the signature of the Convention, to the "vessels, citizens, and subjects, of the two Powers: it "being well understood, that this agreement is not to be "construed to the prejudice of any claim which either of "the two high contracting parties may have to any part "of the said country; nor shall it be taken to affect the "claims of any other Power or State, to any part of the "said country: the only object of the high contracting parties, in that respect, being, to prevent disputes and "differences amongst themselves." 66 The waters of the Columbia river extend, by the Multnomal, to the 42d degree of latitude, where its source approaches within a few miles of those of Platte and Arkansas, and by Clark's river, to the 50th or 51st degree of latitude; thence descending Southward till its sources almost intersect those of the Missouri. To the territory thus watered, and immediately contiguous to the original possessions of the United States, as first bounded by the Mississippi, they consider their right to be now established by all the principles which have ever been applied to European settlements upon the American hemisphere. By the ukase of the Emperor Alexander, of 4 (16) September, 1821, an exclusive territorial right, on the Northwest Coast of America, is asserted as belonging to Russia, and as extending from the Northern extremity of the Continent to latitude 51, and the navigation and fishery of all other nations are interdicted by the same ukase, to the extent of 100 Italian miles from the coast. When Mr. Poletica, the late Russian Minister here, was called upon to set forth the grounds of right, conformable to the laws of nations, which authorized the issuing of this decree, he answered, in his letters of 28th February and 2d April, 1822, by alleging first discovery, occupancy, and uninterrupted possession. It appears, upon examination, that these claims have no foundation in fact. The right of discovery, on this Continent, claimed by Russia, is reduced to the probability that, in 1741, Captain Tchirikoff saw, from the sea, the mountain called St. Elias, in about the 59th degree of North latitude. The Spanish navigators, as early as 1582, had discovered as far North as 57° 30'. As to occupancy, Captain Cook, in 1779, had the express declaration of Mr. Ismaloff, the chief of the Russian settlement at Oonalaska, that they knew nothing of the Continent in America; and, in the Nootka Sound controversy between Spain and Great Britain, it is explicitly stated, in the Spanish documents, that Russia had disclaimed all pretension to interfere with the Spanish exclusive rights to beyond Prince William's Sound, lat. 61a. No evidence has been exhibited of any Russian settlement on this Continent South and East of Prince William's Sound, to this day, with the exception of that in California, made in 1816. It never has been admitted, by the various European nations which have formed settlements in this hemisphere, that the occupation of an island gave any claim whatever to territorial possessions on the Continent to which it was adjoining. The recognized principle has rather been the reverse; as, by the law of nature, islands must be rather considered as appendages to continents than continents to islands. The only color of claim alleged by Mr. Poletica, which has an appearance of plausibility, is that which he asserts as an authentic fact, "that, in 1789, the Spanish packet “St. Charles, commanded by Captain Haro, found, in the On the 6th of October, 1818, fourteen days before the signature of this Convention, the settlement at the mouth of Columbia river had been formally restored to the United States, by order of the British Government. (Message P. U. S. to H. R. 15th April, 1822, p. 13. Letter of Mr. Prevost to the Secretary of State, of 11th Nov. 1818.) By the treaty of amity, settlement, and limits, between" latitude 48 and 49, Russian settlements to the number the United States and Spain, of 22d February, 1819, the boundary line between them was fixed at the 42d degree of latitude, from the source of the Arkansas river to the South Sea. By which treaty the United States acquired all the rights of Spain North of that parallel. "of eight, consisting, in the whole, of twenty families, "and 462 individuals." But, more than twenty years since, Flurieu had shown, in his introduction to the voyage of Marchand, that, in this statement there was a mistake of at least ten degrees of latitude; and that, instead of 48 The right of the United States to the Columbia river, and 49, it should read 58 and 59. This is, probably, not and to the interior territory washed by its waters, rests the only mistake in the account. It rests altogether upon upon its discovery from the sea, and nomination, by a citi- the credit of two private letters; one written from St. zen of the United States; upon its exploration to the sea Blas, and the other from the city of Mexico, to Spain, by Captains Lewis and Clarke; upon the settlement of there communicated to a French consul in one of the SpaAstoria, made under the protection of the United States, nish ports, and by him to the French minister of marine. and thus restored to them in 1818; and upon the subse- They were written in October, 1788, and August, 1789. quent acquisition of all the rights of Spain, th only Eu-We have seen that, in 1790, Russia explicitly disclaimed interfering with the exclusive rights of Spain to beyond Prince William's Sound, in latitude 61: and Vancouver, in 1794, was informed by the Russians on the spot, that their most Eastern settlement there, was on Hinchinbrook Island, at Port Etches, which had been established in the course of the preceding summer, and that the adjacent continent was a sterile and uninhabited country. Until the Nootka Sound contest, Great Britain had never advanced any claim to territory upon the Northwest Coast of America, by right of occupation. Under the treaties of 1763, her territorial rights were bounded by the Mississippi. On the 22d July, 1793, Mackenzie reached the shores of the Pacific, by land, from Canada, in latitude 52° 21′ North, longitude 128° 2′ West of Greenwich. 19TH CONGRESS, 1ST SESSION. the United States and Great Britain should come to a mutual understanding with respect to their respective pretensions, as well as upon their joint views with reference to those of Russia. Copies of the instructions to Mr. Middleton are, therefore, herewith transmitted to you; and the President wishes you to confer freely with the British Government on the subject. The principles settled by the Nootka Sound convention of 28th October, 1790, were 1st. That the rights of fishing in the South Seas; of trading with the natives of the Northwest Coast of America; and of making settlements on the coast itself, for the purposes of that trade, North of the actual settlements of Spain, were common to all the European nations, and, of course, to the United States. 2d. That so far as the actual settlements of Spain had extended, she possessed the exclusive rights, territorial, and of navigation and fishery; extending to the distance of ten miles from the coasts so actually occupied. It is stated in the 52d number of the Quarterly Review, in the article upon Kotzebue's voyage, "that the whole country, from latitude 56° 30′ to the United States, in "latitude 48, or thereabouts, is now, and has long been, "in the actual possession of the British Northwest Com"pany"-that this company have a post on the borders 3d. That, on the coasts of South America, and the adjaof a river in latitude 54° 30′ North, longitude 125° West, cent islands, South of the parts already occupied by and that in latitude 55° 15' North, longitude 129° 44' Spain, no settlement should thereafter be made either by West, "by this time, (March, 1822,) the United Compa- British or Spanish subjects; but, on both sides, should be "ny of the Northwest and Hudson's Bay have, in all pro-retained the liberty of landing and of erecting temporary "bability, forined an establishment." buildings for the purposes of the fishery. These rights were, also, of course, enjoyed by the People of the Unit The exclusive rights of Spain to any part of the American Continents have ceased. That portion of the convention, therefore, which recognizes the exclusive colonial rights of Spain on these continents, though confirmed, as between Great Britain and Spain, by the first additional article to the treaty of the 5th of July, 1814, has been extinguished by the fact of the Independence of the South American nations and of Mexico. Those independent nations will possess the rights incident to that condition, and their territories will, of course, be subject to no exclusive right of navigation in their vicinity, or of access to them by any foreign nation. It is not imaginable that, in the present condition of the world, any European nation should entertain the projected States. of settling a colony on the Northwest Coast of America; that the United States should form establishments there, with views of absolute territorial right, and inland communication, is not only to be expected, but is pointed out by the finger of nature, and has been for years a subject of serious deliberation in Congress. A plan has, for several sessions, been before them, for establishing a Territorial Government on the borders of the Columbia river. It will, undoubtedly, be resumed at their next session, and even if then again postponed, there cannot be a doubt that, in the course of a very few years, it must be carried into effect. As yet, however, the only useful purpose to which the Northwest Coast of America has been, or can be A necessary consequence of this state of things will be, made subservient to the settlements of civilized men, are that the American Continents, henceforth, wil no longer the fisheries on its adjoining seas, and trade with the abo-be subject to colonization. Occupied by civilized, inderiginal inhabitants of the country. These have, hitherto, been enjoyed in common by the People of the United States, and by the British and Russian nations. The Spa mish, Portuguese, and French nations have, also, participated in them, hitherto, without other annoyance than that which resulted from the exclusive territorial claims of Spain, so long as they were insisted on by her. The United States and Great Britain have both protest-its own territories. ed against the Russian Imperial ukase, of 4 (16) September, 1821. At the proposal of the Russian Government, a full power and instructions are now transmitted to Mr. Middleton, for the adjustment, by amicable negotiation, of the conflicting claims of the parties on this subject. We have been informed by the Baron de Tuyll, that a similar authority has been given on the part of the British Government to Sir Charles Bagot. Previous to the restoration of the settlement at the mouth of Columbia river, in 1818, and again, upon the first introduction in Congress of the plan for constituting a Territorial Government there, some disposition was manifested by Sir Charles Bagot and Mr. Canning, to dispute the right of the United States to that establishment; and some vague intimation was given of British claims on the Northwest Coast. The restoration of the place, and the convention of 1818, were considered as a final disposal of Mr. Bagot's objections, and Mr. Canning declined committing to paper those which he had intimated in conver sation. pendent nations, they will be accessible to Europeans, and each other, on that footing alone; and the Pacific Ocean, in every part of it, will remain open to the navigation of all nations, in like manner with the Atlantic. Incidental to the condition of national independence and sovereignty, the rights of interior navigation of their rivers will belong to each of the American nations within The application of colonial principles of exclusion, therefore, cannot be admitted by the United States as lawful, upon any part of the Northwest Coast of America, or as belonging to any European nation. Their own settlements there, when organized as Territorial Governments, will be adapted to the freedom of their own institutions, and, as constituent parts of the Union, be subject to the principles and provisions of their Constitution. With The right of carrying on trade with the natives through out the Northwest Coast, they cannot renounce. the Russian settlements at Kodiack, or at New Archangel, they may fairly claim the advantage of a fur trade, having so long enjoyed it unmolested, and because it has been, and would continue to be, as advantageous, at least, to those settlements as to them. But they will not contest the right of Russia to prohibit the traffic, as strictly confined to the Russian settlement itself, and not extending to the original natives of the coast. If the British Northwest and Hudson's Bay Companies have any posts on the coast, as suggested in the article of The discussion of the Russian pretensions in the nego-the Quarterly Review above cited, the 3d article of the tiation now proposed, necessarily involves the interests convention of the 20th Oct. 1818, is applicable to them. of the three Powers, and renders it manifestly proper that | Mr. Middleton is authorized, by his instructions, to prc |