Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

perial government towards the United States, and enforces the obligation of the government of France to indemnify our citizens for the wrongs they sustained by those acts, whether committed under the sanction of the Berlin and Milan decrees, or by virtue of other orders and proceedings less formal and regular in their character. On these points,

however, it does not, I hear, meet with a thorough acquiescence on the part of all the members of the com mission.

I have the honour to be,
With great respect,

Your most ob't serv't,
W. C. RIVES.

To the Hon. M. Van Buren,
Secretary of State.

No. 64.

SIB,

Mr. Rives to Mr. Van Buren.

Paris, 10th March, 1831.

Having recently obtained a copy of the enclosed document, it has appeared to me to be of so much importance, particularly for the light it sheds on the real state of my negotiations with the late government at the period of its fall, that I have thought it my duty to communicate it to you. It is the report presented by the minister of foreign affairs to the king, in the month of October last, on the subject of our reclamations, and proposing the renewal of the negotiation with me. It was prepared by Baron Deffandis, the directeur of that division of the department of foreign affairs in which the United States are comprehended, and who, in the same quality, you will recollect, had the manage ment of the correspondence, and, in a great part, of the negotiations with me, under the ministry of Monsieur Polignac.

It will be seen from this document, that the opinion expressed by me in my despatch of the 29th July last, that I should have been able, in some short time, to have effected a settlement of this long pending and disagreeable subject with the late government, but for its sudden and unexpected overthrow, did not rest

on slight grounds. The report shows that the great obstacle of the Louisiana question, which had defeated all prior attempts at negotiation, had been successfully removed; that the government of the Bourbons had become convinced that the ground heretofore taken of irrespon sibility for the wrongs of the imperial government could not be maintained; and that they had, in fact, made up their minds, (without negativing the others,) to expressly ad mit five important classes of our reclamations, comprehending con demnations, (heretofore deemed altogether desperate,) as well as sequestrations.

To appreciate the true extent and importance of these admissions, it will be necessary to turn to the projet of a treaty communicated with my despatch No. 16, under date of February 25th, 1830, which is referred to by the report as classing our reclamations into nine gene. ral categories. The second article of the projet, which relates exclu. sively to condemnations, consists, as you will perceive, of six numbered subdivisions. In order to make out the nine categories of which the report speaks, it is to be presumed that they have also subdivided the 1st article, so as to make three ad

66

ditional categories of it, of which the first category would be sequestrations, where the property had not been definitively condemned by the council of prizes," the 2d, "ves. sels destroyed at sea," and the 3d, "supplies.'

The categories, therefore, which the late government had already determined to admit, were the 1st and 2d of the 1st article of the pro. jet, and the 5th of the 2d article, upon the examination made by the commission of liquidation of foreign claims; and the 3d of the 1st article, and the 4th of the 2d article, upon the supplemental examination made by the department of foreign affairs.

As to the vague and conjectural estimate which the report attempts, without the aid of sufficient data, to make of the amount embraced by some of the categories admitted, it is obviously incorrect. That, however, is altogether immaterial, as the respective categories being admitted on principle, they would, of course, carry whatever amount the principle could be shown to embrace; and it should be recollected that the object in view, with the late government, was not a transaction en bloc for a round sum, but a settlement of principles, according to which a mixed commission was to decide upon the claims presented, and to determine the amount to be paid. A correct analysis of the claims shows that the categories admitted by the late government embrace, under one head or another, almost the whole mass of reclamations. The 1st category of the 1st article of the projet alone, (the amount embraced by which the report supposes not to be considerable,) comprehends, in fact, more than one half of the whole amount of the claims,

as will be seen by reference to the classification of the claims contained in my original instructions, where the category in question is represented by part 1st of the 5th class.

With the extensive ground thus secured, and in the dispositions produced by the appeals I had successfully addressed to their commercial apprehensions, (the influence of which, together with that of other considerations employed by me, you will, doubtless, trace in many parts of the report, sometimes in the identical reproduction of the topics I had urged to them,) there is no reason to suppose that any questions which might have remained would have opposed an obstacle to a final adjustment.

The concluding part of the report expressly shows that the negotiation now pending with the actual government of France, reposes on the ground conquered from the last; and whatever new hopes may have been conceived by our citizens from the change of regime here, every day's observation convinces me the more that, if any thing shall be ultimately done towards the redress of their wrongs, it will be the result of the progress made under the late government.

I have the honour to be,
With great respect,

Your most ob't servant,
W. C. RIVES.

To the Hon. M. VAN BURen.
Secretary of State.

P. S. You will perceive that the recent change in the arrangement of the packets, which now leave Havre but twice instead of thrice a month, has occasioned a longer interval than usual between my despatches.

No. 67. Extract of a letter from Mr. Rives to Mr. Van Buren.

Paris, March 30, 1831.

SIR, Having been informed by the minister of foreign affairs that the commission were to make their report on Monday, the 21st instant, I addressed a note to him on the 23d, asking an interview, which took place, by his appointment, on the 26th. I soon found, however, from my conversation with him, that the report had not yet been made, and that he was not prepared to enter into any conference of an useful character on the subject of the reclamations.

I reminded him how many unexpected delays this question had already met with since the establishment of the present government; that, when his majesty came to the throne, an universal and confident expectation prevailed in the United States that justice would be immediately done to our reclamations; that nine months had now elapsed, and we were not so far advanced as under the late government; that the commission, which had been announced to me as a means of accelerating the business, had been an obstacle; that these disappointments could not but éxercise a very unfavourable influence upon the relations of the two countries, which were already, in fact, far from being satisfactory, and which it was no less the interest of France than of the United States to establish upon a different footing.

To these remarks he replied, that, in matters of a litigated character (contentieux,) it had been always the usage in France to form a commission for a preliminary examination of them; that the inves. tigations of the commisssion, in the

present instance, had been neces sarily long; that their report was probably now signed, and, as soon as it was presented to him, he would enter upon an examination of the subject himself; and that, “in the course of a month, it should be terminated."

Since my interview with the mi. nister, the report of the commis. sion, at least upon the most important of the questions submitted to them, has been made, and was put into his possesssion, I learn, on the 28th instant. It presents the opinions, I understand, of both the majority and minority of the commission, (as I mentioned to you in my last despatch, that I had heard it was proposed to do;) the majority consisting of four, including the president of the commission-the minority of only two.

From what I have been able to learn of these opinions, that of the majority is of a character calculated to excite much suprise. They undertake, 1 understand, to defend the general system of measures adopted by the imperial government, comprehending the Berlin and Milan decrees, as well as the Rambouil let and other special decrees, as being justified, on the principles of the law of nations, by the conduct of the British government on the one hand, and that of the American government on the other. Assuming the general legality of this system of measures, they come to the conclusion that no redress is due for cases in which there was a regular application of it; but that, in cases where it was abusively or irregu larly applied, indemnity may be demanded. The result of this view is, that they consider only three

categories of claims as admissible, to wit: vessels burnt at sea; cap. tures made after the first of November, 1810, the period fixed for the report of the decrees; and cases in which the decrees may have been applied restrospectively.

The minority of the commission, (who are understood to be and -,) considering this whole system of measures as violating the principles of the law of nations, as well as the provisions of the convention of 1801, until the period of its expiration, recognise our claim to indemnity in all cases where it was applied, whether regularly or irregularly, to a fair and bona fide commerce. Both branches of the commission have, I understand, indicated the sum which they supposed to be fairly demandable by the United States according to the principles assumed in their respective opinions; the majority between

10 and 15 millions of francs, the minority about 30 millions of francs.

They have made a distinct report on the Louisiana question, in which they all concur in affirming the correctness of the French construction of the eighth article of the treaty of cession, and express, at the same time, the opinion that very little advantage would accrue to France from the suggested reduction of the duties on wine. They have not yet made their report on the claims of French subjects against the United States, although it is expected to be made in a very few days.

The character of these proceedings will serve to show in what little favour our reclamations are with France, and the extent of the difficulties that remain to be overcome in the settlement of this troublesome question.

No. 69.

Mr. Rives to Mr. Van Buren.

Paris, April 14, 1831.

SIR, Count Sebastiani having promised, in the interview I had with him on the 26th ultimo, to give his early attention to the subject of our reclamations, I sought and obtained, on the 4th instant, another interview with him, in the hope of commencing, seriously, the work of negotiation. I found him, however, still unprepared to enter into any useful discussion. He had read, he said, the reports of the commission, in part only, and could not, therefore, express any precise views on the questions in dispute. He added, however, that he had gone far

enough in the examination to see that our claims were greatly exaggerated; and, on the question of the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty, he said the interpretation of it by the French government was so clear and incontestable, that he was much surprised that the American government had ever insisted on a different construction.

I replied that, in regard to the amount of our claims, however large it might appear to him to be, the fact was well known, and vouched by the public history of the times, that the commerce and property of American citizens had been subjected to the most enor

mous violations by the acts of the imperial government; that while, on the one hand, I could not undertake to say that every claim contained in the tables I had communicated to the commission was well founded or accurately stated, yet, on the other, I had every reason to believe that there were claims of considerable amount and indisputable justice, which those tables did not embrace; and that, as he had already expressed to me the desire of the French government to adjust the subject by a transaction, a desire which my government was will. ing to meet in a friendly and equi. table spirit, I waited some specific proposition from him to that end. With respect to the Louisiana question, I told him that the government of the United States, after the most mature and careful examination, was thoroughly convinced of the correctness of the interpretation for which it contended; that it was altogether useless to enter again into a discussion of it, as the arguments on both sides had been fully insist. ed on in the correspondence between Monsieur Polignac and myself, which I invited him to read; that we had never been able to see the propriety of connecting a litigated question of that character with the consideration of indemnities due to our citizens for violent and indisputable wrongs; and that the government of the United States relied on the candour and good faith of the present government of France, to put aside all ob. stacles derived from an extrinsic and irrelevant controversy, which the United States had, moreover, proposed to settle by the fair and usual mode of a reference to the decision of impartial and enlighten. ed arbiters.

In answer to these observations,

the minister gave me to understand that he could not make any specific offer, with a view to a transaction, till he had the sanction of the council, before whom he proposed to lay the whole subject. In regard to the Louisiana question, after repeating his conviction of the obvious meaning of the eighth article of the treaty of cession, he said that, in what seemed to them so plain a case, the government of France could not recognise the propriety of submitting its rights to the opinion of any third party. His declarations on this point were of so positive a character as to preclude all hope of settling the question otherwise than by means of the proposition made to Monsieur Polignac on the 20th May last; and the success of that, I fear, is likely to be counteracted by the opinion which the commission is understood to have expressed as to the little advantage that France would derive from the diminution of the duties on its wines in the United States. The interview terminated with a renewed promise on the part of the minister to occupy himself diligently with the subject of the negotiation, and to bring it to a close as speedily as possible.

On the 9th instant, I had another interview with him, but without any profitable result, or the occurrence of any thing which deserves to be made the subject of special communication. He said that the pressure of other duties upon him had prevented him from making any progress in his investigation since our last interview; that the chamber of deputies would be dissolved in the course of a week, and that he would then be enabled to give more of his attention to our nego. tiation, the importance of which, to both countries, he properly esti

« ZurückWeiter »