[Extracts of a letter from the Secretary of State to Mr. Brown, dated
Washington, December 23, 1823.]
You will immediately after your reception earnestly call the attention
of the French Government to the claims of our citizens for indemnity.
You will at the same time explicitly make known that this Government
can not consent to connect this discussion with that of the pretension
raised by France on the construction given by her to the eighth article
of the Louisiana cession treaty. The difference in the nature and
character of the two interests is such that they can not with propriety
be blended together. The claims are of reparation to individuals for
their property taken from them by manifest and undisputed wrong. The
question upon the Louisiana treaty is a question of _right_ upon the
meaning of a contract. It has been fully, deliberately, and thoroughly
investigated, and the Government of the United States is under the
entire and solemn conviction that the pretension of France is utterly
unfounded. We are, nevertheless, willing to resume the discussion if
desired by France; but to refuse justice to individuals unless the
United States will accede to the construction of an article in a treaty
contrary to what they believe to be its real meaning would be not only
incompatible with the principles of equity, but submitting to a species
of compulsion derogatory to the honor of the nation.
[Extract of a letter (No. 2) from James Brown, envoy extraordinary and
minister plenipotentiary of the United States, dated April 28, 1824.]
I have in a letter to M. de Chateaubriand, copy of which I have now the
honor to send, made an effort to separate the claims of our citizens
from the Louisiana question.
_Mr. Brown to M. de Chateaubriand_.
PARIS, _April 28, 1824_.
His Excellency VISCOUNT DE CHATEAUBRIAND,
_Minister of Foreign Affairs, etc_.
SIR: In the conference with which your excellency honored me a few
days ago I mentioned a subject deeply interesting to many citizens
of the United States, on which I have been instructed to address your
excellency, and to which I earnestly wish to call your immediate
attention.
It is well known to your excellency that my predecessor, Mr. Gallatin,
during several years made repeated and urgent applications to His
Majesty's Government for the adjustment of claims to a very large
amount, affecting the interests of American citizens and originating in
gross violations of the law of nations and of the rights of the United
States, and that he never could obtain from France either a settlement
of those claims or even an examination and discussion of their validity.
To numerous letters addressed by him to His Majesty's ministers on that
subject either no answers were given or answers which had for their only
object to postpone the investigation of the subject. Whilst, however,
he indulged the hope that these delays would be abandoned, and that the
rights of our citizens, which had been urged for so many years, would at
length be taken up for examination, he learned with surprise and regret
that His Majesty's Government had determined to insist that they should
be discussed in connection with the question of the construction of
the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty of cession. Against this
determination he strongly but ineffectually remonstrated in a letter
to Mr. De Villele, dated the 12th November, 1822.
It is notorious that the Government of the United States, whenever
requested by that of His Majesty, have uniformly agreed to discuss any
subject presented for their consideration, whether the object has been
to obtain the redress of public or private injuries. Acting upon this
principle, the question of the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty
was, upon the suggestion of the minister of France, made the subject of
a voluminous correspondence, in the course of which all the arguments
of the parties respectively were fully made known to each other and
examined. The result of this discussion has been a thorough conviction
on the part of the Government of the United States that the construction
of that article of the treaty contended for by France is destitute of
any solid foundation and wholly inadmissible. After a discussion so
full as to exhaust every argument on that question, the attempt to
renew it in connection with the question of the claims of our citizens
appeared to the Government of the United States to be a measure so
contrary to the fair and regular course of examining controverted
points between nations that they instructed Mr, Sheldon, their chargé
d'affaires, to prepare and present a note explaining their views of the
proceeding, which he delivered on the 11th of October, 1823. To this
note no answer has ever been received.
I have the express instructions of the Government again to call the
attention of that of His Majesty to this subject, and to insist that
the claims of our citizens may continue to be discussed as a distinct
question, without connecting it in any way with the construction of the
Louisiana treaty. The two subjects are in every respect dissimilar. The
difference in the nature and character of the two interests is such as
to prevent them from being blended in the same discussion. The claims
against France are of reparation to individuals for their property taken
from them by undisputed wrong and injustice; the claim of France under
the treaty is that of a right founded on a contract. In the examination
of these questions the one can impart no light to the other; they are
wholly unconnected, and ought on every principle to undergo a distinct
and separate examination. To involve in the same investigation the
indisputable rights of American citizens to indemnity for losses and
the doubtful construction of a treaty can have no other effect than to
occasion an indefinite postponement of the reparation due to individuals
or a sacrifice on the part of the Government of the United States of a
treaty stipulation in order to obtain that reparation. The United States
would hope that such an alternative will not be pressed upon them by the
Government of His Majesty.
Whilst I indulge a hope that the course to which I have objected will no
longer be insisted on by His Majesty's ministers, permit me to renew to
your excellency the sincere assurance that the United States earnestly
desire that every subject of difference between the two countries should
be amicably adjusted and all their relations placed upon the most
friendly footing. Although they believe that any further discussion of
the eighth article of the Louisiana treaty would be wholly unprofitable,
they will be at all times ready to renew the discussion of that article
or to examine any question which may remain to be adjusted between them
and France.