As to the boundaries of Louisiana, see Adams, Hist. of the United States, II. For debates in the Senate and the House on the treaty, see Annals of Congress, 8 Cong. 1 sess., 1803-4, pp. 45-70, 434-514, 545, 546. See acts of Oct. 31, 1803, and March 19, 1804, 2 Stat. 245, 272. As to trial by jury in Louisiana, see State r. Fuentes, 5 La. Ann. 427. 3. THE FLORIDAS. $ 102. By the treaty signed at San Lorenzo el Real, October 27, 1795, the boundary between the United States and the Spanish colonies of East and West Florida was agreed upon in conformity with what had been stipulated in the treaty between Great Britain and the United States of 1782. The United States subsequently laid claim to West Florida as part of the Louisiana cession. A long negotiation, embracing the subject of spoliations, of the right of deposit at New Orleans, and the limits of Louisiana, as well as the purchase of the Floridas, ended in failure, and in 1808, in consequence of the political condition of Spain, diplomatic relations between the two countries were suspended." At the close of the war in Europe diplomatic relations were restored, but a new source of complaints had then come into existence in the revolt of the Spanish colonies in America. A negotiation, conducted sometimes at Washington and sometimes at Madrid, was entered upon for the settlement of all differences. Little progress, however, was made in it till 1818. On January 16 in that year the United States put forward a proposal under which Spain was, for various considerations, to cede all claims to territory eastward of the Mississippi, and either to accept for the western boundary the Rio Colorado from its mouth to its source, and a line thence to the northern limits of Louisiana, or to leave that boundary unsettled. The Spanish minister offered to cede the Floridas, the United States agreeing to establish as the boundary between Louisiana and the Spanish possessions one of the branches of the Mississippi, either that of Lafourche or of the Atchafalaya, or else to adopt as the basis of settlement the uti possidetis of 1763. On these proposals and counter proposals a long discussion as to limits ensued. October 24, 1818, the Spanish minister submitted a 1 Op. 108, Lincoln, 1802. Int. Arbitrations, V. 4519; Am. State Papers, For. Rel. I. 63; II. 564; III. 394– 400, 539; Adams's History of the United States, V. 305-315; 2 Stats. 254. Int. Arbitrations, V. 4492-4493; Am. State Papers, II. 469, 596, 613, 615, 626, 635, 667; Adams's Hist. of the U. S., II. 3. & Int. Arbitrations, V. 4494; Am. State Papers, For. Rel. III. 293. Mr. Adams, Sec. of State, to Chev. de Onis, Jan. 16, 1818, Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 422. certain propositions, which embraced the cession of the Floridas and the mutual renunciation of claims. Mr. Adams replied on the 31st of October, and brought the formal discussions practically to a close." February 22, 1819, there was concluded a treaty which, besides defining the boundary between the Louisiana territory and the territories which were still to remain to Spain, conveyed to the United States not only the Floridas, but also all the Spanish titles north of the 42nd parallel of north latitude, from the source of the Arkansas River to the Pacific Ocean; the United States in return assuming the payment of claims of its citizens against Spain to an amount not exceeding 5,000,000 dollars, and engaging to cause satisfaction to be made for certain injuries suffered by the Spanish inhabitants of the Floridas at the hands of American forces, besides extending to Spanish commerce in the ceded territories, for the term of twelve years, privileges which were not to be allowed to any other nation." "The United States having proposed in 1816 to accept a cession of Florida as a basis of the release of the claims held by citizens of the United States against Spain, offered at the same time, by way of further compromise, to take the Colorado River as the western boundary of the Louisiana purchase, although that purchase had been previously maintained to extend as far as the Rio Grande. The Spanish minister, Onis, whose intrigues and turbulence had been a constant source of difficulty at Washington, insisted, in the first place, upon the restoration to Spain of that section of what was called West Florida which included Mobile and the adjacent country. He also presented as a set-off losses to Spain from depredations by expeditions which he alleged had been fitted out at New Orleans for the purpose of assisting the insurgents in Texas and Mexico; and he also claimed that vessels from the insurgent Spanish colonies should be excluded from the ports of the United States. In order to meet the latter complaints so far as they were reasonable, a statute was passed on March 3, 1816, which imposed a fine of ten thousand dollars, forfeiture of the vessels employed, and an imprisonment not exceeding ten years, on all persons engaged in fitting out vessels to cruise against powers with which the United States was at peace." "The defiant patriotism of Mr. Adams was never more conspicuously shown than during his negotiations with Spain in respect to the purchase of the Floridas, and in no part of his public life were his faults of temper, and his antagonism to anyone by whom his personal @ Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 530; Int. Arbitrations, V. 4496. Int. Arbitrations, V. 4496-4497, 4519 et seq. The date of the act was March 3, 1817. It provided that the fine should in no case exceed $10,000, but left it to the discretion of the court to impose a lower penalty. (3 Stats. 370.) The representations of the Spanish minister may be found in Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 184-189. Similar representations were also made by the Portuguese minister. (Case of the United States at Geneva, 138-140; Bemis' American Neutrality, 54 et seq.) ambition was thwarted, less manifest. In Congress, the policy of the Administration in respect to the Floridas was at first looked upon coldly by the rising statesmen, among whom Mr. Clay took the lead, whose primary object was early recognition of South American independence. Florida would be valuable, but it would, in any view, be one of the prizes of a war with Spain which they expected as a necessary and not undesirable consequence of the interposition in South America they proposed. In support of the Administration, in delaying the recognition of the South American insurgents, were rallied several powerful agencies: (1) The commercial interests of the North, which deprecated a war which would expose their ships to Spanish privateers; (2) the Southeastern Atlantic States, of whom Mr. Forsyth was the leading spokesman in Congress, who desired to be relieved from border collisions by purchasing the Floridas at once; and (3), General Jackson, who here displayed that rare sagacity which afterwards so singularly came to his aid in mastering not only the opposition of others, but the impulse of his own passions. His personal instincts were for a Spanish war, and so his private unpublished letters, on file in the Department of State, show. He burned with resentment at what he considered Spanish atrocities which he thought were all the more injurious from the feebleness of the power by which they were upheld. He was ready to seize and occupy Pensacola and other posts which he thought harbored border Indians or hostile raiders. But while thus making the United States as uncomfortable a neighbor to Spain as he could, underneath all his correspondence with the Spanish authorities, lurked the suggestion, how much better for you to sell out.' And purchasing he urged on the Administration as far wiser, surer, and cheaper than conquering. "Mr. Adams's diary explains the annoying vicissitudes to which the negotiation was subjected. It is due to him to say that in no portion of his diplomatic correspondence by which the archives of the Department of State is enriched, did he display more vigor and at the same time less impatience and harshness of expression, than in the remarkable papers which issued from him during this protracted negotiation with Spain. Of Onis, the Spanish minister at Washington, it is sufficient here to say that looking upon the United States with a jealousy and dislike which he was so little able to repress that for some time his reception by the Government was refused, his diplomatic subtlety made him, when he entered at last on the negotiation, a fit instrument of the procrastination his instructions advised. " a De Onis was thus described by Mr. Adams: “Cold, calculating, wily, always commanding his own temper, proud because he is a Spaniard, but supple and cunning, accommodating the tone of his pretensions precisely to the degree of endurance of his opponent, bold and overbearing to the utmost extent to which it is tolerated, careless of what he asserts or how grossly it is proved to be unfounded, his morality appears to be that of the Jesuits as exposed by Pascal. He is laborious, vigilant, and ever attentive to his duties; a man of business and of the world." (Morse, Life of J. Q. Adams, 112.) A When, however, cession of some sort became at last the only alternative to war, and when it was clear that Onis's past conduct and present temper precluded him from successfully concluding the negotiation, the French minister, De Neuville, whose tact and kindliness were recognized by both interests, was called upon to intervene. compromise was through this agency effected. By this treaty, which was at once unanimously ratified by the Senate, the Floridas were supposed to be secured, as well as the disputed southwest boundary settled. Congress, having no doubt of the assent of Spain, passed, just on the eve of its adjournment, acts authorizing the establishing of local governments in the territory so won. "But the assent of Spain was withheld, as Mr. Adams, with rising impatience and indignation, narrates in his diary and protests against in his correspondence. This refusal to accede to the treaty was caused in part by the dilatory temper of Cevallos, the Spanish prime minister, who was swayed to and fro by two conflicting policies--that of reliev ing his Government from the urgency of the spoliation claims, and that of national pride, swelled with resentment at the menacing tone assumed by the United States military authorities on the Florida border, and at the avowed sympathy of a large part of the population of the United States with the insurgents in the Spanish South American colonies." "When the treaty for the purchase of Florida had been ratified by the Senate, Mr. Forsyth was sent with it to Spain, and almost at the same time Onis, whose relations to the United States had never, as has been seen, been cordial, returned to join the ministry at Madrid. Ferdinand's change of attitude may be explained by this change in his advisers. He had consented to the Florida negotiation under the impression that while it was pending South American independence would not be recognized. But Onis was convinced that when Florida. was ceded South American independence would be recognized; and this conviction was easily communicated to both King and Cortes. Even the concession of Texas, unduly liberal as it was, did not relieve Spanish suspicions, since a filibustering invasion of Texas by adventurers who, though acting in contempt of Federal authorities, yet came from the United States, left the impression that after Florida was obtained by treaty, Texas would have to succumb. Had the Spanish Government, no matter for what motives, promptly disavowed the treaty as made in excess of instructions, the United States would have had no ground for substantial complaint, no matter what might have been the reasons for such disavowal.' But this the Spanish Government @See § 103, as to Texas. See, contra, Mr. Adams, Sec. of State, to Mr. Forsyth, Aug. 18, 1819, Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 657-658. Mr. Adams not only maintained that the powers given to the minister were ample, but he also declared, “It is too well known, and they will not dare to deny it, that Mr. Onis' last instructions authorized him to concede much more than he did.” did not do. It is a principle of diplomacy that such disavowal should be prompt; no complaint came from Spain until seven months had passed. The announcement, after that period, that Spain meant to repudiate a bargain which the United States had taken every intermediate step to fulfill, naturally awakened in the minds of Mr. Monroe and of his Cabinet indignation as well as surprise. At first, as we are told in Mr. Adams' contemporaneous diary, the impulse was to occupy Florida, not merely on treaty grounds, but on grounds of necessity, to repel the raids of Indians and Spanish marauders which had their base. in Florida. Spain, it was argued, has neither the power nor the will to keep Florida from being the starting ground for these outrages; it is necessary that the United States take the matter in its own hands. So urged Mr. Crawford, whose State (Georgia) was peculiarly exposed to these incursions; so at first felt Mr. Adams, incensed that the treaty with which his fame was identified should be repudiated. Mr. Monroe at the time yielded to this impulse, but after consideration he concluded to recommend, not immediate occupation, but occupation in the future, dependent on the action of Spain." a Note of Dr. Wharton, Int. Law Dig., II. § 161a. The ostensible ground of delay on the part of Spain was a question concerning certain large grants of land in Florida, made by the King of Spain to the Duke of Alagon, the captain of his guards; the Count of Punon Rostro, one of his chamberlains, and Mr. Vargas, treasurer of the household." By Art. VIII. of the treaty it was provided that all grants of land made in the ceded territories, by His Catholic Majesty or his lawful authorities, before Jan. 24, 1818, should be ratified and confirmed; but that all grants made since that day, “when the first proposal, on the part of His Catholic Majesty, for the cession of the Floridas was made," should be null and void. When the treaty was signed, the three grants in question were known in the United States by rumor, and were understood by the negotiators to be included in the annulment; but in order that the question might not be left undetermined, Mr. Forsyth, who was sent as minister to Spain for the purpose of exchanging the ratifications of the treaty, was instructed to present on that occasion a declaration to the effect that the grants were so included.". The Spanish Government objected to the declaration as an attempted alteration of the treaty, and returned one of Mr. Forsyth's notes because of the harshness of its language, at the same time saying that the King would send a representative to a President Monroe's Ann. Message, Dec. 7, 1819. Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 627. Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 510, 524. This proposal may be found in Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 464. d Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 652. |