to the claims of either of them to its possession.' The Amer ican commissioners declined to accept any arrangement which, without settling the question of title, might seem to imply a renunciation by the United States of any of its claims to territorial sovereignty; and in the end it was agreed that any territory claimed by either party should for a period of ten years be free and open to both parties, without prejudice to either's claim of sovereignty. This agreement was embodied in Article III. of the convention, which reads as follows: "It is agreed, that any country that may be claimed by either party on the nothwest coast of America, westward of the Stony 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 present 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." Ukase of 1821. Before the term for which this article was to remain in force had half expired, the question of territorial rights on the northwest coast of America was suddenly revived by the famous ukase of 1821, by which the Emperor of Russia assumed to exclude foreigners from carrying on commerce and from navigating and fishing within a hundred Italian miles of the coast from Bering Straits down to the fifty-first parallel of north latitude. As the ukase was founded upon and necessarily carried with it an assertion of title to all the territory north of that parallel, both the United States and Great Britain protested against it. Their protests were received by Russia in a friendly spirit, and it was agreed that an effort should be made to settle the territorial claims of the parties by negotiation. By this time the United States had, as we have seen, by the treaty of February 22, 1819, acquired all the territorial rights of Spain on the Pacific north of the forty-second parallel of north latitude. On the 22d of July 1823 Mr. Adams, in an instruction to Mr. Rush, then minister of the United States at London, authorized him "to stipulate that no settlement shall hereafter be made on the 1 Am. State Papers, For. Rel. IV. 391. northwest coast or on any of the islands thereto adjoining by Russian subjects south of latitude of 55°, by citizens of the United States north of latitude 51°, or by British subjects either south of 51° or north of 55°. I mention the latitude of 510," said Mr. Adams, "as the bound within which we are willing to limit the future settlement of the United States, because it is not to be doubted that the Columbia River branches as far north as 51°, although it is most probably not the Taconesche Tesse of Mackenzie. As, however, the line already runs in latitude 49° to the Stony Mountains, should it be earnestly insisted upon by Great Britain, we will consent to carry it in continuance on the same parallel to the sea." "The right of the United States," said Mr. Adams in another place, "from the forty-second to the forty-ninth parallel of latitude on the Pacific Ocean we consider as unquestionable, being founded, first, on the acquisition by the Treaty of February 22, 1819, of all the rights of Spain; second, by the discovery of the Columbia River, first from sea, at its mouth, and then by land by Lewis and Clark; and, third, by the settlement at its mouth in 1811."2 On December 17, 1823, Mr. Rush had an interview with Mr. Canning, who was then indisposed, at Gloucester Lodge, the latter's This interview was solicited by Mr. Canning in order that he might learn the views of the United States in regard to the northwest coast before preparing his instructions on the subject to the British ambassador at St. Petersburg. A map of the coast was produced, and Mr. Rush pointed out the lines by which the claims of the United States were bounded. "Mr. Canning," says Mr. Rush, "went into no remarks, beyond simply intimating that our claim seemed much beyond anything England had anticipated. I said that I had the hope of being able to show its good foundation when the negotiation came on. Further conversation of a general nature passed on the subject, and on coming away I left with him, at his request, a brief, informal statement of our claim in writing."3 In this memorandum Mr. Rush said that the United States would agree to make no settlement north of 51° on Great Britain's agreeing to make none south of that line or north of Rush's Negotiations at London. residence. Am. State Papers, For. Rel. V. 446, 448. 53°. "What can this intend?" asked Mr. Canning, in a personal note to Mr. Rush. "Our northern question is with Russia, as our southern with the United States. But do the United States mean to travel north to get between us and Russia? and do they mean to stipulate against Great Britain in favor of Russia; or to reserve to themselves whatever Russia may not want?" Mr. Rush answered that it was even so; that the line of 55° was supposed to be the southern limit of Russia, it being the boundary within which the Emperor Paul granted certain commercial privileges to his Russian-American Company in 1799; that 51° was taken as the northern limit of the United States in order to include all the waters of the Columbia River, and that the United States did not intend to concede to Russia any system of colonial exclusion above 55° or to deprive themselves of the right of traffic with the natives above that parallel. Mr. Canning acknowledged the receipt of this explanation by saying that he would take it, "like the wise and wary Dutchman of old times, ad referendum and ad considerandum."1 Subsequently to this informal discussion, President Monroe's message of December 2, 1823, was published, in which it was announced that the American continents would not be considered as subjects for future colonization by European powers. Mr. Canning inquired of Mr. Rush as to the precise nature and extent of this principle, of which he said he had not previously been aware. Mr. Rush replied that he had had no instructions on the principle since it was proclaimed in the message, but that he would be prepared to support it when the negotiations came on. Mr. Canning then said he would be under the necessity of addressing to Mr. Rush an official note on the subject, prior to writing to the British ambassador at St. Petersburg, or else of declining to join the United States in the negotiation with Russia, as the United States had proposed; and that he would prefer the latter course, since he did not desire to bring that part of the message into discussion for the present, as England must necessarily object to it. Mr. Rush replied that he was entirely willing that the negotiation should take that course, so far as he had any claim to speak. To this position Mr. Rush was impelled, as he explained to his own government, chiefly by the consideration that, if a negotiation between the three nations as to the northwest coast should take place at 1 Residence at the Court of London, II. 84, 86. St. Petersburg, the non-colonization principle, from which he understood Russia also to dissent, might cause that power to take the side of England against the United States. In consequence, Mr. Rush entered upon a separate discussion with Great Britain. The British plenipotentiaries, Messrs. Huskisson and Stratford Canning, denied the validity of the claims of Spain, as well as that of the claim of the United States based on the alleged discovery of the Columbia River by Captain Gray, and declared that Great Britain considered the whole of the unoccupied parts of America as being open to her future settlement, including that portion of the northwest coast lying between the forty-second and the fifty-first degree of north latitude. The discussions proceeded to a great length, and they were ended on the part of Great Britain by her plenipotentiaries offering as the boundary the fortyninth parallel of north latitude to the point where it strikes the northeasternmost branch of the Columbia, and thence along the middle of the Columbia to the Pacific Ocean, the navigation of that river to be free to the subjects and citizens of both nations. Mr. Rush, while rejecting this offer, consented to alter his proposal so as to shift its southern line to the parallel of 49 in place of 51°. The British plenipotentiaries, after considering this modification for a fortnight, rejected it, and made no new proposal in return. This rejection was not, however, in terms entered on the protocol.1 By the treaty between the United States Line of 54° 40'. and Russia concluded April 17, 1824, the northern limit of the claims of the United States was fixed at 54° 40′ north latitude, it being agreed that the citizens of the United States should not thereafter form, under the authority of their government, any establishment on the coast or the adjacent islands north of that line, and that in the same manner Russian subjects should form no establishment south of it. Thus Russia left it to the United States and Great Britain to contest the territory south of 54° 40', and the United States left it to Russia and Great Britain to divide the territory to the north. This Great Britain and Russia did by the convention of February 28 (March 16), 1825. Residence at the Court of London, II. 86, 88. 2 Id. II. 257. 3 Id. II. 270–271. 4 Id. II. 272–273. tions: Joint Occupation. In 1826 Mr. Canning suggested to Rufus Gallatin's Negotia- King, who was then minister of the United States at London, that the negotiations between Great Britain and the United States should be resumed. Mr. King, who was on the point of leaving England, transmitted Mr. Canning's note to Washington." Mr. Clay was then Secretary of State. He substantially reaffirmed, for the guidance of Mr. Gallatin, who had succeeded Mr. King in the mission to England, the instructions of Mr. Adams to Mr. Rush; but, while authorizing Mr. Gallatin to announce the line of 49° as an ultimatum, said he might agree that British subjects should have the right to navigate the Columbia if that line should cross any of the branches of the river which were navigable from the point of intersection to the ocean.3 The British plenipotentiaries, Messrs. Huskisson and Addington, rejected this proposal on the ground, among others, that the straight line had no regard to convenience, and mentioned particularly that its cutting off the southern portion of Quadra and Vancouver's Island was quite inadmissible. Mr. Gallatin, while not announcing 49 as an "ultimatum," said that the United States would adhere to that line as a basis. In employing this form of expression he had in view the possible "exchange of the southern extremity of Nootka's Island (Quadra and Vancouver's), for the whole or part of the upper branches of the Columbia River north of that parallel." The British plenipotentiaries adhered substantially to the line of the Columbia River, offering the United States above that line merely a detached portion of territory bounded on the west by the ocean, on the north by Fuca's Straits, on the east by the entrance of Admiralty Inlet and the peninsula between that and Hoods Inlet, and on the south by a line drawn thence to Gray's Harbor on the ocean. The British plenipotentiaries dwelt on the excellence of the harbor of Port Discovery, defended by Protection Island, which would thus be secured to the United States. Mr. Gallatin rejected this proposal at once, saying that it did not admit even of discussion as to its details, as its principle was inadmissible. As the nego Am. State Papers, For. Rel. VI. 645-646. 2 Treaties and Conventions of the United States, 1776-1887, p. 1331, notes. 3 Am. State Papers, For. Rel. VI. 641-645. 4 Am. State Papers, For. Rel. VI. 654. |