AND UTTERAXCES OF NATIONAL ORGANS. 147 



plenipotentiaries on exchange of ratifications to the Mexican peace 

 treaty of 1848 and the Clayton-Bulwer treaty with Great Britain 

 of 1850 were considered of doubtful validity,^*' and on other 

 occasions the President has submitted such explanatory documents 

 to the Senate before proclaiming the treaty."^ 



Thus, if in fact the note has not received consent of the full 

 treaty-making power, the United States is not bound unless the 

 foreign nation can show that it had reason to suppose the note had 

 been constitutionally accepted. There would certainly be such a 

 presumption where the exchange of notes took place before the 

 Senate had acted. Thus intrepretive agreements relating to the 

 treaties with Mexico (1848) and Great Britain (1850) not having 

 been exchanged until after ratification, though considered valid 

 by foreign nations,^^ were questioned by the United States. ^^ On 

 the other hand, the interpretive notes exchanged before the Senate 

 had acted on the Swiss treaty of 1855 were considered valid. In 



s^ Moore, Digest, 5: 205-206; Crandall, op. cit., pp. 85, 381. Bigelow, 

 Breaches of Anglo-American Treaties, pp. 1 16-149, discusses at length the 

 effectiveness of these and other documents alleged to be explanatory of the 

 Clayton-Bulwer treaty. Secretary Root agreed by exchange of notes with 

 Mr. Bryce, British Ambassador, as to the meaning of Art. II of the arbi- 

 tration convention of 1908. These documents were submitted to the Senate 

 for its information but apparently not for its approval. Crandall, op. cit., 

 p. 89. 



31 Jefferson thought it necessary to submit an interpretation offered by 

 Napoleon of the treaty of 1801 to the Senate before exchange of ratifica- 

 tions. Charles Francis Adams said that the British interpretation of the 

 Declaration of Paris, to which the United States desired to accede, would 

 have to be submitted to the Senate. Secretary Fish declared the exchange 

 of ratifications of a treaty with Turkey in 1874 was invalid because accom- 

 panied by an explanation of the American plenipotentiary which rendered 

 a Senate amendment nugatory. Secretary Bayard refused to give an ex- 

 planation of a Senate amendment to the treaty with Hawaii of 1884 and to 

 authorize a protocol explaining the submarine cable convention of 1886 

 without Senate approval. Crandall, op. cit., pp. 86-89; Moore, Digest, 5: 

 207. Although protocols prolonging the time for exchange of ratifications 

 have not always been submitted to the Senate, this has usually been done. 

 Crandall, op. cit., pp. 89-92. 



32 Mexico and Great Britain respectively asserted the validity of these 

 agreements. Moore, 5 : 205 ; Lord Clarendon to Mr. Buchanan, May 2, 1854, 

 Br. and For. St. Pap., 46: 267, Moore, 3: 138. The Mexican agreement is 

 printed after the Treaty in Malloy, Treaties, etc., p. 11 19. 



33 Supra, note 30. 



PROC. AMER. PHIL. SQC, VOL., LX., K, MARCH 6, I922. 



