228 DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE. 



commenting, and upon which Lord Salisbury relies for sustaining his 

 contention in regard to theBehring Sea. During an animated conver- 

 sation of an hour or more between Mr. Adams and Baron Tuyll, the 

 former said: 



I told Barou Tuyll specially that we should contest the right of Russia to any ter- 

 ritorial establishment on this continent. * * * 



It will be observed that Mr. Adams uses the same phrase in his con- 

 versation that has misled English statesmen as to the true scope and 

 meaning of his disj)atch of July 23, 1823. When he declared that we 

 should '^ contest the right of Russia to any territorial establishment on 

 this continent" (with the word " any" italicized), he no more meantthat 

 we should attempt to drive Russia from her ancient possessions than 

 that we should attempt to drive England from the ownership of Canada 

 or Nova Scotia. Such talk would have been absmxl gasconade and Mr. 

 Adams was the last man to indulge in it. His true meaning, it will be 

 seen, comes out in the next sentence, when he declares: 



I told Baron Tuyll that we should assume distinctly the jjrinciple that the Ameri- 

 can continents are no longer subjects for any new European colonial establishments. 



In the message of President Monroe to the next Congress (the Eight- 

 eenth) at its first session, December 2, 1823, he announced that at the 

 proposal of the Russian Government the United States had agreed to 

 "arrange by amicable negotiations the respective rights and interests 

 of the two nations on the Northwest Coast of this continent." A similar 

 proposal had been made by Russia, to Great Britain and had been likewise 

 agreed to. The negotiations in both cases were to be at St. Petersburg. 



It was in connection with this subject, and in the same paragraph, 

 that President Monroe spoke thus: 



In the discuvssions to which, this interest has given rise, and in the arrangements 

 by which they may terminate, the occasion has been judged proper for asserting, as 

 a principle in which the rights and interests of the United States are involved, that 

 the American continents, hy the free and independent condition which theij have assumed and 

 maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for fature colinization by any 

 European power. 



This very brief declaration (i^l fact merely the three lines italicized 

 constitute the famous "Monroe doctrine." Mr. Adams's words of the 

 July xDreceding clearly foreshadowed this position as the permanent 

 policy of the United States. The declaration removes tlie last doubt, 

 if room for doubt had been left, that the reference made by Mr. Adams 

 was to the future, and had no possible connection with the Russian 

 rights existing for three-quarters of a century before the dispatch of 

 1823 was Avrittcu. 



It was evident from the first that the determined attitude of the United 

 States, subsequently sui)ported by Great Britain, would prevent the 

 extension of Russian territory southward to the fifty-first parallel. The 

 treaties which were the result of the meeting at St. Petersburg, already 

 noted, marked the surrender on the part of Russia of this pretension 

 and the conclusion was a joint agreement that 54 degrees and 40 min- 

 utes should be taken as the extreme southern boundary of Russia on 

 the Northwest Coast, instead of the fifty-fifth degree, which was pro- 

 claimed by the Emperor Paul in the ukase of 1799. 



The treaty between Russia and the United States was concluded on 

 the 17th of April, 1824, and that between Russia and Great Britain, ten 

 months later, on tlie liitih ot February, 1825. In both treaties Russia 

 acknowledges 54 40 as the dividing line. It was not determined which 

 of the two nations owned the territory fiom 54 40 down to the forty-ninth 



