191 



If admitted, it leaves the question, whether the treaty of 1783 

 was or was not abrogated by the late war ? a mere question of use 

 less speculation, or of national pride. That British statesmen and 

 jurists should manifest some impatience, and seize upon any pretext 

 to cause that treaty to disappear from the archives of their national 

 muniments, is not at all surprising. That an American statesman 

 should partake of the same anxiety, is not so natural, though it 

 may be traced to the same system of public law, by which the com 

 merce and fisheries of the colonies, before the Revolution, were 

 supposed to be held at the mere pleasure of the British crown. 

 It is not necessary to deny that the treaty of 1783 was, as a national 

 compact, abrogated by the late war, so long as with the assertion 

 of its being so abrogated, is not coupled the assertion that any one 

 right or liberty, acknowledged in it as belonging to the people of 

 the United States, was abrogated with it. But when the British 

 government or Mr. Russell assert that all the other rights and li 

 berties acknowledged and secured to the United States by that 

 treaty, survived its abrogation, except one portion of the properly 

 in the fisheries, stipulated in one half of one article, I say there i* 

 nothing either in the nature of the liberty contested, or in the arti 

 cle by which it is recognised, that will warrant their distinction ; 

 that the whole treaty was one compact of irrevocable ackno* iedg- 

 ments, consummated by the ratification ; and that the thin* article 

 ia particular, adjusted the rights and liberties of the partis in and 

 to one common property, of which neither party could ever after 

 wards divest the other without his consent. 



When, therefore, the British government and Mr- ftussell assert, 

 that war abrogates all treaties, and every article of every treaty, 

 they have yet proved nothing for their argument 5 they must pro 

 ceed to affirm, that with the abrogation of th&amp;lt;&amp;gt; treaty by war, all the 

 rights and liberties recognised in the treatf as belonging to either 

 party, are likewise abrogated. And he^n lies the fallacy of their 

 argument. We ask them, was the acknowledgment of the Inde 

 pendence of the United States, in tie first article of the treaty of 

 1783, abrogated by the war of 18^ ? Yes, says Mr. Russell, but 

 the Independence of the United States rested upon their own de 

 claration, and not upon the acknowledgment of Great Britain. With 

 regard to all other nation^, undoubtedly our Independence rests 

 upon our own Declaration, for they never contested it. But Great 

 Britain had waged a war of seven years against it, and it was by vir 

 tue of that article of the treaty alone, that she was bound to acknow 

 ledge our Independence. And this constituted one of the peculiar 

 ities of the treaty of 1723. Our treaty with France, of 1 778, con 

 tained no article stipulating the acknowledgment of our Independ 

 ence. No such article was necessary with any nation which never 

 had contested it. But with Great Britain, it was the whole object 

 of that treaty. All the other articles were merely arrangements ot 

 detail and adjustments of consequences flowing from the recognition 

 f the first article. If the acknowledgment of our Independence,, 



