PERTAINING TO NEGOTIATION OF TREATY OF 1818. 281 



cording to the expressions of Lord Bathurst's note, are in the nature 

 of perpetual obligation. To the first and second of these classes may 

 be referred the tenth article of the treaty of 1794, and all treaties or 

 articles of treaties stipulating the abolition of the slave trade. The 

 treaty of peace of 1783 belongs to the third. 



The reasoning of Lord Bathurst's note seems to confine this per- 

 petuity of obligation to recognitions and acknowledgments of title, 

 and to consider its perpetual nature as resulting from the subject- 

 matter of the contract, and not from the engagement of the con- 

 tractor. While Great Britain leaves the United States unmolested 

 in the enjoyment of all the advantages, rights, and liberties stipu- 

 lated in their behalf in the treaty of 1783, it is immaterial to them 

 whether she founds her conduct upon the mere fact that the United 

 States are in possession of such rights, or whether she is governed by 

 good faith and respect for her own engagements. But if she con- 

 tests any one of them, it is to her engagements only that the United 

 States can appeal as the rule for settling the question of right. If this 

 appeal be rejected, it ceases to be a discussion of right; and this ob- 

 servation applies as strongly to the recognition of independence, and 

 to the boundary line in the treaty of 1783, as to the fisheries. It is 

 truly observed by Lord Bathurst, that in that treaty the independence 

 of the United States was not granted, but acknowledged. He adds, 

 that it might have been acknowledged without any treaty, and that 

 the acknowledgment, in whatever mode made, would have been irre- 

 vocable. But the independence of the United States was precisely 

 the question upon which a previous war between them and Great 

 Britain had been waged. Other nations might acknowledge their 

 independence without a treaty, because they had no right, or claim 

 of right, to contest it; but this acknowledgment, to be binding upon 

 Great Britain, could have been made only by treaty, because it in- 

 cluded the dissolution of one social compact between the parties, as 

 well as the formation of another. Peace could exist between the two 

 nations only by the mutual pledge of faith to the new social relations 

 established between them; and hence it was that the stipulations of 

 that treaty were in the nature of perpetual obligation, and not liable 

 to be forfeited by a subsequent war, or by any declaration of the 

 will o*f either party without the assent of the other. 



In this view, it certainly was supposed by the undersigned that 

 Greal Britain considered her obligation to hold and treat with the 

 United States as a sovereign and independent Power as derived only 

 from the preliminary articles of L782, as converted into the definite 

 i reaty of 1 783. The boundary line could obviously rest upon no other 

 foundation. The boundarie were neither recognitions nor acknowl- 

 edgments of title. They could have been fixed and settled only by 

 treaty, and it is to the treaty alone thai both parties have always 

 referred in all discus ions concerning them. Lord Bathurst's note 

 denies that there is in any one of the articles of the treaty of ( thenl any 

 expre or implied reference to the treaty <>f LT83, as still in force. 

 It -;iy that, by the bipulation for a mutual restoration of territory, 

 each party neces arily "reverted to (heir boundaries as before the 

 war, without reference to the title by which their po es ions were 

 acquired, or to the mode in which their boundaries had been previ- 



oii ly fixed." 



