DOCUMENTS BEARING ON THE TREATY OF GHENT, 1814. 243 



to give up the point if necessary. I contended for Mr. Bayard's 

 amendment, and for erasing the passages which I though objection- 

 able, as long as argument could have any effect. 



Mr. Russell at length said that he would insist for the fisheries 

 as long as possible, but he would sooner give them up than continue 

 the war for them. I appealed again to our instructions, and showed 

 them to him. He said he understood them as referring only to the 

 general right, and not to the liberties as within the British jurisdic- 

 tion. I asked him how they would be construed by our countrymen 

 after we should have given them up. He said he supposed some 

 would construe them as I did, and some as he did. He supposed 

 there would be a great clamor about it, but that must be disregarded. 

 He believed it more for the interest of the country to give up the 

 point rather than continue the war to maintain it. 



I finally told my colleagues that I saw the difference between them 

 and me was, that they had determined ultimately to give up the point, 

 and I had not. I believed the ground we had originally taken to 

 be good and solid. I could make no distinction between the different 

 articles of the Treaty of 1783. If I admitted this day that a half of 

 one of its articles was abrogated by the war, I should give the enemy 

 an argument to say to-morrow that the other half is abrogated 

 equally. If we gave up the liberty to-day, we might be called to 

 give up the right to-morrow. Our instructions were in general terms. 

 They authorized no such distinction as that now made, and no new 

 instruction concerning the fisheries has been given us, since our Gov- 

 ernment knows the pretension of Great Britain. 



Mr. Gallatin said he had always thought our ground upon that 

 point untenable, that I had now almost a majority against me, and 

 he did not wish we should commit ourselves to anything precluding 

 us from abandoning our ground at last. Mr. Russell said that he 

 considered everything of a permanent nature and founded on natural 

 right in the Treaty of 1783 as not affected by a subsequent war; but 

 privileges granted by the treaty, and which we should not have 

 enjoyed without it, he thought were abrogated by war. 



I said there was no grant of new privileges in the treaty. The 

 liberties, as well as the rights, were merely a continuation of what 

 had always been enjoyed. It was necessary for the fishermen to go 

 to the part of the coast frequented by the fish, and when, by the inde- 

 pendence of the United States, it became a foreign jurisdiction, we 

 had a right to reserve the liberty of continuing to fish there, and the 

 circumstance of the jurisdiction alone occasioned the change of the 

 expression. 



Mr. Clay said he did not wish to make up his mind upon the sub- 

 ject until it should be absolutely necessary. He said we should make 

 a damned bad treaty, and he did not know whether he would sign it or 

 not ; but he could draw in five minutes an article agreeing to negotiate 

 concerning the Mississippi and the fisheries without impairing our 

 claim to them by the Treaty of 1783. He drew an article accordingly, 

 which I read, and told him I had no other objection to it than that it 

 would be instantly rejected by the British Plenipotentiaries. I fur- 

 ther said that as they were all determined at last to yield the fishery 

 point, I though they were wrong not to give it up now and sign the 

 treaty without another reference to England, as well as without my 

 signature. I could not sign it, because I could not consent to give up 



