92 
Indiana University Studies 
British colonies must be a subject of negotiation between the 
governments”.^^ 
Adams' reply, however, did not convince Canning of the 
justice of the American position. The latter still contended 
that, since the trade between certain British colonial ports and 
neighboring islands and countries had been opened on condi- 
tion of reciprocity, the United States had no cause for com- 
plaint because of charges and restrictions which might be dis- 
advantageous to the American trade, however inconvenient 
- they might prove in themselves, so long as others, both British 
and foreign engaged in the same branch of trade, were equally 
subject to their operation. In this contention he would seem 
to have been justified. Further, he maintained that the pro- 
ductions of the British West Indies and North American 
provinces were no more distinct from one another than those 
of New England from those of Louisiana or Georgia; that, in 
fact, these British colonies had just as good a right to be 
classed as parts of the same country as the latter. In support 
of his position, he cited a ruling of the Treasury Department 
of the United States in which it had been expressly declared 
that the word “country”, as employed in the act concerning 
navigation, was to be “considered as embracing all the posses- 
sions of a foreign State, however widely separated, which are 
subject to the same supreme executive and legislative au- 
thority”.^^ Canning, it would seem, was getting the better of 
the argument. 
This formal correspondence was accompanied by informal 
personal interviews in which Canning irritated Adams by 
constantly reminding him of the King’s power to prohibit the 
trade by an order in council if privileges similar to those 
granted by the British act to American vessels should not be 
allowed to British vessels.^® The conversation in these con- 
ferences became at times somewhat acrid, judging from 
Adams’ report of one held on November 25, 1822. 
I told him it was probable . . . that Congress might remove 
that discrimination and substitute other regulations in its stead, perhaps 
a limitation to direct voyages, both to and from the colonies, perhaps a 
limited list of imports, excepting the most important of their export 
Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, VI, 98. 
11 Am. State Papers, For. ReL, VI, 216. 
Ibid., VI, 217. 
^^Ibid., VI, 227. 
