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pointed out that there had also been other sins of commission 
and omission on the part of the American Government, It 
had failed to reciprocate the privileges extended to it by the 
British act of 1822. It had demanded that its produce should 
be placed on an equal footing in the British West Indies with 
the like produce of Great Britain herself and her dependen- 
cies. It had delayed for nearly two years to renew the nego- 
tiations suspended in 1824. It had failed to revoke the re- 
striction to a direct trade between the United States and the 
British West Indies, after that of Great Britain had ceased 
in 1825.'^ Thus the attempt was made to create the impres- 
sion that the British Government had resorted to the order 
in council with reluctance, after having been ‘"disappointed 
in their long-cherished hope’^ that the United States would 
meet with a corresponding disposition “the liberal disposition 
manifested by England towards the United States''.^ 
That the reluctance was not extremely deep, however, and 
that there was a certain degree of satisfaction on the part of 
the British Ministry because they had been provided with a 
pretext for this order, cropped out in one of Huskisson's 
speeches in Parliament. After having explained that the 
United States had been excluded from the British colonial 
trade because it “did not think proper to comply'' with the 
conditions laid down by Great Britain he concluded, “I can- 
not say that, with a view to the interests of our Navigations, 
I regret the course which the policy of the American Govern- 
ment has forced us to adopt."® Altho it must be admitted 
that the United States had afforded Great Britain sufficient 
pretext for issuing its order in council, yet it seems more or 
less apparent that the latter seized with avidity upon the pre- 
text as a means of excluding American shipping from the 
British colonies. 
Conditions in Great Britain just prior to the British order 
in council throw some light on the situation. The years from 
1822 to 1825, during which the colonial trade reforms had been 
adopted, had been prosperous. 
Nearly all property had risen greatly in pecuniary value, and every 
branch of internal industry was thriving. Agricultural distress had 
disappeared; the persons employed in the cotton and woolen manu- 
Am. State Pavers, For. Rel., VI, 251-253. 
^ Void., VI, 257. Senate Docs., 22 Cong., 1 Sess., Ill, No. 132, p. 3. 
® Hansard’s Parliamentary Debates (2d series) , XVII, 647. 
