Benns: British West India Carrying-Trade 131 
that he “had overlooked the fact, that since the 5th of January, 
1826, the indirect intercourse was allowed in American and 
forbidden in British vessels”, and stated that it was “not in 
his power to assign the reasons why the provisions of the act 
of Congress of 1823, relating to that indirect intercourse” had 
“been continued in force after the corresponding restrictions 
of Great Britain had been removed, so far as related to foreign 
countries”. The probability was, he thought, that the atten- 
tion of the American Government had been principally turned 
to the general question whether it was better to have the 
trade regulated by treaty or by the respective laws of the 
two countries, and the fact that this particular restriction 
had been thus revoked by the act of Parliament of 1825 had 
escaped its notice.®^ 
After these introductory remarks, he explained that if 
Canning’s refusal to enter into further negotiations had not 
been accompanied by various observations, “one of which at 
least has almost the appearance of a charge against the Gov- 
ernment of the United States”, his duty would have been 
simply to transmit the British decision to his own Govern- 
ment. But Canning’s observations led him to attempt to 
justify the position of the United States. Altho he did not 
deny, as “an abstract and general principle”. Great Britain’s 
right to give to the United States or withhold from it the 
privilege of trading with her West India colonies, he main- 
tained that the trade between the United States and the Brit- 
ish West Indies had always been considered by both parties 
as of a peculiar character, “which distinguished it from every 
other species of colonial trade”. Furthermore, the history 
of the relations between the United States and Great Britain 
and between the former and the British West Indies had led 
the American Government to the opinion that it “might, with- 
out violating the regard due to the usages and opinions of 
others, claim to treat on that subject as on that of any other 
commercial intercourse, and on the basis of equal and recipro- 
cal conditions”. He finally closed his note with the somewhat 
portentous suggestion “that an act excluding the United 
States from a trade open to the rest of the world is, as a 
'permanent measure, of a different character from a general 
exclusion of all foreign nations”.^® 
Am. State Papers, For. Rel., VI, 254. 
^■5 Ibid., VI, 254-256. 
