Benns: British West India Carrying-Trade 139 
The bill as reported reflected the uncompromising, uncon- 
ciliatory attitude of President Adams. As might have been 
expected, it did not coincide with the views of the Opposition ; 
it did ‘‘not answer the object professed — conciliation”.®- The 
bill was immediately seized upon in the Senate by the Opposi- 
tion forces, “all the bill after the enacting clause” was struck 
out, and in its place two sections submitted by Senator Smith 
of Maryland were inserted.®® When the Opposition got thru 
with it, the substitute bill provided:®^ 
1. That from and after December 31, 1827, no other or 
higher duties should be levied on British ships and goods from 
the British colonial free ports, than were levied on American 
vessels and like goods from the same ports. 
2. That the American acts of 1823, 1820, and 1818 should 
be suspended until December 31, 1827, except so much as im- 
posed discriminating duties on tonnage and cargoes of foreign 
vessels. 
3. That, if before December 31, 1827, the President 
should receive satisfactory evidence, etc. (as in the original 
bill), he should issue his proclamation declaring the acts of 
1823, 1820, and 1818 altogether suspended and repealed, such 
repeal to take effect from the time of said satisfactory evi- 
dence being received by the President. This bill, its author 
believed, offered to Great Britain exactly what she had offered 
to the United States the year before and did it in milder terms 
than the original bill submitted by the Committee on Com- 
merce.®^ 
Certainly the two bills differed more in spirit than in actual 
content. Both provided that, for a period, British vessels 
should continue to be admitted into the United States from the 
interdicted colonial ports, subject only to the discriminating 
duties on tonnage and cargoes. The new bill simply extended 
this period for three months longer. Both provided that the acts 
of 1823, 1820, and 1818 should be repealed in case Great 
Britain should revoke her order in council and should admit 
American vessels to her colonies on the terms of the British 
act of 1825. The changes introduced into the new bill were 
due to the desire to conciliate Great Britain and perhaps, at 
Register of Debates, III, 403. 
83 Ibid. 
^^Ibid., Ill, 403, 1501. 
83 /bid.. Ill, 417. 
