to you. I will suppose that you have the capitals and raw materials for establishing manufactories of your own; I will suppose one-third of your peasants and sailors changed by a presto into weavers, combers, fullers, whitesmiths, &c. &c.; I will suppose the manufactories going on, and all of you inspired with patriotism enough to be happy, dressed in the work of their hands; I will suppose, in short, that you no longer stand in need of British manufactures. This is allowing my adversaries every thing they can ask, and all I ask of them in return, is to allow me, that Great Britain stands in no need of your manufactures. If they do not refuse me this, as I think they cannot, I have not the least doubt but I shall prove, that cutting off all communication between the countries, would injure you more than Great Britain.
The imports being prohibited on each side, and both being able to do without them, the injury must arise from the stoppage being put to the exports; and as Great Britain sells you much more than you sell her, the patriots maintain that this stoppage would do her more harm than it would you. This was the shield and buckler of Mr. Madison. He compared the United States to a country gentleman, and Great Britain to a pedlar; and declared that you might do without her, but that she could not do without you.
How illusive this is we shall see in a minute. It is a maxim of commerce, that the exports of a nation are the source of her riches, and that, in proportion as you take from that source, she is injured and enfeebled; hence it follows, that cutting off the communication between Great Britain and you, would injure her more than you, in proportion to the balance now in her favour; that is to say, if the total of her exports and the total of your exports were to the same amount. But this is far from being the case: your exports amount to no more than twenty millions of dollars, or thereabouts, nine millions of which go to Great Britain and her dominions, while the exports of Great Britain amount to one hundred millions of dollars, no more than fifteen millions of which come to the United States. Suppose, then, all communication cut off at once; you would lose nine-twentieths of your exports, while Great Britain would lose only fifteen-hundredths of hers: so that, if there be any truth in arithmetic, you would injure yourselves three times as much as you would her.
If what I have advanced on the subject be correct, “the nature and extent of your exports” do not give you a power “to demand, to exact, to compel,” what conditions you please in your commercial relations with Great Britain; and it follows, of course, that Franklin and the citizens of the Boston town-meeting are mistaken.
Art. XVI. Relates to consuls.
This article has not been meddled with as yet.
Art. XVII. Permits, or rather expressly stipulates, for what is allowed by the law of nations, the seizing of an enemy’s property on board the vessels of either party.
Art. XVIII. Specifies what are contraband articles, and settles an honourable and equitable system of seizure.
As these two articles have been objected to by nobody but the agents of France, as they seem to affect the French more than anybody else, and as that august diet, the Convention, may be at this time debating on the subject, it would be presumption in the extreme for me to hazard an opinion on it.
Art. XIX. Provides for the protection of the vessels and property of the subjects and citizens of the contracting parties.
I have heard nothing urged against this article.
Art. XX. Stipulates that the two contracting parties will not only refuse to receive pirates into their ports &c., but that they will do the utmost in their power to bring them to punishment.
Without objection, for any thing I have heard.
Art. XXI. Stipulates that the subjects and citizens of each of the contracting parties shall not commit violence on those of the other party, nor serve in the fleets or armies, or accept of commissions from its enemies.
Some of the friends of neutrality object to this, as it prevents them from assisting the French, and from making war upon Great Britain for the future, under the cloak of neutrality.
Art. XXII. Stipulates that no act of reprisal shall take place between the parties, unless justice has first been demanded and refused, or unreasonably delayed.
This is opposed by the friends of sequestration and confiscation, as it would give people time to shelter their property from the claws of the patriots.
Art. XXIII, XXIV, and XXV, Provide certain regulations concerning ships of war, privateers, and prizes taken from the enemies of the contracting parties.
Much was said about these articles, till it was proved that they were copied from the treaty of commerce made between France and England since the American war, since your treaty with France. This was a circumstance that the patriots, who are none of the best read in such things, were not aware of.
Art. XXVI. Provides for the security and tranquillity of the subjects and citizens of the two parties living in the territory of each other at the breaking out of a war.
This article has escaped censure.
Art. XXVII. Stipulates for the giving up of murderers and forgers.
From the description of the persons who have hitherto opposed the treaty, and from the futility of the reasons they have given for their opposition, there is every reason to imagine that great part of them object (in the bottom of their hearts) to this article only. If this be the case, it is pity the article was introduced. Forgers and murderers, if left to themselves for a time after their flight, would not fail to meet the fate which the article was made to ensure to them, and it is little matter in what country they suffer.
Art. XXVIII. Relates to the duration of the foregoing ones, and the ratification of the treaty.
This article, which ends the treaty, is of such a nature as to admit of no objection.
Now, you will observe that it is not my intention to render this treaty palatable to you; I shall not insist, therefore, that the terms of it are as advantageous as you might wish or expect them to be; but I insist that they are as advantageous as you ought to have expected. Great Britain grants you favours she has never granted to any other nation; and that no other nation, not even your sister republic, has granted you. Nor can it be said that in return, you grant her favours which you have not granted to other nations; several favours granted to France you have still withheld from Great Britain, even if the present treaty goes into effect. Great Britain does not, then, receive favours, as it has been absurdly asserted, but she grants them.
I cannot dismiss this part of my subject without observing, that Charles Fox made in the British Parliament exactly the same objections to the treaty as the patriots in this country have made. It was humiliating to Great Britain, he said. Unfortunate, indeed, must be the negotiators who have made a treaty humiliating to both the contracting parties! Mr. Fox’s censure is the best comment in the world on that of the American patriots, and theirs on his.
I now come to the third object of the censure of Franklin: the conduct of the President relative to the treaty.
III. That, supposing the terms of the treaty to be what every good American ought to approve, yet the conduct of the President, relative to the negotiation and promulgation of it, has been highly improper and even monarchical, and for which he deserves to be impeached.
Franklin has not obliged the world with articles of impeachment regularly drawn up; but, as far as can be gathered from his letters, he would have the chief magistrate of the union impeached: 1st, for having appointed Mr. Jay as Envoy Extraordinary; 2nd, for having appointed an Envoy
