Note 88 — Chapter II

As it may be important that the reader should understand the title to Louisiana under which the boundary of the Rio Grande was claimed, the following is a summary of its history. Louisiana originally belonged to France, but by a secret compact between that country and Spain in 1762, and by treaties, in the following year, between France, Spain, and England, the French dominion was extinguished on all the continent of America. In consequence of the treaty between this country and England in 1783, the Mississippi became the western boundary of the United States from its source to the 31° of north latitude, and thence, on the same parallel to the St. Mary's. France, it will be remembered, always had claimed dominion in Louisiana to the Rio Bravo or Rio Grande, by virtue

1st. Of the discovery of the Mississippi from near its source to the ocean.

2d. Of the possession taken, and establishment made by La Salle, at the bay of St. Bernard, west of the rivers Trinity and Colorado, by authority of Louis XIV, in 1685; notwithstanding the subsequent destruction of the colony.

3d. Of the charter of Louis XIV, to Crozat in 1712.

4th. The historical authority of Du Pratz, Champigny, and the Count de Vergennes.

5th. Of the authority of De Lisle's map, and of the map published in 1762 by Don Thomas Lopez, geographer to the king of Spain, as well as of various other maps, atlases, and geographical and historical authorities.

By an article of the secret treaty of San Ildefonso, in October, 1800, Spain retroceded Louisiana to France; yet this treaty was not promulgated till the beginning of 1802. The paragraph of cession is as follows: "His Catholic majesty engages to retrocede to the French republic, six months after the full and entire execution of the conditions and stipulations above recited relative to his Royal Highness, the Duke of Parma, the colony and province of Louisiana, with the same extent that it already has in the hands of Spain, and that it had when France possessed it, and such as it should be, after the treaties passed subsequently between Spain and other powers." In 1803, Bonaparte, the first consul of the French republic, ceded Louisiana to the United States, as fully and in the same manner as it had been retroceded to France by Spain in the treaty of San Ildefonso; and, by virtue of this grant, Messieurs Madison, Monroe, Adams, Clay, Van Buren, and Jackson contended that the original limits of the state had been the Rio Grande. However, by the 3rd article of our treaty with Spain in 1819, all our pretensions to extend the territory of Louisiana towards Mexico or the Rio Grande, were resigned and abandoned by adopting the River Sabine as our southern confine in that quarter. See Lyman's diplomacy of the United States. Vol. 1, p. 368, and vol. 2, p. 136.

The following extract from a valuable letter with which the author was favored by Ex-President Adams, who, as secretary of state, conducted the negotiations with Spain, will explain his opinions and acts upon a subject of so much importance.

Quincy, 7th July, 1847.

"Whoever sets out with an inquiry respecting the right of territories in the American hemisphere claimed by Europeans, must begin by settling certain conventional principles of right and wrong before he can enter upon the discussion.

"For example what right had Columbus to Cat Island, otherwise called Guanahani? Who has the right to it now and how came they by it? The flag of St. George and the Dragon now waves over it; but who had the right to take possession of it because Christopher Columbus found it,—the paltriest island in the midst of the ocean. European statesmen, warriors, and writers on what are called the laws of nations, have laid down a system of laws upon which they found this right. Have the Carribee Indians, in whose possession that Island was discovered by Columbus, ever assented to that system of right and wrong?

"You remember that Hume, in commencing his history of England by the Roman conquest says—"that without seeking any more justifiable reasons of hostility than were employed by the later Europeans in subjecting the Africans and the Americans, they sent over an army under the command of Plautius, an able general, who gained some victories, and made a considerable progress in subduing the inhabitants." Then, no European has ever had any better right to take possession of America, than Julius Cæsar and the Romans had to take possession of the island of Britain.

"What then was the right either of France or Spain to the possession of the province of Texas? To come to any question of right between the parties upon the subject you must agree upon certain conventional principles: where and when your question of right must become applicable to the facts; and, as between them, it was a disputed question, and had been so from the discovery of the mouth of the Mississippi river by La Salle, and from his second expedition to find the mouth of the Mississippi coming from the ocean, in which he perished.

"Spain had prior claims to the country, but the claim of France was founded upon the last voyage of La Salle, and by extending a supposed derivative right, from the spot where La Salle landed half way to the nearest Spanish settlement.

"Mr. Monroe and Mr. Charles Pinckney, in their correspondence with Cevallos, assumed this as a settled principle between European nations, in the discussion of right to American territory. It was not contested, but was not assented to on the part of Spain; and, having found it laid down by Messieurs Monroe and Pinckney, I argued upon it, and it was never directly answered by Don Luis De Onis, who could not controvert it without going to the Pope's Bull.[89]

"As between France and Spain therefore, I maintained that the question of right, had always been disputed and never was settled, from which opinion I have not since varied. That we had a shadow of right beyond the Sabine I never believed since the conclusion of the Florida treaty, and, it is from the date of that treaty, that Great Britain had not a shadow of right upon the Oregon territory until we have been pleased to confer it upon her."

"I am, dear sir, with great respect, your very obedient servant,

J. Q. ADAMS."

To Brantz Mayer, Esq., Baltimore."