the points could be more easily collected into a focus by treaty, than by separate acts, which might want explanation, and not at once convey the desired understanding. This having failed, congress was called upon to legislate farther upon the subject. He trusted that its efforts might not prove unavailing. Although Great Britain had endeavoured to advance her northern colonies at our expense, and to impair our commercial prosperity; he hoped that by firm and mild measures, we should be able to retain, if not to advance our present condition. Thinking, that the result desired was to be reached by a frank and manly course, and that our terms both in case of a removal of her restrictions, and of their continuance, ought to be presented in any bill, which congress should pass upon the subject, he should vote against the amendment of the gentleman from Maryland.

MR. JOHNSTON, of Louisiana, said that his duty, as chairman of the committee, in defending the bill, was rendered more difficult, by the extraordinary conduct of the senator from Maryland. That gentleman had distinctly stated, a few minutes previous to the debate, that he approved of the bill, and would sustain it in the senate. He felt therefore much surprised at his motion to strike the interdict from the bill; and his astonishment was not diminished by the studied and

premeditated nature of his attack upon the bill and the report.

He had placed his amendment upon the ground, that this country was in the wrong, and that some act of conciliation was due from us.

He (Mr. J.) thought otherwise. It has been the settled policy of this country, to regulate the terms of its commercial intercourse with other nations, upon terms of equa. lity and reciprocity; to meet them in every act of friendship or hostility, and to be governed by an exact scale of justice.

Such were the principles laid down in the celebrated report of Mr. Jefferson in 1803, which contains the great system of reciprocity, adopted by the government of the United States. He hoped the gentleman from Maryland, and his friends, would look to those principles as their guide, and not to temporary expedients: to meet Great Britain in the true spirit of the nation, and not by humiliating his country before her. Let him remember, that submission never set bounds to encroachment—that free trade is not the proper return for restriction and prohibition; and will not produce their repeal. These principles were violently op. posed in their day, and by arguments similar to his own. They have been adhered to until now, and by abandoning them, we degrade the country, destroy our character for consistent policy, yield

up the trade, and with it the power of controlling it—in the vain hope of operating on British magnanimity.

Mr. Johnston then reviewed the history of this controversy, up to the commencement of the present administration, and came to the conclusion, that up to that time, there was no error, except a common error of restriction on both sides, a mutual error, arising from too much attention to the means of legal protection of what should be left open to the competition of skill and enterprise.

Shortly before the commence. ment of the present administration, a negotiation on that subject had been closed, and propositions mutually exchanged, with an understanding that the negotiation was to be renewed. The present secretary of state, on coming into office, found himself obliged to prepare voluminous instructions for various ministers, and, among others, to the minister at London, on the slave convention, the north eastern boundary, the north west coast, the navigation of the St. Lawrence, and the colonial trade. Instructions were given on some of these subjects, and full powers on all. The slave convention, being the most pressing, was first attended to; but on the colonial question, inasmuch as it was important to settle it definitively, the secretary of state, unwilling to act

solely on his own judgment, sought information from the most distinguished commercial men in the country; and among them, from the gentleman from Maryland himself: and I ask him, if he does not know, that the delay so much complained of, did proceed from the desire of obtaining this information, so as to enable this government to meet the views of the British government, without compromitting our navigating interests ?

Besides, the acts of 1825, which were passed after our minister had left this country for London, entirely changed the state of affairs, and would have rendered any instructions, founded upon the then existing laws, entirely inapplicable.

He could not discover, in any of the transactions connected with this subject, any thing to impair his confidence in the government of his country, or to diminish his belief in its justice and liberality; and he did not envy the senator from Maryland the ungracious task he had undertaken, of putting his own country in the wrong-a task painful to his pride and patriotism, in proportion as he may esteem himself successful in the effort.

It is said, that the interdict contains a menace, and that Great Britain will not act under a menace of coercion. The interdict is the necessary consequence of her own acts. She knew that by a stand

ing law of this country, it was made the duty of the president, to close our ports whenever she closed hers. By excluding our vessels from her colonial ports while she opened them to the rest of the world, she exposed herself to this act of retaliation. It was the necessary effect of her own law. If viewed, therefore, as a menace, it has existed since 1823, and would require a new act of legislation to prevent its operation. With a view to prevent this offensive retaliation, we propose to suspend this act until the 30th of September, to allow Great Britain time to determine on her course. We all agree that the terms are liberal, and that we can offer nothing more; and that if she refuses, an interdict must follow. It is a simple question of time. In his opinion, the interdiction should have followed instantly upon theirs. Their colonies would then have immediately felt its effcct, while our trade would have scarcely suffered from the derange. ment. Our vessels would have merely changed the direction of their voyages.

By the amendment, our ports are left open during the whole year to British vessels. They will, consequently, supply their colonies, and deprive our vessels not only of the colonial trade,but of that trade which would grow out of the suppression of the direct intercourse. On the 1st of

January, their colonies will be supplied for six months; at the expiration of which period, they will receive the supplies of Canada, and two years will elapse before they will in any way feel the effect of our interdict. In the mean time, our vessels will be thrown out of employment, or be compelled to enter on other pursuits. In fine, the postponement for one year is nearly equivalent to the entire loss, and is an abandonment of our principles and our interest. The interdict proposes to do prospectively, what Great Britain has already done. It proposes to suspend for six months, the operation of a positive law, from motives of respect for her. But this is not enough. We must humiliate our country, by confessing our errors, withdrawing our interdict, and making our submission.

Great Britain has placed herself where she was in 1818, claiming a monopoly of the colonial trade. We stand with our ports opened, by the law of 1823, and we propose to do what we did, under like circumstances, in 1818 and 1820. The amendment is an abandonment of those principles. It is a retrograde movement-a sacrifice of principle to temporary expedients, and is marked by a total want of consistency and firmness. No alternative is left to us but submission or interdiction; and as the latter is

demanded by our interest, our principles, and our honour, he should oppose the amendment. Mr. BRANCH, of North Carolina, said that, we were bound first to meet the British government on conciliatory grounds. The amende honorable was due from this government to Great Britain, and he hoped its first act would be, to acknowledge that this country had been wrong. Let us do this in kindness, and tender friendly terms to the British government. If they then rejected them, they would have assumed the fault; and the blame, let what might ensue, would not attach to this government. Such an acknowledgment was no more, than the committee and this government had already made; and congress should not shrink from making it, lest it should shock the morbid sensibility of the powers that be.

MR. HOLMES was in favour of offering to Great Britain, an alternative, so that if the terms offered by the amendment of Gen. Smith were not acceded to by the first of August, the intercourse with the British colonies should be put an end to, by a proclamation from the president. He thought the amendment conceded too much, and proposed no ulterior measures. He accordingly offered an amendment to that effect, but it was rejected by a vote of 32 to 13.

Mr. HOLMES also offered an

amendment, for the purpose of making the non-intercourse with the British colonies general; and with that view, he moved to strike out the words "by sea," from the reported bill, which amendment was adopted by a vote of 32 to 12.

Mr. MACON said, he wished to obtain our object peaceably, and he understood the amendment of Gen. Smith to be an offer on the part of the United States, to accede to terms formerly offered by Great Britain, and rejected by us. He wished to make that offer to the British government, before this country went any farther.

Mr. VAN BUREN imputed the dif ficulty to the executive department of the government, upon whom he also charged the failure of the act, brought forward at the first session of the present congress. He asserted, that in 1824 the British government offered in substance the same terms, that the United States determined to accept in 1826; and asked the reason of a delay of two years in coming to a conclusion, which should not have taken as many months. In the mean time, the British ministry had changed its mind, and prescribed the terms of the intercourse by the acts of 1825. He protested against the responsibility of this failure being imputed to the senate. It belonged to the executive, and it was to be regretted that, by its too great wish to obtain some eclat in settling this