of their country remained free. Their own strength could achieve for them what the national power refused or was unable to obtain. Twenty thousand effective men, west of the Alleghanies, were ready to rush to the mouth of the Mississippi, and drive the Spaniards into the sea. Great Britain stood with open arms to receive them. If not countenanced and succored by the federal government, their allegiance would be thrown off, and the United States would find too late that they were as ignorant of the great valley of the Mississippi, as England was of the Atlantic States when the contest for independence began.1 1 See the documents laid before Congress, April 13, 1787. Secret Journals, IV. 315-328. On the 30th of January, 1787, Mr. Jefferson thus writes to Mr. Madison, from Paris: "If these transactions give me no uneasiness, I feel very differently at another piece of intelligence, to wit, the possibility that the navigation of the Mississippi may be abandoned to Spain. I never had any interest westward of the Alleghany; and I never will have any. But I have had great opportunities of knowing the character of the people who inhabit that country; and I will venture to say, that the act which abandons the navigation of the Mississippi is an act of separation between the Eastern and Western country. It is a relinquishment of five parts out of eight of the territory of the United States; an abandonment of the fairest subject for the payment of our public debts, and the chaining 41 VOL. I. those debts on our own necks, in perpetuam. I have the utmost confidence in the honest intentions of those who concur in this measure; but I lament their want of acquaintance with the character and physical advantages of the people, who, right or wrong, will suppose their interests sacrificed on this occasion to the contrary interests of that part of the Confederacy in possession of present power. If they declare themselves a separate people, we are incapable of a single effort to retain them. Our citizens can never be induced, either as militia or as soldiers, to go there to cut the throats of their own brothers and sons, or rather, to be themselves the subjects instead of the perpetrators of the parricide. Nor would that country quit the cost of being retained against the will of its inhabitants, could it be done. But it cannot be done. They are able already to rescue the naviga Such was the feeling that prevailed in the Western country, as soon as it became known that a treaty was actually pending, by which the right to navigate the Mississippi might be suspended for a quarter of a century. That it should have been accompanied by acts of retaliation and outrage against the property of Spanish subjects, was naturally to have been expected. General George Rogers Clarke, pretending to authority from the State of Virginia, undertook to enlist men and establish a garrison at Port St. Vincennes, ostensibly for the protection of the district of Kentucky, then under the jurisdiction of Virginia. He made a seizure there of some Spanish goods for the purpose of clothing and subsisting his men, and sent an officer to the Illinois, to advise the settlers there of the seizures of American property made at Natchez, and to recommend them to retaliate for any outrages the Spaniards might commit in that country.1 The executive of Virginia disavowed these acts, as soon as officially informed of them; ordered the parties to be brought to punishment; and sent a formal tion of the Mississippi out of the hands of Spain, and to add New Orleans to their own territory. They will be joined by the inhabitants of Louisiana. This will bring on a war between them and Spain; and that will produce the question with us, whether it will not be worth our while to become parties with them in the war, in order to reunite them with us, and And were thus correct our error. 1 Secret Journals, IV. 311-313. disclaimer, through their delegates in Congress, to the Spanish Minister.1 Guardoqui was not disturbed. He expected these occurrences, and maintained his ground, refusing to yield the right of navigating the river; and having assented to Mr. Jay's proposal of an article which suspended the use for a period of twenty-five years, he was quite ready to go on and conclude the treaty. The people of the Western country, however, began to form committees of correspondence, in order to unite their counsels and interests.2 The inhabitants of Kentucky sent a memorial to the General Assembly of Virginia, which induced them to instruct their delegates in Congress to oppose any attempt to surrender the right of the United States to the free use of the Mississippi, as a dishonorable departure from the comprehensive and benevolent feeling that constituted the vital principle of the Confederation, and as provoking the just resentment and reproaches of the Western people, whose essential rights and interests would be thereby sacrificed. They also instructed their delegates to urge such negotiations with Spain as would obtain her consent to regulations for the mutual and common use of the river. The members from Virginia, with one exception, concurred in the policy of these instructions,* 1 February 28, 1787. 2 Madison. Elliot's Debates, V. 97. 3 These instructions were adopted in November, 1786. Pitkin, II. 207. They were laid before Con gress, April 19, 1787. Madison. Elliot's Debates, V. 103. 4 Henry Lee did not approve of this policy. See Washington's Works, IX. 205, note. and at first addressed themselves to some conciliatory expedient for obviating the effect of the vote of seven States. They first represented to Guardoqui that it would be extremely impolitic, both for the United States and Spain, to make any treaty which should have the effect of shutting up the Mississippi. They stated to him, that such a treaty could not be enforced; that it would be the means of peopling the Western country with increased rapidity, and would tend to a separation of that country from the rest of the Union; that Great Britain would be able to turn the force that would spring up there against Spanish America; and that the result would be the creation of a power in the valley of the Mississippi hostile both to Spain and the United States. These representations produced no impression. The Spanish Minister remained firm in the position which he had held from the first, that Spain never would concede the claim of the United States to navigate the river. He answered, that the result of what had been urged was, that Congress could make no treaty at all, and consequently that the trade of the United States must remain liable to be excluded from the ports of Spain.1 Foiled in this quarter, the next expedient, for those who felt the necessity of preventing such a 1 See Madison's account of two interviews with Guardoqui, March 13 and 19, 1787. Elliot, V. 98, 100. At the first of these interviews. Guardoqui stated that he had had no conference with Mr. Jay since the previous October, and never expected to confer with him again, treaty as had been contemplated, was to gain time, by transferring the negotiation to Madrid; and Mr. Madison introduced a resolution into Congress for this purpose, which was referred to the Secretary for Foreign Affairs. In a few days, the Secretary re ported against the proposal, and nothing remained for the opponents of the treaty, but to attack directly the vote of seven States, under which the Secretary had acted in proceeding to adjust with the Spanish Minister an article for suspending the right of the United States to the common use of the river below their southern boundary. The Articles of Confederation expressly declared, that the United States should not enter into any treaty or alliance, unless nine States in Congress assented to the same. It was very justly contended, therefore, that, to proceed to negotiate a treaty au thorized by a vote of only seven States, would expose the United States to great embarrassment with the other contracting party, since the vote made it certain that the treaty could not be constitutionally ratified; and that the vote itself, having passed in a case requiring the assent of nine States, was not valid for the purpose intended by it. This was not 1 April 18, 1787. Madison. Elliot, V. 102. On the next day (April 19) the instructions of Virginia were laid before Congress, but a motion to refer them also to the Secretary was lost, Massachusetts and New York voting against it, and Connecticut being divided. Ibid. When Mr. Jay's report came under consideration, Mr. |