After all the provocation which the President had received, as the representative of his country, what was his conduct? It might have been supposed that this violent man, as the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Southard) has designated him, would at once have recommended decisive measures. Judging from his energy,—from his well-known devotion to the interests of his country,—and above all, from his famous declaration to ask nothing from foreign nations but what was right, and to submit to nothing wrong, I should have expected from him an indignant message at the commencement of the next session of Congress. Instead of that, the message of December, 1833, in relation to French affairs, is of the mildest character. It breathes a spirit of confident hope that our ancient ally would do us justice during the next session of the Chambers. His exposition of the subject is concluded by the following declaration:
“As this subject involves important interests, and has attracted a considerable share of the public attention, I have deemed it proper to make this explicit statement of its actual condition; and should I be disappointed in the hope now entertained, the subject will be again brought to the notice of Congress in such a manner as the occasion may require.”
And thus ends the first act of this astonishing historical drama. Throughout the whole of it, beginning, middle and end, the French government, and not the French Chambers, were exclusively to blame.
We have now arrived at the mission of Mr. Livingston. He reached Paris in September, 1833. The Duc de Broglie assured him “that the king’s government would willingly and without hesitation promise to direct the deliberations of the Chambers to the projet de loi relative to the execution of the convention of July 4, 1831, on the day after the Chamber is constituted, and to employ every means to secure the happy conclusion of an affair, the final determination of which the United States cannot desire more ardently than ourselves.” After this assurance, and after all that had passed, it was confidently expected that the king would, in strong terms, have recommended the adoption of the appropriation by the Chambers. In this we were again doomed to disappointment. In his opening speech he made no direct allusion to the subject. He simply says, that, “the financial laws, and those required for the execution of treaties, will be presented to you.”
The bill was presented, and debated, and finally rejected by the Chamber of Deputies on the 1st day of April, 1834, by a vote of 176 to 168. It is not my present purpose to dwell upon the causes of this rejection. No doubt the principal one was that the French ministers were surrounded near the conclusion of the debate, and were unable at the moment to show that the captures at St. Sebastians were not included in our treaty with Spain. I am sorry they were not better prepared upon this point; but I attribute to them no blame on that account.
It has been urged over and over again, both on this floor and elsewhere, that the rejection of the treaty was occasioned by the publication in this country of Mr. Rives’s letter to Mr. Livingston of the 8th of July, 1831. Is this the fact? If it be so it ought to be known to the world. If it be not, both the character of this Government and of Mr. Rives should be rescued from the imputation. What is the opinion expressed in this letter? Is it that the American claimants would obtain, under the treaty, more than the amount of their just claims? No such thing. Is it that they would obtain the amount of their just claims with interest? Not even this. The negotiator merely expresses the opinion that they would receive every cent of the principal. He does not allege that they would receive one cent of interest for a delay of nearly a quarter of a century. This opinion is evidently founded upon that expressed by Mr. Gallatin in a despatch dated on the 14th January, 1822, cited by Mr. Rives, in which the former expresses his belief that five millions of dollars would satisfy all our just claims. It ought to be observed that the sum stipulated to be paid by the treaty is only 25,000,000 of francs, or about $4,700,000; and that more than nine years had elapsed between the date of Mr. Gallatin’s despatch and the signing of the treaty. These facts all appear on the face of the letter, with the additional fact that the statements of the claimants, which have from time to time been presented to Congress, carry the amount of the claims much higher. These statements, however, Mr. Rives did not believe were a safe guide.
This is the amount of the letter, when fairly analyzed, which, it is alleged, destroyed the treaty before the French Chambers. If a copy of it had been placed in the hands of every Deputy, it could not possibly have produced any such effect.
That it did not occasion the rejection of the treaty is absolutely certain. I have examined the whole debate for the purpose of discovering any allusion to this letter; but I have examined it in vain. Not the slightest trace of the letter can be detected in any of the numerous speeches delivered on that occasion. The topics of opposition were various, and several of them of a strange character; but the letter is not even once alluded to throughout the whole debate. If its existence were known at the time in the French Chamber, this letter, written by a minister to his own government, expressing a favorable opinion of the result of his own negotiations, was a document of a character so natural, so much to be expected, that not one Deputy in opposition to the treaty believed it to be of sufficient importance even to merit a passing notice. Still, I have often thought it strange it had never been mentioned in the debate. The mystery is now resolved. The truth is, this letter, which is alleged to have produced such fatal effects, was entirely unknown to the members of the French Chamber when they rejected the treaty. This fact is well established by a letter from Mr. Jay, the chairman of the committee appointed by the Chamber of Deputies to investigate our claims, addressed to Mr. Gibbes, and dated at Paris on the 24th January, 1835. I shall read it.
(Extract of a letter from Mr. Jay to Mr. Gibbes, dated 24th January, 1835.)—“It is asserted in the American prints that the rejection of the American treaty by the Chamber of Deputies, at their last session, was chiefly owing to the publication of a letter from Mr. Rives to his own Government. This is an error, which justice to that distinguished statesman, and a sense of his unremitting exertions to promote the interests of his Government while here, induce me formally to contradict. No such evidence appears in the debates; and in none of my conversations with the members have I heard his letter alleged as the motive for disputing the amount due. I much question, indeed, if any other Deputy than myself ever read the letter alluded to.”
We have now arrived at that point of time when a majority of the French Chambers arrayed themselves against the treaty. This decision was made on the 1st April, 1834. Some apprehensions then prevailed among the king and his ministers. The business was now becoming serious. New assurances had now become necessary to prevent the President from presenting the whole transaction to Congress, which they knew would still be in session, when the information of the rejection would reach the United States. In his annual message, at the commencement of the session, it will be recollected, he had declared that should he be disappointed in the hope then entertained, he would again bring the subject before Congress, in such a manner as the occasion might require. They knew that he was a man who performed his promises, and a great effort was to be made to induce him to change his purpose.