The letter of the 27th instant, with which you have honored me, has been laid before the President, and that part of it which contains your observations on this subject has been particularly attended to. The respect due to whatever comes from you, friendship for the French nation, and justice to all, have induced him to re-examine the subject, and particularly to give your representations thereon, the consideration they deservedly claim. After fully weighing again, however, all the principles and circumstances of the case, the result appears still to be, that it is the right of every nation to prohibit acts of sovereignty from being exercised by any other within its limits; and the duty of a neutral nation to prohibit such as would injure one of the warring powers; that the granting military commissions within the United States by any other authority than their own, it is an infringement on their sovereignty, and particularly so when granted to their own citizens to lead them to acts contrary to the duties they owe their own country; that the departure of vessels thus illegally equipped from the ports of the United States, will be but an acknowledgment of respect analogous to the breach of it, while it is necessary on their part, as an evidence of their faithful neutrality. On these considerations, Sir, the President thinks that the United States owe it to themselves and to the nations in their friendship, to expect this act of reparation on the part of vessels, marked in their very equipment with offence to the laws of the land, of which the laws of nations makes an integral part.
The expressions of friendly sentiments which we have already had the satisfaction of receiving from you, leave no room to doubt that the conclusion of the President being thus made known to you, these vessels will be permitted to give no further umbrage by their presence in the ports of the United States.
I have the honor to be, with sentiments of perfect esteem and respect, Sir, your most obedient, and most humble servant.
TO MR. HAMMOND.
Philadelphia, June 5, 1793.
Sir,—In the letter which I had the honor of writing you on the 15th of May, in answer to your several memorials of the 8th of that month, I mentioned that the President reserved for further consideration, a part of the one which related to the equipment of two privateers in the port of Charleston. The part alluded to, was that wherein you express your confidence that the executive government of the United States would pursue measures for repressing such practices in future, and for restoring to their rightful owners any captures, which such privateers might bring into the ports of the United States.
The President, after a full investigation of this subject and the most mature consideration, has charged me to communicate to you, that the first part of this application is found to be just, and that effectual measures are taken for preventing repetitions of the act therein complained of; but that the latter part, desiring restitution of the prizes, is understood to be inconsistent with the rules which govern such cases, and would, therefore, be unjustifiable towards the other party.
The principal agents in this transaction were French citizens. Being within the United States at the moment a war broke out between their own and another country, they determine to go into its defence; they purchase, they arm and equip a vessel with their own money, man it themselves, receive a regular commission from their nation, depart out of the United States, and then commence hostilities by capturing a vessel. If, under these circumstances, the commission of the captors was valid, the property, according to the laws of war, was by the capture transferred to them, and it would be an aggression on their nation, for the United States to rescue it from them, whether on the high seas or on coming into their ports. If the commission was not valid, and, consequently, the property not transferred by the laws of war to the captors, then the case would have been cognizable in our courts of admiralty, and the owners might have gone thither for redress. So that on neither supposition, would the executive be justifiable in interposing.
With respect to the United States, the transaction can be in nowise imputed to them. It was the first moment of the war, in one of their most distant ports, before measures could be provided by the government to meet all the cases which such a state of things was to produce, impossible to have been known, and therefore, impossible to have been prevented by that government.