A long and protracted discussion has already taken place between the two Governments in relation to the claim of France under the eighth article of the Louisiana convention, the result of which has been a thorough conviction on the part of the American Government that the claim has no foundation in the treaty whatever. The reasons for this conviction have been so fully set forth in the discussion that it was not anticipated a further examination of it would be thought desirable. As a subject of discussion, however, the American Government is willing to resume it whenever it may suit the views of France to present further considerations relating to it; but while convinced that the claim is entirely without foundation, they can not place it on a footing of concurrent negotiation with claims of their citizens, the justice of which is so unequivocal that they have not even been made the subject of denial.
From the attention which His Excellency the Viscount de Chateaubriand has intimated his willingness to give to the consideration of these claims the President indulges the hope that they will be taken into view upon their own merits, and in that hope the representative of the United States at Paris will at an early day be instructed to present them again to the undivided and unconditional sense of the justice of France.
I pray you, sir, to accept the renewed assurance of my distinguished consideration.
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.
[Extract of a letter from Mr, Sheldon (No. 2) to Mr, Adams, dated Paris, October 16, 1823.]
I took an early occasion after the receipt of your dispatch No. 1, of the 10th August, to communicate the subjects of it in a conversation I had with Viscount de Chateaubriand. His observations in relation to that of the claims, as connected with the pretensions of France under the Louisiana treaty, were of a very general nature and amounted to little more than a repetition of his readiness to enter upon the consideration of whatever subjects of discussion might exist between the two countries and the expression of his satisfaction at the prospect of being soon relieved from the labor which the affairs of Spain had thrown upon him, and having thus more time to devote to those of the United States and others not of the same pressing nature. He avoided any intimation of a disposition to take up the claims by themselves, and it can hardly be expected that the French Government will at this time relax from the ground they have so lately taken upon that point. I informed him that I should communicate in writing an answer to the overture made by Count de Menou at Washington for uniting in a new negotiation this subject with that of the Louisiana treaty, in substance the same as that gentleman had already received there, and should again press upon the French Government the consideration of the claims by themselves; to which he replied that any communication I might make would be received and treated with all the attention to which it was entitled on his part.
Mr. Sheldon to the Viscount de Chateaubriand.
PARIS, October 11, 1823.
SIR: Mr. Gallatin, during his residence as minister of the United States in France, had upon various occasions called the attention of His Majesty's Government to the claims of our citizens for the reparation of wrongs sustained by them from the unjust seizure, detention, and confiscation of their property by officers and agents acting under authority of the Government of France. During the past year His Majesty's ministers had consented to enter upon the consideration of these claims, but they proposed to couple with it another subject having no connection with those claims, either in its nature, its origin, or the principles on which it depended—a question of the disputed construction of one of the articles of the treaty of cession of Louisiana, by virtue of which France claimed certain commercial privileges in the ports of that Province. Mr. Gallatin had not received from his Government any authority to connect these two dissimilar subjects in the same negotiation, or, indeed, to treat upon the latter, which had already been very amply discussed at Washington between the Secretary of State of the United States and His Majesty's minister at that place, without producing any result except a conviction on the part of the Government of the United States that the privileges for French vessels, as claimed by the minister of France, never could have been, and were not in fact, conceded by the treaty in question. A stop was then put to the negotiations already commenced in relation to the claims, and with which had been united, on the proposition of the French Government, and as being naturally connected with it, the consideration of certain claims of French citizens on the Government of the United States.
The chargé d'affaires of France at Washington has lately, on behalf of his Government, expressed to that of the United States a wish that this double negotiation might be resumed and that a definitive arrangement might be made as well in relation to the disputed article of the Louisiana treaty as of the subject of the claims upon the one side and upon the other. The Government of the United States has nothing more at heart than to remove by friendly arrangements every subject of difference which may exist between the two countries, and to examine with the greatest impartiality and good faith as well the nature and extent of the stipulations into which they have entered as the appeals to their justice made by individuals claiming reparation for wrongs supposed to have been sustained at their hands.