PROCEEDINGS AND DEBATES

THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES,

AT THE SECOND SESSION OF THE FIFTEENTH CONGRESS, BEGUN AT THE CITY OF WASHINGTON, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 1818.

PRENTISS MELLEN, appointed a Senator by the Mr. MACON reported, from the joint committee, Legislature of the State of Massachusetts, to that they had waited on the President of the Unisupply the vacancy occasioned by the resigna-ted States, and that the President of the United tion of Eli P. Ashmun; WILLIAM A. PALMER, States informed the committee, that he would appointed a Senator by the Legislature of the make a communication to the two Houses this State of Vermont, to supply the vacancy occa- day.

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Mr. MORRIL Submitted the following motion for consideration; which was read:

NOVEMBER, 1818.

Resolved, That Mountjoy Bayly, Doorkeeper and Sergeant-at-Arms to the Senate, be, and he hereby is, authorized to employ one assistant and two horses, for the purpose of performing such services as are usually required by the Doorkeeper of the Senate, which ex-fied by it; but no arrangement has yet been made for pense shall be paid out of the contingent fund.

Ordered, That it pass to the second reading. The engrossed resolution for the appointment of a joint Library Committee, was read a third time, and passed; and Messrs. DICKERSON, KING, and FROMENTIN, were appointed the committee on the part of the Senate.

PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE.

Our relations with Spain remain nearly in the state in which they were at the close of the last session. The convention of 1802, providing for the adjustment of a certain portion of the claims of our citizens for injuries sustained by spoliation, and so long suspended by the Spanish Government, has at length been ratithe payment of another portion of like claims, not less extensive or well founded, or for other classes of claims, or for the settlement of boundaries. These subjects have again been brought under consideration in into respecting them. In the meantime events have both countries, but no agreement has been entered occurred, which clearly prove the ill effect of the policy which that Government has so long pursued, on the friendly relations of the two countries, which, it is

The following Message was received from the presumed, it is as least of as much importance to PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Fellow-citizens of the Senate

and of the House of Representatives: The auspicious circumstances under which you will commence the duties of the present session will lighten the burdens inseparable from the high trust committed to you. The fruits of the earth have been unusually abundant; commerce has flourished; the revenue has exceeded the most favorable anticipation, and peace and amity are preserved with foreign nations on conditions just and honorable to our country. For these inestimable blessings we cannot but be grateful to that Providence which watches over the destiny of nations.

Spain, as to the United States, to maintain. A state of things has existed in the Floridas, the tendency of which has been obvious to all who have paid the slightest attention to the progress of affairs in that quarter. Throughout the whole of those provinces to of Spain has scarcely been felt. Its authority has which the Spanish title extends, the Government been confined almost exclusively to the walls of Pensacola and St. Augustine, within which only small garrisons have been maintained. Adventurers from slaves, have found an asylum there. Several tribes of every country, fugitives from justice, and absconding Indians, strong in the number of their warriors, remarkable for their ferocity, and whose settlements exAs the term limited for the operation of the com- different hordes of people, connected together, disre tend to our limits, inhabit those provinces. These mercial convention with Great Britain will expire early in the month of July next, and it was deemed garding, on the one side, the authority of Spain, and important that there should be no interval, during protected, on the other, by an imaginary line, which which that portion of our commerce, which was pro-lated our laws prohibiting the introduction of slaves, separates Florida from the United States, have viovided for by that convention, should not be regulated, have practised various frauds on our revenue, and either by arrangements between the two Governments, or by the authority of Congress, the Minister Committed every kind of outrage on our peaceable of the United States at London was instructed, early citizens, which their proximity to us enabled them to in the last Summer, to invite the attention of the Brit- perpetrate. The invasion of Amelia Island, last year, ish Government to the subject, with a view to that by a small band of adventurers, not exceeding one object. He was instructed to propose, also, that the hundred and fifty in number, who wrested it from the negotiation which it was wished to open, might ex-it several months, during which, a single effort only inconsiderable Spanish force stationed there and held tend to the general commerce of the two countries, was made to recover it, which failed, clearly proves and to every other interest and unsettled difference how completely extinct the Spanish authority had between them; particularly those relating to impressment, the fisheries, and boundaries, in the hope that become, as the conduct of those adventurers, while in an arrangement might be made, on principles of re- Possession of the island, as distinctly shows the perciprocal advantage, which might comprehend and purposes for which their combination had been provide, in a satisfactory manner, for all these high concerns. I have the satisfaction to state, that the proposal was received by the British Government in the spirit which prompted it, and that a negotiation has been opened at London embracing all these objects. On full consideration of the great extent and magnitude of the trust, it was thought proper to commit it to not less than two of our distinguished citizens, and, in consequence, the Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States at Paris has been associated with our Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary at London; to both of whom corresponding instructions have been given; and they are now engaged in the discharge of its duties. It is proper to add, that, to prevent any inconvenience resulting from the delay incident to a negotiation on so many important subjects, it was agreed, before enter-stituted the effective force in Florida. With these ing on it, that the existing convention should be continued for a term not less than eight years.

nicious

formed.

This country had, in fact, become the theatre of every species of lawless adventure. With little population of its own, the Spanish authority almost extinct, and the colonial governments in a state of revolution, having no pretension to it, and sufficiently employed in their own concerns, it was in a great measure derelict, and the object of cupidity to every adventurer. A system of bucanneering was rapidly organizing over it, which menaced, in its consequences, the lawful commerce of every nation, and particularly of the United States; while it presented a temptation to every people, on whose seduction its success principally depended. In regard to the United States, the pernicious effect of this unlawful combination was not confined to the ocean. The Indian tribes have con

tribes these adventurers had formed, at an early period, a connexion, with a view to avail themselves of

that force, to promote their own projects of accumulation and aggrandizement. It is to the interference of some of these adventurers, in misrepresenting the claims and titles of the Indians to land, and in practising on their savage propensities, that the Seminole war is principally to be traced. Men who thus connect themselves with savage communities, and stimulate them to war, which is always attended, on their part, with acts of barbarity the most shocking, deserve to be viewed in a worse light than the savages. They would certainly have no claim to an immunity from the punishment, which, according to the rules of warfare practised by the savages, might justly be inflicted on the savages themselves.

SENATE.

over it, and protection was sought, under her title, by those who had committed on our citizens hostilities which she was bound by treaty to have prevented, but had not the power to prevent. To have stopped at that line would have given new encouragement to these savages, and new vigor to the whole combination existing there, in the prosecution of all its pernicious purposes.

In suppressing the establishment at Amelia Island, no unfriendliness was manifested towards Spain, because the post was taken from a force which had wrested it from her. The measure, it is true, was not adopted in concert with the Spanish Government, or those in authority under it; because, in transacIf the embarrassments of Spain prevented her from tions connected with the war in which Spain and the making an indemnity to our citizens, for so long a colonies are engaged, it was thought proper, in doing time, from her treasury, for their losses by spoliation and justice to the United States, to maintain a strict imotherwise, it was always in her power to have provided partiality towards both the belligerent parties, without it, by the cession of this territory. Of this her Gov- consulting or acting in concert with either. It gives ernment has been repeatedly apprized, and the cession me pleasure to state, that the Governments of Buenos was the more to have been anticipated, as Spain must Ayres and Venezuela, whose names were assumed, have known that, in ceding it, she would, in effect, have explicitly disclaimed all participation in those cede what had become of little value to her, and would measures, and even the knowledge of them, until likewise relieve herself from the important obligation communicated by this Government, and have also exsecured by the treaty of 1795, and all other compro- pressed their satisfaction that a course of proceedings mitments respecting it. If the United States, from had been suppressed, which, if justly imputable to consideration of these embarrassments, declined press-them, would dishonor their cause. ing their claims in a spirit of hostility, the motive ought, at least, to have been duly appreciated by the Government of Spain. It is well known to her Government that other Powers have made to the United States an indemnity for like losses sustained by their citizens at the same epoch.

There is, nevertheless, a limit, beyond which this spirit of amity and forbearance can in no instance be justified. If it was proper to rely on amicable negotiation for an indemnity of losses, it would not have been so to have permitted the inability of Spain to fulfil her engagements, and to sustain her authority in the Floridas, to be perverted, by foreign adventurers and savages, to purposes so destructive to the lives of our fellow-citizens, and the highest interests of the United States. The right of self-defence never ceases. It is among the most sacred, and alike necessary to nations and individuals. And, whether the attack be made by Spain herself, or by those who abuse her power, its obligation is not the less strong. The invaders of Amelia Island had assumed a popular and respected title, under which they might approach and wound us. As their object was distinctly seen, and the duty imposed on the Executive, by an existing law, was profoundly felt, that mask was not permitted to protect them. It was thought incumbent on the United States to suppress the establishment, and it was accordingly done. The combination in Florida, for the unlawful purposes stated, the acts perpetrated by that combination, and, above all, the incitement of the Indians, to massacre our fellow-citizens, of every age, and of both sexes, merited a like treatment, and received it. In pursuing these savages to an imaginary line, in the woods, it would have been the height of folly to have suffered that line to protect them. Had that been done, the war could never cease. Even if the territory had been, exclusively, that of Spain, and her power complete over it, we had a right, by the law of nations, to follow the enemy on it, and to subdue him there. But the territory belonged, in a certain sense, at least, to the savage enemy who inhabited it; the power of Spain had ceased to exist

In authorizing Major General Jackson to enter Florida, in pursuit of the Seminoles, care was taken not to encroach on the rights of Spain. I regret to have to add, that, in executing this order, facts were disclosed respecting the conduct of the officers of Spain, in authority there, in encouraging the war, furnishing munitions of war, and other supplies, to carry it on, and in other acts, not less marked, which evinced their participation in the hostile purposes of that combination, and justified the confidence with which it inspired the savages, that, by those officers they would be protected. A conduct so incompatible with the friendly relations existing between the two countries, particularly with the positive obligation of the 5th article of the treaty of 1795, by which Spain was bound to restrain, even by force, those savages, from acts of hostility against the United States, could not fail to excite surprise. The Commanding General was convinced that he should fail in his object; that he should in effect accomplish nothing, if he did not deprive those savages of the resource on which they had calculated, and of the protection on which they had relied in making the war. As all the documents relating to this occurrence will be laid before Congress, it is not necessary to enter into further detail respecting it.

Although the reasons which induced Major General Jackson to take these posts were duly appreciated, there was, nevertheless, no hesitation in deciding on the course which it became the Government to pursue. As there was reason to believe that the commanders of these posts had violated their instructions, there was no disposition to impute to their Government a conduct so unprovoked and hostile. An order was in consequence issued to the General in command there to deliver the posts-Pensacola, unconditionally to any person duly authorized to receive it; and St. Marks, which is in the heart of the Indian country, on the arrival of a competent force, to defend it against those savages and their associates.

ΠΟ

In entering Florida to suppress this combination, idea was entertained of hostility to Spain, and, how

It appears, from these communications, that the Government of Buenos Ayres declared itself independent in July, 1816, having previously exercised the power of an independent Government, though in the name of the King of Spain, from the year 1810: that the Banda Oriental, Entre Rios, and Paraguay, with The strict execution of the revenue laws, resulting the city of Santa Fe, all of which are also indepen- principally from the salutary provisions of the act of dent, are unconnected with the present Government the 20th of April last, amending the several collection of Buenos Ayres: that Chili has declared itself inde-laws has, it is presumed, secured to domestic manupendent, and is closely connected with Buenos Ayres; factures all the relief that can be derived from the duthat Venezuela has also declared itself independent, ties, which have been imposed upon foreign merchanand now maintains the conflict with various success; dise, for their protection. Under the influence of this and that the remaining parts of South America, ex-relief, several branches of this important national incept Montevideo, and such other portions of the eastern bank of the La Plata as are held by Portugal, are still in the possession of Spain, or, in a certain degree, under her influence.