Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye

“ All treaties of reinsurance with a person who became an enemy shall be regarded as having been abrogated by the person becoming an enemy, but without prejudice in the case of life or marine risks which had attached before the war to the right to recover payment after the war for sums due in respect of such risks. ”

“ Under the second point of view, it appears to me wrong on the part of the United States (where not constrained by treaties) to permit one party in the present war to do what cannot be permitted to the other. We cannot permit the enemies of France to fit out privateers in our ports, by the 22d article of our treaty. We ought not, therefore, to permit France to do it; the treaty leaving us free to refuse, and the refusal being necessary to preserve a fair neutrality. ”

“ The articles of a general treaty do not appear so favorable to France, in point of territorial acquisitions, as they do to the other powers; but the magnanimous and disinterested scale of action, which that great nation has exhibited to the world during this war, and at the conclusion of peace, will insure to the King and nation that reputation, which will be of more consequence to them, than every other consideration. ”

“ As to England, any one of the legislatures may impose on her goods double the duties which are paid other nations; may prohibit their goods altogether; may refuse them the usual facilities for 287 recovering their debts or withdrawing their property; may refuse to receive their Consuls or to give those Consuls any jurisdiction. But with France, whose commerce is protected by a treaty, no State can give any molestation to that commerce which is defended by the treaty. ”

“ But since they do not do this, surely it would not be bad policy, even if we gave up more to France in other respects, to prevent her appearing in the treaty as in any respect the champion of America, or as having made any claims for her; we giving her up everything she wants equally, and her future confidence and alliance being such an object to us. ”

“ France, England, and all other nations have a right to cruise on our coasts; a right not derived from our permission, but from the law of nature. To render this more advantageous, France has secured to herself, by a treaty with us, (as she has done also by a treaty with Great Britain, in the event of a war with us or any other nation) two special rights. 1. Admission for her prizes and privateers into our ports. ”

“ There was an obvious difference between treaties of peace and those of commerce, because commercial treaties frequently clashed with the laws upon that subject; so that It was necessary to be ratified in Parliament. As a proof that our present Articles of Confederation were paramount, it was there expressed that France should enjoy certain privileges. Now, supposing any law had passed taking those privileges away, would not the treaty be a sufficient bar to any local or municipal laws? What sort of power is that which leaves individuals in full power to reject or approve? ”

“ Not only do the French government decline to entertain the idea of putting the covenant which constitutes the first and foremost part of the Treaty of Versailles into operation: they have gone so far as to intimate that they will treat any proposal of the kind as an unfriendly act. The constitution of the League stipulates that it will be the friendly duty of any power to move that any international dispute which threatens peace shall be referred to the League. ”

“ Thinking men everywhere realized that the logical result of the failure of the American Senate to ratify the Treaty of Versailles would be the scrapping of the treaty. British public opinion, which had begun to turn against the treaty because of its heavy responsibilities and its supposed connection with British unemployment, clamored for revision of the treaty and the League, drastically if need be, in order to get the United States back into European affairs. ”

“ While France persists in her refusal to comply with the terms of a treaty, the object of which was, by removing all causes of mutual complaint, to renew ancient feelings of friendship, and to unite the two nations in the bonds of amity, and of a mutually beneficial commerce, she cannot justly complain if we adopt such peaceful remedies as the law of nations and the circumstances of the case may authorize and demand. ”

“ There is a strong disposition in our countrymen to discontinue even these; and very possibly it may be done. Consuls will be continued as usual. The interest which European nations feel, as well as ourselves, in the mutual patronage of commercial intercourse, is a sufficient stimulus on both sides to insure that patronage. A treaty, contrary to that interest, renders war necessary to get rid of it.
I send this by Chancellor Livingston, named to the Senate the day after I came into office, as our Minister Plenipotentiary to France. ”

“ France, which had for over a year kept up a wavering policy, now entered into a treaty of alliance with the United States, in which it was agreed that if war should break out between France and England during the existence of the war in America, it should be made a common cause, and that neither of the contracting parties should conclude peace with England without obtaining formal consent of the other. ”

“ If it should happen that a country in the possession of France were to be invaded by the enemy, and afterwards ceded to him by a treaty, would it be just to say to those of the inhabitants who might come to settle on the territory of the republic, that they had forfeited their rights as Frenchmen, for not having quitted their former country at the moment it was ceded ”

“ Does the treaty with France leave us free to prohibit her from arming vessels in our ports? Thomas Jefferson, Hamilton, Knox, and Randolph—unanimous—it does. As the treaty obliges us to prohibit the enemies of France from arming in our ports, and leaves us free to prohibit France, do not the laws of neutrality oblige us to prohibit her? Same persons answer they do. ”

“ The powers of peace and war being vested in Congress, it belonged to that body to decide those questions growing out of treaties which might involve peace or war, and the President, therefore, ought to have assembled the national Legislature before he ventured to issue his proclamation of neutrality, or to prohibit, by his instructions to the State governors, the enjoyment of the particular rights which France claimed under the express stipulations of the treaty of commerce. ”

“ There is no other where the dependence of their colonies on our States for their prosperity is so obvious as here, nor where their negotiator would feel it so much. But it would be imprudent to leave to the uncertain issue of such a treaty, the re-establishment of our commerce with France on the footing on which it was in the beginning of their revolution. That treaty may be long on the anvil; in the mean time, we cannot consent to the late innovations, without taking measures to do justice to our own navigation. ”

“ General Sir Ian Hamilton, in the Manchester “Guardian” and the historian, Signor G. Ferrero, in the Rome “Secolo,” have pointed out the fallacy of considering the League of Nations of the Versailles Treaty a bona fide effort toward international organization and coöperation. General Hamilton believes that “the abstention of the United States is less damaging to the decisions of the so-called League of Nations than the exclusion of Germany; what Europe should have quickly is a true League of European nations, where a German can state his case and then cast his vote.” ”

“ On the subject of treaties, our system is to have none with any nation, as far as can be avoided. The treaty with England has therefore, not been renewed, and all overtures for treaty with other nations have been declined. We believe, that with nations as with individuals, dealings may be carried on as anvantageously [sp.] , perhaps more so, while their continuance depends on a voluntary good treatment, as if fixed by a contract, which, when it becomes injurious to either, is made, by forced constructions, to mean what suits them, and becomes a cause of war instead of a bond of peace. ”

“ If Great Britain asks, then, why she should enter into treaty with us? why not carry on her commerce without treaty? I answer; because till a treaty is made, no consul of hers can be received (his functions being called into existence by a convention only, and the States having abandoned the right of separate agreements and treaties) ; no protection to her commerce can be given by Congress ”

“ It is in fact plain that there is no probability of France obtaining the concessions from the Treaty Powers, on which Thiers professed to reckon. The result already is that, whatever may have been the intention, the Mercantile Marine Law is in practice a blow which falls on England, and not on other European Powers. Unless the French Government means to give us a real most favoured nation clause, the result of denouncing our treaty will be to place us, when it expires, at a special disadvantage as compared with other nations. ”

“ France herself has asserted the right in herself and recognised it in us, in the sixth article of our treaty, where we mutually stipulate that we will, by all the means in our power (not by negotiation) , protect and defend each other’s vessels and effects in our ports or roads, or on the seas near our countries, and recover and restore the same to the right owners. The United Netherlands, Prussia, and Sweden, have recognised it also in treaties with us ”

“ On the other hand, if questions of honor and vital interest are included in the things to be submitted, then if a real vital interest is affected, the probabilities are very strong that the decree of the court will not be acquiesced in by the losing party. Germany considered that her vital interests demanded a passage through Belgium into France so the treaty became a “scrap of paper.” America thinks that her vital interests require that no new aggressive military foreign power shall obtain a foot-hold close to our boundaries on our own continent. ”

“ Owing to the illness of the special envoy, he was not presented to the First Consul until May 1, and hence, as a negotiator, had nothing officially to do with the treaty, which was virtually negotiated April 13, and finally concluded April 30. On that day the treaty was signed in the presence of Napoleon by Marbois and the two American representatives, and when the negotiations were completed Napoleon made the following prophecy: "This accession of territory strengthens forever the power of the United States. I have given England a rival." ”

“ That the King consents to adopt, according to the proposition of the King of England, the treaty of Paris for a basis of the negotiation, not as a confirmation of all its stipulations, but with exceptions and alterations respecting the East Indies, Africa, the fisheries of Newfoundland, and commercial regulations in Europe to mutual advantage. Restitution and compensation to be treated of, when the negotiation shall be established, with respect to which the King will be governed by the principles of justice and moderation, which are the basis of his policy. ”

“ It has been heretofore noted among the defects of the Confederation, that in many of the States it had received no higher sanction than a mere legislative ratification. The principle of reciprocality seems to require that its obligation on the other States should be reduced to the same standard. A compact between independent sovereigns, founded on ordinary acts of legislative authority, can pretend to no higher validity than a league or treaty between the parties. It is an established doctrine on the subject of treaties, that all the articles are mutually conditions of each other ”

“ If it was still in force, the treaty formed part of the law of the land, and American citizens might plead immunity for acts done in pursuance of its provisions. Hamilton was for suspending the treaty since a situation had arisen which made its provisions inconsistent with a policy of neutrality. His main contention was that the obligations imposed by the treaty of '78 were no longer binding on the United States, since they contemplated only defensive war. By her declaration of war France had taken the offensive, thereby relieving the United States of her reciprocal obligations. ”

“ Next day the Chancellor of the Exchequer spoke for a similar purpose at a meeting of Welshmen at the Queen's Hall, London. He said that no man detested war more than himself, but it could not have been avoided without national dishonour. France had respected Belgian neutrality at Sedan at the cost of her own ruin; Prussia's interest was to break the treaty, and she had done it. The German Chancellor called treaties "scraps of paper." Then let them burn their bank-notes; they were only scraps of paper. "What are they made of? Rags. What are they worth? The whole credit of the British Empire." ”

“ We have a right to judge for ourselves what market best suits us, and they have none to forbid to us the enjoyment of the necessaries and [61] comforts which we may obtain from any other independent country.
This act, too, tends directly to draw us from that state of peace in which we are wishing to remain. It is an essential character of neutrality to furnish no aids (not stipulated by treaty) to one party, which we are not equally ready to furnish to the other. If we permit corn to be sent to Great Britain and her friends, we are equally bound to permit it to France. ”