States. The interest of these seems to require that they should retain at least the faculty of giving any encouragement to their own merchants' ships or mariners, which may be necessary to prevent a relapse under Scotch monopoly, or to acquire a maritime importance. The Eastern States need no such precaution.

General Washington and General Carleton have had an interview on the subject of arrangements for executing the provisional treaty. It was interrupted by the sudden indisposition of the latter. In the conversation which took place, he professed intentions of evacuating New York and all the posts in the United States held by British garrisons, as soon as possible, but did not authorize any determinate or speedy expectations. He confessed that a number of negroes had gone off with the refugees since the arrival of the treaty, and undertook to justify the permission by a palpable and scandalous miscon struction of the treaty, and by the necessity of adhering to the proclamations under the faith of which the negroes had eloped into their service. He said that if the treaty should be otherwise explained, compensation would be made to the owners; and, to make this the more easy, a register had been, and would be, kept of all negroes leaving New York before the surrender of it by the British garrison. This information has been referred by Congress to a committee. But the progress already made in the discharge of the prisoners-the only convenient pledge by which fair dealing, on the other side, could be enforced-makes it probable that no remedy will be applied to the evil.

115

DEAR SIR,

Philadelphia, May —,

TO EDMUND RANDOLPH.

-, 1783.

Your favor of the ninth instant was duly brought by yesterday's mail. My impatience is great to know the reception given to the propositions of Congress by the Assembly. I foresaw some of the topics which are employed against. them, and I dread their effect from the eloquent mouths which will probably enforce them; but I do not despair. Until those who oppose the plan can substitute some other equally consistent with public justice and honor, and more conformable to the doctrines of the Confederation, all those who love justice, and aim at the public good, will be advocates for the plan. The greatest danger is to be apprehended from the difficulty of making the latter class sensible of the impracticability or incompetency of any plan short of the one recommended, the arguments necessary for that purpose being drawn from a general survey of the federal system, and not from the interior polity of the States singly.

The letter from the Delegation, by the last post, to the Governor, apprised the Legislature, through him, that negotiations for a treaty of commerce with Great Britain might be expected soon to take place; and that, if any instructions should be deemed proper, no time ought to be lost in giving the subject a legislative discussion. For my own part, I wish sincerely that the commercial interests of Virginia were thoroughly investigated, and the final sense of the State expressed to its representatives in Congress.

The power of forming treaties of commerce with foreign nations is among the most delicate with which Congress is entrusted, and ought to be exercised with all possible circumspection. Whilst an influence might be expected from them on the event or duration of the war, the public interest required that they should be courted with all the respectable nations of Europe, and that nice calculations of their tendency should be dismissed. The attainment of the object of the war has happily reversed our situation, and we ought no longer to enslave ourselves to the policy of the moment. The state of this country in relation to the countries of Europe, it ought to be observed, will be continually changing, and regula tions adapted to its commercial and general interests at present may hereafter be directly opposed to them. The general policy of America is at present pointed at the encouragement of agriculture, and the importation of the objects of consumption. The wider, therefore, our ports are opened, and the more extensive the privileges of all competitors in our commerce, the more likely we shall be to buy at cheap, and sell at profitable, rates. But in proportion as our lands become settled, and spare hands for manufactures and navigation multiply, it may become our policy to favor those objects by peculiar privileges bestowed on our citizens; or at least to introduce regulations not inconsistent with foreign engagements, suited to the present state of things.

The relative situation of the different States, in this respect, is another motive to circumspection. The variance of their policy and interests, in the article of commerce, strikes the first view; and it

may, with great truth, be noted, that as far as any concessions may be stipulated in favor of foreign nations, they will chiefly be at the expense of those States which will share least in the compensations obtained for them. If, for example, restrictions be laid on the legislative rights of the States to prohibit, to regulate, or to tax as they please their imports and exports, and to give such preferences as they please to the persons or vessels employed in them, it is evident that such restrictions will be most felt by those States who have the greatest interest in imports and exports. If, on the other side, the citizens of the United States should, in return for such a stipulation, be allowed to navigate and carry in forbidden channels, is it not equally evident that the benefit must fall to the share of those States which export and consume least, and abound most in resources of ships and seamen?

Nor should it be overlooked, that, as uniform regulations of the commerce of the different States will so differently affect their several interests, such regulations must be a strong temptation to measures in the aggrieved States, which may first involve the whole Confederacy in controversies with foreign nations, and then in contests with one another. I may safely suggest, also, to your ear, that a variety of circumstances make it proper to recollect that permanent engagements, entered into by the Confederacy with foreign powers, may survive the Confederacy itself; that a question must then arise how far such engagements, formed by the States in their Federal character, are binding on each of them separately, and that they may become pretexts for

quarrels with particular States, very inconvenient to the latter, or for a general intrusion into American disputes. On the other hand, candor suggests that foreign connections, if founded on principles equally corresponding with the policy and interests of the several States, might be a new bond to the federal compact.

Upon these considerations I think it would be advisable to form all our commercial treaties in future with great deliberation; to limit their duration to moderate periods, and to restrain our Ministers from acceding finally to them till they have previously transmitted them, in the terms adjusted, for the revision and express sanction of Congress. In a treaty of commerce with Great Britain, it may be the policy of Virginia, in particular, to reserve her right as unfettered as possible over her own commerce. The monopoly which formerly tyrannized over it has left wounds which are not yet healed, and the numerous debts due from the people, and which, by the provisional articles, they are immediately liable for, may possibly be made instruments for re-establishing their dependence. It cannot. therefore, be for the interest of the State to preclude it from any regulations which experience may recommend for its thorough emancipation. It is possible that experience may never recommend an exercise of this right, nor do my own sentiments favor, in general, any restrictions or preferences in matters of commerce; but those who succeed us will have an equal claim to judge for themselves, and will have further lights to direct their judgments. Nor ought the example of old and intelligent nations