there are about twenty, and between ten and fifteen of cotton bagging; and the erection of new ones keeps pace with the annual augmentation of the quantity of hemp. Indeed, the western country, alone, is not only adequate to the supply of whatever of this article is requisite for our own consumption, but is capable of affording a surplus for foreign markets. The amendment proposed possesses the double recommendation of encouraging, at the same time, both the manufacture and the growth of hemp. For by increasing the demand for the wrought article, you also increase the demand for the raw material, and consequently present new incentives to its cultivator.

The three great subjects that claim the attention of the national legislature, are the interests of agriculture, commerce, and manufactures. We have had before us, a proposition to afford a manly protection to the rights of commerce, and how has it been treated? Rejected! You have been solicited to promote agriculture, by increasing the facilities of internal communication, through the means of canals and roads, and what has been done? Postponed! We are now called upon to give a trifling support to our domestic manufactures, and shall we close the circle of congressiona inefficiency, by adding this also to the catalogue?

ON THE LINE OF THE PERDIDO.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, DECEMBER 25, 1810.

[The Perdido is the name of a river and bay, which form the boundary line between the present state of Alabama and Fiorida. It will be recollected, that Florida was a Spanish colony, previous to its cession to the United States by Spain, in 1819. It was discovered by Juan Ponce de Leon, a Spanish navigator, in 1512, and by him it was called Florida. The French made an attempt to colonize the territory in 1562, but their settlement was broken up by the Spaniards, who founded, in 1565, the city of St. Augustine, in East Florida. Pensacola, in West Florida, was founded in 1699. Though often invaded by the French and English, Florida remained part of Spanish America until 1763, when it was ceded to Great Britain; but, by the definitive treaty of 1783, it was receded by Great Britain to Spain. When Florida was a colony of Spain, and Louisiana of France, or from 1699 to 1763, the Perdido river was a common boundary, but, by the treaty of 1763, Louisiana having been ceded by France to Spain, the Spaniards in 1769, for their own convenience, incorporated that part of Louisiana, between the Mississippi and Perdido rivers, with Florida. This act caused a controversy between Spain and the United States; the latter having purchased Louisiana of France, in 1803, to which power it had been ceded by Spain, in 1500. President Madison, in 1810, took possession of the territory in dispute, for which act he was assailed by the opposition members in the senate, particularly by Mr. Horsey, of Delaware; to whom Mr. Clay replied, in defence of the administration, as follows.]

MR. PRESIDENT,

It would have gratified me if some other gentleman had undertaken to reply to the ingenious argument, which you have just heard. (Speech of Mr. Horsey.) But not perceiving any one disposed to do so, a sense of duty obliges me, though very unwell, to claim your indulgence, whilst I offer my sentiments on this subject, so interesting to the union at large, but especially to the western portion of it. Allow me, sir, to express my admiration at the inore than Aristidean justice, which, in a question of territorial title between the United States and a foreign nation, induces certain gentlemen to espouse the pretensions of the foreign nation. Doubtless, in any future negotiations, she will have too much magnanimity to avail herself of these spontaneous concessions in her favor, made on the floor of the senate of the United States.

It was to have been expected, that, in a question like the present, gentlemen, even on the same side, would have different views, and although arriving at a common conclusion, would do so by various

arguments. And hence the honorable gentleman from Vermont, entertains doubt with regard to our title against Spain, whilst he feels entirely satisfied of it against France. Believing, as I do, that our title against both powers is indisputable, under the treaty of St. Ildefonso, between Spain and France, and the treaty between the French republic and the United States, I shall not inquire into the treachery, by which the king of Spain is alleged to have lost his crown; nor shall I stop to discuss the question involved in the overthrow of the Spanish monarchy, and how far the power of Spain ought to be considered as merged in that of France. I shall leave the honorable gentleman from Delaware to mourn over the fortunes of the fallen Charles. I have no commiseration for princes. My sympathies are reserved for the great mass of mankind, and I own that the people of Spain have them most sincerely.

I will adopt the course suggested by the nature of the subject, and pursued by other gentlemen, of examining into our title to the country lying between the Mississippi and the Rio Perdido, (which, to avoid circumlocution, I will call West Florida, although it is not the whole of it,) and the propriety of the recent measures taken for the occupation of that territory. Our title, then, depends, first, upon the limits of the province or colony of Louisiana, and, secondly, upon a just exposition of the treaties before mentioned.

On this occasion it is only necessary to fix the eastern boundary. In order to ascertain this, it will be proper to take a cursory view of the settlement of the country, because the basis of European title to colonies in America, is prior discovery, or prior occupancy. In 1682, La Salle migrated from Canada, then owned by France, descended the Mississippi, and named the country which it waters, Louisiana. About 1698, D'Iberville discovered, by sea, the mouth of the Mississippi, established a colony at the Isle Dauphine, or Massacre, which lies at the mouth of the bay of Mobile, and one at the mouth of the river Mobile, and was appointed, by France, governor of the country. In the year 1717, the famous West India Company sent inhabitants to the Isle Dauphine, and found some of those who had been settled there under the auspices of D'Iberville. About the same period, Baloxi, near the Pascagoula, was settled. In 1719, the city of New Orleans was laid off, and the seat of government of Louisiana was established there; and in 1736 the French erected a fort on Tombigbee. These facts prove that France had the actual possession of the country as far east as the Mobile, at least. But the great instrument which ascertains, beyond all doubt, that the country in question is comprehended within the limits of Louisiana, is one of the most authentic and solemn character which the archives of a nation can furnish; I mean the patent granted in 1712, by Louis XIV, to Crozat. Here Mr. C. read such parts of the patent as were applicable to

the subject.*] According to this document, in describing the province or colony of Louisiana, it is declared to be bounded by Carolina on the east, and Old and New Mexico on the west. Under this high record evidence, it might be insisted that we have a fair claim to East as well as West Florida, against France, at least, unless she has, by some convention, or other obligatory act, restricted the eastern limit of the province. It has, indeed, been asserted, that, by a treaty between France and Spain, concluded in the year 1719, the Perdido was expressly stipulated to be the boundary between their respective provinces of Florida on the east, and Louisiana on the west; but as I have been unable to find any such treaty, I am induced to doubt its existence.

About the same period, to wit, towards the close of the seventeenth century, when France settled the Isle Dauphine, and the Mobile, Spain erected a fort at Pensacola. But Spain never pushed her actual settlements, or conquests, farther west than the bay of Pensacola, whilst those of the French were bounded on the east by the Mobile. Between those two points, a space of about thirteen or fourteen leagues, neither nation had the exclusive possession. The Rio Perdido, forming the bay of the same name,

* Extract from the Grant to Crozat, dated at

LOUIS, By the grace of God, &c.

'Fontainbleau, September 14, 1712.

The care we have always had to procure the welfare and advantage of our subjects, having induced us, &c. to seek for all possible opportunities of enlarging and extending the trade of our American colonies, we did, in the year 1683, give our orders to undertake a discovery of the countries and lands which are situated in the northern part of America, between New France and New Mexico; and the Sieur de la Salle, to whom we committed that enterprise, having had success, enough to confirm a belief that a communication might be settled from New France to the Gulf of Mexico, by means of large rivers, this obliged us, immediately after the peace of Ryswic, to give orders for establishing a colony there, and maintaining a garrison, which has kept and preserved the possession we had taken in the very year 1683, of the lands, coasts, and islands, which are situated in the Gulf of Mexico between Carolina on the east, and old and new Mexico on the west. But a new war having broke out in Europe shortly after, there was no possibility, till now. of reaping from that colony the advantages that might have been expected from thence, &c. And, whereas, upon the information we have received concerning the disposition and situation of the said countries, known at present by the name of the Province of Louisiana, we are of opinion, that there may be established therein considerable commerce, &c., we have resolved to grant the commerce of the country of Louisiana to the Sieur Anthony Crozat, &c. For these reasons, &c. we, by these presents signed by our hand, have appointed and do appoint the said Sieur Crozat, to carry on a trade in all the lands possessed by us, and bounded by New Mexico and by the lands of the English of Carolina, all the establishments, ports, havens, rivers, and principally the port and haven of the Isle Dauphine, heretofore called Massacre; the river of St. Louis, heretofore called Mississippi, from the edge of the sea as far as the Illinois, together with the river St. Philip, heretofore called the Missouri, and of St. Jerome, heretofore called Onabache, with all the countries, territories, and lakes within land, and the rivers which fall directly or indirectly into that part of the river St. Louis.

The Articles. Our pleasure is, that all the aforesaid lands, countries, streams, rivers, and islands be, and remain comprised under the name of the government of Louisiana, which shall be dependent upon the general government of New France, to which it is subordinate; and further, that all the lands which we possess from the Illinois, be united, &c. to the general government of New France, and become part thereof, &c.

di: charges itself into the Gulf of Mexico, between the Mobile and Pensacola, and, being a natural and the most notorious object between them, presented itself as a suitable boundary between the possessions of the two nations. It accordingly appears very early to have been adopted as the boundary, by tacit if not expressed consent. The ancient charts and historians, therefore, of the country, so represent it. Dupratz, one of the most accurate historians of the time, in point of fact and detail, whose work was published as early as 1758, describes the coast as being bounded on the east by the Rio Perdido. In truth, sir, no European nation whatever, except France, ever occupied any portion of West Florida, prior to her cession of it to England, in 1762. The gentlemen on the other side do not, indeed, strongly controvert, if they do not expressly admit, that Louisiana, as heid by the French anterior to her cessions of it in 1762, extended to the Perdido. The only observation made by the gentleman from Delaware to the contrary, to wit, that the island of New Orleans, being particularly mentioned, could not, for that reason, constitute a part of Louisiana, is susceptible of a very satisfactory answer. island was excepted out of the grant to England, and was the only part of the province east of the river that was so excepted. It formed in itself one of the most prominent and important objects of the cession to Spain originally, and was transferred to her with the portion of the province west of the Mississippi. It might with equal propriety be urged that St. Augustine is not in East Florida, because St. Augustine is expressly mentioned by Spain in her cession of that province to England. From this view of the subject, I think it results that the province of Louisiana comprised West Florida, previous to the year 1762.

That

What was done with it at this epoch? By a secret convention of the third of November, of that year, France ceded the country lying west of the Mississippi, and the island of New Orleans, to Spain; and by a contemporaneous act, the articles preliminary to the definitive treaty of 1763, she transferred West Florida to England. Thus, at the same instant of time, she alienated the whole province. Posterior to this grant, Great Britain, having also acquired from Spain her possessions east of the Mississippi, erected the country into two provinces, East and West Florida. In this state of things it continued until the peace of 1783, when Great Britain, in consequence of the events of the war, surrendered the country to Spain, who, for the first time, came into actual possession of West Florida. Well, sir, how does she dispose of it? She reannexes it to the residue of Louisiana-extends ne jurisdiction of that government to it, and subjects the governors, or commandants, of the districts of Baton Rouge, Feliciana, Mobile, and Pensacola, to the authority of the governor of Louisiana, residing at New Orleans; while the governor of East Florida is