Page:Henry Adams' History of the United States Vol. 2.djvu/419

400 conquered race until they learned to consider themselves American citizens.

The people of New Orleans finding themselves in a position of dependence, which, owing chiefly to their hatred of Governor Claiborne, seemed more irritating than their old Spanish servitude, sent three representatives to Washington to urge upon Congress the duty of executing the treaty. Messieurs Sauvé, Derbigny, and Destréhan accordingly appeared at Washington, and in December, 1804, presented a remonstrance so strong that Government was greatly embarrassed to deal with it. Any reply that should repudiate either the treaty obligation or the principles of American liberty and self-government was out of the question; any reply that should affirm either the one or the other was fatal to the system established by Congress in Louisiana. John Randolph, on whose shoulders the duty fell, made a report on the subject. "It is only under the torture," said he, "that this article of the treaty of Paris can be made to speak the language ascribed to it by the memorialists;" but after explaining in his own way what the article did not mean, he surprised his audience by admitting in effect that the law of the last session was repugnant to the Constitution, and that the people of Louisiana had a right to self-government. Senator Giles said