Page:The Cession of Louisana to the United States.pdf/3

 to invest the Louisianians with the same sovereignty, to its full extent, which was possessed by their own citizens. The Louisianians were to be “incorporated in the Union as soon as possible.” How could they be incorporated in a Union of sovereign States, except by becoming the citizens of a State or of States? Therefore the cession of Louisiana, which is commonly called a sale, was nothing else than the annexation of that province to the United States, either as a State or as divided into several States, according to the principles of the Federal Constitution, among which stands prominently the principle of equality among the members of the Confederation. That this was the understanding of Bonaparte is evident from the words which he uttered immediately after he had signed the treaty. He said, to the minister who had negotiated for him, “Let the Louisianians know that we separate ourselves from them with regret; that we stipulate in their favor everything that they can desire; and let them, hereafter, happy in their independence, recollect that they have been Frenchmen, and that France, in ceding them, has secured for them advantages which they would not have obtained from an European power, however paternal it might have been. Let them retain for us, sentiments of affection; and may their common origin, descent, language and customs, perpetuate the friendship.”

Thus, he prided himself on having secured the independence of the Louisianians. How could that independence be obtained except by immediate annexation? We could not have been independent whilst the inhabitants of a Territory of the United States, and therefore dependent on them, no more than we could have been independent whilst remaining the inhabitants of a colony. Whilst the Louisianians were to remain in a transitory condition; whilst they were the inhabitants of a United States Territory; whilst they were incapable of protecting themselves—before their being invested with that sovereignty which became their birth-right by an express stipulation recognized as the supreme law of the land; whilst they were, to some extent, dependent on the United States—“en attendant”—(the words of the French text)—while they were waiting for their independence and their incorporation into the Union, France took special care to demand the guarantee that they should be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their liberty, property and the religion which they professed. Were they sold, then, to the United States according to the common acceptation of the word and the popular impression? Was it because the United States agreed to pay to France a certain sum of money which was a mere reimbursement of all her expenses in her former colony? As well might it be said that Texas sold herself to the United States because she stipulated the payment of a certain sum of money as a condition of her incorporation into the Union.

As long as Louisiana remained a territory, if its inhabitants had been robbed of any of their existing rights, if they had been oppressed in their persons and attacked in their property and religion, France, who, in virtue of the treaty of cession, had retained a right of supervision over the destinies of her former colony, would undoubtedly have had the right to interfere. But as soon as Louisiana was incorporated in the Union as a sovereign State, the protective stipulation on the part of France ceased, because Louisiana was hereafter to look to herself for protection. The act of Congress authorizing the territory of Orleans, which had been carved out of the province of Louisiana, to form a State constitution, was not a voluntary, spontaneous and independent act, originating in the liberality or munificence of that body. It was no boon, no gift, no grant from the United States; it was simply the execution of the treaty of cession—the accomplishment of the generous will of France. It is therefore to the treaty of cession that Louisiana is to look back for her sovereignty, and not to the United States, who had merely bound themselves to accept that sovereignty, and to carry it into effect. If A cedes to B all his rights of property in a slave, and stipulates that B shall emancipate that slave as soon as possible, the act by which B emancipates that slave is really the act of A, and it is to A that the slave is indebted for emancipation, and not to B. Thus the act by which the United States incorporated Louisiana in the Union being prescribed by France, and being an unavoidable obligation on the part of the United States, was in reality the act of France. The United States were a mere ministerial agent chosen by France to secure that independence which she instructed her minister to inform the Louisianians that she had provided for them.

In support of the correctness of my views, I beg, dear sir, to refer you to the debates in Congress on the discussion of the bill providing for the carrying into effect of the treaty of cession. Mr. Pickering, of Massachusetts, opposed it in the Senate, on the ground of its unconstitutionality. Alluding to the third article of the treaty, he said, that it “stipulated the admission of a foreign country as an associate in the Union.” He added, “I have never doubted the right of the United States to acquire new territory, either by purchase or conquest, and to govern the territory so acquired as a dependent province.” But be denied that such was the case with Louisiana. He maintained, justly, that she was acquired as a State to which had been secured the right of independence and self-government, and not as a “dependent province.” He further said, “that if the United States failed to execute, within a reasonable time, the engagement assumed in the third article, the French Government would have the right to declare the whole treaty null and void.”

Mr. Tracy, of Connecticut, followed in the wake of Mr. Pickering. He considered that the United States had acquired a State and not a Territory. “If done at all,” he said, “it must be done by universal consent of all the States, or partners of our political association; and this universal consent, I am positive, can never be obtained to such a pernicious measure as the admission of Louisiana, of a world—and such a world!—into our Union. This would be absorbing the Northern States, and rendering them as insignificant in the Union aa they ought to be, if by their own consent the new measure should be adopted.” Northern insignificance! I avail myself of this opportunity to call your attention, by the way, to this apprehension of Northern insignificance, and Northern decline, compared with Southern