to American vessels of not more than a hundred tons burden, it was rejected. So important, however, did Jay conceive it to be to obtain some relief from the
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Lord Castlereagh
colonial restrictions that, in spite of his instructions, he assented to the incorporation into the treaty, which was signed by him and Lord Grenville on November 19, 1794, of an article by which the privilege of trading between the United States and the British West Indies was for a term of years extended to American vessels of a burden of not more than seventy tons, but only on condition that, during the continuance of the privilege, the United States should prohibit and restrain the carrying of any molasses, sugar, coffee, cocoa, or cotton in American vessels, either from the British islands or from the United States itself, to any port not in the United States. It was argued that this condition, by which American vessels were to be forbidden to transport from their own country any of the specified commodities, even though produced there or in a third country, was essential as a safeguard against abuse of the treaty privilege. American vessels, it was said, might, after importing a cargo from the British islands, carry it on to Europe, under the guise of a feigned American product, and thus destroy the exclusive advantages which were to continue to belong to British shipping. But the price was deemed by the United States to be too high for the limited privilege that was gained. The Senate, in assenting to the ratification of the treaty, struck out the obnoxious article. The treaty, however, provided that the citizens of the two countries might freely pass and repass by land, or by inland navigation, into the territories of the one and the other on the continent of America (the country within the limits of the Hudson Bay Company only excepted), and carry on trade and commerce with each other in that way. American vessels were expressly excluded from any seaports in such territories; but, by another article of the treaty, they were admitted on certain conditions to a direct trade with the British dominions in the East Indies.
During the long wars that grew out of the French Revolution, colonial restrictions in America were from time to time suspended under military necessity. The home governments, when unable to carry on the trade under their own flag,
