Phenix Gazette

THE FRENCH TREATY.

The Department of State has caused to be translated and published in the Washington Globe, the final report upon the Treaty between France and the United States, made by M. Humann, the Minister of Finance, to the Chamber of Deputies on the 6th of April.

The report assumes that the seizure and confiscation of French vessels, made by the United States in 1809, in reprisal for the spoliations on their commerce committed by the French, under the Berlin, Milan and Rambouillet Decrees, estopped this government from all right to found claims against France on account of confiscations made under these Decrees. Exceptions are however admitted which France cannot deny, and the following are given as cases entitled to compensation:

American vessels seized and confiscated in virtue of the Decrees of Berlin, Milan, and Rambouillet, before the persons interested in them could have received information of those Decrees:

American vessels condemned after the 1st of November, 1810, the date of the revocation of those Decrees:

American vessels burnt at sea by the French squadron.

The Report admits that the Government of Bonaparte had admitted the justice of these claims, and that the Government of the Restoration after denying its liability for the acts of its predecessor, had at last acquiesced, and was treating on the subject, about the date of its overthrow. Under the new Government the negotiation was renewed, as M. Humann expresses it, "under the influence of the sympathy which that great event called up between the two nations. Both governments," he adds, "saw there were political reasons which rendered the acknowledgement necessary; that the nations were in great measure united in feelings, and that every obstacle to a more intimate and reciprocal intercourse ought to be removed."

This view of the matter was strengthened by the construction that the question had begun to assume in the United States, the aspect of a political one rather than one of mere private pecuniary interest. These circumstances, added to the counter concessions of the United States, in behalf of sundry claims made by French subjects, and in relation to some disputes between the two countries arising out of the Treaty of Cession of Louisiana, are assigned as the considerations for the Treaty concluded in July last, and ratified in February last.

The report recapitulates the terms of the treaty, which have been faithfully observed on the part of the United States, and calls upon the chambers to provide the necessary means.—"The sum," says M. Humann, "is employed in acquitting a debt, the justice of which cannot be denied; good faith was interested in its admission, and grave political considerations required that the arrangement of the affair should not be deferred."

Accompanying the report is a bill for appropriating 5,166,666 francs for the payment of the first instalment. Of this 1,000,000 francs were for the first instalment of interest on the whole sum, and the balance, for the proportion of the principal due, being one sixth.

This bill and report were printed and referred to the committee, as mentioned in this paper, heretofore, as an item of foreign intelligence.