To the Senate of the United States:

I transmit herewith, for the consideration of the Senate with a view to obtaining its advice thereon and consent thereto, a convention for commercial reciprocity between the United States and the Dominican Republic, which was signed in this capital on the 4th instant.

This convention aims to carry out the principles which, as explained in my last annual message to the Congress, should, it is conceived, control all commercial arrangements entered into with our neighbors of the American system with whom trade must be conducted by sea.  Santo Domingo is the first of the independent Republics of the Western Hemisphere with which an engagement of this character has been concluded, and the precedent now set will command your fullest attention as affecting like future negotiations.

CHESTER A. ARTHUR.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, December 10, 1884.

To the Senate of the United States:

I transmit herewith, for consideration by the Senate with a view to advising and consenting to its ratification, a convention for commercial reciprocity between the United States and Spain, providing for an intimate and favored exchange of products with the islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico, which convention was signed at Madrid on the 18th ultimo.

The negotiations for this convention have been in progress since April last, in pursuance of the understanding reached by the two Governments on the 2d of January, 1884, for the improvement of commercial relations between the United States and the Spanish Antilles, by the eighth article of which both Governments engaged “to begin at once negotiations for a complete treaty of commerce and navigation between the United States of America and the said Provinces of Cuba and Puerto Rico.”  Although this clause was by common consent omitted from the substitutionary agreement of February 13, 1884 (now in force until replaced by this convention being carried into effect), the obligation to enter upon such a negotiation was deemed to continue.  With the best desire manifest on both sides to reach a common accord, the negotiation has been necessarily protracted, owing to the complexity of the details to be incorporated in order that the convention might respond to the national policy of intercourse with the neighboring communities of the American system, which is outlined in my late annual message to the Congress in the following words: 

The conditions of these treaties should be the free admission of such merchandise as this country does not produce, in return for the admission free, or under a favored scheme of duties, of our own products, the benefits of such exchange to apply only to goods carried under the flag of the parties to the contract; the removal on both sides from the vessels so privileged of all tonnage dues and national imposts, so that those vessels may ply unhindered