in all such cases it is their right and duty to consider the expediency of carrying a treaty into effect.  If the House think the faith of the nation already pledged they can not claim any discretion; there is no room left to deliberate upon the expediency of the thing.  The resolution now under consideration is merely “that it is expedient to carry the British treaty into effect,” and not whether we are bound by national faith to do it.  I will therefore consider the question of expediency alone; and thinking as I do that the House has full discretion on this subject, I conceive that there is as much responsibility in deciding in the affirmative as in rejecting the resolution, and that we shall be equally answerable for the consequences that may follow from either.

It is true, however, that there was a great difference between the situation of this country in the year 1794, when a negotiator was appointed, and that in which we are at present; and that consequences will follow the refusal to carry into effect the treaty in its present stage, which would not have attended a refusal to negotiate and to enter into such a treaty.  The question of expediency, therefore, assumes before us a different and more complex shape than when before the negotiator, the Senate, or the President.  The treaty, in itself and abstractedly considered, may be injurious; it may be such an instrument as in the opinion of the House ought not to have been adopted by the Executive; and yet such as it is we may think it expedient under the present circumstances to carry it into effect.  I will therefore first take a view of the provisions of the treaty itself, and in the next place, supposing it is injurious, consider, in case it is not carried into effect, what will be the natural consequences of such refusal.

The provisions of the treaty relate either to the adjustment of past differences, or to the future intercourse of the two nations.  The differences now existing between Great Britain and this country arose either from non-execution of some articles of the treaty of peace or from the effects of the present European war.  The complaints of Great Britain in relation to the treaty of 1783 were confined to the legal impediments thrown by the several States in the way of the recovery of British debts.  The late treaty provides adequate remedy on that subject; the United States are bound to make full and complete compensation for any losses arising from that source, and every ground of complaint on the part of Great Britain is removed.

Having thus done full justice to the other nation, America has a right to expect that equal attention shall be paid to her claims arising from infractions of the treaty of peace, viz., compensation for the negroes carried away by the British; restoration of the western posts, and indemnification for their detention.