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Show -10- territories of the States and the Spanish dominions; but both banks of the river at its outlet and the entire coast of the Gulf of Mexico were held by Spain with navigation on all these waters completely closed to the American States.19 And it may be noted in passing that the sovereignty of Spain at that time extended in undisputed sway over all the territory now within the United States west of the Mississippi River except the 0regon Country"-later made into the States of Oregon, Washington, and Idaho-which was then vaguely claimed 'by both Great Britain and Russia but occupied in fact by none save the savage tribes, ^0 This was the state of affairs national in respect to American waters when a convention met in Philadelphia .in 1787 to form a more perfect union of the thirteen States* In the environment of today it is difficult to comprehend that the delegates in the constitutional convention of 1787 represented States as jealous of their sovereign rights and as distrustful of each other as any other nations.then in existence. All of the States were in controversy over boundaries, partly water-courses, and they had just ceded to the control of the Federal Congress their territories between the mountains and the Mississippi River to avoid con- flict among themselves while still engaged in war with Great Britain. Penn- sylvania and Connecticut had spilled blood in a territorial quarrel which was still unsettled. L War between New York and the unattached republic of Vermont portended,^2 in which situation Massachusetts had already issued its proclama- tion of neutrality.^J Slavery and freedom of transportation on foreign bottoms already loomed as issues between the southern States and New England.24 There was no national credit; no fixed and common currency; and commerce between the States was at low ebb* But all realized that separate national existence with- out a more perfect union or league of some sort was extremely precarious. Europe, with its numberless frontiers of tolls and charges and changing curren- cies, and its bickering alliances for balance of power, afforded an impressive For &. sketch of these treaty transactions, see Bulletin if6&9, Dept. of the Interior, U. S. Geological Survey, 22-21}.; see also, The Federalist, Scott*s ed., 2!)., -where John Jay said, in l'jQ'Jt ¦ - "Spain thinks it' convenient to shut the Mississippi against us on the one side, and Britain excludes us from the St. Lawrence on the other; nor will, either of them pernit the other waters, which are between them and us, to be- come the means of mutual intercourse and traffic." 20 . , Russia relinquished her claim by Treaty of April 17, 182/4.. 2 Malloy»s Treaties, 1513* fixing the boundary line for settlement by the United States at 514.* i+O * north latitude. The British claim was relinquished by the Treaty of 1814.6. 1 Malloyrs Treaties, 657> with the United States fixing the boundary from the IRocky Mountains to the Strait of Juan de Fuca on the 14.9th Parallel north latitude. ' ' Bui letin $689, Dept. of the Interior, U. S. Geological Survey, 105, Sco-t;t, Sovereign States and Suits, 6l. 27> ¦^Issxied by Governor John Hancock, formerly President of the Continental Congress, and first signatory to the Declaration of Independence. Warren, The Supreme Court and Sovereign States, 11-12, 2i4The Federalist, Scott's ed., 92l-92l^ |
