impartiality and fidelity, property of every kind within its territorial limits and belonging to the inhabitants of the country.

As the Mexican inhabitants were left, by the cession and conquest of foreigners, as will be shown hereafter, in territories without local laws, and many Americans resided there when these events occurred, some of whom held slaves, and other slaves have been moved there since, and are held in bondage, the masters can establish as perfect a right to the property they claim in their slaves, by producing and proving the existence of the laws of the state, in which they acquired the property, as any Mexican inhabitant can to the property he possesses, by tracing his title to the laws of Mexico as the source of it. No American resident has a right to require the claim to moveable property, of a Mexican inhabitant, to be decided according to the laws of the state on which the American relies to maintain his own title to personal property. The same principle rejects the pretension of Mexican inhabitants to have the question of the title to such property, set up by an American resident, determined according to the extinct laws of the subverted local government, or of the Republic of Mexico. If a territorial government should be established by the inhabitants, or by Congress, there is no power in either to authorize the government to make a distinction between property of different kinds, within the territorial limits of the government, and to afford protection to one kind and withhold it from another, or to prescribe any.

The eighth article of the treaty, by which the territories were ceded, secures the right to the Mexican inhabitants to continue their residence there, and allows them the alternative of retaining there their character and rights of Mexican citizens, or of becoming citizens of the United States, according to their election, to be made within a year from the exchange of the ratifications of the treaty. The effect of a failure on their part to make an actual election within the year to retain their character of foreigners and of Mexican citizens, and the continuance of their residence in the territories after the expiration of that period, the same article declares shall be a constructive election, the effect of which would make them at the end of the year citizens of the United States. It is not probable there have been many, if any, actual elections under the authority of the treaty, and there could be none by construction before the 30th of May, 1849, the end of one year after the exchange of the ratifications. Every Mexican inhabitant could, if he elected to do so, acquire the right, under the treaty, to remain during his life, in the territories, as a foreigner and a Mexican citizen. The territories were ceded to the United States, with no people, unconditionally, and, as the effect of the treaty alone, incorporated with the people of the United States. The savages, who occupied the territories, were their own rulers, and not subjects of Mexico, and neither party to the treaty intended they should ever become citizens of the United States. Territory, merely, was transferred, without any Mexican inhabitants made absolutely, by the treaty, a part of the people of the United States, and, therefore, entitled, after the cession, to the benefit of all the laws that were not political in their character, by which they had been governed in the territory before the treaty. No laws of a sovereign, who cedes territories, can be impressed upon territory alone and made inseparable from

it. If a territory be transferred without people incorporated by the treaty with the people who receive the cession, the authority of the laws of the former sovereign, in the territories, ceases with his dominion.

The Mexican inhabitants have the right reserved to them by the treaty, which, for any thing we can foresee, they may exercise, to leave the territories, and reside in some part of the Republic of Mexico, or to continue their residence in California and New Mexico, as foreigners and Mexican citizens. Should they become citizens of the United States, it will be the effect of a process of naturalization, after a residence, from necessity, for some time in the territories, after they became territories of the United States. They were foreigners before the cession, and their right to remain in the territories as foreigners was recognized by the treaty, which prescribed a mode in which they might afterward be naturalized and become citizens of the United States, as acts of Congress do for the benefit of all other foreigners, who establish themselves in the United States and apply for the rights of citizenship. The Mexican inhabitants have the privilege, in common with all other foreigners, of seeking and obtaining naturalization; but neither they or any other foreigners have, or can acquire, the right to subject to the laws of the native country of any of them the citizens of the Union in states, or in any territory of the United States.

The eleventh article of the treaty contains a statement of a fact made, and therefore affirmed to be true, by the governments of the United States and of Mexico, that a great part of the territories that were ceded, was occupied by savage tribes of Indians. They were not subject to Mexico, or to any local authority established by that Republic. From other sources of information we have learned, that all but small parts, comparatively, of the territories were occupied exclusively by the tribes referred to in the treaty. They had preserved their independence. They had chiefs and councils and usages, or laws, of their own. They acknowledged no allegiance to Mexico, and rendered no obedience to her laws; but were almost constantly engaged in wars against her. The Mexican inhabitants were indebted, for their occupancy of the soil, in many of their settlements, to the sufferance of some of these tribes, which had the power to terminate the privilege whenever they choseand they frequently extinguished it suddenly, and took compensation for the temporary possession of the soil, in the plunder of the property, and the massacre of the people.

These tribes had, by their power and cruelty, excited such terror in Mexico, that the United States were required, by that Republic, to create, by the treaty an obligation upon the General Government to prevent the tribes, forcibly, if necessary, from making any incursions into any territory, which continued, after the treaty, to be a part of Mexico, and to punish and exact satisfaction for them from the Indians, if they should elude the vigilance and power of the United States, and make any such incursions.

These Indians, in the undisturbed possession of nearly all the territories, held slaves, as the parties to the treaty admit, in the 11th article of it, and would sell and transfer them to others; and, according to one of the most recent authorities, Indian men and women are held in legal servitude by the Californians, who are the descendants of the Spanish

conquerors, and form the best part of the whole population of California.

The usage, or law, of the Indians on the subject, which prevailed over nearly all the territories, authorized slavery. At the time, and before the local government of the territories was overthrown by the employment of the military power of the United States, this Indian usage, or law, as well as the authority in relation to property of the same kind under which the Californians acted, prevailed. Property in slaves, held by the Indian inhabitants of the territories, and, probably, by white persons and Mexicans residing among the tribes at the time of the cession, is recognized by the United States in the eleventh article of the treaty.

One object of the article was to prohibit, in future, any purchase, by any inhabitant of the United States, of any Mexican or foreigner residing in Mexico, who had been captured by Indians inhabiting the territory of either of the two republics. This prohibition relates to all the persons who had been previously captured, and, consequently, to the persons who had been captured before the session by the Indians of California and New Mexico. Another, and the next part of the same article, binds the United States to exercise the influence and power of the General Government, faithfully, to rescue and return to their country, or deliver them to the representatives of the Mexican Government, all persons captured within Mexican territory and carried into the territory of the United States after the cesssion, as we understand the meaning and effect of the treaty to be. No part of the treaty requires the government of the United States to extinguish the claim of the Indians to property in their captives, or to prevent them from selling their captives to any other person than an inhabitant of the United States. The prohibition in the treaty extends no further than to make it unlawful for any inhabitant of the United States to purchase or acquire any such captives. In the limitation of the prohibition is a recognition, by the governments of the two Republics, of the property of Indians, or of those who claimed, under them, in such captives, and of the right of those who were the owners at the time of the cession, to sell their slaves to any other person than an inhabitant of the United States.

ART. IX-HOW SHALL COTTON MAINTAIN REMUNERATING PRICES ? Various propositions have been advanced in reply to the above query. Some have proposed a "Cotton Planter's Convention," to reduce the amount of production. Some have attacked the doctrine of protective duties as destructive to the planters, like Mr. McDuffie, in his" forty bale theory," and advocated "free trade," as the natural parent of "high prices." The truth is, the question is difficult of solution; and no wonder such various opinions are ventured, even among the most intelligent. We are willing to let the planters speak for themselves, and give publication, with pleasure, to the following communication from one of them. If the plan advocated be objectionable, or impracticable, it may suggest to some one a better one, and, at all events, it seems to us far less impracticable and objectionable, than the Cotton Planters' Convention, which takes for granted, that the supply of the staple is above the world's wants. The world has yet millions to be clothed. if we will but trade with them upon fair terms. Give us new markets, and extended commerce, and the demand for cotton will be equal to, if it does not exceed, the supply, which experience begins now to show is limited.—Ed.

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HOW SHALL COTTON MAINTAIN REMUNERATING PRICES?

PANOLA COUNTY, Mississippi. To J. D. B. DE Bow, Esq.-Seeing numerous calls made upon the cotton planter, by the Carolina and Georgia papers, to meet in convention, to take into consideration the adoption of some plan to protect ourselves from ruin, which must ensue, if no relief be found—for, really, our principal commodity (cotton) is not selling for enough to pay the current plantation expenses-I am induced to write to you, making some suggestions to said Convention, or to you, whom we look to as the great advocate of our rights. I have been a constant reader and admirer of your Review, which has given me an insight into the plan that I propose for the protection of cotton planters, which is this, that we (the cotton planters) call on our commission merchants to form a Chamber of Commerce, to be called "The Planters' Chamber of Commerce." There are, in New Orleans, Mobile, Augusta, Charleston, Savannah, &c., commission merchants, who can communicate by Telegraph, every hour, who shall be considered our representatives, elected by our patronage, as are our members of Congress, by our votes, and they shall act in concert, which the cotton planters can never do, from the fact, that we are too numerous, and scattered over too large an extent of territory, without the means of communicating with each other by Telegraph. It shall be the duty of this "Chamber" to say, that cotton shall not be sold for less than a stated price, and any merchant, departing from that law, would not again receive any patronage. Said Chamber might fix the price of cotton at Memphis, Natchez, and all other inland towns. The object would be, to make the commission merchant the true friend and representative of the planter, and, my word for it, no cotton planter will patronize any merchant who will not adhere strictly to laws enacted by such a Chamber. It might be urged, that the factor had accepted for the planter. To illustrate, grant that I draw a bill on my factor to the amount of my cotton-the bill is sent forward and my cotton is not sold-the bill goes to protest, in order to sustain its legal claim: are there not capitalists that would always be glad to take paper, based upon cotton, when it is known that the parcel is in hand? If not so, the Chamber could pass a law, that such protest should not discredit either merchant or planter, until the cotton was sold. This, I think, would work well. Now, sir, these views are predicated upon a statement in your last March number, that there is not more cotton made than would be needed for consumption; yet, with this fact before us, we see that the price has gone so low, until what we receive does not pay expenses. The cause has been attributed to the revolution in France; but time has proved this untrue. Up to the 18th of last month, France had taken from your market within twelve thousand of as many bales of cotton as she did the year before, and Great Britain more than twice that amount her usual quantity. What does this prove, but concert of action on the part of manufacturers and a want of concert amongst planters, which can only be effected through our factors? Look at the enormous profits realized by the cotton manufacturer. A few days since, I conversed with a manufacturer from Cincinnati, Ohio, who boasted that he had purchased cotton at 5 cts. per lb. and worked it into sheeting, which he was selling at 64 cts. per yard, as fast as he could make it, and one pound of cotton made three

yards of cloth. I would not have the price of cotton advance so as to check consumption, but merely to remunerate labor. Let us examine the effort made last summer, by the bagging manufacturers, to lower the price of hemp. When they stopped work for 60 days the growers of the raw material held on, and, as it were, by concert raised the price from 5 to 5 cents per lb.; when it was represented, by all calculations, that there was nearly, or quite, enough then manufactured to put up the present crop. Here we have an example of manufacturers contending, by concert, against the planters, and, according to the statistics of your Review, there are many more laborers engaged in working up the raw material, than in producing it; and it would be as ruinous for them to stop their machinery, as for us to quit our fields. Their employers are making enormous profits, and why? Merely by concert of action among the manufacturers of Manchester, and the brokers of Liverpool, who govern the price of cotton over the whole world. Our home manufacturers obey their bidding. Now, I think, nothing is needed to give the cotton planter a fair remuneration for his labor, but concert of action, which can only be effected through our factors. Should you deem the views contained in this letter worthy consideration, I would feel gratified for you to publish them, that it might draw public attention to the plan proposed; at the same time, you would lend us the aid of your high position, in carrying out this, or some other plan, for concert of action, to relieve those, whose interest you so ably advocate, from ruin. With a sincere desire for your success in aiding the planting and great commercial interest of the South, I remain, with the highest consideration, your obedient servant. MILES H. McGEHEE

COMMERCE OF THE UNITED STATES, 1818.

Since the establishment of the Review, we have preserved regularly, as our volume will evince, the commercial results of the whole Union, as well as of individual states and cities. From the last Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, we compile

1. DOMESTIC EXPORTS OF THE UNITED STATES, 1848.

Summary statement of the value of the exports of the growth, produce, and manufacture of the United States, during the year, commencing July 1, 1847, and ending June 30, 1848.