he affair as
terminated.

Upon the presumption that this was the fact, new negotiations upon the
subject were commenced, and several conferences were held between the
Secretary of State and the Prussian minister. These resulted in a
protocol signed at the Department of State on the 27th of April, 1847,
in which the Secretary proposed either that the two Governments might
agree to extend the time for the exchange of ratifications, and thus
revive the convention, provided the Prussian Government would previously
intimate its consent to the omission of the third article, or he
"expressed his willingness immediately to conclude with Mr. Gerolt a new
convention, if he possessed the requisite powers from his Government,
embracing all the provisions contained in that of the 29th January,
1845, with the exception of the third article. To this Mr. Gerolt
observed that he had no powers to conclude such a convention, but would
submit the propositions of Mr. Buchanan to the Prussian Government for
further instructions."

Mr. Gerolt has never yet communicated in writing to the Department of
State the answer of his Government to these propositions, but the
Secretary of State, a few months after the date of the protocol, learned
from him in conversation that they insisted upon the third article of
the convention as a _sine qua non_. Thus the second negotiation had
finally terminated by a disagreement between the parties, when, more
than a year afterwards, on the 21st June, 1848, the Senate took the
original convention into consideration and ratified it, retaining the
third article.

After the second negotiation with the Prussian Government, in which the
objections to the third article were stated, as they had been previously
in my message of the 16th December, 1845, a strong additional difficulty
was interposed to the ratification of the convention; but I might
overcome this difficulty if my objections to the third article had not
grown stronger by further reflection. For a statement of them in detail
I refer you to the accompanying memorandum, prepared by the Secretary of
State by my direction.

I can not believe that the sovereign States of this Union, whose
administration of justice would be almost exclusively affected by such a
convention, will ever be satisfied with a treaty of extradition under
which if a German subject should commit murder or any other high crime
in New York or New Orleans, and could succeed in escaping to