in this matter is afforded by a letter of the law adviser of
the Crown, transmitted in 1801 by the Secretary for Foreign Affairs to
Mr. King, then United States Minister. "The direct trade between the
mother country and its colonies has not during this present war been
recognized as legal, either by his Majesty's Government or by his
tribunals."[113]

It is to be inferred that the Administration and the Senate, while
possibly thinking Jay too yielding as a negotiator, reached the
conclusion that his estimate of British feeling, formed upon the spot,
was correct as to the degree of concession then to be obtained. At all
events, the treaty, which provided for mixed commissions to adjudicate
upon the numerous seizures made under the British orders, and, under
certain conditions, admitted American vessels to branches of British
trade previously closed to them, was ratified with the exception of
the twelfth article. This conferred on Americans the privilege, long
and urgently desired, of direct trade between their own country and
the British West Indies on the same terms as British ships, though in
vessels of limited size. Greatly desired as this permission had been,
it came coupled with the condition, not only that cargoes from the
islands should be landed in the United States alone, but also, while
the concession lasted, American vessels should not carry "molasses,
sugar, coffee, cocoa, or cotton" from the United States to any part of
the world. By strict construction, this would prevent re-exporting the
produce of French or other foreign colonies; a traffic, the extent of
which during this war may be conceived by the returns for a single
year, 1796, when United States shipping carried to Europe thirty-five
million pounds of sugar and sixty-two million pounds of coffee,
products of the Caribbean region. This article was rejected by the
Senate, and the treaty ratified without it; but the coveted privilege
was continued by British executive order, the regulations in the
matter being suspended on account of the war, and the trade opened to
American as well as British ships. Ostensibly a favor, not resting on
the obligations of treaty, but on the precarious ground of the
Government's will, its continuance was assured under the circumstances
of the time by its practical utility to Great Britain; for the trade
of that country, and its vital importance in the prevailing wars, were
developing at a rate which outstripped its own to