equivalent reservation by France is
completely useless, as well as her previous abandonment of the same
duty, and, in short, the whole article. Each party, then, remains free
to raise or lower its tonnage, provided the change operates on all
nations, even the most favored.

Without undertaking to affirm, we may obviously conjecture that this
article has been inserted on the part of the United States from an
overcaution to guard, _nommement, by name_, against a particular
aggrievance, which they thought they could never be too well secured
against; and that has happened which generally happens--doubts have been
produced by the too great number of words used to prevent doubt.

II. The Court of France, however, understands this article as intended
to introduce something to which the preceding articles had not reached,
and not merely as an application of them to a particular case. Their
opinion seems to be founded on the general rule in the construction of
instruments, to leave no words merely useless for which any rational
meaning can be found. They say that the reservation by the United States
of a right to lay a duty equivalent to that of the 100 sols, reserved
by France, would have been completely useless if they were left free
by the preceding articles to lay a tonnage to any extent whatever;
consequently, that the reservation of a part proves a relinquishment
of the residue.

If some meaning, and such a one, is to be given to the last member
of the article, some meaning, and a similar one, must be given to the
corresponding member. If the reservation by the United States of a right
to lay an equivalent duty implies a relinquishment of their right to
lay any other, the reservation by France of a right to continue the
specified duty to which it is an equivalent must imply a relinquishment
of the right on her part to lay or continue any other. Equivalent
reservations by both must imply equivalent restrictions on both.
The exact reciprocity stipulated in the preceding articles, and which
pervades every part of the treaty, insures a counter right to each
party for every right ceded to the other.

Let it be further considered that the duty called _tonnage_ in the
United States is in lieu of the duties for anchorage, for the support of
buoys, beacons, and light-houses, to guide the mariner into harbor and
along the coast, which are provided and supported at the expense of the
United States, and for fees to measurers, wei