of Parliament, will be manifestly
incompatible with the positive stipulations of the commercial convention
existing between the two countries. That convention, however, may be
terminated with twelve months' notice, at the option of either party.

A treaty of amity, navigation, and commerce between the United States
and His Majesty the Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary and Bohemia, has
been prepared for signature by the Secretary of State and by the Baron
de Lederer, intrusted with full powers of the Austrian Government.
Independently of the new and friendly relations which may be thus
commenced with one of the most eminent and powerful nations of the
earth, the occasion has been taken in it, as in other recent treaties
concluded by the United States, to extend those principles of liberal
intercourse and of fair reciprocity which intertwine with the exchanges
of commerce the principles of justice and the feelings of mutual
benevolence. This system, first proclaimed to the world in the first
commercial treaty ever concluded by the United States--that of 6th
February, 1778, with France--has been invariably the cherished policy of
our Union. It is by treaties of commerce alone that it can be made
ultimately to prevail as the established system of all civilized
nations. With this principle our fathers extended the hand of friendship
to every nation of the globe, and to this policy our country has ever
since adhered. Whatever of regulation in our laws has ever been adopted
unfavorable to the interest of any foreign nation has been essentially
defensive and counteracting to similar regulations of theirs operating
against us.

Immediately after the close of the War of Independence commissioners
were appointed by the Congress of the Confederation authorized to
conclude treaties with every nation of Europe disposed to adopt them.
Before the wars of the French Revolution such treaties had been
consummated with the United Netherlands, Sweden, and Prussia. During
those wars treaties with Great Britain and Spain had been effected, and
those with Prussia and France renewed. In all these some concessions to
the liberal principles of intercourse proposed by the United States had
been obtained; but as in all the negotiations they came occasionally in
collision with previous internal regulations or exclusive and excluding
compacts of monopoly with which the other parties had been trammeled,
the advances made in them toward the freedom