The National Register.
London, England, 1818-04-26 00:00:00

`~!~~+'

No. 53t5.—VoL. XI.

POLITICAL DISQUISITION.

OS THE DISPUTE BETWEEN SPAIN AND AMERICA

EVERY ,year, the ougqralmost to say every poet,
from our late transatlantic possessions, afford fresh
and important matter fur almost boundless contem-
plation, and the most useful reflection. In a spaCe of
time scarcely sufficient for-the maturity of the intellec-
tual power of a human being, have the United State
of America risen frets the origin of their politicel ex-
istence, into a flourishing State, and achieved a power
not only competent to the preservation of themselves,
but already tluvatening to their neighbours, and likely
to increase to an extent almost incalculable. The last mail
from Ara eriza furnishes us with the official correspondence
which hes taken place between the governments of that
country and Spain, relative totherestitution of those parts
Of the Floridas, whiCh were wrested from the hitter
power by the former, during a period of mutual peeee
and certainly, if the truth of the observations we have
just made -require the illustration of evidence, node
snore positive could be adduced than this correspondence.
Iu defiance of every received principle in. the laws of
Latitins, America resolutely persists in retaining the
a,:quisition of frontier she has made at the expense of
0z..... neighbours ; rejects, with a sneer, the proposal of
k.:;...roptan mediation ; and haughtily and abruptly re-
Ellie to enter into further communication on the sub-
ject.• The reasons asslinerl, by Mr. Adams against elks•
prartie. aZi:ity. of acquiescing in the demands of Spain,
of which, however, he does not pretend to deny the
justice, it, that the territory is question being now au-
-I.2xed to• the to-ited •Statett, by an Act c.f. the Govern-
ment, it ,is become impot.xibla nain to saparate them.
The best that een- be asicretiiii deeriptier of argument
that it is letcoaie.; auil in political controversy gene-
' ialiy proves, if' not the right, at least the power of the
party that makes use of it. The conduct of the Uait-
el States in this instance, so nearly resembles that of
Napoieen when in the zenith of his power, that it muy
fairly bli—arerlls6.2 to the same source; a consciousness
of power sufficient to Maintain., in practice, what in
principle ntight he disputed ; and -thus has the terri-
tory in question be,....nineorporated in that of the Unit-
ed States, with as little cerernory as accompanied the
annetettlen of Holland-05 the French Empire.

me occupation of Amelia island by the farces. of
tie United- States flu-;a another point for aiseussionlin
the corropondtnee before referred to ; :tad, speokjag
candidly, the arguments of America on this subject,.
claim 40me respect, at least, fur plausibility. Spain Was
notoriously incapable of Feserying either the peace or
tht ossesiron of the island, and the parties into I:•hos4i
power it lid fallen, are allegea to .have transgressed
the limits of neutrality, a 73.1 to have caused great
injury and interruption to the commerce of the United
states. However this; may be, the rig.ht of Aine:iza to
the are at least as good as those of the parries
lima whom she immediately wrested it: and„tdraittntg.
es she does, the ,claims of'!pain to thVosseatioa of it,
Nvlenever the latter may be enabla,M,,oc.4sjNel ile-
fcrid it, it would; under these circuiistAnoes, De

to reiwolkii Aine,:iekt as the aggrester in this hula

It what.Stpai!l Imam)
.tostr,k, thai, re thc.paLioa
*O-• ..ealltite. will b, ..rtforct: :ter right :is:
lurver, an Act of Ontf;ress may settle the fate
island, us. it appears to • have clone that of her yost,es-
tAtas in la; and from an act of this descriptizii,
teem, acconling. to the doctrine laid down Iy
it. Adam's, there can be nu appeal.. It is certata),

:...tusing to oliserve America kcepiog aloof with si much
" the lahrrittli of Fturopcsn
polities" in her official declaration; whilst in her
clnduct, she is insking a .pruetical assertion of points
of which those politics, in their wildest theorcticul
t-terit, would scarcely a:Lai& the diss:us,ion. Grant-