, 1868-03-03
MEETING 18th February 1868.

proposal u II % HSb'C " IA
steds country district (Christmas) that the
Council would support the petition of the
planters to His Excellency the Governor,
soliciting more favorable conditions for the
importation of the Islands produce into the
mOther-COuntry.
The report rendered by the Committee as
follows
COMMITTEE REPORT.
In the meeting of the Colonial Council of
October 14th last, the underwritten members
were elected as a Committee to draw up a re-
port on a memorial from the planters of this
Island to His Excellency the Governor, for
obtaining more favorable conditions for the
importation of the produce Of this Island into
the mother-country."
SO long a time having elapsed since the
appointment Of the Committee, we would offer
an explanation as to the cause of the delay.
The Committee during the month of October
held several meetings with His Excellency the
Governor, in which sundry questions connected
with this subject were discussed, when the gale
at st Thomas on the goth of October and the
earthquakes from November 18th up to the
present year called His Excellency to st. Tho
mas several times, and thereby interrupted the
meetings of the Committee and when the
news of the sale of these Islands reached here
at the same time,-a sale in which there was
then every reason to suppose st. Crolx was
included-it tended to diminish the interest in
Il matter, for the arranging of which in the best
manner, the cession of this Island to the United
States could not but be considered the most
effiCaciouS, and, as we then believed, also the
most speedy means. In this, however, there
was a disappointment and when it became
known that the treaty concluded between His
Majesty the King and the President of the
ITnitn1 StatnS fDr tho nnCCioO of st HhOmoc
and ST. Johns, did net mention St. Croix, there
arose in this Island a painful anxiety, apt to
draw the minds of the inhabitants to reflect
upon their future relations, such as we must
suppose and fear would arise, in the event of
our becoming separated from the Sister-ISlandS,
and this Island remaining with Denmark, with
out an essential change being made in our re-
lations to that country, favorable to the pro-
duce of the Island and to its importations into
the mother country. As now several months
have already passed by without our having had
any information of the intentions of His Majesty
the King in regard to this Island, and as the
uncertainty about it has, besides very much in
c~reasing the anxious apprehensiOns in the ISL
and, caused injurious effects to our interests
the Committee feel it their duty to take the
matter up a new, though now only as some
thing secondary and provisional, so that, should
the necessary cession of the Island along with
the two other Islands be protracted, then to
seek as quickly as possible, to obtain a change
for the better in the highly onerous conditions
on which planters must now import their pro-
duce into Denmark.
The Committee, therefore, deem it best,
that the Council, while adopting as it's own the
memorial of the planters, should at the same
time with a submissive respect firmly express
first of all, the timely wish and hope of the
whole population of this Island for the cession
also of st. Croix to the United States of Anne
RIGA as only thereby can 9 hope to attain
that total and perpetual amelioration in our
commercial relations, which is indispensable to