1 TREATY WITH SPAIN (1819) [While in the hands of Spain, Florida was the source of much annoyance to the Southern States. Fugitive slaves took refuge there; the white population was largely of a lawless character; and the Seminole Indians often made incursions into Georgia. After the United States had been forced to invade the territory and take possession of part of it, Spain ceded it by the treaty of 1819.] TREATY OF AMITY, SETTLEMENT, AND LIMITS BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND HIS CATHOLIC MAJESTY, CONCLUDED AT WASHINGTON FEBRUARY 22, 1819; RATIFICATION ADVISED BY SENATE FEBRUARY 24, 1819; RATIFIED BY PRESIDENT; RATIFIED BY THE KING OF SPAIN OCTOBER 24, 1820; RATIFICATION AGAIN ADVISED BY SENATE FEBRUARY 19, 1821; RATIFIED BY PRESIDENT FEBRUARY 22, 1821; RATIFICATIONS EXCHANGED AT WASHINGTON FEBRUARY 22, 1821; PROCLAIMED FEBRUARY 22, 1821. T HE United States of America and His Catholic Majesty, desiring to consolidate, on a permanent basis, the friendship and good correspondence which happily prevails between the two parties have determined to settle and terminate all their differences and pretensions, by a treaty, which shall designate, with precision, the limits of their respective bordering territories in North America. With this intention the President of the United States has furnished with their full powers John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State of the said United States; and His Catholic Majesty has appointed the Most Excellent Lord Don Luis De Onis, Gonzales, Lopez y Vara, Lord of the town of Rayaces, Perpetual Regidor of the Corporation of the city of Salamanca, Knight Grand Cross of the Royal American Order of Isabella the Catholic, decorated with the Lys of La Vendée, Knight Pensioner of the Royal and Distin guished Spanish Order of Charles the Third, Member of the Supreme Assembly of the said Royal Order; of the Council of His Majesty; His Secretary, with Exercise of Decrees, and His Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary near the United States of America; And the said Plenipotentiaries, after having exchanged their powers, have agreed upon and concluded the following articles: ARTICLE I There shall be a firm and inviolable peace and sincere friendship between the United States and their citizens and His Catholic Majesty, his successors and subjects, without exception of persons or places. ARTICLE II His Catholic Majesty cedes to the United States, ir full property and sovereignty, all the territories which belong to him, situated to the eastward of the Mississippi, known by the name of East and West Florida. The adjacent islands dependent on said provinces, all public lots and squares, vacant lands, public edifices, fortifications, barracks, and other buildings, which are not private property, archives and documents, which relate directly to the property and sovereignty of said provinces, are included in this article. The said archives and documents shall be left in possession of the commissaries or officers of the United States, duly authorized to receive them. ARTICLE III The boundary line between the two countries, west of the Mississippi, shall begin on the Gulph of Mexico, at the mouth of the river Sabine, in the sea, continuing north, along the western bank of that river, to the 32d degree of latitude; thence, by a line due north, to the degree of latitude where it strikes the Rio Roxo of Nachitoches, or Red River; then following the course of the Rio Roxo westward, to the degree of longitude 100 west from London and 23 from Washing ton; then, crossing the said Red River, and running thence by a line due north, to the river Arkansas; thence, following the course of the southern bank of the Arkansas, to its source, in latitude 42 north; and thence, by that parallel of latitude, to the South Sea. The whole being as laid down in Melish's map of the United States, published at Philadelphia, improved to the first of January, 1818. But if the source of the Arkansas River shall be found to fall north or south of latitude 42, then the line shall run from the said source due south or north, as the case may be, till it meets the said parallel of latitude 42, and thence, along the said parallel, to the South Sea: All the islands in the Sabine, and the said Red and Arkansas Rivers, throughout the course thus described, to belong to the United States; but the use of the waters, and the navigation of the Sabine to the sea, and of the said rivers Roxo and Arkansas, throughout the extent of the said boundary, on their respective banks, shall be common to the respective inhabitants of both nations. The two high contracting parties agree to cede and renounce all their rights, claims, and pretensions, to the territories described by the said line, that is to say: The United States hereby to His Catholic Majesty, and renounce forever, all their rights, claims, and pretensions, to the territories lying west and south of the above-described line; and, in like manner, His Catholic Majesty cedes to the said United States all his rights, claims, and pretensions to any territories east and north of the said line, and for himself, his heirs, and successors, renounces all claim to the said territories forever. ARTICLE IV To fix this line with more precision, and to place the landmarks which shall designate exactly the limits of both nations, each of the contracting parties shall appoint a Commissioner and a surveyor, who shall meet before the termination of one year from the date of the ratification of this treaty at Nachitoches, on the Red River, and proceed to run and mark the said line, from the mouth of the Sabine to the Red River, and from the Red River to the river Arkan A facsimile of the last page of the Treaty with Great Britain which ended the War of 1812, from the original in the Department of State, Washington Count Romanzoff, the Russian Prime Minister, undertook The Czar's advances met with discouragement at |