of the two republics, and quibbling about the price, the purchase was effected by the United States for sixteen million dollars, four millions of which was to be paid to American merchants to indemnify them for losses from French privateers. The treaty was signed on the 3d of May, 1803, and ratified by Congress on the twentieth of the following October; the most essential provisions of which, bearing upon our subject, are here inscribed:
“Article 1.—Whereas, by the article the third of the treaty concluded at St. Ildefonso, the 9th Vendimiaire, an 9, (October 1, 1800,) between the First Consul of the French Republic and his Catholic Majesty, it is agreed as follows: His Catholic Majesty promises and engages on his part to retrocede to the French republic, six months after the full and entire execution of the conditions and stipulations herein to his royal highness, the Duke of Parma, the colony or province of Louisiana, with the same extent it now has in the hands of Spain, and that it had when France possessed it, and such as it should be after the treaties entered into between Spain and other States; And, Whereas, in pursuance of the treaty, and especially the third article, the French Republic has an incontestable title to the domain and possession of said territory: The First Consul of the French Republic, desiring to give to the United States a strong proof of his friendship, doth hereby cede to the United States, in the name of the French Republic, forever, and in full sovereignty, the said territory and all its appurtenances, as fully and in the same manner as they have been acquired by the French Republic, in virtue of the above mentioned treaty concluded with his Catholic Majesty.
“Article 3. The inhabitants of the ceded territory shall be incorporated into the Union of the United States, and admitted, as soon as possible, to all the rights, advantages and immunities of the citizens of the United States; and, in the meantime, they shall be maintained and protected in the free enjoyment of their liberty, property, and the religion which they prefer.”
Immediately after the accession of Louisiana, the President dispatched Generals Wilkinson and Claiborne to take possession of it in behalf of the United States. On their arrival at
