Manuscript DS, signed “George R,” one page both sides, 7.75 x 12.25, September 2, 1824. Warrant by which King George IV grants "a Full Power to Our Trusty and Well beloved Henry Unwin Addington, Esquire, authorizing and empowering him to negotiate and conclude, with the Minister or Ministers duly vested with similar Power and Authority on the part of Our Good Friends The United States of America, a Treaty for the more effectual suppression of the Slave Trade." Boldly signed at the head in ink by King George IV, and countersigned at the conclusion by Foreign Secretary George Canning. The white paper seal affixed to the upper left remains fully intact. Bound to the document with a navy blue ribbon is a manuscript containing the text of the instrument granting Addington the power to negotiate said treaty. In fine condition.
Pressure to abolish slavery within the British Empire was mounting in Great Britain in the mid-1820s. These efforts, led by William Wilberforce, Thomas Clarkson, and others, would achieve success in 1833, when Britain passed the Slavery Abolition Act and emancipated 780,000 slaves. In an effort to assist opponents of the African slave trade, the United States, in early 1824, came close to agreeing to allow Britain to search the ships of American slave traders.
Negotiations over the slave suppression convention were still ongoing in December, when President James Monroe gave his State of the Union Address, commenting on the matter: 'It is a cause of serious regret that no arrangement has yet been finally concluded between the two governments to secure by joint cooperation the suppression of the slave trade. It was the object of the British government in the early stages of the negotiation to adopt a plan for the suppression which should include the concession of the mutual right of search by the ships of war of each party of the vessels of the other for suspected offenders. This was objected to by this government on the principle that as the right of search was a right of war of a belligerent toward a neutral power it might have an ill effect to extend it by treaty, to an offense which had been made comparatively mild, to a time of peace.'
Ultimately, the prospects of the proposed Anglo-American convention collapsed under objections in the United States Senate, and no such treaty would be concluded until the Lyons–Seward Treaty of 1862—an aggressive measure to end the Atlantic slave trade negotiated amidst the Civil War.
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