The fallacy of the argument employed by the advocates of the treaty, that the Americans would honourably fulfil the recommendations of Congress, was illustrated by the following facts:
"The province of Virginia, a short time before the peace, had come to an unanimous conclusion 'that all demands or requests of the British Court for the restoration of property confiscated by the State were wholly impossible; and that their delegates should be instructed to move Congress that they should direct the deputies for adjusting peace not to agree to any such restitution.'"
_The State of New York_ resolved, "That it appears to this Legislature that divers of the inhabitants of this State have continued to adhere to the King of Great Britain, after these States were declared free and independent, and persevered in aiding the said king, his fleets and armies, to subjugate the United States to bondage: Resolved, That as on the one hand the scales of justice do not require, so on the other the public tranquillity will not permit, that such adherents who have been attainted should be restored to the rights of citizens, and that there can be no reason for restoring property which has been confiscated or forfeited."
AGENTS OF LOYALISTS--PROCEEDINGS OF PARLIAMENTARY COMMISSION--RESULTS.
Of course all hope of obtaining relief under the stipulations of the treaty was abandoned by the Loyalists, who "now applied to the Government which they had ruined themselves to serve, and many of them, who had hitherto been 'refugees' in different parts of America, went to England to state and recover payment for their losses. They organized an agency, and appointed a Committee composed of one delegate or agent from each of the thirteen States,[124] to enlighten the British public, and adopt measures of proceeding in securing the attention and action of the British Ministry in their behalf. In a tract printed by order of these agents (which now lies before us, entitled _The Case and Claim of American Loyalists impartially Stated and Considered_, published in 1783), it is maintained that 'it is an established rule, that all sacrifices made by individuals for the benefit and accommodation of others shall be equally sustained by all those who partake of it,' and numerous cases are cited from Puffendorf, Burlamaqui and Vattel, to show that the 'sacrifices' of the Loyalists were embraced in this principle. As a further ground of claim, it is stated that in case of territory alienated or ceded away by one sovereign power to another, the rule is still applicable; for that in the treaties of international law it is held, 'The State ought to indemnify the subject for the loss he has sustained beyond his proportion.' And in the course pursued at the close of the civil war in Spain, when the States of Holland obtained their independence, under the Treaty of Utrecht, and at various other periods, proved that the _rights_ of persons similarly situated had been respected and held inviolate. The conclusion arrived at from the precedents in history, and diplomacy, and in the statute-books of the realm, is, that as the Loyalists were as 'perfectly subjects of the British State as any man in London or Middlesex, they were entitled to the same protection and relief.' The claimants had been 'called by their sovereign, when surrounded by tumult and rebellion, to defend the supreme rights of the nation, and to assist in suppressing a rebellion which aimed at their destruction. They have received from the highest authority the most solemn assurances of protection, and even reward, for their meritorious services;' and that 'His Majesty and the two Houses of Parliament having thought it necessary, as the _price of peace_, or to the interest and safety of the empire, or from some other motive of public convenience, to ratify the Independence of America, _without securing any restitution whatever to the Loyalists_, they conceive that the nation is bound, as well by the fundamental laws of society as by the invariable and external principles of natural justice, to make them compensation.'"[125]