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1822-7] Conventions with Russia and Great Britain. 371 Adams was instructed to demand the grounds on which the claim was based. He was told that the Russians had long maintained a settlement at Novo-Archangelsk in latitude 57, and that latitude 51 was about half-way between that settlement and the mouth of the Columbia river. The restriction forbidding an approach to the coast was made to prevent foreigners carrying on illicit trade with the natives to the injury of the Russian American Fur Company. Adams protested against these doctrines; but the Russian Minister declined to discuss the question; and Monroe, in December, 1822, suggested to Congress that the time had come to think seriously of occupying Oregon. Congress refused to consider the question ; and so the matter rested when Baron de Tuyl, the new Russian Minister, requested that the issue should be settled by negotiation at St Petersburg. The invitation was accepted ; and, while Adams was preparing instructions, the Baron called one day at the State Department and was told that Russians claim to a right to colonise the Pacific coast could not be listened to ; and that both North and South America were closed to colonisation by European Powers because of the independent position the nations of the New World had assumed and maintained. The Minister dissented vigorously; but Adams stood firm. He reasserted the principle in his instructions to the American Minister at St Petersburg; and Monroe announced it in his famous message of December, 1823. Great Britain meantime had protested against the imperial ukase, and had likewise been invited to negotiate for a settlement of the boundary issue. But, when it was found that the British envoy could discuss but could not settle the question, the American Minister offered 55 as the northern boundary of Oregon. Russia offered 54 40', which was accepted and embodied in a convention with Russia, signed in April, 1824. Great Britain in a convention with Russia in 1825 accepted the same line ; and 54 40' became the boundary between Alaska and Oregon. In 1827, as the ten-year period of joint occupancy was drawing to a close, Great Britain and the United States, by a new convention, continued the agreement indefinitely. The announcement of the principles which compose the Monroe Doctrine was hailed, both in Great Britain and America, with delight. The British people, press, and statesmen were loud in their praise of the firm stand that Monroe had taken against the Allies. " The question," said Brougham, " with regard to South America is now disposed of, or nearly so; for an event has recently happened than which no event has dispersed greater joy, exultation, and gratitude over all the freemen of Europe. That event, which is decisive of the subject in respect to South America, is the message of the President of the United States to Congress." In America the interest aroused by the promulgation of the Monroe Doctrine was soon overshadowed by a hotly contested presidential election. No part of the Constitution gave less popular satisfaction CH. xi. 242