Page 5 - Merchants and Mandarins China Trade Era

enforce Imperial rule. As power slipped away from Chinese ad­

ministrators. the English stepped into the vacuum. Attempting

to maintain order and stability, England employed military

force to impose Western concepts of international law on i·�s
relations with China. Consequently, with the Treaty of Na.11-

king (1842), the basis of Sino-Western contact became the

11treaty system. 11

Aware of the importance of the English treaty, the United

States government acted to protect American interests in China

by despa.·tching Caleb Cushing with powers to conclude a treaty

with the Imperial government. In China Cushing perceived that

American residents, who had refused to co-operate with the

English during the Opium War, now had only the dubious protec­

tion of Imperial law. As the Ch 'ing dynas·ty•s power waned the

Chinese government became less capable of discriminating in

favor of nations. who observed Chinese regulations. Cushing' s

recognition of the potential difficulties facing Americans un­

der the emerging 1 treaty system" prompted him to insist on for­
1
malizing American relations with Chi:na. In the Treaty of Wang­

f
hsia (1844) Americans exchanged. the advaf tages they had enjoyed
under the "Canton system" for commercial regulations and legal

and extraterritorial rights guaran·teed by international law.

Cushing' s treaty reflec·ted the ties of friendship that had de­

veloped be·liween .Americans and Chinese. This study examines the

first sixty years of Sino-American contact, a period which

strongly influenced both the Treaty of Wanghsia and the cours.e

of American relations with China in to the ·twen·tieth cent;ury.