Façade of the Kun Iam Temple, where the treaty was signed.
TheTreaty of Wanghia (also known as theTreaty of Wangxia;Treaty of peace, amity, and commerce, between the United States of America and the Chinese Empire;[2] (Chinese:[中美]望廈條約 / [中美]望厦条约) was the first of theunequal treaties imposed by theUnited States on theQing dynasty. By the terms of thediplomatic agreement, the United States received the same privileges with China that Great Britain had achieved under theTreaty of Nanking in 1842. The United States received additional privileges as well, including the right tocabotage on preferential terms and the expansion ofextraterritoriality. Imperial China's Qing dynasty signed the treaty with the United States on July 3, 1844, in theKun Iam Temple. The treaty was subsequently passed by theUS Congress and ratified by PresidentJohn Tyler on January 17, 1845.[3] The Treaty of Wanghia was formally in effect until the signing of the 1943Sino-American Treaty for the Relinquishment of Extraterritorial Rights in China.
The United States was represented byCaleb Cushing, aMassachusetts lawyer dispatched by PresidentJohn Tyler under pressure from American merchants concerned about British dominance in trade with China.[4] Physician and missionaryPeter Parker served as Cushing'sChinese interpreter. The Qing dynasty was represented byKeying, theViceroy of Liangguang, who held responsibility for the provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi.[5][6])
The treaty was modeled after the treaties ofNanking andthe Bogue between theUnited Kingdom and China, but differed in being more detailed.[4] Among other things, it contained provisions for:
Extraterritoriality, whereby Chinese subjects would be tried and punished under Chinese law and American citizens would be tried and punished under the authority of the American consul or other public functionaries authorized to that effect[4]
Fixed tariffs on trade in the treaty ports
The right to buy land in the fivetreaty ports and erect churches and hospitals there
The right to learnChinese by abolishing a law that had forbidden foreigners to do so[7]
Most favored nation status for the United States, resulting in the United States receiving the same beneficial treatment China gave to otherWestern powers and the right to modify the treaty after 12 years
The United States also granted the Chinese Empire powers to confiscate American ships operating outside treaty ports and withdrew consular protection in cases in which American citizens were trading inopium, under articles 3 and 33, respectively.[4] Furthermore, the US agreed to hand over any offenders to China. (Americans entered the opium trade with less expensive but inferior Turkish opium and by 1810 had around 10% of the trade in Canton.[8])
^Tyler Dennett,Americans in Eastern Asia: A critical study of the policy of the United States with reference to China, Japan and Korea in the 19th century (Macmillan, 1922) pp 145-171.online.
^Article 18 of the treaty states, "It shall be lawful for the officers or citizens of the United States to employ scholars and peoples of any part of China...to teach any of the languages of the Empire, and to assist in literary labors ... it shall in like manner be lawful for citizens of the United States to purchase all manner of books in China."
^Tyler Dennett,Americans in Eastern Asia pp 115-124.
Dennett, Tyler.Americans in eastern Asia; a critical study of the policy of the United States with reference to China, Japan and Korea in the 19th century (1922)online
Downs, Jacques M., and Frederic D. Grant Jr.The Golden Ghetto: the American commercial community at canton and the shaping of American China Policy, 1784–1844 (Hong Kong University Press, 2014)online.
Henson Jr., Curtis T.Commissioners and Commodores: The East Indian Squadron and American Diplomacy in China (U of Alabama Press, 1982)
Kuo, Ping Chia. "Caleb Cushing and the Treaty of Wanghia, 1844".The Journal of Modern History 5, no. 1 (1933): 34–54.online
Le Pichon, Alain. "Howqua And the Howqua: how a Chinese monopolist saved American free-traders from financial ruin."Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch 50 (2010): 99–121.online
Swisher, Earl, ed.China's Management of the American Barbarians; a Study of Sino-American Relations, 1841–1861, with Documents. New Haven, CT: Published for the Far Eastern Association by Far Eastern Publications,Yale University, 1953.
Welch, Richard E. "Caleb Cushing's Chinese Mission and the Treaty of Wanghia: A Review."Oregon Historical Quarterly 58.4 (1957): 328–357.online
Treaty of Wanghia atWikisource
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