Mr. Madison, as Secretary of State, in a despatch to Hon. Charles Pinckney, our minister at the court of Spain, under date of February 6, 1804, upholds the justice of the claims in significant words:-- “The claims from which France was released were _admitted by France_, and the release was for _a valuable consideration_ in a correspondent release of the United States from certain claims on them.”[211] Thus, according to official declaration, the claims of American citizens were “admitted by France,” but they were released for _a valuable consideration_ which first inured to the benefit of the Government of the United States. _Equitably, that valuable consideration must belong to the claimants._ Mr. Clay, as Secretary of State under John Quincy Adams, made a report, which had the sanction of the latter, where he fully affirms the justice of the claims:-- “The pretensions of the United States arose out of the spoliations, under color of French authority, in contravention to law and existing treaties. Those of France sprung from the Treaty of Alliance of the 6th February, 1778, the Treaty of Amity and Commerce of the same date, and the Convention of the 14th of November, 1788. Whatever obligations or indemnities from those sources either party had a right to demand were respectively waived and abandoned, _and the consideration which induced one party to renounce his pretensions was that of the renunciation by the other party of his pretensions_. What was the value of the obligations and indemnities so reciprocally renounced can only be matter of speculation.”[212] Mr. Clay concludes by declaring that the Senate, to which his report is addressed, was most competent to determine how far the appropriation of the indemnities due to American citizens was “a public use of private property, within the spirit of the Constitution, and whether equitable considerations do not require some compensation to be made to the claimants.” There is one other authority, of commanding character, not to be forgotten. It is Hon. Edward Livingston, jurist, statesman, and diplomatist, who, though not engaged in the negotiations, knew them as contemporary, and afterward, as Senator, made a report, accepted ever since as an authentic statement of the whole case, in which he says:--