Treaty of Peace and Friendship Between the United States and Morocco

The Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the United States of America and the Empire of Morocco is part of the official treaty record of the United States.

The original Treaty of Peace and Friendship was concluded in 1786 and was formally ratified by the United States in Congress assembled on July 18, 1787. Congress expressly approved the Treaty, ordered it published, and directed that it be faithfully observed and fulfilled by the citizens of the United States. The original federal record remains preserved in the Library of Congress.

The original treaty provided for a fifty-year term. Before that period expired, the United States and the Empire of Morocco entered into the Treaty of Peace and Friendship of September 16, 1836, which renewed and replaced the earlier treaty. The renewed Treaty received the advice and consent of the United States Senate on January 17, 1837, was ratified by the United States on January 28, 1837, and was proclaimed on January 30, 1837.

THE 1836 TREATY WAS DESIGNED TO CONTINUE WITHOUT PERIODIC RE-SIGNING

Article 25 of the 1836 Treaty is particularly important.

The Treaty provided that it would remain in force for fifty years. But unlike an agreement that simply expires at the conclusion of a fixed term, Article 25 further provided that after the fifty-year period the Treaty would continue to be binding upon both parties until one party gave the other twelve months' notice of an intention to abandon it.

Accordingly, the Treaty did not require the parties to return every fifty years and execute a new treaty merely to keep their relationship in force. Its continuation was built directly into Article 25. Termination required an affirmative act: notice by one of the parties followed by the twelve-month period established by the Treaty.

The United States itself later relied upon this provision internationally. In proceedings before the International Court of Justice, the United States stated that because the 1836 Convention had not been denounced, the United States continued to claim rights arising under it.

A CONTINUING FEDERAL TREATY RECORD

The significance of this history is not based upon private opinion or modern terminology. The relationship appears in the official records of the United States.

The Continental Congress ratified the original treaty in 1787. The constitutional treaty process of the United States was subsequently employed for the renewed 1836 Treaty. The agreement was preserved in the United States treaty record and published in the Statutes at Large.

The United States and the Moorish Empire therefore entered into a formally documented political and treaty relationship through instruments recognized within the federal treaty-making system.

The complete Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1836 is provided on this page as a downloadable PDF so that every national, public official, researcher, attorney, court, and member of the public may examine the actual instrument for themselves.

MOORISH NATIONALITY AND RESIDENCE ABROAD

The historical treaty record must also be considered alongside the United States Government's own historical examination of Moorish nationality.

In 1906, the American Legation at Tangier reported to the United States Department of State concerning the citizenship and nationality of Moorish subjects. That material was subsequently transmitted to Congress as part of the federal government's examination of Citizenship of the United States, Expatriation, and Protection Abroad.

The report is important because it distinguished residence from nationality.

The American diplomatic record expressly reported that:

Residence in foreign parts does not affect the nationality of Moorish subjects.

The report also explained that important questions concerning Moorish citizenship had historically been governed by treaties and conventions between the Moorish Empire and foreign powers.

Equally significant, after reproducing Article XV of the Convention of Madrid of 1880 concerning foreign naturalization and return to Morocco, the American diplomatic officer reported that “the above ruling has never yet been acted upon.”

Those historical statements raise an important governmental question concerning the distinction between a nationality that exists as a political relationship and the domestic governmental machinery established for identifying, documenting, continuing, restoring, or regulating that nationality.

NATIONALITY IS A MATTER OF GOVERNMENT AND LAW

Nationality is not created by joining a church, obtaining a tax classification, filing a private declaration, or merely announcing a change of personal status.

Nationality is a political relationship between a national and a State.

Modern United States Department of State materials likewise recognize the principle that a country determines who its nationals are for purposes of its own domestic law and recognize that dual nationality may exist.

For this reason, the United States of America Republic maintains that the proper order is:

NATION → GOVERNMENT → LAW → NATIONALITY → CITIZEN/NATIONAL → OFFICIAL RECORD

The individual does not create the Nation.

The Nation, acting through its lawful governmental institutions and legislative authority, establishes the laws by which its political body is identified and its nationals are documented.

THE U.S.A.R. POSITION

The United States of America Republic presents the Treaty of Peace and Friendship, the Convention of Madrid, the historical United States diplomatic record concerning Moorish nationality, and the applicable principles of the law of nations as part of its governmental record concerning the political and national status of the Moorish American people.

U.S.A.R.'s position is that the national character of a people cannot be reduced merely to their place of residence. The historical United States record itself distinguished residence abroad from the continuing nationality of Moorish subjects.

U.S.A.R. further maintains that the re-establishment of functioning national governmental institutions and the enactment of laws governing citizenship and nationality are fundamentally different from an individual attempting to privately “correct” his or her status.

Government establishes nationality law.
Nationality law identifies the political body.
The national government maintains the official record of its nationals.

FEDERAL TREATY RECORD — The United States formally ratified the original Treaty of Peace and Friendship in 1787. The Treaty was renewed and replaced by the 1836 Treaty, whose Article 25 provides for its continued binding force after the original fifty-year term unless one party gives the other twelve months' notice of its intention to abandon the Treaty.

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1787 TREATY OF FRIENDSHIP AND PEACE

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1836 TREATY WITH MOROCCO

1906 CITIZENSHIP IN THE UNITED STATES, EXPATRIATION, AND CITIZENSHIP ABROAD.

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