Treaty of Wanghia

Exterior of The Kun Iam Temple, where the Treaty was signed.

The Treaty of Wanghia (also Treaty of Peace, Amity, and Commerce, with tariff of duties,traditional Chinese: 望廈條約; simplified Chinese: 望厦条约; pinyin: Wàngxià; Cantonese Yale: Mohng Hah), is a diplomatic agreement between the Qing Dynasty of China and the United States, signed on 3 July 1844 in the Kun Iam Temple. It is considered an unequal treaty by many sources.

Name of the Treaty

The treaty is named after a village northern Macau where the temple is located, called Mongha or Wangxia (traditional Chinese: 望廈; simplified Chinese: 望厦; pinyin: Wàngxià; Cantonese Yale: Mohng Hah), which is now a part of Our Lady of Fatima Parish.

Contents of the Treaty

The United States was represented by Caleb Cushing, a Massachusetts lawyer dispatched by President John Tyler under the pressures of American merchants concerned about the British dominance in Chinese trade. A physician and missionary, Peter Parker, served as Cushing's Chinese interpreter. The Qing Empire was represented by Qiying, the Governor-General of Guangdong and Guangxi.

The treaty was modeled after the Treaties of Nanking and the Bogue between the UK and China, but differed in being more detailed. Among other things, it contained:

• extraterritoriality, which meant that US citizens could only be tried by US consular officers;
• fixed tariffs on the trade in the treaty ports;
• the right to buy land in the five treaty ports and erect churches and hospitals there; and
• the right to learn Chinese by abolishing a law which hitherto forbade foreigners to do so.
• the U.S received most-favored-nation status, resulting in the US receiving the same beneficial treatment China gave to other powers such as Britain, and allowed the US to modify the treaty after 12 years.

As a show of goodwill towards the Qing Empire, the Opium trade was declared illegal, and the U.S. agreed to hand over any offenders to China.

See also

• Imperialism in Asia
• Unequal Treaties
• Sino-American relations

References

• Kuo, Ping Chia. "Caleb Cushing and the Treaty of Wanghia, 1844." The Journal of Modern History 5, no. 1 (1933): 34-54. Available through JSTOR.
• 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.

External links

• On the negotiations of the treaty, 1844