Treaty of Wanghia

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The Sino-American Treaty of Wanghia (Traditional Chinese: ; Simplified Chinese: }}}; pinyin: ) is the first diplomatic agreement between China and the United States in history, signed on 3 July 1844 in a village in northern Macau called Mong Há (Traditional Chinese: 望廈; Simplified Chinese: 望厦; Pinyin: Wàngxià; Cantonese Yale: Mohng Hah, Mong6 Ha6) which is now a part of Our Lady of Fatima.

It was brought about 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. Because America signed as a nation interested in trade instead of colonization, it was rewarded with extraordinary amount of trading power.

The treaty was signed by Cushing for the U.S. and Governor-General (zongdu) Qiying for the Qing Empire. It was modeled after the Treaty of Nanking between the UK and China, from which it differed chiefly by its greater detail and by granting U.S. citizens

extraterritoriality, that is, exemption from imperial jurisdiction,
the right to buy land in five treaty ports and erect churches and hospitals there to provide for Christian missionary activity, and
the right to learn Chinese by abolishing a law which hitherto forbade foreigners to do so.

As a concession to China, Opium trade was explicitly declared illegal, and the U.S. agreed to hand over any offenders against that law to Chinese officials.

Treaty of Wanghia

See also