Succession

1703 · 139168 — London: Printed and sold by John Nutt 1703. Planting colonies in the Spanish Americas First edition preceding the second edition of that year with an added postscript. Published in the third year of the War of the Spanish Succession 1701-1714 the anonymous author proposes that in return for the support of Britain and the Netherlands for the claim of the Emperor of Austria to the Spanish crown Spain's territories in America should be ceded to the two mercantile powers. They propose a confederation which will share the treasure from the Spanish mines keeping it out of the hands of a single monarch and in so doing preserve the balance of power in Europe. They moreover support extending the war to the Spanish West-Indies at that stage untouched by the conflict and offer proposals to plant colonies there. They respond to critics who would argue that such attempts at joint control of the American mines and territories would engender war between Britain and the Netherlands as trade brings peace and also reject the arguments that American wealth flowing into the mercantile nations would weaken the nation as was believed to be the case in Spain. The polemic nonetheless offers a stark realpolitik view of world politics and of the war treating as irrelevant the moral questions of stripping the territories of their nominal ally Habsburg Spain rather than the official war aims of taking French territories and stemming the growth of Bourbon power. A scarce treatise with ESTC locating six copies for this issue and a further two copies of the second edition Library Hub and Worldcat adding several more yet still absent from many prominent institutional collections and untraced in auction records. Small quarto 205 x 162 mm. Disbound pamphlet with remnants of original spine the pages numbered in an 18th-century hand 589-654 from its original place in the sammelband vol. Lightly browned and foxed top two cords mostly gone but bottom two holding light worming at foot not affecting text tiny hole affecting one letter to pp. 25/26. A very good copy without chipping or repairs. Alden 703153; European Americana 703/53; ESTC T193661; Kress S2261. Not in Sabin. unknown