- published: 06 Dec 2010
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The Treaty of Wang Hya (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 tiáoyuē; 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.
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.
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.
John Tyler (29 March 1790 – 18 January 1862) was the tenth President of the United States (1841–1845), after being the tenth Vice President of the United States (1841). A native of Virginia, Tyler served as a state legislator, governor, U.S. representative, and U.S. senator before being elected Vice President in 1840. He was the first to succeed to the office of President on the death of the incumbent. Tyler's opposition to nationalism and emphatic support of states' rights endeared him to his fellow Virginians but alienated him from most of the political allies that brought him to power in Washington. His presidency was crippled by opposition from both parties. Near the end of his life, he supported the secession movement in the southern states, and was elected to the Congress of the Confederate States of America.
Tyler was born to an aristocratic Virginia family of English descent and he came to national prominence at a time of political upheaval. In the 1820s, the nation's only political party, the Democratic-Republicans, split into factions, most of which did not share Tyler's strict constructionist ideals. Though initially a Democrat, his opposition to Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren led him to alliance with the Whig Party; he was elected Vice President In 1840 on the Whig ticket. Upon the death of President William Henry Harrison on 4 April 1841, only a month after his inauguration, a short Constitutional crisis arose over the succession process. Tyler immediately moved into the White House, took the oath of office, and assumed full presidential powers, a precedent that would govern future successions and eventually be codified in the Twenty-fifth Amendment.