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Content Enable editor Use plain text Code entry The Georgia question was only one of two main bones of contention between Spain and England. Indeed, it was the smaller bone of the two. The other was a matter of trade and sea power. But both were questions of the Caribbean and its perimeter. Since the time of Hawkins, Englishmen had smuggled right and left in Spanish American waters. Then, by the Treaty of Utrecht the South Sea Company was granted legal right to a limited amount of trade in Spanish America. This privilege the company brazenly abused, and other English merchants continued to smuggle as of yore. Spain, weary of protest, established a rigorous coast guard. She freely exercised the "right of search," and captured scores of British vessels. Herein, too, abuses occurred. The blame was two-sided, of course. [Para.] The wails of the British merchants resounded throughout the realm. Parliament held a fiery debate on Spanish depredations. Robert Jenkins, one of the plaintiffs, caused a sensation. Seven years before, off Florida, a Spanish coast guard had boarded his ship, cut off one of his ears and handed it back.1 As Exhibit No. 1 Jenkins now showed the bottled ear in Parliament. Some say that Jenkins lied. Be that as it may, his story caught the crowd and they demanded war.

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