Austria and Prussia as they are influenced by the war between them and Denmark. These observations are by no means less valuable, because, while we are speculating concerning the probable solution of the Schleswig-Holstein affair, the conference in London is proceeding to determine the solution certainly independently of all that may be thought or said by those who are not directly concerned in the matter. The United States are suffering much injustice at the hands of some of the European powers. In endeavoring to ascertain what we may have to expect hereafter at the hands of these powers in the vicissitudes of our own civil war, it is necessary to understand as well as we may be able what is likely to be the occupation of these powers respectively, and their relations towards each other in the field, when the interest of self-preservation obliges them to assume great responsibilities. I am, sir, your obedient servant, SIR: I have received with sincere pleasure your despatch of June 18, No. 61. I sympathize with you, as the whole American people do, in the grief and sorrow which you express on the occasion of the death of General Wadsworth. He was an eminent type of the sublime virtue which is saving and regenerating the republic. There is scarcely a family in the country which has not been bereaved, and you may therefore be sure of universal sympathy when you mourn for one near to yourself who was stricken down upon the battle-field. * * * * * * * I thank you for your suggestions concerning Mexico, and the probable influence of recent events in that country upon our relations with Austria. These are consequences of our civil war, and they cannot be controlled. All that can be done in regard to them is to practice prudence and good faith in our foreign relations, and at the same time make preparations for self defence, if, notwithstanding our best efforts, we shall find ourselves involved in new complications. Neither is our political system weak, nor does it stand on an uncertain foundation. We must, indeed, do all that we can to fortify, as well as to defend it; but we may not unwisely indulge an abiding confidence in its inherent strength and stability. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. J. LOTHROP MOTLEY, Esq., &c., &c., &c., Vienna. No. 90.] Mr. Seward to Mr. Motley. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, September 19, 1864. SIR: Absence from the capital has delayed thus long an acknowledgment of your very interesting despatch of the 14th of August, No. 71. Without discussing the merits or the political points of the recent war between the two great German states and Denmark, we may be allowed to rejoice that the war itself is at an end, and that Europe is at peace. The public mind reads recent events as indicative of a return of peace also on this continent. I think, however, that consummation is not to be immediately expected. Of course I do not at all believe that in our approaching election the people will command the government to surrender, or forego the integrity of the Union, the great object of the contest on our part. On the other hand, it is hardly to be expected either that the insurgents will abandon their efforts or be deserted by the people they have misled, until a further blow is delivered against their yet formidable military organization. We are preparing to give that blow. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. J. LOTHROP MOTLEY, Esq., &c., &c., &c., Vienna. No. 92.] Mr. F. W. Seward to Mr. Motley. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, September 24, 1864. SIR: Your despatch of the 29th of August, No. 72, has been received. In acknowledging the receipt of the information I have given you concerning military events in previous despatches, you remark that there is a further illustration of the subject of which you have so often spoken in the fact that my despatch of the 1st of August did not reach you until after telegraphic fragments, such as they were, up to the 10th of August, had been printed in the journals of Vienna. This observation is a just one, but you will excuse me for saying that the fact equally illustrates a position I have heretofore taken, that reliable official despatches from this capital will always be anticipated by unofficial telegraphic despatches, such as they are, in the European press. This department must wait and verify facts before communicating them. Irresponsible reporters give rumors as they rise, and leave the public to correct them. I have been well aware of the expectations which our European enemies have been building upon the delays of our military operations, and upon the plottings of insurrectionary emissaries with doubtful patriots at Niagara. Indeed, what was said and thought and expected in Europe, was first said and thought and expected by a large class of our countrymen at home. All this seems now to be changed. The military campaign proves a success; and the political plot begins to be regarded as a weak and harmless invention. We may, perhaps, accept the fact, that the public attention on both sides of the military line is engaged here, as well as throughout Europe, by earnest expectations of peace, as an indication that peace is approaching. Indeed, this intense and general expectation must have large effect in producing peace. It seems to me not less clear that the peace which is to come is one in which the integrity of the Union shall be saved. Because, first, it is only the political pressure of the Union upon the insurgents that could have brought them back, even indirectly, into the old way of attempting to regulate the elections of the country; and because, secondly, however they may fail in these attempts to regulate with a view to their own unlawful purposes, they will find it difficult to recede so far from this new and false position as to reassume their attitude of independence and sovereignty. I do not pursue my speculations beyond this point, because the whole future policy of the government seems to me to be depending upon the popular elections to be held in November; and I could not discuss the probabilities of that can vass in this correspondence without at least seeming to be influenced by partisanship. I thank you for the interesting information you have given me concerning the Schleswig-Holstein question. I am, sir, your obedient servant, J. LOTHROP MOTLEY, Esq., &c., &c., &c., Vienna. F. W. SEWARD. No. 99.] Mr. Seward to Mr. Motley. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, October 15, 1864. SIR: I call your attention to the enclosed copy of a despatch from M. A. Jackson, United States consul at Halifax, and of an extract from a late Charleston paper, by which it was accompanied, in regard to the proposed building in Europe of a number of fast-sailing steamers for the purpose of running the blockade of Wilmington with troops from Poland to the number of thirty thousand. You will exercise your usual vigilance towards thwarting the scheme referred to. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. J. LOTHROP MOTLEY, Esq., &c., &c., &c., Vienna. No. 103.] Mr. Seward to Mr. Motley. Department of State, Washington, November 14, 1864 SIR: You will probably have learned, before the arrival of this instruction, of the sudden and unexpected death, at New York, of Count Giorgi. Immediately upon the receipt of the sad intelligence here, instructions were sent by telegraph to the United States attorney at New York, requesting him to offer his services and sympathy on the occasion to Mr. Loosey, the consul general, and informing him that all the principal government officers in New York would be expected to attend the funeral. These instructions were fully and acceptably carried out, as will be perceived from the accompanying copy of a letter from the United States attorney dated the 11th instant. The obsequies, which were of the most imposing character, were attended by most of the members of the diplomatic body, the foreign consuls at New York, the principal government officials, and by many of our most distinguished private citizens. It will be proper for you to express to Count Rechberg in a fitting manner the profound regret which has been occasioned by the death of Count Giorgi, who was held in the highest estimation by all who knew him during his brief residence in the United States. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD J. LOTHROP MOTLEY, Esq., &c., &c., &c., Vienna. 8 c *** Mr. Seward to Mr. Motley. No. 104.] DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, November 15, 1864. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your despatch of the 23d of October last. I thank you for the care with which you have placed before me the political condition of Europe. Military action there seems to have given place to speculation, which fortunately is not intense enough to withdraw the attention of states from the improvements of their financial and social condition. In pursuing that important interest they all will have the sympathy and good will of the United states, and to no state will such sentiments be extended more cheerfully or more sincerely than to Austria. I am, sir, your obedient servant, J. L. MOTLEY, Esq., &c., &c., v., Vienna. WILLIAM H. SEWARD. Mr. Motley to Mr. Seward. No. 34.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, Vienna, September 21, 1863. SIR: Since the date of my despatch of last week, No. 33, I have had an interview with Count Rechberg. Nothing, however, has up to this moment been decided in regard to the expected offer of the proposed Mexican throne to the Archduke Maximilian. The affair, so far as the imperial royal government is concerned, remains as before. The deputation from Mexico is expected in the course of this week to arrive at Miramare, the archduke's residence near Trieste. I could not learn from the minister what conditions would be laid down by the archduke as necessary preliminaries to his acceptance of the crown, but I understood him to say that no binding arrangement would be concluded with this deputation, although it would probably be received. I understood him, also, to repeat, as often before, that the Austrian government considered the matter as a purely personal one, regarding the archduke himself and his imperial brother only, and that the imperial royal government had not the means nor the inclination to send out forces to Mexico to maintain the new empire. I do not think it worth while to report any of the observations which I unofficially made on the subject myself, and which were simply those which any loyal American, belonging to any section or party of the United States, would be always sure to make in regard to this overturning of a republic, and the substitution for it of a monarchical government on American soil, and upon our frontier, by means of foreign armies and navies. It seems to me that public opinion does not need much enlightenment as to the effect likely to be produced upon the people of the United States by this European armed intervention in the affairs of an American republic. I suppose that the French emperor is hardly acting in ignorance of American opinions and feelings, but in defiance of them, and that the archduke in going forth upon this adventure to improve imperial institutions upon the ruins of a democratic republic, can hardly have failed of weighing all the possible consequences of such a step, and that he is not likely to have reckoned on the sympathy and support of the United States government and people. Tintimated to Count Rechberg that there were rumors of the impending recognition of the so-called southern confederacy by the provisional government now established in the city of Mexico; I understood him to reply that the Austrian government knew no such provisional government, and that a communication which had been received from that source had not been and would not be answered. 1 I alluded also to the daily rumors in the European journals of intrigues and secret understandings between the agents of the insurgent government in the seceded States and the Emperor Napoleon, in which recognition of that organization as an independent power by France was announced for the immediate future, coupled with cession of territory so far as such agents had the power to cede it to the new Mexican empire, as the price of French recognition and French alliance. He said that the archduke held himself aloof from all such intrigues. In regard to the expected recognition by the new Mexican empire of the so-called confederacy, he observed that it would be easy for the United States government in a moment to make such a step impossible. If the United States should themselves recognize the new government of Mexico, of course such recognition by so important a power would be far more valuable than any political relations that might be established with the southern States. He observed that everybody knew that the previous attacks upon Mexico and the disposition to extend the United States dominion over the soil of that country had always proceeded from the south. I answered, that the recognition by the United States government of this new empire seemed to me impossible. Instead, however, of saying anything more upon this topic myself, my personal opinions and feelings having been often enough and strongly enough expressed, I proposed reading to him your despatch to Mr. Dayton, of March 3, 1862, which, so far as I knew, had never been published, but of which a copy had been forwarded to me at the time, and which I had brought with me. He readily assented, expressing at the same time a strong respect for yourself and your character as a statesman. I thought it could certainly do no harm that the Austrian government should be in possession of so wise and temperate a statement of American thought on that allimportant subject, and accordingly, after reading the paper, I took the responsibility of promising a copy, which has subsequently been communicated to the imperial royal foreign office. If I have done wrong in this you will let me know. I thought it might have some effect in causing reflection at this critical moment, and I relied on an observation in one of your despatches to me, that our government has no concealment in this matter. I think you will hardly wish me to enter into academic or prophetic speculations upon this grave incident in our history. You are informed of the exact relations between the United States and France, while I am necessarily in the dark. Rumors, suspicions, threats, in regard to the attitude of that power towards us fill the atmosphere of Europe. It seems impossible to doubt that the tendencies and sympathies of the French government are towards the slaveholders' insurrection, and that a recognition of the so-called confederacy is an ever-impending event. Since the revelations of the British Parliament by Messrs. Roebuck and Lindsay, it would be folly to doubt the feelings of the ruler of France. At present the see-saw of his policy between Poland on the one side and Mexico on the other seems to incline towards our side of the world. The diplomatic correspondence between the three powers and Russia seems to have come to an end for this year, and it can hardly be said that the Czar's government has sustained a defeat in the encounter. Meantime the Poles, in their struggles for independence, have been for nearly a year in vain supplicating the great powers for that recognition as belligerents which was so very promptly conceded, at the very outbreak of the revolt, to the insurgent slaveholders in the United States. This is a fact which history will forever hold fast. |