Chap. VII. that the sympathy with the Government of the United States is general; that the indignation felt in America is not founded on reason; that the British desire only to be perfectly neutral, giving no aid nor comfort to the insurgents. I believe that this sentiment is now growing to be universal. It inspires Her Majesty's Ministers, and is not without effect on the Opposition. Neither party would be so bold as to declare its sympathy with a cause based on the extension of slavery, for that would at once draw upon itself the indignation of the great body of the people." He believed at the same time that the growth of an active sympathy with the United States would much depend on the success of their arms. As to the popular feeling in America, he expressed to Lord John Russell a few days afterwards his confidence that it "would subside the moment all the later action on this side was known. There was a single drawback remaining-the despatch of reinforcements to Canada." "He" (Lord J. Russell) "said, that was a mere precaution against times of trouble." 2 I have referred particularly to these passages because, occurring very soon after the issue of the Proclamation, they show in what light it was regarded at the time by the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs on the one hand, and on the other by a Minister of so much sense and moderation, yet so thoroughly imbued with the views of his own Government, as Mr. Adams. The Proclamation frequently appeared as a subject of complaint-generally entangled with other subjects of complaint in the later correspondence between the two Governments: by degrees it took the shape of a substantial grievance: at last it towered into a grievance of prodigious magnitude. I do not propose to pursue the course of the controversy. What is material to this history is the general attitude assumed with respect 1 Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward, 21st June, 1861. 2 Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward, 28th June, 1861. 1 to this question by the Government of the United Chap. VII. States. Mr. Seward's earlier despatches to the Legations in Paris and London are clear and explicit enough, and were probably a faithful expression of popular sentiment in the United States. On the 21st May he wrote to Mr. Adams to suspend all intercourse, official and unofficial, with the British Government, if it should have any communication whatever with the agents of the Confederacy-an order which Mr. Adams seems to have had the prudence to disobey. A concession of belligerent rights to the revolted States "would not pass unquestioned." As to Confederate privateers, "this is a question exclusively our own. We treat them as pirates." "If Great Britain shall choose to recognize them as lawful belligerents and give them shelter from our pursuit and punishment, the laws of nations afford an adequate remedy."1 On the 28th, Mr. Dayton was told that "the United States cannot for a moment allow the French Government to rest under the delusive belief that they will be content to have the Confederate States recognized as a belligerent Power by States with which this nation was at amity. No concert of action among foreign States so recognizing the insurgents can reconcile the United States to such a proceeding, whatever may be the consequences of resistance."2 On the 15th June, Lord Lyons and M. Mercier, the French Minister at Washington, had an interview with the Secretary of State, at which they proposed to read to him instructions which they had received from their respective Courts. Mr. Seward, having informed himself of the substance of these instructions, declined to hear them, and communicated the reasons of his refusal to the American Ministers at London and Paris. Of the British instructions he wrote: 1 Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams, 21st May, 1861. Chap. VII. "That paper purports to contain a decision at which the British Government has arrived, to the effect that this country is divided into two belligerent parties, of which this Government represents one, and that Great Britain assumes the attitude of a neutral between them. "This Government could not, consistently with a just regard for the sovereignty of the United States, permit itself to debate these novel and extraordinary positions with the Government of Her Britannic Majesty ; much less can we consent that that Government shall announce to us a decision derogating from that sovereignty, at which it has arrived without previously conferring with us upon the question. The United States are still solely and exclusively sovereign within the territories they have lawfully acquired and long possessed, as they have always been. They are living under the obligations of the laws of nations, and of Treaties with Great Britain, just the same now as heretofore; they are, of course, the friend of Great Britain, and they insist that Great Britain shall remain their friend now just as she has hitherto been. Great Britain, by virtue of these relations, is a stranger to parties and sections in this country, whether they are loyal to the United States or not, and Great Britain can neither rightfully qualify the sovereignty of the United States, nor concede, nor recognize any rights, or interest, or power of any party, State, or section, in contravention to the unbroken sovereignty of the Federal Union. What is now seen in this country is the occurrence, by no means peculiar, but frequent in all countries, more frequent even in Great Britain than here, of an armed insurrection engaged in attempting to overthrow the regularly constituted and established Government. There is, of course, the employment of force by the Government to suppress the insurrection, as every other Government necessarily employs force in such cases. But these incidents by no means constitute a state of war impairing the sovereignty of the Government, creating belligerent sections, ard entitling foreign States to intervene or to act as neutrals between them, or in any other way to cast off their lawful obligations to the nation thus for the moment disturbed. Any other principle than this would be to resolve Government everywhere into a thing of accident and caprice, and ultimately all human society into a state of perpetual war.” 1 To Mr. Dayton : "It is erroneous, so far as foreign nations are concerned, to suppose that any war exists in the United States. Certainly there cannot be two belligerent Powers where there is no war. There is here, as there has always been, one political power, namely, the United States of America, competent to make war and peace, and conduct commerce and alliances with all foreign nations. There is none other, either in fact, or recognized by foreign nations. There is, indeed, an armed sedition seeking 1 Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams, 19th June, 1861. to overthrow the Government, and the Government is employing military Chap. VII. and naval forces to repress it. But these facts do not constitute a war presenting two belligerent Powers, and modifying the national character, rights, and responsibilities, or the characters, rights, and responsibilities of foreign nations. It is true that insurrection may ripen into revolution, and that revolution thus ripened may extinguish a previously existing State, or divide it into one or more independent States, and that if such States continue their strife after such division, then there exists a state of war affecting the characters, rights, and duties of all parties concerned. But this only happens when the revolution has run its successful course." 1 The passages which have been quoted will admit but one construction. They were a rejection, in the most unqualified form, of the proposition that the existence of war is a simple matter of fact, to be ascertained as other facts are-and an assertion, in the most unqualified form, of the dogma that there can be no war, so far as foreign nations are concerned, and, therefore, no neutrality, so long as there is a sovereignty de jure. All circumstances showing the scale upon which the contest was carried on were summarily rejected from consideration. The fact that the people of the Confederate States were not in obedience to the Government of the United States, but in arms against it, and obeyed another Government of their own, was likewise to be rejected from consideration. There could be no war, because the United States were sovereign. In a contest between a sovereign and his subjects, foreign nations could not assume the position of neutrals. This condition of affairs must last until the revolution should have "run its successful course," and the Union should Ihave been divided into two or more communities completely independent of each other. If after such division the strife between them should be continued, there would then be a war. Before it there could be no war. In short, a recognition of belligerency can never properly precede-it can only follow-a recognition of independence. 1 Mr. Seward to Mr. Dayton, 17th June, 1861. M Chap. VII. These positions were perfectly clear and consistent. They were also erroneous, unreasonable, flatly opposed to the settled opinion and practice of nations, and especially to the settled opinion and practice of the United States. Although asserted in Mr. Seward's despatches, which were afterwards published in America, the Government did not at that time attempt practically to enforce them; but it is clear that they continued to exercise an influence on the course of the Government, and still more on that of public opinion. When, however, the question entered the stage of controversy, they were too plainly untenable to be maintained. Endeavours were then made to place it on a different ground. Stripped of mere rhetoric, and reduced (as far as it admits of this) to the form of tangible propositions, the case alleged against England on behalf of the United States in the later despatches was in substance as follows: 1. That at the date of the Queen's Proclamation of neutrality there was in fact no war, or at least no maritime war, between the United States and the people of the revolted States. 1 They re-appear, indeed, in a despatch of Mr. Seward's (in which he reviews the case and re-states the American claim) so late as 1867: "It will be found, we think, that all nations which have desired to practice justice and friendship towards a State temporarily disturbed by insurrection, have forborne from conceding belligerent privileges to the insurgents in anticipation of their concession by the disturbed State itself. A nation which departs from this duty always practically commits itself as an ally to the insurgents, and may justly be held to the responsibilities of that relation.”—Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams, 12th January, 1867. Since it must always be an undecided question, until the contest is over, whether a revolt will prove to be temporary or permanent, this is equivalent to saying that to recognize a revolted community as belligerent before it has been acknowledged as such by its original Sovereign, is always a breach of international duty, which converts the recognizing Power into an ally of the one and an enemy of the other—a proposition truly amazing in the mouth of an American statesman. |