The Express.
London, England, 1856-06-10 00:00:00

DISMISSAL OF MR. DALLAS.

It is thought probable that Mr. Crampton will be
dismissed by the American government. Does it
follow that Mr. Dallis will be dismissed by the
government of Great Britain? If he is dis-
missed, it will be for reasons solemnly alleged, and
reasons such as will be suitable to bear the scrutiny
of the English parliament and people, of Europe,
and of posterity. What will those reasons be?
It is the permanent policy and practice of nations
having interests mutually connected to keep repro-
sentatives at each other's courts. Mr. Dallas will not '
be dismiss. d for any absence oe ampeosion of a
necessity of this kind. On the contrary, the relations
of the two countries are such at the precont moment
as peculiarly to call for that treatment which embas•
Mee ars instituted to afford. Nor will he be dismissed
by reason of being personally obnoxious to any displea-
sure or dissatisfaction. Nothing of the kind is alleged.
If Mr. Dallas is dismissed, it will be for the causes
that (be American government, in the dismissal of Mr.
Crampton, has done to the Queen's government (1), a
wrong; and (2), a wrong which the dismissal of Mr.
Dallas is the proper way to right.
1. Tho.wrong must have been dons, and be proved
to have been done. The unjustifiable and iejurious
character of the act of dismissing Mr. Crampton will
have to be made manifest. Independently of any
feeling which it may excite, the public action taken
j
will have to be founded on, and ustified by, a calm
application of principles of public law.
Orotim (11. 3,2) appears to allow to the
Sovereign the liberty to reject an ambassador on ac-
count of mere personal dislike. He refers to the case
of Lysimmhus, who refused to negotiate with
Ptolemy's envoy, Theodore, because he was a godless
mac.

Vatted says (IV., see. 88)—. The foreign Sove-
reign cannot take it amiss if his minister be requested
to withdraw, when he has fulfilled the object of hie
COMMialiAl' or when he has not any business to
tranuct." And again (VI., sec. 94) he recognises
a justification of dismissal—. Should an ambassador
. . . . render himself disagreeable and danger-
ous." The reasoning which follows (VI., secs. 93,98)
goes to allow great freedom to the Sovereign in this
respect.
Let the case be illustrated from private life. As
Mr. Crampton obtained recruits for the British OW
rice in the L./sited States, let it be sepposA that your
servant, ardor your direction, has carried off my
chambermaid. lam irritated by the transaction, but
we have been old friends. You tell me you meant no
offence, and are sorry to have given it. 'conclude
that I will take no offence; but at the same time I
add: "That servant of yours must not come to my
house any more; it is disagreeable to me to see him—
disagreeable, among other reasons, because he has
got up ill blood between us, a thing which I want to
forget." Could this be taken in ill part ? And has
not the sappolud ease a sufficient analogy with the
ease in band ?
But, says Lord Clarendon, Mr. Crampton did not,
in plist of fact, do the offensive act charged upon
hint. Very well. This is entirely fit for Lord
Clarendon to maintain, and for you and me to believe,
balancing the respectability of Mr. Crampton, who
denies, against the want of respectability of Scobel
and Hertz, who sffirm. But is it not going
uo far for any government, however strong, or
however probably correct its convictions in respect
to a matter of fact may be, to call upon another go-
verninent, in its public action, to discredit its own
Courts of Justice, which, in the present instance, are
understood to have sustained the evidence which in-
culpated Mr. Crampton P Farther, on this point,
Lord Clarendon's denial of the sufficiency of the evi-
dence may not unnaturally be regarded as an implied
admission on his loedship's part that, provided the
evidence were sufficient—a fact which the American
government take on the authority of their own courts
—then the offence proved by it would be valid cause
of dismissal.

2. If the American government, in the dismissal of
Mr. Crampton, has done not only a ditaireeable and
injudicious (which is not the question). but as inju-
rious thine, is the dismissal at Mr. Dallas by the

Britiel government the appropriate Isetbod of show-
iog its SOWN of the wrong ? Because, if not—if that
course has not something sped& to reeommend it in
point of Mums, dignity, and efficieney—if it would
not be something much more than a naturally occur-
ring and compendious expression of wounded feeling
—then the British government would not wish to
adopt it at a moment when the stated the relations
between the two °ow:tries may make it desirable that
there should be no interruption of the channels of
ready communication.