Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-03-22 00:00:00

AMERICAN AFFAIRS.

FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.

END OF. THE SESSION OF CONGRESS—ITS FRIVOLOUS
CAREER ; HURRY AND CONFUSION ; VOTE FOR
ISSUE OF TWENTY MILLIONS OF TREASURY
NOTES ; CORRESPONDENCE OF AN ENGLISH Ex-
MINISTER WITH A NEW YORK JOURNALIST ;
VETOING BY THE PRESIDENT; INEFFICIENCY
OF HIS ATTEMPTS TO SUPPRESS THE
CORRUPTIONS OF THE LOBBY SYSTEM :
- THEIR APPARENT NECESSITY, IN THE
PRESENT STATE OF PARTIES. DECLINE OF
IMMIGRATION : ITS COMPLEXION LAST YEAR.'
THE SPANISH SQUADRON AT CUBA : THE SPA-
NIARDS. READY FOR RESISTANCE. GAIETIES AT
WASHINGTON. THE SICKLES ASSASSINATION :
MORBID SYMPATHY WITH THE ASSASSIN.
Congress has closed a most unsatisfactory Session.
The labour of it has been mainly engrossed with
fighting such shadows as the Cuba annexation
question, and squabbling about the financial resources
which are being wasted by such a variety of corrupt
jobs as have lately been exposed. Well may the
New York Herald call it a " miserable career of
folly and faction." Those important practical measures,
the Post Office Bills, which involved the appropria-
tion of some twenty millions of dollars, had to be
abandoned for want of time—of that time which
had been frittered away so thoughtlessly before.
But what do the members care ! They pocket their
$250 a month, and of course are quite content. It is
probable that an extra session may be indispensable ;
and in that case, so much the better for them, as
there will be so much more pay.
Great has been the hurry and confusion at the
winding up of the Session, in which some of-the
most important of the Appropriation Bills, or Votes of
Supply, had to be pushed through, and some of them
not without great difficulty, while others were either
pared down or lost. Among the latter was the
Ocean Mail Steamer Bill. In the vote for the Mis-
cellaneous Appropriation Bill, the opportunity was
taken to persist in an amendment for an issue of
twenty millions of Treasury Notes, in place of
revising the Tariff, thus accommodating, for the
present, the difficulty of the revenue question.
Your statesmen are apt, it seems, to be misled by
the plausible pretences of certain American notabili-
ties—or rather, perhaps, notorieties—that get access 1
-to them, and impress them with false ideas, appa-
rently, of their respectable .and influential position
at home ; whereas, all the while, they are mere
political adventurers,—it may be mere charlatans.
A case of this kind occurred some four or five years
ago, when a well-known General,:—but one who now
wields the pen, not the sword—and in what fields he
won his military, renown I really cannot tell, or how
he came to be so dubbed— actually succeeded in
penetrating so far into the recesses of the ministry
of the day, as to dine with members of the Cabinet,
and then retailed out their after-dinner conversation
in letters home, through the columns of his news-
paper. It does not, 1 assure you, give Americans
a very exalted notion of English abinet ministers,
to find theni on free-and-easy terms with such a
one, as they were in those his communi-
cations represented to be. Another display
of a similar kind has recently taken place
through the General's editorial columns, but
this time his friend is only an ex-Miuister—though
.he is, or it is insinuated he is, the same noble lord
as before. The present appearance is in the form of
" an extract of a letter from a prominent English
statesman to his correspondent in this city," and the
Harald has no hesitation in saying, that " from the .
tone and drift of the letter, and from the circumstance
of the General having dined once or twice with Lord
Clarendon, we must, conclude that this prominent
English statesman' is none other than my Lord
Clarendon himself." The following is the letter in
question :
You will perceive lby the Queen's speech that our govern-
ment have found it expedient to interfere in Mexican affairs
so far as to demand and enforce Justice to British subjects.
This, after Lord Malniesbury's declaration to your Minister,
may at first excite surprise; but upon reflection your .fair
minded people will acknowledge it was rendered necessary
by the course of your President. When Lord Malmesbury
made the declaration he did, it was based upon your
Minister's declaration of forbearance by your guy erniueu!.
I That declaration was met in the spirit which it appeared
to demand. And yet no sooner did your President receive
that declaration from Lord Malmesbury than he deliberately
proceeded to violate the implied faith upon which it was
made, by asking of your Congress the right to seize the
two northern provinces of Mexico, and garrison them with
American troops. This justly excited the indignation of
Ministers, and they showed their appreciation of your Pre-
sident's conduct, by ordering our naval commander to act,
and added force to the proceeding by the paragraph in the
speech from the throne. Of course, France agreed with our
government that further forbearance, after what appeared
in your President's message, was impossible. Both Powers,
after the interview between Mr. Dallas and Lord Malmes-
bury, were justly indignant at the action of your Executive,
and would have been sustained by the country in adopting
a still more decided course. They contented themselves,
however, by treating his act with contempt, and by changing
their policy, and calling the attention of the world to their
proceeding.
I have frequently said to you, and to others, that if this
country and the United States should ever again become
involved in hostilities, it will be the result of some act of
folly by your President for the time being, and not the con-
sequence of any ill will between the people of the two
countries. The recent conduct of your Executive, although
it will le'ad to no such disastrous results, proves the correct-
s of my nosition.

nes: yp.
It is remarked of this, by the journalist afore.-
said, in criticising it, that it would appear from
it the redoubtable General, "in an outside capa-
city, is still retained in the volunteer diplo-
matic service of England,"--though adding that
"if there be any official vitality in the views
expressed in this letter, it is worthy the
attention of our own government,"---and then
going on to say, that " unquestionably
while touching the recent proceedings of England
And France in Mexican and Central American
affairs, this letter gives a very plausible explanation,
yet the late special message of the President to
Congress does not disclose, on his part, any im-
pression of this sort of Anglo-French retaliation
against the recommedations of his annual message
of December, from which we would infer that the
British government is playing a somewhat
treacherous game of fair promises and foul acts."
I will not go further into it. Your readers will
here see sufficient to understand its drift. But I
cannot help saying, that if it really be Lord
Clarendon who is there confidingly corresponding
with one of the plausiblest and wiliest of our
public journalists, he had better be careful what he
says to him.
The vetoing by the President of the Bill
granting lands to the several States for the
support of Agricultural Colleges, is held
up as an instance of his determination, thatunderhis
administration there shall be no more wasteful lobby
land grants, in which, it is said, as in other things,
the good sense of the American people will sustain
him. His reasons, it seems, were, first—that at a
time when the treasury is reduced to the greatest
straits, this bill, in public lands, would draw from
the public financial resources seven and a half
millions of dollars ; and secondly, that the framers
of the constitution never intended that the public
lands should be thus squandered. These may be
very good reasons in themselves ; but as to there
being " no more lobby land grants," it is quite another
affair. The. lobby system,—that is, the working of
jobs through the influence of those who swarm about
the lobbies of the Senate and the House, as requitals
for political services, is indispensable as things are
managed at present. Mr. Buchanan himself would
probably never have been elected President but for
the services rendered to his cause, for which
pensation was to be obtained through this lobby
system. Take, a recent case exposed by the
Committee of the House of Representatives
gross abuses perpetrated in the nbavealawdeaprdarietdsemh°teonen°ttitililiolef
the public service. The contracts for live oak for
quthiiresd
rbuylelaiwt
to
ohas been detected was
the connivance of Mr.
anwditthhe contract was bestowed on
ed
Bslt lowest
ccehnessaatsuvf,
ayuul la are
biddermrse; evadedel;
active in the election of
a person who had been very
1856,--of course all arranged
influence to that of the gl
through similar corrupt
lobby-system. Again,---a
recent contract for the
machinery -of a war-sloop
had to be entered into, and the law required that it
should be awarded to the lowest responsible bidder.