The Sun.
London, England, 1863-04-25 00:00:00

land and France, respected the foreign enlistment law.-
The American Government had from the first always
shown a willingness to maintain and enforce strict neu-
trality in the wars that had taken place on the European
continent, and at times when popular feeling was
very strong against it. He therefore challenged any hon.
member to show him in the diplomatic correspondence
between this country and America any complaint that
America had violated the principles of the foreign enlist-
ment laws, and what he asked in return was that we should
act towards America as America had acted towards us.
(Hear.) He next referred to the speech of the hon. and
learned gentleman the Solicitor-General on this subject de-
livered a short time since, and combated the principles then
laid down, maintaining it was unsound in law, and would
act most injuriously towards this country if acted upon.
France as well as America had a stringent law upon the
subject, and every one found guilty of breaking it in France
was liable to transportation: (Hear, hear, and oh.) All
he asked for was reciprocity. What, therefore, was to be
done ? Was there no way of protecting the commerce of a
friendly country ? It was a ell known that three ships had
been built and fitted out in this country that had never gone
to any destination, but had marked their progress by fire
and devastation. (Hear, hear.) There was from 100 to
120 millions sterling of British capital annually floating
upon the ocean, while no other country had 30 millions.
So long as we were attacked only on our own home we had
aothing to fear, but the moment we began a system of
reprisals wo were attacked in our most vulnerable part.
(Hear, and No.) Ile would make those who engaged in
building and fitting out ships like the Alabama, the
Florida, and the Japan liable to fine and imprisonment.
After referring to the manner in which these vessels had
left this country, he alluded to Earl Russell having
elegraphed to Nassau to stop the Alabama. It, there-
fore, he asked, she could have been stopped at Nassau,
why con d she not have been stopped elsewhere ? (Hear,
hear.) There was a legal difficulty raised in that case,
that we could not stop a vessel like the Alabama after she
had made her first voyage. His answer was, that the Ala-
bama never bad made a voyage—(hear)—but that she had
been cruising about without a home. (Hear, hear.) such
easels ought to be forbidden from entering any of our ports
—(hear, hear)—and he called upon her Majesty's Govern-
ment to issue a proclamation to that effect, and outlaw them
so Tar as our ports w.. 0 eeeseee-sa hoar)—which
would soon put an end to them by making the speculation
unprofitable. That, he urged, was our duty with reference
to past obligations, and our regard for the future required
its immediate fulfilment. The Foreign Enlistment Act was
passed two centuries ago for the benign object of preventing
wa-s and advancing our civilisation. The ancients as na-
tions were ignorant of such a woi d as neutrality; and in the
middle ages, when war was carried on indiscriminately, neu-
trality was hardly known. Well, then, would England be
be tha first to turn back—to roll back, as it were,-the moral
axis of the world, and recur to the barbarism of the middle
ages by repealing this international code ? He could not
help feeling that when the house and the country reflected
upon the facts of the case, both would come to the conclu-
sion that, in so doing, they would be sanctioning a retro-
grade policy, unworthy of themselves, and that they would
be committing a great crime against humanity. (Cheers.)
Mr. HORSMAN rose, together with the Solicitor-Gene-
ral, but there being loud cries of " Horsman," the Solicitor..
General resumed his seat, and the right hon. gentleman
proceeded to address the house. He said the state of the
American war, and the position of England with regard
to the belligerent parties, had become such that it was
evident at no distant date a very serious and practical dis-
cussion must take place with respect to the duties and
responsibilities of our position. In England war with
America was not desired—(hear, hear)—and since war
with England was entirely against the interest of America,
it was apparent this country could only drift into a
war because the House of Commons neglected its
duty. Up to this he had thought that a discussion on
America was to be deprecated; but when such a discussion
was raised by the friends and advocates of the North, in a
manner so disparaging to the Government of England—.
(loud cheers)—he felt that nothing but mischief could ensue
from evading:such a discussion. He had come to the cone
elusion, in conformity, he believed, with the majority of the
house, that the Government of England had endeavoured,
with perfect integrity, to carry out a policy of strict and
undeviating neutrality. (Cheers.) He admitted that they
were bound to enforce the Act of the 59th George 111., and
therefore he was not the apologist of those whose illegal
acts had so embarrassed the best interests of the country,
(Hear, hear.) No one would deny that it had been the de •
sire of this country to observe a strict neutrality in this
war—no one would deny that it was her desire to avoid
being engaged in a war with America. (Hear.) The object
of the speech made by the hon. member for Rochdale he
was unable to see, although he could see that one effect of it
must be to furnish the American press with a justification
for the reprisals of Admiral Wilkes. The House of Coin-
mons bad not been anxious to enter upon the discussion of
American affairs, and so long as the issue of the contest
was dubious, Parliament had refrained from expressing
any judgment that might wound American sympathies.
But the case was very different when all uncertainty was
dispelled by the inexorable logic of facts. (Hear, hear.)
They saw the spirit of the North broken and her army
driven back with nothing to show but failure and humi •
liation ; the:conquest of the South rendered more hopeless
than ever, and Washington in greater jeopardy than
Richmond. (Hear, hear.) They saw the aggressive and
menacing attitude displayed towards England, forgetful of
how she had borne with patience the destitution of her ope-
ratives and the crippling:of her trade; they saw, above all,
the announcement that certificates of license were to be
given to our merchantmen by a foreign Minister, and when
notwithstanding all they heard themselves,asked that even-
ing to impose fresh fetters upon the Government, by the
exercise of a greater vigilance in obedience to the require-
ments of a foreign Power ; bearing in mind these things he
was not surprised the question was asked, How long were
those inflictions to be endured ? (Cheers.) How long
France and England were to be interdicted from communi-
cating with the South ? How long English operatives
were to be the victims of a deposed and extinct authority,
and of an aggressive and insolent legislature ? (Loud
cheers.) At the commencement of the war the sympathies
of nine-tenths of England tended towards the North, but
as events proceeded our expectations that the war would be
speedily over were falsified,and the South had now brought
the second year of the war of independence to a successful
close. What judgment could they in that Christian as-
sembly pass on the proclamation of President Lincoln with
respect to the emancipation of the slaves than it was one
of the most atrocious crimes against civilisation and huma •
laity the world had ever seen? (Cheers.) And yet an-
other thing that Englishmen hated more than slavery
was cant; and John Bull was far too sagacious to be per

suaded that a war of extermination was carried on
in the interests of humanity. (Renewed cheers.) The
Government of President Lincoln having played their last
desperate card, which had been followed by failure and dis-
grace, professed now still to cherish the delusion that the
Union was to be recovered by war. The attempt to cement

that Union with blood had broken down the whole Govern-
ment. The free republic had been metamorphosed into a
military tyranny, and the President had become mere of a
despot than the Czar of Russia. Liberty was abolished.
Liberty of motion, of speech, of writing, and of thought,
were all gone. The press was coerced and gagged. The
State prisons were filled with political suspects, as they used
to be in Italy. In fact, the constitution was at an end.
While such was their political condition, what was their
financial state ? In three years they had created a debt half
as large as that of Englan3, with double the rate of interest.

In three years they had the largest debt in Europe, with
the least credit. Their army was in process of dissolution.
Their short enlistments expired in June, and were not likely
to be renewed by soldiers whose pay was in arrear. Tho
Irish and Germans, who were the fighting element, were
either killed or had deserted. The negroes, who were the
last hope of the Union, had proved a failure, because, at the
first volley, these sable warriors had thrown down their
muskets and run away. Suchiwas the political, financial, and
military condition of a country which seemed to think that
the beat way to stop their internal discord was by a war with
England. Coming to the point which the house had discussed,
he did not believe that the Northern States had the smallest

desire to go to war with this country. (Hear.) But he did

believe that it was the deliberate policy of the Washington
Cabinet to provoke England to put an end to the blockade,

as the readiest mode of escape from their own domestic

difficulties. Submission to England would save them from
the humiliation of submission to the South, and he believed

it was for that reason that boastful assurances of approach-
ing victory and conquest became more loud and confident
as achievement had proved more notoriously impossible. Ho
believed it was that foreign Powers might be represented as
having at the eleventh hour stepped in to be the saviours of
the South, and thus be made the instrument of a disruption
which, without that foreign intervention, it would be said
never could have been accomplished. The question had been
asked in the house, and elsewhere, how it was that we were
enduring all this for the Northern StateP, when we would
not endure it from the strongest of the old monarchies of
Europe. The answer to that was twofold. We hadshown
them once that we knew how to silence their bravado. To

repeat it too soon would be to lay us open to the charge of
acting with bravado; therefore we could afford to pass by
such nonsense as involved no materialinjury. Though that
might explain the past, it did not suffice to justify our sub-
mission to injuries so flagrant and so systematic in charac-

ter 10 those which were now reported by every packet.
The reasons for the endurance of that were of a higher
character. The Northern States were paesing through a
crisis, the magnitude of which they were not even them-
selves aware of. The war with the Southerners was vir-
tually at an end, the independence of the South being an
accomplished fact. (llear,) The prolongation of the war
would aggravate the evils of the North to an intolerable
degree, whilst peace with the South must lead to complete
disorganisation. It was no doubt because her Majesty's
Government foresaw the ruin and anarchy impending over
the North that they feared to facilitate the crisis. It was
not the strength of the North, but its weakness, that the
Government and people of England had to apprehend. It
was not peril, but responsibility, we should incur. was
the duty, therefore, of all parties in this country to press
upon the Government the, 'l,peleci:--n duty of maintaining
under every provocation, an immovable attitude of peace.
(User.) Repudiating the idea that the Northern sYmPa-