Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1846-04-03

IGltSI6tS0
rable chairman and other Senators; and It has
ken I'D bv thousands, as though it had been
and intentions of the Administration. More
recently, the honorable chairman proclaimed
that the Presidents opinions and views had
undergone $40 shodo,c Of turning - but, In
answer to direct inquiry put to him on the
floor of the Senate, by the honorable Senator
from Maryland. (Mr. Johnson,) it was dis
tincuy admitted 5y himself that the :. records,
and the records ALONE" were the sources
from which he derived any authority Thus to
commit the President against negotiation. In
a word, that the honorable chairman's speech
es were but differences of the Senator-not ar.-
neutrality-suspicious. by the chairman. From
the 'srecords ALONE" Mark that!
The honorable chairman of Foreign Affairs,
then, it appears, has not obtained, and does
not possess, confdentiaHy, the views and pur-
poses of the President; and what he has CIV
en- US was the logic Of his mind. not an au-
:horized dictum Of his Office. After his own
declaration in the Senate, it would be doing
him great injustice to insnuate or to suspect
otherwise, or that he meant any thing else.
Here, then, we see Committee on Foreign
Affairs in the Senate for more than tw months
in possession of great subject, and with
these identical ''records" referred to them for
cbnsideration-early notice asked fora reso-
luton reported, and speeches delivered-but
no communication has been made to the chair
man that his senatorial construction of the
Presidents meaning is true or false! If the
construction be not true, We see reason for
the Presidents silence. However painful to
him personally, he owed it to all the proper
ties of his own public station, and to the ser
vice of the Republic, not to speak beforehand
of his future purposes, in a negotiation, .hro'
the chairman or any body else. If the con-
struction, however, be true, the duty of the
President would be plain one to himself, to
the Senate, and to the nation. He should have
authorized that committee to set the country
right at once, by confirming the Senator's in
depreciation to the letter, and bringing the
Senate to one mind about what it is he means,
and what it is he wants with notice, after
having determined to 90 for IS all of Oregon"
-"no compromise'-'no negotiation =" To
my mind it appears, therefore. that this omis-
sion to make the customary confidential dis
closures to the chairman OF Foreign AffaiTs is
pregnant with differences. More especially as
we know that Senator to be the personal and
political friend of the President, but one who
has committsd himself, and would seem in
clined, l must say, to carry the Administra-
ton with him, eishur before or behind, against
all compromise, and, consequently, against all
negotiation. ] do not say that these mscon-
structons are wilful. | never harbored a sho't
that they were.
But, again, Mr.. President: If the Admins
tration wished to stop all negotiation on their
part, nothing was easier than for the President
of the United States tn do all that without
coming to Congress at all. By the general
law Of nations and of common sense, we know
that this convention of 1927 might have been
abrogated by the mutual consent Of the parties
to it. That is precisely the mode in which a
new treaty annuls an existing convention
Beyond all controversy, the President, in vir-
tue of his constitutional power to propose ne
gotiation and to make treaties with foreign
Governments, had authority, without the
knowledge or consent of Congress, to make a
proposition 10 the British Minister to annul
the Convention of 1927 by the mutual consent
Of both Governments, and there to stop. l
think it is highly probable that this PROPOSE
ton might have been accepted. But what if
it had mott Is there a Senator who doubts
that such proposition, whether agreed to or
not by Great Britain, would have terminated
dHu vi HSeII nave put dl emu 10 the penang
negotiation for compromise and that the
British Minister if he had not taken leave Of
the country, would have been obliged to take
short leave Of this subject Of Oregon1
Why, then, was it not done? Why was it
not attempted sin that manner!" Why was
that more ready and direct manner of tertnina-
ting the negotiation for compromise and alb
rogating the convention cf 1927 omitted alto
gether? There is no answer consistent with
the republican integrity and manly patriotism
Of our President. except that which have al.
ready insisted upon: That he did not wish to
put stop to negotiation on his part. That he
stands upon the line Of 49o as compromise
by the side of the nations honor, as he under
stands it. That he stands there to-day, as he
did last December, with the crown Of peuc.
upon his head, and he has not asked to be co
thed in the panoply Of war. That he wants
peace, honorable peace-not war, dishonora
BILE war!
| Conclusion next week
Death Of Nm. P. Dobson, Esq.-We ART