Weekly national intelligencer., 1851-02-15
Mn. wEBsTERs LETTER TO Mn. HULsEMANN
FROM rHr BOSTON DAILY ApyrHrrsrx.

tered over Europe, 10 attract wider attention and
to give greater impulse to opinion than common
ly falls to the lot Of any diplomatic paper. The
circumstances attending it peculiar, and almost
The people Of Hungary had been
for some time engaged in an unequal contest with
the iron power of Austria; but Notwithstanding the
great and at times apparently hopeless difficulties of
their struggle on the accession of General TAYLOR
TO the Presidency Of the United States, there SEEM
ed, from all the information that could be obtained
in this country, to be reasonable probability Of
their ultimate success, and of the establishment of
their independence. Information, however, of
correct and reliable character, it was exceedingly
difficult to obtain, on this side of the Atlantic and
through the ordinary channels. The origin and
merits of the quarrel were involved in an obscurity
made doubly obscure by the traditions of the past
and the entanglements Of the present. The war
was said to be war of races all unity Of character
and interests was denied to the people of Hungary,
as nation and many judcious persons thought il
was far from being clear that the real interests of
humanity, liberty. and popular institutions were
likely to be promoted by the success of the Hun
garans in their efforts to sever their country from
the Imperial Crown of Austria. AT the same time
the great mass Of the people of the Uni'ed States
took lively interest in this struggle and had firm
faith in its merits and its ultimate success. They
saw, or thought they saw, in its circumstances,
strong analoges to the struggle Of their fathers with
the Crown Of Great Britain. They saw, at any
rate that issue Of this contest would be to es-
tablish the right of gallant and heroic people to
govern themselves and to choose and to fashion their
own institutions and they hoped that thereby the
general cause of liberty would have gained great
accession of strength against the arbitrary and des-
potic Governments which still hold large part of
Europe in subjection. The sympathies Of the peo-
Il ~ Al, Loc Il. -
and interested, by this contest that it was extreme
y important to theGoyernmento of the United States
to know, and to know at the earliest moment and
through the most reliable means of information,
what its result was likely to be; for although neither
the people nor the Government of the United States
proposed to do any thing to accelerate events in
Hungary, or to hasten the accomplishment of its
independence, it would undoubtedly have become
the lawful policy Of this Government to have recog-
nised that independence at any moment when there
was fair prospect of it's being achieved. Non
Intervention in the internal affairs of States engaged
in civil war, or in the process Of constitutional
change, is the declared policy of this country; but
it does not require the suppression of popular sym
pathy; it cannot repress the circulation OF popular
ideas and it does not impose on the Government
of the Union an abstinence from measures of inter-
course and alliance with new nations, as fast as they
shall rise OI TIC Vi all
cient despotsm. The delicate and critical point in
such measures is at the precise moment when
neutral Power may fairly assume that new and in
dependent nation has come into the family of inde-
pendent States. When it can fairly assume this,
its own policy and interests, its own relations to
the world at large and the desirableness of imme-
diate connection with the new Power that may be
created, are the sole guides to its discretion But,
in order to determine whether this point Of time has
been reached, precise and accurate information
such information as can be gathered only by con-
fdental agents necessary; and this we take it,
was the sole purpose, in the case of Hungary, for
which Gen. Taylor's administration sent Mr..
Dudley Mann to that country.
But Mr.. Mann's mission and instructions having
in domestic communication Of the fact
by the Executive to the Senate of the United States
a most extraordinary and unprecedented thing hap
pens. The Austrian Government causes formal
protest to be made against this act of the Govern
men of the United States, in tone at once offen-
sive and presumpuous; declaring the proceeding at
variance with the principles of international law;
plainly intimatng that if the agent of this Govern
ment had been taken by the Austrian authorities
he would have been hanged as spy and insinuat-
ing that the purpose of obtaining reliable informa-
ton was not the true purpose of his mission.
Well, it is something to have the foreign affairs
of country under the guidance of the first intellect
in the world. 1t is something to know that that
intellect can be backed, if need be, by power
which would need only to have hair Of the head
of any of its lawful servants unlawfuly touched, to
cause itself to be felt in the arthest srongholds of
European despotism. We apprehend that by this
time the existence of such power on this side Of
The globe is known to more functionaries, Govern
ments, and people, the continent Of Europe, than
had been in the habit of including it among their
familiar ideas In our opinion, the tone of Mr..
Webster's answer to Mr.. Hulsemann was not only
called for, but it will do great deal Of good.
1t was time that the resources and power of this
country were understood in the interior Of Europe
time that its influence on the progress of free
thought and opinion should be comprehended, both
by those who are interested to retard and those who
wish to advance that progress. Mr.. WEBSTER has
laid this influence and its mode and process of ope
ration bare before the world. He has shown that
it is the inevitable tendency of our history, in
siutons and ideas, to act upon the development OF
constitutional freedom all over the world, through
the influence of opinion, of example, and of the sue
cess which has attended our own great experiment
in the forms and principles of popular government
He has shown that it is from us, from the people
of the United States, that other nations must take
their IDEAS and exemplars of constitutional liberty
and that the Power which thus furnishes these prin-
ciples for the study Of mankind has become too
great and too imposing to receive, with any thlng
but digniied defiance, the menaces of any Govern
ment on the face of the globe. He has completely
repelled the charge that this influence, in the case
of Hungary, was undertaken to be exerted IN