Loudon free press. (Loudon, Tenn.) 1852-1855, 1854-11-27
From National Intelligencer.'
Ihe Ministerial nifficuIfr

| The Ministerial Difficulty.
We have received from our regular Paris cor
respondent the letter which is subjoined, and
which we have no doubt presents the leading
facts of Mr.. Soule's case correctly It's state
ments are coroborated by those of another re-
spectacle American sojurning in Paris, and
may be relied on as Substantially correct. We
have reason to believe, indeed, that these let
tiers embrace the material particulars of all
that transpired on the 30th ult., the latest date
from Paris. A great many particulars connec-
ted with the affair are given in letters and papers
from Europe, but they are of nature not read
lily to have been made public, if true, and are
hardly to be relied on. Our Government pa
per, the Union, publishes letter it has receiv-
ed from London, which states that "our Minis
ter, Mr.. Mason, was treated with rude incicility
when he asked for an official explanation in re-
gard to the indignity offered to Mr.. Soule."-
We trust that this statement will turn out to be
unfounded; for we are sure that the department
of 10 Minister could less invite incivility than
that of Mr.. Mason, and we should be disposed
less easily to excuse act of official rudeness
towards him than the brusque expulsion of Mr..
Soule, as in the latter case there might have
been reason, real or imaginary, for the iucivil
itv.
Public opinion in this country on the subject
has had as yet little opportunity to manifest
itself. Turning to the New York Evening
Post, among the abest of Democratic journals
and with as little liking for the Emperor Of
France or Europeans in general as any other
journal of its party, we find an article on the
treatment of Mr.. Soule and of the general
question involved, from which we extract the
annexed passage:
ave do not by any means agree with those
who are attempting to exalt this affair into an
insult offered by the French Government to
that of the United States. Mr.. Soule was not
in France in any official capacity: be was not
accredited to its Government; be did not in
any manner represent our country within its
limits; in France he was simply an American
citizen. The stopping of Mr.. Soule at the
frontier was no more an insult to our nation
than if he had been the inventor of a sewing ma
machine who was taking it out tic Paris to Sc
cure patent for it." at
frequently happens that Americans are stopped
by the police in European countries and turn
ed back in their journey, with less reason prob
ably than there was in the case of Mr. Soule.-
1t strikes US that these cases ought to be first
despatched by our Government.
'If Mr. Soule had no other way of pro-
ceeding to Spain from London except through
France the case would be a clear one: we would
fight for the right of way. But the Southamp-
ton steamers offer most convenient method
of reaching Spain without coming in sight of
France. The voyage is performed with great
dispatch, and he might have had his choice of
a dozen landing places on the Spanish or Port
ueuese coast. What official necessity takes
him into France, that we should insist upon his
going thither?
ave make these remarks not for the purpose
of iustying in the least degree the French Sow
ereign in the step he has taken, but for the sake
of putting the affair upon its true footing. Mr..
Soule is a person who naturally fell under the
observation of the French police. He was be-
lieved in France to have medded with the pol
itics of Spain, and to have been concerned in
fomenting revolt against the Government
He has recently been in Paris, where it is not
at all likely that his Language. and Rshsx8gs
Emperor. He is Frenchman by birth-elo-
quent, persuasive, imprudent, and endowed
with a marvellous faculty of getting into
scrapes He got into several in Spain, and he |
is now in another with Louis Bonaparte, be- |
tween whom and himself this is personal |
matter, and no more an insult TO our nation than |
the case of Frenchman brought before our
police courts can be-"