The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1855-03-03
The Return OF Mr.. soule-Fns Mission and its
Results.

Mr.. Soule, late our Minister to Spain, return
ed in the ST. Louis to this port, from which he
get sail less than two years ago. Leaving
lis family here temporarily, he has hurried
on to Washington. The interval of his absence
has been one Of the most remarkable in our
political history, foreign and domestic. He left
US, radiant with hope, under the auspices of
triumphant party, new administration, o
popular inaugural, aud with q margin of official
discretion as broad and general as man even
Of his bold and ambitious character could de
sire. The Cuban junta were in ecstacies. We
were to have Cuba without fail. With The
purse in one hand, and the sword in the other,
il was impossible that diplomat SO fearless
ard sagacious as Soule could fail. He returns
to report that be has done nothing, and tia
nothing can be done.
Let us look into this little, for il is escca-
tial in summing up the causes and effects Of
this highly interesting mission Of Soule. A
French revolutionary refugee, we dad him first,
as an adopted American, in the successful prac.
tiee Of the law, ami famous as an orator Of the
elegant French school, at New Orleans. His
talents and accomplishments, and the admiration
OF he French creoles, advance him at length
to the United States Senate. While in this posi-
tion he is appointed delegate to the Baltimore
Convention Of 1852, and is there chosen as oae
Of the special jmmittee appointed to waitupon
Gen. Pierce, at Concord and inform him of his
nomination. The two men accordingly meet,
and the polite and courteous Yankee and the
elegant ard accomplished Frenchman are mu-
tually charmed with each other. To tina. visit
are we indebted for the appointment Of Mr.
secessionist, the most ultra, perhaps, not ex
cepting jeff. Davis upon the compromise mea-
cures of 1850. He had fought against the ad-
mission Of California to the end, and had joined
in that famous Senatorial Southern protest Of
twelve men against it, after the bill had passed
but it was all right if we stop at Baltimore.
The Baltimore Convention of 1852 having
admitted Southern secessionists and Buffalo free
soilers upon the same footing ofequality with The
National Union democrats, Mr.. Pierce concluded
there was an amnesty, and that the democracy,
from his election, were to stand or fall uoon
this Baltimore spoils coalition. Hence that
peculiar half-and half secessionist ard free soil
spoils policy upon which this unhappy adj
ministration has been broken up Hence the
appointment of Mr.. Soule to Spain. Mr.. Pierce
took that juggling Baltimore Convention as his
guide-that deception upon the country--and
in the party politician he cast aside the true
policy of an American statesman. He over
nI md thn -
ment of the masses Of the people against the
insidious dsunion designs of Seward and his
partizans in their support of General Scott and
against the secessionists Of the South. He
adopted the free soil and secession amnesty Of
the Baltimore spoilsmen as the basis of his ad-
ministraton and the reorganization of the de-
mocratic party. He advanced secessionists and
free sellers to the highest honors, to the exciu-
sion Of that saving Union element Of his party
represented by Cass, Dickinson, and others of
hat school, and by the Webster and Fillmore
conservatives of the wing party.
There was another incentive to the appoint
ment of Mr.. Soule. He was an adopted citizen
lively and exciting rivalry for "the foreign
vote" in the election of '52. One could hardly
distinguish which was the better man in this
respect. Gen. Pierce, however, succeeded in
carrying off the bulk Of this foreign vote, and
was anxious to prove the sincerity of his pro-
LESSONS. Thus our gallant Frenchuan was sent
to Spain, q German Jew to Holland, an Irish
ilibuster to Portugal, an English socialist to
Naples, while the Catholics were rewarded. az
such, with representative in the Cabinet in
the person Of Mr.. Campbell. These and similar
concessions to secessionists, free sellers, aud
the foreign VOTE" were the ground work of
the late crushing popular demonstrations against
the administration, involving even the mission
to Spain, in this quick and fearful reaction be-
tween the Inauguration of '53 and the grea.
Know Nothing movement of '55.
Mr.. Soule, we have said, went out to Spain
under the most fattering auspices. He opened
his campaign in dashing style. His programme
was simple and promising. His object was the
acquisition of Cuba Spain had become bank
rupt. He would offer her hundred or even q
hundred and fifty millions for Cuba. She might
sell. She might refuse. In the latter case, a
bold and threatening demand for the redress Of
a long catalogue of certain Cuban outrages,
well put in, woald eithY bring her to a bargain
or rupture, and one alternative would be a.
coed for the annexation of Cuba as the other
Mr. Soul6 persevered in this plan Of operations,
in the teeth of conflicting and changeable in
structions from Marcy, till his work was arrested
by the Espartero revolution. Then, through
the advice Of Nr. Dudley Mann, cur Minister at
Madrid was called to that Ostend conference.
Marcy there was checkmated through the coun.
sells OF Mann-Soule was sustained and after
the settlement Of the little affair with Louis
Napoleon at Calais, he returned to Spain to re-