Washington telegraph., 1862-02-05

OnIo, IN THE YANKEE CONGRESS- ON
THE TRENT AFFAIR.-Mr. Vallandin CHAM
said: | avail myself, sir, of this the ear
lest opportunity offered to express my
utter and strong condemnation. as on, of
the representatives of the people. of the
act of the administration in surrandering
up Messrs. hlasou and Slidell to the Brit
ish Government. For six weeks, sir,
they were held in close custody as traitors
of the United States, by order of the
Secretary of State, and with the approval
aud applause of the press. of the public
men, of the Navy Department, of this
House, and of people of the United
States, with full knowledge of the man
ner and all the circumstances of their
capture; and yet, in six days after the i'm
perious and peremptory demand of Great
Britain, they were abjectly surrendered
upon the mere rumor even of the approach
of hostile fleet, and for the first time in
our national history, have we strutted in
solently into quarrel without right, and
then basely crept out of it without honor;
aud thus for the first time has the Amer
lean eagle been made to cover before the
British lion.
Sir, vassai, or fettered and terror
stricken press, or servie and sycophantic
politicians In this House or out of. it, may
applaud the act, aud fawn and fatter, aud
lick the hand which has smitten down
our honor into the dust. But the people
now or hereafter, will demand terrible
reckoning for this most unmanly surren-
der But | do not trust myself to speak
OF 1t no4 as propose some day to speak.
L rose on y 20 put on record my emphatic
protest against it and TO express my deep
conviction that the very war which the
other day might have been avoided by
combined wisdom and frmness is now in-
evitablc
Sir, the surrender may be no fault of
the Secretary Of State, but he has sown,
| | fear, the dragons teeth by this his fatal
dispatch, aud armed war will spring from
it, In the name OF God, sir, what does
Euglan1 want with Mason aud Sidel?
Ii was Il surrender OF the claim of the
RIG mt to seize them on board her ships,
under her htg, that she demanded, aud
yet this is the very thing that Mr. Seward
demus Captain Wilkes because he did not
enforce this asserted right with greater
severity against the otfeuding neutral ship.
Why, sir upon the principles of this dis
patch, if merchant vessel, as at first at
tended, bad been employed to carry these
men ont from Fort Warren to England,
she might to day have been arrested on
the high seas and they dragged from her
deck, provided ouly she were forthwith
coniscation.
But more than this, England needs. |
do not say wants, a war, but she must and
will have it, aud this administration has
acted from the beginning as if it was their
purpose tc obiige her in it to the utmost.
Look into your diplomatic correspondence
Look at your stone fleet. But let that
pass Who, ask, among all the millions
of this country, or even in this House OF
Senate, or the Administration itself, in
the midst of the dead calm of stoid Sc
curity which seems now to rest over all
has reflected for a moment upon the sig
nificancy of the events of the passing
hour?
A British man-of-war bears to the
shores Of England, there to he received III
triumph aud with shouts of exultation a:
MARTYRS and heroes, and with the gustt
of the people of England and as the pro
teges of their ministers the very men whC
but for the rash act of Captain Wilkes
aud the still more rash endorsement of the
Administration ard the country, would
six weeks ago have been quietly landed
from a private ship in quiet security as
rebels and refugees. All Europe echoes
now with their names All Europe will
rise up to do them honor, and yet you
sure ndered them, did you, to escape the
recognition by England of the Confede-
rite States, and your Secretary of State,
with christian resignation or stole philo-
ply, calmly rejoices that the effectual
check upon. and waning proportions of,
the iusurrecIion, aS we'll as the compara-
tive unim ortance of tie persons concern-
ed, happily enables the administration
after six weeks of experiment, to cheer
fully liberate them, aud thus to remove
the terterimi causi beW.
Sir, give me leave to say that the mo
ment they (Mason and SlidelD stepped
upon the deck of u British man-of war,
your prisoners of state, whom the other
day you would have consigned to telon
cells, became indeed the ENJOYS and am
bassadors of recognized independent
State; aud | predc; here to-day, 10 spite
of this deep national humiliation, or ra'
ther perhaps because of it, and IN spite
too, of the surrender, without protest. OF
the Monroe doctrine, for forty years the
cherished and proud policy of this gov
ernmeut, in less than three months yot
will be at war with Great Britain, or elst
in the meantime, will have bssely sub
mitted to the recognition Of the Confede-
rate States, and the breaking up OF the
blockade; and if war then with hearts un
strung and hands unnerved by this very
surrender.
Courage! courage! courage! sir, IS th'
best aud first of peace-makers. L kno"
well, of course, sir, that, like all Other
similar predictions for some years past, III
regard to our public affairs, you will trea
this one also with scof6ng aud lncredibill
L