The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-05-10
ARE WE NEUTRALS /?

From the ". Y. World.
There is a tendency in certain quarters to
square the Cuban by the English problem and,
matter what our convictions of right may be,
to do, or to refuse to do, things in respect to
the Cuban insurreCtion according to the inhu-
ence which our acts will naturally have upon
our side of the pending dispute with Great Bri-
tain growing out of the Queens proclamation of
neutrality or the fitting out within her territory
of Anglo-Rebel cruisers to devour our commerce.
Such conduct is undignifed and unworthy of
the United States.
Whether President Grant has come to a con-
clusion in respect to the form of the issues if
any, he will frame against England, since the
rejection of the Johnson-Stanley treaty, the
public is uniformed We do know, however,
that quite recently, in conversation on the sub
ject, the President remarked that, rather than
adjust the dispute on the basis of mere pecuniary
damages to injured ship-owners or cargo-owners,
he would prefer that Congress should undertake
their indemnifcatlon. This would seem to imply
that, in his opinion, there was wrong and in
jury to our national honor for which Great Bri-
tain must satisfactorily atone. Whether he finds
evidence of such intentional wound OF our ma
tional dignity in the original declaration of neu-
trality (where Sumner finds it,, or in failure to
preserve that neutrality, as made apparent by
the implied permission to the Contederates to
maintain their naval bureau in Liverpool, under
the charge of Captain Bullock, and fit out there
from, with the guilty cOnnivance of English
ship-bulders and officials, naval expeditions
(where the World finds it), we are in the dark.
Far be it from us to expect any subsequent
administration to Yndcate all the official per-
formances of Mr.. Seward as Secretary of State.
For three or four years he veXed the ears OF
foreign powers with useless discussion as TO the
name to be given to the thing which was shak-
ing continent with the tread of its hostile
armies-the gigantic struggle in the heart of the
United States, on the one hand, to uphold, and,
on the other hand TO destroy the Federal Union
AS though war were any the less war because
Il civil war. Instead of accepting the profter OF
resolutely to all the obligations that neutrality
| inn osed Mr. Seward occupied himself in
| teasing Earl Russell to revoke the deca-
| ration, and, at the same time, humbly
! apOlOgizing to that power for the
act OF Captain Wilkes in taking from the
| steamer Trent contraband Of war in the persons
| of the two insurgent ambassadors, Mason ana
| Slidell-who in their diplomatic character, were
| cOnN eying political and indirect military aid to
| the Rebelhon-and accompanying this apology
with an unnecessary admission that the act OF
| Captain Wilkes was wrong in principle But
| apart from the Vagaries of Mr.. Seward
| the United States have again and again an
nounced the doctrine that neutral is bound to
prevent n proXimate act of war against bel
| ligerent from originating on its territory, and,
| If so originated lit is II just ground OF com
| plant by such belllgercnt and demand Tor IN
demnity.
Now, in respect to Cuba, it is clear that we
| of the United States can desire nothing so much
as to see her people pursuing the path OF pros
J
to our own. If, then, the administration and
| the country are convinced that our obligations
| to a community struggling to throw off the do
minion of Spain and secure for itself liberty pro-
| tected by law demand that, as a nation, we give
moral and material aid, then let us manfully say
so, and openly intervene in favor of the insur-
gents and against the parent government. Above
all, let us avoid sneaking into war with SPAIN
or any other foreign power.
All accounts we get from Washington repre-
sent President Grant as sympathiZing strongly
with the Cuban insurgents. In that he is in ac-
cord with the mass of our people, who think the
insurrection in that island looks to larger indi-
Vidual liberty and the advancement there of the
rights of men. But President Grant is not quite
free to indulge his personal sympathies so far as
to let them control his official conduct. lie in
augurated his administration by a declaration
that bad laws would be enforced, If for no other
reason than to secure their repeal Perhaps thi