The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1871-03-30
MIR. Summers Speech.

point Oh view OF nearing were CrOWueu
to OVERLOOKING.
SENATOR SUMMERS SPEECH.
Mr.. Sumner, in his opening paragraph,
defiantly asserts that it is now on evil
dence before the Senate that the Navy of
the United States, acting under the order
from Washington, has been engaged in
measures of Fiolence and beligerent inter-
yention, being war without the authority
of Congress. The whole business is ag-
gravated when it is considered that the
declared object of this violence is the ac-
QUESTION of foreign territory, leaving halt
of an island in the caribbean Sea, and
still further that this violence has been
employed first to prop and maintain a
weak ruler, himself a usurper, and up
holding him in power, that he might sell
his country, and secondly. that it has been
employed to menace the black republic
of Hayti Such facts, Mr.. Sumner says,
are too grave for silence. For the sake
of the Navy, Administration, Republican
institutions and for the Republican Party
which cannot afford to be responsible for
such conduct, the case must not pass with
out inquiry but beyond all these consid-
eratons, is the commanding rule of JUS
tice. The question is not whether the &C
QUESTION of San Domingo is desirable, but
whether we are justified in the means en-
ployed to accomplish this acquisition, and
the evidence now before us shows too
clearly, that means have been employed
which cannot be justified.
Mr.. Sumner then enters into the legal
arguments, and cites precedents to show
that a contract for the cession of territory
must be without the presence of superior
q Ill IL, co. =, -
returns of the Navy Department, shows
the whole island beleaguered by our Navy,
sailing from port to port and hugging the
land with its guns, and unless the reports
OF the Navy Departments are discredited,
it is obvious beyond doubt that our gov
eminent has seized war powers carefully
guarded by the Constitution and without
The authority of Congress, employed them
TO trample on the independence of two ma
tions co-equal with ours.
The Senator then characterized Baez
and Grant as co-partners in the melan-
choly affair, and carefully reviewed the
history of the former and his unscrupu-
lous usurpation, reciting the origins of the
scheme for anneXing half of an island
reviewing at great length the cireumstan-
ces under which the Babcocl1 treaty was
negotiated and condemning in the sever
est terms the part which President Baez
had taken in the transaction for the sale
of his country. Mr.. Sumner then repeat
ed the allegations in his former speech
that Baez is maintained in power by our
Navy to enable him to carry out the con-
tract with Babcock and that to assume
this sale, Hayti is violently menaced by
our fleet, and presented voluminous doc
umentary official evidence to sustain them,
quoting the Duke of Wellington: There
can be no such thing, My Lords, as little
war" The Senator asserted that there
may be war without battle, and so our
Navy has thus far conquered without shot,
and its presence in Hayt and Dominica
is war.
He then infinitely reviewed the testi-
mony to this effect, furnished by the State
and Navy departments, from which it APP
peares that the very agent who signed
the treaties, officially reported that the
usurpe, was maintained in power by our
guns. After completely reviewing the
testimony establishing beyond question
the two propositions: first, that Baez was
maintained in power by our Navy to en-
able them to carry out the sale of his coun-
try, and secondly, that further to assure
this sale, the neighbor Republic of Hayti
was violently being menaced, all this be-
ing in breach Of public law, international
and constitutional. Mr. Sumner proceeded
to show that the conduct was in gross
violation of international law, and of the
Constitution Of the U. g., oad o;tod vol
luminous authority to prove that the prom
Use made by the President to employ war
powers without authority of Congress was
void, and that every employment ofthese
n of tbiS q
sit was an usurration. and that this as
sumpst in the case of the ST. Domingo
treaty is exceptional and abnormal, being
absolutely without precedent.
But, continues Mr. Sumner, even admit
ing some remote, infinitessimal SEM
blance Of excuse or apology during the
pending treaty all of which insist is alb
surd beyond a question, though not en-
tirely impossible in a quarter unused to
constitutional questions and needing them
little; conceding that the ''assumpsit''
inserted in the treaty by the Secretary of
State and deceived the President into the
idea that he possessed the kingly preroga-
tive Of declaring war at his own mere
notion, and wishing to deal most gently
even with an undoubted usurpation OF
kingly prerogatiye, so long as the Secre-
tary of State, the sworn counsellor of the
President, supplied the formula for usur-
patton, (and you will bare witness that l
have done nothing but state the case. it
Is hard to hold back when the same usur-
patton is openly prolonged after the Sen
ate had rejected the treaty on which the
exercise of the kingly prerogative was
founded and when the "assumpit'' devils
cd by the Secretary of State had passed
into the limbo of things lost on earth.
Here is no remote, intinitessimal SEM
llance of excuse or apology; nothing.
This usurpation pivots on nonenity, al
ways excepting the kingly will of the
President, which constitutionally is also
nonenity. The great artist of Bologna in
sculpturing Mercury, represents him
standing on Il puff of air; the President
has not even puff Of air to stand on.
Mr. Sumner here expressed the deep
regret with which he made the exposure
but he plead now, as often before, only
for justice and peace. He continued:
In the evidence adduced, have confined
myself carefully to public documents, not
travelling out of the record of dispatches,
naval orders and naval reports. These
are unimpeachable authorities and all
these have been officially communicated to
the Senate. Thus stands the case: Inter-
national law has been violated in two of
its commanding rules; one securing the
equality of nations and the other provd-
ing against belligerent Intervention;
while there is a distinctive, fundamental
principle of the Constitution, by which
the President is deprived of the kingly
prerogative asserted by the President.
This is the simplest statement Looking
still further at the facts, we see that all
this great disobedence has for its object
the acquisition of an outlying tropical
island, with a large promise Of wealth
and that in carrying out this scheme our
Republic forcibly maintained a usurper
in the power that he might sell his
country, and dealt a blow at the independ-
cnce of the black Republic of Hayti,
which being wrong to that Republic
was an insult to the African race, and all
this was done by prerogative alone, with
out authority of an act OF Congress. If
such transaction can escape Judgment,