The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1872-03-08
y to day, from week to


was also intended to prey on the commerce
of friendly belligerent. | may mention
here that Admiral Semmes informed me
that he never destroyed a Baltimore vessel,
his object being, as he said, the Yankee"
During my negotiations at first on the sub
ject in Great Britain, Earl Russell, the then
foreign secretary, told me that England
had done nothing to render her response
BILE; that she had fulfilled the whole of her
neutral obligations; that she had nothing
to refer. He was succeeded by Lord Stan
ley. On the 18th May, 1861, the Queen is
sued her proclamation recognizing the Con-
federate States as belligerents.
Lord Stanley at first refused, like Earl
Russell, to refer the two points submitted
by the United States to arbitration, but
after ascertaining that the temper Of the
English people had undergone a change
on the subject, he consented, and in No
vember, 1868, convention was signed by
which the two questions of England's right
to recognize the South as belligerents, and
her supposed want of vigilance in allow
ing the escape Of the Alabama and other
ships were to be submitted to arbitration.
The treaty was approved by the Executive
here, sent to the Senate for ratification,
and was almost unanimously rejected.
Laughter. was at no loss to know why.
Now, gentlemen, neither nor Mr. Adams
bad ever heard about indirect damages at
this stage of the negotiations-not thing fur
ther than individual losses of the citizens
of the United States. There was not
word abiding to consequential or indirect
damages in the instructions to either of us.
Now let me come to the treaty of Wash
ington. Public opinion in England was
growing more friendly every day, and more
favorable to a peaceable solution of the
difficulties, till Summers famous speech on
the subject, which set the whole of Eng
land in frenzy. Sumner said he was as
tonished at the effect of his speech, saying
he intended it for pacific one. told him
next time he intended to deliver a pacific
speech to get somebody else to write it.
We are charged with issuing claims for
consequential damages amounting to thous-
ands of millions of dollars. We say, or
rather our government says, that England
is responsible for the cost of the last two
years of the war. Better had she tax en- part
in the fight and she wouldn't have half as
much to pay. l am no apologst for Eng
land, but looking to the protocols of 18th
January, 1869, and the 9Th May, 1868, and
comparing them with subsequent admis.
sions, do say that she has manifested an
ardent desire to maintain friendly relations
with Us and that she has receded as far
as we could expect, and farther than had
anticipated from her original position on
the subject.
She has agreed in the Washington treaty
to what she demurred to at first, namely,
that the international polity propounded
for future guidance in the treaty shall have
a retroactive operation on her conduct dur
ing our civil war; And this was great
admission on her part. Can we expect her
to do much more2 Sumner said she never
apologized. We do not expect nations to
60 on their knees to apologize 1t may be
mentioned that not one of the negotiations
on our side has opened his lips to say that
indirect damages were designed or were
intended to be included within the forms
of the treaty.
hope, l ardently hope that these diff
culties will not result in war. see no ne
cessity for it, | have lived TO see three
wars between the United States and other
nations; the war of 1912, the Mexican war
of 1916 and that last and most direful of
all, which armed brother against brother,
father aginst son, desolated one-half of the
United States, and left almost every house
in the North draped in mourning. God
forbid that we should do anything that
would bring the United States again into
conflict with any nation in the world, and
above all that nation from whom we are
descended, whose fame we have inherited,
whose language we speak, whose freedom
is the progenitor of our own, and whose
civilization is the pride of the Christian
world.
Now what is to be done l see but
three modes Escaping the embarrassment.
First, that England consents that these
claims be referred to arbitration. think
she may do that with safety. Second the
inevitable conclusion that these claims will
not be allowed by the arbitrators. There
is no court in the United Statea or Eng
land who would entertain for a moment
such claim. They are indefinite and H.
Irritable. The municipal nor no other
law would recognize such demands.
England protracted the war two years
How can that be proved After the bat
tie of Gettysburg offensive operations by
land on the part of the insurgents ceased |!
Did they2 The battle of Gettysburg was
fought on the 4th of July, 1854, General
Lee surrendered in April, 1855. Why,
Grants campaign commenced in this in
teryal. All the great, bloody well-contest-
ed battles occurred after that. There were
three or four petty cruisers on the ocean,
and it was there all the offensive opera
tions were carried on!
Grant didn't think so. He lost 100000
men in this interval, and, l presume, he
reclsoned the operations by which this loss
was occasioned offensive in the extreme
Were in the position of one of these Eng
lish negotiators, would say: You Amer
leans have played us "a clever Yankee trick
in the matter of these consequential dam
ages; why, now go on and see what you
can make of it,
The hest thing we can do in the matter
is to acithdfa1o the demand for indirect dam
ages. England never contemplated their
entertainment, much less the reference of
such claims. We shall gain by their aban-
donment, and make our case in other re-
spects stronger than it is now, Let us
leave this matter of consequential damages
for subsequent negotiation.
If this suggestion be adopted, war-that
most dreadful of curses that was ever in
tlicted by the wickedness of man-will be
averted, and the two greatest nations of
the world 90 hand in hand in the ways of
prosperity and peace. The speaker was
frequently applauded.
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- me Call furnishes the following as a