Arizona republican., 1915-02-15

the right to search American ships
 and to force into the English navy
 not only her own countrymen but
 in some cases those who were Ameri-
 can citizens. Thus. the war began England was the greatest naval power then, as she is today, in the world. We had only few wooden ships unworthy of the name of d navy but all the same the pride of the English navy received d severe blow in the brilliant victory of Com modore McDonough in the waters of Lake Champlain and in other achievements of the American navy On land. we were less fortunate and our humiliation reached it's cuImina- tion in the capture of Washington by the British and the burning of the executive mansion, while the victor ious army overran the fields of Maryland, the humiliation of which is only alleviated by the fact that it gave occasion for the writing of our great national anthem of 'The Star Spangled Banner" But England. proud and defiant, the strongest and most dominant nation in Europe through the recent defeat of Napo- leon at Waterloo by Wellington, which meant the final overthrow of France, her great rival for centuries, was vet eager for peace after years of warfare. By a strange irony of fate. the peace articles were already signed, but the news did not reach America until the battle of New Or leans had been fought and in the victory of our army under General succeeded by feeling of pride and eXutatlon paralleled only with that
 which followed the firal victory at
 Yorktown. when, for the first time
 the British forces had to withdraw
 from this part of the continent
 "A hundred years of peace, con-
 stantly threatened since then until
 these later days, There arose first
 the disputes over the boundaries be
 tween the United States and British
 America. They touched upon Maine
 in the east and Oregon in the west
 They were finally settled by the
 Webster Ashburton treaties Then
 there came the no less serious dis putcs over the fisheries questions.
 which extended from the waters of
 Newfoundland to the Behring Sea. but the most serious misunderstood
 ing of all came in connection with our civil war. In the beginning oe that contest, the sympathies of the
 English people, at least it's leaders.
 were with the south Gladstone in his famous Newcastle speech declared that Jefferson Davis had succeeded in founding q nation. The Historian Freeman wrote on the title page of his history that the period of which he was writing closed with the down fall of the American republic. The southern states were perhaps tech nically correct in their claim that they had right to withdraw from the union but the question was more than a legal one: it was a moral question. If the heresy of state rights had not been stamped out, our national integrity would have been destroyed and we should no longer have had place among the nations of the earth. The great question that divided the nation was. how ever. the belief in the north that hu- man slavery must be destroyed: that the republic could not be half free and half slave. The cause of the rather than political one and on l.,. as England herself recognized later.
 But we were not altogether blamelcss in our conduct toward Great Britain in this troubled period, as one of the officers in our navy committed the almost fatal blunder of removing from an English ship the envoys of the south on their lated apology on our part and the release of the enVoNs. Fortunately for us. Queen Victoria drew her pen the objectionable phrases of the paper written by the English sec retary for foreign affairs, which would very likely have brought on war. There came also the difficult
 
 claims occasoned by the depreda- tions made upon our commerce by vessels fitted out in the ship yards of England. Happily. these disputes were peacefully settled by the treaty of Washington and the arbitration of Geneva. Somewhat later came the Venezuela message of President Cleveland. which threatened trouble for the moment and which event we cannot view with much national pride. while we must confess WIG owe much to the restraint of the English government at that time. For ai quarter of a century now. the two nations have been growing together in mutual understanding and sym pathy. Peace and good will prevail. i Long ago the sneerins question of can book? was nObly answered by 1, the golden age of American iitera 1 ture With a certain condescension ] England long regarded us, feeling a ] certain pride in us as promising ! hut somewhat obstreperous child and i that we very likely needed [ discipline. And doubtless we were ! oVer-sensitive, pugnacious and quite ! ready to fastcn our American eagle | claws into the British lions body if | he provocation was sufficient Com !, ing to manhood we are able to see with clearer vision that English his tory and literature are ours tha and Lincoln are the successors of Cromwell and Hamp- f len: that Shakespeare and Milton i