362 DIPLOMACY 



Secretary Marcy in 1856. Secretary Frelinghuysen said that the 

 department could not, " in justice to its ministers abroad, ask Con- 

 gress to give them higher rank with their present salaries; neither 

 could it with propriety appeal to Congress for an allowance commen- 

 surate with the necessary mode of life of an ambassador." When, in 

 1885, Mr. Phelps, the American minister to Great Britain, urged 

 that the mission be raised to an embassy, Secretary Bayard replied: 

 " The question of sending and receiving ambassadors, under the 

 existing authorization of the Constitution and statutes, has on several 

 occasions had more or less formal consideration, but I cannot find 

 that at any time the benefits attending a higher grade of ceremonial 

 treatment have been deemed to outweigh the inconveniences which, 

 in our simple social democracy, might attend the reception in this 

 country of an extraordinarily foreign privileged class." 



Notwithstanding the reasons given by successive secretaries of 

 state against the creation of the grade of ambassador, the Congress 

 of the United States in 1893 did just what Secretary Frelinghuysen 

 said would be an injustice to American ministers authorize the 

 grade without increasing the pay of its representatives. The legis- 

 lation to this effect was inserted as a clause in one of the regular 

 appropriation bills, and was passed through both chambers without 

 a word of discussion or comment. If its effect in changing a practice 

 of the government for a hundred years had been made known at the 

 time, it is extremely doubtful whether it would have secured the 

 approval of the Congress. 



An ambassador has been held in Europe to be the special or per- 

 sonal representative of his sovereign, and to stand in his place at 

 the foreign court, with the right to claim audience at any time with 

 the head of the state, and entitled to privileges and honors not 

 accorded to other envoys of nations. This claim had some force 

 when the monarch could boast, " I am the state; " but with the 

 establishment of constitutional government and a responsible min- 

 istry, all foundation for such a claim was removed, and it certainly 

 should have no place under a republican form of government. 



Events in Washington following the passage of the law creating 

 the grade of ambassador in the American diplomatic service have 

 shown that Secretary Bayard was not astray in his fears as to "the 

 inconvenience which in our simple social democracy might attend 

 the reception in this country of an extraordinarily foreign privileged 

 class." The reception of ambassadors from Great Britain, France, 

 Germany, Russia, and Italy, in reciprocity for the nomination of 

 American ambassadors to those countries, was followed by the scan- 

 dalous scenes in the Senate Chamber on the first inauguration day 

 following their appointment, when in the zeal of the subordinate offi- 

 cials to show special honor to those newly created and exalted digni- 



