PROPER GRADE OF DIPLOMATIC REPRESENTATIVES 363 



taries, all the other members of the diplomatic body were neglected 

 and left to find their way to their residences without an opportunity 

 to witness and honor the induction of the new President into office; 

 and, if the press reports are to be credited, further trouble was occa- 

 sioned by the question of the proper location of the ambassadors at 

 the last inauguration. Then came the problem whether the Vice- 

 President of the United States should make the first call upon the 

 new ambassadors, and the further question whether the Secretary 

 of State, who stands second in succession to the presidency, and on 

 the death of the Vice- President first in succession, should give place 

 at entertainments and public functions to those dignitaries. These 

 momentous questions were doubtless settled aright in the light of 

 European precedents, and the good sense and prudence of the 

 eminent gentlemen who hold the ambassadorial rank have, it is prob- 

 able, prevented other embarrassing and foolish questions from 

 arising; but these events and those which attended the advent of 

 the Mexican ambassador, whose coming was resented by the Euro- 

 pean ambassadors, as well as the recent unpleasant incident at the 

 White House, when the ambassadors collided with the Supreme 

 Court, would have been avoided if the Act of 1893 had not been 

 passed. When the act creating ambassadors was passed by Con- 

 gress, the government of the United States had grown to recognized 

 greatness and dignity in the eyes of European sovereigns, its diplo- 

 matic service had in the past hundred years and more won deserved 

 honor and distinction, and it did not require the bauble of a title 

 to' give its envoy greater standing or efficiency. I doubt very much 

 whether the absence of rank has ever prevented any really able min- 

 ister of the United States from rendering his country a needed service. 

 I have referred to the theory that ambassadors, because of their 

 supposed investiture of a special capacity to represent their sove- 

 reign or head of their state, have the right to demand an audience at 

 any time with the chief of the nation to which they are accredited, 

 and that such right does not pertain to diplomats of the next lower 

 grade of ministers plenipotentiary. It is a theory which has come 

 down from the medieval period, but in modern times has become 

 pure fiction. Vattel says of ambassadors that their " representation 

 is in reality of the same nature as that of the envoy " or minister 

 plenipotentiary. Calvo, one of the highest living authorities on 

 international law, referring to the claim that ambassadors " have 

 a formal right of treating directly with the sovereign, of which the 

 others [ministers] are deprived," says: " This is a distinction with- 

 out a meaning, especially since the organization of modern nations 

 no longer rests exclusively upon the monarchical principle, and there- 

 fore renders it impossible for sovereigns personally to conduct inter- 

 national negotiations. ... In our eyes the agents of the first two 



