PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. 



791 



cient really to prevent access to our coast," that the 

 declaration of Paris was, in truth, directed against 

 blockades not sustained by any actual force, or sus- 

 tained by a notoriously inadequate force, such as the 

 occasional appearance of a mau-of-war in the offing, or 

 the like. 



It was impossible that this mode of construing an 

 agreement, so as to make its terms mean almost the re- 

 verse of what they plainly conveyed, could be consid- 

 ered otherwise than as a notification of the refusal of 

 the British Government to remain bound by its agree- 

 ment, or longer to respect those articles of the decla- 

 ration of Paris which had been repeatedly denounced 

 by British statesmen, and had been characterized by 

 Earl Russell as " very imprudent " and " most unsat- 

 isfactory." 



If any doubt remained of the motives by which the 

 British Ministry have been actuated in their conduct, 

 it would be completely dissipated by the distinct 

 avowals and explanations contained in the published 

 speech recently made by her Majesty's Secretary for 

 Foreign Affairs. In commenting on the remonstran- 

 ces of this Government against the countenance given 

 to an ineffective blockade, the following language is 

 used : " It is said we have, contrary to the declarations 

 of Paris, contrary to international law, permitted the 

 blockade of three thousand miles of American coast. 

 It is quite true we did so, and the presumable cause of 

 complaint is quite true, that, although the blockade is 

 kept up by a sufficient number of ships, yet these 

 ships were sent into the United States navy in a hurry, 

 and are ill fitted for the purpose, and did not keep up, 

 so completely and effectively as was required, an effec- 

 tive blockade." 



This unequivocal confession of violation, both of 

 agreement with us and of international law, is defend- 

 ed on grounds the validity of which we submit with 

 confidence to the candid judgment of mankind. 



These grounds are thus stated : " Still, looking at 

 the law of nations, it was a blockade we, as a great 

 belligerent Power, in former times, should have ac- 

 knowledged. We, ourselves, had a blockade of up- 

 ward of two thousand miles, and it did seem to me 

 that we were bound in justice to the Federal States of 

 America to acknowledge that blockade. But there 

 was another reason which weighed with me. Our 

 people were suffering severely for the want of that 

 material which was the main staff of their industry, 

 and it was a question of self-interest whether we 

 should not break the blockade. But, in my opinion, 

 the men of England would have been forever infamous 

 if, for the sake of their own Interest, they had violated 

 the law of nations, and made war in conjunction with 

 these slaveholding States of America against the Fed- 

 eral States." 



In the second of these reasons our rights are not in- 

 volved ; although it may be permitted to observe that 

 the conduct of Governments has not heretofore, to my 

 knowledge, been guided by the principle that it is in- 

 famous to assert their rights whenever the invasion of 

 those rights creates severe suffering amongtheir peo- 

 ple, and injuriously affects great interests. But the in- 

 timation that relations with these States would be dis- 

 creditable, because they are slaveholding, would pro- 

 bably have been omitted if the official personage who 

 has published it to the world had remembered that 

 these States were, when colonies, made slaveholding 

 by the direct exercise of the power of Great Britain, 

 whose dependencies they were, and whose interests in 

 the slave trade were then supposed to require that her 

 colonies should be made slaveholdiug. 



But the other ground stated is of a very grave char- 

 acter. It asserts that a violation of the law of nations 

 by Great Britain in 1807, when that Government de- 

 clared a paper blockade of two thousand miles of coast 

 (a violation then defended by her courts and jurists on 

 the sole ground that her action was retaliatory), affords 

 a justification for a similar outrage on neutral rights 

 by the United States in 1861, for which no palliation 

 can be suggested, and that Great Britain " is bound 

 in justice to the Federal States," to make return for the 



war waged against her by the United States, in resit- 

 ance of Tier illegal blockade of 1807, by an acquiescence 

 in the Federal illegal blockade of 1861. The most alarm- 

 ing feature in this statement is its admission of a just 

 claim on the part of the United States to require of 

 Great Britain, during this war, a disregard of the re- 

 cognized principles of modern public law, and of her 

 own compacts, whenever any questionable conduct of 

 Great Britain " in former times" can be cited as a pre- 

 cedent. It is not inconsistent with respect and admi- 

 ration for the great people whose Government have 

 given us this warning, to suggest that their history, 

 like that of mankind in general, offers exceptional in- 

 stances of indefensible conduct " in former times," and 

 we may well deny the morality of violating recent en- 

 gagements through deference to the evil precedents of 

 the past. 



After defending in the manner just stated the course 

 of the British Government on the subject of the block- 

 ade, her Majesty's Foreign Secretary takes care to leave 

 no doubt of the further purpose of the British Govern- 

 ment to prevent our purchase of vessels in Great Brit- 

 ain, while supplying our enemies with rifles and other 

 munitions of war, and states the intention to apply to 

 Parliament for the furtherance of this design. He 

 gives to the United States the assurance that he will 

 do in their favor not only " everything that the law of 

 nations requires, everything that the present Foreign 

 Enlistment act requires," but that he will ask the sanc- 

 tion of Parliament " to further measures that her Maj- 

 esty's ministers may still add." This language is so un- 

 mistakably an official exposition of the policy adopted 

 by the British Government in relation to our affairs, that 

 the duty imposed on me by the Constitution, of giving 

 you, from time to time, " information of the state of 

 the confederacy," would not have been performed if I 

 had failed to place it distinctly before you. 



I refer you for fuller details on this whole subject to 

 the correspondence of the State Department, which 

 accompanies this Message. The facts which I have 

 briefly narrated are, I trust, sufficient to enable you to 

 appreciate the true nature of the neutrality professed 

 in this war. It is not in my power to apprise you to 

 what extent the Government of France shares the 

 views so unreservedly avowed by that of Great Britain, 

 no published correspondence of the French Govern- 

 ment on the subject having been received. No public 

 protest or opposition, however, has been made by his 

 Imperial Majesty against the prohibition to trade with 

 us, imposed on French citizens by the paper blockade 

 of the United States, although I have reason to believe 

 that an unsuccessful attempt was made on his part to 

 secure the assent of the British Government to a course 

 of action more consonant with the dictates of public 

 law, and with the demands of justice toward us. 



The partiality of her Majesty's Government in favor 

 of our enemies has been further evinced in the marked 

 difference of its conduct on the subject of the purchase 

 of supplies by the two belligerents. This difference 

 has been conspicuous since the very commencement 

 of the war. As early as the 1st May, 1861, the Brit- 

 ish Minister in Washington was informed by the Secre- 

 tary of State of the United States, that he had sent 

 agents to England, and that others would go to France, 

 to purchase arms, and this fact was communicated to 

 the British Foreign Office, which interposed no objec- 

 tion. Yet in October of the same year, Earl Russdl 

 entertained the complaint of the United States Minis- 

 ter in London, that the Confederate States were im- 

 porting contraband of war from the island of Nassau, 

 directed inquiry into the matter, and obtained a report 

 from the authorities of the island denying the allega- 

 tions, which report was enclosed to Mr. Adams, and 

 received by him as satisfactory evidence to dissipate 

 " the suspicion naturally thrown upon the authorities 

 of Nassau by that unwarrantable act." So, too, when 

 the Confederate Government purchased in Great Brit- 

 ain, as a neutral country (ana with strict observance 

 both of the law of nations and the municipal law of 

 Great Britain), vessels which were subsequently armed 

 and commissioned as vessels of war after they had 



