GREAT BRITAIN. 



373 



Hoar (late Attorney-General). Secretary to 

 the American commissioners, J. 0. Bancroft 

 Davis, Assistant - Secretary of State. The 

 British commissioners arrived in the United 

 States February 22, 1871, and, proceeding to 

 Washington, the Joint High Commission was 

 soon organized. On the 8th of May, 1871, the 

 treaty was signed by the commissioners, and 

 on the 24th of the same month it was ratified 

 by the United States Senate, by a vote of 50 

 to 12 ; and the same day the British commis- 

 sioners, accompanied by Hon. Robert 0. 

 Schenck. United States minister to the court 

 of St. Jauies, sailed for England. On the 17th 

 of June ratifications of the treaty were ex- 

 changed in London, and on the 4th of July it 

 was proclaimed by President Grant as a bind- 

 ing and valid treaty. The text of the treaty 

 will be found under PUBLIC DOCUMENTS, and its 

 protocols under DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE. 

 The treaty, however, concluded very little. 

 The commissioners on the part of Great Brit- 

 ain refused at the outset to fix upon a gross sum 

 as compensation for the losses by the Alaba- 

 ma, and it was finally agreed that these claims 

 should be submitted to a board of five arbitra- 

 tors, to meet in Geneva, Switzerland, of whom 

 the British and American Governments should 

 each name one, and the other three should be 

 appointed respectively by the King of Italy, 

 the President of the Swiss Confederation, and 

 the Emperor of Brazil. All other claims, ex- 

 cept the Northwestern boundary of the United 

 States, were to be submitted to a commission 

 to meet in Washington, and to consist of three 

 members, of whom one each should be ap- 

 pointed by Great Britain and the United States, 

 and the third agreed upon by these two. The 

 settlement of the Northwest boundary ques- 

 tion was to be submitted to the arbitration of 

 the Emperor of Germany. 



The Board of Arbitrators which formed the 

 Geneva Conference was composed of the fol- 

 lowing members : On the part of Great Brit- 

 ain, Sir Alexander Cockburn ; on the part of 

 the United States, Hon. Charles Francis Ad- 

 ams ; on the part of Switzerland, ex-President 

 Staempfli ; on the part of Italy, Count Selopi ; 

 on the part of Brazil, Baron Itajuba. The 

 British and United States Governments were 

 also to be allowed to prepare their respective 

 cases beforehand, and to be represented before 

 the arbitrators by counsel. 



The British ^ American Claims Commission 

 (for other claims) was composed of Russell 

 Gurney on the part of Great Britain, Judge 

 J. S. Frazer on the part of the United States, 

 and Count Louis Corti as the third member. To 

 the claimants were allowed suitable counsel. 



The first informal meeting of the members 

 of the International Conference at Geneva was 

 held in December, 1871, and in preparation for 

 that meeting each of the parties to the Treaty 

 of Washington had prepared and presented its 

 case ; the American case forming a consider- 

 able volume, prepared principally by Mr. J. C. 



Bancroft Davis, the secretary to the American 

 commissioners, while the treaty was in prog- 

 ress. The British case also formed a consid- 

 erable volume, and was prepared by the official 

 counsel for the crown. Each nation served 

 upon the other party to the arbitration copies 

 of its case. For nearly a month after this de- 

 livery the British Cabinet were occupied with 

 other matters, or did not deem it advisable to 

 make any objection to the American statement 

 of their case ; but toward the middle of Janu- 

 ary, 1872 (and thus hardly within the limits 

 covered by this volume, except constructively), 

 there was an excessive clamor and charges 

 from cabinet officers, as well as others, that the 

 American Government had perverted the in- 

 tention of the treaty, and had acted with con- 

 spicuous unfairness, in presenting a catalogue 

 of indirect claims for damages from the escape 

 of the Alabama from a British port. How 

 violent and unseemly was the rage manifested 

 on this subject, and in what spirit it was met 

 by the authorities in the United States, it be- 

 longs not to this volume to state ; but there 

 seemed at one time a possibility that the two 

 nations might drift into war, or at least into a 

 chronic condition of unfriendliness almost as 

 undesirable. 



Other topics were, during the year, occa- 

 sioning much anxiety to the ministry. 



The enlargement of the basis of represen- 

 tation in 1868, while it increased to some ex- 

 tent the influence and political power of the 

 working-classes, was unsatisfactory in that it 

 did not go far enough. The working-men at- 

 tempted, in several instances, to put some of 

 their own men into Parliament ; but, though 

 they made strong appeals to the sense of fair- 

 ness and justice of the Liberal party, which had 

 effected the change in the number of voters, 

 they were always thwarted because the leaders, 

 with a few exceptions, preferred to retain in 

 the hands of the aristocratic and middle classes 

 all places of power, honor, and emolument, 

 and really cared little for the working-classes, 

 except as the means of their own advancement. 

 The working-men were thus blind Samsons, 

 conscious of the possession of power, but un- 

 able to use it effectively ; and they felt their 

 position the more keenly because, at this very 

 time across the Channel, their brethren, the 

 Internationals, were for the moment the rulers 

 of the French capital ; and while they abhorred 

 the license and anarchy which these were 

 permitting, they felt themselves capable of 

 better things, if they could only achieve mod- 

 erate authority. The Non-conformists, con- 

 stituting even in England a very considerable 

 majority of the population, and a still larger 

 proportion in Scotland and Ireland, and be- 

 longing largely to the class of working-men, 

 had felt specially aggrieved at the course pur- 

 sued by the ministry in relation to their claims, 

 in the Education Bill, and in other matters, 

 where it had been the habit of the ruling class 

 to ignore the existence of any dissent from 



