CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



207 



dental or incidental injury committed against 

 a neutral nation by a belligerent, in her efforts 

 to carry on war against a nation with which 

 she was in a state of belligerency. So they 

 say, not that ' whereas differences have arisen 

 in respect to claims of citizens of the United 

 States for illegal seizures or captures made 

 under the authority or by the assistance of 

 her Majesty's Government,' bat, on the other 

 hand, that differences have arisen between the 

 two Governments in respect to the acts, not 

 of her Majesty's cruisers, but in respect to the 

 acts of belligerent Confederate cruisers carry- 

 ing on war, lawful war, upon principles of 

 public law, against the whole body of the 

 United States. Then when we come to the 

 seventh article, to condense this as much as 

 possible, after having declared in article six 

 what are the duties of neutral nations, we find 

 this guide to the action of the tribunal: 



The skid tribunal shall first determine as to each 

 vessel 



" not as to each citizen 



separately, whether Great Btitain has by any act or 

 omission" failed to fulfill any of the duties set forth 

 in the foregoing three rules, or recognized by the 

 principles of international law, not inconsistent with 

 such rules, and shall certify such fact as to each of 

 the said vessels. In case the tribunal find that 

 Great Britain has failed to fulfill any duty or duties 

 aforesaid, it may, if it think proper, proceed to 

 award a sum in gross, to be paid by Great Britain 

 to the United States, for all the claims referred to 

 it ; and in such case the gross sum so awarded shall 

 be paid in coin by the Government of Great Britain 

 to the Government of the United States, at Wnsh- 

 iegton, within twelve months after the date of the 

 award. 



" That is the seventh article. There is no 

 reference whatever to any claim of a citizen, 

 no reference whatever to any right of a citi- 

 zen, and, as I have said, for the obvious reason 

 that the nature of the case was such that no 

 citizen had any right, the nature of the case 

 was such that as to a citizen her Majesty's 

 Government had not committed any wrong 

 whatever. No sailor of hers, no gun of hers, 

 in t lit- national sense, no ship of hers, had made 

 a seizure, legal or illegal, right or wrong, of 

 any vessel or any property of any citizen of 

 the United States. She had only by a general 

 contribution, and not for the purpose of mak- 

 ing war upon us, strengthened the hands of 

 the belligerent with whom we were at war, 

 and thereby augmented the capacity for de- 

 struction that that belligerent had attained; 

 and so it was necessary that we should look to 

 her in the national sense alone ; so it was 

 necessary that she should respond to ns, if she 

 were bound to respond at all, in the national 

 sense alone. 



Xow we come to the tenth article, which 

 provided that in case the tribunal finds that 

 Great Britain has failed to fulfill her duties, 

 and the tribunal does not award a sum in 

 -. a board of assessors shall be appointed 

 who shall determine upon each head of the re- 

 spective claims. It does not provide that that 



board of assessors shall determine in favor of 

 citizens and make awards to citizens; but, 

 quite the reverse, it provides as follows upon 

 that head : they shall ' ascertain and deter- 

 mine what claims are valid ' not what citi- 

 zens are entitled and ' what amount or 

 amounts shall be paid by Great Britain to the 

 United States on account of the liability ' not 

 on account of the citizen, as the other treaties 

 had provided, bat ' on account of the liability 

 arising from such failure, as to each vessel, ac- 

 cording to the extent of such liability as de- 

 cided by the arbitrators.' Then it goes on to 

 provide that the sum allowed finally shall be 

 paid by one Government to the other, not, as 

 is stated in the former treaties, for the benefit 

 of the citizens whose particular property may 

 have been destroyed, but simply paid from one 

 Government to the other. 



"Thus, Mr. President, it seems to me to be 

 perfectly evident that by the treaty itself, in the 

 light of the history that preceded it, or with- 

 out that light upon the face of the treaty it- 

 self, the sum of money which has been awarded 

 to us by the tribunal at Geneva, if that award 

 was made in conformity to the treaty, was a 

 sum awarded to the nation and not to individ- 

 uals, and that it was awarded to the nation 

 without any stint or limitation in respect to 

 the uses to which the nation might apply it, 

 and that these individual inquiries as to the 

 classification of injuries were only the ele- 

 ments that went to make up the sum total 

 that might be allowed. 



"But, Mr. President, this tribunal did not 

 undertake to decide beyond the treaty. It did 

 not, as I construe its decision, undertake to 

 say that any private claimant in any character 

 was entitled to any standing at all in respect 

 to a claim upon this fund. It only undertook 

 to classify, as one of the articles of the treaty 

 required it to classify, the vessels in respect to 

 which it might be found that her Majesty's 

 Government had been an accessory in the bel- 

 ligerence of the Confederate States, and hav- 

 ing ascertained those vessels and decided that 

 her Majesty's Government was liable for their 

 acts to us as acts of belligerence accessory to 

 the acts of a belligerent, and not for any il- 

 legal destruction of the private property of 

 citizens of the United States, it then proceeds 

 to decide that certain other claims that we 

 make, as for prospective profits, as for the ex- 

 pense of chasing Confederate cruisers, as for 

 unearned freights, as for a variety of things, 

 are inadmissible as going to show that the sum 

 we claim is more than we are entitled to have. 

 It then goes on to say as a final conclusion : 



The tribunal making use of the authority con- 

 ferred upon it by article seven of the said treaty, by 

 a majority of four voices to one, awards to the United 

 States a sum of $15,500,000 in gold as the indemnity 

 to be paid by Great Britain to the United States for 

 the satisfaction of all the claims referred to the con- 

 sideration of the tribunal, conformably to the pro- 

 visions contained in article seven of the aforesaid 

 treaty ; and in accordance with the terms of article 



