DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE. 



269 



in any case be less flagrant, and peace, when broken, 

 will be restored all the more quickly and all the more 

 perfectly if foreign nations shall hare the sagacity, not 

 the magnanimity, to practise the neutrality we 

 demand. 



Foreign intervention would oblige us to treat those 



who should yield it as allies of the insurrectionary 



and to" carry on the war against them as ene- 



The case would not be relieved, but, on the 



irv, would only be aggravated, if several Eu- 



. States should combine in that intervention. 



The President and the people of the United States 



deem the Union, which would then be at stake, worth 



all the cost and all the sacrifices of a contest with the 



world in arms, if such a contest should prove in- 



.ble. 



However other European powers may mistake, his 

 . is the last one of those sovereigns to misap- 

 prehend the nature of this controversy. He knows 

 that the revolution of 1775 in this country was a suc- 

 : contest of the great American idea of free 

 popular government against resisting prejudices and 

 errors. He knows that the conflict awakened the sym- 

 pathies of mankind, and that ultimately the triumph 

 of that idea has been hailed by all European nations. 

 He knows at what cost European nations resisted for 

 a time the progress of that idea, and perhaps is not 

 unwilling to confess how much France, especially, has 

 profited by it. He will not fail to recognize the" pres- 

 ence of that one great idea in the present conflict, nor 

 will he mistake the side on which it will be found. It 

 i?, in short, the very principle of universal suffrage, 

 with its claim to obedience to its decrees, on which the 

 Government of France is built, that is put in issue by 

 the insurrection here, and is in this emergency to be 

 vindicated, and, more effectually than ever, estab- 

 lished by the Government of the United States. 



I forbear from treating of questions arising out of 

 the revenue laws of the L nited States, which lately have 

 been supposed to have some bearing on the subject. 

 They have already passed away before the procla- 

 mation of the blockade of ports in the hands of the 

 revolutionary party. Nor could considerations so 

 merely mercenary and ephemeral in any case enter 

 into the counsels of the Emperor of France. 



You will, naturally enough, be asked what is the 

 President's expectation concerning the progress of 

 the contest and the prospect of its termination. It is, 

 of course, impossible to speculate, with any confidence, 

 upon the course of a revolution, and to fix tunes and 

 seasons for the occurrence of political events affected 

 by the excitement of popular passions ; but there are 

 two things which may be assumed as certain : First. 

 That the union of these States is an object of supreme 

 and undying devotion on the part of the American 

 people, and, therefore, it will be vindicated and main- 

 tained. Secondly, The American people, notwith- 

 standing any temporary disturbance of their equa- 

 nimity, are yet a sagacious and practical people, and 

 less experience of evils than any other nation would 

 require will bring them back to their customary and 

 habitual exercise of reason and reflection, and, through 

 that process, to the settlement of the controversy 

 without further devastation and demoralization by 

 needless continuance in a state of civil war. 



The President recognizes, to a certain extent, the 

 European idea of the balance of power. If the prin- 

 ciple has any foundation at all, the independence and 

 the stability of these United States just in their pres- 

 ent form, properties, and character, are essential to 

 the preservation of the balance between the nations 

 of the earth as it now exists. It is not easv to see how 

 France, Great Britain, Russia, or even reviving Spain, 

 could hope to suppress wars of ambition which must 

 inevitably break out if this continent of North Amer- 

 ica, now, after the exclusion of foreign interests for 

 three-quarters of a century, is again to become a 

 theatre for the ambition and cupidity of European 

 nations. 



It stands forth now to the glory of France that she 

 oontributed to the emancipation of this continent from 



the control of European States an emancipation which 

 has rendered only less benefit to those nations than to 

 America itself. The present enlightened monarch of 

 France is too ambitious, in the generous sense of the 

 word, to signalize his reign by an attempt to reverse 

 that great and magnanimous transaction. He is, more- 

 over, too wise not to understand that the safety and 

 advancement of the United States are guaranteed by 

 the necessities, and, therefore, by the sympathies of 

 mankind. 



On the 19th of March Mr. Faulkner replies 

 to the letter of Mr. Black, dated February 28th. 

 In this answer he thus describes the views and 

 intentions of the French Government : 



I have no hesitation in expressing it as my opinion, 

 founded upon frequent general interviews with the 

 Emperor, although in no instance touching this par- 

 ticular point, that France will act upon this delicate 

 question when it shall be presented to her consider- 

 ation in the spirit of a most friendly power ; that she 

 will be the last of the great States of Europe to give 

 a hasty encouragement to the dismemberment of the 

 Union, or to afford to the Government of the United 

 States, in the contingency to which you refer, any just 

 cause of complaint. The unhappy divisions which 

 have afflicted our country have attracted the Em- 

 peror's earnest attention since the first of January last, 

 and he has never, but upon one occasion of our meet- 

 ing since, failed to make them the subject of friendly 

 inquiry, and often of comment. He looks npon the 

 dismemberment of the American Confederacy with no 

 pleasure, but as a calamity to be deplored by every 

 enlightened friend of human progress. And he would 

 act, not only in conflict with sentiments often ex- 

 pressed, but in opposition to the well-understood feel- 

 ings of the French people, if he should precipitately 

 adopt any step whatever tending to give force and 

 efficacy to those movements of separation, so long as 

 a reasonable hope remains that the Federal authority 

 can or should be maintained over the seceding States. 



The Emperor Napoleon has no selfish purpose to 

 accomplish by the dismemberment of the American 

 Union. As he has upon more than one occasion said 

 to me, " There are no points of collision between 

 France and the United States ; their interests are har- 

 monious, and they point to one policy, the closest 

 friendship, and the freest commercial intercourse." 

 He knows full well that the greatness of our republic 

 cannot endanger the stability of his throne, or cast a 

 shadow over the glory of France. He would rather 

 see us united and powerful than dissevered and weak. 

 He is too enlightened to misapprehend the spirit of 

 conciliation which now actuates the conduct of the 

 Federal authorities. He knows that appeals to the 

 public judgment perform that function in our republic 

 which is elsewhere only accomplished by brute force. 

 And if armies have not been marshalled, as they 

 would have been ere this in Europe, to give effect to 

 the Federal authority, he is aware that it is not be- 

 cause the General Government disclaims authority over 

 the seceding States, or is destitute of the means and 

 resources of war, but from an enlightened conviction 

 on its part that time and reflection will be more effica- 

 cious than arms in reestablishing the Federal author- 

 ity, and restoring that sentiment of loyalty to the 

 Union which was once the pride of every American 

 heart. 



I have not, so far, heard that any commissioners 

 have been sent by the seceding States to France. 

 Should they, as you anticipate, arrive shortly, I think 

 I am not mistaken in saying that they will find that 

 the Imperial Government is not yet prepared to look 

 favorably upon the object of this mission. 



Again, on the loth of April, Mr. Faulkner 

 describes to Mr. Seward his interview with the 

 French Minister of Foreign Affairs, M. Thou- 

 venel. In reply to the request of Mr. Faulkner 

 that no proposition recognizing the permanent 



