95 



to and discussed with them, and heard from them the reasons wTiich 

 induced them to reject it, which reasons did not embrace one of 

 those which he has so severely tasked his sagacity to devise for 

 them ; but, plainly and simply, because they said it was clogged 

 with conditions which made it of no value to them, or, at least, not 

 of value to induce them to concede that our fishing liberties, withia 

 Briti^^h jurisdiction, should continue, in return : and he afterwards 

 signed a letter to the British plenipotentiaries, together with all the 

 other members of the mission, declaring that they had no ohjeciion 

 to the article, considering it as merely declaratory. 



If Mr. Russell had entertained at Ghent the sentiments relating 

 to this measure, disclosed in the duplicate, or even tliose avowed 

 in the original of his letter, he is to account for it to his conscience 

 and his country, that he ever assented to it at all. He was not 

 under the elightest obligation to assent to it. As an act of the ma- 

 jority, it would have been equally valid without his concurrence 

 cr signature as with it More than one member of the mission, 

 and on more than one occasion, signified his determiuRtion to de- 

 cline signing the treaty, if particular measures, proposed by the 

 British plenipotentiaries, should be acceded to by the majority. A 

 refusal by any one member to concur in any measure upon which 

 a majority were agreed, would at least have induced the majority 

 to re-consider their vote, and in all probability to have cancelled it. 

 In a case of such transcendent importance as this, of high interests, 

 generous policy, humane and tender sympathies, wantonly to be 

 sacriticed, in defiance of the most express and unqualified instruc- 

 tions, to the paltry purpose of accommodating a few fishermen, des- 

 titute of all claim of right, how could Mr. Russell sit patiently in 

 conference with the British plenipotentiaries, and join in the offer 

 of it to them ? How could he subscribe his name to a letter declar- 

 ing he h-id no objection to it ? Had Mr. Russell dissented from this 

 measure of the majority, and they had still persisted in it, he would 

 doubtless have reported to his own government the reasons of his 

 dissent ; his colleagues of the majority would in like manner have 

 reported theirs ; and the responsibility of each party would have 

 rested, as it ought, upon their respective acts. To concur individu- 

 ally in the measure ; to sign all the papers approving it; and then 

 secretly to write to the government a letter of censure, reproach, 

 and misrepresentation, against it and those who proposed it-— was, 

 indeed, a shorter and easier process. 



Mr. Russell, therefore, did not entertain or express at Ghent, 

 the opinions disclosed in his letter from Paris, and has been as un- 

 fortunate in the representation of his own conduct and sentiments, 

 as in that of the subject of his letter, and in that of the sentiments 

 and conduct of his colleagues. 



But there is a point of view more important than any regard to 

 his conduct and sentiments, in which his letter is yet to be consi* 

 dered. If there were any force in his argument agaiust the mea^ 



