ALABAMA CLAIMS. 179 
insufficiently discouraged by any Government, are in- 
deed -fettered by the three Rules, as they were al- 
ready, so far as morality or law could do it, being 
classed by statute with piracy, perjury, arson, murder, 
and other kindred “ Pleas of the Crown.” True, there 
is tendency of opinion in the United States, as there 
is in Great Britain, to think that, all Yebellion is pre- 
sumptively wrong at home, and that all rebellion is 
presumptively right every where else; but that is a 
theory which has its inconveniences. In a word, there 
is no possible view of the subject in which jilibuster- 
ism is not a crime and a shame, without even the 
mean excuse of possible but dishonorable benefits to 
the United States. At all times, under all adminis- 
trations, private equipments in our ports, for the pur- 
pose of hostilities against any country with which we 
were at peace, have been treated as what they are, 
criminal violations of the law of the land and of the 
law of nations. Statesmen, jurists, and tribunals are 
all of accord on this point. Contracts for such equip- 
ments are “so fraught with illegality and turpitude 
as to be utterly null and void.” ... “There can be no 
question of the guilt and responsibility of a Govern- 
ment which encourages or permits its private citizens 
to organize and engage in such predatory and unlaw- 
_ ful expeditions against a State with which that Gov- 
ernment is at peace.” ... “This principle is univers- 
ally acknowledged by the law of nations. It lies at 
the foundation of all Government. It is, however, 
more emphatically true in relation to citizens of the 
United States.” Such was the doctrine of the United 
