Passing from the treaty, I come now to consider briefly, but with
proper precision, the true ground of complaint; and here again we
shall see the constant inadequacy of the remedy now applied. It is with
reluctance that I enter upon this statement, and I do it only in the
discharge of a duty which cannot be postponed.
Close upon the outbreak of our troubles, little more than one month
after the bombardment of Fort Sumter, when the Rebellion was still
undeveloped, when the National Government was beginning those gigantic
efforts which ended so triumphantly, the country was startled by the
news that the British Government had intervened by a Proclamation
which accorded belligerent rights to the Rebels. At the early date
when this was done, the Rebels were, as they remained to the close,
without ships on the ocean, without prize courts or other tribunal
for the administration of justice on the ocean, _without any of those
conditions which are the essential prerequisites to such a concession_;
and yet the concession was general, being applicable to the ocean and
the land, so that by British fiat they became ocean belligerents as
well as land belligerents. In the swiftness of this bestowal there was
very little consideration for a friendly power; nor does it appear that
there was any inquiry into those _conditions-precedent_ on which it
must depend. Ocean belligerency, being a “fact,” and not a “principle,”
can be recognized only on evidence showing its _actual existence_,
according to the rule first stated by Mr. Canning and afterward
recognized by Lord John Russell.[53] But no such evidence was adduced;
for it did not exist, and never has existed.
Too much stress cannot be laid upon the rule, that belligerency is
a “fact,” and not a “principle.” It is perhaps the most important
contribution to this discussion; and its original statement, on
the occasion of the Greek Revolution, does honor to its author,
unquestionably the brightest genius ever directed to this subject.
According to this rule, belligerency must be proved to exist; it must
be shown. It cannot be imagined, or divined, or invented; it must exist
as a “fact” within the knowledge of the world, or at least as a “fact”
susceptible of proof. Nor can it be inferred on the ocean merely from
its existence on the land. From the beginning, when “God called the dry
land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called He Seas,”
the two have been separate, and power over one has not necessarily
implied power over the other. There is a dominion of the land, and a
dominion of the ocean. But, whatever power the Rebels possessed on the
land, they were always without power on the ocean. Admitting that they
were belligerents on the land, they were never belligerents on the
ocean.
“The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee, _and arbiter of war_,”--
these they never possessed. Such was the “fact” that must govern
the present question. The rule, so simple, plain, and intelligible,
as stated by Mr. Canning, is a decisive touchstone of the British
concession, which, when brought to it, is found to be without support.
Unfriendly in the precipitancy with which it was launched, this
concession was more unfriendly in substance. It was the first stage in
the depredations on our commerce. Had it not been made, no Rebel ship
could have been built in England: every step in her building would
have been piracy. Nor could any munitions of war have been furnished:
not a blockade-runner, laden with supplies, could have left the English
shores, except under a kindred penalty. The direct consequence of this
concession was to place the Rebels on an equality with ourselves in
all British markets, whether of ships or munitions of war. As these
were open to the National Government, so they were open to the Rebels.
The asserted neutrality between the two began by this tremendous
concession, when the Rebels, at one stroke, were transformed not only
into belligerents, but into customers.
In attributing to that bad Proclamation this peculiar influence I
follow the authority of the Law Lords of England, who, according to
authentic report, announced that without it the fitting out of a ship
in England to cruise against the United States would have been an act
of piracy. This conclusion was clearly stated by Lord Chelmsford,
ex-Chancellor, speaking for himself and others, when he said: “If the
Southern Confederacy had not been recognized by us as _a belligerent
power_, he agreed with his noble and learned friend [Lord Brougham],
that any Englishman aiding them by fitting out a privateer against the
Federal Government _would be guilty of piracy_.”[54] This conclusion is
only according to analogies of law. It is criminal for British subjects
to forge bombs or hand-grenades to be employed in the assassination of
a foreign sovereign at peace with England, as when Bernard supplied
from England the missiles used by Orsini against the life of the
French Emperor,--all of which is illustrated by Lord Chief-Justice
Campbell, in his charge to the jury on the trial of Bernard, and also
by contemporaneous opinions of Lord Lyndhurst, Lord Brougham, Lord
Truro, and at an earlier day by Lord Ellenborough in a case of libel
on the First Consul. That excellent authority, Sir George Cornewall
Lewis, gives a summary drawn from all these opinions, when he says:
“The obligation incumbent upon a state of preventing her soil from
being used _as an arsenal_, in which the means of attack against a
foreign government may be collected and prepared for use, is wholly
independent of the form and character of that government.”[55] As every
government is constrained by this rule, so every government is entitled
to its safeguards. There can be no reason why the life of our Republic
should be less sacred than the life of an Emperor, or should enjoy less
protection from British law. That England became an “arsenal” for the
Rebels we know; but this could not have been, unless the Proclamation
had prepared the way.
The only justification that I have heard for this extraordinary
concession, which unleashed upon our country the Furies of War to
commingle with the Furies of Rebellion at home, is, that President
Lincoln undertook to proclaim a _blockade_ of the Rebel ports. By the
use of this word “blockade” the concession is vindicated. Had President
Lincoln proclaimed a _closing_ of the Rebel ports, there could have
been no such concession. This is a mere technicality; lawyers might
call it an _apex juris_; and yet on this sharp point England hangs
her defence. It is sufficient that in a great case like the present,
where the correlative duties of a friendly power are in question,
an act fraught with such portentous evil cannot be vindicated on a
technicality. In this debate there is no room for technicality on
either side. We must look at the substance, and find a reason in
nothing short of overruling necessity. War cannot be justified merely
on a technicality; nor can the concession of ocean belligerency to
rebels without a port or prize court. Such a concession, like war
itself, must be at the peril of the nation making it.
The British assumption, besides being offensive from mere technicality,
is inconsistent with the Proclamation of the President, taken as a
whole, which, while appointing a blockade, is careful to reserve
the rights of sovereignty, thus putting foreign powers on their
guard against any premature concession. After declaring an existing
insurrection in certain States, and the obstruction of the laws for
the collection of the revenue, as the motive for action, the President
invokes not only the Law of Nations, but “the laws of the United
States,” and, in further assertion of the national sovereignty,
declares Rebel cruisers to be pirates.[56] Clearly the Proclamation
must be taken as a whole, and its different provisions so interpreted
as to harmonize with each other. If they cannot stand together, then it
is the “blockade” which must be modified by the national sovereignty,
and not the national sovereignty by the blockade. Such should have
been the interpretation of a friendly power, especially when it is
considered that there are numerous precedents of what the great German
authority, Heffter, calls “Pacific Blockade,” or blockade without
concession of ocean belligerency,--as in the case of France, England,
and Russia against Turkey, 1827; France against Mexico, 1837-39;
France and Great Britain against the Argentine Republic, 1838-48;
Russia against the Circassians, 1831-36, illustrated by the seizure of
the Vixen, so famous in diplomatic history.[57] Cases like these led
Heffter to lay down the rule, that “_blockade_” does not necessarily
constitute _a state of regular war_,[58] as was assumed by the British
Proclamation, even in the face of positive words by President Lincoln
asserting the national sovereignty and appealing to “the laws of the
United States.” The existence of such cases was like a notice to the
British Government against the concession so rashly made. It was an
all-sufficient warning, which this power disregarded.
So far as is now known, the whole case for England is made to stand
on the use of the word “Blockade” by President Lincoln. Had he used
any other word, the concession of belligerency would have been without
justification, even such as is now imagined. It was this word which,
with magical might, opened the gates to all those bountiful supplies by
which hostile expeditions were equipped against the United States: it
opened the gates of war. Most appalling is it to think that one little
word, unconsciously used by a trusting President, could be caught up by
a friendly power and made to play such a part.
I may add that there is one other word often invoked for apology.
It is “Neutrality,” which, it is said, was proclaimed between two
belligerents. Nothing could be fairer, always provided that the
“neutrality” proclaimed did not begin with a concession to one party
without which this party would be powerless. Between two established
Nations, both independent, as between Russia and France, there may
be neutrality; for the two are already equal in rights, and the
proclamation would be precisely equal in its operation. But where one
party is an established Nation, and the other is nothing but an odious
combination of Rebels, the proclamation is most unequal in operation;
for it begins by a solemn investiture of Rebels with all the rights of
war, saying to them, as was once said to the youthful knight, “Rise;
here is a sword; use it.” To call such an investiture a proclamation
of neutrality is a misnomer. It was a proclamation of equality between
the National Government on the one side and Rebels on the other, and no
plausible word can obscure this distinctive character.
Then came the building of the pirate ships, one after another. While
the Alabama was still in the ship-yard, it became apparent that she
was intended for the Rebels. Our Minister at London and our Consul at
Liverpool exerted themselves for her arrest and detention. They were
put off from day to day. On the 24th July, 1862, Mr. Adams “completed
his evidence,” accompanied by an opinion from the eminent barrister,
Mr. Collier, afterward Solicitor-General, declaring the plain duty of
the British Government to stop her.[59] Instead of acting promptly by
the telegraph, five days were allowed to run out, when at last, too
tardily, the necessary order was dispatched. Meanwhile the pirate ship
escaped from the port of Liverpool by a stratagem, and her voyage
began with music and frolic. Here, beyond all question, was negligence,
or, according to the language of Lord Brougham on another occasion,
“crass negligence,” making England justly responsible for all that
ensued.
The pirate ship found refuge in an obscure harbor of Wales, known as
Moelfra Bay, where she lay in British waters _from half-past seven
o’clock, P. M., July 29th, to about three o’clock, A. M., July 31st_,
being upward of thirty-one hours, and during this time she was supplied
with men from the British steam-tug Hercules, which followed her from
Liverpool. These thirty-one hours were allowed to elapse without any
attempt to stop her. Here was another stage of “crass negligence.”
Thus was there negligence in allowing the building to proceed,
negligence in allowing the escape from Liverpool, and negligence in
allowing the final escape from the British coast.
Lord Russell, while trying to vindicate his Government, and repelling
the complaints of the United States, more than once admitted that the
escape of the Alabama was “a scandal and a reproach,”[60] which to
my mind is very like a confession. Language could not be stronger.
Surely such an act cannot be blameless. If damages are ever awarded to
a friendly power for injuries received, it is difficult to see where
they could be more strenuously claimed than in a case which the First
Minister of the offending power did not hesitate to characterize so
strongly.
The enlistment of the crew was not less obnoxious to censure than the
building of the ship and her escape. It was a part of the transaction.
The evidence is explicit. Not to occupy too much time, I refer only
to the deposition of William Passmore, who swears that he was engaged
with the express understanding that “the vessel was going out to the
Government of the Confederate States of America,” “to fight for the
Southern Government”; that he joined her at Laird’s yard at Birkenhead,
near Liverpool, remaining there several weeks; that there were about
thirty men on board, most of them old man-of-war’s men, among whom
it was “well known that the vessel was going out as a privateer for
the Confederate Government, to act against the United States, under
a commission from Mr. Jefferson Davis.”[61] In a list of the crew,
now before me, there is a large number said to be from the “Royal
Naval Reserve.”[62] I might add to this testimony. The more the case
is examined, the more clearly do we discern the character of the
transaction.
The dedication of the ship to the Rebel service, from the very laying
of the keel and the organization of her voyage, with England as her
_naval base_, from which she drew munitions of war and men, made her
departure as much _a hostile expedition_ as if she had sailed forth
from her Majesty’s dock-yard. At a moment of profound peace between the
United States and England there was a hostile expedition against the
United States. It was in no just sense a commercial transaction, but an
act of war.
The case is not yet complete. The Alabama, whose building was in
defiance of law, international and municipal, whose escape was “a
scandal and a reproach,” and whose enlistment of her crew was a fit
sequel to the rest, after being supplied with an armament and with a
Rebel commander, entered upon her career of piracy. Mark now a new
stage of complicity. Constantly the pirate ship was within reach of
British cruisers, and from time to time within the shelter of British
ports. For five days, unmolested, she enjoyed the pleasant hospitality
of Kingston, in Jamaica, obtaining freely the coal and other supplies
so necessary to her vocation. But no British cruiser, no British
magistrate ever arrested the offending ship, whose voyage was a
continuing “scandal and reproach” to the British Government.
The excuse for this strange license is a curious technicality,--as if a
technicality could avail in this case at any stage. Borrowing a phrase
from that master of admiralty jurisprudence, Sir William Scott, it is
said that the ship “deposited” her original sin at the conclusion of
her voyage, so that afterward she was blameless. But the Alabama never
concluded her voyage until she sank under the guns of the Kearsarge,
because she never had a port of her own. She was no better than the
Flying Dutchman, and so long as she sailed was liable for that original
sin, which had impregnated every plank with an indelible dye. No
British cruiser could allow her to proceed, no British port could give
her shelter, without renewing the complicity of England.
The Alabama case begins with a fatal concession, by which the Rebels
were enabled to build ships in England, and then to sail them, without
being liable as pirates; it next shows itself in the building of the
ship, in the armament, and in the escape, with so much of negligence
on the part of the British Government as to constitute sufferance, if
not connivance; and then, again, the case reappears in the welcome
and hospitality accorded by British cruisers and by the magistrates
of British ports to the pirate ship, when her evasion from British
jurisdiction was well known. Thus at three different stages the
British Government is compromised: first, in the concession of ocean
belligerency, on which all depended; secondly, in the negligence which
allowed the evasion of the ship, in order to enter upon the hostile
expedition for which she was built, manned, armed, and equipped;
and, thirdly, in the open complicity which, after this evasion, gave
her welcome, hospitality, and supplies in British ports. Thus her
depredations and burnings, making the ocean blaze, all proceeded from
England, which by three different acts lighted the torch. To England
must be traced, also, all the wide-spread consequences which ensued.
I take the case of the Alabama because it is the best known, and
because the building, equipment, and escape of this ship were under
circumstances most obnoxious to judgment; but it will not be forgotten
that there were consort ships, built under the shelter of that fatal
Proclamation, issued in such an eclipse of just principles, and, like
the ships it unloosed, “rigged with curses dark.” One after another,
ships were built; one after another, they escaped on their errand;
and, one after another, they enjoyed the immunities of British ports.
Audacity reached its height when iron-clad rams were built, and the
perversity of the British Government became still more conspicuous by
its long refusal to arrest these destructive engines of war, destined
to be employed against the United States. This protracted hesitation,
where the consequences were so menacing, is a part of the case.
It is plain that the ships which were built under the safeguard of this
ill-omened Proclamation, which stole forth from the British shores
and afterward enjoyed the immunities of British ports, were not only
British in origin, but British in equipment, British in armament, and
British in crews. They were British in every respect, except in their
commanders, who were Rebel; and one of these, as his ship was sinking,
owed his safety to a British yacht, symbolizing the omnipresent support
of England. British sympathies were active in their behalf. The cheers
of a British passenger-ship crossing the path of the Alabama encouraged
the work of piracy; and the cheers of the House of Commons encouraged
the builder of the Alabama, while he defended what he had done, and
exclaimed, in taunt to him who is now an illustrious member of the
British Cabinet, John Bright, that he “would rather be handed down
to posterity as the builder of a dozen Alabamas” than be the author
of the speeches of that gentleman “crying up” the institutions of
the United States, which the builder of the Alabama, rising with his
theme, denounced as “of no value whatever,” and as “reducing the very
name of Liberty to an utter absurdity,”[63] while the cheers of the
House of Commons echoed back his words. Thus from beginning to end,
from the fatal Proclamation to the rejoicing of the accidental ship
and the rejoicing of the House of Commons, was this hostile expedition
protected and encouraged by England. The same spirit which dictated
the swift concession of belligerency, with all its deadly incidents,
ruled the hour, entering into and possessing every pirate ship.
There are two circumstances by which the whole case is aggravated. One
is found in the date of the Proclamation which lifted the Rebels to an
equality with the National Government, opening to them everything that
was open to us, whether ship-yards, foundries, or manufactories, and
giving to them a flag on the ocean coëqual with the flag of the Union.
This extraordinary manifesto was signed on the very day of the arrival
of our Minister in England,--so that, when, after an ocean voyage, he
reached the British Government, to which he was accredited, he found
this great and terrible indignity to his country already perpetrated,
and the floodgates opened to infinite woes. The Minister had been
announced; he was daily expected; the British Government knew of his
coming;--but in hottest haste they did this thing.
The other aggravation is found in its flagrant, unnatural departure
from that Antislavery rule which, by manifold declarations,
legislative, political, and diplomatic, was the avowed creed of
England. Often was this rule proclaimed, but, if we except the great
Act of Emancipation, never more pointedly than in the famous circular
of Lord Palmerston, while Minister of Foreign Affairs, announcing
to all nations that England was pledged to the Universal Abolition
of Slavery.[64] And now, when Slaveholders, in the very madness of
barbarism, broke away from the National Government and attempted
to found a new empire with Slavery as its declared corner-stone,
Antislavery England, without a day’s delay, without even waiting the
arrival of our Minister at the seat of Government, although known to
be on his way, made haste to decree that this shameful and impossible
pretension should enjoy equal rights with the National Government in
her ship-yards, foundries, and manufactories, and equal rights on the
ocean. Such was the decree. Rebel Slaveholders, occupied in a hideous
attempt, were taken by the hand, and thus, with the official protection
and the God-speed of Antislavery England, commenced their accursed work.
I close this part of the argument with the testimony of Mr. Bright,
who, in a speech at Rochdale, among his neighbors, February 3, 1863,
thus exhibits the criminal complicity of England:--
“I regret, more than I have words to express, this painful
fact, that, of all the countries in Europe, this country is the
only one which has men in it who are willing to take active
steps in favor of this intended Slave Government. We supply the
ships; we supply the arms, the munitions of war; _we give aid
and comfort to this foulest of all crimes. Englishmen only do
it._”[65]
In further illustration, and in support of Mr. Bright’s allegation,
I refer again to the multitudinous blockade-runners from England.
Without the manifesto of belligerency they could not have sailed. All
this stealthy fleet, charged with hostility to the United States, was
a part of the great offence. The blockade-runners were kindred to the
pirate ships. They were of the same bad family, having their origin and
home in England. From the beginning they went forth with their cargoes
of death;--for the supplies which they furnished contributed to the
work of death. When, after a long and painful siege, our conquering
troops entered Vicksburg, they found Armstrong guns from England in
position;[66] and so on every field where our patriot fellow-citizens
breathed a last breath were English arms and munitions of war, all
testifying against England. The dead spoke, also,--and the wounded
still speak.