I allude with hesitation to personal misrepresentations on the matter.
It has been said that I promised originally to support the treaty.
This is a mistake. I knew nothing of the treaty, and had no suspicion
of it, until several months after the protocol, and some time after
the negotiation was completed; and then my simple promise was that it
should have from me “the most careful and candid consideration”; and
such I gave it most sincerely. At first my opposition was reserved
and without allusion to the President. It was only when the strange
business was fully disclosed in official documents communicated in
confidence to the Senate, and it was still pressed, that I felt
impelled to a sterner resistance. Especially was I constrained, when I
found how much the people of Hayti suffered. It so happened that I had
reported the bill acknowledging their independence and establishing
diplomatic relations between our two countries, assuring that equality
which had been violated. Not unmoved could I witness the wrong
inflicted upon them. And has it come to this, that the President of the
Great Republic, instead of carrying peace and good tidings to Africans
commencing the experiment of self-government, should become to them an
agent of terror?
It is difficult to see how I could have done otherwise. Anxious to
excuse the anger towards me, it has been said that I opposed the treaty
because Mr. Motley was unceremoniously removed from the mission at
London; and here you will see the extent to which misrepresentation has
gone. It so happens that Mr. Motley was removed on the day immediately
following the rejection of the treaty. Evidently my opposition was not
influenced by the removal: was the removal influenced by my opposition?
Equally absurd is the story that I am now influenced by personal
feelings. I am a public servant, trained to duty; and now, as always
before, I have yielded only to this irresistible mandate. With me
there is no alternative. The misconduct of the President, so apparent
in the San Domingo device, became more conspicuous in the light of
illustrative facts, showing it to be part of a prevailing misrule,
which, for the sake of our country, should not be prolonged. As a
patriot citizen, anxious for the national welfare and renown, am I
obliged to declare these convictions.
* * * * *
I am now brought to those two chief measures to be advanced by the
election of Horace Greeley, each of controlling importance,--one
looking directly to purity and efficiency in the government, and the
other to the peace and welfare of our country.