Reconstruction in the South--The Congress and the President--Liberal
Republican Movement--Nomination, Defeat and Death of Greeley--Troops
Withdrawn by President Hayes--Foreign Policy of the Past Thirty Years--
French Ordered from Mexico--Last Days of Maximilian--Russian-America
Bought--The Geneva Arbitration--Alabama Claims Paid--The Northwest
Boundary--The Fisheries--Spain and the Virginius--The Custer Massacre
--United States of Brazil Established--President Harrison and Chile
--Venezuela--American Prestige in South America--Hawaii--Behring
Sea--Garfield, the Martyr of Civil Service Reform--Labor Troubles--
Railway Riots of 1877 and 1894--Great Calamities--The Chicago Fire,
Boston Fire, Charleston Earthquake, Johnstown Flood.
The Southern people cannot be justly blamed for their resolute resistance
to negro domination. It was too much to expect that former masters should
accept political inferiority to a race emancipated from slavery, but not
emancipated from deplorable ignorance and debasement, and easily misled
by unscrupulous whites. On the other hand, gratitude and prudence
demanded, on the part of the North, that the negro should not only be a
freeman, but also a citizen; that he should not only be liberated from
slavery, but also protected against oppression. The negro, however
ignorant, was true to the Union, and attached to the Republican party;
the black soldiers had fought in the Union armies, and Abraham Lincoln
himself had advised Governor Hahn, of Louisiana, in 1863, that "the very
intelligent colored people, and especially those who fought gallantly in
our ranks, should be admitted to the franchise," for "they would probably
help in some trying time to come to keep the jewel of liberty within the
family of freedom."
Andrew Johnson, succeeding to the chair of Lincoln, and with his heart
softened toward his native South, would have restored the whites to full
control, with the negroes at their mercy. The Congress, however,
intervened, and the ex-Confederate States were placed under military law,
and only admitted to recognition as States upon conditions which gave the
negro equal rights with his white fellow-citizens--and indeed superior
rights to many of them, the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of
the United States excluding from office all persons who, having taken an
oath as public officers to support the Constitution afterward joined the
Confederacy. For opposing these measures of Congress President Johnson
was impeached, and escaped conviction by one vote.
* * *
The Southern whites continued to struggle for white supremacy. The
conflict continued throughout Johnson's term as President, and even the
severe military measures adopted under power from Congress by General
Grant, only suppressed organized violence in its more rampant form. It
was impossible to imprison a commonwealth or to place bayonets at every
threshold, and while the negro might be upheld in his right of suffrage,
Federal protection could not supply him with work and bread. The
intellect and the property of the South were on the side of the whites,
and the blacks began to find that their choice was between submission or
extinction.
In the North, even among Republicans, a feeling grew that the
ex-Confederates had suffered enough, while it was impossible for an
honest man to have any other sentiment than contempt for the political
vultures who had descended on the wasted South. This feeling gave
strength to the Liberal Republican movement in 1872, and arrayed
Democrats--and not a few of the old anti-slavery leaders--in support of
Horace Greeley for President.
The insanity and death of Mr. Greeley cast a gloom over the election for
victors as well as vanquished. Mr. Greeley's mind was weakened by
domestic affliction, and by the desertion of _Tribune_ readers, and when
crushing defeat at the polls gave the _coup-de-grace_ to his political
prospects, his once vigorous intellect yielded under the strain. Like a
dying gladiator, mortally wounded, but with courage unquenched, he seized
once more the editorial blade with which he had dealt so many powerful
blows in the past for justice and for truth; but nature was not equal to
the task, and the weapon fell from his nerveless grasp. His last words
were: "The country is gone; the _Tribune_ is gone, and I am gone."
General Grant attended the funeral of his gifted and hapless competitor,
and the nation joined in honor and eulogy of the great editor whose heart
was always true to humanity, and whose very failings leaned to virtue's
side. Fortunately Mr. Greeley's irresponsible utterance was not prophetic
either as to the country or the _Tribune_. Mr. Whitelaw Reid succeeded to
the editorial chair, and has ably kept the _Tribune_ in the front rank of
American journals.
* * *
Mr. Greeley's last editorial expression pleaded with the victors in
behalf of justice and fair dealing for the South. General Grant himself
is said to have arrived at the conclusion before the close of his second
term, that the Federal troops should be withdrawn from the Southern
States, and sagacious Republicans discerned in the growth of Democratic
sentiment both North and South a warning that the people were becoming
tired of bayonet government ten years after Appomattox. The election of
1876, when the Democrats had a popular majority, and the decision between
Rutherford B. Hayes, Republican, and Samuel J. Tilden, Democrat, depended
on a single vote, emphasized the popular protest against military rule in
time of peace, and when the Electoral Commission gave a verdict in favor
of General Hayes, the new President speedily withdrew the National troops
from the reconstructed States.
* * *
While the country witnessed deep agitation and difference of opinion
regarding reconstruction in the South, there was no difference of public
sentiment regarding the vigorous, far-sighted and thoroughly American
policy of the government in dealing with foreign powers. One of the first
steps of Secretary Seward after the close of the war was to demand in
courteous language that the French should evacuate Mexico. Napoleon dared
not challenge the United States by answering no. General Philip H.
Sheridan was on the Rio Grande with fifty thousand men, anxious to cross
over and fight; a million veterans were ready to obey the summons to
battle, and Generals Grant and Sherman would willingly have followed in
the footsteps of Scott and Taylor. The French troops were withdrawn.
Maximilian, deceived as to the strength of his cause with the natives,
refused to accompany Bazaine across the ocean, and the month of May,
1867, saw the usurping emperor shut up with a small force in Queretaro,
surrounded by an army of forty thousand Mexican avengers.
In those final days of his life and reign the hapless Austrian prince
exhibited a courage and nobility of character which showed that the blood
of Maria Theresa was not degenerate in his veins. He faced death with
more than reckless daring; he shared in all the privations of his
faithful adherents, and he was preparing to cut his way out through the
host of besiegers, at the head of his men, when treachery betrayed him to
the enemy.
Miguel Lopez was the Benedict Arnold of Queretaro; personal immunity and
two thousand gold ounces the price. Lopez held the key of Queretaro--the
convent of La Cruz. Maximilian had been his generous patron and friend,
and had appointed him chief of the imperial guard. Lopez discerned the
approaching downfall of his sovereign, and resolved to save himself by
delivering up that sovereign to the enemy. On the night of May 14, the
Liberal troops were admitted to La Cruz, and Queretaro was at the mercy
of the besiegers.
Maximilian made a last stand on the "Hill of the Bells." Successful
resistance was impossible. The bullet he prayed for did not come, and the
emperor and his officers were prisoners. In vain the Princess Salm-Salm,
representing one of the proudest families of Europe, bent her knees
before the Indian President of Mexico, and pleaded for the life of
Maximilian. "I am grieved, madam," said Juarez, "to see you thus on your
knees before me; but if all the kings and queens of Europe were in your
place, I could not spare that life. It is not I who take it. It is the
people and the law, and if I should not do their will, the people would
take it, and mine also."
"Boys, aim well--aim at my heart"--was Maximilian's request to his
executioners. "Oh man!" was his last cry as he fell, the victim of his
own ambition, and of Louis Napoleon's perfidy. The volley which pierced
his breast was the knell of the Bonaparte dynasty. Gravelotte was but
little more than three years from Queretaro.
* * *
The acquisition of Russian America for the sum of $7,200,000 was a
splendid stroke of statesmanship, and secured to the United States the
control of the North Pacific coast of the continent, besides adding about
581,107 square miles to the territory of the Republic. Alaska has immense
resources, and is already looking forward to a proud and prosperous
future as the north star in the flag of our Union.
* * *
When the British Government proposed, in 1871, a joint commission to
settle the Canadian fisheries dispute, Secretary of State Hamilton Fish
replied that the settlement of the claims for depredations by
Anglo-Confederate cruisers would be "essential to the restoration of
cordial and amicable relations between the two governments." In the
following February five high commissioners from each country met in
Washington, and a treaty was agreed upon providing for arbitration upon
the issues between the American Republic and Great Britain. These issues
included the "Alabama Claims"--so-called because the Alabama was the most
notorious and destructive of the Anglo-Confederate sea rovers--the
question of the Northwest boundary, and the Canadian fisheries.
The Tribunal of Arbitration upon the "Alabama Claims" met at Geneva,
Switzerland, December 15, 1871. Charles Francis Adams, American Minister
to England during the war, was member of the Tribunal for the United
States, and Lord Chief Justice Cockburn acted for Great Britain. Baron
Itajuba, Brazilian Minister to France; Count Sclopis, an Italian
statesman, and M. Jaques Stæmpfii, of Switzerland, were the other members
of the illustrious and memorable court. Caleb Cushing, William M. Evarts
and Morrison R. Waite, counsel for the United States, presented an
indictment against England which should have made British statesmen
shrink from the evidence of their unsuccessful conspiracy against the
life of a friendly State. The course of Great Britain during the war was
reviewed in language not less forcible and convincing because it was
calm, dignified and restrained. A fortress of facts was presented
impregnable to British reply, and highly creditable to the forethought
and skill with which the American State Department had gathered the
material for its case from the very beginning of the war. So strong and
unanswerable was the proof against the Alabama that the British
arbitrator voted in favor of the United States on the issue of British
responsibility for that vessel.
The Tribunal awarded $15,500,000 in gold for the vessels and cargoes
destroyed by the Alabama, with her tender; the Florida, with her three
tenders, and the Shenandoah, or Sea King, during a part of her piratical
career. England promptly paid the award, and learned for the third time
in her history that the rights and interests of the American people were
not to be trampled on with impunity. The United States, in fulfilment of
an award made by a commission appointed under the Treaty of Washington
paid $2,000,000 for damages incurred by British subjects during the war
for the Union, the claims presented to the commission having amounted to
$96,000,000. The differences between the United States and Great Britain
on account of the rebellion were thus happily removed without the
shedding of a drop of blood, and the two great nations of English origin
gave to mankind an admirable example of peaceful arbitration as a
substitute for the ordeal of battle.
* * *
The question of the Northwest boundary was also settled to the
satisfaction of the United States, by the German emperor, William I., to
whom it was referred as arbitrator. The treaty of 1846 left in doubt
whether the boundary line included the island of San Juan and its group
within American or British territory. American and British garrisons
occupied the disputed island of San Juan. When the Emperor William
decided in favor of the United States the British troops were withdrawn.
Less advantageous to the United States was the attempt made to settle the
long dispute over the fisheries. The Treaty of Washington provided that
American fishermen should be freely admitted to the Canadian fisheries,
and that Canadians should be permitted to fish on the American coast as
far south as the thirty-ninth parallel, and that there should be free
trade in fish-oil and salt water fish, these provisions to be abrogated
on two years' notice. Through a most unfortunate blunder on the part of
our government a commission was constituted virtually British in its
character, which awarded to Great Britain the sum of $5,500,000 for
imaginary American benefits to be derived from reciprocity. This money
was paid without any real equivalent.
The reciprocity arrangement was abrogated, under notice from our
government, in 1885, and the old contention was renewed. As a result of
Canadian outrage and intolerance a bill was passed by the American
Congress, March 3, 1887, providing that the President, on being satisfied
that American fishing masters or crews were treated in Canadian ports any
less favorably than masters or crews of trading vessels belonging to the
most favored nations could "in his discretion by proclamation to that
effect deny vessels, their masters and crews, of the British dominions of
North America, any entrance into the waters, ports or places of or within
the United States." Eventually the Canadians assumed a more reasonable
attitude, and American fishermen, on their part, learned to be
independent of Canada, and to value the exclusive possession of their own
markets more than Canadian fishing privileges.
* * *
Spain invited a conflict with the United States by the summary execution,
in November, 1873, of 110 persons, including a number of American
citizens, captured on the American steamship Virginius, while on their
way to assist the Cuban patriots. President Grant acted with firmness and
deliberation, refusing to be carried away by the popular demand for war,
but resolute in his demand for redress on the part of Spain. The Spanish
government surrendered the survivors and the Virginius, and made
reparation satisfactory to the United States. When the American schooner
Competitor was captured recently, on an errand to the Cuban insurgents,
the Spaniards did not dare to repeat the tragedy of the Virginius.
* * *
The American Indians made their last hostile stand against white
aggression June 25, 1876, when the Sioux, led by Sitting Bull, destroyed
General Custer and three hundred cavalry under his command. The troops
fought bravely, but the Indians were nerved to desperation by the
presence of their women and children. Sitting Bull took refuge with his
followers in British territory, but surrendered to United States
authority in 1880, under promise of amnesty. He was treacherously killed
in 1890, on suspicion of being concerned in fomenting trouble with the
whites. The policy of the National Government toward the Indians has of
late years been humane and liberal.
* * *
The extinction of imperialism in Brazil in 1889 effaced monarchy from the
American continent, save as represented in the territories still subject
to European States. Dom Pedro II., one of the most amiable and liberal of
nineteenth century rulers, was driven into exile, and without an armed
encounter, or the firing of a gun in anger, the empire of Brazil became
the United States of Brazil. Unlike other emperors and kings who have
been compelled to give up their American dominions, Dom Pedro's parting
message to the land he had wisely governed was one of amity and peace. As
the shores of his loved Brazil disappeared before his moistening eyes he
released a dove to bear back his last adieu of loyal and fervent
goodwill. He died in exile, his end doubtless hastened by pathetic
longing to see once more the native land forever barred to him.
The path toward freedom in Brazil had not been strewn with flowers.
Brazil had its martyrs as well as its heroes. It is a remarkable fact
that nearly every revolution in France had its echo in Brazil, and
undoubtedly French as well as American example had much to do with the
deposition of Pedro II. It is a mistake to argue, as some European
writers have argued, that the change from a monarchy to a republic in
Brazil was nothing more than a successful military revolt. It was the
culmination of more than a century of agitation in behalf of republican
principles; it was the pure flame of a sacred hearth-fire, which had
never been extinguished from the day when it caught the first feeble glow
from the dying breath of Filipe dos Santos.
The Brazilians have given an admirable example to other South American
republics in the separation of State from Church. While providing for the
maintenance of ecclesiastics now dependent on the State for support, the
Brazilian Constitution decrees not only entire liberty of worship, but
absolute equality of all before the law, without regard to their
religious creed. The absence of this equality is the chief blot on some
South American States.
* * *
The resolute course of President Harrison in exacting indemnity and
apology from Chile for insult to the American uniform and the murder and
wounding of American sailors, tended greatly to promote the influence and
prestige of the United States in South America, and the Spanish-American
republics are learning to esteem the United States, instead of England,
as the leading power of the New World. Brazil is grateful for American
countenance and friendship in the defence of that youngest and greatest
of South American republics against rebellion plotted in Europe in the
interest of the Braganzas, while Venezuela depends upon the United States
with justifiable confidence for the vindication of the Monroe Doctrine,
and the restoration of territory seized and occupied by the British
without any title save that of superior force. Cuba, in her heroic battle
for freedom, is upheld by American public sentiment and the substantial
sympathy of the American people, and Nicaragua is virtually under
American protection. The American eagle, from its seat in the North,
overshadows with guardian pinions the American continent.
* * *
In the case of Hawaii the American Republic seems likely to depart from
its traditional policy of acquiring no territory beyond American bounds.
The Hawaiian Islands were won from barbarism by the efforts and
sacrifices of American missionaries and their descendants. A republic has
been established there, and intelligent Hawaiians look hopefully forward
to a common future with the United States. There is hardly a doubt that
this hope will be fulfilled, and that the Eden of Southern seas will
become an outpost of American civilization. With the two great English
speaking nations of America and Australia confronting each other across
the Pacific, that ocean is certain to be in the twentieth century the
theatre of grand events, perhaps of future Actiums and Trafalgars. In
Hawaii we will have a Malta worthy of such a mighty arena, and the flames
of Kilauea will be a beacon fire of American liberty to the teeming
millions of Asia.
* * *
The Behring Sea negotiations have from the first been discreditable to
diplomacy at Washington. The attempt to prove that the fur-seals are
domestic animals, and the property of the United States when a hundred
miles out in the Pacific Ocean was a humiliating reflection on the
intelligence of both parties to the dispute, and showed abject and
degrading subserviency to the corporation controlling the seal monopoly.
Added to this was the disgrace of forgery, detected, unfortunately, not
at Washington, but in London, and indicating that, while Washington
officials were doubtless innocent of complicity in the crime, the forger
knew, or thought he knew, what was wanted. The end is that this country
has to pay about $400,000 to England, while the seals are abandoned to
destruction, which at least will have the happy effect of removing them
as a cause of international controversy.
* * *
The assassination of President Garfield, July 2, 1881, by a disappointed
seeker for office made that President the martyr of civil service reform,
and gave an irresistible impulse to the movement to alleviate the evils
of what is known as the "spoils system." Notwithstanding the opposition
of politicians and newspapers representing the vicious and ignorant
element, civil service reform has made marvelous progress, and the
principle is now recognized not only in appointments to the vast majority
of non-elective offices under the National Government, but also in the
civil service of States and municipalities.
* * *
An unfortunate consequence of the vast growth of individual and corporate
wealth, after the war, was the widening of the division line between
capital and labor. The depression consequent upon the collapse of
inflated values in 1873 compelled employers to reduce expenses, and made
harder the lot of labor, while the workingman who saw his wages reduced
was not always willing to make intelligent allowance for the
circumstances which made the reduction necessary. The spirit of
discontent reached the point of eruption in 1877, when railway employees
throughout a large part of the Union abandoned their work, and indulged
in riot and disorder. The struggle raged most fiercely in the city of
Pittsburg, which was subjected for some days to the reign of a mob, and
to perils seldom surpassed save in the tragic scenes of old-world
barricades and revolution. The County of Allegheny had to settle for
damages to the amount of $2,772,349.53, of which $1,600,000 went to the
Pennsylvania Railroad. Chicago, Baltimore and Reading were also the
scenes of severe and sanguinary conflict between rioters and the militia.
It was estimated that about 100,000 workers were engaged in the strike in
various parts of the country.
Pennsylvania, New York, Illinois and other States have witnessed serious
labor troubles since 1877, and the regular army of the United States was
employed by order of President Cleveland to put down unlawful
interference with interstate commerce in 1894; but the general tendency
of workingmen is to obtain redress for real or imaginary grievances in a
law-abiding manner by securing the election of officials favorable to
their interests. This is the only method of redress that can be tolerated
in a republic.
* * *
The great fires of Chicago in 1871, and of Boston in 1872, the Charleston
earthquake of 1886 and the Johnstown flood of 1889, were among the most
memorable of the destructive visitations which have served signally to
illustrate the energy, the generosity, and the recuperative power of the
American people. Chicago, with $200,000,000 of property swept away by the
flames, laid amid the ashes the foundations of that new Chicago which is
the inland metropolis of the continent, brimming with the spirit of
American progress, and the blood in every vein bounding with American
energy. Boston plucked profit from disaster by establishing her claim as
the modern Athens in architecture as well as literature, and Charleston
learned, amid her ruins, that northern sympathy was not bounded by Mason
and Dixon's line. The South taught a similar lesson in return when the
cry from flood-stricken Johnstown touched every merciful heart.