LORD PALMERSTON, etc.:
The undersigned, envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary from
the United States, has the honor, in pursuance of instructions from his
Government, to transmit to Lord Palmerston, Her Majesty's principal
secretary of state for foreign affairs, copies of sundry official
documents detailing the circumstances under which a most unwarrantable
outrage has recently been committed by the authorities of the Province
of New Brunswick upon the rights and liberty of a citizen of the United
States.
From these papers it appears that Ebenezer S. Greely, a citizen of
the State of Maine, was duly appointed for the purpose of taking
an enumeration of the inhabitants of that State by an act of its
legislature; that on the 6th of June last, whilst Mr. Greely was engaged
in performing this duty and taking down the names of the inhabitants
residing in that part of the disputed territory claimed by the United
States as lying within the limits of Maine, he was forcibly arrested by
the authorities of New Brunswick, immediately transported in custody to
the town of Frederickton, and imprisoned in the public jail, where he
still remains. This proceeding by the authorities of New Brunswick,
having produced, as might justly have been expected, very deep
excitement in Maine, was followed by an immediate appeal from the
governor of that State to the Government of the United States for
intervention and redress.
This application on the part of Maine having received the special
consideration of the President, the undersigned has been instructed
to lose no time in presenting the subject to the early and earnest
attention of Her Majesty's Government, and demanding not only the
immediate liberation of Mr. Greely from imprisonment, but indemnity
for the injuries that he has sustained.
In fulfilling these instructions of his Government it is not the
purpose of the undersigned to open the general discussion of the
respective claims of Great Britain and the United States to the disputed
territory (within which Mr. Greely was arrested), or the right of either
Government to exercise jurisdiction within its limits. Whatever opinion
the undersigned may entertain as to the rightful claim of the State of
Maine to the territory in dispute, and however unanswerable he may
regard the arguments by which the claim may be sustained, he deems
it neither proper nor needful to urge them upon the consideration of
Her Majesty's Government in the decision of the present case; more
especially as the whole subject is elsewhere, and in another form,
matter of negotiation between the two Governments, where the discussion
of the question of right more appropriately belongs. The undersigned,
moreover, does not presume that pending the negotiation, and whilst
efforts are making for the peaceable and final adjustment of these
delicate and exciting questions, Her Majesty's Government can claim
the right of exclusive jurisdiction and sovereignty over the disputed
territory or the persons residing within its limits. In such a claim of
power on the part of Great Britain or its provincial authorities, the
undersigned need not repeat to Lord Palmerston (what he is already fully
apprised of) the Government of the United States can never consent to
acquiesce in the existing state of the controversy. On the contrary,
the mutual understanding which exists between the two Governments on
the subject and the moderation which both Governments have heretofore
manifested forbid the exercise by either of such high acts of sovereign
power as that which has been exerted in the present case by the
authorities of Her Majesty's provincial government.
The undersigned must therefore suppose that this arrest and imprisonment
of an American citizen under such circumstances and in the existing
state of the controversy could only have been justified by some supposed
infringement of the understanding existing between the parties in
relation to the question of jurisdiction within the disputed territory.
Such, however, was not the case. The correspondence between the governor
of Maine and the lieutenant-governor of New Brunswick shows that
the only act done by Mr. Greely was the simple enumeration of the
inhabitants, and it is not perceived how such an act could be construed
into a breach of the understanding between the two Governments.
It is proper also to remark that this was not the first time that the
inhabitants within this particular settlement had been enumerated under
the authority of the United States. It was done in the census of 1820
(as a portion of the State of Maine), and was at the time neither
objected to nor remonstrated against by the British Government or that
of New Brunswick.
Wherever, then, the right of jurisdiction and sovereignty over this
territory may dwell, the undersigned feels satisfied that Her Majesty's
Government can not fail to perceive that the arrest and imprisonment of
Mr. Greely under the circumstances of the case was not only a violation
of the rights of the United States, but was wholly irreconcilable with
that moderation and forbearance which it is peculiarly the duty of both
Governments to maintain until the question of right shall be
definitively settled.
It becomes the duty of the undersigned, therefore, in pursuance of
special instructions from his Government, to invite the early and
favorable consideration of Her Majesty's Government to the subject, and
to demand, as a matter of justice and right, the immediate discharge of
Mr. Greely from imprisonment, and a suitable indemnity for the wrongs
he has sustained.
Before closing this note the undersigned will avail himself of the
occasion to remind Lord Palmerston of the urgency which exists for the
immediate and final adjustment of this long-pending controversy, and the
increased obstacles which will be thrown in the way of its harmonious
settlement by these repeated collisions of authority and the exercise of
exclusive jurisdiction by either party within the disputed territory.
He begs leave also to repeat to his lordship assurances of the earnest
and unabated desire which the President feels that the controversy
should be speedily and amicably settled, and to express the anxiety
with which the Government of the United States is waiting the promised
decision of Her Majesty's Government upon the proposition submitted
to it as far back as July, 1836, and which the undersigned had been
led to believe would long since have been given; and he has been
further directed to say that should this proposition be disapproved
the President entertains the hope that some new one on the part of
Her Majesty's Government will immediately be made for the final and
favorable termination of this protracted and deeply exciting
controversy.
The undersigned begs Lord Palmerston to receive renewed assurances of
his distinguished consideration.