_Paris, April 18, 1835_.
M. LE DUC: I am specially directed to call the attention of His
Majesty's Government to the following passage in the note presented
by M. Sérurier to the Secretary of State at Washington:
"Les plaintes que porte Monsieur le Président centre le prétendu
non-accomplissement des engagemens pris par le Gouvernement du Roi á
la suite du vote du 1er avril 1834, ne sont pas settlement étrangé par
l'entière inexactitude des allégations sur lesquelles elles reposent,
mais aussi parceque les explications qu'a recues á Paris M. Livingston,
et celles que le soussigné a donnees directement an cabinet de
Washington, semblaient ne pas laisser même la possibilité d'un
malentendu sur des points aussi délicats."
Each party in a discussion of this nature has an uncontested right to
make its own statement of facts and draw its own conclusions from them,
to acknowledge or deny the accuracy of counter proof or the force of
objecting arguments, with no other restraints than those which respect
for his own convictions, the opinion of the world, and the rules of
common courtesy impose. This freedom of argument is essential to the
discussion of all national concerns, and can not be objected to without
showing an improper and irritating susceptibility. It is for this reason
that the Government of the United States make no complaint of the
assertion in the note presented by M. Sérurier that the statement of
facts contained in the President's message is inaccurate, and that
the causes assigned for the delay in presenting the law ought to
have satisfied them. On their part they contest the facts, deny the
accuracy of the conclusions, and appeal to the record, to reason, and
to the sense of justice of His Majesty's Government on a more mature
consideration of the case for their justification. But I am further
instructed to say that there is one expression in the passage I have
quoted which in one signification could not be admitted even within the
broad limits which are allowed to discussions of this nature, and which,
therefore, the President will not believe to have been used in the
offensive sense that might be attributed to it. The word "_pretendu_"
sometimes, it is believed, in French, and its translation always in
English, implies not only that the assertion which it qualifies is
untrue, but that the party making it knows it to be so and uses it
for the purposes of deception.
Although the President can not believe that the term was employed in
this injurious sense, yet the bare possibility of a construction being
put upon it which it would be incumbent on him to repel with indignation
obliges him to ask for the necessary explanation.