ing all sympathy with the outrage, on that ground alone. There is danger of a general discharge and proscription of these people, most of whom are laborers earning their daily bread, and a very large proportion of whom are doubtless wholly innocent. The consequences to themselves, not less than to the community at large, may easily be foreseen. The chief sufferers will be those least contemplated at the outset. Under these circumstances, it does not seem to me that the mode of operation thus resorted to can ever deserve to be classed as an incident to a meritorious political movement, or, if pushed much further, is likely to be productive of any better ultimate result than a passionate and vindictive retaliation upon a race, without discrimination between the innocent and the guilty. In this view of the difficulties of the case, it seems extremely hazardous for persons not members of the community to undertake to judge of the propriety of the course of repression which it may be driven to adopt. Certainly, down to this time, the policy of this government cannot be charged with extreme severity. It has, on the other hand, given rise to more or less of popular dissatisfaction, on the ground of its feebleness and lenity. In regard to these conflicting opinions it is my province not to adopt either. I have endeavored only to present to you the exact state of the facts, so as to enable you to judge of the great difficulty in any case calling for intervention of steering clear of offense between them. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS. Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward. No. 1503.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, London, December 24, 1867. SIR: In accordance with the directions contained in your dispatches Nos. 2102 and 2103, of the 29th of November and 2d of December, I obtained to-day an interview with Lord Stanley, for the purpose of reading to him the contents of the first. After having done so I left a copy, as directed in No. 2103. His lordship, on receiving it, asked me whether I was in possession of any later views of my government on the subject of this dispatch. I promptly responded in the negative. I considered the negotiation as now closed, without a prospect of reopening it, and had so written home. His lordship then said that he had just received a letter from Mr. Ford, at Washington, which he would be glad to have me read and give him my impression of its meaning. He then handed it to me, and I looked over it carefully. It was dated the 8th instant, and reported a conversation the writer had just had with you. The substance of it was, according to him, that you said you could not recede from the position of holding the British government responsible for the consequences of the proclamation of neutrality; hence, that all prospect of success from the proposal of arbitration, made with an exception of that point, must be regarded as over. Neither could you make any new offer to negotiate, for the United States felt itself like a party injured by a severe blow, who could not properly initiate a proposal for reparation from the party that had inflicted it. In order to get rid of the awkwardness of such a position, you suggested the possibility of his lordship's proposing to merge this particular question in the mass of matters now remaining open between the countries, and lumping them altogether in one treatment or negotiation. You closed by hinting that an avenue would remain open to his lordship through the answer which he might make to the last note which you had written-in other words, to the dispatch No. 2102, which I had just communicated. After reading it, I observed that this view of the subject was, in some measure, new to me, and that I could not undertake, with my partial comprehension of it, to give him many explanations having authority. If it was the intention to proceed by the customary way of negotiation between the countries, in my opinion the brief remnant of the term of the administration would expire before much progress had been made. This was said in view of the fact that there must, after all, be some precision arrived at in defining the controverted points. The British claims would require examination, and perhaps evidence to substantiate them, before they could be conceded. The same thing would happen with ours, which were larger, and more complicated with disputed questions. His lordship said that he did not quite understand it. He had regarded the main question as involving a claim put forth for damages, which it seemed to him the part of the person considering himself aggrieved to advance; but he was not strenuous on that point. A more serious difficulty would perhaps lie in the fact that the private claimants under what were, after all, the gravest questions, might not be well content to see them liable to be mixed up and bargained away against other points in which they were not interested. I said that there was the more ground for such an objection in the fact that precisely such an event had happened in a former treaty of ours with France. The effect of it had been, in that case, that the country had received a benefit for the surrender of large claims for unlawful captures of private property at sea, but that from that day to this not a farthing of compensation had ever been made good by it to the owners of the claims thus abandoned. His lordship concluded by saying that he had but just received this letter, and he should endeavor to give it the most careful reflection; but at present he could not perceive any course open to him. The papers would probably be all laid before the House of Commons at the adjourned session, when he would be called upon to make his explanations. He should endeavor to be prepared for the occasion. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, SIR: Your dispatch of the 7th of December, No. 1490, has been received. The Secretary of War ad interim reports that Ricord OS. Burke was in the volunteer service of the United States from 1863 until the close of the war, when he was serving as captain, and was honorably discharged on the 13th of June, 1865, and that his military record is deemed an honorable one. By the President's direction I telegraphed to you yesterday to employ counsel for Burke at reasonable cost. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS, Esq., &c., &c., &c. Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward. No. 1504.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: I have to acknowledge the reception of a telegram by the cable, dated the 24th instant, directing me to employ legal assistance in behalf of Mr. Burke, at reasonable cost. Unfortunately, the qualification is a difficult one to construe, for the charges would probably be at once multiplied the moment it was known by whom they were to be borne. Mr. Burke has already had assistance provided for him by his friends. I shall endeavor to place the matter in such a shape that the government will only incur the amount of charge which will have been agreed upon on the supposition that his friends are to defray it. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, SIR: I have received your dispatch of the 11th of December, No. 1492, and have carefully read the papers touching the law of expatriation to which you refer. They are acceptable indications of a disposition in a certain quarter to relieve the two governments of the embarrassments which have arisen from the unnecessary and indiscreet assertion in Great Britain of a principle which has become practically obsolete. It is expected that Congress will, immediately after reconvening, bring the legislative department of this government explicitly into concord with the executive department upon the question. When that shall have been done, the President will be prepared to express his official opinion concerning it for the information of her Majesty's government. You are quite right in saying that it is very desirable to remove the causes of future collision on the subject. At the same time I think it necessary to say that, in view of the failure hitherto to obtain a satisfactory settlement of our complaints against Great Britain which occurred during the late rebellion in the United States, and in view also of the severity which continues to be practiced by the courts of law in Great Britain discriminating against native Irishmen duly naturalized in the United States, I do not think that a situation exists in the United States favorable to the initiation of negotiations by this department limited to the single pur pose of obtaining a revision of the law concerning expatriation. I am, sir, your obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS, Esq., &c., &c., &c. Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, January 6, 1868. SIR: Your dispatch of the 1st of December, No. 1499, has been received. It contains your resignation of the office of envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary to the United Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, a proceeding for which you had kindly prepared the way in a previous informal correspondence. The resignation will be accepted. I am charged, however, with the duty of saying that the President regrets profoundly the necessity which constrains you to retire from your important field of public service. If this regret is attended by less anxiety now than it would have been heretofore, it is only because you will leave the interests of the United States improved and rendered hopeful by sagacity, assiduity, and ability, which cannot fail to be universally acknowledged. Proceedings will be taken for the appointment of your successor within the period which you have indicated. The President indulges me with the privilege of expressing my personal feelings on the occasion. The official ties between us, which are now to be sundered, were formed in the darkest hour our country has ever known-darker, as I trust, than she is to know again in your lifetime or in my own. They have been continually subjected to such strains as few political relationships can endure. The memory of the association will be among the most cherished which will survive my own connection with the public affairs. With earnest wishes for your future welfare and happiness, I remain, sir, your very obedient servant, WILLIAM H. SEWARD. CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS, Esq., &c., &c., &c. Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward. No. 1513.] LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: I have to acknowledge the reception from the department of dispatches Nos. 2112, 2113, and 2114. During the past week the panic occasioned by the affair at Clerkenwell has been slowly subsiding, although the attempts to do mischief have not altogether ceased. Some of the efforts made in Ireland to get possession of gunpowder appear to have been successful. The projects upon the post office in London, through the agency of packets stuffed with explosive materials, have generally failed. The most serious of these, which was undertaken at the distributing office in this district, does not appear to have been noticed in the newspapers. No discovery has yet been made of the origin of these movements. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS. Secretary of State, Washington, DC. No. 1516.] Mr. Adams to Mr. Seward. LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: I beg to call your attention to a leader in the London Times of this morning, a copy of which I transmit, following up the subject of the law of allegiance discussed in the same paper on the 11th of December last, reference to which was made in my dispatch No. 1492, of that date. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, Hon. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS. Secretary of State, Washington, D. C. [From the London Times, January 8, 1868.] The United States Congress is already acting upon the President's suggestion, and the liabilities of naturalized citizens must soon become the subject of serious negotiation. On the 19th of last month there was a debate in the Senate upon a petition soliciting protection in general terms for American citizens domiciled abroad. The immediate occasion of this petition appears to have been the revival of an old dispute with Prussia respecting the alleged claims of that power to the military service of Prussians naturalized in America but actually residing in the country of their birth. Now that Prussia represents North Germany, and that a rigid system of conscription is established throughout the confederation, the question has acquired a new importance, and will not be solved without difficulty. The debate, however, inevitably expanded into a discussion of the still larger question opened by the Fenian prosecutions in Ireland. Senator Conness, who spoke in a very hostile spirit towards this country, stated that American citizens had been convicted in our courts not only for acts done but for words uttered in America; and Mr. Reverdy Johnson expressed great indignation at the refusal of a jury de mediatate to natural-born British subjects afterwards naturalized in America. The matter had previously been referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations, but Mr. Sumner, as chairman of that committee, declared that it would not be shelved there. He added that, in his opinion, the unrestricted permission of emigration by Great Britain, coupled with the doctrine of perpetual allegiance, involved a downright absurdity, and predicted that, on a candid examination, our government would not maintain the latter claim. In the mean time large meetings have been held in various parts of the Union to assert the rights of "foreign-born citizens abroad," and the House of Representatives has passed a resolution urging the Committee on Foreign Affairs to inquire forthwith into the alleged maltreatment of American citizens by the British authorities in Ireland. We cannot be surprised, and we ought not to be offended, at the keen interest manifested by the Americans in the principle which, as they suppose, is at stake. The whole number of foreign-born citizens naturalized in the United States has been estimated to exceed 4,000,000, at least half of whom are immigrants from British territories, and more than one-third from Ireland alone. If the strict theory of perpetual allegiance were enforced, any of these Irish-Americans who might serve against Great Britain in the armies of the United States would be guilty of treason against his lawful sovereign, and, if captured, might be punished accordingly. Of course, the law would never in practice be carried to this length, but a nation so largely composed of foreign element must naturally rebel against a rule which, if applied, would produce such consequences. Mr. Sumner, however, went too far when he maintained that it was peculiar to English jurisprudence and is not recognized in the United States. On the contrary, though disputed in one case by an American secretary, it has been admitted, we believe by all American judges and jurists of repute, down to General Halleck. Mr. Justice Story himself, though he points out that no state can give an extra-territorial operation to its laws by requiring another state to execute them, carefully abstains from denying its right over natural-born subjects returning within its own jurisdiction. He elsewhere affirms this right in express and unqualified language. An offense," says he, "may be committed in one sovereignty in violation of the laws of another, and if the offender be afterwards found in the latter state, he may be punished according to the laws thereof, and the fact that he owes allegiance to another sovereignty is no bar to the indictment." Nor is this all; for the same eminent authority negatives, as if by anticipation, the untenable notion that American legislation can affect the status of natural-born British subjects, or any other persons, in an English court. If our com |
