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THE TRENT CASE-BRITISH DOCTRINE.

troversy between it and our own, this doctrine is set forth as follows:

"The Order in Council of the 23d of June being officially communicated in America, the Government of the United States saw nothing in the repeal of the Orders which should, of itself, restore peace, unless Great Britain were prepared, in the first instance, substantially to relinquish the right of impressing her own seamen, when found on board American merchant ships. ***

* * *

"If America, by demanding this preliminary concession, intends to deny the validity of that right, in that denial Great Britain cannot acquiesce; nor will she give countenance to such a pretension, by acceding to its suspension, much less to its abandonment, as a basis on which to treat. The British Government has never asserted any exclusive right, as to the impressment of British seamen from American vessels, which it was not prepared to acknowledge as pertaining equally to the Government of the United States, with respect to American seamen when found on board British merchant ships. * * *

"His Royal Highness can never admit that, in the exercise of the undoubted, and, hitherto, undisputed, right of searching neutral vessels, in time of war, the impressment of British seamen, when found therein, can be deemed any violation of a neutral flag. Neither can he admit that the taking such seamen from on board such vessels can be considered, by any neutral State, as a hostile measure, or a justifiable cause of war.

"There is no right more clearly established: than the right which a sovereign has to the allegiance of his subjects, more especially in time of war. Their allegiance is no optional duty, which they can decline at pleasure. It is a call which they are bound to obey. It began with their birth, and can only terminate with their existence."

In the Queen's Proclamation of Neutrality between the United States and the Confederates, dated May 13th, 1861, there occurs this express and proper inhibition:

“And we do hereby further warn all our

loving subjects, and all persons whatsoever entitled to our protection, that, if any of them shall presume, in contempt of this Royal Proclamation, and of our high displeasure, to do any acts in derogation of their duty as subjects of a neutral sovereign, in the said contest, or in violation or contravention of the law of nations in that be

half-as, for example and more especially, by entering into the military service of either

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of the said contending parties as commissioned or non-commissioned officers or soldiers; or by serving as officers, sailors, or marines, on board any ship, or vessel of war, or transport of or in the service of either of the said contending parties; or by serving as officers, sailors, or marines, on board any privateer bearing letters of marque of or from either of the said contending parties; or by engaging to go, or going, to any place beyond the seas with intent to enlist or engage in any such service; or by procuring, or attempting to procure, within Her Majesty's dominions, at home or abroad, others to do so; or by fitting out, armning, or equipping, any ship or vessel, to be employed as a ship of war, or privateer, or transport, by either of the said contending parties; or by breaking, or endeavoring to break, any blockade lawfully and actually established by or on behalf of either of the said contending parties; or by carrying officers, soldiers, dispatches, arms, military stores or materials, or any article or articles considered and deemed to be contraband of war, according to the law or modern usage of nations, for the use or service of either of the said contending parties, all persons so offending will incur and be liable to the several penalties and penal consequences by the said statute, or by the law of nations, in that behalf imposed or denounced.

"And we do hereby declare that all our subjects and persons entitled to our protection, who may misconduct themselves in the premises, will do so at their peril and of their own wrong, and that they will in nowise obtain any protection from us against any liability or penal consequences; but will, on the contrary, incur our high displeasure by such misconduct."

It

Now, there was no shadow of doubt that the Trent was consciously, willingly, employed in carrying very important officers and dispatches for the Confederates; rendering them the greatest possible service, and one which could not safely be effected in vessels bearing their own flag. was not at all the case of dispatches carried unconsciously, innocently, in the public mails of mail steamers; but just such an interference to the prejudice of the one and the advantage of the other belligerent as British Courts of Admiralty had been accustomed to condemn; forfeiting

speedily and certainly ensue-was complied with by our GovernmentGov. Seward, in an able dispatch, basing that compliance more immediately on the failure of Capt. Wilkes to bring the Trent into port for adjudication on the legality of his act, whereby her voyage had been temporarily arrested and two of her passengers forcibly abstracted.

the vessel and cargo of the offender. | the United States and England must Great Britain, however, would not see it in this light. Com. Wilkes's act was an outrage-an insult-which must be promptly atoned for at the peril of war. Such was the purport of the language held by a large majority of her publicists and journals; and a peremptory demand was promptly made, through her Embassador, Lord Lyons, for the unconditional surrender of Messrs. Mason and Slidell and. their secretaries. France seconded and supported the requirement of Great Britain, in a considerate and courteous dispatch, wherein she justly claimed to have hitherto uniformly accorded with the United States in a liberal interpretation and generous assertion of the rights of neutrals in war. This demand of Great Britain-to the great disappointment and chagrin of the Confederates, who confidently expected that war between

And thus, at the close of the year 1861, the imminent peril of war with that European Power most able to injure us, because of her immense naval strength, as well as of the proximity of her American possessions, was wisely averted; though it was bitterly felt that her demand would at least have been more courteously and considerately made but for the gigantic war in which we were already inextricably involved by the Slaveholders' Rebellion.

XXXVII.
KENTUCKY.

WE have seen' that Kentucky emphatically, persistently, repeatedly, by overwhelming popular majorities, refused-alike before and after the formal inauguration of war by the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter-to ally herself with the Rebellion, or to stand committed to any scheme looking to Disunion in whatever contingency.

Her Democratic Governor and Legislature of 1860-61, with most of her leading Democratic, and many of her Whig, politicians, were, indeed, more or less cognizant of the

Disunion conspiracy, and were more or less intimate and confidential with its master-spirits. But they looked to very different ends. The Southrons proper, of the school of Calhoun, Rhett, Yancey, and Ruffin, regarding Disunion as a chief good under any and all circumstances, made its achievement the great object of their life-long endeavor, and regarded Slavery in the territories, fugitive slaves and their recovery, compromises, John Brown raids, etc., only as conducive to or impeding its consummation; while

1 P. 492-7.

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KENTUCKY FOR THE UNION-HENRY CLAY.

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Democratic party had, since 1826, uniformly commanded overwhelming majorities. That district, at the western extremity of the State, hemmed in between West Tennessee, Southern Missouri, and that portion of Illinois widely known as 'Egypt,' and traversed by the great Southern rivers Tennessee and Cumberland, had, in fact, for more than a quarter of a century, been alien from Kentucky in character and sympathies, as it proved itself in this case. residue of the State elected only Unionists to Congress, by a popular majority of almost three to one.

The

the 'State-Rights' apostles of the Bor- | Democrat, in a district where the der-State school contemplated Secession, and everything pertaining thereto, primarily, as means of perfecting and perpetuating the slaveholding ascendency in the Union as it was. Hence, we have seen Gov. Magoffin' protest against the secession of South Carolina and the Cotton States, not as a treasonable repudiation of their constitutional duties, but as a chimerical futility, and as a betrayal of the slaveholding Border States into the power of the 'Black Republicans.' Kentucky, as we have shown,' nine weeks after the reduction of Fort Sumter, gave an aggregate of 92,365 votes for Union to 36,995 for Secession candidates, in choosing, at a special election, her representatives in the XXXVIIth Congress, while, as yet, no Federal soldier stood armed on her soil, and while her Legislature, Governor, and most of his associate State officers, were the Democratic compatriots of Breckinridge, Burnett, and Buckner. Only a single district elected a Secessionist, by four-sevenths of its total vote; and he its old member, who had hitherto received far larger majorities, running as a

2 See pp. 340-41.

3 P. 496.

4 Pollard, in his "Southern History," fully admits, while he denounces and deplores, the hostility of Kentucky to the Rebel cause-saying:

"It is not to be supposed for a moment that, while the position of Kentucky, like that of Maryland, was one of reproach, it is to mar the credit due to that portion of the people of each, who, in the face of instant difficulties, and at the expense of extraordinary sacrifices, repudiated the decision of their States to remain under the Federal Government, and expatriated themselves that they might espouse the cause of liberty in the South. The honor due such men is, in fact, increased by the consideration that their States remained in the Union, and com

pelled them to fly their homes, that they might certify their devotion to the South and her cause of independence. Still, the justice of history must be maintained. The demonstrations of sympathy with the South on the part of the

This majority was very nearly maintained at her regular State election (August 5th), when-Magoffin being still Governor, Buckner commander of the State Guard, and the local offices mainly held by 'StateRights' Democrats, with the recent Union rout and disaster at Bull Run tending still further to unmask and develop all the latent treason in the State-a new Legislature was chosen, wherein Unionism of a very decided type predominated in the proportion of nearly three to one."

States referred to-Maryland and Kentuckyconsidered either in proportion to what was offered the Lincoln Government by these States, or with respect to the numbers of their population, were sparing and exceptional; and although these demonstrations on the part of Kentucky, from the great and brilliant names associated with them, were perhaps even more honorable and more useful than the examples of Southern spirit offered by Maryland, it is unquestionably though painfully true, that the great body of the people of Kentucky were the active allies of Lincoln, and the unnatural enemies of those united to them by lineage, blood, and common institutions."

Those who love and honor the name of Henry Clay will thank the author of the "Southern History" for the following undesigned but richly merited homage to the character and influence of that great man:

"It is certainly defective logic, or, at best, an

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