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which I am placed by the conclusion of this treaty, and by the communication of your letter to M. Guizot.

Before proceeding further, however, permit me to remark, that no one rejoices more sincerely than I do at the termination. of our difficulties with Great Britain, so far as they are terminated. That country and ours have so many moral and material interests involved in their intercourse, that their respective governments and inhabitants may well feel more than ordinary solicitude for the preservation of peace between these two great nations. Our past history, however, will be unprofitable if it do not teach us that unjust pretensions, affecting our rights and honor, are best met by being promptly repelled when first urged, and by being received in a spirit of resistance worthy the character of our people and of the great trust confided to us as the depositaries of the freest system of government which the world has yet witnessed.

I had the honor, in my letter of the 17th ultimo, to solicit permission to return to the United States. That letter was written the day a copy of the treaty reached Paris; and the remark which I then made to you, that "I could no longer be useful here," has been confirmed by subsequent reflection, and by the receipt of your letter and of the correspondence accompanying it. I feel that I could no longer remain here honorably for myself or advantageously for our country.

In my letter to you of the 15th of February last, transmitting a copy of my protest against the ratification of the quintuple treaty for the suppression of the African slave trade, I took the liberty of suggesting the propriety of demanding from Lord Ashburton, previously to entering into any negotiation, a distinct renunciation of this claim to search our vessels. I thought then, as I do now, that this course was demanded by a just self-respect, and would be supported by that tribunal of public opinion which sustains our government when right, and corrects it when wrong. The pretension itself was one of the most flagrant outrages which could be aimed at an independent nation; and the mode of its enunciation was as coolly contemptuous as diplomatic ingenuity could suggest. We were told, that to the doctrine that American vessels were free from the search of foreign cruisers in time of peace, "the British government never could or would subscribe" and we were told, too, there was reason to expect that the United States would themselves become converts to the same opinion; and this expectation was founded on the hope that "they would cease to confound two things which are in their nature entirely different, and would look to things, and not to words." And the very concluding paragraph of the British correspondence tells us, in effect, that we may take whatever course we please,

but that England will adhere to this pretension to board our vessels when and where her cruisers may find them. A portion of this paragraph is equally significant and unceremonious. "It is for the American government," says Lord Aberdeen, "alone to determine what may be due to a just regard for their national dignity and national independence." I doubt if, in the wide range of modern diplomacy, a more obnoxious claim has been urged in a more obnoxious manner.

This claim, thus asserted and supported, was promptly met and firmly repelled by the President in his message at the commencement of the last session of Congress; and in your letter to me, approving the course I had adopted in relation to the question of the ratification by France of the quintuple treaty, you consider the principles of that message as the established policy of the government. Under these circumstances of the assertion and denial of this new claim of maritime police, the eyes of Europe were upon these two great naval powers, one of which had advanced a pretension, and avowed her determination to enforce it, which might at any moment bring them into collision. So far our national dignity was uncompromited.

But England then urged the United States to enter into a conventional arrangement, by which we might be pledged to concur with her in measures for the suppression of the slave trade. Till then we had executed our own laws in our own way. But, yielding to this application, and departing from our former principle of avoiding European combinations upon subjects not American, we stipulated, in a solemn treaty, that we would carry into effect our own laws, and fixed the minimum force we would employ for that purpose. Certainly, a laudable desire to terminate this horrible man-stealing and man-selling may well justify us in going further, in changing one of the fundamental principles of our policy, in order to ef fect this object, than we would go to effect any other. It is so much more a question of feeling than of reasoning, that we can hardly be wrong in yielding to that impulse which leads us to desire to unite our efforts with those of other nations for the protection of the most sacred human rights. But, while making so important a concession to the renewed application of England, it seems to me we might well have said to her, Before we treat upon this matter, there is a preliminary question connected with it which must be settled. We will do no act which may, by any possibility, appear to be a recognition of your claim to search our vessels. That claim has arisen out of this very subject, or, at any rate, this subject has been the pretext for its assertion; and if we now negotiate upon it, and our concurrence is yielded, you must relinquish, as solemnly as you have announced, this most offensive pretension. If this is not done,

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by now making a conventional arrangement with you, and leaving you free to take your own course, we shall, in effect, abandon the ground we have assumed, and with it our rights and honor.

In carefully looking at the seventh and eighth articles of the treaty providing for our co-operation in the measures for the suppression of this traffic, I do not see that they change in the slightest degree the pre-existing right claimed by Great Britain to arrest and search our vessels. That claim, as advanced both by Lord Palmerston and Lord Aberdeen, rested on the assumption that the treaties between England and other European powers upon this subject could not be executed without its exercise, and that the happy concurrence of these powers not only justified this exercise, but rendered it indispensable. By the recent treaty we are to keep a squadron upon the coast of Africa. We have kept one there for years-during the whole term, indeed, of these efforts to put a stop to this most iniquitous commerce. The effect of the treaty is, therefore, to render it obligatory upon us, by a convention, to do what we have long done voluntarily-to place our municipal laws, in some measure, beyond the reach of Congress, and to increase the strength of the squadron employed on this duty. But if a British cruiser met a vessel bearing the American flag, where there is no American ship of war to examine her, it is obvious that it is quite as indispensable and justifiable that the cruiser should search this vessel to ascertain her nationality since the conclusion of the treaty as it was before. The mutual rights of the parties are in this respect wholly untouched; their pretensions exist in full force; and what they could do prior to this arrangement, they may do now; for, though they have respectively sanctioned the employment of a force to give effect "to the laws, rights, and obligations of the two countries," yet they have not prohibited the use of any other measure which either party may be disposed to adopt.

It is unnecessary to push these considerations further; and, in carrying them thus far, I have found the task an unpleasant one. Nothing but justice to myself could have induced me to do it. I could not clearly explain my position here without this recapitulation. My protest of the 13th of February distinctly asserted that the United States would resist the pretension of England to search our vessels. I avowed, at the same time, that this was but my personal declaration, liable to be confirmed or disavowed by my government. I now find a treaty has been concluded between Great Britain and the United States, which provides for the co-operation of the latter in efforts to abolish the slave trade, but which contains no renunciation by the former of the extraordinary pretension, resulting, as she said, from the exigencies of these very efforts; and which pre

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tension I felt it my duty to denounce to the French government. In all this I presume to offer no further judgment than as I am personally affected by the course of the proceedings; and I feel they have placed me in a false position, whence I can escape but by returning home with the least possible delay. I trust, therefore, that the President will have felt no hesitation in granting me the permission which I asked for. I am, &c., LEWIS CASS.

DANIEL WEBSTER, Secretary of State, Washington.

Mr. Webster to Mr. Cass.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, October 11, 1842. SIR, I have to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch of the 17th of September last, requesting permission to return home.

I have submitted the dispatch to the President, and am by him directed to say that, although he much regrets that your own wishes should, at this time, terminate your mission to the court of France, where for a long period you have rendered your country distinguished service, in all instances to its honor and to the satisfaction of the government, and where you occupy so favorable a position, from the more than ordinary good intelligence which is understood to subsist between you, personally, and the members of the French government, and from the esteem entertained for you by its illustrious head; yet he can not refuse your request to return once more to your home and your country, so that you can pay that attention to your personal and private affairs which your long absence and constant employment in the service of your government may now render most necessary.

I have, sir, to tender you, on behalf of the President, his most cordial good wishes, and am, &c.,

FLETCHER WEBSTER, Acting Secretary of State.

LEWIS CASS, Esq., &c., &c., &c.

Mr. Cass to Mr. Webster.

LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES, Paris, October 29, 1842.

SIR, I have the honor to transmit herewith a copy of the letter of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the 14th instant, acknowledging the reception of my letter to him of the 2d instant, inclosing a copy of your communication of August 29th, respecting the conclusion of the recent treaty with Great Britain. I am, &c., LEWIS CASS.

Hon. DANIEL WEBSTER, Secretary of State, Washington.

[INCLOSURE. TRANSLATION.]

PARIS, October 14, 1842. GENERAL, I have received, with the letter which you did me the honor to address to me on the 2d instant, a copy of the dispatch wherein Mr. Webster, the Secretary of State, while communicating to you the result of his negotiations with Lord Ashburton, her Britannic majesty's plenipotentiary, informs you of the views of the Federal government with regard to the repression of the slave trade.

I thank you, sir, for this communication, and I embrace with satisfaction this opportunity to renew to you, &c.,

Mr. Webster to Mr. Cass.

GUIZOT.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, November 14, 1842. SIR, I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch of the 3d of October, brought by the "Great Western," which arrived at New York on the 6th instant.

It is probable you will have embarked for the United States before my communication can now reach you; but as it is thought proper that your letter should be answered, and as circumstances may possibly have occurred to delay your departure, this will be transmitted to Paris in the ordinary way.

Your letter has caused the President considerable concern. Entertaining a lively sense of the respectable and useful manner in which you have discharged, for several years, the duties of an important foreign mission, it occasions him real regret and pain that your last official communication should be of such a character as that he can not give to it his entire and cordial approbation.

It appears to be intended as a sort of protest, a remonstrance, in the form of an official dispatch, against a transaction of the government to which you were not a party, in which you had no agency whatever, and for the results of which you were no way answerable. This would seem an unusual and extraordinary proceeding. In common with every other citizen of the republic, you have an unquestionable right to form opinions upon public transactions, and the conduct of public men; but it will hardly be thought to be among either the duties or the privileges of a minister abroad to make formal remonstrances and protests against proceedings of the various branches of the government at home, upon subjects in relation to which he himself has not been charged with any duty or partaken any responsibility.

The negotiation and conclusion of the Treaty of Washington were in the hands of the President and Senate. They had acted upon this important subject according to their convic

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