Mr. Seward to Mr. Dayton
Sir: Your confidential despatch of May 29 (No. 311) has been received, and I have made its contents known to the Secretary of the Navy.
[Page 744]I have experienced the same surprise which you have confessed in learning that our recent proceedings in relation to France, in Mexico, have been regarded as illiberal by the imperial government. Mr. Corwin, in a despatch of the 11th of March, referred to complaints made by the government of Mexico to the effect that we allowed the French government to obtain supplies here, while we denied similar favors to the government of Mexico.
In the same paper Mr. Corwin informed me that, on the 9th of February, he had been solicited by the retiring minister from Prussia to assume the protection of all French, Spanish, Prussian, and Belgian subjects in Mexico, and that he had declined to assume this charge without instructions from his own government. Mr. Corwin promptly set forth the circumstances of the case, and asked the President’s instructions thereupon. Such instructions were duly given on the 18th of April last.
I give you, by way of extract, such portions of Mr. Corwin’s despatch as bears on the subject, together with a copy of a note relating thereto, which was addressed to him by the minister for foreign relations of Mexico. I add a copy of my reply to Mr. Corwin’s despatch. You are at liberty to read these papers to Mr. Drouyn de l’Huys, if it should seem to you, as it does to me, that they are calculated to show that, in respect to both of the topics mentioned by Mr. Drouyn de l’Huys, this government has acted with a scrupulous regard to its friendly relations with them, and its neutrality in the war which unhappily exists between that power and Mexico.
William L. Dayton, Esq., &c., &c., &c.