Mr. Seward to Mr. Dayton
Sir: Your confidential despatch of the 5th of June (No. 313) has been read with deep interest. The alternating reaction of liberal principles and [Page 746] rigorous ones, in France, comes, sooner or later, to be the chief subject of study for every representative of our country who sojourns there. You are witnessing only a continuance of a struggle which, in an earlier stage of it, engaged the philosophic attention of your predecessors, Franklin and Jefferson. I trust that you will be able to keep us informed of any effect which the recent changes of popular sentiment are likely to produce in the foreign policy of the French government, especially so far as it may bear at all upon the affairs of this continent.
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I cannot doubt that the republicanism of France has derived some strength from violence done, by real or seeming imperial organs, to the cause of republicanism in America. What has happened may prove beneficial to both countries, if it shall cause our civil war to be regarded in France less with regard to the material or commercial interests which are affected, and more with reference to the social and political questions which have been brought by reaction into the test of battle.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
William L. Dayton, Esq.