Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams.
Sir: Your despatch of January 28, No. 584, has been received.
You are very right in leaving the complaint about the Kearsarge at rest, since the British government have given no further indications of discontent with the ground upon which you have placed it. The President’s view in regard to it is, that we should remove, so far as is possible, every plausible ground of complaint of violation of British neutrality laws by our agents, while we claim and insist upon the enforcement of those laws against our enemies in Great Britain and her provinces. Our instructions must always be based upon the understanding we have of facts at the time the despatches leave this department. On the other hand, the whole aspect of a case existing abroad is often changed without our knowledge, before instructions from this place are received, and sometimes, indeed, before they are written. In all cases you could hardly overdraw upon the confidence of the department in your wisdom and discretion.
I regret that the conversations with Earl Russell do not warrant an expectation that her Majesty’s government is likely to take into early and serious consideration the complications of our international affairs. It would seem that interested and prejudiced sympathies with the insurgents are yet strong enough in England to persuade the government to be content to leave their relations towards this government upon their present basis. It is, nevertheless, a grave question, whether, if so left, they must not inevitably fall into a worse and more perplexing condition. The state of our relations is this: Great Britain regards the insurgents as a lawful naval belligerent; we do not. Great Britain pursues a policy in regard to them based upon her view of their character. We pursue a different one. The dealings of British subjects with the insurgents in the insurrectionary region, in the loyal parts of the United States, in Great Britain, in her provinces, and on the high seas, are continually producing controversies and claims upon which the two governments cannot agree. Interested British subjects require her Majesty’s government to ask of the United States explanations [Page 172] and concessions which they cannot make; and the interests of the United States and their citizens require this government to make claims which her Majesty’s government think they cannot concede. These perplexities have continually increased with the progress of the war, until it already begins to be a cause of painful apprehension in both countries, that, if peace should come to-day, it would be very difficult to adjust the controversies already ripened between the two nations. In Great Britain it is thought, or at least it seems desirable to think, that the result of this civil war is yet distant and uncertain; and this persuasion reconciles the government to a perserverance in the policy of which the United States complain. On the other hand, the war is believed here to be approaching its end, and that end is confidently expected to be a complete and perfect re-establishment of the supremacy of the Union upon-foundations broader than those upon which it has heretofore stood. The two national legislatures are in session, and each is likely to act more or less under the influence of national sentiments, prejudices, and passions. Under these circumstances, each government, more or less influenced by the same sentiments actively enforced by popular legislatures, must demand more and concede less. It is the earnest desire of the President that both governments may improve the present hour by a common preparation for a peaceful, friendly, and beneficent future.
The mails which carry this despatch carry out abundant evidence that the force and strength of the insurgents are declining, that the force and strength of the Union are increasing, and that at last the element of sympathy in the free States, upon which the insurgents have hitherto relied for the growth of a faction which should come to their aid, is exhausted. It seems now as if the whole loyal part of the country is not merely prepared to surrender slavery, but to suppress and extirpate it forever. I have already indicated in a previous despatch that in the insurgent States slaves are rapidly ceasing to be an investment of capital. Thus, practically, slavery is fast disappearing from the country. What, then, shall hinder or long delay reunion? Only passions and wrongs that have already had their full satisfaction in the devastation and misery they have produced.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Charles Francis Adams, Esq., &c., &c., &c.