dominant policy, the stern and unbending resolve to stand together as one man against every movement which had even the slightest tendency toward a restoration of the hated conditions from which they had escaped. No sane mind can wonder at "the solid South," or at the Democratic South. Life, property, happiness, honor, civilization, everything which makes existence endurable demanded that the decent white men of the South should stand shoulder to shoulder in defending their families, their homes and their communities from any return of the vile plague under which they had suffered so long and so cruelly; and human instinct determined that this should be done in connection with that party which was hostile to the Republican party. The differences which lead to a fair fight and the wounds which are received in it are easily healed, but indignities heaped upon a fallen foe create a bitterness of heart that lasts so long as life endures.

Slavery was a great wrong, and secession was an error and a terrible blunder, but Reconstruction was a punishment so far in excess of the crime that it extinguished every sense of culpability upon the part of those whom it was sought to convict and convert. More than a quarter of a century has now passed since the blunder-crime of Reconstruction played its baleful part in alienating the two sections of the country. Until four years ago little progress had been made in reconciling them. It is said now that the recent war with Spain, in which men from the North and men from tion between the South marched under the same banner the South. to battle and to victory, has buried the hatchet forever between them. But they had done this many times before, and yet it did not prevent the attempt to destroy the Union. It cannot be in this alone that the South feels increased security against the doctrines and the poli

Reconcil i a

the North and

cies and interferences of the Republican party with regard to the negro question, the great question which has made and kept the South solidly Democratic. It is something far more significant and substantial than this. It is to some the pleasing, though to others startling, fact, that the Republican party, in its work of imposing the sovereignty of the United States upon eight millions of Asiatics, has changed its views in regard to the political relation of races and has at last virtually accepted the ideas of the South upon that subject. The white men of

the South need now have no further fear that the Republican party, or Republican Administrations, will ever again give themselves over to the vain imagination of the political equality of man. It is this change of mind and heart on the part of the North in regard to this vital question of Southern "State" polity which has caused the now much-talked-of reconciliation.

CHAPTER XIV

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES BETWEEN 1867 AND 1877

The Purchase of Alaska-The Contention of the House of Representatives in Regard to its Power over Treaties-The Senate's Position and the Compromise-Irritation of the American People against Great Britain-The Johnson-Clarendon Treaty President Grant's Statements in His First Annual Message and in His Second Annual Address-Sir John Rose's Mission to the United States-The Joint High CommissionThe Treaty of Washington-The Alabama Claims and the Geneva Convention-Triumph of the Diplomacy of the United States-Organization of the Tribunal and Filing of the Cases -The Controversy between Mr. Fish and Lord GranvilleThe Filing of the Counter Cases and the Argument-Obstacles -Decision of the Tribunal in Regard to National and Indirect Damages-The Decision of the Tribunal in the Case of the Florida-The Decision in the Case of the Alabama-The Decision in the Case of the Shenandoah, and other VesselsInternational Principles Settled by the Geneva Tribunal-The Northwest Boundary Question-The Fisheries Question-The Halifax Commission and Award - The Burlingame Treaty with China-The Attempt to Annex the Dominican Republic to the United States-The Treaty-The Treaty before the Senate-Its Rejection-The President's Attempt to Renew Negotiations-The Committee of Inquiry-The Report of the Committee-The Abandonment of the Scheme.

THE two chief products of American diplomacy in the decade between 1867 and 1877 were the purchase of Alaska, and the treaty of Washington with Great Britain. The purchase of Alaska, the northwest corner of the North American continent, together with the islands

of Alaska.

adjacent thereto, a vast region of some five hundred thousand square miles in extent, inhabited chiefly by The purchase a few savage tribes, was effected by a treaty, negotiated by Mr. Seward and the Russian diplomatist, Baron Stoeckl, and ratified by the Senate of the United States on the 30th of March, 1867.

The reasons for and against the purchase.

The proposition came from the side of Russia, and it appeared that Russia was more eager to sell than the United States was to buy. The price agreed on was seven millions two hundred thousand dollars in gold, and most people in the United States thought, at the time, that this great sum was being paid for nothing but a barren area of snow and ice. The country was declared to be utterly worthless by some of the best informed men in Congress, and a man of no less ability and influence than Mr. Shellabarger opposed the purchase on the ground that it involved an extension of territory dangerous to the existence of the Republic.

On the other hand, such men as General Banks and Mr. Stevens contended that from the point of view of a business transaction alone it was worth the money; and Mr. Higby, of California, told his colleagues that they were mistaken in regard to the climate of the region. The consideration, however, which seems to have had most weight was gratitude toward Russia, whose government had manifested the most friendly feeling for the Union in the struggle against the giant rebellion, and had even threatened interference in behalf of the Union against interference in behalf of the Confederacy by any other European state. That acute observer of political opinion, Mr. Blaine, affirmed that a like offer from any other European government would most probably have been declined.

A real polit

the purchase.

It is, however, almost certain that Mr. Seward had another very profound reason for making the purchase, one which he could not very well proclaim from the housetops, especially as the feeling ical reason for on his part, and on the part of the Government and of the people of the North, was most kindly toward Russia. It was this: The United States would in this way and at a comparatively small cost rid herself forever of any danger of Russian colonization on the North American continent, and of the danger of any complications between Russia and Great Britain upon this continent. This was a most important political consideration, one which much overbalanced the price paid for the territory and the cost of its administration.

pay

The contention of the House of Rep

resentatives in

regard to its

power over

treaties in

volving the

payment of money by the

United States.

When the bill for making the appropriation to pay for Alaska came before the House of Representatives, that body raised the question of the power of the House over treaties involving the ment of money by the United States, by asserting in the preamble of the bill that its consent was necessary to the validity of such treaties. It did so on the ground that as an independent legislative body it could refuse any appropriation at its own discretion, and that as all foreign countries were bound to know this from the wording of the Constitution, no foreign country could consider a treaty with the United States, involving financial obligations by the United States, as completed until the House of Representatives should have voted the appropriation of the amount stipulated in the agreement.

The Senate, on the other hand, repudiated this doctrine, and rejected the bill with the preamble containing it as it came from the House of Representatives.