as justifying her reception in British ports, that it cannot be evaded if the claims are to be referred at all. The only practical questions, then, which appear to me to remain, are those of settling the form of the reference and choosing the arbitrator; and to these I earnestly desire that both governments should address themselves with all candor and sincerity. Let the issues be clear, precise, and appropriate, so the deliverance of them will most tend to take out the sting from the feelings of both sides, and to leave international law, and the habits of conducting international relations, in a better plight and condition than that in which they were found.

་་

"I am, &c.,

"JOHN WESTLAKE 58

"LINCOLN'S-INN, Jan. 23."

58 John Westlake, Q. C., since 1888 Professor of International Law in Cambridge University, published in 1858 A Treatise on Private International Law, or the Conflict of Laws, which he rewrote entirely in 1880; in 1894 he published Chapters on the Principles of International Law. He was the Foreign Secretary of the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, and President of its Jurisprudence Department at the Birmingham meeting in 1884. He is a member, and was President at the Cambridge meeting in 1895, of l'Institut de Droit International.

CHAPTER V.

On the 6th of March, 1868, there was a debate in the House of Commons on the Alabama claims. Mr. Shaw-Lefevre (Liberal), who during the Civil War sympathized with the Union cause, moved an address calling for the publication of papers relating to the Alabama claims. The Foreign Secretary, Lord Stanley, Mr. W. E. Forster, Mr. Mill and most of the members who spoke, favored, at the same time that they insisted on the safeguarding of the rights of England, the adoption of a conciliatory policy towards the United States.59

In June, 1868, President Johnson appointed Mr. Reverdy Johnson, of Maryland, to succeed Mr. Adams who had resigned in December, 1867, but had continued until May, 1868, at the post he had filled with such marked ability and success, and maintained during the course of difficult negotiations the high diplomatic traditions left him by an honored sire and grandsire. Mr. Johnson arrived in

59

The London Times, March 7th, 1868, page 6.

England with instructions to seek for an amicable arrangement of several vexatious questions, such as naturalization and the San Juan water boundary, then existing between the two countries. He negotiated for many months with Lord Stanley and his successor in the Foreign Office, Lord Clarendon. At length, on January 14th, 1869, the Johnson-Clarendon convention providing for the settlement of the Alabama claims was signed. It provided that a commission of four members should sit at Washington, that each power should name two commissioners, that all the claims of subjects of either country against the other nation should be submitted to the four commissioners; and that if in any case the commissioners failed to come to an agreement, they should choose an umpire, but if they did not agree in their selection, then each side should name an umpire, and then from these two persons an umpire should be chosen for each particular case in which the commissioners failed to agree.

When the convention came up for ratification in the United States, it met with strong opposition. Charles Sumner, Senator from Massachusetts, the Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, delivered, in executive session, on April 13th, 1869, a strong speech against ratifying the convention. Senator Sumner first of all said, that the Committee would not hesitate

to advise the Senate to reject the treaty and then he went on to say :

60

“A treaty which, instead of removing an existing grievance, leaves it for heart-burning and rancor, cannot be considered a settlement of pending questions between two nations. It may seem to settle them, but does not. It is nothing but a snare.

the character of the treaty now before us.

tion.

And such is

The mas

sive grievance under which our country suffered for years is left untouched; the painful sense of wrong planted in the national heart is allowed to remain. For all this there is not one word of regret or even of recognition; nor is there any semblance of compensaIt cannot be for the interest of either party that such a treaty should be ratified. It cannot promote the interest of the United States, for we naturally seek justice as the foundation of a good understanding with Great Britain; nor can it promote the interest of Great Britain, which must also seek a real settlement of all pending questions. Surely I do not err when I say that a wise statesmanship, whether on

60

Appendix to the Congressional Globe: Containing Speeches, Important State Papers and the Laws of the First Session, Fortyfirst Congress. City of Washington: Office of the Congressional Globe, 1869, pages 21-26, passim.

Speech of Hon. Charles Sumner on the Johnson-Clarendon Treaty for the Settlement of Claims. Delivered in the U. S. Senate. Boston, 1870.

our side or on the other side, must apply itself to find the real root of evil, and then, with courage tempered by candor and moderation, see that it is extirpated. This is for the interest of both parties, and anything short of it is a failure.

*

"If we look at the negotiation, which immediately preceded the treaty, we find little to commend. You have it on your table. I think I am not mistaken when I say, that it shows a haste which finds few precedents in diplomacy, but which is explained by the anxiety to reach a conclusion before the advent of a new Administration. Mr. Seward and Mr. Reverdy Johnson both unite in this unprecedented activity, using the Atlantic cable freely. I should not object to haste or to the freest use of the cable, if the result were such as could be approved; but, considering the character of the transaction, and how completely the treaty conceals the main cause of offence, it seems as if the honorable negotiators were engaged in huddling something out of sight.

"The treaty has for its model the Claims Convention of 1853. To take such a Convention as a model was a strange mistake. This Convention was for the settlement of outstanding claims of American citizens on Great Britain, and of British subjects on the United States, which had arisen since the treaty of