To give a brief summary, then, of General Banks's Report, and afford a clue to his leading motives in setting on foot the new scheme of neutral policy, I believe his general drift may be fairly stated to be about as follows:

That our early neutrality—that of Washington's day and the era of the law of 1794 - was well enough, but not deserving of praise.

"It was the result of the situation of the country; and the deficiency in armies, navies, fortifications, and the implements of war, had as much to do with it as the opinions of legislators, executive officers, or the people." ("House Report, No. 100," p. 5.) It was a policy of isolation and estrangement from foreign nations, rather than of mere neutrality." (Ib., p. 6.) "The government accepted it, not because it was just, but necessary." (1b.) "For a time it answered the demands of other governments." (Ib., p. 2.)

The law of 1794 having received its first amendment three years later, viz., in 1797, — General Banks says of the amendment, and of the combined effect of the two laws :

"In 1797 the statute was amended by further restrictions upon commerce and the people. Neither the interests of France nor public sentiment prompted this change in the existing law. It could have been suggested only by the power that prompted the original enactment." (Ib., p. 2.)

enabled the Administration

...

"Public opinion to gratify England by the enactment of statutes for its protection, more explicit and stringent than those imposed by the law of nations." (Ib., p. 2.) "The statutes of 1794 and 1797 were sufficiently stringent in their prohibitions upon American commerce and the American people, to satisfy and silence the claims of the nation most ambitious for supremacy upon the land and sea." (Ib., p. 3.)

Passing to the next and concluding period of neutral legislative history, the acts of 1817 and 1818, the General says of the former (p. 4),

"It was not legislation to punish crime against the law of nations, but to prevent offences against Spain." The law of 1818, the existing statute, "was enacted upon the pressing claims of Spain and Portugal, backed by the representations of Great Britain."

After going into an analysis of its provisions (as if new legislation, when in fact it was substantially a re-enactment of the law of 1794, made perpetual in 1800, as I shall presently show), General Banks proceeds to say of it:

"It is impossible to suppose that provisions so repressive upon American commerce, so hostile to the cause of liberty in the colonies, and so strongly in favor of a government whose principles were so repugnant to the people as those of Spain, were voluntarily adopted. They had their origin in the interests of European governments, hostile to the cause of the colonies." (p. 4.)

And again, three pages later (p. 7) :—

"In reviewing the statute of 1818, we cannot escape the conclusion, that it disregards the inalienable rights of the people of all nations; that it was imposed upon the country by considerations affecting exclusively the political interests of other nations; that it criminally restrains the rights of nations at peace, for the benefit of those at war; that it was intended to perpetuate the supremacy of favored nations on the sea. It properly belongs to another age, and is not of us nor for us."

Following up these disparaging views of our past neutral legislation, as one reflecting no credit upon the country, but as at all times imposed upon us by foreign dictation, and to which we yielded through maritime weakness and a disposition to favor England, General Banks goes on to recommend a thorough revision of the neutrality laws hereafter; and, in the mean time, to repeal so much of the provisions now in force as "to scale" our own code down to the level of English legislation. Accordingly, his project, as ultimately amended and voted by the House, contains various modifications of the law of 1818 designed to that end; the "scaling" down, as the chairman explains, being motived upon the idea -

and

"That we can no longer stand bail for the peace of the world, that we have stood guard for other nations long enough; and that, "when the maintenance of national honor is identified with the defence of principles essential to the independence of States and the progress of civilization, we cannot falter on a course marked out for us by duty and destiny." (Report, p. 10.)

The Report concludes with a special arraignment of the conduct of Great Britain towards the United States during the late civil struggle, in permitting the equipment and outfit of rebel cruisers from British territory, and afterwards receiving them with friendly hospitality into British outports; and, having shown that the proposed reduction of the tone of our neutrality laws will not prejudice our claims against England for indemnity for those grievances, it then closes with a strong denunciation of Irish wrongs, and an expression of opinion that the voice of the Government should be heard in aid of the cause of Irish independence against British oppression.

Now, to this proposed step forward in the course of manifest destiny, so far as its expediency is sought to be justified by the exposé of our neutral history above abbreviated from General Banks, I have to object, in the first place, that it unjustly and unjustifiably disparages the country's historic good name and fame.

CHAPTER II.

The fame of the United States for neutrality only second to its being the country of Washington. — This especially true of its neutrality in Washington's day. General Banks's sentiment contested, that we only observed neutrality from necessity and national weakness. - On the contrary, it is a special glory that we were so bravely and honestly neutral when so weak. — Statement of the characteristics of early American neutrality. - Proof of the position by historical instances. The case of the " Grange," prize to the "L'Embuscade," the French war-frigate which brought Genet to the United States. The prize given back to England, and the surroundings of the case. The case of the "William," a prize under charge of Gideon Henfield. — The sale of the prize stopped, the prize seized, a libel filed for its restitution, and Henfield arrested and tried for a violation of the law of nations. - Letters between Genet and Jefferson. - Henfield acquitted; but his case made the occasion for the passage of the law of 1794, June 5. Note to this case, showing its bearing on the method of restoring prizes taken in violation of neutrality. Case of the seizure of the French privateer "The Republican," with an armed force. - The recall of Genet demanded in one of the boldest and ablest of American State papers. - Mr. Pickering's despatches also commended for their able assertion of neutral independence. As to subservience to England, at this time we were almost at swords'-points with her, and therefore could not have been over-complaisant. — Jay's instructions and Mr. Randolph's despatch quoted to show this. - Several examples given of our enforcement of neutrality against England. - The French Minister of Foreign Affairs quoted to the same effect. - A striking example of the fearlessness of our people towards England given in the affair of the "Nautilus," where the General Assembly of Rhode Island detained one of His British Majesty's captains till he gave up six impressed American seamen detained on board his vessel.

If there is any point well established in our favor on the pages of history, I had supposed it to be that we enjoyed a national reputation for professing and maintaining high principles of international neutrality. If the remark is limited to the time of Washington's presidency, there can be no doubt, I believe, that such a reputation is justly deserved. Probably next to our country's fame as being the place where Washington lived, there is no particular in which the republic is so favorably known in Europe and throughout the civilized world as that of being the honest and consistent advocate of neutral rights at

the time of the French Revolution. And it was in her infancy, more than at any other time, that the United States enjoyed the opportunity of establishing this fame upon the basis of a manly and courageous self-respect, as well as in obedience to Christian precepts of love of peace, and promotion of goodwill among men.

Does General Banks think that we chose our path of neutrality, in the trying days of the French Revolution, out of weakness and overpowering necessity? I maintain, that it was just because, when we were so weak and defenceless as at that era, we yet so manfully resisted the aggressions of France and England upon our independence, and so courageously fought the battle of neutral rights for other nations as weak as ourselves, that our vindication of neutrality deservedly became commendable and famous.

That a great and formidable power should force other equal or inferior powers to respect its rights of territorial sovereignty is a matter meriting no special comment. That such a power even should fulfil the duties of an impartial and yet hospitable neutrality, in affording that protection to the neutral rights of inferior or co-ordinate powers which the active practice of neutrality demands, is not altogether a new incident in international history. But for a new-born nation, five, or at most fifteen, years old, without a soldier or a sailor at its command, nay, without a dollar, as I might say, in its treasury, and having an unarmed frontier of thousands of miles by sea and by land lying open to aggression, to announce to nations four and five times its superior in numbers and a hundred-fold its overmatch in preparations for war, that its territory is sacred from belligerent enterprises and hostile undertakings; that it acknowledges no superior but the law of nations; that, in observance of that law, it shall compel the contending parties to comply with certain before-unheard-of but eminently just prescriptions of neutral conduct; and that, finally, it holds itself accountable to injured powers for any damage sustained by them through its own non-enforcement of these prescriptions, and through its own non-fulfilment of the law of nations generally, was a new and unheard-of trait of