The Palmerston press—and on another occasion I will show 
that in foreign affairs Palmerston’s control over nine-tenths of the 
English press is just as absolute as Louis Bonaparte’s over 
nine-tenths of the French press*—the Palmerston press feels that 
it works among “pleasing hindrances”. On the one hand, it 
admits that the law officers of the Crown‘ have reduced the 
accusation against the United States to a mere mistake in procedure, 
to a technical error. On the other hand, it boasts that on the basis of 
such a legal quibble a compelling ultimatum has been presented to 
the United States, such as can only be justified by a gross violation 
of law, but not by a formal error in the exercise of a recognised 
right. Accordingly, the Palmerston press now pleads the question 
of material right again. The great importance of the case appears 
to demand a brief examination of the question of material right. 

By way of introduction, it may be observed that not a single 
English paper ventures to reproach the San Jacinto for the visi- 
tation and search of the Trent. This point, therefore, falls out- 
side the controversy. 

First, we again call to mind the relevant passage in Queen 
Victoria’s proclamation of neutrality of May 13, 1861. The passage 
reads: 

“Victoria R. 
‘““As we are at peace with the United States ... we warn all our beloved subjects 
. to abstain from contravening our Proclamation ... by breaking the legally 

recognised blockade or by carrying officers ... dispatches ... or any other contraband 
of war. All persons so offending will be liable to the various penalties imposed in 
that behalf by the English municipal law and by the law of nations.... Such persons 
will in no way receive our protection against the consequences of their conduct but 
will, on the contrary, incur our displeasure.” @ 

This proclamation of Queen Victoria, therefore, in the first 
place declares dispatches to be contraband and makes the ship that 
carries such contraband liable to the “penalties of the law of 
nations”. What are these penalties? 

Wheaton, an American writer on international law whose 
authority is recognised on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean alike, 
says in his Elements of International Law, p. 565°: 

“The carrying of dispatches of the enemy subjects the neutral vessel in which 
they are transported to capture and confiscation. The consequences of such a service 
are infinitely beyond the effect of conveying ordinary contraband.... As Sir 
W. Scott, the English judge, says, the carrying of military stores is necessarily of 
limited nature, while the carrying of dispatches is an act that may defeat the entire 
plan of campaign of the other belligerent.... The confiscation of the noxious article, 
which constitutes the usual penalty for contraband, would be ridiculous when 
applied to dispatches. There would be no freight dependent on their transporta- 
tion. Therefore, their confiscation does not affect the shipowner and hence does 
not punish the ship carrying them. The vehicle, in which they are carried, must, 
therefore, be confiscated.” 

Walker, in his Introduction to American Law, says: 

“Neutrals may not be concerned in bearing hostile dispatches, under the penalty 
of confiscation of the vehicle, and of the cargo also.” 

Kent, who is accounted a decisive authority in English courts, 
states in his Commentaries: 

“Tf, on search of a ship, it is found that she carries enemy dispatches, she incurs 
the penalty of capture and of confiscation by judgment of a prize court.” 

Dr. Robert Phillimore, Advocate of Her Majesty in Her Office of 
Admiralty,© says in his latest work on international law, p. 370: 

“Official communications from an official person 4 on the affairs of a‘belligerent 
Government are such dispatches as impress an hostile character upon the carriers of 
them. The mischievous consequences of such a service cannot be estimated, and 
extend far beyond the effect of any Contraband that can be conveyed, for it is 
manifest that by the carriage of such dispatches the most important plans of a 

Slidell”, New-York Daily Tribune, No. 6435, November 18, 1861.— Ed. 

Belligerent may be forwarded or obstructed.... The penalty is confiscation of the 
ship which conveys the dispatches and of the cargo.” 

Two points are therefore established. Queen Victoria’s procla- 
mation of May 13, 1861, subjects English ships that carry 
dispatches of the Confederacy to the penalties of international law. 
International law, according to its English and American interpre- 
ters, imposes the penalty of capture and confiscation on such ships. 

Palmerston’s organs consequently lied on orders from above— 
and we were naive enough to believe their lie—in affirming that 
the captain of the San Jacinto had neglected to seek for dispatches 
on the Trent and therefore had of course found none; and that 
the Trent had consequently become shot-proof through this 
oversight. The American journals of November 17 to 20, which 
could not yet have been aware of the English lie, unanimously state, 
on the contrary, that the dispatches had been seized and were 
already in print for submission to Congress in Washington. This 
changes the whole state of affairs. Because of these dispatches, the 
San Jacinto had the right to take the Trent in tow and every 
American prize court had the duty to confiscate her and her cargo. 
With the Trent, her passengers also naturally came within the pale 
of American jurisdiction. 

Messrs. Mason, Slidell and Co., as soon as the Trent had 
touched at Monroe, came under American jurisdiction as rebels. 
If, therefore, instead of towing the Trent herself to an American 
port, the captain of the San Jacinto contented himself with seizing 
the dispatches and their bearers, he in no way worsened the 
position of Mason, Slidell and Co., whilst, on the other hand, his 
error in procedure benefited the Trent, her cargo and_ her 
passengers. And it would be indeed unprecedented if Britain 
wished to declare war on the United States because Captain Wilkes 
committed an error in procedure harmful to the United States, but 
profitable to Britain. 

The question whether Mason, Slidell and Co. were themselves 
contraband, was only raised and could only be raised because the 
Palmerston journals had broadcast the lie that Captain Wilkes had 
neither searched for dispatches, nor seized dispatches. For in this 
case Mason, Slidell and Co. in fact constituted the sole objects on 
the ship Trent that could possibly fall under the category of 
contraband. Let us, however, disregard this aspect for the 
moment. Queen Victoria’s proclamation designates “officers”” of a 
belligerent party as contraband. Are “officers” merely military 

officers? Were Mason, Slidell and Co. “officers” of the Confedera- 
cy? “Officers,” says Samuel Johnson in his dictionary of the English 
language, are “men employed by the public”,* that is, in German: 
Offentliche Beamte. Walker gives the same definition. (See his 
dictionary, 1861 edition.) 

According to the usage of the English language, therefore, 
Mason, Slidell and Co., these emissaries, id est, officials of the 
Confederacy, come under the category of “officers”, whom the 
royal proclamation declares to be contraband. The Trent captain 
knew them in this capacity and therefore rendered himself, his 
ship and his passengers confiscable. If, according to Phillimore 
and all other authorities, a ship becomes confiscable as the carrier” 
of an enemy dispatch because it violates neutrality, in a still higher 
degree is this true of the person who carries the dispatches. 
According to Wheaton, even an enemy ambassador, so long as he is 
in transitu, may be intercepted. In general, however, the basis of 
all international law is that any member of the belligerent party 
may be regarded and treated as “belligerent” by the opposing 
party. . 

“So long as a man,” says Vattel, “continues to be a citizen of his own country, he 
is the enemy of all those with whom his nation is at war.” ¢ 

One sees, therefore, that the law officers of the English Crown 
reduced the point of contention to a mere error in procedure, not an 
error in re,? but an error in forma, because, actually, no violation 
of material right is to hand. The Palmerston organs chatter about 
the question of material right again because a mere error in 
procedure, in the interest of the “Trent” at that, gives no plausible 
pretext for a haughty-toned ultimatum. 

Meanwhile, important voices have been raised in this sense from 
diametrically opposite sides: on the one side, Messrs. Bright and 
Cobden; on the other, David Urquhart. These men are enemies on 
grounds of principle and personally: the first two, peaceable 
cosmopolitans; the third, the “last of the Englishmen”’**; the former 
always ready to sacrifice all international law to international 
trade; the other hesitating not a moment: “Fiat justitia, pereat 

mundus”’,’ and by “justice” he understands “English” justice. The 

voices of Bright and Cobden are important because they represent 
a powerful section of middle-class interests and are represented in 
the ministry by Gladstone, Milner Gibson and also, more or less, 
by Sir Cornewall Lewis. The voice of Urquhart is important 
because international law is his life-study and everyone recognises 
him as an incorruptible interpreter of this international law. 

The usual newspaper sources will communicate Bright’s speech 
in support of the United States and Cobden’s letter, which is 
conceived in the same sense.* Therefore I will not dwell on them. 

Urquharts organ, The Free Press, states in its latest issue, 
published on December 4: 

“*We must bombard New York!’ Such were the frantic sounds which met the 
ears of every one who traversed the streets of London on the evening of this day 
week, on the arrival of the intelligence of a trifling warlike incident. The act was 

one which, in every war, England has committed as a matter of course—namely, the 
seizure on board of a neutral of the persons and property of her enemies.” 

The Free Press further argues that, in 1856 at the Congress of 
Paris, Palmerston, without any authority from the Crown or 
Parliament, sacrificed English maritime law in the interest of Russia, 
and then says: 

“In order to justify this sacrifice, Palmerston’s organs stated at that time that if 
we maintained the right of visitation and search, we should assuredly be involved in a 
war with the United States on the occasion of the first war in Europe. And now he_ 
calls on us through the same organs of public opinion to bombard New York 
because the United States act on those laws which are theirs no less than our 
own.” 

With regard to the utterances of the “organs of public opinion”, 
The Free Press remarks: 

“The bray of Baron Munchausen’s thawing post-horn was nothing to the 
clangour of the British press on the capture of Messrs. Mason and Slidell.” ¢ 

Then humorously, it places side by side, in “strophe” and 
“antistrophe”, the contradictions by which the English press seeks 
to convict the United States of a “breach of law”. 

December 11, 1861