“Who can be wise, amazed, temperate and furious,
Loyal and neutral, in a moment? No man.
The expedition of my violent love
Outran the pauser reason.…
… Who could refrain,
That had a heart to love, and in that heart
Courage to make his love known?”
If this transaction be regarded exclusively in the light of British precedents, if we follow the seeming authority of the British Admiralty, speaking by its greatest voice, and especially if we accept the oft repeated example of British cruisers, upheld by the British Government against the oft repeated protests of the United States, we find little difficulty in vindicating it. The act becomes questionable only when brought to the touchstone of those liberal principles which from the earliest times the American Government has openly avowed and sought to advance, and other European nations have accepted with regard to the sea. Great Britain cannot complain, except by adopting those identical principles; and should we undertake to vindicate the act, it can be only by repudiating those identical principles. Our two cases will be reversed. In the struggle between Laertes and Hamlet, the combatants exchanged rapiers, so that Hamlet was armed with the rapier of Laertes, and Laertes with the rapier of Hamlet. And now, on this sensitive question, a similar exchange occurs. Great Britain is armed with American principles, while to us are left only those British pretensions which throughout our history have been constantly, deliberately, and solemnly rejected.
Earl Russell, in his despatch to Lord Lyons, communicated to Mr. Seward, contents himself by saying that “it appears that certain individuals have been forcibly taken from on board a British vessel, the ship of a neutral power, while such vessel was pursuing a lawful and innocent voyage,—an act of violence which was an affront to the British flag, and a violation of International Law.”[33] Here is positive assertion that the ship, notoriously having on board the Rebel emissaries, was pursuing a lawful and innocent voyage; but there is no specification of the precise ground on which the act is regarded as a violation of International Law. Of course, it is not an affront; for an accident can never be an affront to an individual or to a nation.
But public report, authenticated by various authorities, English and Continental, forbids us to continue ignorant of the precise ground on which this act is presented as a violation of International Law. It is admitted that a United States man-of-war, meeting a British mail steamer beyond the territorial limits of Great Britain, may subject her to visitation and search; also that such man-of-war might put a prize crew on board the British steamer, and take her to a port of the United States for adjudication by a Prize Court there; but it is alleged that she would have no right to remove the individuals, not apparently officers in the military or naval service, and carry them off as prisoners, leaving the ship to pursue her voyage.[34] Under the circumstances, in the exercise of a belligerent right, the British steamer, with all on board, might have been captured and carried off; but, according to the British law officers, on whose professional opinion the British Cabinet acted, the whole proceeding was vitiated by failure to take the packet into port for condemnation. This failure is the occasion of much unprofessional objurgation; and we are emphatically and constantly reminded that the custody of the individuals in question could not be determined by a navy officer on his quarter-deck, so as to supersede the adjudication of a Prize Court. This is confidently stated by an English writer, assuming to put the case for his Government, as follows.