CHAPTER X.
THE BOMBARDMENT.
During the interval between the return of the British fleet, on the 15th of May, and the time fixed by the Admiral for the commencement of the bombardment, an active interchange of messages had been going on by cable between the Governments of the United States and Great Britain. Inasmuch as the minister of each power had been recalled from the other's capital, this intercourse could only take place through the British and American ambassadors at Paris.
Protests against the inhumanity and barbarity of bombarding a defenseless city, were met by propositions for a settlement of the whole dispute. Great Britain offered to cede Canada to the United States, and conclude a definite treaty of peace, and withdraw her fleet from American waters at once, provided the United States would pay the sum of £300,000,000 sterling (about $1,500,000,000). This proposition was met with a howl of indignant rage, by the Senators and members of Congress from the Western and Central States; and the old and almost forgotten cry of "Millions for defense; not one cent for tribute!" was resuscitated by these back-country orators, and used with as much dramatic effect as though it had never been uttered before.
For the first time in the history of the country, parties seemed about to divide, on entirely new sectional lines. Heretofore it had always been the North against the South. Now it was the seaboard against the interior. The Pacific Coast States joined with the Atlantic and Gulf States in advocating a settlement, even on the harsh terms proposed by Great Britain.
They pictured the enormous destruction of property which the bombardment of all our principal coast cities would involve, and although they conceded the truth of the assertion of their opponents in the debate, that there could be but one ultimate result to the war, if fought to its natural termination, and that Canada was practically ours already, yet they claimed that as a mere matter of dollars and cents, it would be cheaper to pay even fifteen hundred millions of dollars, than to go on with the war; when the enormous amount of property involved, and the vast extent of Canadian territory to be overrun, were taken into consideration.
The orators from the west, however, took the high and lofty ground of "millions for defense, etc.," and numerous propositions were made to establish navy yards at various points in the interior, on navigable rivers a hundred miles or more from the coast, and also on the great Lakes; thus indicating that their authors had an eye to the "main chance," and were willing to vote for the "old flag and an appropriation," provided the appropriation was to be expended in their own states. The debate waxed hot, and it was with the greatest difficulty that several personal encounters among the members and senators were prevented.
A member from one of the so called "Granger States" even went so far as to intimate that he would rejoice to see these soulless monopolists and capitalists of the eastern cities brought down a peg or two. They had for years been sapping the foundations of the country's prosperity by vast combinations of capital; and had levied extravagant tolls on everything that the farmers of the Great West bought and sold, thus increasing the cost of their living, while diminishing the product of their labor. Of course he was not unpatriotic enough to rejoice at beholding a foreign foe upon American soil; nor did he anticipate any such result from the present war; which would certainly end by establishing the stars and stripes as the sole National Emblem of the North American Continent. "Nevertheless, while we of the Great West send our brawny sons and brothers to the battle-field to wrest a portion of its ill-gotten territory from the so-called British Empire, it is not too much to expect our friends In the East to bear their proper share of the burdens of the contest. Patriotism has its responsibilities and its duties, and these frequently involve the sacrifice of life and property; and I would be the last man to deprive my eastern friends of one iota of the patriotic satisfaction which they will experience, when some of their ill-gotten gains are sacrificed on their country's altar,"—and a lot more rubbish of the same sort.
To which a New York member replied, by making sarcastic allusions to the "honest Grangers," who he said had for years been going down on their knees and begging the capitalists of the great eastern cities, to send their money west and invest it, in railways, water-works, gas-works and other public improvements; or to lend money to western farmers on their farm mortgages; and then, as soon as they had fairly gotten the money out there, they had invariably tried to steal it—or to confiscate it through forms of law—which amounted to the same thing. They passed laws limiting the price of gas and water to such low figures that many of the gas and water companies were bankrupted; they organized state boards of Railway Commissioners who assumed to fix passenger and freight rates at figures which would scarcely pay operating expenses; and having discovered that several hundreds of millions of dollars of eastern capital had been advanced on what were known as "farm mortgages," at rates of interest varying from seven to twelve percent., passed usury laws fixing the rate at not to exceed six per cent., and also passed laws exempting a farmer's house and barns from sale under execution. It is true, this last law had been decided to be unconstitutional, but it only showed the lengths to which the "honest" agricultural toiler would go in his efforts to get something that did not belong to him. "Why sir!" continued this metropolitan statesman, "Who supports our confidence men? Visitors from the country, who want to play a 'skin game' where they think they have a 'sure thing.' How do our 'green goods' men find their customers?'
"By mailing their circulars, offering to sell well executed counterfeit money at ten cents on the dollar, to 'honest' tillers of the soil in all parts of the country. Show me a man who is constantly prating about the 'tyranny of capital,' and the 'grinding of honest toilers' by corporate greed and individual usury; and I will show you a man who is at heart a scoundrel and a knave; and who will never pay even a just debt, if he can sneak out of it."
Of course these speeches were entirely foreign to the subject under discussion, but I introduce these brief extracts merely to show to what extent sectional feelings and prejudices ran, as well as to explain to a certain extent, the almost incredible failure of Congress to act promptly, and prevent the vast destruction of property which the bombardment of our seaport cities would involve.