[31] Consul Park at Rio Janeiro to Secretary Buchanan, Aug. 20, 1847: House Exec. Doc., 30 Cong. 2 sess. VII. No. 61, p. 7.
[32] Suppose "an American vessel employed to take in negroes at some point on this coast. There is no American man-of-war here to obtain intelligence. What risk does she run of being searched? But suppose that there is a man-of-war in port. What is to secure the master of the merchantman against her [the man-of-war's] commander's knowing all about his [the merchant-man's] intention, or suspecting it in time to be upon him [the merchant-man] before he shall have run a league on his way to Texas?" Consul Trist to Commander Spence: House Doc., 27 Cong. 1 sess. No. 34, p. 41.
[33] A typical set of instructions was on the following plan: 1. You are charged with the protection of legitimate commerce. 2. While the United States wishes to suppress the slave-trade, she will not admit a Right of Search by foreign vessels. 3. You are to arrest slavers. 4. You are to allow in no case an exercise of the Right of Search or any great interruption of legitimate commerce.—To Commodore Perry, March 30, 1843: House Exec. Doc., 35 Cong. 2 sess. IX. No. 104.
[34] House Reports, 27 Cong. 3 sess. III. No. 283, pp. 765–8. Cf. Benton's speeches on the treaty of 1842.
[35] Report of Hotham to Admiralty, April 7, 1847: Parliamentary Papers, 1847–8, Vol. LXIV. No. 133, Papers Relative to the Suppression of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa, p. 13.
[36] Opinions of Attorneys-General, III. 512.
[37] Tenth Annual Report of the Amer. and Foreign Anti-Slav. Soc., May 7, 1850, p. 149.
[38] Opinions of Attorneys-General, IV. 245.
[39] Senate Doc., 28 Cong. 2 sess. IX. No. 150, pp. 108, 132.
[40] House Exec. Doc., 30 Cong. 2 sess. VII. No. 61, p. 18.