The undersigned, her Britannic Majesty’s charge d’affaires, has the honor
to transmit to the Secretary of State of the United States the
accompanying copy of a despatch which he has received from her Majesty’s
principal secretary of state for foreign affairs, bearing reference to
the note which the Secretary of State addressed to the undersigned,
under date of the 18th of August last, in reply to representations on
the subject of restrictions imposed on the trade in British vessels from
the ports of the United States to the Bahamas.
The undersigned avails himself of this opportunity to renew to the Hon.
William H. Seward the assurance of his high consideration.
Earl Russell to Mr. Stuart.
No. 130.]
Foreign Office,
September 22, 1862.
Sir: I have had under my consideration and
have consulted the proper law advisers of the crown respecting your
despatch No. 172, of the 20th ultimo, in which you enclose a copy of
a note you had received from Mr. Seward in reply to the
representations you had addressed to him on the subject of the
restrictions imposed on the trade in British vessels from the ports
of the United States to the Bahamas.
I have now to state to you that the gravity of the circumstances in
this case is, in the opinion of her Majesty’s government, rather
increased than diminished by the grounds on which the proceedings of
the New York custom-house are explained and sought to be justified
in the letter from Mr. Collector Barney to Mr. Chase, of which a
copy is enclosed in Mr. Seward’s note, and which proceedings are, as
it appears, approved and sanctioned by the government of the United
States.
It is admitted in this letter that the prohibitions and restrictions
in question are directed exclusively against the commerce of one
particular British possession, namely, Nassau. It is therefore clear
that, unless they can be justified by the law of nations, they
violate the terms of the subsisting commercial treaties between the
United States and this country, and furnish ground for international
complaint.
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The position assumed by the United States government is this, that it
is entitled to prohibit, or place under restrictions equivalent to
prohibition, the exportation from New York to Nassau of articles
which are neither in their own nature contraband of war nor made
contraband for the purpose of the present hostilities, by any
general and public declaration of that government, with a view
thereby to prevent British subjects, resident at Nassau, or making
that colony a depot for purposes of commerce, from trading in those
articles with the so-styled Confederate States. The inference that
the articles, though having really and bona
fide a British destination, are likely to be afterwards
used for the purposes of the trade between Nassau and the so-styled
Confederate States, is drawn, as explained by Collector Barney, from
the magnitude of the consignments, from a comparison between the
amount of the trade in similar articles carried on between New York
and Nassau in former times and the amount during the present war,
from the notorious existence of an extensive trade during the war
between the so-styled Confederate States and Nassau, and from the
known or reputed connexion of certain merchants or mercantile houses
in England and at Nassau with that trade. The possibility or
probability being thus arrived at that such a use may be made of
some of these articles after their arrival at Nassau, it is
concluded that the United States government are entitled to stop
them at New York. From this conclusion her Majesty’s government
dissent.
The trade between Nassau and the so-styled Confederate States is
subject to those limitations which the law of nations has
established as legitimate as the trade between Great Britain and any
other part of the world. Even if the government of the United States
were in a condition to ask other nations to assume (which is very
far indeed from being the case) that every port of the coasts of the
so-styled Confederate States is effectively blockaded, British
subjects at Nassau would still have a perfect right to sell goods to
all such shippers, whether of the so-styled Confederate States or
others, as might be able to resort to Nassau for the purpose of
buying them there; and the dealers at Nassau, or their principals in
Europe, in making such sales are not chargeable with any, the
slightest, violation of neutrality. If contraband articles are
shipped for any port of the so-styled Confederate States they are
liable to seizure according to the law of nations; if articles not
contraband are shipped for any blockaded place they also may be
seized upon the high seas according to the law of nations. But the
liability of the trade between Nassau and the so-styled Confederate
States, or any part of it, to be intercepted upon the high seas by a
maritime capture, according to the rules of international law, does
not render the dealing in the articles which supply that trade, by
British subjects within British jurisdiction, less lawful and
innocent than if there were no such liability; much less does it
justify a belligerent government in superadding to the known
belligerent rights of blockade and of maritime capture an embargo
within its own ports upon any part of the trade of a neutral nation
with one of its colonial possessions, merely because this may
possibly tend to cripple or embarrass another lawful trade between
that country and the country of the other belligerent.
The doctrine of the United States on this subject has always been the
same as that of Great Britain, namely, that neutral governments are
under no obligation to stop a contraband trade between their
subjects and a belligerent power, and that the only penalty of such
a trade is the liability of contraband shipments to be captured on
the high seas by the other belligerent.
The false assumptions which seem to pervade the views of the United
States government with respect to Nassau are, that it is a violation
of neutrality for a British colony to carry on any active trade with
the so-styled Confederate States during the existence of the
blockade, and that, in aid of the inefficiency of the
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blockading force, an
embargo may lawfully be placed on a particular trade of British
commerce at New York.
You will furnish Mr. Seward with a copy of this dispatch.
I am, with great truth, &c., &c.,
Hon. William Stuart, &c., &c., &c.
