Mr. Seward to Mr. Bigelow
Sir: I recur now to your two despatches of the 13th of April, Nos. 302 and 303.
In those papers you have given us an account of your intervention in the cases of George Schneider, J. Baptiste Cochener, Francois Pierre, and Frederick Todry, severally. Each of those persons, though a native of France, was naturalized in the United States, and two of them served in our military forces during the recent war. Each of them having returned to France, bearing a passport of this government, was arrested, cast into prison, and detained a painful period, awaiting trial for “refractoriness” against conscription, as a crime against the civil laws of the empire.
Your despatches are accompanied with the correspondence which has taken place on this subject between yourself and Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys.
It is gratifying to perceive that the replies of Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys were made with due consideration, and in a becoming and friendly spirit. It is also a source of much satisfaction that all the parties were, after considerable delays, released. You will, if opportunity offers, obtain from the several parties such statements as will enable us to present applications in their behalf, respectively, for indemnity for losses and hardships, if there shall be found sufficient merit to support such a measure.
In regard to the general subject of the dishonor in France of our passports of naturalized citizens, the President thinks it desirable that you should solicit a conference with Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys.
In such a conference, you may say to him that we appreciate the , difficulties and the delicacy of a conflict between immunities demanded by the passport and the laws of military conscription. We have encountered the embarrassment of that conflict in our late civil war. The result of our late experience is that a foreign passport may be safely taken as furnishing presumptive evidence of a title to exemption from military service, so long, at least, as the government which grants the passport shall be found to be acting in good faith, and in conformity with the law of nations.
Second. That when a person representing himself to be an alien, and whether producing a passport or not, is conscripted, he shall be at liberty to present his claim, with evidence in its support, to a competent military tribunal, by which the case shall be heard summarily; a discharge by such military tribunal to be final. If, on the contrary, the claim of an alien is overruled by the military tribunal, then the discharge, with the facts relative to the case, shall be remitted to the minister of state charged with the conduct of foreign affairs.
At every stage of the case the representatives of the nation whose protection is invoked are allowed to intervene. If the department of foreign affairs decides the claim of alienage to be well taken, the conscript is immediately released. If, on the contrary, the claim of alienage is denied by that department, then it becomes a subject of diplomatic discussion.
A considerable proportion of the inhabitants of the United States are foreigners, either naturalized or unnaturalized. They came to us from all the [Page 305] nations of Europe, as well as from American states. We raised in four years, not altogether without conscription, armies unparalleled in numerical forces, yet cases of injustice and hardship, resulting from the denial of justice on the plea of alienage, are believed to have been very rare.
You will submit to Mr. Drouyn de Lhuys, in a friendly manner and spirit, the question, whether it may not be found practicable to make some modification of the imperial military laws, in conformity with these suggestions.
All the rigor of invention, all the resources of commerce, and all the influences of civilization, combine to stimulate intercourse between citizens and subjects of friendly states. Care ought to be taken by every government not to obstruct this intercourse unnecessarily, or to suffer occasions for the wounding of national sensibilities to arise where they can be prevented.
I feel sure that the enlightened government of France will concur in these sentiments.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
John Bigelow, Esq., &c., &c., &c.