TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE STRONG RED LINE.
AN inclination has been shown in some quarters to call up the ghost of the North-east Boundary controversy ; and the apparition, like its sister shade in the Castle Spectre, has made its appearance in approved theatrical costume, with "a strong red line" about its neck.
The noise making about a k:tter of Dr. FRANKLIN and a map with "a strong red line" in the topographical bureau at Paris, dis- covered by Mr. JARED SPARKS, the American historian, as related by Mr. FEATHERSTONHAUGH in his recent pamphlet On the Wash- ington Treaty,* is idle and unprofitable. Taking the story in its most exaggerated form, it would only go to confirm an opinion already pretty prevalent, that diplomatists are an unscrupulous race—with the addition, of which suspicions have more than once been whispered, that of all diplomatists those of the United States are the most unscrupulous. Great is our regret that any thing should have occurred to create such an impression : it necessarily engenders a painful distrust and alienation in the minds of the British community towards the people of the United States. The revelations made by Mr. Rivzs in the secret sitting of the Senate have gone far to undo on this side of the water the good effects of Lord ASHBURTON'S mission in creating a friendly feeling be- tween the two countries.. This is deeply to be lamented : but on our side there is no reason for either regret or shame on account of the treaty. The disgrace attaches elsewhere ; and the advan- tages of a defined frontier are beyond dispute. Mr. Wausxsa's conduct, view it in its blackest light, does not affect the merits of Lord ASHBURTON'S treaty one jot. Before Lord ASHBURTON undertook his mission, successive Bri- tish Administrations had declared their readiness to compromise the question. The Tory Ministry, of which Lord PALMERSTON was a member in 1814, proposed a revision of the boundary ; the Whig Ministry, of which Lord PALMERSTON was a member in 1831, accepted the award of the King of the Netherlands ; the Whig-Radical Ministry, of which the same Lord PALMERSTON was a member in 1835, proposed to the American Government "to adjust the present difference by dividing equally between Great Britain and the United States the territory in dispute." The ac- count now given by Mr. FEATHERSTONHAUGH; in his pamphlet, of the " disadvantages " under which the British diplomatists laboured, throws some light upon this readiness to compromise. They "were unable to avail themselves of any authentic information respecting the intentions of the signers of the treaty of peace of 1783, be- yond those meagre notices which bad been at various times derived from some of the American Commissioners of that period pre- vious to their decease " : it was " well known that authentic maps, upon which the boundary established in 1783 was laid down, had existed; but, unfortunately, they could not be found, many of the public and private papers connected with the treaty of 1783 having disappeared during the various changes in the de- partments of the Government at that period" : and "a conse- quence of this defective state of information was, that, having no case sufficiently well-grounded to bring forward on the part of Great Britain, they were chiefly occupied on the defensive, resting the strength of their own case principally on the insufficiency of that of their opponents." In other words, the papers necessary to establish the claims of Great Britain had been lost by the careless- ness of old public servants, and new public servants were too lazy to think of examining the French archives to supply the deficiency ; and consequently, this country was in the position of an ungracious litigant, who cannot prove that he is in the right and will not own that he is in the wrong. In this state of affairs, Lord ASHBURTON undertook to make a last attempt to induce the American Govern- ment to value the disputed territory. He succeeded : he obtained for Great Britain a more advantageous frontier-line, and 700,840 acres of territory more than had been awarded by the King of the Netherlands : he obtained within 76,000 acres (even upon the Bri- tish surveyor Dr. TIARK'S estimate of the extent of the whole dis- • Observations upon the Treaty of Washington, signed August 9, 1842; with the Treaty annexed ; together with a Map, &c. By GEORGE WILLIAM FLATHERSTONHAUGH, Esq., F.R.S., F.G.S., late one of her Majesty's Com- missioners for the North American Boundary.
The story, as detailed in a Supplement of 12 pages, added after Mr. FEATHER.. STONHAUGII'S defence of the Treaty had been prepared for publication, is briefly to this effect. It appears from the Washington Globe, that in a secret session of the Senate of the United States, held to discuss the provisions of Lord Ashburton's treaty, Mr. Rives, Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, with a view to intimidate refractory Senators, produced a letter ad- dressed by Mr. Jared Sparks, of Boston, to the Department of State. It nar- rated, that in the course of some researches Mr. Sparks was making among the papers relating to the American Revolution, in the Archives des Affaires Etran- geres in Paris, he had found an original letter from Dr. Franklin to the Count de Vergennes, written only six days after the preliminaries of the peace of 1783 were signed, and stating, that the Doctor sends the Count a map on which the boundary of the United States, as settled in the preliminaries between the British and American plenipotentiaries, (of whom Dr. Franklin was one,) is marked with a strong red line. Mr. Sparks subsequently found in the Ame- rican division of the topographical department a map of America, dated 1746, on which the boundary of the United States was marked with a strong red line; and this, Mr. Sparks adds, "is exactly the line now contended for by Great Britain, except that it concedes more than is claimed." Mr. Rives men- tioned at the same time a map taken from Mr. Jefferson's collection, on which a line appeared indicating the boundary of the United States, and coinciding exactly with the line traced on the map found by Mr. Sparks. It is inferred from these revelations of Mr. Rives, that, at the time Mr. Webster was de- claring to Lord Ashburton, in the strongest terms, his conviction of the justice of the claims advanced by the United States, he possessed proof to the con- trary, and suppressed it.
puted territory, which is allowed to be considerably in excess) of what Lord PALMERSTON asked in 1835; and as for the provisions respecting the navigation of the river St. John, it is only necessary to add, in the words of Mr. FEATHERSTONBAUGH, "that her Majesty's subjects in New Brunswick are fully aware of the ad- vantages they are to derive from this part of the treaty, and that the friendly arrangement which has been made is on account of its tendency to promote the regular business of the colony, ex- tremely popular there." Viewed on the broadest national grounds— viewed either as a moral or an economical question—Lord ASH- BURTON'S settlement, by its tendency to diminish the risk of war and the expense and vexation of endless diplomacy, and to promote the interests of our North American Colonies, is a national benefit. It is therefore extremely idle to say the least, to raise the ques- tion, what arrangement might have been made had the map dis- covered at Paris been known to exist before the treaty was con- cluded.
It is not going too far to say, that Lord ASHBURTON, even had the existence of the map come to his knowledge before the treaty was concluded, would have done wrong if he had broken off the negotiations on that account. There is a strong presumption that the map is the one referred to in FRANKLIN'S letter, but there is not sufficient legal evidence that it is. Sir ROBERT PEEL men- tioned on Monday evening, that he had seen in the King's Library at Paris a map with a very different boundary-line marked on it : this may have been FiterixLia's map, which, as an unofficial com- munication, was quite as likely to come into the King's psivate collection as into the topographical bureau. Besides, the old maps of the territory in dispute are so unlike the reality, that it would be impossible to transfer to the actual hills and dales a line drawn upon any of them. If before Lord PALMERSTON was turned out of office some agent of his had discovered Dr. FRANKLIN'S letter and (not the map discovered by Mr. SPARKS but) the map seen by Sir ROBERT PEEL, would he have held himself bound upon that evidence to concede the boundary claimed by the Americans ? Is it to be supposed that the not over-reasonable public officers of Maine would have been more easily persuaded to yield than his Lordship ? And would it have been wise in Lord Asninnerox to have increased the difficulties of Mr. WEBSTER, who had to the full as difficult and embarrassing a negotiation to carry on with Maine as with Great Britain, by reverting to the original claims of this country after they had been explicitly de- parted from ? The map discovered by Mr. SPARKS could not de- cide the question : it might, indeed, have supplied a pretext for renewed litigation—for keeping the boundary undetermined ten years longer, unless war had come in to cut the controversy short ; and, doubtless' bad Lord PALMERSTON been in office, he would have welcomed a pretext for indulging in his favourite amusement of interminable negotiation : but this is only one additional reason for gratitude that his Lordship has been relegated to a private station.
Mr. WEBSTER'S share in the transaction is the proper concern of the United States. That Government will surely and speedily be made to feel the disadvantages of a bad character, if be cannot vindicate his conduct. There is a growing impression—arising out of the submissive tone of the General Government to Maine, the difficulty it experienced in controlling the "Sympathizers" on the Canadian frontier, the disputed jurisdiction in the case of M'Leon, the nervous anxiety with which Congress deprecates all discussion of Slavery, the indecorum of the Senate's allowing the Oregon Territory bill to be engrossed, and similar occurrences—that the weakness of the Government of Washington is such as to render it unsafe for other Governments to rely upon treaties concluded with it. If to this conviction be added the opinion that American negotiators are capable of gross bad faith, the United States will soon find themselves in an embarrassing state of isolation—in a position which will derange all their commercial transactions. It is not impossible that Mr. WEBSTER may be able to ex- culpate himself. The date of Mr. Seaaxs's letter and the period of its receipt are unknown : Mr. WEBSTER, seeing that the ground of the treaty had been abandoned, may have thought himself, in his capacity of agent for the United States, not warranted to produce a document which might have complicated and could not settle the controversy ; and in his correspondence with Lord ASHBURTON, he appears to have expressed, not his own opinions, but those of the American public : "Few questions have ever arisen under this Government in regard to which a stronger or more general con- viction was felt that the country was in the right." He may be able: to prove his own good faith ; but appearances are much against him, and he must explain if he has any regard for his character. This, however, is Mr. WEBSTER'S and his country's concern. As for Great Britain, the treaty is an advantageous treaty ; and our honour and interests are in nowise affected, even though the morale of American statesmen should turn out to be as low as that of American merchants.
The attempt to make the antiquarian discovery at Paris a ground of inculpation against Lord ASHBURTON and the Ministers who sent him out, is ridiculous. This use of "the strong red line" is quite in Lord PALMERSTON'S line, and too strong for any other person. It is or used to be the custom to interweave a thread of red silk in all the cordage manufactured in the royal dockyards, as a distinctive mark : to some publicists unconnected with the Ex- Secretary for Foreign Affairs, who have waxed warlike on the strength of Mr. WEBSTER'S duplicity, it may be hinted, that good taste dictates the propriety of relinquishing the " strong red line" to Lord PALMERSTON, to be used in the same way for his fabrica- tions. The noble Viscount ought to be enabled to claim the exclusive right of vending, by his agents in the press or House of Commons, all compositions in which it appears—to advertise "none else are genuine."
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