CHAPTER XVIII. THE KEY-NOTE OF BRITISH ATTITUDE
On May 8, 1865, the news was received in London of Johnston's surrender to Sherman. On that same day there occurred in the Commons the first serious debate in thirty-three years on a proposed expansion of the electoral franchise. It was a dramatic coincidence and no mere fortuitous one in the minds of thoughtful Englishmen who had seen in the Civil War a struggle as fateful in British domestic policy as in that of America herself. Throughout all British political agitation from the time of the American revolution in 1776, there had run the thread of the American "example" as argument to some for imitation, to others for warning. Nearly every British traveller in America, publishing his impressions, felt compelled to report on American governmental and political institutions, and did so from his preconceived notions of what was desirable in his own country[1323]. In the ten years immediately preceding the Civil War most travellers were laudatory of American democracy, and one, the best in acute analysis up to the time of Lord Bryce's great work, had much influence on that class in England which was discontented with existing political institutions at home. This was Mackay's Western World which, first published in 1849, had gone through four editions in 1850 and in succeeding years was frequently reprinted[1324]. Republicanism, Mackay asserted, was no longer an experiment; its success and permanence were evident in the mighty power of the United States; Canada would soon follow the American example; the "injustice" of British aristocrats to the United States was intentional, seeking to discredit democracy:
"... Englishmen are too prone to mingle severity with their
judgments whenever the Republic is concerned. It is the
interest of aristocracy to exhibit republicanism, where-ever
it is found, in the worst possible light, and the mass of the
people have too long, by pandering to their prejudice, aided
them in their object. They recognize America as the
stronghold of republicanism. If they can bring it into
disrepute here, they know that they inflict upon it the
deadliest blow in Europe[1325]."
On the opposing side were other writers. Tremenheere argued the inapplicability of American institutions to Great Britain[1326]. The theoretical bases of those institutions were in some respects admirable but in actual practice they had resulted in the rule of the mob and had debased the nation in the estimation of the world; bribery in elections, the low order of men in politics and in Congress, were proofs of the evils of democracy; those in England who clamoured for a "numerical" rather than a class representation should take warning from the American experiment. Occasionally, though rarely, there appeared the impressions of some British traveller who had no political axe to grind[1327], but from 1850 to 1860, as in every previous decade, British writing on America was coloured by the author's attitude on political institutions at home. The "example" of America was constantly on the horizon in British politics.
In 1860, the Liberal movement in England was at its lowest ebb since the high tide of 1832. Palmerston was generally believed to have made a private agreement with Derby that both Whig and Tory parties would oppose any movement toward an expansion of the franchise[1328]. Lord John Russell, in his youth an eager supporter of the Reform Bill of 1832, had now gained the name of "Finality John" by his assertion that that Reform was final in British institutions. Political reaction was in full swing much to the discontent of Radicals like Bright and Cobden and their supporters. When the storm broke in America the personal characteristics of the two leaders North and South, Lincoln and Davis, took on, to many British eyes, an altogether extreme importance as if representative of the political philosophies of the two sections. Lincoln's "crudity" was democratic; Davis' "culture" was aristocratic - nor is it to be denied that Davis had "aristocratic" views on government[1329]. But that this issue had any vital bearing on the quarrel between the American sections was never generally voiced in England. Rather, British comment was directed to the lesson, taught to the world by the American crisis, of the failure of democratic institutions in national power. Bright had long preached to the unenfranchised of England the prosperity and might of America and these had long been denied by the aristocratic faction to be a result of democratic institutions. At first the denial was now repeated, the Saturday Review, February 23, 1861, protesting that there was no essential connection between the "shipwreck" of American institutions and the movement in England for an expanded franchise. Even, the article continued, if an attempt were made to show such a connection it would convince nobody since "Mr. Bright has succeeded in persuading a great number of influential persons that the admission of working-men into the constituencies is chiefly, if not solely, desirable on the ground that it has succeeded admirably in America and has proved a sovereign panacea against the war, taxation and confusion which are the curses of old Governments in Europe." Yet that the denial was not sincere is shown by the further assertion that "the shallow demagogues of Birmingham and other kindred platforms must bear the blame of the inference, drawn nearly universally at the present moment, that, if the United States become involved in hopeless difficulties, it would be madness to lower the qualification for the suffrage in England."
This pretended disclaimer of any essential relation between the American struggle and British institutions was not long persisted in. A month later the Saturday Review was strong in contemptuous criticism of the "promiscuous democracy" of the North[1330]. Less political journals followed suit. The Economist thought the people of England would now be convinced of the folly of aping America and that those who had advocated universal suffrage would be filled with "mingled alarm, gratitude and shame[1331]." Soon W.H. Russell could write, while still at Washington "... the world will only see in it all, the failure of republican institutions in time of pressure as demonstrated by all history - that history which America vainly thought she was going to set right and re-establish on new grounds and principles[1332]." "The English worshippers of American institutions," said the Saturday Review, "are in danger of losing their last pretext for preferring the Republic to the obsolete and tyrannical Monarchy of England.... It now appears that the peaceable completion of the secession has become impossible, and it will be necessary to discover some new ground of superiority by which Mr. Buchanan or Mr. Lincoln may be advantageously contrasted with Queen Victoria[1333]."
These expressions antedated the news of the actual opening of the war and may be regarded as jeers at Bright and his followers rather than as attempts to read a lesson to the public. No such expressions are to be found in the letters of leading officials though minor ones occasionally indulged in them[1334]. As late as June, 1861, Adams declared that while some in England welcomed American disunion as a warning to their countrymen it was evident that but a small number as yet saw the cause of the North as identical with the world progress of free institutions[1335]. Evidently he was disappointed that the followers of Bright were not exhibiting more courage and demanding public support of the North as fighting their battle at home. They were indeed strangely silent, depressed no doubt by American events, and discouraged. It required time also to arouse intensity of feeling on the American question and to see clearly the issues involved. Aristocratic Britain was first to declare a definite lesson to be learned, thereby bringing out the fighting qualities of British democracy. Throughout 1861, the comment was relatively mild. In July, Blackwood's declared:
"It is precisely because we do not share the admiration of
America for her own institutions and political tendencies
that we do not now see in the impending change an event
altogether to be deplored. In those institutions and
tendencies we saw what our own might be if the most dangerous
elements of our Constitution should become dominant. We saw
democracy rampant, with no restriction upon its caprices. We
saw a policy which received its impulses always from below
... nor need we affect particularly to lament the exhibition
of the weak point of a Constitution ... the disruption of
which leaves entirely untouched the laws and usages which
America owes to England, and which have contributed so
powerfully to her prosperity...."
"With a rival Government on the frontier ... with great
principles to be not vapoured about but put to the proof we
should probably see the natural aristocracy rise from the
dead level of the Republic, raising the national character
with its own elevation[1336]."
In the same month the Quarterly, always more calm, logical and convincing than Blackwood's, published "Democracy on its Trial[1337]." "The example of America kept alive, as it had created, the party of progress"; now "it has sunk from the decrepitude of premature old age." If England, after such an example, permits herself to be led into democracy she "will have perished by that wilful infatuation which no warning can dispel."
Adams had complained that few British friends of progress identified the cause of the North with their own, but this was true of Americans also. The Atlantic Monthly for July 1861, discussed British attitude wholly in terms of cotton supply. But soon there appeared in the British press so many preachments on the "lesson" of America that the aristocratic effort to gain an advantage at home became apparent to all[1338]. The Economist moralized on the "untried" character of American institutions and statesmen, the latter usually as ignorant as the "masses" whom they represented and if more intellectual still more worthy of contempt because of their "voluntary moral degradation" to the level of their constituents[1339]. "The upper and ruling class" wrote Bright to Sumner, were observing with satisfaction, "that democracy may get into trouble, and war, and debt, and taxes, as aristocracy has done for this country[1340]." Thus Bright could not deny the blow to democracy; nor could the Spectator, upbraiding its countrymen for lack of sympathy with the North: "New England will be justified in saying that Old England's anti-slavery sympathies are mere hollow sentimental pretences, since she can rest satisfied to stuff her ears with cotton against the cries of the slaves, and to compensate her gentle regret over the new impulse given to slavery by her lively gratification over the paralyzing shock suffered by Democracy[1341]." This was no taking up of cudgels for the North and "Progress" such as Adams had hoped for. Vigour rested with the opposing side and increased when hopes of a short war vanished. TheSaturday Review asserted:
"In that reconstruction of political philosophy which the
American calamities are likely to inaugurate, the value of
the popular element will be reduced to its due
proportions.... The true guarantee of freedom will be looked
for more in the equilibrium of classes than in the equality
of individuals.... We may hope, at last, that the delusive
confusion between freedom and democracy is finally banished
from the minds of Englishmen[1342]."
"The real secret," wrote Motley, "of the exultation which manifests itself in the Times and other organs over our troubles and disasters, is their hatred, not to America, so much as to democracy in England[1343]." It was scarcely a secret in the columns of the journals already quoted. But no similar interpretation had as yet appeared in the Times and Motley's implication was justified for it and other leading daily newspapers. The Reviews and Weeklies were for the moment leading the attack - possibly one reason for the slowness in reply of Bright and his followers. Not all Reviews joined in the usual analysis. The Edinburgh at first saw in slavery the sole cause of the American dispute[1344], then attributed it to the inevitable failure in power of a federal system of government, not mentioning democracy as in question[1345]. Blackwood's repeatedly pushed home its argument:
"Independent of motives of humanity, we are glad that the end
of the Union seems more likely to be ridiculous than
terrible.... But for our own benefit and the instruction of
the world we wish to see the faults, so specious and so
fatal, of their political system exposed, in the most
effective way.... And the venerable Lincoln, the respectable
Seward, the raving editors, the gibbering mob, and the
swift-footed warriors of Bull's Run, are no malicious tricks
of fortune played off on an unwary nation, but are all of
them the legitimate offspring of the great Republic ...
dandled and nursed - one might say coddled - by Fortune, the
spoiled child Democracy, after playing strange pranks before
high heaven, and figuring in odd and unexpected disguises,
dies as sheerly from lack of vitality as the oldest of
worn-out despotisms.... In the hope that this contest may end
in the extinction of mob rule, we become reconciled to the
much slighter amount of suffering that war inflicts on
America[1346]."
Equally outspoken were a few public men who early espoused the cause of the South. Beresford Hope, before a "distinguished audience" used language insulting to the North, fawning upon the South and picturing the latter as wholly admirable for its aristocratic tendencies. For this he was sharply taken to task by the Spectator[1347]. More sedately the Earl of Shrewsbury proclaimed, "I see in America the trial of Democracy and its failure. I believe that the dissolution of the Union is inevitable, and that men now before me will live to see an aristocracy established in America[1348]." In all countries and at all times there are men over-eager in early prophecy on current events, but in such utterances as these there is manifest not merely the customary desire to stand in the limelight of assured knowledge and wisdom, but also the happy conviction that events in America were working to the undoing of the Radicals of Great Britain. If they would not be supine the Radicals must strike back. On December 4, at Rochdale where, as the Times asserted, he was sure of an audience sympathetic on purely personal grounds, Bright renewed his profession of faith in the American Republic and sang his accustomed praises of its great accomplishments[1349]. The battle, for England, on American democracy, was joined; the challenge issued by aristocratic England, accepted.
But apart from extreme factions at either end of the scale there stood a group holding a middle ground opinion, not yet sure of the historical significance of the American collapse. To this group belonged Gladstone, as yet uncertain of his political philosophy, and regretful, though vainly, it would appear, of the blow to democracy. He wrote his thought to Brougham, no doubt hoping to influence the view-point of the Edinburgh.
"This has without doubt been a deplorable year for poor
'Democracy' and never has the old woman been at a heavier
discount since 1793. I see no discredit to the founders of
the American constitution in the main fact of the rupture.
On the contrary it was a great achievement to strike off by
the will and wit of man a constitution for two millions of
men scattered along a seaboard, which has lasted until they
have become more than thirty millions and have covered a
whole continent. But the freaks, pranks, and follies, not to
say worse, with which the rupture has been met in the
Northern States, down to Mr. Chase's financial (not
exposition but) exposure have really given as I have said the
old lady in question such a heavy blow and great
discouragement that I hope you will in the first vigour of
your action be a little merciful and human lest you murder
her outright[1350]."
On this middle group of Englishmen and their moral conceptions the American Minister, Adams, at first pinned his faith, not believing in 1861 that the issues of democracy or of trade advantage would lead Great Britain from just rules of conduct. Even in the crisis of the Trent affair he was firm in this opinion:
"Much as the commercial and manufacturing interests may be
disposed to view the tariff as the source of all our evils,
and much as the aristocratic classes may endeavour to make
democracy responsible for them, the inexorable logic of
events is contradicting each and every assertion based on
these notions, and proving that the American struggle is,
after all, the ever-recurring one in human affairs between
right and wrong, between labour and capital, between liberty
and absolutism. When such an issue comes to be presented to
the people of Great Britain, stripped of all the disguises
which have been thrown over it, it is not difficult to
predict at least which side it will not consent to
take[1351].
April, 1861, saw the beginning of the aristocratic challenge on American democracy and December its acceptance by Bright. Throughout 1862 he practically deserted his seat in Parliament and devoted himself to stirring up labour and radical sentiment in favour of the North. In January, 1862, a mass meeting at New Hall, Edgware Road, denounced the daily press and was thought of sufficient moment to be reported by Adams. A motion was carried:
"That in the opinion of this meeting, considering the
ill-disguised efforts of the Times and other misleading
journals to misrepresent public opinion here on all American
questions ... to decry democratic institutions under the
trials to which the Republic is exposed, it is the duty of
the working-men especially as unrepresented in the National
Senate to express their sympathy with the United States in
their gigantic struggle for the preservation of the
Union[1352]...."
The daily press was, in fact, now joining more openly in the controversy. The Morning Post, stating with conviction its belief that there could be no re-union in America, added:
"... if the Government of the United States should succeed in
reannexing them [the Southern States] to its still extensive
dominions, Democracy will have achieved its grandest triumph
since the world began. It will have demonstrated to the ample
satisfaction of its present and future proselytes that it is
even more puissant in war than in peace; that it can navigate
not only the smooth seas of unendangered prosperity, but can
ride safely through the fiercest tempests that would engulf
every other craft laden with human destinies; that it can
descend to the darkest depths of adversity, and rise from
them all the stronger for the descent.... And who can doubt
that Democracy will be more arrogant, more aggressive, more
levelling and vulgarizing, if that be possible, than it ever
had been before[1353]."
By midsummer, 1862, Adams was more convinced than in 1861 that the political controversy in England had an important bearing on the attitude toward America. Even the alleged neutrality of Fraser's Magazine seemed turning to one-sided presentation of the "lesson" of America. Mill's defence of the North, appearing in the February number, was soon followed in July by the first of a series of articles, "Universal Suffrage in the United States and Its Consequences," depicting the war as the result of mob rule and predicting a military despotism as its inevitable consequence. The Liberals were losing strength, wrote Adams:
"That the American difficulties have materially contributed
to this result cannot be doubted. The fact that many of the
leading Liberals are the declared friends of the United
States is a decided disadvantage in the contest now going on.
The predominating passion here is the desire for the ultimate
subdivision of America into many separate States which will
neutralize each other. This is most visible among the
conservative class of the Aristocracy who dread the growth of
liberal opinions and who habitually regard America as the
nursery of them[1354]."
From all this controversy Government leaders kept carefully aloof at least in public expression of opinion. Privately, Russell commented to Palmerston, "I have been reading a book on Jefferson by De Witt, which is both interesting and instructive. It shows how the Great Republic of Washington degenerated into the Democracy of Jefferson. They are now reaping the fruit[1355]." Was it mere coincidence or was there significance in an editorial in Palmerston's alleged "organ," the Morning Post:
"That any Englishman has looked forward with pleasure to the
calamities of America is notoriously and demonstrably false.
But we have no hesitation in admitting that many thoughtful
Englishmen who have watched, in the policy of the United
States during the last twenty years, the foreshadowing of a
democratic tyranny compared with which the most corrupt
despotisms of the Old World appear realms of idyllic
happiness and peace, have gratefully recognized the finger of
Providence in the strife by which they have been so
frightfully rent asunder[1356]...."
In October the heavy artillery of the Conservatives was again brought into action and this time with more explicit diagnosis than heretofore. "For a great number of years," said the Quarterly, "a certain party among us, great admirers of America ... have chosen to fight their English battles upon American soil." Now the American Government "has disgracefully and ignominiously failed" at all points. It is evident that "political equality is not merely a folly, it is a chimera[1357]." At last, in November, the Times openly took the position which its accusers declared to have been the basis of its editorial utterances almost from the beginning of the Civil War.
"These are the consequences of a cheap and simple form of
government, having a rural attorney for Sovereign and a city
attorney for Prime Minister. We have already said that if
such a terrible exposure of incapacity had happened in
England we should at the earliest moment possible have sent
the incapables about their business, and put ourselves in the
hands of better men...."
"This Republic has been so often proposed to us as a model
for imitation that we should be unpardonable not to mark how
it works now, when for the first time it has some work to do.
We believe that if the English system of Parliamentary action
had existed in America, the war could not have occurred, but
we are quite sure that such Ministers would have long since
been changed[1358]."
In addition to a Conservative ringing the changes upon the failure of democracy, the open friends of the South dilated also upon the "gentlemanly" characteristics of Southern leaders and society. This was the frequent burden of articles in The Index in the early weeks of its publication. To this was soon added a picture of Northern democracy as composed of and controlled by the "immigrant element" which was the source of "the enormous increase of population in the last thirty years" from revolutionary areas in Europe. "Germans, Hungarians, Irish carried with them more than their strong arms, they imported also their theories of equality.... The revolutionary party which represents them is at this moment master in the States of the North, where it is indulging in all its customary licence[1359]." This fact, complained The Index, was not sufficiently brought out in the English press. Very different was the picture painted by Anthony Trollope after a tour of the Western states:
"... this man has his romance, his high poetic feeling, and
above all his manly dignity. Visit him, and you will find him
without coat or waistcoat, unshorn, in ragged blue trousers
and old flannel shirt, too often bearing on his lantern jaws
the signs of ague and sickness; but he will stand upright
before you and speak to you with all the ease of a lettered
gentleman in his own library. All the odious incivility of
the republican servant has been banished. He is his own
master, standing on his own threshold, and finds no need to
assert his equality by rudeness. He is delighted to see you,
and bids you sit down on his battered bench, without dreaming
of any such apology as an English cotter offers to a Lady
Bountiful when she calls. He has worked out his independence,
and shows it in every easy movement of his body. He tells you
of it unconsciously in every tone of his voice. You will
always find in his cabin some newspaper, some book, some
token of advance in education. When he questions you about
the old country he astonishes you by the extent of his
knowledge. I defy you not to feel that he is superior to the
race from whence he has sprung in England or in Ireland."
* * * * *
"It is always the same story. With us there is no level of
society. Men stand on a long staircase, but the crowd
congregates near the bottom, and the lower steps are very
broad. In America men stand upon a common platform, but the
platform is raised above the ground, though it does not
approach in height the top of our staircase. If we take the
average altitude in the two countries, we shall find that the
American heads are the more elevated of the two[1360]."
A comparison of dates shows that the unanimity of conservative and aristocratic expression on the failure of American democracy and its lesson to England was most marked and most open at the moment when the Government was seriously considering an offer of mediation in the war. Meanwhile the emancipation proclamation of September, 1862, had appeared. It did not immediately affect governmental attitude, save adversely to the North, and it gave a handle for pro-Southern outcry on the score of a "servile war." Indeed, the radicals were at first depressed by it; but when months passed with no appearance of a servile war and when the second emancipation proclamation of January, 1863, further certified the moral purpose of the North, a great element of strength was added to the English advocates of democracy. The numerous "addresses" to Lincoln exhibited both a revived moral enthusiasm for the cause of anti-slavery and were frequently combined with a laudation of American political institutions. The great mass-meeting at Exeter Hall, January 29, 1863, was described by the correspondent of an American paper as largely deriving its strength from the universal dissatisfaction of the lower orders of the English people with their existing conditions under the Crown:
"The descendants of the Roundhead commoners, chafing under
the limitations of the franchise, burdensome taxation, the
contempt with which they are regarded by the lords of the
soil, the grievous effects of the laws of entail and
primogeniture, whereby they are kept poor and rendered liable
to starvation and pauperism - these have looked to America as
the model democracy which proves the poor man's capacity for
self-government." The meeting was called for seven o'clock
but at half after five the hall was filled, and at six
crowded. A second hall was filled and outdoor meetings of two
thousand people organized in Exeter Street. "All
working-class England was up in arms, not so much against
slavery as against British oligarchy[1361]."
The correspondent further reported rumours that this meeting had caused anxious consideration to the managers of the Times, and the decision to step more warily. No doubt this was exaggeration of the political character and effect of the meeting, but certain it is that the political element was present joining hands with anti-slavery enthusiasm. Also it is noteworthy that the last confident and vigorous expression of the "failure" of democracy, from sources professedly neutral, appeared immediately after the St. James' Hall meeting, but was necessarily written before that meeting took place. Blackwood's, in its issue of February, 1863, declared, as before: "Every sensible man in this country now acknowledges ... that we have already gone as far toward democracy as is safe to go.... This is the great moral benefit which we have derived from the events in America." John Blackwood was an intimate friend of Delane, editor of the Times, holding similar views on political questions; but the Times was suddenly grown cautious in reading English political lessons from America. In truth, attack now rested with the Radicals and Bright's oratory was in great demand[1362]. He now advanced from the defensive position of laudation of the North to the offensive one of attacking the Southern aristocracy, not merely because it wished to perpetuate African slavery, but because it desired to make all the working-classes as subservient to it as was the negro[1363]. It was now Radical purpose to keep the battle raging and they were succeeding. Bigelow believed that the United States might well recognize its opportunity in this controversy and give aid to its friends:
"After all, this struggle of ours both at home and abroad is
but a struggle between the principle of popular government
and government by a privileged class. The people therefore
all the world over are in a species of solidarity which it is
our duty and interest to cultivate to the utmost[1364]."
But Adams gave contrary advice. Wholly sympathetic with the democratic movement in England as now, somewhat to his surprise, developed, he yet feared that the extremes to which Bright and others were going in support of the North might create unfortunate reactions in the Government. Especially he was anxious that the United States should not offer opportunity for accusation of interference in a British political quarrel. It is noteworthy that while many addresses to Lincoln were forwarded by him and many were printed in the annual publication of diplomatic correspondence, those that thus appeared dealt almost exclusively with emancipation. Yet Adams was also forwarding addresses and speeches harping on American democracy. A meeting at Edinburgh, February 19, found place, in its emancipation aspect in the United States documents[1365], but the burden of that meeting, democracy, did not. It was there proclaimed that the British press misrepresented conditions in America, "because the future of free political institutions, as sketched in the American Declaration of Independence and in the State Constitutions of the Northern States, would be a standing argument against the expansion of the franchise and the enjoyment of just political rights among us, as well as a convenient argument in favour of the continued domination of our aristocratic parties[1366]." The tide of democratic feeling was rising rapidly in England. On March 26, Adams wrote to Seward of a recent debate in Parliament that that body was much more judicious in expressions on America than it had been before 1862. "It will not escape your observation that the question is now felt to be taking a shape which was scarcely anticipated by the managers [of the Times ] when they first undertook to guide the British mind to the overthrow of free institutions in America[1367]."
On the evening of the day on which this was written there occurred the greatest, most outspoken, and most denunciatory to the aristocracy, of the meetings held to support the cause of the North. This was the spectacular gathering of the Trades Unions of London at St. James' Hall, on March 26, usually regarded as the culminating effort in Bright's tour of England for the cause of democracy, but whose origin is somewhat shrouded in mystery. Socialist tradition claims that Karl Marx conceived the idea of the meeting and was responsible for its organization[1368]. The press generally reported it as a "Bright Meeting." Adams wrote to Seward of the pressure put on him by Professor Beesly, of the University of London, to send a representative from the American Ministry, Beesly expanding upon the importance and high standing of the Trades Unions. To this Adams demurred but finally sent his son to sit in the audience and report the proceedings.
Whatever its origin there can be no doubt that this was the most important of all pro-Northern meetings held in England during the Civil War, nor that its keynote was "America fighting the battle of democracy." Save for some distinguished speakers those in attendance consisted almost wholly of three thousand picked representatives of the Trades Unions of London. Adams transmitted to Seward his son's report of the meeting, its character, composition, names of speakers and their emphatic expressions of friendship for the North[1369], but it is again noteworthy that Henry Adams' clear analysis of the real significance of the meeting was not printed in the published diplomatic correspondence. Giving due praise to the speeches of Bright and Beesly, and commenting on press assertions that "the extraordinary numbers there were only brought together by their curiosity to hear Mr. Bright," Henry Adams continued: "That this was not the case must have been evident to every person present. In fact, it was only after he closed that the real business of the evening began." Then followed speeches and the introduction of resolutions by "Mr. Howell, a bricklayer ... Mr. Odgers, a shoemaker ... Mr. Mantz, a compositor ... Mr. Cremer, a joiner, who was bitter against Lord Palmerston ... Mr. Conolly, a mason...." and other labouring men, all asserting "that the success of free institutions in America was a political question of deep consequence in England and that they would not tolerate any interference unfavourable to the North." No one, the report emphasized, "could doubt what was intended."
"The meeting was a demonstration of democratic strength and
no concealment of this fact was made. If it did not have a
direct political bearing on internal politics in England it
needed little of doing so. There was not even a profession of
faith in the government of England as at present constituted.
Every hostile allusion to the Aristocracy, the Church, the
opinions of the 'privileged classes,' was received with warm
cheers. Every allusion to the republican institutions of
America, the right of suffrage, the right of self-taxation,
the 'sunlight' of republican influence, was caught up by the
audience with vehement applause. It may therefore be
considered as fairly and authoritatively announced that the
class of skilled workmen in London - that is the leaders of
the pure popular movement in England - have announced by an
act almost without precedent in their history, the principle
that they make common cause with the Americans who are
struggling for the restoration of the Union and that all
their power and influence shall be used on behalf of the
North[1370]."
Bright's words of most scarifying indictment of "Privilege," and his appeal to workers to join hands with their fellows in America have been given in a previous chapter[1371]. Evidently that appeal, though enthusiastically received for its oratorical brilliance, was unneeded. His was but an eloquent expression of that which was in the minds of his audience. Upon the American Minister the effect was to cause him to renew warnings against showing too keen an appreciation of the support of political radicalism in England. The meeting, he wrote, had at once stirred anxiety in Parliament and verged:
"... much too closely upon the minatory in the domestic
politics of this Kingdom to make it easy to recognize or
sympathize with by Foreign Governments.... Hence it seems to
me of the greatest consequence that the treatment of all
present questions between the two nations should be regulated
by a provident forecast of what may follow it [the political
struggle in England] hereafter. I am not sure that some
parties here would not now be willing even to take the risk
of a war in order the more effectually to turn the scale
against us, and thus, as they think, to crush the rising
spirit of their own population. That this is only a feeling
at present and has not yet risen to the dignity of a policy
may be true enough; but that does not the less impose upon
the Government at home a duty so to shape its actions as, if
possible, to defeat all such calculations and dissipate such
hopes.... We owe this duty not less to the great body of
those who in this kingdom are friends to us and our
institutions, than to ourselves[1372]."
Thus Adams advised his Government to tread lightly in respect to democratic agitation in England. Over a month later he received a deputation headed by Bright, come to present to him the resolutions passed at the Trades Unions' meeting. The deputation expressed fears that a rupture was imminent in the relations of Great Britain and America, and that this would have a disastrous influence on the aspirations of working-class Europe. Adams replied in general terms of appreciation for the sympathies expressed by the meeting but carefully avoided specific comment on its democratic purpose. "He was too prudent," said the Times in reporting the deputation, "to appraise the importance of the particular demonstration to which his notice was invited ..." and his reply was given favourable comment[1373]. This reply, wrote Adams, "appears to have had a sedative effect[1374]." Meanwhile, Bright continued his preachment to the English people though modifying his tone of fierce accusation against "privilege," and confining himself to declaring the interest of the unenfranchised in the American conflict. In a speech before the Union and Emancipation Society of London, on June 16, he asserted for the "twenty millions of people in this country" as yet without representation in Parliament, "I say that these have an interest, almost as great and direct as though they were living in Massachusetts or New York, in the tremendous struggle for freedom which is now shaking the whole North American Continent[1375]." Like utterances were repeated at further public meetings and so insistent were they as to require reply by the conservative faction, even if, as was supposed, the effect of the Trades' Union attitude had been to give a halt to the vehemence of those who had been sounding the "lesson" of American failure in democracy. Bright became the centre of attack. The Times led.
"His is a political fanaticism. He used to idolize the
Constitution of the United States as the one great dominant
Democracy of the world. He believes in it still, and, if it
must go, he is ready to idolize its memory. For this he gives
up all his most cherished notions and all his less absorbing
principles...."
"Yet Mr. Bright is consistent. He has one master passion and
his breast, capacious as it is, can hold no more. That master
passion is the love of that great dominant Democracy. He
worshipped it while rising to its culminating point, and he
is obliged to turn right round to worship it while setting.
He did not himself know, until tested by this great trial,
how entirely his opinions as to war and peace, and slavery
and freedom, and lust of conquest and hatred of oppression,
were all the mere accidents which hung loosely upon him, and
were capable of being detached at once in the interest of the
ruling passion of his soul for that great dominant Democracy.
Nor need we wonder; for if that great Democracy has been a
failure, then men will say that the life of Mr. John Bright
up to this time has been but a foolish dream[1376]."
Evidently Bright's speeches were causing anxiety and bitterness; but an "if" had crept into the estimate of the future of American democracy, caused less by the progress of the war than by the rising excitement of democratic England. The Times editorial just quoted appeared when the faith was generally professed that Lee was about to end the war through the invasion of Pennsylvania. In the reaction created by the arrival of the news of Gettysburg and Vicksburg, Adams still again warned his Government against either a belligerent or interfering attitude toward Great Britain, but stated plainly that Northern victory was of supreme importance in Europe itself. "We have a mission to fulfill. It is to show, by our example to the people of England in particular, and to all nations in general, the value of republican institutions." There was still a general belief in the incompetency of those institutions. "The greatest triumph of all would be to prove these calculations vain. In comparison with this, what would be the gain to be derived from any collision with the powers of Europe[1377]?"
It is strange that with so clearly-expressed a division of English opinion on American democracy few in America itself appreciated the significance of the British controversy. J. M. Forbes, who had been on a special mission to England, wrote to Lincoln, on his return[1378]:
"Our friends abroad see it! John Bright and his glorious band
of English Republicans see that we are fighting for Democracy
or (to get rid of the technical name) for liberal
institutions; the Democrats and the liberals of the old world
are as much and as heartily with us as any supporters we have
on this side.
Our enemies too see it in the same light; the Aristocrats and
the Despots of the old world see that our quarrel is that of
the People against an Aristocracy[1379]."
But there are few similar expressions and these few nearly always came from men who had been abroad and had thus come into direct contact with British political movements. Meanwhile, Lee's retreat from Pennsylvania had produced a like retreat in the opinions on the failure of democracy earlier confidently held by the professedly neutral press. In September, having arrived at the point by the usual process of gradually facing about, the Times was bold enough to deny that England had any personal feeling or concern about democracy in America or that this had anything to do with English attitude on the war[1380]. Thenceforth neither the Times nor any of the leading papers saw fit to revive with vigour the cry of "democracy's failure," no matter how persistent in proclaiming ultimate victory for the South. Aristocratic exultation had given place to alarm and it seemed wiser, if possible, to quiet the issue[1381]. Not so the Radicals, who made every effort to keep the issue alive in the minds of the British public, and whose leaders with less violence but increased firmness debated the question in every public meeting favourable to the North[1382]. Many Conservatives, Adams reported, were now anxiously sitting on the fence yet finding the posture a difficult one because of their irritation at Bright's taunts[1383]. Bright's star was rising. "The very moment the war comes to an end," wrote Adams, "and a restoration of the Union follows, it will be the signal for a reaction that will make Mr. Bright perhaps the most formidable public man in England[1384]."
The continuation of the controversy was not, however, wholly one-sided. In the silence of the daily press it seemed incumbent upon the more eager and professed friends of the South to take up the cudgels. Hence, in part, came the organization of the Southern Independence Association and the attempt to hold public meetings favourable to the South, in the early months of 1864. Much talk had been spent on the "British issue" involved in the war; there was now to be vigorous work to secure it[1385]. The Index plunged into vigorous denunciation of "The Manchester School, which, for convenience and truth, we had better for the future call the American School." Even the Government was attacked for its complacence under the "American danger" and for retaining as a member Milner-Gibson, who, in a recent speech, had shown that he shared Bright's views on democracy:
"That gentleman [Bright] could not be asked to enter the
Cabinet in person. The country abhorred him; Parliament
despised him; his inveterate habits of slander and
vituperation, his vulgarity, and his incurable want of
veracity, had made him so hateful to the educated classes
that it would have required no common courage to give him
office; his insolent sneers at royalty would have made his
appointment little less than a personal insult to the Queen;
and his bad temper would have made him an intolerable
colleague in the Council. But Mr. Bright had another self; a
faithful shadow, which had no ideas, no soul, no other
existence but what it borrowed from him, while its previous
life and education had accustomed it to the society of
statesmen and of gentlemen[1386]."
Such expressions gained nothing for the Conservative cause; they were too evidently the result of alarm at the progress of Radical and pro-Northern sentiment. Goldwin Smith in a "Letter" to the Southern Independence Association, analysed with clarity the situation. Answering criticisms of the passionate mob spirit of Northern press and people, he accused the Times of having
"... pandered to the hatred of America among the upper
classes of this country during the present war. Some of us at
least had been taught by what we have lately seen not to
shrink from an extension of the suffrage, if the only bad
consequence of that measure of justice would be a change in
government from the passions of the privileged class to the
passions of the people.... History will not mistake the
meaning of the loud cry of triumph which burst from the
hearts of all who openly or secretly hated liberty and
progress, at the fall, as they fondly supposed, of the Great
Republic." British working men "are for the most part as well
aware that the cause of those who are fighting for the right
of labour is theirs, as any nobleman in your Association can
be that the other cause in his[1387]."
The question of democracy as a political philosophy and as an institution for Great Britain was, by 1864, rapidly coming to the front in politics. This was very largely a result of the American Civil War. Roebuck, after the failure of his effort for mediation in 1863, was obsessed with a fear of the tendency in England. "I have great faith in my countrymen," he wrote, "but the experience of America frightens me. I am not ashamed to use the word frightened. During my whole life I have looked to that country as about to solve the great problem of self-government, and now, in my old age, the hopes of my youth and manhood are destroyed, and I am left to reconstruct my political philosophy, and doubt and hesitation beset me on every point[1388]." More philosophically Matthew Arnold, in 1864, characterized the rule of aristocracy as inevitably passing, but bent his thought to the discovery of some middle ground or method - some "influence [which] may help us to prevent the English people from becoming, with the growth of democracy, Americanized[1389]." "There is no longer any sort of disguise maintained," wrote Adams, "as to the wishes of the privileged classes. Very little genuine sympathy is entertained for the rebels. The true motive is apparent enough. It is the fear of the spread of democratic feeling at home in the event of our success[1390]."
The year 1864 had witnessed a rapid retreat by wiser Conservative elements in proclaming the "lesson" of American democracy - a retreat caused by alarm at the vigour with which Radicals had taken up the challenge. Conservative hopes were still fixed upon Southern success and Conservative confidence loudly voiced. Even the pride of the Times in the accuracy of its news and in its military forecasts was subordinated to the purpose of keeping up the courage of the faction it represented[1391]. Small wonder, then, that Delane, on receiving the news of Sherman's arrival before Savannah, should be made physically ill and write to Dasent: "The American news is a heavy blow to us as well as to the South." The next day he added: "I am still sore vexed about Sherman, but Chenery did his best to attenuate the mischief[1392]." "Attenuation" of Northern progress in arms was, indeed, attempted, but the facts of the military situation were too strong for continued concealment. From January, 1865, only the most stubborn of Southern friends could remain blind to the approaching Northern victory. Lord Acton, a hero-worshipper of the great Confederate military leader, "broke his heart over the surrender of Lee," but was moved also by keen insight as to the political meaning of that surrender[1393].
So assured were all parties in England that the great Civil War in America was closing in Northern victory that the final event was discounted in advance and the lines were rapidly being formed for an English political struggle on the great issue heralded as involved in the American conflict. Again, on the introduction of a motion in Parliament for expansion of the franchise the ultra-Conservatives attempted to read a "lesson" from America. The Quarterly for April, 1865, asserted that even yet "the mass of educated men in England retain the sympathy for the South which they have nourished ever since the conflict assumed a decided shape." America was plainly headed in the direction of a military despotism. Her example should warn England from a move in the same direction. "The classes which govern this country are in a minority," and should beware of majority rule. But events discredited the prophecy of a military despotism. The assassination of Lincoln gave opportunity not merely for a general outpouring of expressions of sympathy but also to the Radicals a chance to exalt Lincoln's leadership in democracy[1394].
In July Great Britain was holding elections for a new Parliament. Not a single member who had supported the cause of the North failed of re-election, several additional Northern "friends" were chosen, and some outspoken members for the South were defeated. Adams thought this a matter deserving special notice in America, and prophesied a new era approaching in England:
"As it is, I cannot resist the belief that this period marks
an era in the political movement of Great Britain. Pure
old-fashioned conservatism has so far lost its hold on the
confidence of the country that it will not appear in that
guise any more. Unless some new and foreign element should
interpose, I look for decided progress in enlarging the
popular features of the constitution, and diminishing the
influence of the aristocracy.... It is impossible not to
perceive traces of the influence of our institutions upon all
these changes.... The progress of the liberal cause, not in
England alone, but all over the world, is, in a measure, in
our hands[1395]."
The "Liberal progress" was more rapid, even, than Adams anticipated. Palmerston, ill for some months past, died on October 18, 1865. Russell succeeded him as head of the Ministry, and almost immediately declared himself in favour of Parliamentary reform even though a majority in both Houses was still opposed to such a measure. Russell's desertion of his earlier attitude of "finality" on franchise expansion correctly represented the acceptance, though unwillingly, by both political parties of the necessity of reform. The battle, long waged, but reaching its decisive moment during the American Civil War, had finally gone against Conservatism when Lee surrendered at Appomatox. Russell's Reform Bill of 1866 was defeated by Tory opposition in combination with a small Whig faction which refused to desert the "principle" of aristocratic government - the "government by the wise," but the Tories who came into power under Derby were forced by the popular demand voiced even to the point of rioting, themselves to present a Reform Bill. Disraeli's measure, introduced with a number of "fancy franchises," which, in effect, sought to counteract the giving of the vote to British working-men, was quickly subjected to such caustic criticism that all the planned advantages to Conservatism were soon thrown overboard, and a Bill presented so Radical as to permit a transfer of political power to the working classes[1396]. The Reform Bill of 1867 changed Great Britain from a government by aristocracy to one by democracy. A new nation came into being. The friends of the North had triumphed.
Thus in addition to the play of diplomatic incidents, the incidental frictions, the effect on trade relations, the applications of British neutrality, and the general policy of the Government, there existed for Great Britain a great issue in the outcome of the Civil War - the issue of the adoption of democratic institutions. It affected at every turn British public attitude, creating an intensity and bitterness of tone, on both sides, unexampled in the expressions of a neutral people. In America this was little understood, and American writers both during the war and long afterwards, gave little attention to it[1397]. Immediately upon the conclusion of the war, Goldwin Smith, whose words during the conflict were bitter toward the aristocracy, declared that "the territorial aristocracy of this country and the clergy of the Established Church" would have been excusable "if they could only have said frankly that they desired the downfall of institutions opposed to their own, instead of talking about their sympathy for the weak, and their respect for national independence, and their anxiety for the triumph of Free Trade[1398]." This was stated before the democratic hope in England had been realized. Three years later the same staunch friend of the North, now removed to America and occupying a chair of history at Cornell University, wrote of the British aristocracy in excuse of their attitude: "I fought these men hard; I believed, and believe now, that their defeat was essential to the progress of civilization. But I daresay we should have done pretty much as they did, if we had been born members of a privileged order, instead of being brought up under the blessed influence of equality and justice[1399]."
Such judgment and such excuses will appear to the historian as well-founded. But to Americans who conceived the Civil War as one fought first of all for the preservation of the nation, the issue of democracy in England seemed of little moment and little to excuse either the "cold neutrality" of the Government or the tone of the press. To Americans Great Britain appeared friendly to the dissolution of the Union and the destruction of a rival power. Nationality was the issue for the North; that democracy was an issue in America was denied, nor could it, in the intensity of the conflict, be conceived as the vital question determining British attitude. The Reform Bill of 1867 brought a new British nation into existence, the nation decrying American institutions was dead and a "sister democracy" holding out hands to the United States had replaced it, but to this the men who had won the war for the North long remained blind. Not during the generation when Americans, immersed in a life and death struggle for national existence, felt that "he who is not for me is against me," could the generally correct neutrality of the British Government and the whole-hearted support of Radical England be accepted at their true value to the North. For nearly half a century after the American Civil War the natural sentiments of friendship, based upon ties of blood and a common heritage of literature and history and law, were distorted by bitter and exaggerated memories.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1323: See my article, "The Point of View of the British Traveller in America," Pol. Sci. Quarterly, June, 1914.]
[Footnote 1324: Alexander Mackay, The Western World; or Travels in the United States in 1846-47.]
[Footnote 1325: Ibid., Fourth Edition, London, 1850, Vol. III, p. 24.]
[Footnote 1326: Hugh Seymour Tremenheere, The Constitution of the United States compared with Our Own, London, 1854.]
[Footnote 1327: e.g., William Kelly, Across the Rocky Mountains from New York to California, London, 1852. He made one acute observation on American democracy. "The division of parties is just the reverse in America to what it is in England. In England the stronghold of democracy is in the large towns, and aristocracy has its strongest supporters in the country. In America the ultra-democrat and leveller is the western farmer, and the aristocratic tendency is most visible amongst the manufacturers and merchants of the eastern cities." (p. 181.)]
[Footnote 1328: Monypenny, Disraeli, IV, pp. 293-4, states a Tory offer to support Palmerston on these lines.]
[Footnote 1329: Dodd, Jefferson Davis, p. 217.]
[Footnote 1330: March, 30, 1861.]
[Footnote 1331: March 16, 1861.]
[Footnote 1332: To John Bigelow, April 14, 1861. (Bigelow, Retrospections, I, p. 347.)]
[Footnote 1333: April 27, 1861.]
[Footnote 1334: Bunch wrote to Russell, May 15, 1861, that the war in America was the "natural result of the much vaunted system of government of the United States"; it had "crumbled to pieces," and this result had long been evident to the public mind of Europe. (F.O., Am., Vol. 780, No. 58.)]
[Footnote 1335: State Department, Eng., Vol. 77, No. 9. Adams to Seward, June 21, 1861.]
[Footnote 1336: I have made an effort to identify writers in Blackwood's, but am informed by the editors that it is impossible to do this for the period before 1870, old correspondence having been destroyed.]
[Footnote 1337: July, 1861.]
[Footnote 1338: The Atlantic Monthly for November, 1861, takes up the question, denying that democracy is in any sense "on trial" in America, so far as the permanence of American institutions is concerned. It still does not see clearly the real nature of the controversy in England.]
[Footnote 1339: Aug. 17, 1861.]
[Footnote 1340: Sept. 6, 1861. (Mass. Hist. Soc. Proceedings, XLVI, p. 94.)]
[Footnote 1341: Sept. 7, 1861.]
[Footnote 1342: Sept. 14, 1861.]
[Footnote 1343: Motley, Correspondence, II, p. 35. To his mother, Sept. 22, 1861.]
[Footnote 1344: April, 1861.]
[Footnote 1345: Oct., 1861.]
[Footnote 1346: Oct., 1861. Article, "Democracy teaching by Example."]
[Footnote 1347: Nov. 23, 1861.]
[Footnote 1348: Cited by Harris, The Trent Affair, p. 28.]
[Footnote 1349: Robertson, Speeches of John Bright, I, pp. 177 seq.]
[Footnote 1350: Gladstone Papers, Dec. 27, 1861.]
[Footnote 1351: State Dept., Eng., Vol. 78, No. 95. Adams to Seward, Dec. 27, 1861. As printed in U.S. Messages and Documents, 1862-63, Pt. I, p. 14. Adams' emphasis on the word "not" is unindicated, by the failure to use italics.]
[Footnote 1352: Ibid., No. 110. Enclosure. Adams to Seward, Jan. 31, 1862.]
[Footnote 1353: Feb. 22, 1862.]
[Footnote 1354: State Dept., Eng., Vol. 80, No. 206. Adams to Seward, Aug. 8, 1862. Of this period in 1862, Rhodes (IV, 78) writes that "the most significant and touching feature of the situation was that the cotton operative population was frankly on the side of the North." Lutz, Die Beziehungen zwischen Deutschland und den Vereinigten Staaten waehrend des Sezessionskrieges, pp. 49-53, makes an interesting analysis of the German press, showing it also determined in its attitude by factional political idealisms in Germany.]
[Footnote 1355: Palmerston MS., Aug. 24, 1862.]
[Footnote 1356: Aug. 30, 1862.]
[Footnote 1357: October, 1862. "The Confederate Struggle and Recognition."]
[Footnote 1358: Nov. 4, 1862.]
[Footnote 1359: The Index, Nov. 20, 1862, p. 63. (Communication.)]
[Footnote 1360: Anthony Trollope, North America, London, 1862, Vol. I, p. 198. The work appeared in London in 1862, and was in its third edition by the end of the year. It was also published in New York in 1862 and in Philadelphia in 1863.]
[Footnote 1361: The Liberator, March 13, 1863, quoting a report in the New York Sunday Mercury.]
[Footnote 1362: Lord Salisbury is quoted in Vince, John Bright, p. 204, as stating that Bright "was the greatest master of English oratory that this generation - I may say several generations - has seen. I have met men who have heard Pitt and Fox, and in whose judgment their eloquence at its best was inferior to the finest efforts of John Bright. At a time when much speaking has depressed, has almost exterminated, eloquence, he maintained that robust, powerful and vigorous style in which he gave fitting expression to the burning and noble thoughts he desired to utter."]
[Footnote 1363: Speech at Rochdale, Feb. 3, 1863. (Robertson, Speeches of John Bright, I, pp. 234 seq.)]
[Footnote 1364: Bigelow to Seward, Feb. 6, 1863. (Bigelow, Retrospections, I, p. 600.)]
[Footnote 1365: U.S. Messages and Documents, 1863, Pt. I, p. 123.]
[Footnote 1366: State Dept., Eng., Adams to Seward. No. 334. Feb. 26, 1863. enclosing report of the Edinburgh meeting as printed in The Weekly Herald, Mercury and News, Feb. 21, 1863.]
[Footnote 1367: U.S. Messages and Documents, 1863, Pt. I, p. 157.]
[Footnote 1368: Spargo, Karl Marx, pp. 224-5. Spargo claims that Marx bent every effort to stir working men to a sense of class interest in the cause of the North and even went so far as to secure the presence of Bright at the meeting, as the most stirring orator of the day, though personally he regarded Bright "with an almost unspeakable loathing." On reading this statement I wrote to Mr. Spargo asking for evidence and received the reply that he believed the tradition unquestionably well founded, though "almost the only testimony available consists of a reference or two in one of his [Marx's] letters and the ample corroborative testimony of such friends as Lessner, Jung and others." This is scant historical proof; but some years later in a personal talk with Henry Adams, who was in 1863 his father's private secretary, and who attended and reported the meeting, the information was given that Henry Adams himself had then understood and always since believed Marx's to have been the guiding hand in organizing the meeting.]
[Footnote 1369: U.S. Messages and Documents, 1863, Pt. I, p. 162. (Adams to Seward, March 27, 1863.)]
[Footnote 1370: State Dept., Eng., Vol. 82, No. 358. Adams to Seward, March 27, 1863, enclosing report by Henry Adams. There was also enclosed the printed report, giving speeches at length, as printed by The Bee Hive, the organ of the London Trades Unions.]
[Footnote 1371: See ante, p. 132.]
[Footnote 1372: State Dept., Eng., Vol. 82, No. 360. Adams to Seward, April 2, 1863.]
[Footnote 1373: May 5, 1863.]
[Footnote 1374: U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1863, Pt. I, p. 243. Adams to Seward, May 7, 1863.]
[Footnote 1375: Robertson, Speeches of John Bright, I, p. 264. In a letter to Bigelow, March 16, 1863, Bright estimated that there were seven millions of men of twenty-one years of age and upward in the United Kingdom, of whom slightly over one million had the vote. (Bigelow, Retrospections, I, p. 610.)]
[Footnote 1376: July 2, 1863. The editorial was written in connection with Roebuck's motion for mediation and is otherwise interesting for an attempt to characterize each of the speakers in the Commons.]
[Footnote 1377: U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1863, Part I, p. 319. To Seward, July 23, 1863.]
[Footnote 1378: See ante, p. 130, note 2.]
[Footnote 1379: MS. letter, Sept. 8, 1863, in possession of C. F. Adams, Jr.]
[Footnote 1380: Sept. 24, 1863.]
[Footnote 1381: Even the friendly Russian Minister in Washington was at this time writing of the "rule of the mob" in America and trusting that the war, "the result of democracy," would serve as a warning to Europe. (Russian Archives, Stoeckl to F.O., Nov. 29-Dec. 11, 1864, No. 1900.)]
[Footnote 1382: State Dept., Eng., Vol. 84, Nos. 557 and 559. Adams to Seward, Dec. 17, 1863. Adams repeated his advice to "keep out of it."]
[Footnote 1383: Ibid., Vol. 85, No. 587. Adams to Seward, Jan. 29, 1864. Adams here expressed the opinion that it was partly the aristocratic antipathy to Bright that had produced the ill-will to the United States.]
[Footnote 1384: Ibid.]
[Footnote 1385: See Ch. XV.]
[Footnote 1386: The Index, Jan. 28, 1864, p. 58.]
[Footnote 1387: Goldwin Smith, A Letter to a Whig Member of the Southern Independence Association, London, 1864, pp. 14, 68, and 71.]
[Footnote 1388: Leader, Roebuck, p. 299. To William Ibbitt, April 26, 1864.]
[Footnote 1389: Arnold, Mixed Essays, p. 17. N.Y., Macmillan, 1883.]
[Footnote 1390: State Dept., Eng., Vol. 86, No. 709. Adams to Seward, June 9, 1864]
[Footnote 1391: See ante, Ch. XVI.]
[Footnote 1392: Dasent, Delane, II, pp. 135-6. Delane to Dasent, Dec. 25 and 26, 1864. The Times on December 26 pictured Sherman as having escaped to the sea, but on the 29th acknowledged his achievements.]
[Footnote 1393: Lord Acton's Letters to Mary Gladstone, p. 183.]
[Footnote 1394: These were not confined to Great Britain. The American Legation in Berlin received addresses of sympathy from many organizations, especially labour unions. One such, drawn by W. Liebknecht, A. Vogt, and C. Schilling read in part: "Members of the working-class, we need not affirm to you the sincerity of these our sympathies; for with pride we can point to the fact, that, while the aristocracy of the Old World took openly the part of the southern slaveholder, and while the middle class was divided in its opinions, the working-men in all countries of Europe have unanimously and firmly stood on the side of the Union." (U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1865, Pt. IV, p. 500.)]
[Footnote 1395: U.S. Messages and Documents, 1865, Pt. I, p. 417. Adams to Hunter, July 13, 1865.]
[Footnote 1396: Disraeli was less disturbed by this than were other Tory leaders. He had long before, in his historical novels, advocated an aristocratic leadership of democracy, as against the middle class. Derby called the Bill "a leap in the dark," but assented to it.]
[Footnote 1397: Pierce, Sumner, IV, pp. 151-153, summarizes the factors determining British attitude and places first the fear of the privileged classes of the example of America, but his treatment really minimizes this element.]
[Footnote 1398: Goldwin Smith, "The Civil War in America: An Address read at the last meeting of the Manchester Union and Emancipation Society." (Jan. 26, 1866.) London, 1866, pp. 71-75.]
[Footnote 1399: Goldwin Smith, America and England in their present relations, London, 1869, p. 30.]