As to intervention to preserve the balance of power in Europe, see Phillimore, 2d ed., I., Preface, vii-ix. As an example of intervention to put an end to abhorrent conditions, the As an example of intervention on the invitation of the parties to a civil "As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity of Musselmen; and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries." Art. X., treaty between the United States and Tripoli, signed by Hassan See, also, Art. XIV., treaty with Tripoli, 1805. "As the government of the United States of America has, in itself, no 66 The laws of Turkey "whereby the penalty of death is denounced against the Mussulman who embraces Christianity," however outrageous, do not justify an appeal from this Government for their repeal. Mr. Marcy, Sec. of State, to Mr. Spence, Dec. 28, 1855, MS. Inst. Turkey, I. 392. "The main difficulty connected with intervention is the following: It may be admitted that there are possibilities of tyrannical usage, barbarous practices, or persistent and hopeless anarchy, out of which the friendly aid of a generous, impartial, and truly disinterested by stander may be the only way to a deliverance. But two cautions have to be interposed: First, it has to be provided that the aid is accorded at a time and under circumstances which do not in any way prejudge the issue of a struggle yet undetermined, and which ought, in the interests of the state concerned, to be decided by the real and internal, and not by the factitious and external, elements of victory. The importance of this consideration was signally illustrated in the late insurrection of the Southern States of the American Union, and in the controversy that long hung round the questions whether England had chosen the proper moment for according to the Southern Confederacy the rights of a belligerent state, and what was the meaning and political significance of recognition for belligerent purposes. A second caution in respect of intervention is, that, admitting the propriety and duty of intervention in certain extreme crises, it is always open to a state, influential, designing, and unscrupulous, to foster in another state, subject to moral control, the very condition of things which will, sooner or later, bring about a fit opportunity for its own overt interference. Whether Russia was guilty of this conduct in the case of the late Servian war and the Herzegovinian insurrection, is of less importance here than the fact that she was constantly reproached with it. It is a danger which is almost inherent in the nature of the doctrine of a right of intervention in certain emergencies." Amos, Remedies for War (N. Y. 1880), 60. See an article by Mr. Senior, 77 Edinburgh Review (1843), 334, 358. As to the circular issued by Russia, when France and Great Britain sus- On Sept. 26, 1815, the Emperors of Austria and Russia and the King of Prussia concluded at Paris a treaty which was known as the Holy Alliance. In course of time this league, the object of which was professedly benevolent, came more and more to assume the form of a league for the protection of the principle of "legitimacy" against the encroachment of liberal ideas. The league was joined by the King of France. Congresses of the allies were held at Aix-la-Chapelle, Troppau, and Laybach; and popular movements were suppressed in Piedmont and Naples. In 1823 France, acting for her associates, intervened in Spain, for the purpose of restoring the absolute monarch Ferdinand VII. A proposal to intervene to restore to Spain her colonies in America led to the promulgation of the Monroe doctrine. The "sympathy" expressed in the United States with the Greek insurrection against Turkey never took the shape of intervention. Of the intervention of Great Britain, France, and Russia in that struggle, Mr. Abdy, in his edition of Kent, thus speaks: "The intervention was based on three grounds. First, in order to comply with the request of one of the parties; secondly, on the ground of humanity, in order to stay the effusion of blood; and, thirdly, in order to put a stop to piracy and anarchy. If the recognition of the Greek insurgents and the intervention in their favour are to be looked upon as precedents, it is fitting that all the facts connected with them should be investigated, all the documents examined, and a careful distinction made between the policy and the legality of what was done. And then, in spite of the vigorous defense of the British minister of the day, it is difficult to withhold our assent from the judgment passed by an able writer of our own time [Sir W. Harcourt, in Historicus'] upon the event, when he says that The emancipation of Greece was a high act of policy above and beyond the domain of law. As an act of policy it may have been and was justifiable; but it was not the less a hostile act, which if she had dared Turkey might properly have resented by war.'" Abdy's Kent (1878), 50. It is not permissible for one sovereign to address another sovereign on political questions pending in the latter's domains unless invited so to do. The treaty between France, Great Britain, and Russia, signed at London July 6, 1827, for the pacification of Greece, sets forth the specific grounds on which the three powers intervened. In the preamble the contracting parties declare that, "penetrated with the necessity of putting an end to the sanguinary struggle which, while it abandons the Greek provinces and the islands of the archipelago to all the disorders of anarchy, daily causes fresh impediments to the commerce of the states of Europe, and gives opportunity for acts of piracy which not only expose the subjects of the high contracting parties to grievous losses, but also render necessary measures which are burthensome for their observation and suppression; " and that two of the high contracting parties (France and Great Britain) having besides "received from the Greeks an earnest invitation to interpose their Mediation with the Ottoman Porte," and being, together with the Emperor of Russia, "animated with the desire of putting a stop to the effusion of blood, and of preventing the evils of every kind which the continuance of such a state of affairs may produce," they had all resolved to combine and regulate their efforts by a formal treaty with a view to reestablish peace between the contending parties by means of an arrangement demanded "no less by sentiments of humanity, than by interests for the tranquillity of Europe." Hertslet's Map of Europe by Treaty, I. 769–770. "Her Majesty's government deeply lament the outbreak of hostilities in North America, and they would gladly lend their aid to the restoration of peace. "You are instructed, therefore, in case you should be asked to employ your good offices either singly or in conjunction with the representatives of other powers, to give your assistance in promoting the work of reconciliation. "But as it is more probable, especially after a recent letter of Mr. Seward, that foreign advice is not likely to be accepted, you will refrain from offering it unasked. Such being the case, and supposing the contest not to be at once ended by signal success on one side or by the return of friendly feeling between the two contending parties, her Majesty's government have to consider what will be the position of Great Britain as a neutral between the two belligerents. "So far as the position of Great Britain in this respect toward the European powers is concerned, that position has been greatly modified by the Declaration of Paris of April 16, 1856." Earl Russell, British for. sec., to Lord Lyons, British min. at Washington, "The steadfast determination of the [British] government neither to say nor do anything which could reasonably be construed into an interference [in the civil war in the United States] was tested in November, 1862, when it was proposed by the Emperor of the French that the courts of France, Russia, and Great Britain should tender their good offices to both belligerents, in the hope of preparing the way for an accommodation. M. Drouyn de Lhuys, in addressing himself to the British government, dwelt on the innumerable calamities. and immense bloodshed' which attended the war, and on the evils which it inflicted upon Europe. The two contending parties, he said, had up to that time fought with balanced success, and there appeared to be no probability that the strife would soon terminate. He proposed, therefore, that the three courts should join in recommending an armistice for six months, during which means might be discovered for effecting a lasting pacification. The British government declined to take part in such a recommendation, being satisfied that there was no reasonable prospect of its being entertained by that of the United States." Bernard, The Neutrality of Great Britain during the American Civil War, 467-468. The proposal was also rejected by Russia, unless it should be found to be acceptable to both parties. (Dip. Cor. 1863, II. 765, 768.) "As soon as the news of the second battle of Bull Run reached England, Palmerston sent a note to Russell in which he spoke precisely but unsympathetically of the result as a very complete smashing of the Federals. He also suggested that, in case Baltimore or Washington should fall into the hands of the Confederates, it would be time for Great Britain and France to address the contending parties and recommend an arrangement upon the basis of separation. Russell expressed the opinion that what was known. already would warrant offering mediation to the United States, with a view to the recognition of the independence of the Confederates.' October 30, 1862, he [Louis Napoleon] instructed the French ambassadors to Great Britain and to Russia to invite those powers to join France in requesting the belligerents to agree to an armistice of six months, so as to consider some plan for bringing the war to an end. . . . Great Britain promptly and unqualifiedly declined the proposition. The complete change of mind on the part of Palmerston and Russell was probably due to three facts, which they had not anticipated: The smashing' of the Federals at Bull Run did not demoralize the Washington Government or lead to other results that were expected; the Confederates had lost in Maryland the prestige they had won in Virginia; and the preliminary proclamation of emancipation showed that the war was to become positively antislavery. Russia's reply to Napoleon was also discouraging. She was unwilling to adopt the proposed course because she believed that it would not lead to peaceful results; yet if France and Great Britain should agree to act together on this question, Russia's reprsentative at Washington would be instructed to lend to his colleagues, if not his official aid, at least moral support."" Bancroft, Life of Seward, II. 304, 307, 308, citing 2 Walpole's Russell, 349; Dip. Cor. 1862, 405; Dip. Cor. 1863, I. 3. "Your private letter of October 7th has been received. There was no mystery in the Department's reply to Prince Gortschakoff. His admirable letter was throughout responsive to our own past communications through Mr. Clay to Russia. We are not prepared to accept counsels of mediation with the rebels, although they were generously offered. We could not, without rudeness, distinctly decline them. We were grateful for the generosity of the Czar, so strikingly in contrast with that of some other potentates, and at the same time thought it proper to avoid any seeming excitement resulting from it. The occasion was a proper one for showing that, as we are not provoked by European hostility, we are not unnaturally flattered by European friendship." (Mr. F. W. Seward, Acting Sec. of State, to Mr. Harvey, No. 16 (private), Nov. 5, 1861, MS. Inst. Portugal, XIV. 219.) "There are speculations in the European press of propositions by some of the southern European powers to the states of northern Europe, for their concurrence in representations to be made to us, with a view to produce a deflexion from the policy of maintaining the union, which has been hitherto so constantly pursued. While we attach no credit to these rumors, the President nevertheless expects that you will be watchful of any such designs. There is only one road to peace in this country, and that is the one which the government has adopted under the inspiration of the will of the na |