Concerted Measures in the United States

Final Concerted Measures (1842–1862) and the International Status of the Slave-Trade (1783–1863)

In the book “The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America 1638-1870” (1), W. E. B. Du Bois explained the following: The Treaty of Washington, in 1842, made the first effective compromise in the matter and broke the unpleasant dead-lock, by substituting joint cruising by English and American squadrons for the proposed grant of a Right of Search. In submitting this treaty, Tyler said: “The treaty which I now submit to you proposes no alteration, mitigation, or modification of the rules of the law of nations. It provides simply that each of the two Governments shall maintain on the coast of Africa a sufficient squadron to enforce separately and respectively the laws, rights, and obligations of the two countries for the suppression of the slave trade.”61This provision was a part of the treaty to settle the boundary disputes with England. In the Senate, Benton moved to strike out this article; but the attempt was defeated by a vote of 37 to 12, and the treaty was ratified.62

This stipulation of the treaty of 1842 was never properly carried out by the United States for any length of time.63 Consequently the same difficulties as to search and visit by English149 vessels continued to recur. Cases like the following were frequent. The “Illinois,” of Gloucester, Massachusetts, while lying at Whydah, Africa, was boarded by a British officer, but having American papers was unmolested. Three days later she hoisted Spanish colors and sailed away with a cargo of slaves. Next morning she fell in with another British vessel and hoisted American colors; the British ship had then no right to molest her; but the captain of the slaver feared that she would, and therefore ran his vessel aground, slaves and all. The senior English officer reported that “had Lieutenant Cumberland brought to and boarded the ‘Illinois,’ notwithstanding the American colors which she hoisted, … the American master of the ‘Illinois’ … would have complained to his Government of the detention of his vessel.”64 Again, a vessel which had been boarded by British officers and found with American flag and papers was, a little later, captured under the Spanish flag with four hundred and thirty slaves. She had in the interim complained to the United States government of the boarding.65

Meanwhile, England continued to urge the granting of a Right of Search, claiming that the stand of the United States really amounted to the wholesale protection of pirates under her flag.66 The United States answered by alleging that even the Treaty of 1842 had been misconstrued by England,67 whereupon there was much warm debate in Congress, and several attempts were made to abrogate the slave-trade article of the treaty.68 The pro-slavery party had become more and more suspicious of England’s motives, since they had seen her abolition of the slave-trade blossom into abolition of the system itself, and they seized every opportunity to prevent co-operation with her. At the same time, European interest in the question showed some signs of weakening, and no decided action was taken. In 1845 France changed her Right of150 Search stipulations of 1833 to one for joint cruising,69 while the Germanic Federation,70 Portugal,71 and Chili72enounced the trade as piracy. In 1844 Texas granted the Right of Search to England,73 and in 1845 Belgium signed the Quintuple Treaty.74

Discussion between England and the United States was revived when Cass held the State portfolio, and, strange to say, the author of “Cass’s Protest” went farther than any of his predecessors in acknowledging the justice of England’s demands. Said he, in 1859: “If The United States maintained that, by carrying their flag at her masthead, any vessel became thereby entitled to the immunity which belongs to American vessels, they might well be reproached with assuming a position which would go far towards shielding crimes upon the ocean from punishment; but they advance no such pretension, while they concede that, if in the honest examination of a vessel sailing under American colours, but accompanied by strongly-marked suspicious circumstances, a mistake is made, and she is found to be entitled to the flag she bears, but no injury is committed, and the conduct of the boarding party is irreproachable, no Government would be likely to make a case thus exceptional in its character a subject of serious reclamation.”75 While admitting this and expressing a desire to co-operate in the suppression of the slave-trade, Cass nevertheless steadily refused all further overtures toward a mutual Right of Search.

The increase of the slave-traffic was so great in the decade 1850–1860 that Lord John Russell proposed to the governments of the United States, France, Spain, Portugal, and Brazil, that they instruct their ministers to meet at London in May or June, 1860, to consider measures for the final abolition of the trade. He stated: “It is ascertained, by repeated instances, 151that the practice is for vessels to sail under the American flag. If the flag is rightly assumed, and the papers correct, no British cruizer can touch them. If no slaves are on board, even though the equipment, the fittings, the water-casks, and other circumstances prove that the ship is on a Slave Trade venture, no American cruizer can touch them.”76 Continued representations of this kind were made to the paralyzed United States government; indeed, the slave-trade of the world seemed now to float securely under her flag. Nevertheless, Cass refused even to participate in the proposed conference, and later refused to accede to a proposal for joint cruising off the coast of Cuba.77 Great Britain offered to relieve the United States of any embarrassment by receiving all captured Africans into the West Indies; but President Buchanan “could not contemplate any such arrangement,” and obstinately refused to increase the suppressing squadron.78

On the outbreak of the Civil War, the Lincoln administration, through Secretary Seward, immediately expressed a willingness to do all in its power to suppress the slave-trade.79 Accordingly, June 7, 1862, a treaty was signed with Great Britain granting a mutual limited Right of Search, and establishing mixed courts for the trial of offenders at the Cape of Good Hope, Sierra Leone, and New York.80 The efforts of a half-century of diplomacy were finally crowned; Seward wrote to Adams, “Had such a treaty been made in 1808, there would now have been no sedition here.”81

Resources

Notes and References

1. W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America 1638-1870” (1893), Longmans, Green and Co., London, New York, Bombay and Calcuta.

See Also

Further Reading

• Jeffrey R. Brackett. The Status of the Slave, 1775–1789. (Essay V. in Jameson’s Essays in the Constitutional History of the United States, 1775–89. Boston, 1889.)
• George Lawrence. An Oration on the Abolition of the Slave Trade … Jan. 1, 1813. New York, 1813.
• Paul Leicester Ford. Pamphlets on the Constitution of the United States, published during its Discussion by the People, 1787–8. (With Bibliography, etc.) Brooklyn, 1888.
• A Short Account of that part of Africa Inhabited by the Negroes, … and the Manner by which the Slave Trade is carried on. Third edition. London, 1768.
• Moncure D. Conway. Omitted Chapters of History disclosed in the Life and Papers of Edmund Randolph, etc. New York and London, 1888.
• John Pennington, Lord Muncaster. Historical Sketches of the Slave Trade and its effect on Africa, addressed to the People of Great Britain. London, 1792.
• Daniel R. Goodloe. The Birth of the Republic. Chicago, [1889.]
• William B. Weeden. E
  conomic and Social History of New England, 1620–1789. 2 vols. Boston, 1890.