"[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, that 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.
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