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No. 476.]

No. 290.

Mr. Fish to General Schenck.

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, November 8, 1873. SIR Referring to the case of Albert Allen Gardner, master of the American ship Anna Camp, tried in the county court at Liverpool, in May last, copies of certain papers relating to which were forwarded to you by General Badeau, I desire to call your attention to the claim of jurisdiction put forth by the local common-law courts of Great Britain in this and other similar cases.

It seems to be claimed by the courts in question that their jurisdiction extends to the hearing and determining of causes arising upon complaints between masters and mariners of vessels of the United States. not only when the occurrences upon which the complaint may be founded took place within British ports or waters, but also when the offense which is made the ground of action was committed on board the vessel on the high seas.

The exercise of this jurisdiction by the local common-law courts at Liverpool has already been the cause of much annoyance and, in some instances, serious inconvenience to masters and owners of American vessels, and if persisted in may affect injuriously the interests of American shipping.

The courts of the United States, even those possessing admiralty jurisdiction, have repeatedly declined to take cognizance of cases of this nature when the parties to the action were seamen and masters of foreign vessels. The reasons assigned by the courts of the United States for refusing to entertain jurisdiction of such cases are believed to be in accord with the general practice of other maritime powers and sup ported by the principles of international maritime law, as understood and interpreted by the highest judicial authority of maritime nations. In a case of controversy between the crew and the master of the British ship Reliance, sought to be prosecuted before the district court of the United States in the city of New York, the master and crew in question being British subjects, the court, in declining to entertain the case, says: "The admiralty courts of the United States will decline jurisdiction of controversies arising between foreign masters and owners unless the voyage has been broken up or the seamen unlawfully discharged. It is expected," continues the same judge, "that a foreign seaman seeking to prosecute an action of this description in the courts of this country will procure the official sanction of the commercial or political representative of the country to which he belongs, or that good reasons will be shown for allowing his suit in the absence of such refusal. This court," adds the learned judge, " has repeatedly discountenanced actions by foreign seamen against foreign vessels not terminating their voyages at this port as being calculated to embarrass commercial transactions and relations between this country and others in friendly relations with it."

The justice and wisdom of those observations of the court will be at once obvious. The laws of the United States, and the instructions of this Department to its consular officers resident in foreign countries, provide with more than ordinary care for the adjustment of all questions of controversy which may arise between the masters and crews of American vessels growing out of the relations of such masters and seamen on board the vessel while on the high seas or in the ports of foreign

powers; and where offenses are committed by either master or mariner, or other questions of dispute between them arise which are beyond the province of the consul to determine, ample provision is made by law for the trial and punishment of such offenses and the settlement of those questions by the courts of the United States. These provisions of the law and consular regulations of this country are believed, moreover, to be in general harmony with existing laws and regulations of Great Britain on this subject.

This Department, as you are aware, has repeatedly brought to the attention of Her Majesty's government the necessity of a consular convention between the two countries, the existence of which would do much to obviate in future occurrences such as that now complained of. It is not designed in this connection to renew any discussion of that subject now, as you are fully informed that this Government is now, as it has been heretofore, ready to enter into a convention on that subject. You will avail yourself of the earliest opportunity to bring the question involved in the case of Captain Gardner to the attention of Her Majesty's government, with the expression of the hope indulged by the Government of the United States that measures will be adopted to prevent in future the exercise of jurisdiction by the local common-law courts of Great Britain in controversies arising between the masters and seamen of vessels of the United States growing out of occurrences on board their vessels on the high seas.

I am, &c.,

No. 291.

HAMILTON FISH.

No. 534.]

General Schenck to Mr. Fish.

LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES,

London, December 12, 1873. (Received December 27.) SIR Referring to the correspondence which was communicated to you in my No. 453, relating to the privileges to be extended by Her Majesty's government or certain of her colonial governments to the expedition to be sent next year from the United States for the purpose of observing the transit of Venus, I have now to transmit to you a copy of another note received from Lord Granville on that subject. His lordship writes to inform me that there has been communicated to him from the secretary of state for the colonies a memorandum from the governor of Tasmania, stating that instructions will be given for the admission free of duty and wharfage of all instruments, &c., to be used by the expedition, and that a suitable site will be assigned for making the observations. You will doubtless desire to have this information to convey to the Secretary of the Navy.

I am, &c.,

[Inclosure in No. 534.]

ROBT. C. SCHENCK.

Lord Granville to General Schenck.

FOREIGN OFFICE, December 8, 1873. SIR: With reference to my note of the 25th of June last, I have the honor to acquaint you that the secretary of state for the colonies has communicated to me a memorandum received from the governor of Tasmania, stating that instructions will

be given for the admission free of duty and wharfage of all instruments, &c., to be used by the expedition from the United States which will visit Hobart Town for the purpose of observing the transit of Venus next year, and that a suitable site for making the observations will be placed at the disposal of the expedition.

I am, &c.,

GRANVILLE.

No. 552.]

No. 292.

General Schenck to Mr. Fish.

LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES,

London, January 24, 1874. (Received February 6.) SIR: Parliament is about to be dissolved. The formal act of dissolution will take place, it is expected, on the 27th instant. This movement has taken the country and all parties by surprise. It was generally expected that the present Parliament would continue through another session, which was to begin on the 5th of February, and that probably at the close of that session its dissolution would be announced and a general election ordered. Now there will be a general election, I presume, next month, and the new Parliament may meet perhaps as early as in March. Mr. Gladstone's address to his Greenwich constituency, which appears in this morning's journals, is the first intimation given to the public of the decision of the government to appeal at once to the electors.

It is impossible to predict with any strong degree of confidence what will be the result of a general election.

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The contest will be active and bitter, especially on the part of the conservatives or tory party, who have been encouraged greatly by their repeated successes in single and casual elections held to fill vacancies.

The telegraph will, of course, have given you immediate intelligence. of this event in British politics, but I have thought it might be interesting to you to receive what I send you by to-day's mail, a copy of the full text of Mr. Gladstone's address to the Greenwich electors, and the comments with which the sudden movement has been received by the leading newspapers of London.

I am, &c.,

No. 293.

ROBT. C. SCHENCK.

No. 553.]

General Schenck to Mr. Fish.

LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES,

London, January 26, 1874. (Received February 16.) SIR: Having sent you on Saturday, with an account of the dissolution of Parliament, Mr. Gladstone's address to his constituents, I have thought it might interest you to have also, as a pendant to that, and in a form to be preserved, the counter-address issued to his constituents by Mr. Disraeli, the leader of the opposition to the government. I inclose it accordingly. It is not to be presumed that the questions of either local or national policy which may just now enter into a general election in

Great Britain will be regarded with any great degree of concern in the United States; but still it may be well to keep a note of the issuesmore or less clearly defined-which are involved in the present strife of parties in this kingdom.

I have, &c.,

[Inclosure.]

ROBT. C. SCHENCK.

[Extract from the Times, Monday, January 26, 1874.]

THE GENERAL ELECTION.

Mr. Disraeli has issued the following address to the electors of the county of Buckingham:

"Gentlemen: Mr. Gladstone has informed the electors of Greenwich that Her Majesty has been advised by her ministers to dissolve the present Parliament.

"Whether this step has been taken as a means of avoiding the humbling confession by the prime minister that he has, in a fresh violation of constitutional law, persisted in retaining for several months a seat to which he was no longer entitled, or has been resorted to by his government in order to postpone or evade a day of reckoning for a war carried on without communication with Parliament, and the expenditure for which Parliament has not sanctioned, it is unnecessary at present to consider. It is sufficient to point out that if, under any circumstances, the course, altogether unprecedented, of calling together Parliament by special summons for the dispatch of business and then dissolving it before its meeting, could be justified, there is in the present case no reason whatever suggested why this was not done six weeks ago, and why the period of the year usually devoted to business before Easter, which must now be wasted, should not thus have been saved.

"Gentlemen, I appeal to you again for the continuance of that confidence which you have extended to me on nine different occasions, running over a period longer than a generation of men.

"The prime minister has addressed to his constituents a prolix narrative, in which he mentions many of the questions that have occupied or may occupy public attention, but in which I find nothing definite as to the policy he would pursue, except this, that having the prospect of a large surplus, he will, if retained in power, devote that surplus, to the remission of taxation, which would be the course of any party or any ministry. But what is remarkable in his proposals is that, on the one hand, they are accompanied by the disquieting information that the surplus, in order to make it adequate, must be enlarged by an adjustment, which must mean an increase of existing taxes, and that, on the other hand, his principal measures of relief will be the diminution of local taxation and the abolition of the income-tax-measures which the conservative party have always favored and which the prime minister and his friends have always opposed.

Gentlemen, I have ever endeavored, and if returned to Parliament, I shall, whether in or out of office, continue to endeavor to propose or support all measures calculated to improve the condition of the people of this kingdom. But I do not think this great end is advanced by incessant and harassing legislation. The English people are governed by their customs as much as by their laws, and there is nothing they more dislike than unnecessary restraint and meddling interference in their affairs. Generally speaking, I should say of the administration of the last five years that it would have been better for us all if there had been a little more energy in our foreign policy and a little less in our domestic legislation.

"By an act of folly or of ignorance rarely equaled, the present ministry relinquished a treaty which secured us the freedom of the Straits of Malacca for our trade with China and Japan, and they, at the same time, entering on the west coast of Africa into those equivocal and entangling engagements' which the prime minister now deprecates, involved us in the Ashantee war. The honor of the country now requires that we should prosecute that war with the vigor necessary to insure success; but when that honor is vindicated, it will be the duty of Parliament to inquire by what means we were led into a costly and destructive contest which neither Parliament nor the country has ever sanctioned, and of the necessity or justice of which, in its origin, they have not been made aware.

"The question of a further reform of the House of Commons is again suggested by the prime minister. I think unwisely. The argument for extending to the counties the household franchise of the towns on the ground of the existing system, being anomalous, is itself fallacious.

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"There has always been a difference between the franchises of the two divisions of the country, and no one has argued more strongly than the present prime minister against the contemplated identity of suffrage. The conservative party view this question without prejudice. They have proved that they are not afraid of popular rights. But the late reform act was a large measure, which, in conjunction with the ballot, has scarcely been tested by experience, and they will hesitate before they will sauction further legislation which will inevitably involve, among other considerable changes, the disfranchisement of at least all boroughs in the kingdom comprising less than 40,000 inhabitants.

"Gentlemen, the impending general election is one of no mean importance for the future character of this kingdom. There is reason to hope, from the address of the prime minister, putting aside some ominous suggestions which it contains as to the expediency of a local and subordinate legislature, that he is not, certainly at present, opposed to our national institutions or to the maintenance of the integrity of the empire. But, unfortunately, among his adherents some assail the monarchy; others impugn the independence of the House of Lords, while there are those who would relieve Parliament altogether from any share in the government of one portion of the United Kingdom. Others, again, urge him to pursue his peculiar policy by disestablishing the Anglican as he has despoiled the Irish Church, while trusted colleagues in his cabinet openly concur with them in their desire altogether to thrust religion from the place which it ought to occupy in national education.

"These, gentlemen, are solemn issues, and the impending general elections must decide them. Their solution must be arrived at when Europe is more deeply stirred than at any period since the Reformation, and when the cause of civil liberty and religions freedom mainly depends upon the strength and stability of England. I ask you to return me to the House of Commons to resist every proposal which may impair that strength and to support by every means her imperial sway.

"HUGHENDEN MANOR, January 24."

"B. DISRAELI.

No. 294.

Mr. Fish to General Schenck.

No. 524.]

DEPARTMENT OF STATE,

Washington, February 4, 1874. SIR: I inclose extracts from the material parts of a dispatch of the 6th of November last addressed to this Department by Mr. Vidal, the intelligent consul of the United States at Tripoli. A copy of the accompani ments. to the dispatch is also inclosed.* As these papers seem to show that the African slave-trade has, until recently, at least, been carried on by the way of Malta and Constantinople, and that British authorities at the former island have not been as zealous in checking it as the policy of their government upon the subject may be supposed to require, it is deemed advisable that the subject should be brought to the notice of Earl Granville, in order that the necessary measures may be adopted toward causing that policy to be duly respected at Malta.

I am, &c.,

No. 295.

HAMILTON FISH.

No. 558.]

General Schenck to Mr. Fish.

LEGATION OF THE UNITED STATES,

London, February 5, 1874. (Received February 20.) SIR: With reference to your No. 384 and my No. 453, respecting the establishment by the United States Government of stations in New

* For this correspondence see Barbary States.

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