United States Dept of State

Papers Relative to Mexican Affairs. Communicated to the Senate June 16, 1864. United States Dept of State

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1865 edition. Excerpt: ...has named in the ports and commercial cities of the republic be retired. Certainly a government which treats consular officers in this manner is neither worthy of appointing them or receiving them. We had maintained these agents in conformity with the least rigorous usages, although the Emperor and his generals have made public the real and positive end to which this war is to lead, and that it is the destruction of our government and of our republican institutions which is sought. To make this revelation until the last hope of peace had disappeared is to violate all the laws of war, and we are therefore free from any obligation to respect them oa our part. Besides, as the government of France ignores the federal government, it cannot respect, as in fact it does not respect, any of its rights; but by this very act it declares it free of all obligations towards Franse, its government and its citizens. To this extreme would the conduct of the Emperor lead us if we listened only to the voice of our great injuries, and if we sought to prove to our enemies the precise anil logical consequences of their insane proceedings. But we abstain from adopting this course, because we have a respect for public law and our own dignity, not from fear of our invaders, whom we are resisting with arms, and shall resist to the end. In one word, if in this affair it is not advisable that we should violate our traditional policy to initiate proceedings as unjust and as insulting as those of the French government, it is still proper to take others of such eliiciency and energy as shall justly protect the honor of the republic. And as this determination can he realized, as I have already intimated, by terminating the commissions of our consuls in France, and by...