And Then There Arose A Clamor Of Justification Among The Lawyers;
Judges And Ex-Judges Flew To Wheaton, Phillimore, And Lord Stowell.
Before Twenty-Four Hours Were Over, Every Man And Every Woman In
Boston Were Armed With Precedents.
Then there was the burning of
the "Caroline." England had improperly burned the "Caroline" on
Lake Erie, or rather in one of the American ports on Lake Erie, and
had then begged pardon.
If the States had been wrong, they would
beg pardon; but whether wrong or right, they would not give up
Slidell and Mason. But the lawyers soon waxed stronger. The men
were manifestly ambassadors, and as such contraband of war. Wilkes
was quite right, only he should have seized the vessel also. He
was quite right, for though Slidell and Mason might not be
ambassadors, they were undoubtedly carrying dispatches. In a few
hours there began to be a doubt whether the men could be
ambassadors, because if called ambassadors, then the power that
sent the embassy must be presumed to be recognized. That Captain
Wilkes had taken no dispatches, was true; but the captain suggested
a way out of this difficulty by declaring that he had regarded the
two men themselves as an incarnated embodiment of dispatches. At
any rate, they were clearly contraband of war. They were going to
do an injury to the North. It was pretty to hear the charming
women of Boston, as they became learned in the law of nations:
"Wheaton is quite clear about it," one young girl said to me.
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