What
Would Mr. Everett Have Thought Had He Been Refused A Passage From
Dover To Calais, Because The Carrying Of Him Would Have Been Toward
The South A Breach Of Neutrality?
It would never have occurred to
him that he could become subject to such stoppage.
How should we
have been abused for Southern sympathies had we so acted! We,
forsooth, who carry passengers about the world, from China and
Australia, round to Chili and Peru, who have the charge of the
world's passengers and letters, and as a nation incur out of our
pocket annually loss of some half million of pounds sterling for
the privilege of doing so, are to inquire the business of every
American traveler before we let him on board, and be stopped in our
work if we take anybody on one side whose journeyings may be
conceived by the other side to be to them prejudicial! Not on such
terms will Englishmen be willing to spread civilization across the
ocean! I do not pretend to understand Wheaton and Phillimore, or
even to have read a single word of any international law. I have
refused to read any such, knowing that it would only confuse and
mislead me. But I have my common sense to guide me. Two men
living in one street, quarrel and shy brickbats at each other, and
make the whole street very uncomfortable. Not only is no one to
interfere with them, but they are to have the privilege of deciding
that their brickbats have the right of way, rather than the
ordinary intercourse of the neighborhood!
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