"Mr. WATKIN, Member For Stockport, Said, That He Felt Concerned To Hear
The United States So Often Spoken Of In
The debate as 'the enemy;' and
if he thought that the vote before the committee would in any manner
Increase international irritation, he should regret his vote in favour
of the proposition of the Government. As it was, he felt that he could
not quite agree with the policy the vote indicated. That policy was one
of armament against an enemy. The proposition, in his opinion, went
either too far or not far enough. It did not go far enough to inspire
undoubted confidence and to deter attack by providing for absolute
defence; and still it went far enough to raise suspicion and to excite
or to aggravate a frontier feeling. But he thought that our actual
relations with the United States were guiding considerations in
reference to the policy of this vote. Government ought, therefore, to
tell the House how far they could repeat the peaceful assurances of a
former debate. Did the despatches by the mail just arrived tend towards
peace or misunderstanding? Was it true, on one side, that formal notice
had a few days ago been given to our Government by the United States to
terminate the Reciprocity Treaty? and was it true that that notice had
been entirely unaccompanied by any overture or suggestion for a re-
discussion of the question? On the other and more friendly side, was it
true that the vexatious passport system had been abrogated? and, above
all, was it also true that the Government of Washington had expressed
to Her Majesty's Government their intention to revoke the notice to
terminate the arrangement of 1817, and to place gunboats on the great
American lakes? If this was true, and if it should also appear that the
notice to put an end to the Reciprocity Treaty had either not yet been
given or had been accompanied by some friendly declaration of a desire
to negociate anew, the House must receive the intelligence with
satisfaction; but should it, unfortunately, be the fact that non-
intercourse regulations were maintained, that the lakes were to be
covered by armaments, and that international trade was to be interfered
with, then he thought the House would consider the question as one
affecting a hostile neighbour, whose unfriendly designs had to be met
by preparation. He hoped, therefore, that the right hon. gentleman
would give the House all the information at his command. Had he been in
possession of all the facts, he should have been disposed to move as an
amendment that it was inexpedient to consider a vote of money for the
construction of fortifications adjoining the United States frontier
until negociations had been undertaken and had failed, with a view to
the suspension of such works under treaty obligation. He was strongly
in favour of negociation. There was an example and precedent in the
arrangement of 1817 for the neutralization of the lakes. That peaceful
compact had endured for fifty years, and had alike saved the expense
and obviated the dangers attending rival navies on the great internal
waters of America.
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