It is strange that with so clearly-expressed a division of English opinion on American democracy few in America itself appreciated the significance of the British controversy. J.M. Forbes, who had been on a special mission to England, wrote to Lincoln, on his return[1378]:
"Our friends abroad see it! John Bright and his glorious band of English Republicans see that we are fighting for Democracy or (to get rid of the technical name) for liberal institutions; the Democrats and the liberals of the old world are as much and as heartily with us as any supporters we have on this side.
Our enemies too see it in the same light; the Aristocrats and the Despots of the old world see that our quarrel is that of the People against an Aristocracy[1379]."
But there are few similar expressions and these few nearly always came from men who had been abroad and had thus come into direct contact with British political movements. Meanwhile, Lee's retreat from Pennsylvania had produced a like retreat in the opinions on the failure of democracy earlier confidently held by the professedly neutral press. In September, having arrived at the point by the usual process of gradually facing about, the Times was bold enough to deny that England had any personal feeling or concern about democracy in America or that this had anything to do with English attitude on the war[1380]. Thenceforth neither the Times nor any of the leading papers saw fit to revive with vigour the cry of "democracy's failure," no matter how persistent in proclaiming ultimate victory for the South. Aristocratic exultation had given place to alarm and it seemed wiser, if possible, to quiet the issue[1381]. Not so the Radicals, who made every effort to keep the issue alive in the minds of the British public, and whose leaders with less violence but increased firmness debated the question in every public meeting favourable to the North[1382]. Many Conservatives, Adams reported, were now anxiously sitting on the fence yet finding the posture a difficult one because of their irritation at Bright's taunts[1383]. Bright's star was rising. "The very moment the war comes to an end," wrote Adams, "and a restoration of the Union follows, it will be the signal for a reaction that will make Mr. Bright perhaps the most formidable public man in England[1384]."
The continuation of the controversy was not, however, wholly one-sided. In the silence of the daily press it seemed incumbent upon the more eager and professed friends of the South to take up the cudgels. Hence, in part, came the organization of the Southern Independence Association and the attempt to hold public meetings favourable to the South, in the early months of 1864. Much talk had been spent on the "British issue" involved in the war; there was now to be vigorous work to secure it[1385]. The Index plunged into vigorous denunciation of "The Manchester School, which, for convenience and truth, we had better for the future call the American School." Even the Government was attacked for its complacence under the "American danger" and for retaining as a member Milner-Gibson, who, in a recent speech, had shown that he shared Bright's views on democracy:
"That gentleman [Bright] could not be asked to enter the Cabinet in person. The country abhorred him; Parliament despised him; his inveterate habits of slander and vituperation, his vulgarity, and his incurable want of veracity, had made him so hateful to the educated classes that it would have required no common courage to give him office; his insolent sneers at royalty would have made his appointment little less than a personal insult to the Queen; and his bad temper would have made him an intolerable colleague in the Council. But Mr. Bright had another self; a faithful shadow, which had no ideas, no soul, no other existence but what it borrowed from him, while its previous life and education had accustomed it to the society of statesmen and of gentlemen[1386]."
Such expressions gained nothing for the Conservative cause; they were too evidently the result of alarm at the progress of Radical and pro-Northern sentiment. Goldwin Smith in a "Letter" to the Southern Independence Association, analysed with clarity the situation. Answering criticisms of the passionate mob spirit of Northern press and people, he accused the Times of having
"... pandered to the hatred of America among the upper classes of this country during the present war. Some of us at least had been taught by what we have lately seen not to shrink from an extension of the suffrage, if the only bad consequence of that measure of justice would be a change in government from the passions of the privileged class to the passions of the people.... History will not mistake the meaning of the loud cry of triumph which burst from the hearts of all who openly or secretly hated liberty and progress, at the fall, as they fondly supposed, of the Great Republic." British working men "are for the most part as well aware that the cause of those who are fighting for the right of labour is theirs, as any nobleman in your Association can be that the other cause in his[1387]."
The question of democracy as a political philosophy and as an institution for Great Britain was, by 1864, rapidly coming to the front in politics. This was very largely a result of the American Civil War. Roebuck, after the failure of his effort for mediation in 1863, was obsessed with a fear of the tendency in England. "I have great faith in my countrymen," he wrote, "but the experience of America frightens me. I am not ashamed to use the word frightened. During my whole life I have looked to that country as about to solve the great problem of self-government, and now, in my old age, the hopes of my youth and manhood are destroyed, and I am left to reconstruct my political philosophy, and doubt and hesitation beset me on every point[1388]." More philosophically Matthew Arnold, in 1864, characterized the rule of aristocracy as inevitably passing, but bent his thought to the discovery of some middle ground or method--some "influence [which] may help us to prevent the English people from becoming, with the growth of democracy, Americanized[1389]." "There is no longer any sort of disguise maintained," wrote Adams, "as to the wishes of the privileged classes. Very little genuine sympathy is entertained for the rebels. The true motive is apparent enough. It is the fear of the spread of democratic feeling at home in the event of our success[1390]."
The year 1864 had witnessed a rapid retreat by wiser Conservative elements in proclaming the "lesson" of American democracy--a retreat caused by alarm at the vigour with which Radicals had taken up the challenge. Conservative hopes were still fixed upon Southern success and Conservative confidence loudly voiced. Even the pride of the Times in the accuracy of its news and in its military forecasts was subordinated to the purpose of keeping up the courage of the faction it represented[1391]. Small wonder, then, that Delane, on receiving the news of Sherman's arrival before Savannah, should be made physically ill and write to Dasent: "The American news is a heavy blow to us as well as to the South." The next day he added: "I am still sore vexed about Sherman, but Chenery did his best to attenuate the mischief[1392]." "Attenuation" of Northern progress in arms was, indeed, attempted, but the facts of the military situation were too strong for continued concealment. From January, 1865, only the most stubborn of Southern friends could remain blind to the approaching Northern victory. Lord Acton, a hero-worshipper of the great Confederate military leader, "broke his heart over the surrender of Lee," but was moved also by keen insight as to the political meaning of that surrender[1393].
So assured were all parties in England that the great Civil War in America was closing in Northern victory that the final event was discounted in advance and the lines were rapidly being formed for an English political struggle on the great issue heralded as involved in the American conflict. Again, on the introduction of a motion in Parliament for expansion of the franchise the ultra-Conservatives attempted to read a "lesson" from America. The Quarterly for April, 1865, asserted that even yet "the mass of educated men in England retain the sympathy for the South which they have nourished ever since the conflict assumed a decided shape." America was plainly headed in the direction of a military despotism. Her example should warn England from a move in the same direction. "The classes which govern this country are in a minority," and should beware of majority rule. But events discredited the prophecy of a military despotism. The assassination of Lincoln gave opportunity not merely for a general outpouring of expressions of sympathy but also to the Radicals a chance to exalt Lincoln's leadership in democracy[1394].
In July Great Britain was holding elections for a new Parliament. Not a single member who had supported the cause of the North failed of re-election, several additional Northern "friends" were chosen, and some outspoken members for the South were defeated. Adams thought this a matter deserving special notice in America, and prophesied a new era approaching in England:
"As it is, I cannot resist the belief that this period marks an era in the political movement of Great Britain. Pure old-fashioned conservatism has so far lost its hold on the confidence of the country that it will not appear in that guise any more. Unless some new and foreign element should interpose, I look for decided progress in enlarging the popular features of the constitution, and diminishing the influence of the aristocracy.... It is impossible not to perceive traces of the influence of our institutions upon all these changes.... The progress of the liberal cause, not in England alone, but all over the world, is, in a measure, in our hands[1395]."
The "Liberal progress" was more rapid, even, than Adams anticipated. Palmerston, ill for some months past, died on October 18, 1865. Russell succeeded him as head of the Ministry, and almost immediately declared himself in favour of Parliamentary reform even though a majority in both Houses was still opposed to such a measure. Russell's desertion of his earlier attitude of "finality" on franchise expansion correctly represented the acceptance, though unwillingly, by both political parties of the necessity of reform. The battle, long waged, but reaching its decisive moment during the American Civil War, had finally gone against Conservatism when Lee surrendered at Appomatox. Russell's Reform Bill of 1866 was defeated by Tory opposition in combination with a small Whig faction which refused to desert the "principle" of aristocratic government--the "government by the wise," but the Tories who came into power under Derby were forced by the popular demand voiced even to the point of rioting, themselves to present a Reform Bill. Disraeli's measure, introduced with a number of "fancy franchises," which, in effect, sought to counteract the giving of the vote to British working-men, was quickly subjected to such caustic criticism that all the planned advantages to Conservatism were soon thrown overboard, and a Bill presented so Radical as to permit a transfer of political power to the working classes[1396]. The Reform Bill of 1867 changed Great Britain from a government by aristocracy to one by democracy. A new nation came into being. The friends of the North had triumphed.
Thus in addition to the play of diplomatic incidents, the incidental frictions, the effect on trade relations, the applications of British neutrality, and the general policy of the Government, there existed for Great Britain a great issue in the outcome of the Civil War--the issue of the adoption of democratic institutions. It affected at every turn British public attitude, creating an intensity and bitterness of tone, on both sides, unexampled in the expressions of a neutral people. In America this was little understood, and American writers both during the war and long afterwards, gave little attention to it[1397]. Immediately upon the conclusion of the war, Goldwin Smith, whose words during the conflict were bitter toward the aristocracy, declared that "the territorial aristocracy of this country and the clergy of the Established Church" would have been excusable "if they could only have said frankly that they desired the downfall of institutions opposed to their own, instead of talking about their sympathy for the weak, and their respect for national independence, and their anxiety for the triumph of Free Trade[1398]." This was stated before the democratic hope in England had been realized. Three years later the same staunch friend of the North, now removed to America and occupying a chair of history at Cornell University, wrote of the British aristocracy in excuse of their attitude: "I fought these men hard; I believed, and believe now, that their defeat was essential to the progress of civilization. But I daresay we should have done pretty much as they did, if we had been born members of a privileged order, instead of being brought up under the blessed influence of equality and justice[1399]."
Such judgment and such excuses will appear to the historian as well-founded. But to Americans who conceived the Civil War as one fought first of all for the preservation of the nation, the issue of democracy in England seemed of little moment and little to excuse either the "cold neutrality" of the Government or the tone of the press. To Americans Great Britain appeared friendly to the dissolution of the Union and the destruction of a rival power. Nationality was the issue for the North; that democracy was an issue in America was denied, nor could it, in the intensity of the conflict, be conceived as the vital question determining British attitude. The Reform Bill of 1867 brought a new British nation into existence, the nation decrying American institutions was dead and a "sister democracy" holding out hands to the United States had replaced it, but to this the men who had won the war for the North long remained blind. Not during the generation when Americans, immersed in a life and death struggle for national existence, felt that "he who is not for me is against me," could the generally correct neutrality of the British Government and the whole-hearted support of Radical England be accepted at their true value to the North. For nearly half a century after the American Civil War the natural sentiments of friendship, based upon ties of blood and a common heritage of literature and history and law, were distorted by bitter and exaggerated memories.
FOOTNOTES:
[1323] See my article, "The Point of View of the British Traveller in America," Pol. Sci. Quarterly, June, 1914.
[1324] Alexander Mackay, The Western World; or Travels in the United States in 1846-47.
[1325] Ibid., Fourth Edition, London, 1850, Vol. III, p. 24.
[1326] Hugh Seymour Tremenheere, The Constitution of the United States compared with Our Own, London, 1854.
[1327] e.g., William Kelly, Across the Rocky Mountains from New York to California, London, 1852. He made one acute observation on American democracy. "The division of parties is just the reverse in America to what it is in England. In England the stronghold of democracy is in the large towns, and aristocracy has its strongest supporters in the country. In America the ultra-democrat and leveller is the western farmer, and the aristocratic tendency is most visible amongst the manufacturers and merchants of the eastern cities." (p. 181.)
[1328] Monypenny, Disraeli, IV, pp. 293-4, states a Tory offer to support Palmerston on these lines.
[1329] Dodd, Jefferson Davis, p. 217.
[1330] March, 30, 1861.
[1331] March 16, 1861.
[1332] To John Bigelow, April 14, 1861. (Bigelow, Retrospections, I, p. 347.)
[1333] April 27, 1861.
[1334] Bunch wrote to Russell, May 15, 1861, that the war in America was the "natural result of the much vaunted system of government of the United States"; it had "crumbled to pieces," and this result had long been evident to the public mind of Europe. (F.O., Am., Vol. 780, No. 58.)
[1335] State Department, Eng., Vol. 77, No. 9. Adams to Seward, June 21, 1861.
[1336] I have made an effort to identify writers in Blackwood's, but am informed by the editors that it is impossible to do this for the period before 1870, old correspondence having been destroyed.
[1337] July, 1861.
[1338] The Atlantic Monthly for November, 1861, takes up the question, denying that democracy is in any sense "on trial" in America, so far as the permanence of American institutions is concerned. It still does not see clearly the real nature of the controversy in England.
[1339] Aug. 17, 1861.
[1340] Sept. 6, 1861. (Mass. Hist. Soc. Proceedings, XLVI, p. 94.)
[1341] Sept. 7, 1861.
[1342] Sept. 14, 1861.
[1343] Motley, Correspondence, II, p. 35. To his mother, Sept. 22, 1861.
[1344] April, 1861.
[1345] Oct., 1861.
[1346] Oct., 1861. Article, "Democracy teaching by Example."
[1347] Nov. 23, 1861.
[1348] Cited by Harris, The Trent Affair, p. 28.
[1349] Robertson, Speeches of John Bright, I, pp. 177 seq.
[1350] Gladstone Papers, Dec. 27, 1861.
[1351] State Dept., Eng., Vol. 78, No. 95. Adams to Seward, Dec. 27, 1861. As printed in U.S. Messages and Documents, 1862-63, Pt. I, p. 14. Adams' emphasis on the word "not" is unindicated, by the failure to use italics.
[1352] Ibid., No. 110. Enclosure. Adams to Seward, Jan. 31, 1862.
[1353] Feb. 22, 1862.
[1354] State Dept., Eng., Vol. 80, No. 206. Adams to Seward, Aug. 8, 1862. Of this period in 1862, Rhodes (IV, 78) writes that "the most significant and touching feature of the situation was that the cotton operative population was frankly on the side of the North." Lutz, Die Beziehungen zwischen Deutschland und den Vereinigten Staaten während des Sezessionskrieges, pp. 49-53, makes an interesting analysis of the German press, showing it also determined in its attitude by factional political idealisms in Germany.
[1355] Palmerston MS., Aug. 24, 1862.
[1356] Aug. 30, 1862.
[1357] October, 1862. "The Confederate Struggle and Recognition."
[1358] Nov. 4, 1862.
[1359] The Index, Nov. 20, 1862, p. 63. (Communication.)
[1360] Anthony Trollope, North America, London, 1862, Vol. I, p. 198. The work appeared in London in 1862, and was in its third edition by the end of the year. It was also published in New York in 1862 and in Philadelphia in 1863.
[1361] The Liberator, March 13, 1863, quoting a report in the New York Sunday Mercury.
[1362] Lord Salisbury is quoted in Vince, John Bright, p. 204, as stating that Bright "was the greatest master of English oratory that this generation--I may say several generations--has seen. I have met men who have heard Pitt and Fox, and in whose judgment their eloquence at its best was inferior to the finest efforts of John Bright. At a time when much speaking has depressed, has almost exterminated, eloquence, he maintained that robust, powerful and vigorous style in which he gave fitting expression to the burning and noble thoughts he desired to utter."
[1363] Speech at Rochdale, Feb. 3, 1863. (Robertson, Speeches of John Bright, I, pp. 234 seq.)
[1364] Bigelow to Seward, Feb. 6, 1863. (Bigelow, Retrospections, I, p. 600.)
[1365] U.S. Messages and Documents, 1863, Pt. I, p. 123.
[1366] State Dept., Eng., Adams to Seward. No. 334. Feb. 26, 1863. enclosing report of the Edinburgh meeting as printed in The Weekly Herald, Mercury and News, Feb. 21, 1863.
[1367] U.S. Messages and Documents, 1863, Pt. I, p. 157.
[1368] Spargo, Karl Marx, pp. 224-5. Spargo claims that Marx bent every effort to stir working men to a sense of class interest in the cause of the North and even went so far as to secure the presence of Bright at the meeting, as the most stirring orator of the day, though personally he regarded Bright "with an almost unspeakable loathing." On reading this statement I wrote to Mr. Spargo asking for evidence and received the reply that he believed the tradition unquestionably well founded, though "almost the only testimony available consists of a reference or two in one of his [Marx's] letters and the ample corroborative testimony of such friends as Lessner, Jung and others." This is scant historical proof; but some years later in a personal talk with Henry Adams, who was in 1863 his father's private secretary, and who attended and reported the meeting, the information was given that Henry Adams himself had then understood and always since believed Marx's to have been the guiding hand in organizing the meeting.
[1369] U.S. Messages and Documents, 1863, Pt. I, p. 162. (Adams to Seward, March 27, 1863.)
[1370] State Dept., Eng., Vol. 82, No. 358. Adams to Seward, March 27, 1863, enclosing report by Henry Adams. There was also enclosed the printed report, giving speeches at length, as printed by The Bee Hive, the organ of the London Trades Unions.
[1371] See ante, p. 132.
[1372] State Dept., Eng., Vol. 82, No. 360. Adams to Seward, April 2, 1863.
[1373] May 5, 1863.
[1374] U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1863, Pt. I, p. 243. Adams to Seward, May 7, 1863.
[1375] Robertson, Speeches of John Bright, I, p. 264. In a letter to Bigelow, March 16, 1863, Bright estimated that there were seven millions of men of twenty-one years of age and upward in the United Kingdom, of whom slightly over one million had the vote. (Bigelow, Retrospections, I, p. 610.)
[1376] July 2, 1863. The editorial was written in connection with Roebuck's motion for mediation and is otherwise interesting for an attempt to characterize each of the speakers in the Commons.
[1377] U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1863, Part I, p. 319. To Seward, July 23, 1863.
[1378] See ante, p. 130, note 2.
[1379] MS. letter, Sept. 8, 1863, in possession of C.F. Adams, Jr.
[1380] Sept. 24, 1863.
[1381] Even the friendly Russian Minister in Washington was at this time writing of the "rule of the mob" in America and trusting that the war, "the result of democracy," would serve as a warning to Europe. (Russian Archives, Stoeckl to F.O., Nov. 29-Dec. 11, 1864, No. 1900.)
[1382] State Dept., Eng., Vol. 84, Nos. 557 and 559. Adams to Seward, Dec. 17, 1863. Adams repeated his advice to "keep out of it."
[1383] Ibid., Vol. 85, No. 587. Adams to Seward, Jan. 29, 1864. Adams here expressed the opinion that it was partly the aristocratic antipathy to Bright that had produced the ill-will to the United States.
[1384] Ibid.
[1385] See Ch. XV.
[1386] The Index, Jan. 28, 1864, p. 58.
[1387] Goldwin Smith, A Letter to a Whig Member of the Southern Independence Association, London, 1864, pp. 14, 68, and 71.
[1388] Leader, Roebuck, p. 299. To William Ibbitt, April 26, 1864.
[1389] Arnold, Mixed Essays, p. 17. N.Y., Macmillan, 1883.
[1390] State Dept., Eng., Vol. 86, No. 709. Adams to Seward, June 9, 1864
[1391] See ante, Ch. XVI.
[1392] Dasent, Delane, II, pp. 135-6. Delane to Dasent, Dec. 25 and 26, 1864. The Times on December 26 pictured Sherman as having escaped to the sea, but on the 29th acknowledged his achievements.
[1393] Lord Acton's Letters to Mary Gladstone, p. 183.
[1394] These were not confined to Great Britain. The American Legation in Berlin received addresses of sympathy from many organizations, especially labour unions. One such, drawn by W. Liebknecht, A. Vogt, and C. Schilling read in part: "Members of the working-class, we need not affirm to you the sincerity of these our sympathies; for with pride we can point to the fact, that, while the aristocracy of the Old World took openly the part of the southern slaveholder, and while the middle class was divided in its opinions, the working-men in all countries of Europe have unanimously and firmly stood on the side of the Union." (U.S. Diplomatic Correspondence, 1865, Pt. IV, p. 500.)
[1395] U.S. Messages and Documents, 1865, Pt. I, p. 417. Adams to Hunter, July 13, 1865.
[1396] Disraeli was less disturbed by this than were other Tory leaders. He had long before, in his historical novels, advocated an aristocratic leadership of democracy, as against the middle class. Derby called the Bill "a leap in the dark," but assented to it.
[1397] Pierce, Sumner, IV, pp. 151-153, summarizes the factors determining British attitude and places first the fear of the privileged classes of the example of America, but his treatment really minimizes this element.
[1398] Goldwin Smith, "The Civil War in America: An Address read at the last meeting of the Manchester Union and Emancipation Society." (Jan. 26, 1866.) London, 1866, pp. 71-75.
[1399] Goldwin Smith, America and England in their present relations, London, 1869, p. 30.