r
the enterprise of our fellow-citizens. We receive from the powers in
that region assurances of good will; and it is worthy of note that a
special envoy has brought us messages of condolence on the death of our
late Chief Magistrate from the Bey of Tunis, whose rule includes the old
dominions of Carthage, on the African coast.

Our domestic contest, now happily ended, has left some traces in our
relations with one at least of the great maritime powers. The formal
accordance of belligerent rights to the insurgent States was
unprecedented, and has not been justified by the issue. But in the
systems of neutrality pursued by the powers which made that concession
there was a marked difference. The materials of war for the insurgent
States were furnished, in a great measure, from the workshops of Great
Britain, and British ships, manned by British subjects and prepared for
receiving British armaments, sallied from the ports of Great Britain to
make war on American commerce under the shelter of a commission from the
insurgent States. These ships, having once escaped from British ports,
ever afterwards entered them in every part of the world to refit, and so
to renew their depredations. The consequences of this conduct were most
disastrous to the States then in rebellion, increasing their desolation
and misery by the prolongation of our civil contest. It had, moreover,
the effect, to a great extent, to drive the American flag from the sea,
and to transfer much of our shipping and our commerce to the very power
whose subjects had created the necessity for such a change. These events
took place before I was called to the administration of the Government.
The sincere desire for peace by which I am animated led me to approve
the proposal, already made, to submit the question which had thus arisen
between the countries to arbitration. These questions are of such moment
that they must have commanded the attention of the great powers, and are
so interwoven with the peace and interests of every one of them as to
have insured an impartial decision. I regret to inform you that Great
Britain declined the arbitrament, but, on the other hand, invited us to
the formation of a joint commission to settle mutual claims between the
two countries, from which those for the depredations before mentioned
should be excluded. The proposition, in that very unsatisfactory form,
has been declined.

The United States did not present the subject as an im