But it is the desire of the Storthing to address an appeal to Your
Majesty, to the Swedish Diet and Nation, to assist in a peaceful
arrangement for the dissolution of the Union, in order to secure
relations of friendship and cooperation between the two peoples of the
Peninsula. From statements made in Sweden, the Storthing finds that the
resolution the Storthing considered it its duty towards the fatherland to
adopt, by declaring the Union between the United Kingdoms to be
dissolved, has, in its form and the manner of carrying it out, been
looked upon as an insult to Sweden. This has never been our intention.
What has now happened and must happen in Norway, was simply done in order
to maintain Norway's constitutional rights. The nation of Norway never
intended an insult to the honour of Sweden.

Your Majesty having on the 27th May declared it impossible to sanction
the unanimous decision of the Storthing to establish a separate Norwegian
Consulate, and as no Norwegian Government could be formed by Your
Majesty, the constitutional situation became out of joint, so dislocated
that the Union could no longer be upheld. The Norwegian Storthing
therefore found the position untenable and was forced to get a new
government for the country. Every other resource was excluded, so much
the more so as the Swedish government of Majesty had already in April
23:rd emphatically refused fresh negotiations, he alternative of which
was the dissolution of the Union, if new regulations for the continuance
of the Union could not be arranged.

The Storthing has already, before hand, stated that the Norwegian people
do not entertain any feelings of bitterness or ill-will towards Your
Majesty and the people of Sweden. Expressions to the contrary which may
possibly on different occasions have been heard, have alone been caused
on the grounds of the displeasure of Norway at her position in the Union.
When the cause of this bitterness and ill-will on account of the
dissolution of the Union has been removed, its effects will also
disappear. A ninety years' cooperation in material and spiritual culture
has inspired in the Norwegian people a sincere feeling of friendship and
sympathy for the Swedish people. The consequences will be, that when
Norway no longer stands in a position so insulting to its national sense
of independence, a friendship will be established that will serve to
confirm and increase the mutual understanding between the two peoples