[
624]
Mr. Harlan in his letter concurs with his associates in the opinion that ‘as a mere commercial transaction the proposed purchase at the price named would have been a great folly;’ that ‘as a naval depot and coaling station
St. Thomas would be of doubtful value to the
United States;’ and ‘as it did not appear to the committee to be specially desirable as a military station, they decided unanimously, I think, not to recommend the ratification of the treaty.’
As to the charge of unjustifiable delay on the part of the committee, he writes:—
In this case the committee were not, I think, dilatory.
Ample but only necessary time was taken to make the necessary investigations and inquiries, and for the interchange of views; and when they decided not to recommend the ratification, it was thought that it would seem less harsh towards the other power to permit the time for exchanging ratifications to expire than to formally reject the proposed Cession.
In relation to the inquiry as to whether the chairman,
Mr. Sumner, acted fairly in the transaction,
Mr. Harlan adds:—
None who ever knew Mr. Sumner could have any doubt on that point.
He was the soul of candor and frankness.
And if he had been disposed to act otherwise in the case referred to, he could not have trifled with the Senate committee on foreign relations as then constituted.
It is perhaps worthy of observation that the Senate appears to have unanimously acquiesced in the views of the committee.
Such is the true version of the ‘diplomatic episode,’ or rather of the diplomatic fiasco, and a final question may be asked: If the acquisition of
St. Thomas was so manifestly desirable as
Miss Seward represents, how does it happen that no one at
Washington or among the people during the twenty years since
Mr. Seward left office has said a word to revive the scheme?
A good thing does not die so easily; there will always be true men and wise men to appreciate what is of enduring value.
We have since had six
Presidents,—Grant,
Hayes,
Garfield,
Arthur,
Cleveland, and
Harrison,—and, not counting
Washburne, five
Secretaries of State,—Fish,
Evarts,
Blaine,
Frelinghuysen, and
Bayard; but none of them has coveted this island of the
Caribbean Sea, rifted by earthquakes, swept by cyclones, and submerged by tidal waves, the imagined centre of universal commerce and a necessary outpost for our national defence!
Journalists and merchants have been alike silent.
Foreign nations who were suspected to be greedy spectators have turned away from the prize.
St. Thomas remains still a Danish spinster, as she has been for two hundred years, unwedded and unsought.
One lone sigh over her continued isolation comes from the namesake of a statesman who saw visions of her fairness and her dowry hidden altogether from the eyes of his own and of this generation.
