of the 21st of November the subject of careful consideration, and regrets that he has not been able to arrive at the same conclusion. The right of unhindered written intercourse between a government and its diplomatic representative, especially so far as concerns the government to which he is accredited, is in itself undisputed. But this right may come in conflict with rights which of themselves are also beyond dispute; as for instance in the case where a State, to guard against contagious disease, subjects travelers and papers to a quarantine. So, too, in war. The universal and imperative right of self-protection, of which war is itself the expression, may come in conflict with the diplomatic privileges, which, just because privileges, are, in doubtful case, subject not to an enlarging, but to a contracting interpretation. A precedent where a government has transformed its permanent seat into a strong fortress, and has in consequence been exposed, with the envoys accredited to it, to a long siege is certainly not to be found, so far as known, in modern history, nor can indeed it well occur, since Paris is, of modern capitals, the only fortress; and, in earlier times, when every city was fortified, and sieges of cities in which a government had its seat could occur more frequently, standing embassies were not yet established. If the writers on public law concede to the diplomatic representatives of neutral states, rights as against a belligerent power, they do so only while, at the same time coupling therewith the right to regulate the correspondence of such persons with a besieged town, according to military exigencies. Vattel says: "Elle (la guerre) permet d'ôter à l'ennemi toutes ses ressources, d'empecher qu'il ne puisse envoyer ses ministres pour solliciter des secours. Il est même des occasions où l'on peut refuser le passage aux ministres des nations neutres qui voudraient aller chez l'ennemi. On n'est point obligé de souffrir qu'ils lui portent peut-être des avis salutaires, qu'ils aillent concerter avec lui les moyens de l'assister, etc. Cela ne sonffre nul doute par exemple, dans le cas d'une ville assiégée. Aucun droit ne peut autoriser le ministre d'une puissance neutre ni qui que ce soit à y entrer malgré l' assiégeant, mais pour ne point offenser les souverains, il faut leur donner de bonnes raisons du refus que You fait de laisser passer leurs ministres, et ils doivent s'en contenter s'ils prétendent demeurer neutres." What is true of ministers will be all the more so of messengers and dispatches. Other authorities go still further. Merlin, cited with assent by Wheaton, makes the privileges of a minister, who in time of peace passes through the territory of a third state, subject to the consent of the latter to the transit. Without this permission, express or by acquiescence, the minister is to be regarded as an ordinary traveler. The military necessity of cutting off a besieged town from outside intelligence appears a sufficient ground for subjecting to control, in a military point of view, the correspondence of diplomatic persons remaining in the town in its transit through territory ocenpied by the besiegers, and temporarily subject to their war sovereignty. It is not perceived that these persons are thereby treated as enemies, nor that they are thereby prevented from continuing neutral, nor that wars are thereby indefinitely prolonged. On the contrary, the end of a war is all the sooner to be expected the more strictly the isolation of the hostile capital is carried out. Its termination would be indefinitely distant if every one of the diplomatic persons in a besieged capital, and their number may be very considerable, could require that so often as he had to send a communication to his government, or expected one from it, the activity of the besiegers should be stayed. The undersigned requests the envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of the United States, Mr. George Bancroft, to acquaint his Government with this communication, and takes occasion to renew to him the assurance of his most distinguished consideration. VON BISMARCK. No. 186.1 No. 160. Mr. Bancroft to Mr. Fish. AMERICAN LEGATION, Berlin, February 1, 1871. (Received February 28.) SIR: The capitulation of Paris will, it is here universally believed, lead to the establishment of peace. The terms will include Metz. Germany is determined to rely for its security against future aggression from France on a safe military line of defense. If it obtains the boundary which it requires, peace between the two peoples can hardly be broken for a century. The minister from Switzerland tells me to-day that eighty thousand of the troops of Bourbaki have escaped from before the Germans into the neutral territory of Switzerland. This is the fourth French army that has been brought to ruin since the capture of the late Emperor at Sedan, and military power, and with it military influence, are now so completely crushed in France that the constituent assembly which is to be convened at Bordeaux will, in proceeding to form a new constitution, be entirely free from the control or influence of the army. In that convention I cannot but hope that the late anti-republican usurpation will receive its proper rebuke, and that the more reasonable and better instructed statesmen of France may assist to found a republic on principles analogous to our own. With regard to Germany, present appearances indicate that, after the close of this war, it will devote itself exclusively to the employments of peace. Compared with the great objects of this war, which involved the question of national existence, all conceivable causes for a future war will appear trivial and indifferent. This war has carried sorrow into almost every family, alike into the houses of that class from which the officers are chiefly taken, and those of the poor. Two hundred of the students of Konigsberg University are serving for the most part in the ranks, and the other universities have contributed to the army in the same proportion, so that for the future no motive to war that is likely to occur can seem worthy of a repetition of equal sacrifices. Indeed, people of every degree long for peace, and long for its continuance. I am, therefore, of the opinion that Germany in the coming years will devote its immense energies to the improvement of its laws, the establishment of its liberties, and the development of its great re sources. The relations between our own country and the new empire are happily those of reciprocal good will and amity. The heart of the German people at the beginning of the war turned with affectionate confidence toward America. This warmth of feeling was somewhat chilled by the exportations of the munitions of war from America to France, but the minister here has been just to our government, knowing well the condition of our laws and our treaty stipulations with Prussia in regard to traffic in contraband articles of war, established on our part by Franklin, John Adams, and Jefferson, in the days of Frederick the Great, and renewed by John Quincy Adams, and again by Henry Clay, during the reign of the father of the present King, and continued in force to the present day. I remain, &c., No. 161. GEO. BANCROFT. No. 188.] Mr. Bancroft to Mr. Fish. AMERICAN LEGATION, Berlin, February 6, 1871. (Received March 3.) SIR: I have not failed to continue the inquiries made proper by your telegram of January 16, respecting the interruptions to the communication of Mr. Washburne with his Government. I receive the most unequivocal assertions here at each of the departments of the ministry of the willingness and desire for the prompt transmission of Mr. Washburne's pouch from London to Paris. I observed in the columns of a late French newspaper, published in Paris, the assertion as of a well-known fact, that Mr. Washburne received his dispatches, letters, and newspapers, &c., once a week. My own letters to him appear to have reached him regularly except on one single occasion. The note of Count Bismarck, of January 15, which I lately forwarded to you, states unequivocally that Mr. Washburne's intercourse with the Government is free and uninterrupted. I have heard of no delay but on one occasion; but the unvarying declarations of this government from all its departments preclude the idea that the delay was intentional on their part. The government here has been kept fully informed of the manner in which Mr. Washburne has discharged his duties as protector of the Germans, and has uniformly expressed to me its warm and grateful sense of his assiduousness and fidelity. Berlin, February 6, 1871. (Received March 3.) SIR: I have received your No. 281 of January 17, and its inclosures. I share your regret that this government should have revoked its declaration exempting private property on the high seas from seizure, but American navigation has very little to apprehend from that revocation, for this government is bound by the principle that free ships make free goods, so that French property on board American ships, unless contraband of war, will remain perfectly safe. As it regards contraband of war, this government is fully aware of the stipulations with regard to it made originally with the full approval of Frederick the Great by John Adams, Franklin, and Jefferson, on our part, renewed in 1799, in a treaty signed by John Quincy Adams, and indefinitely continued by the treaty negotiated by Henry Clay. I am, therefore, persuaded that everything will be carefully avoided which could give us ground of complaint. Indeed, it may be a question whether the revocation of the declaration does in any way affect the navigation of the United States, since the declaration neither revoked nor impaired the treaty obligations of the two countries. Meantime Paris has surrendered, and the protocol and convention of surrender, of which I inclose official copies, partake of the character of a political national act. All accounts that are received here tend to confirm the general opinion that this convention, made with the government of the national defense at Paris, will be followed by peace. Pray give no credence to the conditions of peace reported in English newspapers, under the real or pretended authority of telegrams. They are in many respects purely fictitious. But so far as relates to a cession of territory, I inclose to you a map published by the German post-office department, and which, therefore, may be regarded in some measure as authentic and official. The part of Alsace and Lorraine of which it appears the cession will be required, is marked on the Swiss side with a line of blue, on the French side by a line of blue and red. The cession is one which it will be very hard, if not impossible, for the French to make. The Germans plead that, square mile for square mile, the territory to be ceded is exactly of the same extent as that which France, in 1859, required from Italy, so that, as to square miles, France would be of exactly the same contents as by the treaty of 1815. With regard to Metz, I hear it sometimes said that Luxemburg was the proper defense of Germany on that side against France; that so late as 1867, Germany, rather than engage in a war with France, consented to give up that fortress and retire from Luxemburg, surrendering a German territory, in old times a part of the empire, and since 1815 a part of the German Union, entirely to the King of Holland. I do not suffer myself to express any opinions on these questions, and hardly to form any. My object is simply to keep the Department accurately informed on questions as they arise. Berlin, February 23, 1871. (Received March 15.) SIR The expectation of immediate peace continues, though the moment of decision is awaited not without anxiety, and troops are still going forward that every contingency may be provided for. The progress of the negotiations will reach you by way of London sooner than I can report it, even by telegraph from Berlin. To understand the condition of France, it is only necessary to note the course of military events by which Gambetta hoped in the month of January to establish his dictatorship. General Roye with his army, supported by troops from Havre, was to drive the Germans from Rouen. General Faidherbe was to cut the connections of the Germans in the Northeast and East. Bourbaki and Garibaldi were, by menacing Belfort, to attract the forces under Prince Frederick Charles; and so the way was to be left open for General Chanzy from Maus to relieve Paris. But General Roye was beaten back with a loss of 12,000, taken prisoners; General Faidherbe, with a like loss of 11,000; Chanzy, 24,000; Bourbaki, 30,000, and more than 80,000 driven into Switzerland. In killed and wounded the loss of these armies, with those who fell in the sorties from Paris, amounted to 41,000; so that, apart from the losses of Garibaldi and the franc-tireurs, France suffered a loss of its active men in the field of about 200,000 outside of Paris, in the month of January alone. Add to this 150,000 troops that surrendered at the capitulation of Paris, without counting the national guard; and it appears that the effective force of France was in the month of January diminished by at least 350,000 men. The loss of the Germans to be set against this was about 10,000. In this way the dictatorship of Gambetta came to an end, and France was driven to the necessity of making conditions of peace which almost seem like a capitulation. Your instructions to No. 293 (except 237) have been received. I remain, &c., GEO. BANCROFT. ! No. 296.] No. 164. Mr. Fish to Mr. Bancroft. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, February 24, 1871. SIR: I have received your No. 183 of the 21st ultimo, accompanied by the original of a letter from Count Bismarck replying to my note of November 21 to Baron Gerolt, and also a translation of the same. I am happy to think that the question discussed in my note, and in Count Bismarck's reply, is no longer one of practical application to any probable occurrences. It is therefore quite unnecessary to consider whether the approach of a hostile force, and its military preparations for the capture of a city which has been for ages the seat of government and the capital of the country, where the political head of that country is and has been established, where its minister of foreign affairs has his office and his archives, where the representatives of other powers have been and are resident, can so convert that city into a military fortress as to apply to it the rules of war applicable to fortresses as distinguished from other towns. Or whether such approach and military demonstratious of a hostile force impose upon the diplomatic representatives of other and neutral states the alternative of abandoning their posts and their duties, or of privation of the right of free and uninterrupted correspondence with their government, which public law, no less than international comity, accords in the interest of peace. I inclose herewith copies of a correspondence between Mr. Washburne and Count Bismarck on the subject of the transmission of Mr. Washburne's dispatches. You will observe that in this correspondence Count Bismarck, under date of January 15, admits that the delay to which the transmission of the correspondence of this Government with its minister in Paris was subjected depended upon the principle adopted by the general staff of the German army, allowing no sealed packages or letters to pass through their lines in either direction without a stoppage of several days, and he cautiously disclaims one act of immediate transmission being taken as a precedent. The President desires to make all proper allowance for the military exigencies which are represented to have led to the withholding and detaining of the official correspondence of the minister, and is gratified to receive the recognition in Count Bismarck's letter of 28th January to Mr. Washburne of the right of correspondence contended for in my note to Baron Gerolt of 21st November last, and his assurance that the delay to which it was subjected proceded from causes which he could not remove. Recent events, it is confidently hoped, have removed the probability of any recurrence of the interruption of free correspondence. And Count Bismarck's assurance to Mr. Washburne that "the delay occurring now and then in the transmission of your dispatch bag is not occasioned by any doubt as to the right of your Government to correspond with you, but by obstacles it was out of my power to remove," confirms this Government in its confidence of an entire agreement between it and North Germany on the question of the right and the inviolability of correspondence between a government and its representative, and of the absence of any intentional interference with that right in the case of its minister to Paris. I send, herewith, a copy of a dispatch of this date to Mr. Washburne. As Count Bismarck's recognition of the right for which I contended in my note to Baron Gerolt is subsequent to his letter to you of 15th |