แ

WHEN the independence of the Spanish American colonies was established, and Bolivar returned to Lima, he wrote a proclamation of congratulation to his soldiers: "You have given freedom to South America, and a fourth part of the world is the monument of your glory." Almost at the same time and with the same pen he prepared his celebrated circular of December 7, 1824, inviting all the nations of America to send delegates to a conference at Panama. "After fifteen years of sacrifice," he said, "devoted to the liberty of America, to secure a system of guaranties that in peace and war shall be the shield of our new destiny, it is time that the interest and sympathy uniting the American republics should have a fundamental basis that shall perpetuate, if possible, their governments." He proposed a congress of plenipotentiaries from each state "that shall act as a council in great conflicts, to be appealed to in case of common danger, be a faithful interpreter of public treaties, when difficulties shall arise, and conciliate all our differences."

The first nation to accept was, Colombia, then Mexico, Chile, and the others in order, but Bolivar sent no invitation to the United States. He foresaw opposition to such a conference from the slaveholding element in this country, for the principal features in his great plan of future operations were

47

American pat

would have ceived more s stantial assista from the Unit States in th struggle for f

dom. Early in revolution he l declared himself abolitionist, a was one in pract as well as in theo

If he had been p mitted to remain the head of the go

ernment of Color

bia, slavery wou

have been abolish

immediately after the establishment of independence. Whe the new republic of Peru presented him with a million dolla for his services in its behalf, he devoted the money to purcha ing the liberty of a thousand slaves, and in a famous messag to the Congress of Colombia he said:

"There must be no caste on this continent. There is n blood less noble than other blood. All is the same in the sigh of God. All are heroes who enter the camps of the battalion of liberty, and all, whether white or black, are equally entitle to the just recompense of valor, of honor, of intelligence, o sacrifice, and of virtue."

These sentiments did not find favor on the northern continent, and the movements of Bolivar were regarded with apprehension by the public men of the southern portion of the United States. But the governments of Mexico and Colombia asked the United States to send delegates to the proposed conference, and in a message to Congress on the 6th of December, 1825, President John Quincy Adams announced that the invitation had been accepted. The information was not received with approval. On the 26th of the same month, Mr. Adams transmitted another message to Congress in which he explained at length the purpose of the conference, and asserted that "the moral influence of the United States may perhaps be exerted with beneficial consequences at such a meeting, and a decisive inducement with me for according to the measure, is to show by this token of respect to the southern republics, the interest we take in their welfare, and our disposition to comply with their wishes. Having been the first to recognize their independence, and sympathize with them so far as was compatible with our neutral duties in all their struggles and sufferings to acquire it, we have laid the foundation of our future intercourse with them in the broadest principles of reciprocity and the most cordial feelings of fraternal friendship. To extend those principles to all our commercial relations with them, and to hand down that friendship to future ages, is congenial to the highest policy of this Union, as it will be to all those nations and their posterity. In confidence that these sentiments will meet the approval of the Senate, I nominate Richard C. Anderson of Kentucky, and John Sergeant of Pennsylvania, to be envoys extraordinary and ministers plenipotentiary to the assembly of American nations at Panama, and William B. Rochester of New York to be secretary to the mission."

This message was accompanied by a long and able letter

from Henry Clay, then secretary of state, setting forth w he deemed to be the just and proper policy for the Un States to pursue toward the young republics which had b founded upon the same principles and were actuated by same motives that had caused ours to exist. This commun tion and others upon the same subject, which preceded a followed it, were among the ablest public papers from the of Mr. Clay. He had been one of the earliest and most ard advocates of the independence of the Spanish colonies America, and both in Congress and upon the platform duri their entire struggle had demanded, with his well-kno fervor and eloquence, that the sympathy of the people and t government of the United States should not be limited formal words, but should take the form of active co-operati with money, and arms, and men. His speeches on this subje are among the most brilliant examples of his eloquence, and was largely due to his eloquence that this government w persuaded to recognize the belligerent rights of the Spanis colonists during the war, and their independence as nation when their victory was finally achieved. As early as 1818 h declared himself in favor of the establishment of "a huma freedom league" in America, in which all the people "from Hudson's Bay to Cape Horn should be united for defens against the crowned despots of Europe." He declared tha through the power of example, as well as by its moral influ ence, the United States should take an active part in promoting the liberty of the American people, "until the American hemisphere should become a haven for freedom and for the lovers of freedom, and a union of republics would be formed upon the soil that was wet with the blood of patriots"; and he regarded the Congress at Panama as "the boundary stone of a new epoch in the world's history."

The zeal and eloquence of Mr. Clay were not without their

effect upon the cooler temperament of President Adams, who in subsequent messages to Congress continued to advocate participation by the United States in the Panama Congress. He expressed a doubt whether "such a favorable opportunity for subserving the benevolent purposes of Divine Providence" and "dispensing the promised blessings of the Redeemer of mankind" would ever again in centuries be offered to this government.

But the opposition of the slaveholding element in Congress and the Southern States was equally determined. The slaveholders saw in the Congress at Panama peril to their "peculiar institution," and resisted every form of foreign policy that might point directly or indirectly to its destruction. In the invitations to the Congress Hayti had been mentioned, and it was a name of ominous sound to the slaveholding aristocracy of the United States. The story of the successful negro revolution on that island was read with apprehension through the entire South, and, as Hayne, the eloquent orator of

South Carolina declared, "furnished. an example fatal to our repose." "Those governments," he said, al

luding to the South

American Repub

lics, "have pro

DOM

claimed the principles of liberty and equality, and have marched to victory under the banner of universal emancipation. You find men of color at the head of their armies, in their legislative halls, and in their executive departments."