§ MR. D. GRIFFITHsaid, he wished to ask the noble Lord the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether the British Consul at Rio has exercised his authority to prevent a certain contract for the sale of slaves in Brazil, by the directors of a British Mining Company in that country, to one Santos, from being carried into effect, although such sale professed to be 586 under the sanction of the decision of a British Court of Law; and whether or not it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to support him in that course?
§ LORD JOHN RUSSELLsaid he thought that this question had arisen from a misapprehension of the real facts of the case. At the end of the year 1857, Her Majesty's Consul at Rio informed the Government that there was an intention of selling the slaves of the Imperial Brazilian Mining Association to a merchant of Brazil, named Santos, and asked whether such a transaction would be legal. The Government referred this question to the law officers of the Crown. It depended upon the construction of two statutes, one the 5th of George IV., which made the sale of slaves felony, and another an Act passed in the year 1843, permitting the sale of slaves then in the possession of persons claiming to be their owners. The point, however, arose whether children born since 1843, not having been slaves at that time, could legally be sold. The law officers of the Crown were of opinion that they could not, and that the selling them by British subjects would be a felony. They added that although if the persons remained in Brazil they might be free from the penalty of the English law, yet if they landed on British ground, or went on board a British vessel, they might be prosecuted for a felony. They intimated, moreover, that it was desirable that this opinion should be known to the parties concerned. It was accordingly transmitted to Her Majesty's Minister at Rio, who informed the Consul, who by his direction communicated to these persons that they would, in certain cases named, be liable to the punishment of felony. The consul did not pretend to prevent the sale, or to interfere with their proceedings. He only gave them warning of the penalty to which they would be subject. He (Lord J. Russell) conceived that his conduct had been perfectly right, and that no objection could be taken to the course which he pursued.