§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNErose, pursuant to notice, to call attention to the state of our political relations with Brazil, and said, Sir, I feel that some apology is due not only to the House but to the immense commercial interests which are affected—to the owners of Brazilian stock, and to all who are engaged in commercial intercourse with the Empire of Brazil, that some apology is due for my bringing on this subject at the eleventh hour to a fatigued House, exhausted by the labours of the Session. But if the House is exhausted by its labours, I think it is bound to remember the great issues which are at stake in the question of the unsatisfactory relations which have for a long period existed, and which still exist, between this country and the Empire of Brazil. The question is so important that I think even the Chancellor of the Exchequer would do well to interrupt his private conversation, and to listen to what is now going on—because it 1627 materially affects the credit and responsibility of Her Majesty's Ministers, as I will show presently. The case of our relations with Brazil at this moment may be put shortly. I believe the Empire of Brazil is the one isolated example in the civilized world, of a State with which we have numerous transactions of various kinds, with which we have not a single commercial treaty or a treaty of any kind except the Convention of 1826. I hope the House will give me its attention while I state the nature of our transactions with Brazil. I find the commerce carried on between this country and Brazil amounts to not loss than £12,000,000 a year. I find that the Brazilian debt held in this country amounts to nearly £9,000,000. Moreover, there are three English companies engaged in making railways in Brazil, which have guarantees for upwards of £5,000,000 of capital. Added to these three companies are various other companies, composed entirely of Englishmen, and employing English labour, who have undertaken not only to drain the capital but to light the towns, to work the mines, and to perform other operations in that country. There is a numerous English population scattered all over the country, and yet that population is not secured in its property, nor protected in person by any sort of treaty. That fact must at once strike the House as a state of things which is so peculiar that we are entitled to ask how it has been brought about, and why it is allowed to continue by Her Majesty's Government? What is the cause of this entire absence of treaties? The cause, I am unfortunately obliged to say, is to be found in that meddling, mischievous policy which is never content unless it is interfering with small States and subjecting them to insult and to injustice. That policy in the case of Brazil has not only been tyrannical towards her, but has been mischievous in its effects upon England. Without going into a history of all our transactions with Brazil, I may say that there can be no doubt that from 1822 to 1844 Brazil was in such a state, owing to the weakness of her finances and the weakness of her Executive, that the slave trade was carried on to an enormous extent; but I am prepared to maintain that from the period when Brazil became altogether independent, the policy of that empire has been essentially anti-slave-trade. A very remarkable fact occurs by which I will prove that assertion. It is proved by what is called the Convention of 1826. In 1628 that Convention were incorporated the slave treaties we had made with Portugal, whereby the right of search was given, and the power of adjudication by mixed Commissions. But besides that there was a most unexampled provision in that Convention—one which, I believe, was never introduced in any slave trade treaty with any other Power. It is that stipulation which is at the bottom of all the bad feeling which has been generated in Brazil towards us. By that provision, if Brazilian citizens were found to be engaged in the slave trade, the Brazilian Government engaged to treat them as guilty of piracy. Such a provision exists in no other treaty, but the Brazilians yielded that concession to us, and proved by adhering to it that their policy was anti-slavery, and in utter opposition to the traffic in slaves. That provision was in force from March, 1830, to March, 1845, when be strong was the public feeling in Brazil against our exercise of the right of search—which had been tremendously abused by the English Government—so great was the public discontent that the Government of Brazil was forced to give it up, and to notify to the English Government that the adoption of the Portuguese treaties, as far as they were applicable to Brazil, must cease. The English Government accepted that notice, and the arrangement terminated in 1845, and then no other stipulation remained but the first article of the Convention of 1826. Lord Aberdeen's Government was then, I believe, in power. And here let me say that, in speaking of Lord Aberdeen, I can never do so in this House or elsewhere without doing justice to his intrinsic probity, his honesty, and his good intentions. Lord Aberdeen was induced to get the Parliament of that date to pass an Act, the 8 & 9 Vict. c. 122, called the Aberdeen Act. That Act authorized British cruisers to seize Brazilian ships upon suspicion of being employed in the slave trade, and to carry them before British Vice Admiralty Courts for condemnation. That must strike the House as a most extraordinary provision. That provision, however, was extensively put in force. Innumerable vessels were seized and were sent before the Vice Admiralty Court at St. Helena—acts which naturally produced a very bad feeling in Brazil against this country. When that Act was discussed in this House, who was the man who spoke loudest against it? The man who more than any other 1629 opposed the Act was a man who had been Attorney General, and who afterwards became Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and ultimately Lord High Chancellor—Sir Thomas Wilde. He said, in effect, that so illegal, so monstrous was the Act that it was impossible England could ever inflict it upon any country but one which was unable to resist. That was the opinion of Sir Thomas Wilde, the Lord High Chancellor of the Whig Government. Another great Whig ornament of the House also spoke loudly against the Act, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Milner Gibson). I wish he would now bring his influence to bear upon his noble Friend at the head of the Government, and would now use those glowing words which he used on that former occasion. If he would do that he would be doing much towards restoring amicable relations between this country and Brazil. That right hon. Gentleman not only resisted that measure, but he brought forward an express Motion and divided the House upon it. At that period large cargoes of slaves were being landed in Brazil. If at that time he thought the Act was unjust, what does the right hon. Gentleman say now, when, as I will show, the slave trade is extinct? and how can he reconcile it to himself to sit cheek by jowl with the noble Lord who insists upon retaining that Act? But Lord Aberdeen never meant that Act to be permanent. We have had so much of blue-books lately that I will not trouble the House by making many references, but I must refer to one despatch. When Lord Aberdeen notified the passing of this Act to the Brazilian Government, what did he say? In a despatch dated the 2nd of June, 1845, Lord Aberdeen said—
Her Majesty's Government are far from wishing this mode of adjudicating vessels shall be permanent. They will be ready, as soon as any measures of the Brazilian Government shall enable them to do so, to recommend to Parliament to repeal the Act.That was an express pledge given to the Brazilian Government that if they then adopted measures tending to the extinction of the slave trade, Parliament should be invited to repeal the Act as soon as the circumstances justified such a course. I think even the noble Lord will not deny that that was an express promise. Brazil received this Act—a weak State—a State which could be experimentalized upon by 1630 the policy of the noble Lord, having no navy and no means of defence. What could Brazil do? It did all it could do. It protested against this Act as an infraction of the law of nations—and in that the Brazilians were fortified by the opinion of Sir Thomas Wilde—and they refused altogether to enter into any commercial treaty with this country until that Act was repealed. The protest was treated as all protests are by our Government from States which have not Armstrong guns to enforce them. Not content with the Act as hitherto carried out by our cruisers, who had only attacked Brazilian vessels which were suspected when they were found on the high seas on the coast of Brazil, the noble Lord in 1850 actually ordered our cruisers to carry their operations still further, and to do an act which he believed had never been done before under similar circumstances—he ordered them to invade Brazilian ports and to cut out the suspected vessels even when in the Brazilian ports and waters. This system continued for two years; and this measure created the greatest ill feeling in Brazil towards the English. Did we succeed by what I will term this legislative piracy in stopping the slave trade? The feeling of the Brazilians was very strong against the slave trade—for I beg to call the attention of the House to the fact, that that trade was carried on not by the Brazilians themselves but by foreign capitalists and adventurers, chiefly Americans, Spaniards, and Portuguese, but in some instances—at least, so it has been whispered—by Liverpool merchants. The Brazilians, however, were so much disgusted with the meddling policy of this country towards them that, instead of supporting us by measures in their Chamber, they took no steps to aid in putting down the slave trade. Subsequently, however, the greatest exertions were made by the Brazilian Government to put down the traffic, and with such success that even the noble Lord now at the head of the Government wrote as follows to Lord Howden, our Ambassador at Madrid, on the 15th of May, 1851, enclosing a copy of the Brazilian laws, and holding up Brazil as an example to the Spanish and Portuguese Governments. These are the noble Lord's words—No reasonable doubt can be now entertained, that if this same system is energetically pursued for another twelve months the slave trade to the Brazils will be almost entirely extinguished.1631 So great were the exertions of the Brazilian Government, and so great their success, that in April, 1852, I find that Lord Malmesbury, then our Foreign Minister, withdrew the order for British cruisers to enter the Brazilian ports and waters, which was given by the noble Lord in 1850; and I must say that the conduct of Lord Malmesbury, at all events, in connection with his management of our affairs with Brazil, reflected great credit upon him, although it has been the fashion of hon. Members sitting upon the Ministerial side of the House to cast much abuse upon him. In consequence of that order British cruisers ceased to invade Brazilian ports and waters, and a better state of things soon arose. The Brazilian Chambers, sensible of the kindness and conciliating disposition by which the conduct of the noble Earl had been dictated, redoubled their efforts to suppress the slave trade. In 1853, a Committee, the Chairman of which, I believe, was the late Mr. Hume, and on which were the hon. Baronet the Member for Droitwich (Sir John Pakington) and the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn (Lord Stanley), came to the conclusion that it would be right, in consequence of the great exertions of the Brazilian Government for the suppression of the traffic, to consider the propriety of repealing an Act which was still regarded as so obnoxious. Since 1852, so successful has been the policy of the Brazilian Government, in consequence of the measures carried by Lord Malmesbury and the conciliating tone of the noble Lord's despatches, that the slave trade had virtually ceased by 1856. I think there were only two attempts to run slave cargoes between those years. One of those cases occurred, I believe, in 1852, when an English ship was taken by a Brazilian cruiser in Brazilian waters. The captain and crew of that ship were severely punished, and all the slaves liberated. But there was still another case which I know will be adduced, and to which, as I wish to avoid nothing, I will refer. In 1853 a ship containing 250 Africans was taken by a Brazilian cruiser, but forty-seven of the Africans were stolen. This fact caused a great outcry, and all the missing slaves, with the exception of about sixteen, were ultimately captured. Since the year 1856, I am prepared to prove on undoubted authority, that no slave has been run on the coast of Brazil, and that the slave trade there is entirely extinct. I will give a 1632 short quotation upon this point, for I do not like to make a statement of this nature without fortifying it by high authority, and what authority can be higher upon the subject than the opinion of the noble Lord the First Minister of the Crown? On the 5th of June, 1856, the noble Lord said—The slave trade might be regarded as extinct in Brazil, for though attempts had been made to revive it, they had not been attended with much success. There was generally evinced throughout the Brazils a spirit of determined hostility to the revival of the traffic.Since that period the Brazilian Government have passed law after law; and, what is more, have attempted to enforce them in the strictest manner possible. It is a curious fact that not a single slave was employed in the construction of the 200 miles of railway made by English companies in Brazil. Moreover, I must say to his honour, the Prince de Joinville, who married a Portuguese Princess, is most decidedly opposed to the trade, and by his exertions and the spirit of the Portuguese Government, free labour has almost superseded slave labour. The whole of his estates are colonized by Germans, and, I believe, by a great many Swedes. The slave trade in Brazil has thus of late years received a blow from which, I think, it can never recover. What has been the conduct of this House in reference to this traffic? It was not too much to expect that the House would, with the extinction of the slave traffic, repeal the obnoxious Act of 1845—an Act which the Brazilians regarded as unjust and insulting; but the House did nothing of the kind. The House has been content to wait year after year, and to leave our enormous trade without protection. We have witnessed several abortive attempts on the part of several Governments to enter into treaties with Brazil, and both Lord Clarendon and Earl Russell have made ineffectual attempts in that direction. The Brazilians absolutely refused to enter into any treaty with us unless the Act of 1845 were repealed. And yet that Act still remains upon the statute-book, irritating public opinion in Brazil, doing incalculable mischief to our trade, and making our policy a byword among nations. Now I will call the attention of the House to the occurrences of last year, which I think ought to be taken into consideration. We all remember the case of the Forte, and the severe reprisals which were made upon the Brazilians by a 1633 British squadron. That case was referred to the general arbitrator in the disputes of nations, the King of the Belgians, who in June, 1863, gave his decision to the effect that the British officers were altogether in the wrong.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONNot altogether.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEDo you contradict it?
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONYes.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEWell, really, the noble Lord has the face to contradict anything. I did not expect that the statement would be contradicted, for, if I have read that award aright, the King of the Belgians said that the British officers were wrong, and that some amends ought to be made to the Brazilian Government. I can only wish that I had provided myself with the despatch, for the denial of the noble Lord shows how careful one ought to be. At any rate the decision was not in our favour. That, at least, the noble Lord will not gainsay, although he may, possibly, be able to get off upon a quibble of words. Well, there was another case. I find that in 1859 the British cruisers captured and retained a steamer belonging to the Republic of Paraguay, which was taken in the River La Plata. The whole affair was carefully kept secret until I asked whether any apology had been made. It was denied that any apology had been made; but the fact is that in 1862 Mr. Dorian, the British Chargé d'Affaires in that part of the world, was empowered to apologize to the Republic of Paraguay for the affront which had been offered to their steamer. I believe this to have been the first apology ever made by the noble Lord, and as such it is very curious, and deserves to be recorded in letters of gold. I have not the despatch by me, but I do not think that this will be denied. An apology was offered to the Government of Paraguay; but up to the present time no concession has been made in respect to the case of the Forte to the Brazilian Government. Do you dispute that? The Under Secretary has been rather unfortunate in his contradictions to me. He contradicted me in a previous debate, and he has not vacated his office yet. We have had incidental debates on this subject before, and after the question has been referred to Portuguese mediation I cannot understand why irritating and offensive language should be used by Her Majesty's Government. 1634 What must be the feeling of the noble Lord at the Foreign Office when he became aware of the use of such language. On the 8th of February, 1861, the noble Lord the Foreign Minister wrote to Mr. Christie—
I think it right to observe for your information and guidance that, as the Government of Brazil have of late acted in perfect good faith in regard to the suppression of the slave trade, it would be advisable in any communications which you may have on this question of the emancipated negroes, to avoid as much as possible any discussions which may tend to continue the feeling of irritation which has so long existed in the public mind in Brazil against this country in reference to the slave trade.That being the despatch of 1861, how can the irritating and improper language used in 1864 be reconciled with those expressions, and I should like to know whether the Portuguese Government would continue their mediation in the face of such language? Perhaps I may be contradicted in that, but I have information in my pocket which defies contradiction—and it may be that I am in a position to give some information to the Foreign Office, which is at once ignorant and insolent. What has been the policy of the Brazilian Government with regard to the emancipados? By a decree of 1858, the Brazilian Government altogether forbade any emancipated negroes to be appropriated to private individuals. None of these negroes could be apprenticed, except under the Government. The adoption of that step was most material. It has been denied that any of those men were really emancipated; but I have the Report of the Minister of Justice to the Brazilian Chambers, and from that it appears that in 1860–1 200 emancipados were made free; 147 in 1862–3; and 71 down to May, 1864. Yet in the teeth of all this it is denied by the First Minister of the Crown that any satisfaction had been given on these points, or that the Brazilian Government has taken any steps to emancipate these men. I now come to the most extraordinary statement that I have ever heard from the Treasury Bench—and I have heard a great many. It was said, in answer to a question—it looked very much like an arranged thing, and like what is called in the sporting world a "plant"—it was said that there were twenty requirements, without satisfying which no negro could obtain his freedom. I was puzzled to find where the document containing those requirements came from. It is 1635 well known that our agents and Consuls abroad all know the tenor of what the Foreign Office wishes, and Mr. Christie knows the spite of the noble Lord at the head of the Government against Brazil, and was willing to supply him with fuel in this way. On the 3rd of April, 1852, these twenty requirements were forwarded in a despatch from Mr. Christie. But where did he get them from? From any official document? By no means. They are contained in an Opposition newspaper, which is a sort of half Owl and half Punch, and the object of publishing them was to ridicule the law's delays in Brazil. However, Mr. Christie was only too happy to Bee them in the newspaper, cuts them out, and sends them to this country, and the noble Lord the Prime Minister seriously produces them in this House as official. What would the noble Lord say if he saw quoted in the Brazilian Chambers Punch's Essence of Parliament as authentic?—and yet that would be just an analogous proceeding. It is too bad that a nobleman holding the position of First Minister of the Crown, should come down to this House and endeavour to persuade the representatives of the country that that list of twenty requirements was an official Brazilian document, when in fact it was no other than a squib. In sober sadness I ask what is the policy of the noble Lord in regard to Brazil? Is it a hostile policy? Does he wish to worry these unfortunate Brazilians until, like Denmark, they should resist? I really do believe that the best thing they could do would be to show some spirit and resist the Act of 1845, and that would be sufficient to upset the present Ministry and would lead to the repeal of that piece of legislative oppression. It would not be difficult to prove that there has always been an understanding in Brazil that the Act would be repealed. The noble Lord the Prime Minister said the other night that Lord Aberdeen did not repeal the Act in 1852, when he was in office. Why, the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston) was in Lord Aberdeen's Cabinet, and I always understood that he was an awkward colleague to Lord Aberdeen. We all know that, when the noble Lord takes up a thing, he does not lightly leave it off. I have no doubt that Lord Aberdeen would have repealed that Act but for the presence in his Cabinet of the noble Lord. Lord Aberdeen, in the debate on the 17th of June, 1858, said that the Act was so obnoxious to Brazil that it was 1636 called there "the Algerine Act;" that, on its introduction, he had stated that nothing would give him greater pleasure than the arrival of the day when it should be repealed, and he was not sure that the proper time for its repeal had not already arrived: it was, however, for Her Majesty's Government to decide; but the conduct of Brazil in this matter had been such as to entitle that country to much consideration at our hands; and he could only recommend the attention of Her Majesty's Government to the realization of what he promised when he originally introduced the Act. That was Lord Aberdeen's opinion so late as 1858; and although the First Minister of the Crown in 1864 had testified to the extinction of the slave trade to a great extent, and although it had been condemned by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne, yet the obnoxious Act remained upon our statute-book. Surely, using the language of menace and irritation is not the way in which a country like Brazil, no longer in its infancy, should be treated. If we want to get on with any country, we should employ terms of conciliation and not irritation. From the repeal of the Act of 1845 what state of things would result? Brazil would be too happy to enter into a commercial treaty and a postal convention with you on the condition, however, that you remove a stigma from them by repealing the Act of 1845. There could not be a better time than the present for the repeal, because in February of the present year there was a meeting of a new Parliament in Brazil, and I believe it is well known that the temper of that Assembly is such that if you repealed the Act of 1845 they would be ready to grant you anything in the way of commercial freedom. But so long as that Act remains in the statute-book, and so long as language is used in defence of that Act, so long will you have a state of irritation in Brazil, most unfortunate for that nation and most injurious to the commerce of this country.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONSir, while the hon. Gentleman recommends mildness of language—of which he is so great a master—he has not himself used the mildest language in discussing this subject; but it is my intention rather to follow his precepts than to imitate his example. The hon. Gentleman says I am a great hand at denying. I think I may retort upon him that he is a great hand at asserting. I know—every body knows—the source 1637 whence the hon. Gentleman draws his information. [Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE: Where from?] From an active Brazilian agent. [Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE: I deny it.] The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well whom I mean. [Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE: No. What is his name?] He is indebted to an active Brazilian agent—an Englishman, I am sorry to say—who is very ready to supply information—what I think is sometimes incorrect information—to newspapers and others who are willing to undertake the cause of Brazil. I do not blame him, for he is doing his duty and is paid for it; but I only wish that those who adopt his statements in Parliament would take the trouble to be quite sure that what they assert is exactly correct. There was much in the speech of the hon. Gentleman which might provoke me to go into an angry discussion. [Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE: Be provoked then.] Never mind. Her Majesty's Government are now engaged through the Portuguese Government in negotiations, the object of which is to re-establish diplomatic relations between this country and Brazil. I do not think, therefore, that the hon. Gentleman has shown great judgment in endeavouring just at this moment to raise a controversial discussion on the matters to which his speech related. If I were to go into details in reference to his statements, the necessary consequence would be that I should be led to say things which he would again condemn; and thus the controversy would go on. I trust the House will allow that I am better performing my duty in abstaining from entering upon the details which the hon. Gentleman has gone into. As the hon. Gentleman has endeavoured to impress the House with an idea of the disadvantages occasioned to commerce, not only by our present relations with Brazil, but by those which have existed for some time, I will simply state the amount of our exports to and imports from Brazil in a certain period of time. From 1850 to 1852 the imports varied from £2,000,000 to some £2,100,000, and the exports from £2,000,000 to £3,000,000. From I860 to the present time our imports from Brazil have been as follows:—In 1860, £2,200,000; 1861, £2,600,000; 1862, £4,400,000; 1863, £4,500,000. I say that that is not a state of things which shows that our commerce is under any disadvantages. Our exports to Brazil have grown not quite in the same degree. 1638 From 1850 to 1852 they amounted to from £2,000,000 to £3,500,000; in 1860 they were £4,500,000; in 1861 they were rather more than £4,500,000; and in 1862–3 they were from £3,700,000 to £3,900,000. Therefore, as far as our commercial intercourse with Brazil is concerned, it cannot be established that it has suffered in consequence of the matters which have, no doubt, occasioned a considerable amount of irritation on the side of the Brazilians, It is quite true that the Brazilian slave trade has ceased since 1852. In the beginning of that year the Brazilian Government passed laws and established regulations which have, I believe, prevented any material importation of slaves into Brazil. But when the hon. Gentleman says there is such a dislike to the slave trade in Brazil, I must remind him that out of a population of 7,500,000 there are 3,000,000 slaves or only 1,000,000 short of the number in the Southern States of America. There are 10,000 emancipados. [Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE: There are more.] Then that tells still more against the hon. Gentleman, and at the rate at which, according to the hon. Gentleman, they are set free, they may be all dead before they are liberated. I must not, however, waste time by going into a controversial discussion with the hon. Gentleman on these subjects. I am anxious that the negotiations now going on should be successful; and I think the House would act wisely if it refrained from debate on this question, and did not allow things to be said on one side or the other which might revive angry feelings, and embarrass the negotiations which the Portuguese Government, with the best motives and in the best spirit, have undertaken to carry on.
§ MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDSir, I do not desire to address the House at any length; but the speech of the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston) which we have just heard is so different in spirit to the one he delivered on a former occasion, that it is necessary I should make a few observations. The noble Lord has appeared in quite a new character, particularly with regard to Brazil. He says that he thinks the House will be of opinion that he will best discharge his duty by avoiding irritating language towards the Brazilian Government. ["Hear, hear!"] And I think that cheer shows the noble Lord that it is the opinion of the House that he will best discharge his duty by using moderate 1639 and courteous language towards that country. I can only express my regret—a regret which I know is shared by many Members—that what the noble Lord feels to be his duty now he did not feel to be his duty on former occasions. What was the language which, within a very short period, the noble Lord used in this House with reference to the Brazilian question? The noble Lord told the House that the conduct of the Brazilian Government was flagrant, disgraceful, and flagitious; and the noble Lord went on to say that, instead of giving merit to the Brazilian-Government for any efforts on their part to put down the slave trade, it was only under the fear of the Aberdeen Act that the slave trade was not carried on now. The noble Lord refused on that occasion to give the slightest credit to the Brazilian Government, for what all the world acknowledges to have been most noble and praiseworthy conduct in their efforts to suppress the slave trade. The noble Lord may laugh, but that is an opinion which has been expressed by some of those who are as anxious to put down the slave trade, and who are as good friends of the negro as the noble Lord himself. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Liskeard (Mr. B. Osborne) has quoted the opinion of Lord Truro; I quoted the other day the opinion of Lord Aberdeen; and I ask the noble Lord if he has not read that Lord Brougham said the other night, in another place, that the Brazilian Government were worthy of all praise, and had met with the success they deserved. And yet the noble Lord thinks he is performing his duty and is using moderate language when he uses the terms, flagrant, flagitious, and disgraceful towards the Brazilian Government. [VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I did not use the word flagitious.] The noble Lord did not confine his courtesies of language only to the Brazilian Government, because he told me that it argued great ignorance on my part that I did not know the contents of the document to which he referred. The hon. Member for Liskeard has already referred to that document; and what is it? It now appears that it was a squib from an opposition newspaper, which was cut out by our Chargé d'Affaires, and sent home to the noble Lord. It has never been laid on the table of the House, but it has appeared in a blue-book which is never distributed to Members. And this unauthentic document is that upon which the noble Lord, in the exercise of his courteous lan- 1640 guage towards Members on this side of the House, says is a mark of the grossest ignorance on my part that I did not know it. I have a number of statements, not derived, as the noble Lord says, from Brazilian sources, but from our own blue-books, which show that the Brazilian Government have the greatest difficulties to contend with in dealing with the emancipados. The country is extensive and the plantations are separated by vast distances, and the emancipados having been located in old times upon the plantations, there is great difficulty in getting an account of them. It is evident, however, that the Brazilian Government are making every effort in their power to get the negroes set free. In 1861 Mr. Christie mentioned that in one district letters of emancipation were being granted to the blacks in large numbers, and added, "This I know to be true;" also, that in the very last year the Brazilian Government had been exerting themselves in the most praiseworthy manner in reference to the emancipados, and had set free a great many employed in the Government establishments. And I defy Her Majesty's Government to show that the Brazilian Government has not exhibited a most anxious desire to use every effort to carry into effect the stipulation with reference to their freeing the emancipados. I will not detain the House longer, but I could not help congratulating the noble Lord on the new course which he has adopted, and I hope he will continue to think that he will best discharge his duty by using moderate language to other countries, and that it will not be inconsistent with his duty not to use offensive language towards those who sit opposite to him.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, he did not reproach the hon. Gentleman with not knowing the contents of the document referred to and laid on the table of the House last year. What he meant was, that the hon. Gentleman having been in the Foreign Office must have known the general conduct of the Brazilian Government in respect to the emancipados, and that frequent applications had been made to them for lists, which we have not been able to obtain.
§ MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDsaid, he did not know it. It never came before him in the shape the noble Lord had put it.
§ SIR HUGH CAIRNSsaid, he could not allow the discussion to close without expressing his regret at another point in the speech of the noble Lord. The noble Lord said the statistics he had read showed 1641 that the commerce of the country had suffered but little, if at all, from the interruption of diplomatic relations with Brazil. He was sorry to find that the Government entertained that opinion, for he feared it would lead them to take very little trouble to get diplomatic relations renewed. Prom communications with persons engaged in commerce between England and Brazil, he knew that traders laboured under constant and serious apprehension with regard to the risks to which their property—amounting to three or four millions sterling—was exposed in Brazil from the want of that protection which British commercial interests enjoyed in every other country, and that they stated in the most decided manner their conviction that the renewal of diplomatic relations would be followed by a considerable expansion of commerce. He trusted, therefore, that the Foreign Office would endeavour to ascertain whether or not this was a delusion under which the Government laboured. He pronounced it an utter and complete delusion. He was quite aware that the noble Lord could point to the Returns, showing the increase of imports and exports but could the noble Lord contradict what he had stated—that the merchants were filled with apprehension in regard to their property, and that they said the exports could be, perhaps, doubled if commerce received due protection? He would give the noble Lord another instance which was worthy of his attention. In this country our merchants had at this moment claims against the Brazilian Government to the extent of several hundred thousand pounds. No person ever disputed the justice of those claims, and an attempt had been made to adjust them by means of a mixed Commission. Her Majesty's Government had repeatedly said that there ought to be means provided for repaying to the subjects of this country the claims to which they were justly entitled; yet, from the bad terms on which they were with the Brazilian Government, they had utterly failed in obtaining a satisfactory adjustment. He could tell Her Majesty's Government also, from his own personal communications with merchants in this country who were interested in the question, that they had long since ceased to importune the Foreign Office with regard to the resumption of diplomatic relations, simply because they were convinced of the inveterate and determined hostility felt by the noble Lord and the Foreign Office to the Government of Brazil, And he must say 1642 that when they heard such language as was heard in that House not many days ago from the noble Lord, that impression on the part of the merchants of this country must necessarily be confirmed. Reference had been made by the hon. Gentleman who introduced the discussion (Mr. B. Osborne) to the Aberdeen Act as being the primary and chief cause of the bitter feeling existing between this country and Brazil. In his (Sir Hugh Cairns) opinion, the causes of the rupture of diplomatic relations were these two—the Aberdeen Act and the language of the noble Lord. The noble Lord had not ventured that evening to say a word on the subject of the Aberdeen Act. As a question of international law, it was impossible to look at that Act without feelings of unmitigated amazement. He firmly believed that there was not a country in the world of whose strength we had any reason to be afraid against whom we should ever have ventured to direct such a measure. How was it that that Act happened to pass? It was because Sir Robert Peel brought it in under the sanction of his Government, and because the noble Lord who was then in Opposition supported it, and thu3 neutralized the opposition which would otherwise have been raised to it. But what did Sir Robert Peel say with reference to it? Did any one wish to know the history and merits of the Act? Let them read the short debate which took place upon the subject of that Act in 1845, and they would find that Sir Robert Peel said he felt that it was a most extreme and even extraordinary measure. He stopped the progress of it for some days in order that he might consider whether the objections made by Sir Thomas Wilde could be answered. He then said—
It seems a very strong measure indeed for us to legislate for Brazilian subjects; and although we have the Treaty of 1826, which stipulates that the slave trade shall be deemed to be piracy on the part of Brazil, we will not venture, in our legislation, to deal with the persons and lives of Brazilian subjects, but will only deal with their property." [3 Hansard, lxxxii. 1071.]He (Sir Hugh Cairns) would like to know what right had we to deal with their property any more than with their lives? If the argument was worth a rush, the stipulation in the treaty that the trade should be piracy, if it gave this country the power of dealing with it by its municipal laws as piracy, gave it the power of dealing with the lives of those engaged in it just as much as with their property. The vice of the Act was at once shown, and condemna- 1643 tion branded upon it by these expressions. Let any one read the speech of the Attorney General of that day, who attempted to defend the measure, and say whether there was one word in his speech which answered the objections of Sir Thomas Wilde. In fact, the treaty was a stipulation between two countries that it should not be lawful for the subjects of the Emperor of Brazil to be concerned in carrying on the slave trade; but what did that mean? Did it mean that a foreign country was to pass laws to punish the subjects of another country as they thought fit? All that the Government of Brazil said was that they would have municipal laws passed in their own Legislature to punish their own subjects within their own jurisdiction. [Viscount PALMERSTON: Read what follows.] The words that followed did not alter the case in the least. All that was said was that it should not be lawful for the subjects of the Emperor of Brazil to be concerned in carrying on the slave trade under any pretence, and that carrying it on by any person who was a subject of His Imperial Majesty should be deemed and treated as piracy. But by whom was it to be so deemed and treated? Not by our Parliament so as to enable us to fix penalties; but it was to be so deemed and treated by the Brazilian Government, who if they had not power to punish it as piracy, could go to the Legislature and obtain that power. He again repeated that there was not a nation which would not have said, and said most truly, that this was a flagrant attempt to infringe the independence of its Legislature and its Sovereignty, and it would have been resented on that account.
§ MR. NEWDEGATEsaid, he rose to do an act of justice to Mr. Christie, our Minister at Brazil, who had been spoken of in terms of reprobation by the hon. Member for Liskeard.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEI beg pardon. I said he was universally unpopular in Brazil.
§ MR. NEWDEGATEsaid, the hon. Member had stated that Mr. Christie had somehow or other been provided for in this country. Now, whatever Mr. Christie derived from this country he had earned by honest service. But this was not the only act of injustice of which the hon. Member had been guilty. The hon. Member attributed to Mr. Christie having sent home an extract from a Brazilian paper, which had been quoted by the noble Lord at the head of the Government. Mr. Christie 1644 did no such thing. He held in his hand papers, which were accessible to every Member of that House, which showed that the extract in question was sent home by Mr. Elliot, the present Chargeé d'Affaires, subsequent to Mr. Christie's recall. He had not the least wish to impugn the accuracy of the document, or to except to the hon. Member's description of the source whence it was derived, but he was anxious to exonerate Mr. Christie from the blame that had been heaped upon him for having in his diplomatic character sent home that document. He thought the substance of this debate must lead the House at once to understand that Mr. Christie was not likely to meet with justice at the hands of the Brazilian Government. He was sorry to say it appeared that the Government of Brazil were seeking to compel that House to repeal an Act of Parliament by persecuting Englishmen in Brazil. Such was the corruption among the Brazilian Judges that seven of them had been displaced since the difference between England and Brazil had been referred to arbitration, first to the King of the Belgians and now to the King of Portugal. He held in his hand a letter from a high official of the name of Don Jose do Narcimento Silva with reference to the case of a Mr. Reeves, which was under adjudication in Brazil. Mr. Reeves was a claimant—a joint claimant—for a sum of £20,000. With the permission of the House he would read the letter of the eminent person in Brazil to whom he had referred to the Judge who was to try the case. The writer said—
Most Illustrious and Excellent Judge,—Your Excellency is a Judge in the cause in which an Englishman (Reeves) denies the maternity of a lady Deslinda, in order to deprive her of her inheritance from her son, and I am so convinced of the right of this lady that I take the liberty of asking you to vote for her. Read the arguments of Nabuco, compare them with the proofs in the cause, and you will see that what I ask is just. I thank you by anticipation for your kindness, and beg you to give orders to your most affectionate friend, &c.He could multiply proofs of attempts to corrupt the Judges engaged in trying cases between Brazilians and Englishmen. He hoped that the result of this discussion would be to show to the House that if harsh measures appeared to have been used towards Brazil it must be borne in mind that Brazil had been persecuting English subjects, and had refused to answer the notes of the English Government, and had maligned Mr. Christie by agents 1645 here as well as in Brazil. They must remember the animus manifested by Brazil, and that Brazil was trying by these means to coerce the English Legislature into a repeal of the Act, which was certainly justifiable at the time it was passed. Indeed, if the accounts which we received of the state of the internal slave trade of Brazil were true, the Act was not only justifiable but was actually necessary. He believed that that Act was necessary still, for the price of slaves in Brazil was rising, and he suspected that one of the inducements which made the Brazilians so anxious to obtain the repeal of the Act of 1845 was that they might "abate," as they called it, the price of slaves. Within Brazil at this moment the internal slave trade was of a most (he would not use harsh terms) painful character. Slaves were torn from one province to be sent to another; husbands were separated from their wives, the mother from the child, and children sold from ten to twelve years old. This was the state of things under which we were asked to abandon the policy we had hitherto pursued. If ever there was a justification for our interference in any case against the renewal of the slave trade, he believed it was in the case of Brazil; and when the hon. Member for Liskeard appealed to the fact that the English railway companies who were constructing railways in Brazil had never employed a single slave on their works, he (Mr. Newdegate) thanked God that his fellow-countrymen had discarded that infernal traffic in the undertakings in which they were engaged. He thought, however, that the very fact of the hon. Member mentioning that circumstance showed how general was the employment of slave labour in Brazil.
MR. T. BARINGthought his hon. Friend who had just spoken (Mr. Newdegate) had rather wandered from the question, which was not whether Mr. Christie had been abused, or whether Brazilian Judges were corrupt, but whether by conciliation and kind language we were not likely to renew friendly relations with Brazil, to increase our commerce, to obtain justice for Englishmen, and to succeed in the negotiations which were now taking place? His hon. Friend might say that the internal slave trade was an abominable traffic, and so it was; but the Act of 1845 was not levelled against the internal, but against the foreign slave trade; and when there was evidence that in Brazil the latter had ceased, the whole case of his hon. 1646 Friend fell to the ground. The question then was, whether we were to persevere in a course of action which had drawn o line of separation between this country and Brazil; or whether we should now enter upon a policy of conciliation, instead of that taunting, irritating policy which we had hitherto pursued?