When the judgment had been rendered, the counsel for Hayti presented a memorial to the State Department, setting forth the impropriety and bad policy of a presentation by the Government of the United States of a judgment rendered in favor of a claimant who had been found guilty of fitting out a slave-trading expedition within the limits of the United States, and using the flag of the United States as a protection in the prosecution of his illegal undertaking. Mr. Bayard was then Secretary of State, and Mr. Cleveland was President. That view of the counsel of Hayti was accepted by the Secretary of State and by the President, and the government of Hayti was relieved from the payment of the claim. I ought to add that Mr. Justice Strong concurred with the counsel for Hayti, and made a representation to the Department of State urging the remission of the penalty in the judgment he had rendered.
The decision of Mr. Justice Strong raises a question of very serious character--that is to say, whether an international tribunal can take notice of proceedings in the judicial tribunals of a foreign state, further than to ascertain whether the proceedings were according to "due process of law" in the state where the proceedings were had. Justice Strong went so far as to hold that the courts of Hayti had erred upon the question of their own jurisdiction. Such a ruling, if applied to cases of public importance, might lead to very serious results.
[* Printed in the _New England Magazine_. Copyright, 1900, by Warren F. Kellogg.]
XLIII MR. LINCOLN AS AN HISTORICAL PERSONAGE.
A SPEECH DELIVERED BEFORE THE LA SALLE CLUB, CHICAGO, FEBRUARY 12, 1889
The services and fame of Mr. Lincoln are so identified with the organization, doings and character of the Republican Party, that something of the history of that party is the necessary incident of every attempt to set forth the services and the fame of Mr. Lincoln.
In a very important sense Mr. Lincoln may be regarded as the founder of the Republican Party. He was its leader in the first successful national contest, and it was during his administration as President that the policy of the party was developed and its capacity for the business of government established. The Republican Party gave to Mr. Lincoln the opportunity for the services on which his fame rests, and the fame of Mr. Lincoln is the inheritance of the Republican Party. His eulogy is its encomium, and therefore when we set forth the character and services of Mr. Lincoln we set forth as well the claims of the Republican Party to the gratitude and confidence of the country, and the favorable opinion of mankind.