This text is part of:
Table of Contents:
[48]
were the secret allies of the Emperor, it being understood that so soon as he should obtain a firm footing in Mexico he should, for valuable commercial considerations agreed upon, acknowledge the independence of the Confederate States, and uphold it by force of arms if necessary; it also being understood that the Government which Davis and his fellow-conspirators were to establish at the close of hostilities, should in nowise offend Napoleon's ideas of imperialism.
Monarchical titles, distinctions, and privileges, were to prevail.
The slave-holding class were to be the rulers, and the great mass of the people were to be subordinated to the interests of that oligarchy.
Therefore the triumphal march of the French invaders toward the Mexican capital, in the spring of 1863, was hailed with delight by the authorities at Richmond.1 To them, and to the deluded people of the Confederate States, who did not penetrate the dark designs of the leaders, against their liberties, the skies never seemed brighter with promises of speedy success for their cause, and the establishment of a permanent empire, with slavery for its corner-stone.2 For in addition to the positive victory at Chancellorsville, the increase of Lee's forces, and the evident demoralization, for the moment, of the Army of the Potomac, the impression was universal in the Confederacy that the Peace Faction in the Free-labor States was a true exponent of the sentiments of the Opposition, and that a great majority of the people were eagerly awaiting an opportunity for revolting against the Government, because of its decided emancipation policy, its threat of conscription, the increase in the prices of food and fabrics, and the plain apparition
1 Soon after the late civil war broke out, England, France, and Spain, entered into negotiations for a triple alliance, ostensibly for the purpose of compelling Mexico to pay its debts due to citizens of those countries, or punishing it for wrongs inflicted on those citizens. The treaty was signed on the 21st of October, 1861. Diplomatic relations with Mexico were broken off by those powers, and each ally sent a fleet with troops to the Gulf of Mexico, numbering in all 61 vessels and 88,000 men. They appeared off Vera Cruz on the 8th of December, 1861, where they landed without much difficulty, the commanders assuring the Mexicans that there was no intention to interfere with their form of government, or to abridge their liberties. It was soon discovered by the representatives of Great Britain and Spain that the French Emperor was playing falsely and selfishly in the matter, and in the spring of 1862 the British and Spanish troops left Mexico and returned home.
The real designs of Louis Napoleon were now made apparent. His political design was to arrest the march of empire southward on the part of the United States. His religious design was to assist the Church party in Mexico, which had been defeated in 1857, in a recovery of its power, that the Roman Catholic Church might. have undisputed sway in Central America. In a letter to General Prim, the Spanish commander, dated July 3, 1862, the Emperor, after saying that the United States fed the factories of Europe with cotton, and asserting that it was not the interest of European Governments to have it hold dominion over the Gulf of Mexico, the Antilles, and the adjacent continent, he declared that if, with the assistance of France, Mexico should have “a stable Government,” that is, a monarchy, “we, shall have restored to the Latin race upon the opposite side of the ocean its strength and its prestige; we shall have guaranteed, then, security to our colonies in the Antilles, and to those of Spain; we shall have established our beneficent influence in the center of America; and this influence, by creating immense openings to our commerce, will procure to us the matter indispensable to our industry.”
Louis Napoleon supposed the power of the United States to be broken by the rebellion and civil war, and that he might, with impunity, carry out his designs against republican institutions in the New World, and establish a dependency of France in the fertile, cotton-growing regions of Central America. His troops were re-enforced after the two allies withdrew. They marched upon and seized the capital, and then, in accordance with a previous arrangement made with leaders of the Church party, the Austrian Archduke Maximilian was chosen Emperor of Mexico by a ridiculous minority of the people, known as the “Notables,” and placed on a throne. This movement was offensive to the people of the United States, for they saw in it not only an outrage upon a sister republic, but a menace of their own. No diplomatic intercourse was held by them with Maximilian, and when the civil war was closed, in 1865, and it was seen that our Government was more powerful than ever, Louis Napoleon, trembling with alarm, heeded its warning to withdraw his forces, at the peril of forcible expulsion by our troops. He was mortified and humbled, and, with a perfidy unparalleled in the history of rulers, he abandoned his dupe, Maximilian, and left him to struggle on against the patriots fighting for their liberties under the direction of their President, Benito Juarez, until the “Emperor” was finally captured and shot, leaving his poor wife, the “Empress” Carlotta, a hopeless lunatic in her home in Austria.
2 For a year the subject of a seal for the Confederate States had been before the “Congress” at Richmond, and on the 27th of April, 1868, the “Senate,” in which action upon the subject originated, amended a resolution of the “House of Representatives,” and decided that the device for the seal should be as follows: “A device representing an equestrian statue of Washington (after the statue which surmounts his monument in the Capitol square at Richmond), surrounded with a wreath composed of the principal agricultural products of the Confederacy, and having around its margin the words, ‘Confederate States of America, 22D Feb., 1862,’ with the following motto: ‘Deo Vindice,’ ” --God, the protector, defender, deliverer, or ruler. This was adopted by both “Houses,” and then it was proposed to send some one through the lines to New York, to procure an engraving of the same on brass and steel. This was objected to, and the commission was finally given to an engraver in England. The writer was informed by Mr. Davis, of Wilmington, N. C., the Confederate “Attorney-General,” that the engraving was not completed in time for use. It had just arrived at Richmond when the evacuation of that city occurred, in April, 1865, and no impression from it was ever made. That pretended Government never had an insignia of sovereignty. None of its officers ever bore a commission with its seal; and the writer was informed that many officers of high rank in the Confederate army never received a commission.
 |
| Proposed “Confederate State” seal.2 |
3 this is copied from a rude wood-cut, at the head of a certificate of honorary directorship of a Confederate Association for the relief of maimed soldiers. the object of that Association was to supply artificial limbs gratuitously to soldiers who had lost them. A subscription annually of $10 constituted a member; of $300, a life member; and of $1,000, an honorary director.
Scanned printed text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.