The Path of Empire, A Chronicle of the United States as a World Power | Page 5

Howe, an impetuous
young American doctor, crossed the seas, carrying to the Greeks his
services and the gifts of Boston friends of liberty. A new conflict
seemed to be shaping itself--a struggle of absolutism against
democracy, of America against Europe.
Between the two camps, both in her ideas and in her geographical
situation, stood England. Devoted as she was to law and order, bulwark
against the excesses of the French Terror and the world dominion that
Napoleon sought, she was nevertheless equally strong in her opposition
to Divine Right. Her people and her government alike were troubled at
the repressive measured by which the Allies put down the Revolution
of Naples in 1821 and that of Spain in 1823. Still more were they
disturbed at the hint given at the Congress of Verona in 1822 that,
when Europe was once quieted, America would engage the attention of
Europe's arbiters. George Canning, the English foreign minister, soon

discovered that this hint foreshadowed a new congress to be devoted
especially to the American problem. Spain was to be restored to her
sovereignty, but was to pay in liberal grants of American territory to
whatever powers helped her. Canning is regarded as the ablest English
foreign minister of the nineteenth century; at least no one better
embodied the fundamental aspirations of the English people. He
realized that liberal England would be perpetually a minority in a
united Europe, as Europe was then organized. He believed that the best
security for peace was not a union but a balance of powers. He opposed
intervention in the internal affairs of nations and stood for the right of
each to choose its own form of government. Particularly he fixed his
eyes on America, where he hoped to find weight to help him balance
the autocrats of the Old World. He wished to see the new American
republics free, and he believed that in freedom of trade England would
obtain from them all that she needed. Alarmed at the impending
European intervention to restore the rule of Spain or of her monarchical
assignees in America, he sought an understanding with the United
States. He proposed to Richard Rush, the United States minister in
London, that the two countries declare concurrently that the
independence of Spanish America, was a fact, that the recognition of
the new governments was a matter of time and circumstance, that
neither country desired any portion of Spain's former dominions, but
that neither would look with indifference upon the transfer of any
portion of them to another power.
On October 9, 1823, this proposal reached Washington. The answer
would be framed by able and most experienced statesmen. The
President, James Monroe, had been almost continuously in public
service since 1782. He had been minister to France, Spain, and England,
and had been Secretary of State. In his earlier missions he had often
shown an unwise impetuosity and an independent judgment which was
not always well balanced. He had, however, grown in wisdom. He
inspired respect by his sterling qualities of character, and he was an
admirable presiding officer. William H. Crawford, his Secretary of the
Treasury, John C. Calhoun, his Secretary of War, William Wirt, his
Attorney-General, and even John McLean, his Postmaster-General, not
then a member of the Cabinet, were all men who were considered as of
presidential caliber.

Foremost in ability and influence, however, was John Quincy Adams,
the Secretary of State. Brought up from early boyhood in the
atmosphere of diplomacy, familiar with nearly every country of Europe,
he had nevertheless none of those arts of suavity which are popularly
associated with the diplomat. Short, baldheaded, with watery eyes, he
on the one hand repelled familiarity, and on the other hand shocked
some sensibilities, as for example when he appeared in midsummer
Washington without a neckcloth. His early morning swim in the
Potomac and his translations of Horace did not conquer a temper which
embittered many who had business with him, while the nightly records
which he made of his interviews show that he was generally suspicious
of his visitors. Yet no American can show so long a roll of diplomatic
successes. Preeminently he knew his business. His intense devotion and
his native talent had made him a master of the theory and practice of
international law and of statecraft. Always he was obviously honest,
and his word was relied on. Fundamentally he was kind, and his work
was permeated by a generous enthusiasm. Probably no man in America,
had so intense a conviction not only of the correctness of American
principles and the promise of American greatness but of the immediate
strength and greatness of the United States as it stood in 1823.
Fully aware as Adams was of the danger that threatened both America
and liberty, he was not in favor