Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 13.djvu/465

 464 Southern Historical Society Papers.

and to the world to make good a declaration thus solemnly made. Propositions of such gravity and emanating from sources so high may fairly be considered as affecting the general business relations of human society, and as controlling in a great degree the calcula- tions and arrangements of nations, so far as they are concerned, in the rules thus laid down. Men have a right to presume that a law thus proclaimed will be uniformly enforced by those who have the power to do so, and who have taken it upon themselves to watch over its execution; nor will any suppose that particular States or cases would be exempted from its operation under the influence of partiality or favor. If, therefore, we can prove the blockade to have been ineffectual, we perhaps have a right to expect that the nations assenting to this declaration of the Conference at Paris will not con- sider it to be binding. We are fortified in this expectation not only by their own declaration, but by the nature of the interests affected by the blockade. So far at least it has been proved that the only certain and sufficient source of cotton supply has been found in the Confederate States. It is probable that there are more people with- out than within the Confederate States who derive their means of living from the various uses which are made of this important staple. A war, therefore, which shuts up this great source of supply from the general uses of mankind is directed as much against those who trans- port and manufacture cotton as against those who produce the raw material. Innocent parties who are thus affected may well insist that a right whose exercise operates so unfavorably on them shall only be used within the strictest limits of public law. Would it not be a movement more in consonance with the spirit of the age to insist that amongst the many efficient means of waging war, this one should be excepted in deference to the general interests of mankind, so many of whom depend for their means of living upon a ready and easy access to the greatest and cheapest cotton market of the world. If, for the general benefit of commerce, some of its great routes have been neutralized so as to be unaffected by the chances of war, might not another interest of a greater and more world-wide importance claim at least so much consideration as to demand the benefit of every presumption in favor of its protection against all the chances of war, save those which arise under the strictest rules of public law? This is a question of almost as much interest to the world at large as it is to the Confederate States. No belligerent can claim the right thus to injure innocent parties by such a blockade, except to the extent that it can be shown to furnish the legitimate, or, perhaps,