Secretary Seward's circular--British opinion of his position and Arguments.
[From the London Times, Sept. 4.]
Mr. Seward's diplomatic circular, which we published yesterday, consists of a proposition, an argument, and an application.
His proposition is that the statement of
England and
France having conceived at the beginning of the
American war a belief that the restoration of the
Union was an impossibility, persist in that belief to the present hour.
His argument resolves itself into a long narrative of the campaigns of the last twelve months, and this historical compendium is then applied to the purpose of correcting the prevailing belief, and impressing the two Western Powers with convictions more favorable to the
Federal cause.
In its object this State paper is certainly intelligible.
Mr. Seward is
perfectly accurate in his presumption that the statement of France and England--In neight have included, indeed, those of the rest of Europe — do consider to this very day that the American Union can never be reconstructed. It is natural, too, that he should be desirous of removing this conviction, but the argument which he employs for this purpose is both ineffective and needless — needles, because we all knew beforehand every particle of his story, and ineffective because, even if we accept it exactly as it is presented to us, it leaves our conclusions just what they were.
The truth is, the course of the
American war has taken us by surprise.
When we first arrived at the conclusion that the
South could never be coerced into reunion at the point of the sword we still anticipated prompt military success on the part of the
North.
The only reserve affecting our judgment was a doubt about the earnestness and unanimity of the
South in claiming independence.
That condition being satisfied, we considered that though twenty millions of men were certainly stronger than nine millions,
they were not so much stronger as to have any chance of subjugating these nine millions, dispersed as they were over an almost illimitable territory. We hardly doubted the immediate superiority of the
North in the field.
The general expectation of Englishmen was that the
South would soon be overrun, that its seaports would be all captured and occupied, and that strong Federal garrisons would hold its chief towns.
In short, we anticipated that the first six months, or at any rate the first year of the war, would see the prostration of the
Confederates thus far completed; but it was then that we thought the hopelessness of the work would begin to be left.
If at that time we could have foreseen that the successes of the
North after more than two years of desperate fighting would amount only to the achievements now recounted with so much complacency by
Mr. Seward, we should have thought the task of the
Washington Government more impracticable than ever.
We venture to add that
Mr. Seward himself would have been very much of the same opinion.
We think it may be said with some truth that if the
Federal Government had, at the beginning of the year 1861, foreseen that in the middle of the year 1863 the seceding States would still be free;
Richmond and
Charleston still safe, and
Washington in some little danger, the war would never have been undertaken at all. That
Mr. Seward, at this period of the strife,
should be reduced to sing a mean over the deliverance of the North from the incision of a Southern army, is about the strongest possible proof of the hopelessness of his cause.
The Federals thought to sweep the
Southern States with their irresistible forces.
At first they actually imagined that three months and 70,000 men would suffice for the work.
A single battle taught them the extent of this miscalculation; and though they still limited the time to "ninety days" they expanded the armament to 700,000 soldiers.
The 700,000 did no more than the 70,000--in fact, they were defeated in the
East, and evenly matched in the
West.
All that can be said at this moment of Northern exultation is that the
Federals have taken two places on the
Mississippi after sieges three times as tedious and as costly as they were expected to be, and that they have not had their own capital occupied by the enemy, as seemed highly probable two months ago.--
Mr. Seward, while coloring his history as favorably as he can, is compelled to talk of drawn battles as events creditable to the
Federal arms; and the very paper which is designed to show the unquestionable ascendancy of the
North speaks of the "necessity of covering the national capital," and the absolute equality of the belligerent forces in its immediate vicinity.
There might be some purpose in
Mr. Seward's present exposition if either we in this country or the
Americans in the
Federal States had begun by regarding the belligerents as equally matched, and the war as likely to be protracted on even terms for a long series of years.
This, however, was not the case, and we are therefore not much impressed with the moderate balance of success which
Mr.Seward claims for his own side.
In point of fact, taking one field with another, the
South has had a greater share of victory than the
North its only conspicuous failure, indeed, was in an attempt to bring the war to a close by the capture of the
Northern capital.
Even now Gen. Louis by all accounts more likely to resume the offensive than Gen. Mead, and though we do not hear that the
Federals are preparing immediately to invade the territories of the
Confederates, we do hear that the
Confederates may be expected at any moment in the country of the
Federals.
This is not much of a case for a Power pretending so distinctly to superiority as to complain that the character of a belligerent is accorded to its rival.
On that point, indeed, let any one read
Mr. Seward's own descriptions, in this very document, of the strength, the numbers, and the bearing of the Confederate armies, and then say if the
South be not entitled to the designation of a belligerent.
Why, in recording the
battle of Antietam, the
Federal Secretary is actually compelled to expatiate on the identical qualities of the contending forces, and to add that the
Northern soldiers were then proved, for the first time; to be not inferior in heroism and valor.
Practically, then,
the very gist and essence of Mr. Seward's argument is fatal to its object.--If all is true that he tells us, that all is infinitely short of what we were prepared to take for granted two years ago, without being any the more sanguine of Northern success.
We thought the
North would overrun the
South in a brief campaign, but would then find the difficulties begin.
Mr. Seward tells us that after two years of mortal struggle the
North has not overrun a quarter of the
South--having the real difficulty still in prospect as before.
We only conclude from this that the
Federals have not even that superiority for which we gave them credit; and and that the relative strength of the
Confederates is by so much the greater.
If
Mr. Seward really wishes to make converts of French and English statesmen, he must adopt a very different form of argument.-- He must show us either that the
South is evincing a readiness to yield, or that the
North has a policy which will admit of the restoration of the
Union without this submission.
But he shows neither of these things.
On the contrary, he tells us that the
Southern President has just proclaimed all evy
en masse, while of his own Government he says nothing, except that it is preparing to prosecute the war as before.
But what is to be the end?
Europe thinks that the reconstruction of the Union by force of arms is an impossibility, and a very great number of Americans are of the same opinion. Europe also sees distinctly that the
South gives not the slightest sign of concession, while even the fortunes of the war are not, upon the whole, very unevenly balanced.
Not, therefore, without reason do we persist in our original opinions on the subject; but though
Mr. Seward has thus lost his pains, we can console him with the assurance that, so far as we are concerned, they were needlessly expended.
If his object was merely to deter us from intervention it is safe in spite of the failure of this argument. In the "domestic controversies," which have cost upwards of 500,000 lives and at least five hundred millions of money in two years, we have not the least design of interfering.--The "adjustment" of these little matters we are ready to leave to
Americans themselves as "exclusively" as
Mr. Seward can desire; and if we add another remark upon a point so certain, it is merely to suggest
that people who thus busy themselves even superfluously in deprecating our intervention might be a little less forward in threatening us with the extremities which would drive us to intervene. 
