Loudon Free Press

LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT.

WASHINGTON, NOV. 27

The Republic by the consent of the President published the following:

WASHINGTON, NOV. 12.

Hugh Maxwell: Your note of yesterday came to hand this morning in which you state a conversation with Mr. Law, from which you learned that the Crescent City will go to Cuba and enter the port of Havana in defiance of the Spanish authorities, and if fired upon, she will be surrendered. and that then and others will immediately commence hostilities against the Island. You say, also, that you desire to know whether he is right in persisting in the pursuit of lawful business. and that if the Government shall tell him he must not go, he will not. If, however, nothing is said against his going, he will infer he has a right to go.

In regard to the chief matter of your letter permit me to say in the first place, that I do not admit the right of Mr. Law or any other citizen to threaten war on his own account, for the purpose of seeking redress for real or imaginary injuries, and then to call upon his government to say whether it approves or disapproves of such conduct, and assume its approbation unless the act is forbidden. The Constitution of the U. S. has vested in Congress alone the power of declaring war, and neither executive branch of the Government nor George Law have any right to usurp that power by commencing war without its authority, and if he shall attempt it, it will be my duty, and it is my duty and determination to exert all power confided to the Executive of the Government by the constitution and the laws to prevent it.

I am resolved at every hazard to maintain our rights in this controversy as against Spain, and I am equally resolved that no act of our own citizens shall be permitted to place this Government in the wrong. Mr. Law has an undoubted right to pursue his lawful business, but when a question is raised between this Government and a foreign nation, as to whether the business he pursues is lawful, or pursued in a lawful manner, the decision of that question belongs to the governments and not to him. If his object be to assert his right to enter the port of Havana with such persons as he may choose to select, in defiance to the laws of the Government of Spain, he has certainly done enough to present that question for decision to the governments of Spain and the United States. Negotiations have already commenced, and our rights as we understand them, have been asserted, and as I said before, will be maintained, but the acts of this Government cannot be controlled by the interference of any individual. It is entirely unnecessary that Mr. Law should repeat these attempts for the purpose of settling the controversy. If he wilfully does so, and in so doing violates the laws of a foreign nation within its own jurisdiction, and thereby losses his vessel, he can expect no indemnity for such an act of folly from this Government.

We regulate terms and conditions upon which all foreign vessels enter our ports, and we fix penalties for the violation of these laws. The right to do so we shall never suffer to be questioned by foreigners. We do not question theirs to do the same thing. He must wait the result of negotiations between the two Governments. This is not a question to be settled between him and Cuba, nor even between the United States and Cuba. but between the United States and Spain, which alone is responsible for the conduct of the governors of Cuba.

You are at liberty to make known the contents of this letter to Mr. Law, and inform him that. as a good citizen. I presume he will not attempt any violation of our neutrality laws by attackting Cuba.

I am truly, yours,

MILLARD FILLMORE.