On the 10th of February, 1840, probably suspecting-unfairness on the part of the administration, a resolution was offered, requesting the president to communicate to the house copies of any demand by the Spanish government for the surrender of the Africans, and of the correspondence between the state department and the Spanish minister and the district attorney of the United States in the judicial district of Connecticut.
On the 20th of January, 1841, while the question of the prisoners was still pending in the supreme court of the United States, the British minister ad dressed to Mr. Forsyth, secretary of state, a letter representing the interest felt by his government in the case of the African negroes, mentioning the obligation of Spain, by treaty with Great Britain, to prohibit the slave trade from the 30th of May, 1820, and the mutual engagements of the United States and Great Britain, by the 10th article of the treaty of Ghent, to use their endeavors for the entire abolition of the slave trade. And as the freedom of the negroes may depend upon the action of the United States government, he expresses the hope that the president will find himself empowered to take such measures in their behalf, as should secure them their liberty.
Mr. Forsyth, in his answer of the 1st of February, says, in substance, that the introduction of the negroes into this country did not proceed from the wishes or direction of our government The vessel and the negroes had been demanded by the Spanish minister, and the grounds of that demand were before the judicial tribunals. He tells Mr. Fox that our government is not willing to erect itself into a tribunal between Spain and Great Britain; that he, (Mr. Fox,) had doubtless observed from the correspondence published in a congressional document, that the Spanish minister intended to restore the negroes, should their delivery to his government be ordered, to the island of Cuba, to be placed under the protection of the government of Spain. There was the proper place, and there would be a full opportunity, to discuss questions arising under the Spanish laws and the treaties of Spain with Great Britain.
The decision of the supreme court was awaited with deep interest by all who sympathized with the negroes. Mr. Adams, who had not argued a case for thirty or forty years before that court, made a very elaborate as well as able argument in their behalf. The opinion of the court was pronounced by Mr. Justice Story, early in March, 1841, affirming the decision of the district court in every particular, except that which ordered the negroes to be delivered to the president to be transported to Africa. The court reversed this part of the decree, and ordered the cause to be remanded to the circuit court which had affirmed the same, with directions to enter in lieu thereof, that the negroes be declared free, and be discharged from suit.[1]
[The word libel used in the above case signifies, in courts of admiralty, "a declaration or charge in writing, exhibited in court, particularly against a ship or goods, for a violation of the laws of trade or revenue;" also when a prize is brought into port, the captors make a writing called libel.]
- ↑ Young's Political History.
