Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 April 1891 — BLAINE’S REPLY SENT. [ARTICLE]

BLAINE’S REPLY SENT.

IT SHOULD EFFECTUALLY SETTLE THE TROUBLE. < Uncle Samuel’s Secretary of State Puts Humbert’s Minister ata Disadvantage— He Shows that the Powers of Rome Have Receded from Their First Demand on Tills Country. Mr. Blaine’s reply to Marquis Rudini’s note of April 2 has been transmitted to the Italian Government. It is a<l gnified and yet caustic reply to a demand that had in it too much bravado to be read with patience in this country. The question is discussed from the standpoint of a people indignant at the gratuitous bumptiousness of a friendly nation, manifesting a desire to be fair, but exhibiting not the slightest inclination to apologize. In effect Blaine takes the Italian Ministry up, shakes it, and then with a show of iron-handed courtesy shoves it out of the way. Mr. Webster’s correspondence as to the Spanish riots in New Orleans, which is quoted in the reply, was memorable, but Mr. Webster all through his dispatches expressed an honest desire that the peaceful relations existing between the United Statfes and Spain might not be disturbed. There is an entire absence of any such wish or expression in the reply to the Italian Government. The opinion is universal that the Italian Premier d> - served fully the castigation he receives, yet it is doubtful if any two great nations not immediately contemplating war ever before entered upon such a fusillade of absurd and unreasonable demands on the one hand and of caustic irony and derisive courtesy on the other hand, as appear in this correspondence. Imperiali’s opening and curious soft sawder, in addressing the Secretary of State as “Your Excellency” almost overshadows the admission he immediately afterward makes that Baron Fava was not recalled,-as the Baron himself gave out originally, but was simply absent “on leave.” This gives Blaine a chance to get back at Imperial! and address him as full “charge d'affaires,” instead of being simply the officer left “in charge of current business” as was so sedulously stated at the outset of the trouble. The Italian Government has not suspended diplomatic relations by recalling its Minister, though for home effect it has proclaimed that it has done so. The next and even more important point made is the showing from the exact language of Rudini’s original dispatch how widely different his two demands —the one sent out from Rome and the one now answered —were. Incidentally, Mr. Blaine gets in a sarcastic allusion to Baron Fava's English. His quotation shows that ten years’ residence in Washington has not given the Baron greater familiarity with the language than he seems to have with the institutions of the country. Noting the different terms employed in the dispatch which he is answering from those used in the dispatch previously received, he says his departxnent “has Ho desire to change” the language of the original dispatch of March 24, which was delivered to him in person by Baron Fava, transcribed in English. Then he quotes that dispatch with its assertion of a right “to demand and obtain the punishment of the murderers and an indemnity for their victims.” Then follows this extraordinary sentence, which the Secretary of State mercilessly quotes: “I would add that the public opinion in Italy is justly impatient, and if concrete provisions were not at once taken I should find myself in the painful necessity o' showing openly our dissatis action by recalling the Minister of his Majesty from a country where he is unable to obtain justice.” Mr. B aine, of course, cannot resist contrasting the original demand with the subsequent cable dispatch stating that “The government of Italy has asked nothing but the prompt institution of judicial proceedings through the regular channels. ” He does not say that the Italian government has failed to carry out its threat of recalling the Minister, but he addresses his reply to Imperial! as “charged’affaires,’’show* ing that he takes cognizance of the fact, and then he proceeds to analyze other portions of the Italian Minister s second dispatch. It seems that the summary as given out from Rome, in violation of all diplomatic usage, was correct in stating that Rudini assumed the Secretary of State had promised indemnity for ttie families of the victims. Mr. Blaine shows that he had only recognized the “principle oi indemnity” to those who had suffered in violation of treaty obligations. Finally, he puts it that if any of the persons killed by the mob in New Orleans were really “Italian subjects who were resident or domiciled in that city, agreeably to our treaty with Italy and not in violation of our immigration laws, and who were abiding in the peace of the United States and obeying the laws thereof,” impossible conditions for the Italian Government to show—then, in case the State authorities l ad failed to properly protect them, the “President would under such circumstance* feel that a case was established that should be submitted to the consideration of Congress.” Only this and nothing more. It is very strongly suspected that the preliminary abstract of tlie report prepared by United States District Attorney Grant, of New Orleans, wi.l disclose that all the men killed except two or three were naturalized citizens, and that these two or three were Italian bandit.* who had come here in violation of our naturalization laws,and for whom the Itaiiarj Government has therefore no right of reclamation. This correspondence will leave the Rudini ministry in a critical position before its own people, but it is generally conceded here that the Italian Government has brought the situation upon itself by bluff and bluster and jingoism. What effect the publication of this correspondence may have upon the critical, threatening attitude of several of the European powers to each other, including those in alliance with Italy, is a fruitful theme for tonjecture The much-talked-of letter will not ghe much comfort in Italy. Life, like war, is a series of mistakes, and he ,is not the best Christian nor the best general who makes fewest false steps. Poor mediocrity may secure that; but he is the best who' wins the most snlendid victories by the retrieval of mistakes. Forget mistakes; organize victory out of mistakes. You must be sure of two things— you must love your work, and not be always looking oyer the eige of it. wanting your play to begin; and the other is, you must not be ashamed of your work, and think it would be more honorable to you to be doing something else.