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President James Buchanan Outlines Relations with Paraguay for U.S. Senate
President James Buchanan Outlines Relations with Paraguay for U.S. Senate
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James Buchanan
Washington, DC, February 12, 1861
President James Buchanan Outlines Relations with Paraguay for U.S. Senate
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JAMES BUCHANAN, Autograph Document, Draft Message to the U.S. Senate, [February 12, 1861], Washington, DC 2 pp., 8.5" x 9.75", 8.5" x 13". Some toning; scattered spots; light edge soiling.

In this draft of the first part of a February 1861 message to the U.S. Senate, President James Buchanan reports the results of a commission to examine the claims of the United States and the Paraguay Navigation Company against Paraguay. The commissioners found no basis for the claims. Although Buchanan publicly criticized their decision in his annual message in December 1860, he ultimately accepted the outcome.

In the remainder of this message to the Senate, Buchanan declared, "After all this had been done, after we had fitted out a warlike expedition in part to obtain satisfaction for this very claim, after these solemn acts had been performed by the two Republics, the commissioners have felt themselves competent to decide that they could go behind the action of the legislative and executive branches of this Government and determine that there was no justice in the original claim." Exasperated that the arbitrators found that the claims of the company were bogus, Buchanan concluded, "If a commissioner were appointed under a convention to ascertain the damage sustained by an American citizen in consequence of the capture of a vessel admitted by the foreign government to be illegal, and he should go behind the convention and decide that the original capture was a lawful prize, it would certainly be regarded as an extraordinary assumption of authority. The present appears to me to be a case of this character, and for these reasons I have deemed it advisable to submit the whole subject for the consideration of the Senate." The Senate referred Buchanan's message to the Committee on Foreign Relations but took no further action during the remaining three weeks of its session.

Complete Transcript
To the Senate of the U.S.

I herewith submit to the Senate for their advice the proceedings & award of the Commissioners under the Convention between the United States of America & the Republic of Paraguay proclaimed by the President on the 12th March 1860. It is decided by the award of these Commissioners that "The United States & Paraguay Navigation Company" have not proved or established any right to damages for their said claim against the Government of the Republic of Paraguay; & that upon the proofs aforesaid the said Government is not responsible to the said Company, in any damages or pecuniary compensation whatever in all the premises."

"Our relations with that Republic had for years been of a most unsatisfactory character. They had been investigated by the preceding & the present administration. The latter came to the conclusion that both the interest & honor of the Country required that our rights should, if necessary, be enforced. Accordingly, the President, in his annual Message of December 1857 called the attention of Congress to the subject in the following language: "A demand for these purposes will be made in a firm but conciliatory speech. This will the more probably be granted if the Executive shall have authority to use other means in the event of a refusal. This is accordingly recommended."

After due deliberation, Congress on the 2d of June 1858 authorised the President "to adopt such measures & use such force as in his judgment may be necessary & advisable" in the premises.

Historical Background
In 1845, when James Buchanan was serving as Secretary of State, he sent Edward A. Hopkins, a former member of the U.S. Navy who had been court-martialed three times and dismissed from his squadron, to Paraguay to determine whether the United States should grant diplomatic recognition to the country. Hopkins's mission was an abject failure, but he later convinced Rhode Island Governor Samuel G. Arnold and other investors that Paraguay represented a profitable business opportunity. They incorporated the United States and Paraguay Navigation Company to trade with the South American country. In June 1853, Hopkins managed to gain an appointment as U.S. Consul in Paraguay, where he also served as agent of the U.S. and Paraguay Navigation Company. Although the business venture was a failure, Hopkins borrowed money from the President of Paraguay, Carlos Antonio Lopez, and opened a sawmill and cigar factory.

The arrogant behavior of Hopkins soon alienated Lopez, leading to his expulsion from the country. In the United States, the U.S. and Paraguay Navigation Company submitted a claim against Paraguay and publicly claimed that it had been wronged by the South American Republic. Lopez then refused to ratify a treaty of friendship with the United States.

In his first annual message to Congress in December 1857, Buchanan informed Congress that Paraguay had seized the property of American citizens, refused to ratify the treaty of friendship "upon frivolous and even insulting pretexts," and fired upon a U.S. steamer on an exploratory mission. Buchanan said he would demand redress but wanted permission to use force if necessary. On June 2, 1858, Congress authorized Buchanan to obtain satisfaction, using force if necessary. Later that year, Buchanan sent a nineteen-ship squadron with 200 guns, 2,500 men, and a diplomat to Paraguay to demand satisfaction. Parts of the expedition arrived in Montevideo, Uruguay, in December 1858, causing general alarm in the region. Diplomat James B. Bowlin of Missouri continued in a single ship to Paraguay, where President Lopez agreed to a treaty of friendship, a conciliatory statement on the firing on the U.S. steamer, and arbitration on the claims of the U.S. and Paraguay Navigation Company. Bowlin left Asunción in mid-February 1859.

The arbitration commission consisted of one American and one Paraguayan arbitrator. On August 13, 1860, the commissioners declared that the United States and Paraguay Navigation Company had "not proved or established any right to damages." Buchanan refused to accept the arbitrators' award of no damages, exaggerated the importance of the expedition he sent to Paraguay, and minimized its $3 million expenses. In 1861, President Abraham Lincoln sent Charles Ames Washburn to Asunción to revive the claim, but the Paraguayan government rejected the effort. Another attempt to revive the claim in 1885 likewise failed.

James Buchanan (1791-1868) was born in Pennsylvania and graduated from Dickinson College in 1809. He served in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives as a Federalist from 1814-1816. With the collapse of the Federalist Party, Buchanan became a Republican-Federalist and served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1821 to 1831, where he largely supported Andrew Jackson. He served as ambassador to Russia for eighteen months in 1832 and 1833, then as U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania from 1834 to 1845. President James K. Polk appointed him as Secretary of State, a position he held from 1845 to 1849. President Franklin Pierce sent Buchanan as the U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom, a position he held from 1853 to 1856. Being out of the country in the increasing sectional tensions caused by the Kansas-Nebraska Act and other controversies aided Buchanan's political fortunes in 1856, when he won the Democratic nomination on the 17th ballot over incumbent Pierce and Stephen Douglas of Illinois. Buchanan supported Douglas's doctrine of popular sovereignty, hoping to keep the divisive issue of slavery out of Congress and national debate. Two days after his inauguration, the Supreme Court issued its Dred Scott decision, declaring that Congress could not outlaw slavery in the territories. Far from settling the issue, the Court's decision fueled more sectional outrage. He took little direct action in response to the Panic of 1857, which hit northern cities and states hardest. Buchanan's poor handling of the Utah War and Bleeding Kansas also contributed to his poor reputation as president. As he left office, he famously declared that the southern states had no right to secede and that the federal government had no right to prevent them. He spent the Civil War weakly supporting the Union war effort and writing a memoir in defense of his presidency, published in 1866. Buchanan never married, the only president to remain a bachelor.

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

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  • Dimensions: 8.5" x 9.75", 8.5" x 13"
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