American Diplomacy

JANUARY, 1906

BY FRANCIS C. LOWELL

AT home and abroad there has been much criticism of American diplomatic representatives as compared with those of European countries. It is often said that our men are much inferior to their expert colleagues from Europe, and we are urged to adopt a system like the European, for their careful training and due promotion. That this criticism is valuable cannot be denied. The extreme unfitness of some American envoys has discredited us, but there are advantages in our system, or want of it, which we ought not to overlook. In considering them here, we will pass over the consuls and limit ourselves to the regular diplomatic service.

Let us take a concrete case, and compare the American representatives in London with the English representatives in Washington. Since 1850 we have sent to England Joseph R. Ingersoll, James Buchanan, George M. Dallas, Charles Francis Adams, Reverdy Johnson, J. L. Motley, R. C. Schenck, Edwards Pierrepont, John Welsh, J. R. Lowell, Edward J. Phelps, Robert T. Lincoln, Thomas F. Bayard, John Hay, Joseph H. Choate, and Whitelaw Reid. The English have sent to us Sir Henry Bulwer (Lord Balling), J. F. T. Crampton, Lord Napier, Lord Lyons, Sir Frederick Bruce, Sir Edward Thornton, L. S. Sackville West, Lord Pauncefote, Sir Michael Herbert, and Sir Mortimer Durand.

Without dwelling on particular names, we see plainly that the Americans have been the more distinguished men. The English representatives have been well educated and trained, and have tried to do their diplomatic duty, with measurable success. No one of them at any time or in any place made considerable mark of any sort upon the history of his country or that of the world. No one held important office outside the diplomatic service. To establish an accurate standard of comparison is impossible. Distinction and importance cannot be weighed. But of the Englishmen we may say that hardly one was of English cabinet rank, that is to say, had the importance which usually belongs in England to a cabinet minister. Among the sixteen Americans there are found one president, one vice-president, and an unsuccessful nominee of a great party for the latter office. Five served in our small cabinet: two secretaries of state, a secretary of war, and two attorneys-general; two others were lawyers at the head of their profession, one was a historian, and one a poet, both of high rank, and still we have not classified Mr. Adams, who did the greatest service of them all. The difference in the lists is striking.

It may be answered that we send our best men to England, while until lately the comparatively low rank of the British legation at Washington has required the choice of an English minister less distinguished than those sent elsewhere. Let us make a comparison between the Americans just named and the English ambassadors to France, as Paris is the first of English diplomatic appointments. The latter have been Lords Normanby, Cowley, Lyons, Lytton (Owen Meredith), and Dufferin, Sir Edmund Monson, and Sir Francis Bertie. Doubtless Lord Dufferin was a heaven-born ambassador, whom any country would gladly welcome or employ, but he was hardly the equal of Mr. Hay or Mr. Adams. Like Lord Dufferin, Lord Lytton had been viceroy of India, and had made his mark in literature. But notwithstanding Lords Dufferin and Lytton, the Americans upon the whole exceed greatly in distinction. It has been said that our best men are sent to England, but the list of distinguished Americans who have represented us in other countries is long. To France, we have sent E. B. Washburne and Levi P. Morton, not to mention two unsuccessful candidates for the vice-presidency, William L. Dayton and Whitelaw Reid. To Austria, Anson Burlingame, J. L. Motley, J. A. Kasson, Alphonso Taft (Secretary of War and AttorneyGeneral). To Russia, Simon Cameron (Secretary of War), Bayard Taylor, J. W. Foster (Secretary of State), Alphonso Taft, Charles E. Smith (Postmaster-General), Andrew D. White, E. A. Hitchcock (Secretary of the Interior). To Germany, George Bancroft, Bayard Taylor, Andrew D. White, J. A. Kasson, George H. Pendleton. To Spain, Carl Schurz, John P. Hale, Caleb Cushing (Attorney-General), J. R. Lowell, Hannibal Hamlin (Vice-President), J. W. Foster, J. L. M. Curry. Very few men of this distinction have been sent by any European country to the United States. Not so many, I believe, have served the diplomacy of any one European country during the last fifty years.

Few of these Americans had long diplomatic experience; many of them served with little or none. Hence our range of choice has been much wider than that of those countries which have maintained a regular diplomatic service. Cabinet ministers, historians, poets, lawyers, teachers, are chosen to represent the United States. No country could keep permanently in its diplomatic employ so large a number of its leaders. There would not be enough left for other necessities. The American diplomat is a man of distinction, taken from public life, literature, or the bar, from a large business, or from a university, and set to a job for which he has had no special training. The typical European diplomat is a man of less ability and less general distinction, trained to a profession from his youth. What are the comparative advantages of the two systems ?

The ordinary functions of a diplomat are matters of routine, the observation of proper formalities in public functions and in his official duties. Herein experience tells. Not only has the elaborate etiquette of courts and public offices become second nature to the ambassador who has practiced it since he was a boy, but, apart from the diplomatic career, the bringing up of a European gentleman, especially of a European nobleman, gives him the start of his American colleague, though the latter has grown up in the best society of New York or Washington. But important negotiations are now carried on by foreign secretaries, not by diplomats. The envoy who transmits messages between them is left little discretion. That he should have good manners is desirable, but want of ability and lack of initiative are not serious drawbacks. Thus far the European diplomat has the advantage. Yet emergencies may arise which call for ability in the diplomat himself as well as in his superior, the foreign secretary. There the European is at a disadvantage. His whole life has been given to the study of routine, until his initiative is gone. The American’s ignorance of routine may be a positive help. He is accustomed to emergencies where something new and unexpected must be done. Business, politics, the law, literature, sometimes call for originality.

The success of American diplomacy in meeting these emergencies is illustrated by the career of Mr. Washburne as minister to France. He had been a member of the American House of Representatives and an experienced politician of Illinois, with little knowledge of Europe and almost none of the French language. His diplomatic rank in Paris was low. Nuncio, ambassadors, some ministers plenipotentiary, outranked him. The United States then had little reputation in Europe. But when the political revolution which followed the battle of Sedan perplexed European diplomats, Mr. Washburne made it his business to do the work which lay next his hand, and he found a good deal of it. Within a few weeks the envoy who had stood near the bottom of the list was become in effect the first diplomatic representative in France. How much credit for the gain was due to our Secretary of State, Mr. Fish, and how much to Mr. Washburne, is not known, but much was due to the latter. His protection of the Germans was efficient before and during the siege. When the French government moved to Versailles in consequence of the outbreak of the Commune, Mr. Washburne formally established his legation there, but spent most of his time in Paris. He was helped by his extraordinary courage, no doubt, but courage is not a rare virtue. His common sense, leading him to disregard diplomatic traditions, contributed more than his courage to his success. Thus he was able to save some proposed victims from the Commune, and to comfort in prison the Archbishop of Paris, though he could not save him. Much of his action was irregular, and his establishment in Paris was criticized. Thus he wrote: “This action, it must be admitted, was not entirely acceptable to the government at Versailles, and it was communicated to me, as coming unofficially from that government, that it would have been better for me to have joined all my diplomatic colleagues at Versailles, and not to have kept up any legation whatever in Paris. My answer to all this was that, while I desired to be as agreeable as possible to the government at Versailles, and not to be wanting in my loyalty to it, as minister of the United States, in any respect, yet that there were vast interests with which I was charged at Paris, and, however disagreeable it might be to remain there, I owed a greater duty to the interests with which I was charged than I did to the mere etiquette which would have required me to remain in Versailles. ”

That some disregard of diplomatic traditions on his part does not always discredit a diplomatic representative is proved by Mr. Washburne’s experience. He had aided and protected the Germans. In this way he had obtained the gratitude of Germany; but the Germans were unpopular in France. He had dealt with the leaders of the Commune, some of them vile criminals as well as armed rebels. If his acts had strained our relations with France, his successes would have been dearly bought. But his tact and common sense conciliated France. Momentary irritation soon disappeared. The French ministers of foreign affairs were persons too considerable not to admire beneficent ability, even if its methods were unusual. Mr. Washburne’s habit of dealing with men of all sorts as a man of business, not much troubled by the formalities of diplomatic etiquette, pleased every one. He earned the gratitude of the Germans, while keeping French good-will. His conduct improved our position in Europe. At the other side of the world, nearly thirty years later, America was represented in China by Mr. Conger, an American politician of secondary importance, who had little knowledge of China and no diplomatic experience. An emergency arose, not provided for in the rules of diplomatic etiquette. While Mr. Conger’s achievements in the Boxer troubles were not so great as Mr. Washburne’s in France, yet it is understood that he was rather more than the equal of his trained brethren from England and the continent of Europe. We have just achieved diplomatic success in Russia, having disregarded diplomatic tradition so completely that our ignominious failure was generally predicted. This was the achievement of a president with neither diplomatic training nor a foreign secretary, speaking through an ambassador trained in business and politics.

Emergencies like these are infrequent, it is true, and the close observance of due formalities is called for every day. Granted that Mr. Washburne’s success was brilliant, yet such instances are necessarily rare, and have grown rarer. If our representatives in England, France, and Germany, can to-day do no more than observe diplomatic traditions, keep posted in the gossip of the capital, and avoid the little blunders upon which their colleagues, their colleagues’wives, and other persons of fashion like to dwell, then perhaps we may admit that emergencies may be left to take care of themselves, and that a trained diplomat may be most to our advantage. But some of our representatives, as it seems to me, have pointed out a new function for the diplomat which is of real benefit to his own country and to that which he visits.

An Englishman wrote at the time of Mr. Choate’s departure: “Instinctively we separate the American Ambassador from all his colleagues in the Diplomatic Corps. He is the only one who really reaches the masses. He is the only one in whom the people, as a whole, have any interest. Of him alone is it expected that he will be less of an official and more of a man. One never hears of the Russian or German Ambassador being asked to lecture before a philosophical or historical society, or invited to a literary dinner. They and their colleagues are permitted to stand outside all but a fraction of the national life. They may entrench themselves behind the ramparts of society and officialdom, and none will seek to drag them forth. The public at large knows nothing of them, and does not care to know anything. They are what the American Ambassador never is, — they are foreigners, and treated as such. We surrender them cheerfully to Downing-Street, the Court, and the West End. . . . We never really give the poor man a moment’s rest. We might almost be accused of trying to kill him with kindness. Even before he lands on English soil he is pounced upon by the Mayor and Corporation of Southampton, an address of welcome fired at him on shipboard, and a speech extorted from him in reply. And that is but a foretaste of what is to come. . . . But as it is, no sooner has he presented his credentials than the bombardment begins. I must admit at once it is most vigorously replied to. England and the American Ambassador set to forthwith to see which can spoil the other the most. Chambers of Commerce swoop down upon him and bear him off in triumph as their guest of honour. The Omar Khayyam Club points an invitation at his head, demanding unconditional surrender. The Dante Society insists on his escorting its members through the infernal regions. The Wordsworth Society, the Browning Society, the Boz Club, the Sir Walter Scott Club, — all press their claims. The Birmingham and Midland Institute insidiously elects him as its annual president, and exacts by way of tribute an address on Benjamin Franklin. The Edinburgh Philosophical Institution bestows the same honour for the price of a paper on Abraham Lincoln. And so it goes on. The big public schools, knowing that he is an American, and therefore wrapped up in education, play upon his weakness and lure him into distributing their prizes. Political leagues expect him to tell them all about the United States Supreme Court. The historic City companies never once let go of him. He is a standing feature on the toast-list of the Guildhall banquet. Charitable and philanthropic societies pursue him relentlessly. Working men’s institutes, trading on his democratic sympathies, bid for an evening’s loan of his presence and voice. Libraries refuse to be opened except by him. He is the obvious man to unveil a bust or a portrait. The organizers of a dinner in honour of a famous English cartoonist turn to the American Embassy for the orator of the occasion. After all, I suppose it is partly America’s own fault. She should not send us such charming, cultivated, broadgauged men. Adams, Lowell, Phelps, Bayard, Hay, and Choate,—what other country has sent us representatives to compare with them ? The capacity of a long line of American Ambassadors to warm both hands at the cheerful fire of English existence has been so palpable, their interests have so manifestly stretched beyond the humdrum game of protocols and despatches, they touch life at so many more points than the ordinary professional diplomat, that we should hardly know what to do if the United States accredited to the Court of St. James any one short of her best. A tongue-tied, unsociable, purely official American Ambassador has become unthinkable to this country. We calmly take it for granted that the representative of the United States, whoever he may be, will be a firstclass after-dinner speaker, and able and willing at any time to deliver an address, preside at a meeting, or unveil a monument. And so he invariably is. Why, then, should we not use him for our profit and entertainment?”

The suggestion thus conveyed is valuable, now that our ambassadors are in hourly connection with Washington, and have become little more than messengers and clerks in their ordinary work. May they not be employed in acquainting people of one nation with the people of another ? For this purpose, miscellaneous ability is more effective than training. After he had become famous, Thackeray sought appointment as secretary of legation at Washington. The place was refused him because it had been promised to some one else, and also because some budding diplomat was deemed fairly entitled to it. We make ambassadors of men like Thackeray. To compare with him J. F. T. Crampton, Esq., at about that time British minister to Washington, seems to us absurd.

It is said that training is needed to avoid the blunders often committed by men who are unacquainted with the ways of courts. This is obvious, but how important are these blunders, after all ? They give rise to the gossip common in the diplomatic circles of Pumpernickel and elsewhere, but, except in Pumpernickel, do the people of importance really care ? Those who govern great states, be they sovereigns or ministers, are interested to find intelligence and capacity anywhere. They leave questions of precedence and clothes for the most part to their chamberlains and valets.

We have been successful in interesting the English people in our ambassadors, and their official position has not been much damaged by this interest. We have profited by the transaction, and this profit would have been impossible had we sent trained diplomats to London. In less degree we have profited elsewhere. We have certain advantages in supplying representatives of this sort, besides natural American adaptability. We draw from all the nations of Europe, and ought not to be strangers to any of them. Some of them are ripe for an ambassador who will talk to the people or to large classes of the people as our representatives have talked to the people of England for a generation. That one of our ambassadors appeals especially to men of letters, another to men of business, a third to men in public life, and still a fourth to teachers, but adds variety to the general interest aroused by the succession. In these latter days the people of one country are becoming curious about the people of another. International friendship and international tolerance, both important in their place, are advanced by international knowledge. The exchange of professors between our universities and those of continental Europe illustrates this growing interest of one people in another. Professor Wendell, lecturing last year in the provinces as well as in Paris, owed his welcome to his nationality as well as to his learning and literary skill. This year in Germany Professor Peabody has similar greeting from the Germans, and both will leave behind them sound knowledge and good feeling which the publication of their written lectures could not have effected. To expect our ambassador to open museums and to lecture on politics and literature seems, at first sight, to be asking him to go outside his vocation; but does not our English experience prove that the service he thus renders is in itself important, and that it does not interfere with duties more strictly diplomatic ? Let us suppose, for example, that President Roosevelt, when he leaves his office, were sent to represent us for a while in some continental country. The people of that country would be immensely interested to see him and hear him. Seeing and hearing him, they would be interested in us, and would learn to know us better. With increased knowledge, they would lose some misconceptions and prejudices, and thus we should profit by our representative. That the President is not a trained diplomat is unimportant. It may well be that we can employ him more profitably than as an ambassador, but the suggestion explains my meaning.

Illustration may be found also in the diplomacy of other countries. In the Boxer troubles of 1900, China owed much to her envoy in this country. No doubt he discharged his diplomatic duty at Washington, but he did much more. In the face of the American people, he maintained the Chinese cause under extraordinary difficulties. We did not altogether believe what he said, but we were forced to hear him. He interested us, and, even against our will, made us feel human kinship with his people, while he showed such knowledge of ours.

A trained diplomat, indeed, can be of service to a lawyer, or poet, or college president, sent to represent us at a European court. If the secretary of legation will attend to the routine of the office and will coach the ambassador in the details of behavior and dress, the latter can attend to serious matters with more leisure and effect. But to carry out this plan, the promotion of our regularly trained diplomats must stop short of the highest places in our diplomatic service, and it is doubtful if reasonably intelligent young men will be attracted to a service in which they must remain subordinates. No professional training, however well directed, no experience, however extensive, will produce men to compare in general ability and distinction with our representatives in England, chosen almost at haphazard, during the last fifty years.

In the matter of payment, we touch upon one of our most serious difficulties. The salaries now paid are too low, especially for married men with considerable families. Private means are now needed to supplement the official salary, and so we are coming to appoint as ambassadors only those men whose private means are large. This may not be absolutely necessary. Mr. Roosevelt or Mr. Hay might live in London on $17,500 a year without loss of prestige, but it takes great distinction to make so little money go so far. We cannot expect to get it in every case. As things go, the salary is not ordinarily large enough to enable our representative to live like his diplomatic colleagues. Therefore we appoint rich men ambassadors, to eke out the salary from their private wealth. Not only do they do this, but they outspend their colleagues so lavishly, that soon the merely rich man will be embarrassed by the extravagance of his predecessor. To curtail expense, especially for an American, is difficult. Yet the inability to live on his official salary ought not to lead an ambassador to spend ten times that amount . No nation can pay a salary like that. No nation ought to do so. But few men have that amount of money to spend, and not all the members of the small class of the very rich have the distinction which we ought to find in our foreign representatives. To limit our choice to multi-millionaires would be in every way unfortunate. If an ambassador’s expenses are very large, whether he can afford them or not, he makes it harder for his successor to practice economy. To determine what an ambassador ought to spend in one place or another may not be easy, but we should make the best guess possible, fix the salary accordingly, and intimate strongly and officially to our representatives that then style of living should correspond. That its representatives should vie with princes and great nobles does the United States no good.

Our experience has thus shown that our diplomatic representatives may render us excellent and novel service by talking freely to the people of the countries they visit, to the learned and unlearned alike, and that we may well hesitate to establish a profession of diplomacy which would at once deprive us of Motley, Bayard Taylor, Choate, Lowell, and Andrew D. White, and before long would probably shut out Bayard, Charles Francis Adams, Washburne, and perhaps John Hay.