The war was closed by the Treaty at Ghent; but, perversely, the British pretension was not renounced. Other negotiations, in 1818 under President Monroe, in 1823 also under Monroe, and again in 1827 under John Quincy Adams, expressly to procure its renunciation, were all unavailing. Of these various negotiations I forbear all details; but the language of Mr. Rush, our Minister at London, who pressed this question assiduously for several years, beginning with 1818, should not be omitted. The case was never stated more strongly. “Let the steps by which the enforcement proceeds be attended to. A British frigate, in time of war, meets an American merchant vessel at sea, boards her, and, under terror of her guns, takes out one of the crew. The boarding lieutenant asserts, and, let it be admitted, believes, the man to be a Briton. By this proceeding the rules observed in deciding upon any other fact, where individual or national rights are at stake, are overlooked. _The lieutenant is accuser and judge. He decides upon his own view, instantly._ The impressed man is forced into the frigate’s boat, and the case ends. _There is no appeal, no trial of any kind_; more important still, there is no remedy, should it appear that a wrong has been committed.”[57] At last, in 1842, at the Treaty of Washington, Mr. Webster, calmly setting aside all idea of further negotiation on this pretension, and without even proposing any stipulation with regard to it, deliberately announced the principle irrevocably adopted by our Government. It was that announced at the beginning by Mr. Jefferson. This document is one of the most memorable in our history, and it bears directly on the existing controversy, when, in exposing the British pretension, it says:-- “But the lieutenant of a man-of-war, having necessity for men, _is apt to be a summary judge_, and his decisions will be quite as significant of his own wants and his own power as of the truth and justice of the case.”[58] At a later day still, on the very eve of recent events, we find General Cass, as Secretary of State, in elaborate instructions to our ministers in Europe, dated June 27, 1859, declaring principles which may properly control the present question. He says:--