The Purchase of Alaska--The Contention of the House of Representatives in Regard to its Power over Treaties--The Senate's Position and the Compromise--Irritation of the American People against Great Britain--The Johnson-Clarendon Treaty--President Grant's Statements in His First Annual Message and in His Second Annual Address--Sir John Rose's Mission to the United States--The Joint High Commission--The Treaty of Washington--The Alabama Claims and the Geneva Convention--Triumph of the Diplomacy of the United States--Organization of the Tribunal and Filing of the Cases--The Controversy between Mr. Fish and Lord Granville--The Filing of the Counter Cases and the Argument--Obstacles--Decision of the Tribunal in Regard to National and Indirect Damages--The Decision of the Tribunal in the Case of the _Florida_--The Decision in the Case of the _Alabama_--The Decision in the Case of the _Shenandoah_, and other Vessels--International Principles Settled by the Geneva Tribunal--The Northwest Boundary Question--The Fisheries Question--The Halifax Commission and Award--The Burlingame Treaty with China--The Attempt to Annex the Dominican Republic to the United States--The Treaty--The Treaty before the Senate--Its Rejection--The President's Attempt to Renew Negotiations--The Committee of Inquiry--The Report of the Committee--The Abandonment of the Scheme. The two chief products of American diplomacy in the decade between 1867 and 1877 were the purchase of Alaska, and the treaty of Washington with Great Britain. [Sidenote: The purchase of Alaska.] The purchase of Alaska, the northwest corner of the North American continent, together with the islands {300} adjacent thereto, a vast region of some five hundred thousand square miles in extent, inhabited chiefly by a few savage tribes, was effected by a treaty, negotiated by Mr. Seward and the Russian diplomatist, Baron Stoeckl, and ratified by the Senate of the United States on the 30th of March, 1867. [Sidenote: The reasons for and against the purchase.] The proposition came from the side of Russia, and it appeared that Russia was more eager to sell than the United States was to buy. The price agreed on was seven millions two hundred thousand dollars in gold, and most people in the United States thought, at the time, that this great sum was being paid for nothing but a barren area of snow and ice. The country was declared to be utterly worthless by some of the best informed men in Congress, and a man of no less ability and influence than Mr. Shellabarger opposed the purchase on the ground that it involved an extension of territory dangerous to the existence of the Republic.