When the conflicting interests of two nations are so opposed on a
particular question as to admit of no possible compromise, the sword may
be required to cut the knot which reason is unable to untie.
When passions have been so excited on both sides that no common standard
of justice can be found, and what one party insists on as a right the
other denounces as a wrong, prejudice may become too headstrong to yield
to the voice of equity, and those who can agree on nothing else may
consent to abide the fate of arms and to allow that the party which
shall prove the weakest in the war shall be deemed to have been wrong
in the dispute.
But in the present case there is no question of national interest at
issue between France and the United States. In the present case there
is no demand of justice made by one party and denied by the other.
The disputed claims of America on France, which were founded upon
transactions in the early part of the present century and were for many
years in litigation, have at length been established by mutual consent
and are admitted by a treaty concluded between the two Governments.
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