confines its interposition."

The President himself did not run into any such uncalled-for
extravagance of expression, but his statement of the American
position did not thereby lose in vigor. When he had received the
reply, of the British Government refusing to recognize the
interest of the United States in the case, Cleveland addressed
himself, on December 17, 1895, to Congress. In stating the
position of the Government of the United States, he declared that
to determine the true boundary line was its right, duty, and
interest. He recommended that the Government itself appoint a
commission for this purpose, and he asserted that this line, when
found, must be maintained as the lawful boundary. Should Great
Britain continue to exercise jurisdiction beyond it, the United
States must resist by every means in its power. "In making these
recommendations I am fully alive to the responsibility incurred,
and keenly realize all the consequences that may follow." Yet
"there is no calamity which a great nation can invite which
equals that which follows a supine submission to wrong and
injustice and the consequent loss of national self-respect and
honor beneath which axe shielded and defended a people's safety
and greatness."

Perhaps no American document relating to diplomacy ever before
made so great a stir in the world. Its unexpectedness enhanced
its effect, even in the United States, for the public had not
been sufficiently aware of the shaping of this international
episode to be psychologically prepared for the imminence of war.
Unlike most Anglo-American diplomacy, this had been a long-range
negotiation, with notes exchanged between the home offices