devoted especially to
the American problem. Spain was to be restored to her sovereignty, but
was to pay in liberal grants of American territory to whatever powers
helped her. Canning is regarded as the ablest English foreign minister
of the nineteenth century; at least no one better embodied the
fundamental aspirations of the English people. He realized that liberal
England would be perpetually a minority in a united Europe, as Europe
was then organized. He believed that the best security for peace was not
a union but a balance of powers. He opposed intervention in the internal
affairs of nations and stood for the right of each to choose its own
form of government. Particularly he fixed his eyes on America, where he
hoped to find weight to help him balance the autocrats of the Old World.
He wished to see the new American republics free, and he believed that
in freedom of trade England would obtain from them all that she needed.
Alarmed at the impending European intervention to restore the rule
of Spain or of her monarchical assignees in America, he sought an
understanding with the United States. He proposed to Richard Rush,
the United States minister in London, that the two countries declare
concurrently that the independence of Spanish America, was a fact,
that the recognition of the new governments was a matter of time and
circumstance, that neither country desired any portion of Spain's
former dominions, but that neither would look with indifference upon the
transfer of any portion of them to another power.

On October 9, 1823, this proposal reached Washington. The answer would
be framed by able and most experienced statesmen. The President, James
Monroe, had been almost continuously in public service since 1782. He
had been minister to France, Spain, and England, and had been Secretary
of State. In his earlier missions he had often shown an unwise
impetuosity and an independent judgment which was not always well
balanced. He had, however, grown in wisdom. He inspired respect by
his sterling qualities of character, and he was an admirable presiding
officer. William H. Crawford, his Secretary of the Treasury, John C.
Calhoun, his Secretary of War, William Wirt, his Attorney-General,
and even John McLean, his Postmaster-General, not then a member of the
Cabinet, were all men who were considered as of presidential caliber.

Foremost in ability and influence, however, was John Quincy Adams, the
Secretary of State. Broug