Should the leading powers of Europe concur in proposing as a rule of international law to exempt private property upon the ocean from seizure by public armed cruisers as well as by privateers, the United States will readily meet them upon that broad ground.
Pierce indicates the U.S. willingness to engage in discussions about international law regarding private property at sea.
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More from Franklin Pierce
In providing for the present you can hardly fail to avail yourselves of the light which the experience of the past casts upon the future.
The object of that war was to disenthrall the united colonies from foreign rule, which had proved to be oppressive, and to separate them permanently from the mother country.
Our Government exists under a written compact between sovereign States, uniting for specific objects and with specific grants to their general agent.
Our refusal to be brought within and subjected to their peculiar system has, I fear, created a jealous distrust of our conduct and induced on their part occasional acts of disturbing effect upon our foreign relations.
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