410 HARVARD LAW REVIEW. This occurred on December 29, 1837; ^ week later, on January 5, 1838, President Van Buren issued this proclamation: — " Whereas information having been received of a dangerous excitement on the northern frontier of the United States, in consequence of the civil war begun in Canada; . . . that arms and munitions of war and other supplies have been procured by the insurgents in the United States ; that a military force, consisting in part, at least, of citizens of the United States, had been actually organized, had congregated at Navy Island, and were still in arms under the command of a citizen of the United States, and that they were constantly receiving accessions and aid : " Now therefore ... I, Martin Van Buren, do most earnestly exhort all citizens of the United States who have thus violated their duties, to return peaceably to their respective homes ; and I hereby warn them that any per- sons who shall compromit the neutrality of this government by interfering in an unlawful manner with the affairs of the neighboring British provinces, will render themselves liable to arrest and punishment." ^ The Governors of the States of New York and Vermont had previously issued similar proclamations; and finally the President issued a second proclamation reiterating the warnings of the first, on November 21, 1838.2 No formal action was taken, nor was there even an informal recognition of belligerency in the case of several revolts in which the people of the United States took an intense and friendly in- terest, though they may for a time have seemed sure to succeed. Such revolts were those of Greece, Hungary, Sicily, Poland, and Cuba. In several cases inquiry was made as to the probability of success: in the cases of Spanish America and of Hungary, com- missioners were sent by the President to investigate the state of affairs ; but this was with a view to recognizing independence, if it existed. Secretary Cass was quite justified in writing to the Peruvian Minister in 1858, — " By what public act, whether proclamation or otherwise, this 'recogni- tion [of belligerency] must take place I have not found laid down. I am not aware that, in this country, any solemn proceeding, either legisla- tive or executive, has been adopted for the purpose of declaring the status of an insurrectionary movement abroad, and whether it is entitled to the attributes of a civil war ; unless, indeed, in the formal recognition of a portion of an empire seeking to establish its independence, which in fact does not so much admit its existence as it announces its result, at 1 38 Br. & For. St. Pap. 1074. 2 26 Br. & For. St. Pap. 1324.
