Biography

On June 30, 1850, he secretly married Harriet Stanwood, at that time teaching in Kentucky, but belonging to an old Massachusetts family, one branch of which settled in 1822 at Augusta, Me. As the legality of this marriage was in doubt, they were remarried on Mar. 29, 1851, at Pittsburgh, Pa. Through this connection came, in 1854, an opportunity to enter journalism at Augusta. Through the financial assistance of Mrs. Blaine's brothers he was able to purchase an interest in the Kennebec Journal. For several years he also served on the editorial staff of the Portland Advertiser. Although he left journalism in 1860, it was, aside from politics, his profession, and he may be said to have been the most prominent of American statesmen to receive their training from that calling. He settled in Augusta, joined the Congregational church, and from 1854 was identified with Maine, illustrating a migration unusual in American history. Augusta remained his home, and here he raised a family of seven children, of whom four survived him. Much of his time, however, was spent at Washington, and in his later years, his summers at Bar Harbor.

Blaine was of a stalwart, well-proportioned physique, with a large, fine head; distinctly a commanding figure. His eyes were particularly brilliant; his voice effective and attractive. His manner had much of the dignity of his generation of statesmen. Much more striking, however, was his magnetic quality, which gave charm to his social intercourse, and which made his oratory perhaps the most thrilling of his day. It was probably the exhaustion, coming after demonstrations of such power, which caused his complaints of ill health, which often puzzled his friends. Undoubtedly he had much of what is called temperament. It followed that he was at his best with a crowd or audience. He was not a clubman, and had more followers than intimates.

His mental characteristics were decidedly those connected with mathematical talent. His speeches were carefully prepared and contained much exact information. One of his greatest political assets was his ability to remember names and faces. He was an expert in the interpretation of election returns. He had in addition an intuitive talent for political leadership. It was this talent, combined with an imagination which gained in power as he gained confidence in himself, which distinguished his foreign policy; but by the time he put this forward, when fifty, he had, perhaps, lost his earlier zest for the exact study upon which he based his domestic policies. His humor, which must have been native, was slow to develop and was assiduously cultivated. Developed by the repartee of debate, it became one of his effective political weapons.

Blaine came to his leading political ideas by nature and by inheritance. His family were Whigs. Thomas Ewing of Ohio was a cousin of his mother. He was a great admirer of Henry Clay, on whose famous Lexington speech of 1847 he took notes. To advocate measures of a nationalizing character was, therefore, natural to him. His interest in the question of slavery was equally keen. In 1854, his first year of editorship, he abandoned the name Whig, and was instrumental in causing those Maine voters, who, under many political titles, were opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska bill, to adopt the new Western cognomen of Republican; thus giving that name currency in the East. In 1856 he was a delegate to the first national Republican convention, and one of its secretaries. He was, therefore, one of the genuine founders of that party, which he expected to carry on Whig measures as well as to oppose slavery.

While Maine was located so far to one side of the country as to miss that strategic importance of a central position which has counted for so much in American politics, nevertheless Blaine found there two advantages. The Maine elections were, during most of his career, held a month earlier than those elsewhere, and were consequently watched eagerly all over the country. More important was the fact that the number of men of exceptional ability in the politics of the state was particularly large. The editor of the rival newspaper at Augusta was Melville W. Fuller, later chief justice of the United States. The strength of the Maine politicians helped him not only by rivalry, but also by support. He was always surrounded by a strong group of local supporters, such as William Pierce Frye, Thomas Brackett Reed, and Nelson Dingley. The Maine habit of keeping such men long in office made them an increasingly powerful group. In a new party young men have an exceptional opportunity. In 1859 he was made chairman of the Republican state committee. He kept this post until 1881, and made himself the accepted and acceptable dictator of his party in the state.

In 1858 he was elected to the state legislature and was twice reelected. During the last two terms he was Speaker of the House of Representatives. This success was won by his editorial skill and ability in political management and in legislative business. It was not until 1860 that he began his career as a public speaker. He entered Congress in 1863, serving in the national House of Representatives until July 10, 1876. In 1869 he was elected speaker, serving until the Democratic House of 1875 took office; after which he became leader of the Republican opposition. On July 10, 1876, he became senator, holding that office until Mar. 5, 1881.

During these years Blaine rose to be a national figure. He exhibited an unusual level-headedness, and changed his views less often than most men during the trying period of Civil War and Reconstruction. These views were sufficiently direct and clear-cut to arouse enthusiasm, but did not share the radicalism and vindictiveness of the extremists. He was firmly a Lincoln man, although in 1860 most of his Maine associates preferred Seward. Before he entered Congress he helped to win a victory in the state election of 1863 on Lincoln's program of Unionism, dropping in that election the designation of Republican, and doing much to organize the large Union majorities of that year, so necessary to offset the Democratic gains of 1862.

Early in the Reconstruction period he came out for negro suffrage, but accepted the lead of neither Thaddeus Stevens nor Charles Sumner. Rather he began to make connections with certain Western leaders, like Bingham and Garfield. He first attracted wide notice by joining with Bingham in adding as an amendment to Stevens's bill for the military government of the South, a provision for reconstruction. This amendment was characterized by the extreme Radicals as "making universal suffrage and universal amnesty" the basis of reconstruction (J. F. Rhodes, History of the United States, 1906, VI, 19). After a severe fight the amendment was attached to the bill, though its amnesty feature was modified.

This was a notable victory for a youngster over the venerable Republican floor leader. Stevens's death Blaine regarded as "an emancipation for the Republican party." Asked who could take his place, Blaine replied, "There are three young men coming forward." He pointed to Allison of Iowa, Garfield of Ohio, and, looking up into the dome of the Capitol, said, "I don't see the third" (G. F. Hoar, Autobiography, 1903, I, 239). He remained opposed to the extreme coercive measures of the Grant administration, helping to defeat a new Force Bill. On the other hand, in 1875, when the Democrats had gained control of the House, he opposed a general amnesty bill, making a violent attack on Jefferson Davis which left no doubt of his genuine Unionism. On the whole he came well through this trying period with the reputation of a liberal who could nevertheless be trusted even by the Grand Army.

During these years he built up also a strong popularity in the West. His associates were Garfield and Allison. He assisted in 1872 in a reduction of the tariff (Horace White, The Life of Lyman Trumbull, 1913, pp. 354-55). His position on the currency was that of a moderate, with tendencies toward sound money. He was regarded as loyal to the principles and practises of his party, but was not an extremist. As important as the friendships which he made was one lasting enmity. This was with the brilliant representative from New York, Roscoe Conkling. In April 1866 they became engaged in a violent personal encounter, when Blaine was presenting a report from the committee on military affairs. Words ran very high, and Blaine accused Conkling of editing his remarks for the Congressional Globe in a way to place Blaine's rejoinders in a false light. This break was never healed. Conkling became one of the leading supporters of Grant, and Blaine became the head of opposition within the party. Gradually there formed two Republican factions, the Stalwarts, or Grant men, and the Half-Breeds, among whom Blaine was most conspicuous--a rivalry kept before the country by the wit of Conkling and the dramatic instinct of Blaine. The probable retirement of Gen. Grant from the presidency in 1876 left the field open to many candidates. Circumstances seemed to have made Blaine the leading candidate for the Republican nomination when a dramatic episode occurred which probably barred the door of the presidency to him forever, as the cry of "Bargain and Corruption" had barred it to his hero Clay. The Democratic committee investigating the charges of railroad graft brought charges of corruption against Blaine. The proof of their truth or falsity was supposed to rest in a collection known as the "Mulligan Letters." These letters Blaine secured. He refused to hand them over to the committee of "southern brigadiers," but he himself read from them to the House in a brilliant and dramatic speech.

The facts seem to be that a decision of Speaker Blaine saved a land grant for the Little Rock and Fort Smith Railroad in 1869. Blaine, thereupon, on the basis of this favor, asked the favor of the railroad managers. He received the privilege of selling bonds on a commission that was secret and certainly generous. He claimed that he lost money on the transaction, as the bonds fell, and he felt under obligation to reimburse his friends. This loyalty to his friends and disregard for the public interest was characteristic of the time. The fact that he conferred the favor before, and not after, receiving the return favor, differentiated him from many public men. It was, nevertheless, true that Blaine became wealthy without visible means of income, and that he resisted all attempts "to expose his private business." His standards were not below those of many public men of his time, but they rendered him anathema to those who were endeavoring to raise the public standards, particularly to the group headed by Carl Schurz, whose independence of party rendered them so powerful in politics from 1868 to 1895. (The best statement of the charges against Blaine is in Carl Schurz, Speeches, Correspondence, and Political Papers, 1913, IV, 239-48; the most considered historical judgment is F. L. Paxson, Recent History of the United States, 1921, pp. 90-91.)

It was under such circumstances that Blaine was first a candidate for the presidency. As always with him the striking accidental combined with the well-earned weight of facts to influence the result. Five days before the convention he was prostrated by the heat of Washington, and the uncertainty of his recovery became a factor in the voting. His name was presented by Robert G. Ingersoll in a speech which has generally been considered the most brilliant nomination in the history of our conventions, and which designated Blaine as the "Plumed Knight," a title which always clung to him. In this convention he had the strongest initial vote, 285, to 125 for his nearest rival, Oliver P. Morton of Indiana who was among those favored by Grant. In addition the anti-Grant forces were in a majority in the whole convention. It was felt, however, that the feeling of the administration against Blaine was so strong that the support of powerful men would be lacking in the campaign should he be nominated, and that the Schurz group would turn to the Democrats. The vote of Rutherford B. Hayes, governor of Ohio, grew steadily, and when New York transferred its vote from Conkling to Hayes, Blaine telegraphed Hayes his congratulations, although Hayes was not nominated until the seventh ballot. It was by such impulsive and generous gestures that Blaine won the widespread affection which was his great political asset.

During the Hayes administration Blaine, now senator from Maine, was preparing for the next campaign. He supported the administration against the attacks of Conkling, their brilliant exchanges keeping both constantly in the public eye. It was a contest for tactical advantage but Blaine strengthened his reputation for moderation and for consideration of the West.

President Hayes was not a candidate for renomination. The Stalwarts concentrated their attention upon again nominating Grant himself, securing a solid block of over three hundred delegates who never wavered. Blaine was again the leading candidate in opposition, with an initial 284 delegates. The others were divided among other Half-Breed leaders, the most important being Senator John Sherman of Ohio and Senator George F. Edmunds of Vermont. Again Conkling's extreme bitterness against Blaine was feared as a factor in the subsequent campaign, and on the thirty-sixth ballot, Gen. James A. Garfield, a friend of Blaine, was nominated. Again Blaine took the result with good nature and worked in the closest intimacy with Garfield in the subsequent campaign. To assuage the disgruntled Stalwarts, Chester A. Arthur of New York was nominated for the vicepresidency.

Garfield appointed Blaine as secretary of state and the administration might almost be called that of Garfield-Blaine. Among its lesser political measures were a series of appointments which violently angered the Stalwarts. After Garfield was shot and died, and Arthur, the friend of Conkling, succeeded, Blaine's influence in the administration was gone, and he tendered his resignation, Sept. 22, 1881. At the request of President Arthur, however, he continued to serve as secretary until Dec. 19, 1881.

The division in the Republican party still remained, but on the whole the Half-Breeds gained. However much Blaine was a politician, it seems to be the fact that from 1876 he was the choice of the majority, or of the largest faction of Republicans, who believed that he had been kept from nomination by political expedients and who felt that his time had now come. Remaining in Washington, he wrote the first part of his Twenty Years of Congress (Volume I published 1884) and articles setting forth his position. He was also in daily touch with his political associates. As the presidential year approached President Arthur received the support of the Stalwarts for renomination, but that faction was steadily losing power. In the convention of 1884 Blaine was nominated for the presidency on the first ballot, and Gen. John A. Logan of Illinois was chosen as candidate for vice-president.

His Democratic opponent was Grover Cleveland, who as governor of New York had attracted the favor of those particularly interested in certain reforms, as that of the civil service. This fact, combined with the suspicion clinging to Blaine as a result of the affair of the Mulligan Letters, caused the group led by Carl Schurz, which had up to this time coöperated with the Republicans, to shift to the support of Cleveland. Their numbers were not large and some associated with them, as Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge, refused to change. Nevertheless they were men of prominence and their desertion weakened the Republican hope of success. Popularly they were designated as Mugwumps.

The foreign policy which Blaine had developed while secretary of state, moreover, seems to have caused more apprehension than enthusiasm. His tilts with Great Britain, however, were popular with the Irish-Americans, and it was hoped that he could divide that vote. At the very end of the campaign, in a speech at the Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York, a supporter of Blaine, the Rev. S. D. Burchard [q.v.], referred to him as fighting the Democratic party as "the party whose antecedents are rum, Romanism, and rebellion." This expression, coming too late to be explained away, undoubtedly alienated many Irish Catholics, and in view of the closeness of the vote in New York, the key state, where a change of 600 votes would have turned the election, may well have meant the defeat of Blaine. He lost Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Indiana, and the election.

Blaine now resumed the writing of his Twenty Years in Congress, publishing the second volume in 1886. In the following year he published a collection of his speeches with the title Political Discussions: Legislative, Diplomatic, and Popular. He still remained the most powerful Republican, and expectation was general that he would be nominated again in 1888. Before the convention he went for a long trip to Europe. On Jan. 25, 1888, he wrote home from Florence stating that he was not a candidate, and that he could not accept unless he were to be chosen by an unanimity which was impossible. This decision was confirmed by other letters, and finally convinced his friends, although votes were still cast for him in the convention. He was, however, though still away, a powerful factor, and was instrumental, if not the chief influence, in causing the selection of Benjamin Harrison of Indiana as candidate.

It was taken for granted, upon the election of Harrison, that the chief post in the cabinet would be offered to Blaine. The offer was made and accepted and Blaine entered upon the most fruitful part of his career. These were, however, unhappy years for Blaine. In 1890 he lost two children. His relations with the President became strained, and his health was not good. As the presidential year approached, again he announced that he would not be a candidate, which left the President the leading aspirant, but not a popular one. When the convention met, the President had almost, but not quite, a majority of pledged delegates. On June 4, three days before the convention, Blaine resigned in a curt letter, and his resignation was as curtly accepted. Such action can hardly be interpreted otherwise than that Blaine hoped for a miracle, for a demonstration of that enthusiasm which he still inspired so convincing as to sweep the convention off its feet. He received 182 5/6 votes, but Harrison was nominated on the first ballot. With that generosity which always characterized him, Blaine returned to Washington, was reconciled with the President, and took what little part in the campaign his health allowed. His health, however, rapidly declined, and on Jan. 27, 1893, at the age of sixty-two, he died. In spite of this early death, Blaine seemed to have well rounded out a career. New times were calling for men of different training. He impresses one, moreover, as having lived at the height of his powers in the years between 1865 and 1885, and to have died an old man.

The permanent influence of Blaine on American life has been through his foreign policy. On Mar. 7, 1881, he first entered upon his duties as secretary of state. This position in American government has taken on a double significance; the secretary is, under the president, the leader of the administration, and is also the foreign minister. The general expectation was that in an unusual degree Blaine would emphasize the political aspects of the office. Intimate friend of the President, he was in the public eye a more considerable figure. This political reputation, moreover, had been built up on the basis of his leadership in domestic problems. It was not, therefore, supposed that he would do more than follow the routine policies of the country, perhaps with some tincture of his customary dash.

It is too little to say that this expectation was shattered. From the time he took office, Blaine made foreign affairs his leading interest. He made them the outstanding point in the appeal to the people for the presidency to which he constantly aspired. Nor does this seem to have been merely an intellectually contrived project for political advancement. Almost alone among the public men of his period, he saw in American foreign relations not merely a series of episodes, to be dealt with according to the fixed rules of the Monroe Doctrine and of international law, but a general situation calling for a constructive policy, to be adjusted to changing conditions. His rising interest in diplomatic problems may well have been due to native instinct. He had the qualities of a diplomat, and his personal conduct of such affairs was his strongest asset; though his personal feeling was perhaps too strong, as is evinced by his refusal while in London to meet Lord Salisbury, because of their acrimonious exchanges.

Blaine's generation in the United States was almost totally without the basic training for diplomatic thought or practise. It was the nadir of American diplomacy. This defect Blaine at fifty was not prepared to make good by study. His years of strenuous application had passed. He remained, therefore, lamentably ignorant of international law and of diplomatic history. In addition his major interest in politics often caused him to be careless in the selection of his agents in critical situations. These defects seriously affected his reputation. That they marred his success is more doubtful; he was a forerunner of American world interests, and so far in advance of the public that even perfect achievement would scarcely have won popular support in his time.

Blaine's first term as secretary lasted only from Mar. 7, 1881, to Dec. 19, 1881. On Mar. 7, 1889, however, he again entered the office, serving until June 4, 1892. In the interval, neither the Republican administration of President Arthur and Secretary Frelinghuysen, nor the Democratic administration of President Cleveland and Secretary Bayard, was in harmony with his views. Blaine, however, during this period made his chief residence in Washington, with summers at Bar Harbor, and one visit to Europe. He was always in the closest touch with his group of Republican leaders in Congress, and his influence was very powerful. He remained thus constantly a force in determining United States policy, and this period of his life is distinctly a unit.

There were several closely interknit problems to which he devoted his attention. Ever since the Civil War the relations between the Latin American countries and Great Britain had been growing more intimate at the expense of the United States. This was due in large measure to the supplanting of the latter's merchant marine by the British. Furthermore the competition of South American nations, particularly of Argentina, was encroaching upon the command of the European food trade by the United States, at the same time that the latter's manufactures, which were Blaine's chief concern, were reaching the point where foreign markets were deemed necessary. Lastly, the question of an inter-oceanic canal had assumed a new importance in the light of the successful forcing of the isthmus of Suez.

From these factors Blaine evolved a policy well coördinated and appealing. In form, this was much influenced by his admiration for Henry Clay. Like Clay he was not satisfied with the negative features of the Monroe Doctrine. He would unite the nations of America into a real system, with the United States as "elder sister." He would maintain peace among them by the use of the good offices of the United States and by arbitration. For constructive purposes he would call them all in joint conference to plan measures of mutual advantage. He would rally them to an extension of Clay's American system, "America for the Americans." That this policy might bring some occasion for dispute with Great Britain was politically an advantage, for any baiting of the British lion was pleasing to the Irish vote which was large and strategically placed. The traditional division of the world into two hemispheres, set forth in the Monroe Doctrine, would be maintained.

When Blaine took office in 1881 a concession for the building of a canal across the isthmus of Panama had already been obtained from the Republic of Colombia by a French company headed by the famous De Lesseps, the constructor of that at Suez. Both Secretary Evarts and President Hayes of the preceding administration had strongly taken a stand refusing to join in an international guarantee of the neutrality of such a canal, and insisting that such a canal must be built under the auspices and sole protection of the United States and the country through which it was constructed. Blaine promptly endorsed this policy, sending instructions to the American ministers in Europe, that the "guarantee given by the United States of America does not require re-enforcement, or accession, or assent from any other power." He stated that the passage of hostile troops through such a canal when either the United States or Colombia was at war was "no more admissible than . . . over the railroad lines joining the Atlantic and Pacific shores of the United States."

This was in fact a change in policy on the part of the United States, which had until the time of Evarts stood for an international control of such a canal. It was, in addition, in direct contravention of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty of 1850 with Great Britain, which had agreed to a canal under a joint international guarantee and had invited others to join in a guarantee of neutrality. On Nov. 1, 1881, Blaine took up this treaty. He argued that the treaty was void because of changed conditions, and contrary to the established policy of the United States. A lively interchange of notes, however, between the governments of the United States and Great Britain, failed to eliminate the treaty, nor was there any peaceful method of voiding the Colombian concession to the French company. Blaine, therefore, used his influence to promote the project of a United States canal through the nearby isthmus of Nicaragua. His canal policy was continued by Frelinghuysen, but negotiations with Nicaragua were brought to an end by President Cleveland, who reverted to the earlier United States policy, that such a canal "must be for the world benefit, a trust for mankind, to be removed from chance of domination by any single power." This matter continued as a subject of political and international controversy for twenty years. Ultimately the policy of Blaine was accepted by the United States. The plan for a Nicaragua Canal was not dropped until President Roosevelt succeeded in so modifying the Clayton-Bulwer treaty as to allow the canal at Panama to become a United States property, fortified by the United States.

A similar question confronted Blaine when he became secretary a second time, in 1889; that of the protection of the seal herds which bred on the Pribilof Islands of Alaska. The question of their destruction by Canadians and other deep-sea fishers had reached an acute stage under President Cleveland. Blaine at once took the stand that Bering Sea was a closed sea and part of the territorial waters of the United States. This position was historically unsound and was out of harmony with the previous policy of the United States as it had been evolved in the case of the northeastern fisheries. He negotiated, however, with the British minister in the United States, Sir Julian Pauncefote, a rather remarkable treaty by which legal rights were submitted to arbitration, and, in case the United States were to lose, for a scientific enquiry to be made to determine measures necessary to protect seal herds. Pending the arbitration they were placed under the protection of a modus vivendi. The United States lost its case but Blaine had raised the question of the protection of such animal life as migrates from country to country and uses the high seas. Since his day much has been done in this direction, by treaties between various countries interested.

The main constructive portion of Blaine's foreign policy had to do with South America. This had been foreshadowed before he became secretary by his support of subsidies to revive the United States's shipping connections with that continent (Blaine, Political Discussions, pp. 186--93). As secretary one of his first acts was to stand between Latin-American countries and Europe. To prevent the seizure of Venezuelan customhouses by the French for payment of a claim, he urged Venezuela to pay through the agent of the United States and threatened that should no payment be made within three months, the United States would herself seize the customhouses and collect the money. He protested June 25, 1881, in a letter to Lucius Fairchild, minister to Spain, against the proposal of Colombia and Costa Rica to submit a boundary dispute to Spain for arbitration. This was not a denial of right, but an expression of his hope that the United States might become sole arbitrator in such disputes (see C. R. Fish, American Diplomacy, 1915, pp. 384-85).

He devoted much attention to keeping the peace in America by active mediation. Convinced that Guatemala was right in a dispute with Mexico, he wrote the latter: "This country will continue its policy of peace even if it cannot have the great aid which the coöperation of Mexico would assure; and it will hope at no distant day to see such concord and coöperation between all nations of America as will render war impossible." His greatest interest was in the war actually in progress between Chile and Peru, over the Tacna-Arica territory. His first agents to the two countries were diplomatically incompetent, but finally he sent William H. Trescot of South Carolina, an accomplished diplomat. Trescot was to warn Chile against an unwarrantable use of her victories, and to threaten her with intervention, not by the United States alone but by joint action of the American powers (Ibid., p. 386). Already Blaine was making preparations to secure such American coöperation, by developing the idea of Pan-Americanism, which had been so dead since Clay's fiasco with the Congress of Panama. On Nov. 29, 1881, he asked all the independent nations of America to discuss arbitration, and inaugurate an era of good will. This invitation was withdrawn when, after the assassination of Garfield, Blaine was succeeded by Frelinghuysen. In fact his whole Latin American policy was promptly dropped. It did not, however, cease to be discussed. It was attacked as partial and blustering and apt to bring hostility between Europe and America. Its errors of detail were severely arraigned. It seems to have served Blaine little politically, as the country was uninterested in foreign affairs. Blaine defended his policy in magazine articles, and urged it through his friends in Congress. In 1888 Congress passed a bill calling a Pan-American congress, which President Cleveland allowed to become a law without his signature (M. Romero, "The Pan-American Conference," North American Review, September, October, 1890). On Oct. 2, 1889, this Congress met at Washington, with a long program including arbitration and the facilitating of commercial intercourse; but avoidance of all exciting questions. While without power, it drew up, under the personal influence of Blaine, many desirable recommendations, and in particular laid the foundation of the Bureau of American Republics at Washington, which has proved a permanent contribution. The vitality of this coöperation was in Blaine's mind to rest upon increased commercial intercourse, which he planned to promote by reciprocity treaties authorized in 1884. The new McKinley tariff bill, then under discussion in Congress, put on the free list most of the agricultural products of Latin America, thus depriving the United States of any quid pro quo in bargaining. Blaine, on July 11, 1890, wrote Senator Frye of Maine: "There is not a section or a line in the entire bill that will open the market for another bushel of (American) wheat or another barrel of pork." His views received much support from the West, and were offered in an amendment, fixing a duty upon sugar and such commodities, but allowing the President power to remove such duties in the case of "all products of any nation of the American hemisphere upon which no export duties are imposed" in case the agreed products of the United States should be admitted free of duty. This amendment was not passed, but a "reciprocity" clause was introduced, which left the products in question on the free list, but allowed the President to impose a tax in case the duties imposed by any nation on articles from the United States appeared to him "unequal and unreasonable." This ignored Blaine's intention of specially cementing relations with American powers; nevertheless he concluded under it a number of treaties, which were in operation too short a time to demonstrate their possible effect.

As had been customary since the days of Webster, Blaine considered the Hawaiian Islands as part of the American hemisphere. He found them a kingdom closely bound to the United States by a reciprocity treaty, but with a government which he believed was strongly susceptible to foreign influences, especially that of Great Britain. In 1881 he wrote the American minister there that should the native population continue to decline, the United States would be obliged to take over the islands. On becoming secretary again in 1889, he sent as minister John L. Stevens, one of his closest friends and business associates. On Feb. 8, 1892, Stevens wrote Blaine that "annexation must be the future remedy or else Great Britain will be furnished with circumstances and opportunity to get a hold on these islands which will cause future serious embarrassment to the United States." After Blaine's retirement a revolution broke out, which was sympathetically supported by Minister Stevens and which could hardly have been beyond Blaine's vision of the possible.

While pursuing his policy of America for the Americans, Blaine did not stand apart from movements to improve general international organization. He negotiated an important treaty on extradition with Great Britain, joined in a general act for the suppression of the African slave trade, and made the United States' first treaties on international copyright.

Blaine is conspicuous as the only outstanding public figure between Seward and Hay who was really interested in foreign affairs. His contributions, the Pan-American Union and reciprocity, are of less importance than the fact that he attracted public attention to international problems, and in particular to certain lines of policy relating to America, which were followed out by Roosevelt, and are still (1927) developing.

text by Carl Russell Fish, Dictionary of American Biography