ABSTRACT
W.E.Gladstone once observed that foreign policy is more than just about interests. For many years diplomatic historians have eagerly embraced such issues as strategy, ideology, cultural relations, and trade in an effort to comprehend the relations between states. In the ambivalent relationship between Great Britain and the United States in the nineteenth century, the American Civil War of 1861-65 serves as a crucible into which the main issues between the two countries can be poured, brought into close relationship and put to the test. In the nineteenth century these issues revolved around independence, sovereignty and the balance of power in the Western Hemisphere. Their resolution would be determined by the relative significance attached by either side to power and the moral imperative. In this reconsideration, the main focus will be on the relative power relationship of each country rather than on the details of diplomatic exchanges. There have been many full-dress diplomatic histories of Anglo-American relations in this period and it seems unnecessary to repeat them. The approach in this chapter is thematic. It attempts to place the diplomatic history of the Civil War period into a much broader context than is frequently attempted. It therefore draws comparisons and contrasts from both before 1861 and after 1865. The American Civil War was obviously far more important to the Americans than to the British, and it is necessary to understand the effect this variance had on the development of policy by either side. Also, the moral factor was important for both sides for most of the time; but ultimately both sides lacked an interest in going to war that could outweigh their interest in preserving the peace. Despite inflammatory language, in reality, both powers reached a level of accommodation, compromise and affinity that was unusual in the nineteenth century.
