hoped to finally achieve his long-term goal of acquiring Cuba, where slavery still flourished. After long negotiations with the British, he convinced them to agree to cede the Bay Islands to Honduras and the Mosquito Coast to Nicaragua. However, Buchanan's ambitions in Cuba and Mexico were blocked in the House of Representatives where the anti-slavery forces strenuously opposed any move to acquire new slave territory. Buchanan was assisted by his ally Senator John Slidell (D.-Louisiana). But Senator Stephen Douglas, a bitter enemy of Buchanan inside the Democratic Party, worked hard to frustrate Buchanan's foreign-policy. Buchanan tried to purchase Alaska from Russia, possibly as a colony for Mormon settlers, but the U.S. and Russia were unable to agree upon a price. In China, despite not taking direct part in the Second Opium War, the Buchanan administration won trade concessions. The president relied on William Bradford Reed (1806–1876) his Minister to China in 1857–58. A former Whig, Reed had persuaded many old-line Whigs to support Buchanan in the 1856 campaign. The Treaty of Tientsin (1858) granted American diplomats the right to reside in Peking, reduced tariff levels for American goods, and guaranteed the free exercise of religion by foreigners in China. Reed developed some of the roots of the Open Door Policy that came to fruition 40 years later. In 1858, Buchanan was angered by "A most unprovoked, unwarrantable, and dastardly attack" and ordered the Paraguay expedition. Its successful mission was to punish Paraguay for firing on the which was on a scientific expedition. Paraguay apologized and paid an indemnity. Civil War and the Gilded Age: 1861–1897 American Civil War Every nation was officially neutral throughout the American Civil War, and none recognized the Confederacy. That marked a major diplomatic achievement for Secretary Seward and the Lincoln Administration. France, under Napoleon III, had invaded Mexico and installed a puppet regime; it hoped to negate American influence. France therefore encouraged Britain in a policy of mediation suggesting that both would recognize the Confederacy. Washington repeatedly warned that meant war. The British textile industry depended on cotton from the South, but it had stocks to keep the mills operating for a year and in any case the industrialists and workers carried little weight in British politics. A war would cut off vital shipments of American food, wreak havoc on the British merchant fleet, and cause the immediate loss of Canada. Britain therefore refused to