No 332.
Mr. Foster
to Mr. Evarts.
Mexico, November 9, 1877. (Received November 23.)
Sir: I have information that informal and personal interviews have recently occurred in this capital, looking to a renewal of relations between Great Britain and Mexico.
Upon the return of the republican government to this capital in 1867, all of the European representatives accredited to Maximilian left the country except the British chargé d’affaires, who remained in this city [Page 535] with the members of his legation. Some time after the re-establishment of the republican government, the British consul, upon seeking to intervene in a Mexican court in behalf of an intestate estate in his charge, was informed, by a note from the Minister of Foreign Affairs, that he would not be permitted to act in his official capacity, for the reason that the government of the republic had determined to have no official intercourse with any agent of the government abroad that had acknowledged the Maximilian government. The British Government, being advised of this action, directed its diplomatic representative to withdraw from the country with the archives of the legation. In December of the same year the Mexican Executive announced officially that for the same reason all the treaties with the European powers were abrogated, specially mentioning the British debt conventions.
In renewing relations with Germany and Spain the initiative came from the former powers, and Germany has made new treaties with Mexico. No new treaties have as yet been celebrated between Mexico and Spain, but the former insists upon the position assumed by President Juarez in 1867, and it is tacitly acquiesced in by Spain.
It has been understood that Great Britain has occupied the ground that it is willing to renew diplomatic relations, but that, in view of the circumstances under which its legation was withdrawn from this country, the initiative should come from Mexico, and that the treaties and conventions should be recognized as existing.
The result of the recent interview between the Mexican minister and a British resident of this city, who held a personal letter to the latter from Lord Derby, has been a failure to modify the positions of the Mexican Government above referred to.
I am, &c.,