No. 24.
Mr. Osborn to Mr. Evarts.

No. 296.]

Sir: The national interventor, General Bustillos, having taken possession of the provincial chambers, while the legislature was taking a recess, with an armed force, by orders of the President, and prohibited the legislature from assembling again, on the 1st instant, Governor Moreno and his ministers, with the municipal authorities of the city and the chief of police, resigned their offices. Governor Moreno issued an address to the people of the province—a printed copy of which I inclose herewith—giving his reasons why he and his ministers can no longer retain their offices.

It is said the President will also issue an address denying many of the statements in the address of the governor, and at the same time will set forth that since the close of the rebellion the provincial legislature has been guilty of acts both treasonable and revolutionary. The national interventor has summoned the people of the province to elect a new legislature on the 26th instant. The complexion of the new legislature will undoubtedly be in conformity with the desire of the national government, as the opposition will very probably refuse to vote.

At any other time the sweeping changes of the provincial authorities would probably have led to serious consequences, but as a result of the suppression of the late rebellion, the people accept the situation with becoming silence and resignation. Gold in the market has fallen, Argentine stocks have advanced, and business men look forward to the administration of President Roca with confidence.

I have, &c.,

THOS. O. OSBORN.
[Inclosure with No. 296.—From the Standard, February 2, 1880.]

address of the executive to the people of buenos ayres.

When the vice-governor assumed power on July 1, circumstances clearly traced his line of action. After the bloody events of June, negotiations for peace, the details of which the people already know, were opened with the President of the republic, who, as constitutional commander-in-chief, commanded the army operating against Buenos Ayres.

The reciprocal obligations contracted in those negotiations included the submission and obedience of the province to the national government, the city forces to be disbanded, and their arms to be deposited in the arsenal, the President, on his part, recognizing the existing public powers of the province, and refraining from any civil or military prosecutions, without prejudice, however, to his administrative and military faculties.

The details of the due execution of the foregoing bases were arranged privately, as the people already know.

The government at once adopted every means to loyally carry out the obligations entered into, and to insure complete pacification. The vice-governor officially announced the submission of the province to the national authorities, and this was fully accepted by the President of the republic in documents already published. All measures necessary for disbanding and disarming the city forces were subsequently taken, and the details set forth in a note to the national government, stating that each and every one of the obligations entered into by the province had been duly fulfilled, according to the bases agreed on with the President of the republic.

(Here follows the governor’s note to Minister Zorrilla, the contents of which are already known.)

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To this hour no answer has been received to this note. On the contrary, a national commissioner has ruled in the camp districts, since the 18th June, whose chief duty was to protect life and property while the governor of Buenos Ayres was in armed resistance and the war lasted, and whose authority should have ceased when the circumstances to which it was due had disappeared.

The Government of Buenos Ayres was made every effort, privately and officially, to induce the national government to fulfill its obligations, but every day there was some delay, while the public authorities of the province were curtailed in their attributes, and at last the legislature was dissolved by an act of congress, declaring it in rebellion, although since peace was made it had done no legislative act to warrant such a declaration, and without congress having any legal or constitutional right to make it.

Buenos Ayres has laid down its arms, disbanded its forces, submitted to the national government, and resumed the regime of peace, relying on arrangements which, although wanting the formality of a treaty between political entities, were not the less solemn and binding on Argentine honor and the good faith of the nation.

The president has twice corroborated this, first in congress, when he said that in recognizing the vice-governor he recognized the legislature; and, again, when he declared that, as commander-in-chief, he had accepted the submission of the Buenos Ayres revolutionists, while leaving the public authorities of the province intact. This included the legislature and condoned its previous acts.

These declarations, which are in exact conformity with the agreement made, show that the act of congress maintaining the intervention and dissolving the chambers is in direct opposition to them, disclosing quite; a different system of pacification, tending to a dissolution and reconstruction of the public bodies of the province.

To this end a special commissioner has summoned the people to elect a new legislature, ignoring the provincial executive and riding rough-shod over article 105 of the constitution, which allows the provinces to elect their own governors, legislators, &c., without any interference by the federal government. In this way the basis on which the government that succeeded Governor Tejedor’s was to restore order and its regular institutions to the province has disappeared: and the dignity of the province, with which is linked the dignity of its government, imperiously demands that the, latter should abandon a post which they can only consent to retain on the conditions stipulated with the national government.

The legislature has been dissolved by national troops, without any intimation to either chamber: and, as no public body now exists in whose hands the members of the executive can place their resignation, and it being impossible for them to fulfill their constitutional duties, we hereby declare before the people of Buenos Ayres that we leave our posts with the consciousness of having done our duty in the present critical times, with regret at not being able to accomplish the task set us by public opinion and necessity, and with the hope that more elevated ideas of justice and political honesty may soon produce happier days for the province and for the country.

  • JOSÉ M. MORENO.
  • F. ALCOBENDAS.
  • F. L. BALBIN.