Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, Transmitted to Congress, With the Annual Message of the President, December 1, 1884

No. 217.
Mr. Frelinghuysen to Mr. Langston.

Department of State,
Washington, March 7, 1884.

No. 265.]

Sir: Your dispatch No. 602, of the 17th of December last, has been received. It transmits a copy of a note addressed to you by President Salomon on the 22d of November last, inviting you to an interview touching the question of indemnity proposed by Hayti to be accorded to foreigners who suffered through the unfortunate events of the 22d and 23d of September, 1883, and at the same time inviting the consuls of France, England, Germany, Spain, and Italy to be present and take part in the interview. In a subsequent note of the 9th of December, a copy of which also accompanies your dispatch, you communicate the view of President Salomon that, according to the judgment of his Government, the events which took place at Port au Prince on the 22d and 23d of September last, provoked evidently by the riots of those days, should be the subject of a special examination, and that his own desire is to put aside from such examination occurrences which have taken place in Hayti at other periods, as well as those which may have been produced in other localities in consequence of these same events. The President further says in that same dispatch addressed to you:

The principle of indemnity once recognized in favor of foreigners who had sustained real damages on the 22d and 23d days of September last, the estimate of their losses should be confided to mixed commissions, the members whereof should be named, half by my [Haytien] Government and half by the representatives of the countries of the claimants, who should have to present in support of their demands all the necessary justificative documents.

The limitation suggested by the President of Hayti, restricting the subject of indemnity to losses sustained by foreigners in Port au Prince during the events of the 22d and 23d of September, and excluding the consideration of losses in other localities of the Republic, resulting from the same events, appears to me somewhat narrow, but as the claim of American citizens of the class now under discussion are, so far as now known, confined to losses at Port au Prince, this Government is not disposed to press that view or to interpose it as an obstacle to the establishment of the proposed commission.

The President also conceives that the submission of the claims of all foreigners whose Governments shall join in the arrangement to one mixed commission, in which all of these Governments shall be represented is, on the whole, preferable to separate joint commissions with each country, and will tend to facilitate a more speedy and just settlement than could reasonably be hoped for from a separate commission for each, and conscious of the high sense of justice by which the Haytien Government is animated in this as in all other matters, no objection is made to that Government having the power to name one-half of the members of the tribunal.

The examination by the commission should also, as suggested by President Salomon, be confined to the consideration of actual and real losses growing out of the events referred to. This Government, however, reserves to itself the right, after full examination by this Department, to present diplomatically any claim of one of its citizens based on the withholding or abuse of any personal rights of such citizen of the United States or indignities to their persons by the officers of the Haytien Government.

There is still one other question to which your attention is invited in connection with any proposed agreement for such a commission. President Salomon observes that the mode of payment could only be settled after the nature of the obligations allowed and their importance shall have become known, and that such question must, in conformity to the constitutional law of Hayti, be submitted to the legislative chambers.

This Government would not feel disposed to assent to any arrangement for the establishing of a mixed commission, which, after subjecting the citizens to the inconvenience and expense of formulating their claims and collecting and adducing evidence and proofs in support of such claims, and accepting the awards of the commission, would still leave entirely unsettled the question of satisfaction of these awards by Hayti, both as to time and mode of payment. A stipulation should therefore be embraced in the agreement binding that Government to abide by the results of the commission’s labors, and to satisfy the awards made against it by payment to this Government, within a fixed period, the amount of the several awards made on account of the claimants who may be citizens of the United States.

I inclose a draft copy of an agreement which may aid you in considering the question in connection with the consuls of the several other powers who may enter into the arrangement.

Before concluding or signing any agreement that may be determined upon between the Haytien Government and the representatives of the several Governments concerned, you will forward an authentic copy to this Department.

I am, &c.,

FRED’K T. FRELINGHUYSEN.

[Inclosure in No. 265.]

Memorandum of an agreement between the Government of Hayti of the one part and the Government of the United States of America, the Government of France, the Government of Great Britain, the Government of Germany, the Government of Spain, and the Government of Italy of the other part, for the adjustment of losses suffered by the citizens or subjects of the said several Governments at Post au Prince on the 22d and 23d of September, 1883, resulting from insurrectionary movements and events which occurred in that capital on the two days named.

I. It is agreed that all such claims which shall have been presented by the claimants or in their behalf to their respective Governments parties to this agreement, or which shall be so presented before the day fixed by this agreement for the meeting of the mixed commission herein provided for, shall be submitted to a mixed commission, to be composed of twelve commissioners, six of whom shall be selected by the President of the Haytien Republic, and one each respectively by the minister resident and consul-general of the United States, the consul of France, the consul of Great Britain, the consul of Germany, the consul of Spain, and the consul of Italy at Port au Prince.

II. The commissioners so named shall meet at Port au Prince within one month from the time of their appointment, and shall, before proceeding to business, make and subscribe a solemn declaration that they will impartially and to the best of their judgment and according to public law and the existing treaties between the several powers who are parties of the second part to this agreement and the Republic of Hayti and these present stipulations, decide all such claims as shall in conformity with this agreement be laid before them on the part of all and each of the several Governments who are parties hereto of the second part, and such declaration shall be entered on the records of their proceedings.

III. Each Government may name an agent to appear before the commission to represent the interests of the parties respectively.

IV. The commission shall have full power subject to these stipulations, and it shall be its duty before proceeding with the hearing and decison of any claim to make and publish convenient rules prescribing the time and manner of the presentation of claims and the proof thereof, it being understood that a reasonable time shall be allowed for the presentation of proofs; that all claims and the documentary proofs in support of them shall be presented only by the Government of the nation of which the private claimant is a citizen or subject; that the award made in each case shall be expressed in writing, the sum to be paid shall be expressed in the gold coin of the country of the private claimant, and the amount shall be paid by the Government of Hayti to the Government of such country at the time and in the manner hereinafter stipulated.

V. The commission shall have jurisdiction of all claims presented to them by either of the Governments who are parties hereto of the second part, in behalf of citizens or subjects of either of said countries for actual losses resulting from spoliations or destruction of property real or personal connected with or growing out of the insurrectionary troubles and events of the 22d and 23d of September, 1883, at Port au Prince. The citizenship of claimants whose claims are presented through their respective Governments shall not be questioned, but the allegation by such Government that the person on whose account a claim may be presented, that he or she is a citizen or subject as the case may be, of such country shall be accepted and taken by the commission as sufficient proof of the nationality of such private claimant.

VI. The expenses of the commission shall be defrayed by a percentage to be added in each case to the amount awarded. The commissioners shall receive each for his compensation a sum not exceeding —, and the commission may employ a secretary who shall be acquainted with the English and French languages, at a compensation of the sum of — per day for every day actually and necessarily given to the business of the commission.

VII. Each of the said Governments hereby agree to accept the awards made in the several cases submitted to the said commission as final and conclusive, and the Government of Hayti agrees to pay within — to each of the several Governments who are parties of the second part to this agreement the full amount that may be awarded in favor of the citizens or subjects of the said Governments respectively.