No. 383.
Mr. Bayard to Mr. Carter.
Washington , September 23, 1887.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your note of to day’s date, in response to mine of the 22d instant, touching the pending supplementary convention between the United Stated and His Majesty the King of the Hawaiian Islands.
The amendment relating to the harbor of Pear River was adopted, in its executive sessions, by the Senate, and I have no other means of arriving at its intent and meaning than the words employed naturally import.
No ambiguity or obscurity in that amendment is observable, and I can discern therein no subtraction from Hawaiian sovereignty over the harbor to which it relates, nor any language importing a longer duration for the interpolated Article II than is provided for in Article I of the supplementary convention.
The limitation of my official powers does not make it competent for me in this connection to qualify, expand, or explain the amendments in grafted on that convention by the Senate, but in the present case I am unable to perceive any need for auxiliary interpretation or ground for doubt as to the plain scope and meaning thereof, and, as the President desires a ratification of the supplementary convention in its present shape, I can see no cause for any misapprehension by your Government as r-o the manifest effect and meaning of the amendment in question.
I therefore trust that it will be treated as it is tendered, in simple good faith, and accepted without doubt or hesitation.
Accept, etc.,