No. 211.
Mr. Bayard
to Mr. Denby.
Washington, June 6, 1888.
Sir: I have received your dispatch No. 618, of April 7 last, in which you report that the question of the audience of foreign ministers with the Emperor is again agitated in view of His Majesty’s contemplated sole assumption of imperial rule on May 20th, ultimo, and ask instructions touching a declaration on the part of this Government, with others, that if the Emperor should refuse to receive the foreign representatives at Peking, the ministers of China will in like manner be refused audience by the heads of the governments to whom they are accredited.
Your views as to the inexpediency of announcing, in advance of a general agreement, a rule of action which would necessarily be binding upon this Government and so assume the character of an ultimatum, are entirely approved, and there seems to be no good reason to instruct you to commit this Government to any particular course on this question.
While, unquestionably, nothing that savors of inequality in the relative positions of sovereignty of this Government and that of China is to be recognized or admitted, nevertheless the inherent dissimilarity in the civilizations and customs of the two countries will almost inevitably render precise similarity or even equivalence in ceremonial impracticable if not impossible, and in these differences there need be no suggestion or implication of discourtesy or Jack of respect on one side or the other.
We therefore can not expect, nor do we desire, to supplant and replace the traditions, manners, and customs of other nations by our own and against their will, but should endeavor to allow the spirit and intent of mutual amity and respect to find expression in such ways as may be most agreeable to those foreigners with whom we are thrown in intercourse, and this to such a degree as shall not invade or impair the essentials of our own self-regulated decorum.
If any proposed ceremonial in China should be in violation of our canons of propriety it should be so stated, and the ceremony altered or disallowed; but if the Government of China prefers to make and receive its responsible communications through the medium of certain officials only, and under certain established and traditionary forms, I do not consider that the United States ought to demur because the form or the agency is dissimilar from those employed by us.
The pageantries of royalty are unknown in the United States, but they are an important feature in some other governments, and unless they are inconsistent with a proper respect to our sovereignty as represented by our minister, I should not be disposed to object to them.
[Page 308]The mysterious seclusion of the head of the Chinese Empire may be used by that nation as a political force in their system and esteemed by his subjects as part of that “divinity” that “doth hedge a king,” and to be successful in conveying an impression of power.
So far as the subject falls under the purview of existing treaty engagements, it would certainly seem that reciprocity is to prevail in the matter of diplomatic representation, and it is further deducible that the measure of such reciprocal treatment shall be the usage of the western nations.
Article V of our treaty of June 18, 1858, with China, only gave to the minister of the United States in that country the right of stated visits to the Imperial capital and conference there with a member of the privy council, or any other officer of equal rank deputed for that purpose, on matters of common interest and advantage.”
There is herein no stipulation or even suggestion of diplomatic audience of the American minister with the head of the Chinese Empire. But article VI of the same treaty provides that:
If at any time His Majesty, the Emperor of China, shall, by treaty voluntarily made, or for any other reason, permit the representative of any friendly nation to reside at his capital for a long or short time, then without any further consultation or express permission, the representative of the United States in China shall have the same privilege.
Within eight days from the signature of our treaty as aforesaid, a treaty was signed at Tientsin, on June 26, 1858, between Great Britain and China, by the third article of which provision is made for the permanent residence of a British minister at the capital of the Empire. In the first paragraph of that article, it is said of such British minister that:
He shall not be called upon to perform any ceremony derogatory to him as representing the sovereign of an independent nation on a footing of equality with that of China. On the other hand, he shall use the same forms of ceremony and respect to His Majesty the Emperor as are employed by the ambassadors, ministers, or diplomatic agents of Her Majesty towards the sovereigns of independent and equal European nations.
It is to be remarked that the form of etiquette and ceremonial thereby stipulated is guarantied to the Emperor of China as his right, and the stipulation does not create a right e converso in the British minister in China to receive in return the same ceremonial observances.
What stipulation as to the form and measure of ceremonial observance to which the British minister in China was entitled under the Anglo-Chinese treaty of 1858 is found in the fourth article, which, after defining certain personal rights of travel, security of correspondence, and the like, concludes as follows:
And generally, he shall enjoy the same privileges as are accorded to officers of the same rank by the usage and consent of western nations.
The privileges of residence and representation so stipulated in favor of the British minister in China forthwith inured to the minister of the United States in virtue of the above-cited sixth article of our treaty of 1858, and the subsequent treaties of China with other nations have added no substantial modifications in this regard.
Another circumstance to be remarked is that nowhere in the treaties of China with the United States is the privilege of imperial diplomatic representation in the United States expressly stipulated. That, however, is a right of independent nations, necessarily incidental to their friendly intercourse, and maybe assumed to exist without express convention, It is, in fact, so assumed in the fourth article of our treaty of [Page 309] November 17, 1880, where “the Chinese minister at Washington” is mentioned incidentally and as a matter of course. This common recognition of an inherent right of independent and equal sovereignty is, perhaps, more suitable than a specific permission for the reciprocal sending of diplomatic agents.
If China confined her diplomatic intercourse with other States to receiving their envoys, and sent to foreign countries in return none but, consular representatives, whose functions are properly definable by treaty, the treatment of such envoys at Peking might, within due limits of international respect, be governed wholly by Chinese usage or prescription, but by sending diplomatic agents, as well as receiving them, a reciprocity and mutuality of treatment in conformity with the modern usage of nations is necessarily implied. It is, as you suggest, very likely that this consideration of reciprocal usage and ceremonial as essential to the intercourse of equal and independent powers would largely influence the Government of the United States in dealing with the issue should it be raised at Peking by a formal denial of audience.
Strictly speaking, however, a minister plenipotentiary (except for the presentation of his letters of credence or recall, and then only by custom and usage), has no right of audience with the head of the State.
That right rests upon the fiction of personal representation of the sovereign, which pertains to the ambassadorial capacity, and neither China nor the United States sends or receives “ambassadors” eo nomine. While the Chinese minister in Washington has no more right to demand personal audience of the President, for any purpose, than the minister of the United States at Peking has to demand similar audience of the Emperor, it is unlikely that any discrimination would ever be made against the Chinese minister in Washington in respect of ceremonies shared by the whole diplomatic body. It might, for example, be deemed invidious to exclude him from the President’s receptions, and the like, to which all the foreign representatives are customarily invited. But no such idea of discrimination could be involved in requiring the Chinese minister in the United States to present his letters of credence or recall, or to perform any other act which, according to “the usage and consent of western nations,” is done in special audience, in the same manner that the United States minister at Peking is required to do.
It does not appear practicable at present to give you any more precise instructions in the premises than these.
I am, etc.,