Legation of the United States,
Constantinople, November 28,
1896. (Received Dec. 14.)
No. 1084.]
[Inclosure 1 in No.
1084.]
Mr. Terrell to
Tevfik Pasha.
Legation of the United States,
Constantinople, November 28, 1896.
Sir: I have received from the Hon. Richard
Olney, Secretary of State, a copy of your excellency’s note to His
Excellency Moustapha Bey, inclosed by Moustapha Bey, under date of
November o, and of Mr. Olney’s answer thereto in his note No. 2 of
November 11.
[Page 929]
The answer of Mr. Olney is full, and I now call your attention to the
inclosed copy of an open telegram this day forwarded to my
Government and designed to correct erroneous statements in the
American press prejudicial to the Government of His Imperial
Majesty.
Freedom of the press too often degenerates into licentiousness, but
in the United States the publication of falsehood is not feared when
truth is free to correct it.
The predecessor of your excellency was informed last year that
instructions had been sent to Admiral Selfridge, commanding United
States naval forces in the Mediterranean, to prevent the landing in
Turkey of any revolutionary person claiming American citizenship.
This was not requested by your predecessor and these instructions
were sent at the very time when my request for a small dispatch boat
here was not granted by the Imperial Government.
Should you hereafter desire a small boat of the United States
stationed in the harbor of Constantinople, it would always afford me
pleasure in my capacity of a United States judge to use its naval
force to prevent the landing of any citizens of the United States
whose designs might be hostile and whose presence in Turkey might be
undesirable to the Ottoman Government. As Mr. Olney has remarked,
the absence of a small United States naval force ties my hands
regarding the matter referred to.
The broad statement in the inclosed telegram regarding the surrender
from prison of all peaceful American citizens in Turkey does not, of
course, include those now confined in Aleppo, who are charged by
your Government as being persons arrested in armed resistance to the
Imperial Government. Their case will be the subject of an early note
to your excellency.
Receive, etc.,
