Mr. Barrett to Mr.
Olney.
Legation of the United States,
Bangkok, Siam
,
December 29,
1896
. (Received Feb. 12, 1897.)
No. 153.]
Sir: I have the honor to inclose copies of
correspondence passed between the foreign minister and myself in regard
to the question raised in your esteemed No. 79 in regard to the
arbitration of the Cheek case.
After receiving your instructions, as intimated in my 150, of December
23, I pressed the foreign minister for an answer, with what result you
now see.* * *
I hardly feel as if I am warranted in cabling as much as it would appear
would be necessary to explain the latest attitude of Siam. I shall try
again to get a briefer and more explicit reply to your question, but if
I fail I may only cable you that the Siamese Government desires you to
await the receipt of the inclosed letters.
I have, as the correspondence will prove, to have them cable their
consul-general their full answer if they did not feel like making it
briefer for me, but now the foreign minister claims a misunderstanding,
and seems to oppose any cabling.
In my reply which I shall send to the foreign minister’s arguments about
former propositions of arbitrations, etc., I shall feel constrained
almost to inform him that rehashing old contentions already extensively
and exhaustively discussed is not pertinent, nor is it of any advantage.
* * *
I have, etc.,
John Barrett,
Minister Resident.
[Inclosure 1 in No.
153.]
Mr. Barrett to
the Foreign Minister.
Legation and Consulate-General of the United States of
America,
Bangkok
,
December 14,
1896
.
Monsieur le Ministre: Referring to an
interview of recent date, I have now the honor to forward to you a
formal note covering the matter then under discussion—a certain
phase of proposed arbitration of the Cheek case.
[Page 469]
I will now provide you with an extract from instructions received by
me from the Honorable Richard Olney, Secretary of State of the
United States, as follows:
* * * The Government of Siam has expressed a desire to have
the matter of his claim submitted to arbitration on
condition that the Siamese counterclaim against the estate
of Dr. Cheek shall be included in the submission and
considered by the arbitrator. The Siamese claim against
Cheek is supposed to relate to an unpaid balance of Cheek’s
indebtedness to that Government, which was not liquidated by
the appropriation of Cheek’s property under royal order in
1892 and 1893, which act of appropriation is the
subject-matter of Cheek’s complaint.
Dr. Cheek made his claim for damages against the Siamese
Government subject to deduction of the amount which he (or
his estate, now that he is dead) owes that Government. The
proposition of Siam is therefore assumed to be that in case
the arbitrator shall find that Cheek’s indebtedness to Siam
exceeds the amount of damages awarded to him in consequence
of the injurious action of the Siamese Government the
arbitrator shall have authority to make an award against Dr.
Cheek’s estate in favor of the Siamese Government for the
amount of such excess.
You are instructed to ascertain from the Siamese minister of
foreign affairs and to report at once whether the suggestion
of the Siamese Government is rightly understood in the sense
above explained.
Your royal highness will please be good enough to inform me at your
first convenient opportunity if the assumption above outlined is
correct or not, in order that I may immediately inform my
Government, and thus facilitate an early understanding as to an
acceptable basis of arbitration.
Your royal highness will please accept my renewed assurance of high
consideration.
I have, etc.,
John Barrett,
Minister Resident.
[Inclosure 2 in No.
153.]
Foreign Minister to
Mr. Barrett.
Foreign Office
,
December 24, 1896
.
Monsieur le Ministre: I have the honor to
acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 16th instant providing
me with an extract from instructions received by you and relating to
the proposed arbitration of the Cheek case.
I stated with pleasure that the principle of settling this case by
arbitration, which I proposed in the name of His Majesty’s
Government, is admitted by the Government of the United States. As
to the question whether the suggestion of the Siamese Government is
rightly understood in the sense explained in the dispatch of the
Honorable Richard Olney, whereof you kindly transcribe an extract, I
regret to say that I can not accept the expressions “appropriation
of Cheek’s property” as corresponding with the views of His
Majesty’s Government on their own action, and that I can not
consider as correct the following assumption of Siam’s proposition:
That in case the arbitrator shall find that Cheek’s
indebtedness to Siam exceeds the amount of damage awarded to
him, in consequence of the injurious action of the Siamese
Government, the arbitrator shall have an authority to make
an award against Dr. Cheek’s estate in favor of the Siamese
Government for the amount of such excess.
If this assumption were accepted by my Government as a right
explanation of their views, it would follow that Ave admit as well
founded Dr. Cheek’s complaint of an alleged “injurious action” of
this Government, [Page 470] and his
claim for damages on his account. I, on the contrary, am bound to
state that His Majesty’s Government never made such admission, and
that the very first question which we propose to submit to
arbitration is whether the action of this Government in attaching
timber mortgaged to them as the only means of getting back their
advances was or was not justified by Dr. Cheek’s own repeated
breaches of contract, and consequently whether Dr. Cheek is entitled
in principle to claim any damages on account of said action.
It is only when this first question will have been decided by the
arbitration court that it will be possible to decide whether and for
what amount the balance of all accounts between this Government and
Dr. Cheek (or Dr. Cheek’s estate) is in favor of the former or of
the latter.
Accept, etc.,
Devawongse,
Minister for Foreign
Affairs.
[Inclosure 3 in No.
153.]
Mr. Barrett to
Foreign Minister.
Legation and Consulate-General of the United States of
America,
Bangkok
,
December 26,
1897
.
Monsieur le Ministre. In our conversation
of Thursday, December 24, your royal highness kindly consented to
exchange with me copies of cablegram to be forwarded, respectively,
to the Department of State of the United States and the Siamese
consul-general, in answer to the inquiry of the Department of State,
touching the proposed arbitration of the Cheek case, transmitted to
your royal highness in my note of the 16th instant and answered in
your letter of December 24.
If your royal highness will now, therefore, be good enough to provide
me, as soon as convenient, with such copy of message, I will, upon
the receipt thereof, provide you with a copy of mine.
Your royal highness will please accept my assurance of high
consideration.
I have, etc.,
John Barrett,
Minister Resident.
[Inclosure 4 in No.
153.]
Foreign Minister to
Mr. Barrett.
Foreign Office
,
December 28, 1896
.
Monsieur le Ministre: I am afraid that
there was some misunderstanding between us about the result of our
conversation of the 24th instant. I had no idea of sending any
cablegram to our consul-general, except to assist you in
communicating with your own Government. I thus agreed that if you
would show me how you would wire briefly to your Department of
State, and referring to my cablegram to our consul-general at New
York, I could oblige you by going to the expense of telegraphing
fully the statement of our views.
[Page 471]
As for myself, I can only repeat that I do not feel the necessity of
telegraphing at all to our consul-general. His Majesty’s Government
are certainly anxious to arrive at the constitution of the
arbitration court, and as proof of their earnest wish in this
respect I beg to remark that when the idea of an arbirration was
emitted nearly three years ago by Mr. Eaton, acting consul-general
of the United States, in a letter which he addressed to me on the
21st of January, 1893, I at once accepted the proposal. The matter
might thus have been considered as settled between both Governments
nearly three years ago if Dr. Cheek had not simply refused to agree
with this mode of just and friendly settlement. Since then the
proposal of arbitration was renewed by His Majesty’s Government more
than one year ago, and repeatedly insisted on in my letters to you.
But it is only on the 14th instant that you intimated your
Government’s acquiescence to the idea. This seems to indicate that,
at least in the opinion of your Government, there is no such urgency
in the case that we should recur to an expensive exchange of
telegrams about the terms in which the case for Siam was stated in
your letter of the 14th instant. I therefore beg to propose that you
inform his excellency the Secretary of State that there is some
difference between his statement of our case and ours, and that you
send him by the next mail copy of our correspondence.
May I ask you by the same opportunity if you have already received
instructions about the way in which your Government proposes to
constitute the arbitration court and the procedure to be
followed?
Accept, etc.,
Devawongse,
Minister for Foreign
Affairs.
