Mr. Buchanan to Mr. Hay.
Buenos Ayres, November 22, 1898.
Sir: On the 15th instant the captain of the Hawaiian schooner, Americana, which had arrived the previous day at the entrance to this port, with lumber from St. Johns, New Brunswick, called at our consulate and asked what he should do with regard to entering the docks, he having left St. Johns under the Hawaiian flag and register; and, also, as to whether our consul would enter and clear his ship.
Consul Mayer called to see me before giving an answer, and I advised him to withhold replying until I could advise you of the case and receive your instructions.
Upon being so informed by the consul, the captain of the schooner said he could not afford to lie outside the harbor awaiting a reply and [Page 8] that he should hoist the Hawaiian flag, enter the docks, and deliver his ship’s papers to the captain of the port. This he did.
In accordance with my reply to Consul Mayer, I telegraphed you as follows on the 16th instant:1
On the 17th instant I received the following reply to my inquiry:1 Inasmuch as your reply did not afford me the information I desired with regard to the status before our consul of the schooner in question, I deemed the case one of sufficient importance to justify my again telegraphing you with greater detail than I had thought necessary to do at first.
I therefore wired you on the 19th instant as follows:1
To my said telegram you replied as follows on the 21st:1
I have to-day furnished Consul Mayer with a copy of these telegrams and have said to him that it was clear therefrom that he could not clear the schooner in question, inasmuch as she was not entitled to carry the United States flag; and that I deemed it proper for him to so advise her captain to the end that he may, when ready to sail, either change his ship’s registry to such flag as he desires, other than our own, or clear through the office of the captain of the port, as he entered, with the Hawaiian flag, or in such manner as he chooses.
The case is certainly a peculiar one, and of more than usual interest.
Had it not been for the fact that the legation was without official advice as to the annexation of Hawaii, and that I knew, from conversations, that this Government was equally without notice of such fact, I would probably not have been so careful to have telegraphed you as I did. As it now appears, I am glad I did so, because I am certain I should otherwise have reached a conclusion different from that outlined in your last telegram.
Had the legation had official knowledge of the annexation of Hawaii, I am inclined to think I should have assumed it to be a self-evident fact that the Hawaiian flag as an insignia of sovereignty and nationality ceased to exist when hauled down from over the Government House in Honolulu on August 12 last; and that from that moment the schooner in question had neither registry nor flag, since her registry would appear to be as much a part of the public property of Hawaii delivered to the United States by the terms of the first paragraph of the act of Congress accepting Hawaii as would the public record of deeds of the country; and assuming it to be a fact that the Hawaiian flag could not have been hoisted over a plantation there, for instance, after August 12 last, it would have appeared to me logical to presume therefrom that it could not be kept up over the schooner in question, which had been, equally with the plantation supposed, private Hawaiian property.
Following out that line of reasoning, I would, I think, have been inclined to the conclusion that it would appear reasonable to believe that, if the public Hawaiian record of deeds became in fact and actually a United States record by the act of changed sovereignty effected by the annexation of the islands, then it would equally follow that the Hawaiian registry of ships would, by the same change of sovereignty and flag, become a United States registry, notwithstanding the fact that in the case in point such a conclusion would run counter to the terms of section 348 of the consular regulations, and possibly other legislation.
I have, etc.,