Mr. Hunter to Mr.
Sherman.
Legation of the United States, Guatemala and
Honduras,
Guatemala, April 28,
1898.
No. 47.]
Sir: I have the nonor to inform you that in
compliance with Department’s instructions by cable, dated April 26,
1898, I addressed a note to the minister for foreign relations on
yesterday, to which he made response in the afternoon of the same day. A
copy of my note, marked A, and a translation of the minister’s reply,
marked B, are hereto attached.
You will see from the minister’s note that Guatemala will observe a
strict neutrality in the war between the United States and Spain.
I have, etc.,
[Inclosure
1.—Translation.]
National
Palace,
Office of the Secretary of
Foreign Relations,
Republic of Guatemala,
Guatemala, April 27, 1898.
Mr. Minister: I have the honor to
acknowledge the receipt of your excellency’s attentive note of
yesterday, in which you are pleased to communicate to me a dispatch
from the Hon. John Sherman, Secretary of State, announcing that from
the 21st instant there exists a state of war between the United
States and Spain, and consequently desiring to know the attitude of
the Government of Guatemala in the struggle.
In answer, I have the honor to inform your excellency, in order that
through your worthy medium it may become known to the Cabinet at
Washington, that the Government of Guatemala will faithfully comply
with the laws of neutrality as prescribed by the universally
accepted principles of international law.
I take advantage of this opportunity to renew to your excellency the
assurance of my most distinguished consideration.
His Excellency W. Godfrey
Hunter,
Envoy Extraordinary and
Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States.
[Inclosure in dispatch No.
235.]
Mr. Powell to Mr.
Sherman.
Legation of the United States,
Port au Prince, Haiti,
April 27,
1898.
A conflict regrettable in all points has just armed one against the
other the two Governments of Spain and of the United States of
America, to which the Government of the Republic of Haiti is bound
by friendly relations that it desires to maintain and conserve in
observing the most strict neutrality between the belligerents.
[Page 872]
The Government recognizes its obligations and will conform to the
principles that govern them.
Further, while its general duties, based on the law of nations, will
be strictly observed, the conventional duties by which it finds
itself bound toward one of the belligerents, and which a public
treaty has fixed at a far remote period, will be equally
observed.
Nevertheless, if the treaty of friendship, of commerce, of
navigation, and of extradition with the United States, in force
since 1864, at an epoch when the war could not have been foreseen,
places the Government of the Republic under obligation to follow a
certain line of conduct (fixed beforehand by articles 30 and 31),
the principles from which the treaty has not derogated, relative to
refuge and asylum of vessels of war in national ports, to wrecks of
merchant vessels on the coast and in the ports of the country, to
maritime commerce, and to contraband of war, will be equitably put
into practice in favor of both of the belligerents.
But the Republic makes a pressing appeal to the Governments of the
United States and of Spain not to lose sight of the obligations
toward neutrals that the law of nations imposes on belligerents.
