The Acting Secretary of State to Minister Dawson.

[Telegram.]

Answering your telegram of the 25th, the President is favorable to the modus which the Dominican Republic proposes to adopt for the purpose of keeping the pending treaty alive until the Senate shall have acted upon it and in order to permit of its full execution should it be ratified, while at the same time not prejudicing any rights should the treaty eventually fail. You are instructed that the Government of the United States will acquiesce in the Dominican proposal. The Secretary of War of the United States will present for nomination by the President of the Dominican Republic men to act in the positions referred to in both the northern and the southern ports, using utmost care to select men of capacity and absolute integrity, with some knowledge of Spanish. All moneys collected from both northern and [Page 362] southern ports not turned over to the Dominican Government in the prescribed proportion in your cablegram will be deposited in some New York bank, to be designated by the Secretary of War [later amended to “the President of the United States,”] there to be kept until the Senate has acted. If the action is adverse, the money will then be turned over to the Dominican Government; if it is favorable, the money will be distributed among the creditors in proportion to their just claims under the treaty.

You will make it clear that having negotiated the pending treaty at the earnest request of the Dominican Republic we acquiesce in the Republic adopting the proposed plan, in order that pending the final dispositon of the treaty no change shall take place in the situation which would render useless the consummation of the treaty or bring complications into its enforcement.

This arrangement is not to take the form of a protocol stipulating engagements on behalf of the United States. The President’s desire and purpose to help the Dominican Republic to carry out its own plan in the way above described will be sufficiently established if this present telegram be accepted categorically by the President of the Dominican Republic.

Adee.