Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, With the Annual Message of the President Transmitted to Congress December 3, 1906, (In two parts), Part I

The Acting Secretary of State to Minister Dawson.

Department of State,
Washington, August 21, 1906.

No. 130.]

Sir: I have to acknowledge receipt of your No. 271, of the 1st instant, reporting that the Dominican Government had withdrawn the exequatur of the Portuguese consul on the ground of his complicity in the conspiracy which resulted in the attack upon Macoris.

You state that the consul appealed to you as acting dean to intervene, but that you declined.

The department approves your refusal to intervene.

The withdrawal of an exequatur is, like the granting of one, a sovereign prerogative, conditional on the consular representative being persona grata, and this Government recognizes, and the proper case arising exercises, that right.

I am, etc.,

Robert Bacon,
Acting Secretary.