File No. 2624/15–16.
The British Ambassador to the Secretary of State.
Northeast Harbor, Me., September 7, 1909.
Sir: Owing to British protectorates not being, strictly speaking, British dominions, and the British extradition acts consequently not being the municipal law of such territories, the absence of the necessary legal machinery has so far precluded the surrender of fugitive criminals between British protectorates and foreign states and their dependencies.
[Page 287]To remedy this state of affairs special legislative enactments have now been passed in the various British protectorates on the African Continent, of which a list is inclosed, and local notices have been issued that they will be applicable to the United States.
I have, however, to explain that the natives of these protectorates are not by the mere fact of birth within their limits British subjects, and consequently the provisions in the treaties which His Majesty’s Government have concluded, and which in some cases altogether preclude and in others leave the surrender of nationals optional, would not, in the absence of some specific understanding, apply in strictness to natives.
His Majesty’s Government, however, contemplate assimilating the position of natives to that of British subjects for the purposes of these treaties, and they apprehend that the United States Government will readily assent to this course.
I have accordingly the honor, under instructions from His Majesty’s principal secretary of state for foreign affairs, to bring this information to your notice and to intimate that a reply to the effect that the United States Government have taken due note of its contents will be sufficient to give due effect to the understanding without any further formality.
The procedure for requesting the rendition of fugitive criminals would in that case thenceforward be regulated, as far as possible, by the provisions of the existing treaty between the two countries.
I have, etc.,