File No. 2491/58.
The Costa Rican Minister on Special Mission to the Secretary of State.
Washington, February 23, 1909.
Mr. Secretary: I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of your excellency’s communication of the 16th instant, wherein, with reference to the pending negotiations for the final settlement of the boundary question between Costa Rica and Panama, your excellency deigns to express the importance to the United States of the establishment of a permanent status in the territory in dispute, in order that the just rights of American citizens established therein be recognized and safeguarded. Your excellency adds that the negotiations, having been transferred to Costa Rica, the department earnestly hopes that the boundary dispute may be arranged to the satisfaction of both parties, and that—
Should, however, an adjustment of the controversy be delayed or no adjustment made in the near future, the Government of the United States will be constrained to the conclusion that the conditions existing for years and still existing are such that they force the United States, in justice to its own citizens, to treat the de facto line as the line to the north of which Costa Rica has jurisdiction and to the south of which Panaman jurisdiction is recognized. In other words, to hold that, inasmuch as the territory north of the de facto line is left by Panama within the actual jurisdiction and control of Costa Rica, the United States must, in the interest of its citizens, treat it as Costa Rican territory and look to Costa Rica to remedy the annoying and embarrassing situation caused to the United States and its citizens by the absence of responsible jurisdiction in that quarter.
My Government, which appreciates fully the importance of the good offices of that of the United States toward a just solution of the boundary dispute with Panama, regrets that it should not have been possible at the present time to arrive by this means at the immediate settlement that it desires so much, but it hopes at the same time that the negotiations which are about to be initiated in San Jose de Costa Rica, through the legation that Panama will send there with that purpose, will bring forth an understanding that will obliterate forever [Page 784] the only difference that has existed between the friendly and sister Republics of Costa Rica and Panama.
If, contrary to what is expected, the definite settlement should be delayed, it pleases me to state solemnly to your excellency that the interests of the citizens of the United States in all the disputed territory over which Costa Rica exercises its jurisdiction will have, as they have at all times had, the ample and most efficient protection granted by our laws. To this effect I deem it opportune to tell your excellency, as I have had occasion to inform the Department of State, that the line which defines the present territorial jurisdiction of Costa Rica to the south is “the River Sixola from its outlet on the Atlantic up to its junction with the River Yurquin; thence following in almost a straight line the watershed to end in Punta Burica on the Pacific.”
This is the status quo that has been maintained for many years and that the convention of December 25, 1880, ratifies. In said convention it is expressly agreed between Costa Rica and Colombia that while the boundary question and the designation of frontiers are not decided the status quo will be maintained. This pact, together with the actual control exercised by Costa Rica, constitutes the title with which my country maintains its sovereignty over the territory northward of the frontier line above set forth. My Government accepts with real gratification the statement contained in the last part of your excellency’s note, because, as such sovereign, it takes upon itself unreservedly all the responsibilities inherent to the exercise of jurisdiction; and the Government of your excellency can therefore rest assured that the Government and the courts of justice of Costa Rica will give all the necessary and effective protection to the just and legitimate interests that citizens of the United States, or of any other nation, may have in that territory.
Before closing this communication, which terminates the present negotiation, I wish to express once more to your excellency the deep appreciation of the Costa Rican Government and my own for the kind deference and good will with which the Department of State has been ready to cooperate toward the satisfactory solution of the boundary question between Costa Rica and Panama, and for the repeated proofs of personal consideration with which your excellency has been kind to oblige me.