62d Congress, 1st Session.
Senate Doc. (Executive Series B.)
Message from the President of the United States transmitting a Convention between the United States and Nicaragua concerning a loan which Nicaragua contemplates making with citizens of the United States.
[Read June 8, 1911; convention read the first time; message and convention referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations and ordered to be printed in confidence for the use of the Senate.]
To the Senate:
In my message of January 26, 1911,1 transmitting to the Senate the Honduran Loan Convention, I said:
Besides the considerations of propriety, expediency and interest which make the present arrangement with Honduras alike desirable and mutually advantageous, its wisdom as an evolution in the direction of far-sighted international policy is to be borne in mind. Honduras is not alone in financial embarrassment. The continual disturbances of other Central American States put them also, although to a less degree, in the category of prospective borrowers. Within a year past Guatemala has sought the friendly counsel of the United States regarding the terms of a projected foreign loan, and it is announced, as part of the program of national recuperation put forth by the newly installed constitutional Government of Nicaragua, that the aid of the United States will be asked in effecting a readjustment of the debts of that Republic. It needs no profuse argument to show that the financial rehabilitation of the greater part of Central America will work potential good for the stability and peace of all and lead to that development of international resources and expansion of foreign commerce of which they are all capable and of which they all stand in need.
What was then expected with respect to Nicaragua has now become a fact. That Republic, after many years of governmental maladministration, interspersed with internal disturbances and followed by civil war, has at last established a government on a constitutional basis, which finds itself, unfortunately, with a depleted treasury and burdened with an accumulation of debts and claims, both domestic and foreign, which it is unable to meet without outside aid. I It has accordingly indicated its desire for assistance on the part of I the United States for the refunding of its debt and the placing of its finances and administration upon a sound and stable basis, with a view to meeting its foreign obligations and to securing the tranquillity, prosperity and progress of the country. Heartily sympathizing with the Government of Nicaragua in its wish to reconstruct the financial and economic situation in that Republic and to further the development of that country, I empowered the Secretary of State to negotiate and conclude with the authorized plenipotentiary of Nicaragua a convention concerning a loan which that country contemplates making with citizens of the United States to provide for the refunding of its debt and the placing of its finances upon a sound and stable basis. This convention, signed at Washington on June 6, [Page 1073] 1911, I transmit herewith to the Senate and commend with all earnestness to its favorable consideration, to the end that the advice and consent to ratification required by the Constitution may be given.
The convention with Nicaragua now transmitted is similar in its provisions to that with’ Honduras already before the Senate, and the weighty considerations of national and international policy which I advanced as counseling the consummation of the convention with Honduras are equally pertinent and applicable to the convention with Nicaragua. I deem it of paramount importance that both conventions should be ratified as contributing to the peace of Central America, for the fostering of which, under the Washington conventions of 1907, a moral obligation at least rests upon the United States.
Not only this, but a further responsibility is thrown upon us by the Monroe doctrine. Much of the debt of Nicaragua is external and held in Europe; and, while it may not be claimed that by the Monroe doctrine we may be called upon to protect an American Republic from the payment of its just foreign claims, still complications might result from the attempted enforced collection of such claims, from the involutions of which this Government might not escape. Hence it should be the policy of this Government, especially with respect to countries in geographical proximity to the Canal Zone, to give to them when requested all proper assistance, within the scope of our limitations, in the promotion of peace, in the development of their resources, and in a sound reorganization of their fiscal systems, thus, by contributing to the removal of conditions of turbulence and instability, enabling them by better established governments to take their rightful places among the law-abiding and progressive countries of the world. Better by far is this beneficial and constructive policy in the neighborhood of the Caribbean Sea, the Panama Canal and the Central American Republics, based as it is on the logic of our geographical position, the development of our commerce in the immediate neighborhood of our shores, our moral responsibilities due to a long-standing policy in the region mentioned, as well as, respecting Central America, arising from our relations to the Washington conventions, than it is with listless indifference to view unconcernedly the whole region in fomentations of turbulence, irresponsibly contracting debts that by their own exertions they would never be able to discharge, or to be required, as in several instances in the past, to land our armed forces for the protection of American citizens and their interests from violence, and for the enforcement of the humane provisions of international law for the observance of which in the region concerned this Government, whether rightfully or wrongfully, is held responsible by the world.
This convention now laid before the Senate, like the loan convention with Honduras, was drawn and signed, and now stands binding upon the Governments of the United States and Nicaragua, when by them ratified, only in respect to a loan contract when one shall have been signed which shall be finally found satisfactory to both Governments and shall consequently be admitted under the protection of the convention.
It is my judgment the part of wisdom and of statesmanship to ratify both the convention with Nicaragua now submitted and that with Honduras transmitted to the Senate on January 26, 1911, and it is [Page 1074] my earnest hope that I may early receive the advice and consent of the Senate to their ratification.
Washington , June 7, 1911.