File No. 412.11/149.
The Secretary of State to the American Ambassador.
Washington, January 25, 1913.
Sir: The Department has received your No. 1845, of the 8th instant, in which you invite attention to the seeming discrepancies [Page 933] in the instructions which the Department has given your Embassy at different times, concerning the claims of American citizens against Mexico. You suggest that the United States adopt a fixed policy in this matter.
The Department feels sure that if a more careful examination had been made of its various instructions regarding claims of American citizens against Mexico the apparent discrepancies and inconsistencies to which you refer, but which were not specifically pointed out in your despatch, would have entirely disappeared.
It was stated in the Department’s telegram of April 14, 3 p.m. [1912], that “this Government must hold Mexico and the Mexican people responsible for all wanton or illegal acts sacrificing or endangering American life or damaging American property or interests there situated.” Obviously this means acts which are illegal according to the rules controlling in the premises, including the applicable principles of international law, which principles the Department had prominently in mind when the telegram was prepared. Inasmuch as the facts and circumstances which called forth this strong instruction required that the attention of the Mexican Government be called in as forceful a manner as possible to its legal liability to foreigners, it was necessary to state the principle of international law in broad and unqualified terms. To have surrounded the broad principle at that time with a statement of any generally accepted limitations and exceptions would clearly have robbed the telegram of its force and deprived it of its essential purpose.
In its No. 1116, relative to the case of Mr. Miller, the Department made a statement of some of those principles of international law which seem to be applicable under the circumstances set forth. This statement contained the express provision that the principles set forth were subject to exceptions, which exceptions, when established by the particular facts and circumstances of any case, would of course fix the legal liability. This instruction might appropriately be regarded as supplementing the previous instruction and rounding out at a suitable time the statement of the principles of international law therein contained.
In its note regarding the Sherron case the Mexican Government stated very broadly and incompletely the principle of international law with reference to a government’s liability for damages suffered by foreigners in times of insurrection, without admitting any exceptions to the rule. It was to the failure of the Mexican note to acknowledge any exceptions to the broad rule of international law therein set forth that the Department instructed you to demur. Clearly the statement of principles of international law contained in the Department’s No. 1116 is vastly different from the statement contained in the Mexican note in the Sherron case. If the principle is stated correctly in the Mexican note, Mexican federal troops might stand by and witness wanton destruction of foreign life and property at the hands of rebels whose actions they might easily control, without the Mexican Government’s incurring any liability in the premises.
The Department has always intended and still intends to hold the Mexican Government responsible to the full extent of the applicable [Page 934] and controlling principles of international law for the injuries suffered by American citizens in the recent revolutionary disturbances. However, in order that claimants might know the international law problems which they must meet and in order that the Department might not be regarded as having caused claimants to be unduly optimistic regarding their prospects of recovering indemnity for such injuries, it has seemed proper to the Department to call the attention of persons desirous of presenting claims to some of the pertinent rules of international law such as are noted in your despatch, which rules, as the Department has always stated, are subject to exceptions.
As the claimants and the Embassy have been advised, the Department expects, at an opportune time, to take up for careful consideration all of the claims of American citizens against Mexico which shall have been filed with it, and it is not doubted that such considerations will disclose the international law liability of the Mexican Government with regard to some of these claims. Such liability will, of course, and as above stated, be insisted upon by the United States Government. This is the “fixed policy” of this Government.
The Department remarks, in conclusion, that while it regrets that numerous Americans were unduly hopeful with regard to their claims on account of unwarranted statements which they may have seen in the American and Mexican press with regard to the position of the United States in this matter, it can assume no responsibility whatsoever for their ill-founded expectations; and in the situation thus created it becomes more than ever necessary to represent to claimants the matter of claims in its true light. It would be manifestly against their interests for their claims to be presented at a time not opportune, and it is bootless and but invites disappointment to expect damages for losses suffered if by generally accepted governing rules and principles of international law there is no legal liability therefor.
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