Office of the Historian

File No. 832.61333/160.

The Ambassador of Brazil to the Secretary of State.

[Translation.]
Embassy of Brazil,
Washington, April 24, 1913.

Mr. Secretary of State: I had the honor to receive the note of the 22d instant in which your excellency was pleased to communicate to me the reply of the Attorney General of the United States regarding the suppression of the suit begun by the American courts against the valorization of the coffee of the State of São Paulo. It is stated therein that my declaration, together with the information now in the possession of that Department would be sufficient to justify this suppression, instructions for which purpose were issued to the Attorney for the District of New York. The Attorney General adds that, as it is not the custom of his Department to issue an opinion on possibilities in the application of laws, he can not say whether a similar lawsuit would be repeated under analogous conditions, nor can he promise the modification or the non-application of such laws.

I also thank your excellency for the information that you gave me on the same occasion that you had requested the Department of Justice that, should there occur in the future any reason for a similar lawsuit, due information would be furnished to the State Department thereof, so that when this Embassy was informed we could through Governmental action obtain the same result which judicial proceedings would entail.

I informed my Government of your excellency’s communication by telegraph, and have [etc.]

D. da Gama.

Message of the President of Brazil to Congress, May 3, 1913.

[Extract.]

The proceedings relating to sales of coffee from the valorization stock, instituted in the United States, have been happily ended and the two Governments have arrived at an understanding whereby the [Page 67] existing stock can be placed on the market without valorization. Through the medium of our Embassy at Washington our Foreign Office declared that the sales had been bona fide, whereupon the Attorney General of the United States, satisfied with that assurance, also declared that the American Government would not prosecute the matter further.