Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, With the Address of the President to Congress December 8, 1914
File No. 022.21.
Minister Thomson to the Secretary of State.
Bogota, August 22, 1914.
Sir: I have the honor to transmit herewith the “Memoria del Ministro de Relaciones Exteriores al Congreso de 1914.”
[Page 143]I have also the honor to enclose an English translation of that part of the Memoria which refers to the United States, which will be found on pages 34–50 inclusive.* * *
I have [etc.]
the united states of america.
Our Legation at Washington continues in the charge of Don Julio Betancourt. Dr. Roberto Ancízar was appointed Secretary thereof.
In my report last year8 I gave an account of the proposals made by the plenipotentiary of the United States, Mr. James T. DuBois; also of the rejection which the Government was obliged to make and of the reasons on which this was based.
On August 30th of last year Mr. Thaddeus Austin Thomson presented his credentials as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States in Colombia. Since the commencement of his high diplomatic mission and with the lofty spirit and noble intentions which distinguish them, Mr. Thomson conveyed to this Government the just sentiments of the Government of Mr. Wilson towards Colombia and the desires of that eminent magistrate, those of the Secretary of State, Mr. Bryan, and the personal desires of the new Envoy, to offer Colombia a moral and material reparation for the events which took place on the Isthmus of Panama in November 1903.
Since the first conferences which I held with Mr. Thomson, and in reply to his initiatives in the sense of a direct negotiation, I informed him that the Government of Colombia did not reject this procedure as a means to arrive at the desired solution, as long as the negotiations should take place in Bogota, as long as everything concerning territorial options and concessions for coaling stations involved in the DuBois proposition should be laid aside from the beginning, and as long as any proposition that might be made should include a moral reparation. I also stated to Mr. Thomson that it was understood that in case the direct negotiations should not be concluded, Colombia would insist upon her demand for arbitration. This is made clear in the Minutes of the Conference of September 23, 1913, as follows:
minutes of the conference of september 23, 1913.
There were present their excellencies the Minister for Foreign Affairs; the Minister Plenipotentiary of the United States of America; Mr. Harrison, Secretary of the Legation of the United States; and Mr. L. Montejo, translator of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs stated that after a conversation with His Excellency the President of the Republic, he had to inform the Minister of the United States that in attention to the desire expressed by the Government of the United States through its Plenipotentiary at Bogota to submit to the consideration of the Colombian Government certain proposals which might conduce to the satisfactory settlement of pending questions, the said Government would have no objection to consider the first formal written proposal of which the American Minister had spoken yesterday, which would be given more careful study so that the reply thereto would combine the views of Colombia upon all the points which should serve as a basis of a possible arrangement, all of which were tentatively suggested in yesterday’s conference.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs also stated that he had informed both His Excellency the President of the Republic as well as the members of the Commission of Foreign Affairs, in accordance with what Mr. Thomson had told him, that the initial proposal of the Legation of the United States would not contain anything regarding options or territorial concessions analogous to those of the DuBois Memorandum and which would render a consideration of the proposal impossible.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs also stated that, interpreting Mr. Thomson’s idea expressed yesterday, he had informed His Excellency the President of the Republic and the members of the Commission of Foreign Affairs, that the fact that the initial proposition which Mr. Thomson was about to submit, would make no mention of boundaries or other points of substantial importance, especially regarding the first, did not imply the idea of the Department of State to exclude them from the negotiation which was now to be opened, but simply the desire that the Colombian reply should minutely express the Colombian views regarding boundaries and other points of which mention had been made.
Lastly, the Minister for Foreign Affairs requested that careful note should be taken of the following official declaration, which he then made:
“The Government of Colombia was confident that through the good will of the United States to settle in a satisfactory manner Colombian claims in a direct and friendly way it might be possible this time to reach an acceptable arrangement, but if this happy result [Page 144] should not be realized Colombia would again renew its demand for arbitration now pending before the Department of State.”
The Minister of the United States believed that he would be able to send his written formal proposal in the course of the present week.
Francisco José Urrutia.
Thaddeus A. Thomson.
[Here follows the exchange of notes between the Legation and the Ministry of Foreign Relations. An English translation of Dr. Urrutia’s reply was transmitted to the Department with my despatch No. 10 of October 8, 1913.9]
The negotiations being thus initiated were continued for several months in a spirit of frank cordiality. During the precarious absence of Mr. Thomson from this capital, they were continued with the Secretary of the Legation, Charge d’Affaires ad interim, Mr. Leland Harrison.
The negotiations were conducted together with the valuable and essential assistance of the Commission of Foreign Relations whose members, in addition to their talents and counsels, added the prestige of their names to the pact of April 6 by accepting the special commission given them by the Government for the conclusion and signature of the treaty.
Likewise the assistance rendered during the negotiations by the Minister of the Republic in Washington, Don Julio Betancourt, and by the Secretary of the Legation, Dr. Roberto Ancizar, has been very important. Both have been indefatigable in their labor, as difficult as it was intelligent, in favor of our rights. Worthy also of special mention is the efficacious propaganda carried on by our Consul General in New York, Mr. Francisco Escobar.
I would, moreover, fail in my duty if I did not avail myself of this opportunity to place on record the gratitude of the Government toward the noble friends of the cause of Colombia—several of them North Americans—who have contributed by their writings and by propaganda of various kinds in making still clearer Colombia’s right to a reparation.
The text of the Treaty of April 6, as well as the Memoria of the Commission of Foreign Relations, reporting the course of the negotiations which preceded it and the most important documents in regard to the discussion of the pact in the extraordinary session of Congress during the month of May of this year, make up the second volume of “Anexos” to this report.
A few days after the signature of the treaty, the Government published it profusely throughout the Republic. The discussion thereof was absolutely full and free in the press as it was subsequently in Congress. The discussion was marked by a serene atmosphere, which constitutes a notable example of the progress made by us in our parliamentary debates and in our press.
According to the advices received from our Legation at Washington, the treaty was presented on the 19th ultimo by the Secretary of State to the Senate of the United States. That eminent body referred it to the Committee on Foreign Relations. The Secretary of State, Mr. Bryan, has given the press an explanation in order to enlighten public opinion, making powerful arguments in defense of the treaty and insisting that it is necessary to approve it and fulfill an unavoidable duty.
After Law No. 14 of this year, which approved the treaty, had been sanctioned by the Executive Power, a certain citizen denounced it before the Supreme Court as being unconstitutional. The Supreme Court by a resolution dated the 6th instant, considered that it lacked legal faculties to decide upon the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of this law. In the first volume of “Anexos” attached to this report you will find the luminous decision of the Supreme Court, which is a document of greatest import in our constitutional and international life.
The above-mentioned denunciation and the decision of the Supreme Court caused the Ministry of Foreign Relations to address to the Legation of the United States of America the following communications which faithfully reflect the opinion of the Government and of the Commission of Foreign Relations on this subject:
[See my despatch No. 77 of June 19, 1914.]
arbitration treaty.
The civilizing ideas of the President of the United States and of his Secretary of State can be no less than sympathetic to Colombia in view of the well-known [Page 145] adhesion of the latter to the principles of arbitration, its sentiments and its traditions in favor of everything that may tend to render more respected the principles of justice and to make international peace more secure. Nevertheless, the Government believed that the negotiation of a pact, such as that now proposed, should be postponed until the definite completion of the negotiations relative to Panama and the exchange of ratifications of the treaty. I spoke in this sense to the Chargé d’Affaires of the United States and the same was also said by our Minister in Washington a short while thereafter.
After the ratification of the treaty of April 6, our Chancellery, without doubt, will give the deepest attention to the proposal of the Government of Washington and will enter upon the study of the terms of a possible treaty of general arbitration between Colombia and the United States of America. It is, moreover, proper to observe that it would be most desirable that all the nations of America should agree upon an extensive arbitration treaty which would bind them all and which would constitute a solemn confirmation by the nations of the New World of the isolated efforts which have been made since the dawn of emancipation as well as of the principles proclaimed a hundred years ago by Colombia and by her Liberator in favor of international equality upon the august basis of justice. Such a pact, if it could be celebrated, could then be presented by the nations of America at the next peace conference at The Hague as a magnificent tribute to peace and universal civilization and would take advantageously the place of the Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Conflicts, which has not been able to prevent the international wars which have occurred since 1899 up to the present day nor the sorrowful outrages against right, and which owing to its vague formulae is still scarcely but a deficient step towards the realization of an ideal.
mediation of american republics between the united states and mexico.
In the last days of the month of April a conflict at arms seemed imminent between the United States and Mexico. Consequently the diplomatic representatives of Brazil, Argentina and Chile in Washington, under instructions from their respective Governments, offered their friendly mediation, which was accepted both by the Governments of the United States and Mr. Huerta. Upon learning of the step, the Government of Colombia authorized its Minister at Washington to adhere to the offer of mediation, in the name of the Republic. And later, when the same information was communicated by the Legation of the United States in this capital, the undersigned took pleasure in ratifying the adhesion of the Government of Colombia to such a sympathetic and civilized action for the solution of a conflict which otherwise might have had the most grave and lamentable consequences.
panama-pacific exposition.
Under date of July 26, 1912, the Legation of the United States in this capital invited the Government of Colombia to take part in the Panama-Pacific International Exposition which should take place in San Francisco, California, next year to commemorate the completion of the Panama Canal. In later communications of August 19, 1913, and January 12th of this year, the Legation of the United States has informed the Colombian Government regarding various resolutions relative to the organization of that international competition.
The Colombian Government has found itself obliged to put off making reply to the invitation of the United States of America, in order to see if, after the satisfactory and definite settlement of the pending questions and the re-esablishment of our ancient friendship, it would be possible for Colombia to take part in some form in the aforesaid exposition.
international congress of americanists.
There is also pending the invitation which the Government of the United States has extended through the Legation in this capital to Colombia to be represented in the XIX International Congress of Americanists which will convene at Washington in October of this year.