File No. 817.812/49.
The Secretary of State to the Minister of Salvador.
Washington, February 18, 1914.
Sir: The Department has received and has maturely considered the protest7 which you were so good as to address to it on the 21st of October last for the purpose of reserving any rights and interests of your Government which might be affected or impaired by the grant to the United States by the Republic of Nicaragua, within the latter’s jurisdiction, of the right to establish a naval station on the Gulf of Fonseca.
In your protest the position is taken that the Gulf of Fonseca is a territorial bay whose waters are within the jurisdiction of the bordering States. This position the Department is not disposed to controvert. Your protest, however, further claims that, after the dissolution of the Republic of Central America, the States of Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua remained “the joint lawful owners and sovereigns of the Gulf of Fonseca as they now hold it,” no treaty or agreement having been made to bring to an end the condition of “undivided and joint ownership” which previously existed. The grounds of this claim are not evident, nor do they appear to have been admitted by the bordering States, namely, Salvador, Honduras [Page 955] and Nicaragua. From the fact that the Republic of Nicaragua deems itself to have the right to make the concession to which the project relates, it is necessarily to be inferred that that Government regards the jurisdiction over the Gulf of Fonseca as belonging to them severally and not as belonging to them in undivided and joint ownership. The Department understands that this has been and is the view of the Government of Honduras. It would also appear to have been heretofore the view of the Government of Salvador, as is shown by the treaty between Salvador and Honduras of April 10, 1884, by which the boundary between Salvador and Honduras was extended across the Gulf of Fonseca. This treaty, it is true, never became effective for the reason that the Congress of Honduras failed to approve it; but it is understood that this failure of approval was not due to any supposition that it involved the division of a proprietorship which was previously undivided and joint. On the contrary, the treaty seems to have presupposed that each of the three bordering States claimed as its own a certain part of the Gulf and asserted jurisdiction only over such part. The Department is advised that this is the condition of things which exists to-day.
The protest makes a further claim to the effect that the establishment by the United States of a naval station in the Gulf of Fonseca would radically alter the political situation in that quarter in such manner as to put in jeopardy important interests of Salvador and Honduras. In this relation the protest points out that the interests of Nicaragua in the Gulf are much smaller than those of Honduras and Salvador, and that, while Nicaragua has no port of entry in the Gulf, Salvador and Honduras have therein two such ports, La Unión and Amapala, through which a large part of the commerce of the two countries is conducted.
The Government of the United States desires to give the most respectful consideration to these representations, but is obliged to think that they rest upon apprehensions which are hardly justified by the circumstances. In establishing a naval station in the Gulf of Fonseca, the Government of the United States would have at heart the interests of Central America no less than its own. Particularly would it have in view the safeguarding of the local sovereignty; and to this end this Government would be prepared to consider a concession either from Salvador or from Honduras, or from both of them,| similar to that which Nicaragua has indicated a willingness to make.
With reference to the objection that the proposed concession by Nicaragua would form an obstacle to the restoration of the Union of the State of Central America, the Department cherishes the hope that your Government will, upon further consideration of all the circumstances, be inclined to view the subject in a different light. The concession would not give to the United States any right or interest in the political affairs of Central America beyond that which now exists and would in no respect form an obstacle to the political union of the Central American States in case they should at any time wish to take such a step.
The protest finally suggests that the concession of a naval station to the United States in the Gulf of Fonseca would require the plebiscitary authorization of the peoples whose territory and jurisdictional rights would be affected. This objection seems of necessity to rest primarily upon the claim now made that the waters of the Gulf [Page 956] of Fonseca belong to the bordering states in undivided and joint ownership, for on any other supposition the question of a plebiscite could hardly be raised by Salvador in respect of a concession proposed to be made by the Republic of Nicaragua in waters which the Nicaraguan Government evidently regards as being within the exclusive jurisdiction of Nicaragua.
The claim of undivided and joint ownership having heretofore been discussed, it is hoped that the Government of Salvador will, for the reason above set forth, concur with this Government in the view that the claim does not rest upon solid foundation.
Accept [etc.]