File No. 812.00/11517a.
The Secretary of State to Chargé O’Shanghnessy.9
Washington, April 14, 1914, 10 p.m.
744. The Government of the United States appreciates the courteous and conciliatory attitude of General Huerta but ventures to think that he does not realize the very serious character of the present situation and the very grave consequences which it may involve. The Government of the United States cannot believe that the landing of the marines was really regarded in anything but its true light. It was obviously a routine visit to the shore to obtain supplies. The marines were engaged in loading the supplies into the boat when they were seized and there is no evidence whatever that they had been warned that a landing at that place was contrary to the existing regulations. Even if they were acting contrary to the regulations governing that particular landing-place, the remedy should have been a request to them to withdraw and a notification to their commanding officer of the real situation. In no conceivable circumstances, while peace between the two countries exists, could the arrest and even temporary detention of regularly commissioned officers and enlisted men of this Government by Mexican authorities have been excusable. You will please represent to General Huerta, very respectfully but with the greatest firmness, the confidence of this Government that it can depend upon his quick perception and his sense of military honor to comply with the expectations of the naval authorities of the United States at Vera Cruz and Tampico. This Government does not feel that it would be dealing candidly with [Page 460] General Huerta if it did not point out to him that a failure to reconsider his present attitude might lead to a situation which this Government and, I am sure, General Huerta himself would contemplate with the greatest reluctance. No mortification can possibly come to General Huerta from paying full respect to the sovereign dignity of the United States of America, and nothing less than that can satisfy the principles of this Government or the feeling of the people whom it represents.
The impression on the part of this Government that the arrest of the officer and men at Tampico cannot have been the mere mistake of a subordinate officer is intensified by the subsequent arbitrary and, as it seems to this Government, quite inexcusable arrest of a uniformed orderly of the United States Navy at Vera Cruz while carrying the mails of the fleet, and by the action of the government censor at Mexico City in presuming to withhold dispatches sent by this Government to its Embassy.
The President regards this as a most serious matter and directs that you communicate it to General Huerta in full and at once with the assurance that the President expects a prompt acceptance of the terms.
- In response to his No. 847 of April 12, 2 p.m.↩