File No. 812.6363/154.
Vice Consul Bevan to the Secretary of State.
Tampico, January 22, 1915.
Government will not grant oil companies permission to resume drilling and construction work unless companies agree to abide by new petroleum laws in course of preparation, by signing following document: [Page 875]
As the object of the decree issued on the 7th of the present month by the First Chief of the Constitutionalist Army in charge of the Executive Power of the Nation is to prevent the construction of new work conflicting with the application of the new petroleum law that the Secretary of Fomento has under consideration, we hereby declare that in soliciting this permission we understand that this new work will be in every respect subject to whatever the prospective new law and regulations may determine, with which we are absolutely in conformity.
None of the Tampico oil companies will sign this document in its present form.