File No. 812.512/950a.
The Acting Secretary of State to Special Agent Silliman.
Washington, June 30, 1915.
Department desires that you call emphatically to General Carranza’s attention the deplorable status of foreign-owned mining properties. The owners of these properties have in many cases paid taxes to both factions, and recent decrees published by both factions impose conditions absolutely impossible to meet under the peculiar conditions existing in Mexico. The mine owners have employed every reasonable effort to continue the operation of their plants, but interruption and sometimes destruction of transportation facilities, [Page 922] disturbed conditions of labor, requisitions by armed forces upon their stores, supplies and output, have placed them in a position where further attempts to continue operations appear in the large majority of cases useless and inadvisable. Moreover, recent decrees have arbitrarily increased taxes and called for their payment in Mexican gold, a condition with which many mining companies cannot possibly comply.
You are instructed to state to General Carranza that this Government, in its desire to avoid grave complications and after serious consideration of this question, is of opinion that General Carranza should take immediate steps to guarantee these foreign interests in the titles to their properties and to permit such as are able to continue operations to do so, without imposing any taxes other than those fixed by the laws emanating from the Constitution; and hopes that due and immediate consideration will be given to the matter in order that this question may be definitely and satisfactorily settled.
You will also state that this Government wishes him to give earnest and weighty consideration to the rights of foreigners in general. The United States Government has at all times dealt fairly with the leaders of the contending factions in Mexico, and it expects reciprocal treatment of its citizens in that country, and that leaders who exercise power will mete out justice to American citizens and foreigners generally.