File No. 419.11D29/110.
The Secretary of State to Minister Price.
Washington, December 4, 1915.
Sir: The Department has received your No. 665, of the 4th ultimo, in which you enclose a copy of a judgment of the Supreme Court of Panama, holding that there is no sufficient evidence on which to institute a prosecution growing out of the riot of July 4, 1912.
You will advise the Foreign Office as follows:
Having read with care the decision of the Supreme Court, the Department cannot refrain from expressing its keen disappointment at the signal failure of the Panaman authorities to fix responsibility upon any of the individuals of the Panaman police who were engaged in the acts of criminal aggression upon citizens of the United States in the disturbances of July 4, 1912, in which several American citizens were killed and a number of others wounded.
The several disturbances of a similar character, which have occurred since the tragedy of July 4, confirm the Department’s belief that the lack of vigor displayed by the Panaman authorities to detect and punish those guilty in the first disturbances would lend encouragement to repetitions; and the Department gravely fears that the situation will not be improved by the decisions of the Panaman judges.
If, as found by the Panaman judges, no guilt can be traced to any of the police engaged in the outbreak of July 4, and if, as is said by the Supreme Court in the decision under notice, “since the unfortunate event of July 4, which was investigated in these proceedings, other similar ones have occurred in the cities of Panama and Colon, and now as then it has been impossible for the Panaman and American authorities to come to an agreement as to the underlying causes thereof,” the wisdom of the stipulation in the Canal Treaty by which the United States Government may take over the policing of these cities is vindicated, resort to which treaty right the Government of the United States now finds it necessary to consider, to avoid further repetitions of these unfortunate occurrences.
I am [etc.]