Office of the Historian

File No. 837.001M52/29

The Cuban Minister to the Secretary of State

[Translation]
No. 90
Legation of Cuba,
Washington, August 10, 1917.

Mr. Secretary: I have the high honor to place in your excellency’s hands, together with this note, the autograph letter written to His Excellency, Mr. Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States of America, by the President of Cuba, with the request that you kindly forward it to its high destination.

I also have the honor to enclose the usual office copy of the said autograph letter.

I renew [etc.]

Carlos Manuel de Céspedes
[Page 413]
[Inclosure—Translation]

President Menocal to President Wilson

Great and Good Friend: I have the honor to inform Your Excellency that as a result of the general elections that took place in the nation on the first of November last, I was proclaimed by the Senate and Chamber of Representatives assembled in Congress on the 7th day of the present month President of the Republic for the 1917–1921 term.

And having on this day taken the oath required by the Constitution to assume the exercise of the executive power, it affords me pleasure to assure Your Excellency that from the high post which I am called upon to hold by the vote of my fellow citizens, I shall invariably endeavor to have the friendly relations which happily exist between our two governments and countries grow more and more friendly.

I make sincere wishes for the prosperity of your nation and the personal happiness of Your Excellency of whom I am the Great and Good Friend.

Your Good Friend,

Mario G. Menocal

Pablo Desvernine,
Secretary of State

Written at Habana, Palace of the Presidency, on the 20th of May, 1917.