438.00/116
The French Ambassador ( Jusserand ) to the Acting Secretary of State
Mr. Secretary of State: In a memorandum dated October 29 last, Your Excellency was pleased to lay before the Embassy certain propositions which the Government of the United States, desiring to heed as far as possible the views of the Government of the Republic, saw fit to offer with a view to a settlement of the French claims in Haiti.
In reply to your memorandum I have the honor to inform Your Excellency that with the exception of the claims that have already passed through the regular channel and which shall be mentioned hereinafter, the Government of the Republic is disposed to accept the procedure suggested by the American Government, on condition, however, that it shall be well defined through an exchange of notes with regard to:
- 1.
- The absolute right of the French Government to refer to an arbitral tribunal instituted in accordance with the Franco-Haitian Protocol of 1913, all claims whose settlement by the Claims Commission would not be deemed satisfactory.
- 2.
- The extreme limit of time in which the Haitian Government shall appoint its arbitrator for the organization of the said tribunal.
- 3.
- The mode and term of payment of claims settled by the arbitral tribunal.
As for the French claims that have already been settled in principle as a consequence of a regular proceeding, it does not seem possible again to refer to the Claims Commission.
Moreover these claims are few and may be divided into three classes: [Page 834]
- (a)
- Claims settled by the arbitral tribunal organized under
the Franco-Haitian Protocol of 1913. They number three,
namely:
- (1)
- Lassalle claim, allowed in the sum of $3000.00;
- (2)
- Barthe claim, allowed in the sum of $1100.00;
- (3)
- Clovis claim, rejected.
- (b)
- Claims settled by a special arbitral tribunal (Rouzier claim). In consequence of a difference that arose between Mr. Semexant Rouzier and the City Government of Cape Haitien, the parties agreed to refer the case to arbitration. The tribunal gave its award against the City Government of Cape Haitien in the sum of $8,800 to be paid to our fellow countrymen. Under the law of Haiti the State must see to the payment of the debts of city governments when these are not able to meet their engagements.
- (c)
- Claims settled by the Haitian courts. One case alone comes under that head. It is the Gluck claim. The Haitian courts found against the Government which was sentenced to pay Mr. Gluck the following sums: $524.00, 55.553 francs and 189 Haitian piasters.
To the amount of these claims there may properly be added annual interest at 6% from the date of the judgment. The total sum is about $20,000, and the French dependents request its payment.
Finally the Government of the Republic urgently requests that a solution should be reached also as soon as possible with regard to the service of the foreign debt and internal debt of Haiti.76
The foreign debt consists of the three loans of 1875, 1896, and 1910 floated in France. The service of those loans is secured by special appropriations, and before the American occupation, was regularly attended to by the Haitian Government in spite of the revolutions and internal difficulties of various kinds.
Now, although the convention of 1915 provides by article 5 that “all resources recovered and cashed by the Receiver General shall be applied … to the interest and to the amortization of the Public Debt of Haiti”, payment of the interest was suspended several years and the outstanding coupons were not paid until the beginning of 1920, and yet the service of the debt has not been so far regularly resumed. The receipts of Haiti in the fiscal year 1918–1919, reached the figures of $5,225,422.00 and 3,482,802 gourdes, which, in the last eight years were exceeded but once, in 1911–1912, and it is not seen why the service of the external debt of Haiti should not be continuously attended to.
The service of the internal debt which had always been regularly attended to by the Haitian Government before the occupation, has [Page 835] also been suspended since 1915. This situation is very prejudicial to the French merchants settled in Haiti who had invested their savings in bonds of the internal debt and now find it impossible either to sell them or contract loans upon them on account of the depreciation caused by the suspension of payment of the interest.
Finally, it would be desirable to have also the question of the payment of interest and amortization settled, as regards:
- (1)
- The consolidated debt acknowledged by a law published December 8, 1915, that is to say, under the rules of the occupation.
- (2)
- The floating debt which has been verified at the request of the Financial Adviser, and
- (3)
- The Bonds of the Revolution and the Davilmar Bonds, which may properly be verified and even reduced but have been legal tender in Haiti.
Since the American intervention in Haiti had for its object as stated in the very language of the convention of 1915 “to establish the Haitian finances on a substantial basis”, the Government of the Republic indulges in the hope that the American Government will kindly take into consideration the foregoing facts and take into account the rights of the French creditors of Haiti.
Be pleased [etc.]