tion, and, under these circumstances, he deemed it his duty to recommend to Congress, in his annual message of 1859, the employment of a sufficient military force to penetrate into the interior, where the government of Miramon was to be found, with, or if need be without, the consent of the Juarez government, though it was not doubted that such consent could be obtained. As the result of such a movement on the part of the United States, it was expected that the constitutional government would have been able to establish itself at the City of Mexico, and would have been ready and willing to do justice. Moreover, European governments would thus have been deprived of all pretext to interfere in the territorial and domestic concerns of Mexico. "We should thus have been relieved," said President Buchanan," from the obligation of resisting, even by force should this become necessary, any attempt by these Governments to deprive our neighboring Republic of portions of her territory-a duty from which we could not shrink without abandoning the traditional and established policy of the American people. I am happy to observe that, firmly relying upon the justice and good faith of these Governments, there is no present danger that such a contingency will happen. "Having discovered that my recommendations would not be sustained by Congress, the next alternative was to accomplish, in some degree, if possible, the same objects by treaty stipulations with the constitutional Government. Such treaties were accordingly concluded by our late able and excellent minister to Mexico, and on the 4th of January last were submitted to the Senate for ratification. As these have not yet received the final action of that body, it would be improper for me to present a detailed statement of their provisions. Still, I may be permitted to express the opinion in advance that they are calculated to promote the agricultural, manufacturing, and commercial interests of the country and to secure our just infiuence with an adjoining Republic as to whose fortunes and fate we can never feel indifferent; whilst at the same time they provide for the payment of a considerable amount toward the satisfaction of the claims of our injured fellow-citizens." President Buchanan, annual message, Dec. 3, 1860, Richardson's Messages, V. 646. As to treaty negotiations with Mexico, see Davis' Notes, Treaty Volume (1776-1887), 1356-1357. (2) REPRISALS BY ALLIED POWERS. § 956. "The claims of Great Britain, France, and Spain against Mexico may be classified thus: "1. British. On November 16, 1860, the house of the British legation was broken into and £152,000 sterling bonds, belonging to British subjects, were carried off. (See Fraser's Mag., Dec., 1861, where it is said that this attack was a sort of 'reprisal' for the action of British naval officers, who had evaded the Mexican tariff on the exportation of silver by carrying off silver in British cruisers.) Damages were also claimed for the murder of a British subject on April 3, 1859. There was also a claim for bonded debts secured by a prior diplomatic arrangement with Mexico. "2. French. During Miramon's revolutionary administration an issue of bonds for $15,000,000 was made through the agency of Jecker, a Swiss banker, the amount to be raised by this process being $750,000. These bonds fell into the hands of Jecker's French creditors. A claim was made also for $12,000,000 for torts on French subjects. "3. Spanish. By the Miramon revolutionary government certain prior Spanish claims of various types were recognized. These, however, were repudiated by the Juarez government. Another grievance was the abrupt dismissal of the Spanish minister by the latter government. (See Tucker's Monroe Doct. 93.) As will be hereafter seen, Great Britain and Spain withdrew from the alliance before the hostile occpation of Mexican soil by France." Wharton, Int. Law Digest, § 58, I. 311–312. See Lawrence's Com. sur. Droit Int. II. 339, 340. As to the French claims and the convention of Oct. 31, 1861, see Maximilian in Mexico, by Sara Yorke Stevenson, 17-23. See, also, as to the joint intervention and the grounds thereof, "The Present Condition of Mexico," H. Ex. Doc. 100, 37 Cong. 2 sess. 229 et seq. "This Government has learned from information which leaves no room for doubt that an armed movement is being prepared by the Governments of Great Britain and France to proceed to Vera Cruz with a view to make demands of some nature upon Mexico. “My dispatch to you of the 24th day of August last. will have shown you that this Government takes so deep an interest in the permanency of the Mexican Republic that it is even not unwilling to render it some extraordinary good offices in its present emergency. "The President desires you to inform the Government of France that this Government looks with deep concern to the subject of the armed movement to which I have thus directed your attention, and to ask Mr. Thouvanel for such explanations of it as His Imperial Majesty may feel at liberty to give with a view to the satisfaction of the United States and the preservation of peace in this hemisphere. It is confidently believed that such explanations may not be unreasonably asked, in view of the instructions we have already given our minister in Mexico, in regard to an assumption of the payment of interest on the Mexican debt due to foreign bondholders." Mr. Seward, Sec. of State, to Mr. Dayton, min. to France, No. 60, Sept. See, also, Mr. Seward, to Mr. Dayton, No. 79, Nov. 4, 1861, id. 83; Mr. Acknowledging the receipt of a joint note of the Spanish, French, and British ministers of Nov. 30, 1861, which enclosed the text of a convention between their governments, concluded at London, Oct. 31, 1861, for the purpose of obtaining, through combined action, the redress of grievances against the Republic of Mexico, Mr. Seward said: "In the first article the high contracting parties bind themselves to make, immediately after the signing of the convention, the necessary arrangements to send to the shores of Mexico land and sea forces combined, the effective number of which shall be determined in a further exchange of communications between their Governments, but the total of which must be sufficient to enable them to seize and occupy the various fortresses and military positions of the Mexican sea-coasts; also that the commanders of the allied forces shall be authorized to accomplish such other operations as may, on the spot, be deemed most suitable for realizing the end specified in the preamble, and especially for insuring the safety of foreign residents; and that all the measures which are thus to be carried into effect shall be taken in the name and on account of the high contracting parties without distinction of the particular nationality of the forces employed in executing them. "In the second article, the high contracting parties bind themselves not to seek for themselves, in the employment of the coercive measures foreseen by the present convention, any acquisition of territory, or any peculiar advantage, and not to exercise in the subsequent affairs of Mexico any influence of a character to impair the right of the Mexican nation to choose and freely to constitute the form of its own government. "In the third article, the high contracting parties agree that a commission composed of three commissioners, one appointed by each of the contracting powers, should be established, with full power to determine all questions which may arise for the employment and distribution of the sums of money which shall be recovered from Mexico, having regard to the respective rights of the contracting parties. "In the fourth article, the high contracting parties, expressing the desire that the measures which it is their intention to adopt may not have an exclusive character, and recognizing the fact that the Government of the United States, like themselves, has claims of its own to enforce against the Mexican Republic, agree that, immediately after the signing of the present convention, a copy of it shall be communicated to the Government of the United States, and that this Government shall be invited to accede to it, and that in anticipation of such accession, their respective ministers at Washington shall be furnished with full powers to conclude and sign, collectively or severally, with a plenipotentiary of the United States, to be designated by the President, such an instrument. "But as the high contracting powers would expose themselves, in making any delay in carrying into effect articles one and two of the convention, to failure in the end which they wish to attain, they have agreed not to defer, with a view to obtaining the accession of the United States, the commencement of the stipulated operations beyond the period at which their combined forces may be united in the vicinity of Vera Cruz. "The plenipotentiaries, in their note to the undersigned, invite the United States to accede to the convention. The undersigned, having submitted the subject to the President, will proceed to communicate his views thereon. "First. As the undersigned has heretofore had the honor to inform each of the plenipotentiaries now addressed, the President does not feel himself at liberty to question, and does not question, that the sovereigns represented have undoubted right to decide for themselves the fact whether they have sustained grievances, and to resort to war against Mexico for the redress thereof, and have a right also to levy the war severally or jointly. 66 Secondly. The United States have a deep interest, which, however, they are happy to believe is an interest held by them in common with the high contracting powers and with all other civilized states, that neither of the sovereigns by whom the convention has been concluded shall seek or obtain any acquisition of territory or any advantage peculiar to itself, and not equally left open to the United States and every other civilized state, within the territories of Mexico, and especially that neither one nor all of the contracting parties shall, as a result or consequence of the hostilities to be inaugurated under the convention, exercise in the subsequent affairs of Mexico any influence of a character to impair the right of the Mexican people to choose and freely to constitute the form of its own government. "The undersigned renews on this occasion the acknowledgment heretofore given, that each of the high contracting parties had informed the United States substantially that they recognized this interest, and he is authorized to express the satisfaction of the President with the terms in which that recognition is clearly embodied in the treaty itself. "It is true, as the high contracting parties assume, that the United States have, on their part, claims to urge against Mexico. Upon due consideration, however, the President is of opinion that it would be inexpedient to ask satisfaction of their claims at this time through an act of accession to the convention. Among the reasons for this decision which the undersigned is authorized to assign, are, first, that the United States, so far as it is practicable, prefer to adhere to a traditional policy recommended to them by the Father of their Country and confirmed by a happy experience, which forbids them from making alliances with foreign nations; second, Mexico being a neighbor of the United States on this continent, and possessing a system of government similar to our own in many of its important features, the United States habitually cherish a decided good will towards that Republic, and a lively interest in its security, prosperity, and welfare. Animated by these sentiments the United States do not feel inclined to resort to forcible remedies for their claims at the present moment, when the Government of Mexico is deeply disturbed by factions within, and war with foreign nations. And, of course, the same sentiments render them still more disinclined to allied war against Mexico, than to war to be waged against her by themselves alone. "The undersigned is further authorized to state to the plenipotentiaries, for the information of the sovereigns of Spain, France, and Great Britain, that the United States are so earnestly anxious for the safety and welfare of the Republic of Mexico, that they have already empowered their minister residing there to enter into a treaty with the Mexican Republic, conceding to it some material aid and advantages which it is hoped may enable that Republic to satisfy the just claims and demands of the said sovereigns, and so avert the war which these sovereigns have agreed among each other to levy against Mexico. The sovereigns need not be informed that this proposal to Mexico has been made, not in hostility to them, but with a knowledge of the proceeding formally communicated to them, and with the hope that they might find, through the increased ability of Mexico to result from the treaty, and her willingness to treat with them upon just terms, a mode of averting the hostilities which it is the object of the convention now under consideration to inaugurate. What has thus far been done by the American minister at Mexico, under those instructions, has not yet become known to this Government, and the information is looked for with deep interest. "Should these negotiations offer any sufficient grounds on which to justify a proposition to the high contracting parties in behalf of Mexico, the undersigned will hasten to submit such a proposition to those powers. But it is to be understood, first, that Mexico shall have acceded to such a treaty; and, secondly, that it shall be acceptable to the President and Senate of the United States. "In the meantime the high contracting powers are informed that the President deems it his duty to provide that a naval force should |