right of her legations in other South American states to the said privileges, and denies the same to the legations of such states in Peru." This seems to have effectually cleared the atmosphere in this country, for there is no subsequent record of Peru upon the books of the United States.

9. In 1868, Washburn, minister to Paraguay, gave shelter to a number of political refugees, including two American citizens. A list of them having been furnished to the government, they were demanded, and the Americans seized as they were accompanying Mr. Washburn out of the country. They were subsequently released upon demand of Admiral Davis, backed up by an American man-of-war. No complaint was made by Secretary Seward as to the refusal of the Paraguayan government to permit the continuance of the practice, but in his note of January 14th he said: "Your intention to afford asylum in the legation to those who may resort to it, save notorious criminals, as far as it can be done without compromising your neutral character, is approved." 10. At about the same time, May, 1868, Mr. Seward was instructing Mr. Hollister, minister to Hayti: "We are prepared to accept your opinion that it is no longer expedient to practice the right of asylum in the Haytien republic. Nevertheless, we should not be willing to relinquish the right abruptly. . . nor any sooner, nor in any greater degree, than it is renounced by the legations of the other important neutral powers. . . the exercise of the right should be attended with delicacy and no display of arrogance." 11. In the following year, Mr. Secretary Fish, who gave our policy a strong impetus in its present direction, began to take a more radical position. He says to Mr. Bassett at Hayti: "While you are not required to expel. you will give them to understand that your government cannot assume any responsibility for them, and especially cannot sanction any resistance by you to their arrest by the authorities for the time being." 12. In 1870, Mr. Hudson, minister to Guatemala, refused to give refuge to one Granadas, at that time eluding arrest for rebellion, but upon the overthrow of the government and the rise of Granadas, he extended the protection of the legation to all parties; whereupon the United States government gave answer: "Your efforts to protect life and property meet with the approval of this department." 13. In 1871, Duenas, the deposed president of Salvador, took refuge at the American legation, whence he was later surrendered upon the guarantee that his life would be spared, and with his own assent. Mr. Fish regarded the assent as a necessary element in the case,

...

apparently thus claiming the right to retain the refugee. He subsequently called upon the government to respect its promise of immunity. 14. In 1872, American consuls in Hayti protected refugees without comment from the government, under a "wise discretion and avoidance of misunderstandings.' 15. In 1873,

Mr. Fish regarded the invasion of the consular office at St. Marc an international discourtesy requiring an emphatic protest and a demand for decided redress, but did not make any claim on account of the fugitives arrested. The year 1875 was prolific of trouble for our ministers in Bolivia and Hayti, in both of which countries mushroom revolutions and counter-revolutions sprung up. In Bolivia four different instances arose (cases 16, 17, 18, 20), while in Hayti our legation was in a state of siege from May 1 to October 5 over the case of General Boisrond Canal, the "pièce de resistance," under this head, of American diplomacy. 16. Minister Reynolds, at La Paz, on January 19, congratulated himself that "no harm has come to any one that asked asylum in this legation." 17. On February 20, he refused asylum to those "connected with the late mutiny, knowing well its character, wherein many murders were permitted in cold blood," but allowed two political refugees to remain who filed statements that they had not been in arms. He also assured the Bolivian government that "under no circumstances could I permit an unfriendly or hostile act toward the constitutional government of Bolivia by any one under the protection of the flag." 18. Upon March 20, he refused asylum to further insurgents on the ground that "they were criminals to be tried for incendiarism and murder in the attack upon the imperial palace," while, October 5 (case 20), he refused General Suarez, who claimed to be a political refugee, not "knowing for what he was sought to be arrested or charged," which position was approved at Washing

ton.

19. In Hayti, May 1st, there was a scene of wild disorder. Illegal arrests had been ordered for three leaders of the opposition party; they, fearing that the arrests were made as cover for assassination, resisted. Two were killed, but General Boisrond Canal fought his way with two relatives to the country house of Minister Bassett, where were three other Haytien gentlemen spending Sunday with the minister. All of the refugees in the legation were demanded, martial law was proclaimed, the whole town was in an uproar, 1500 soldiers were posted around the premises, and threats of incendiarism were made. The minister refused to give a list of the fugitives, asserting that this was a courtesy given in the past

only to expedite the embarkation of refugees, and not to furnish ready identification for a trumped-up indictment. The Haytien government insisted that the refugees were guilty of criminal acts, while Minister Bassett was equally positive (in which opinion the diplomatic corps agreed) that the fugitives were only political offenders, and the arrest was intended as a coup d'étât. Ingress and egress at the minister's home was blocked, and the continued noise made by the armed forces rendered rest impossible. While Mr. Bassett protested against this outrageous treatment, the Haytien government took an appeal through their minister at Washington to Secretary Fish, and upon September 27th, after a statement by Secretary Fish that the continuance of the indignities would be considered an unfriendly act justifying the visit of a warship, it was agreed that the refugees should be embarked for Jamaica upon surrender to the Haytien officials. During the course of correspondence the following extracts are of importance:

"I shall receive and protect, as I judge best, in my legation, any and every person who may apply." (Stuart, British Minister.) "I do not see how we can ignore it in the face of the practice which has existed here for seventy years. The right of asylum has never been renounced by this government, and it practically has refused to assent to its discontinuance. . . . The Haytien plenipotentiary would not agree to having the exercise of this right taken away from even our consulates in the inferior ports." (Minister Bassett to Secretary Fish.) "These men are considered as being on the territory of the United States and under its protection. I guarantee that they will in no way affect public order while they remain here." (Minister Bassett to Mr. Excellent of Hayti.) "Since the custom is tolerated by the other powers . . . we are not disposed to place the representatives of the United States in an invidious. position by positively forbidding them to continue the practice. . . . You have repeatedly been instructed that such a practice has no basis in public law, and is believed to be contrary to sound policy. The course of other states in receiving political refugees is not sufficient to sanction a similar step for us. . . . However, it is not expedient that the refugees should be given up. . . No matter what our disposition to receive reasons to palliate or justify, it is still in the power of the Haytien government to refuse to be satisfied. . . . It is to be regretted that you allowed your partialities and humanity to overcome that discretion which you were expected to exercise." (Secretary Fish to Minister Bassett.) "The practice has been to tolerate the right in countries of Spanish. origin... the practice has never addressed itself to the full favor of the government. . . . This government is not by itself and independently disposed to absolutely prohibit its diplomatic representatives from grant

ing asylum in every case. They may exercise the prerogative under their own responsibility. . . . We would prefer, therefore, not to formally assent to the 'propositions you make for its abolishment' without ascertaining the views of other governments." (Secretary Fish to Mr. Preston [Hayti].)

21. In 1877, General Arce took refuge in an American consulate in Mazatlan, Mexico. Notwithstanding our consul announced that he was under his protection, the refugee was forcibly removed. Minister Foster called attention to our discouragement of asylum, but claimed that the act was in bad faith after the assurance by the Mexican government of its respect of the protection. The matter does not further appear in the reports. 22. In 1878, Minister Langston, after giving the names of certain refugees rebelling against the Canal administration, secured their embarkation with the consent of the Haytien government. The diplomatic corps had agreed not to deliver up any one desiring refuge. 23. In the following year in the revolution of that season, Boisrond Canal, who had, subsequently to his asylum in 1875, returned and been chosen President, abdicated and claimed again the right of asylum, this time upon a British war vessel. At this time Secretary Evarts thus instructed Langston: "The practice has become so deeply established as to be practically recognized by whatever government may be in power, even to respecting the premises of a consulate, as well as a legation. This government does not sanction the usage, and enjoins . . . the avoidance of all pretexts for its exercise; while indisposed from obvious motives of common humanity to direct its agents to deny temporary shelter to any unfortunates threatened with mob violence, it will not countenance any attempt to knowingly harbor offenders against the laws." 24. Feb. 23, 1885, a controversy arose with the Colombian government over the protection afforded a wealthy citizen in the Argentine legation, and Minister Scruggs delivered himself of the following: "To make the exemption of the minister the more complete, the fiction of 'exterritoriality' has been invented, whereby, though actually in a foreign country, he is supposed to remain. within the territory of his own sovereign." This view was straightway disavowed by Secretary Bayard, who stated that the argument deduced from this phrase as a basis was utterly fallacious. 25. Nov. 7, 1885. Mr. Bayard to Mr. Thompson, minister to Hayti: "If, as a custom, the practice prevails, the exercise by Americans could not be deemed exceptional, and we should certainly expect such privileges as would be accorded other powers.

But we claim no right or privilege of asylum, but discountenance it." 26. The same statement was repeated in 1888 for the benefit of Consul Goutier, for whose instruction it was given in 1885, since he again stated that American consulates did not recognize the privilege of asylum; and (27) to Mr. Douglass in 1890, when the ubiquitous and pyrotechnic General Boisrond Canal, in the shift of fortunes, was again a compulsory guest, this time at the British legation, other persons having sought our shelter. 28. In 1890, in the Barrundia case, where Minister to Guatemala Mizner permitted the authorities to go aboard the U. S. vessel Acapulco after a political refugee, Secretary Blaine, on page 138, Foreign Relations Reports for 1890, urges that the exception to the general doctrine as to asylum has been maintained uniformly in South and Central America. "No nation could acquiesce in the sudden disregard or heed a demand for the peremptory abandonment of a privilege sanctioned by so general a usage." . . "Even more powerfully do these causes operate to secure a refuge on foreign vessels." And, on page 135: "The most extreme writers hold it part of every nation's independence to grant asylum for those sought to be prosecuted for their political acts." Questions as to the right of asylum upon American ships also arose in 1891 in Salvador, 1892 in Venezuela, and in numerous other instances, but the principles involved are apart from the present subject.

29. On the 29th of August, 1891, upon the defeat of the government forces in Chili, Minister Egan threw open the doors of the American legation to some eighty refugees, among them the family of the defeated president, Balmaceda. Nine days previously he had sheltered some of the revolutionists against the opposition of the then government, which threatened to search the legation to discover them. Police were placed about the legation to arrest all persons entering or leaving the premises. This was on the 30th of August, and they were not withdrawn until January 12, 1892, when Mr. Egan succeeded in embarking those that remained with him, after an expense of some $5000 for their entertainment, as he states in his dispatch of November 16th. The Chilian government charged that the legation was a hotbed of conspiracy against the state, an allegation which met with a strenuous denial from Mr. Egan, but the feeling which was worked up by the sheltering of the fugitives led to the outbreak against the "Americanos," crew of the Baltimore. Although ultimately giving the refugees permission to leave the country, the Chilian govern