32D CONG.....2d Sess.

and approval; and the second was, that all the colonists who went on to work upon the proposed railway, or other interoceanic communication, should renounce their nationality, and give up their alien privileges. Upon these terms, and these conditions being incorporated into the decree, or into the credentials, Garay took the grant.

The grant to Garay was of a twofold characterand I beg the Senate to bear this in mind, because if they do, they will avoid some of the very errors into which the Administration has fallen. One of these grants was for colonizing the country, and the other was for making an interoceanic communication; and both were separate and distinct. On the 7th of January, 1847, Guray assigned to Manning & Mackintosh-what? What the Committee on Foreign Relations suppose by their report, what Mr. Webster says in his letter, was a contract for making a way over the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. But it is no such thing. On the 7th of January, 1847, Garay assigned to Manning & Mackintosh that part of the grant which related to colonization, and he expressly said:

"That by this transfer on the part of the covenanter, D. José Garay, it is not to be understood that he confers upon Messrs. Manning & Mackintosh, and Schneider & Company, any right whatever to carry on navigation from one sea to the other; but he declares that he transfers to the gentlemen aforesaid the right of navigating said Coatzacoalcos river for all such purposes as may be suitable and useful to the business connected with the transfer of the lands in ques tion, without any detriment accruing in virtue of such act to the privileges vested in the aforesaid Garay."

That Garay reserved to himself in the most formal manner possible. He retained all the privileges relating to the construction of a railroad, or other transit, across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and he sold to Manning & Mackintosh the simple right of colonizing the country. Manning & Mackintosh, as they were perfectly aware that they were bound to do by the conditions that had been inserted into the contract that was drawn up upon the decree of Salas, submitted this transfer to the Government for approval. Did the Government approve of it? No, sir; but they rejected it until something else was inserted, and I want to read the note which was inserted in the deed:

"The most excellent President has made himself acquainted with the contents of the clause of this document, and in view of the antecedents which have been borne in mind, he has been pleased to approve of said contract, but with the additions which have been deemed wise and just, in order to fill up the vacuums alluded to in the deed itselfvacuums which might become the source of all sorts of discussions, that are to be avoided. It has been noticed that no mention has been made in the contract of the renunciation of nationality, provided for by the thirteenth article of the law of November 5, 1846. According to the spirit of the aforesaid law, this renunciation must take place in the most positive and conclusive manner, on the part of the settlers, so that whatever circumstances may happen, and whatever measures these may require, neither the settlers aforesaid, nor the proprietors may not, in any case nor for any cause, plead alien privileges, nor any other privileges except those which have been granted or may be granted to them by the laws of the country, to which both their persons and their property must be subjected, and without this requisite they will not be admitted. Nor is it stated whether the transferees have to give an account to the Supreme Government of the contracts they may enter into for the introduction of families, nor is there any mention made of the record ordered to be kept, in pursuance of the fourteenth article of the aforesaid law of November the 5th. All these obligations are of a relative character, and as they have been contracted by you, they must be binding upon the transferees."

This note, containing this explicit direction to the proprietors that settlers must renounce their nationality, and submit themselves entirely to such justice as Mexico would give them, to be fully and explicitly understood, was inserted in the contract itself, and signed by Manning & Mackintosh. They took the assignment of that part of the Garay grant with the full knowledge that they divested themselves of all protection that the Government would be bound to extend to them under other circumstances if they had not thus divested themselves.

Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Hale.

Mexican Government had any notice that anybody else except a Mexican citizen was coming in to take this contract, they notified Manning & Mackintosh that they would not consent to the transfer, and they further notified them that the Government resumed to themselves all the concessions which had been made in the Garay grant, for the reason that the time limited in the grant for the performance of the work had expired. They not only did that, but they instructed the Minister of Mexico resident in the United States to serve upon Garay, who was then residing in New York, a like notice, which I ask the Secretary to do me the favor to read.

The Secretary accordingly read it, as follows: MEXICAN LEGATION TO THE

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

His Excellency the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Mexican Republic, in his note of the 8th of the last March, commands me, by order of his Excellency the President, to notify you that the time of the extension of the privilege for opening a way of intercourse, of interoceanic communication through the Isthmus of Tehuantepec having expired, all the concessions made to you by the decree of March, 1842, have ceased, and the Republic has reassumed all her rights upon this matter. God and Liberty! LUIS DE LA ROSA. To Señor DON JOSE GARAY, New York. BALTIMORE, April 8, 1849.

Mr. HALE. That Garay received that notice in season is substantiated by the fact, that on the 12th of April he answered it. Now, it must be remembered that up to this time there had not been the least intimation to Mexico that anybody except Garay had any interest in the contract for making the interoceanic communication. They had been notified of the transfer of the colonization grant, they should favor that assignment, because they and probably good reasons were suggested why wanted foreigners to come in and settle. But up to this moment they had never received any intimation that anybody but Garay was interested in the other grant; and when they did hear it, they notified Manning & Mackintosh that they did not recognize them as transferees of Garay, inasmuch as the two years granted by the decree of 1846 had expired, and the privilege of the claim

had likewise become extinct.

In view of all these facts, I wish the Senate to look at the position of the President of the United States, of the late Secretary of State, and of our Minister to Mexico. The complaint has gone out to the world that, induced by the tempting offers of Mexico, American citizens have gone on and invested their money, their means, in this grant, relying upon the good faith of Mexico; and that Mexico having refused to keep her faith, this Government is called upon to go even to the extreme resort of war, to vindicate the outraged rights of those American citizens who have been thus trampled upon by Mexico. Why, sir, this was a Mexican grant to a Mexican citizen, to be performed on Mexican soil, and the time and time again for which the extension had been sought and granted, had expired, and nothing had been done. Then it was sold to Manning & Mackintosh, to induce the English Government to come in and see if they could not be affected. It was transferred to English subjects in order to try to get England to bully Mexico into what her sense of justice would not dictate to her. I do not know, and I have not the facts that I can state to the Senate sufficient to warrant me in saying, that an application was made to the British authorities to induce them take up this claim of Manning & Mackintosh. I have not such evidence as will authorize me to lay it before the Senate, but I have as much as satisfies my own mind that their interposition was asked, and that the British officials refused to touch it with their fingers.

SENATE

on the 15th of July, 1849, six months after Mr. Mackintosh informed the Governmer: Mexico that he was going to inform his rarel residing out of the Republic, of what had no place in regard to his enterprise, the headomes of which, by common consent of all parties ested, had been definitively established in thet. ted States; the company being represented Señor Don Pedro Amada Hargous, who fir future would deal with the Government of the public, since he, Mackintosh, had ceased in m resent the interests of said company. That me first time, the 15th of July, 1849, that Mr. Fo gous's name appears in this matter. The had before that time expired by its own lin in 1848. It had been annulled by the ManCongress, and resumed by the Mexican Gen ment. Mackintosh, the English assigne. been notified of this; Garay had been nonde, it; the thing was as dead as death could mea Then, in order to revive it, if possible, it w signed to citizens of the United States, ari Government of the United States was called r to go in and vindicate the rights of its citizens, r had been induced, upon the tempting Mexico, to invest their capital in the enter

What were those offers? Why, sir, the Mcan Government said to every citizen of tha ted States, "Before you can be interested contract, or before you can go on to this rewig settler, you must renounce your nationes"you must give up the idea of appealing to m own Government-you must come here Mexican soil, and take a Mexican contram n be content with Mexican laws, and such a tribunals can give you." These were the ter ment and adjudication of your rights as Va ing offers that were held out. That was the sir faith of Mexico upon which the citizens t United States went there, and invested their in this contract.

Now, I know very well that there is an made by the Committee on Foreign Relation by the Secretary of State, to show that, standing the grant had expired by its own! tion; notwithstanding the objections to the thority of Santa Anna, and of Carnilize, an Salas, to make the decrees; notwithstanding the two years prescribed by Salas in his des November 6, 1846, had also expired, there s reasons enough by which it can be made to s that Mexico has acknowledged the grants quently. I will first take the reasons given Committee on Foreign Relations. The comm

say:

"The committee will now proceed to show that the Kican Government has, subsequently to this decree of V ber. 1846, recognized, in the most unequivocal mar binding validity of this grant, and admitted its on – abide by it.

"In 1846-47 the assignment of the grant to Man Mackintosh was duly notified to the Government & W and, on their complaint, President Herrera issued t the Governors of Oaxaca and Vera Cruz to prevent he ting of mahogany, on the lands granted, by any edet! the English company.”

That is one reason, and the answer to that have suggested itself to everybody who he ened to me. The assignment spoken of made in 1847 to Manning & Mackintosh, w an assignment of the right to make a com tion between the two oceans, but it was ans ment of the mere right to colonize the cour related to colonization entirely. That w object which the Mexican Government was ious to have effected, to have the country and therefore it confirmed that assignment an abundant answer to that further to ST Manning & Mackintosh so understood it: Gr so understood it; and everybody so understan because in September, 1848, Garay execute other conveyance to them, by which he gave in addition to the right of colonization, the of making this way across the Isthmus of Te tepec. The committee go on to give their ser

reason:

"In 1847, whilst the treaty of peace was under E tion. Mr. Trist, the Commissioner on the part of the States, by instruction from his Government, prose large money consideration to Mexico for a rightÁC across the Isthmus of Tehuantepee, and was a that Mexico could not treat on this subject, becar'bad, several years before, made a grant to one of bat 'citizens, who had transferred his right, by authorization

32D CONG.....2D SESS.

e Mexican Government, to English subjects, of whose ghts Mexico could not dispose.'"'

Whatever these negotiations may have meantether they meant to have a little diplomacy re-whether they meant to represent the matter ittle stronger than it was-nothing is clearer in that they could not have had in their heads hearts the idea that Garay had assigned to any glish subjects the right of making this interanic communication, because the contract under ich Manning & Mackintosh claimed that right is not executed until some eighteen months afterrds. That contract was executed in September, 48, and these negotiations were going on in the rly part of 1847. It is therefore perfectly plain at the negotiations could not have referred to a ant to make that way across the Isthmus, beuse it was not assigned to Manning & Mackinsh for more than a year afterwards. What, then, the Commissioners mean? They meant the ht of colonization, because that was the only ntract which had been made. But the commitgo on and give their third reason to show that exico acknowledged this grant, and that reason in these words:

After the assignment of the grant to the present Amerin holders, the Minister of the United States in Mexico ts instructed by his Government to apprise that of Mexico the desire of this company to commence their work by horough survey of the Isthmus; and the Minister was rther instructed to make overtures for a treaty securing to e enterprise the joint protection of the two Governments. e Mexican Government, as we learn from the corre

ondence of Mr. Letcher with the Mexican Minister of

reign Relations, made not the slightest opposition in orwarding passports, and issued orders to the departments f Oaxaca and Vera Cruz, not only to avoid interposing my obstacles in their way, but, on the contrary, to afford hem aid and hospitality.""

As has been remarked, I think by the Senator om New York, [Mr. SEWARD,] who addressed e Senate upon this subject some days ago, it is very curious fact, that while there are so many tters and so many short notes given, which assed between Mr. Letcher and the Mexican overnment upon this subject, this very important tter, in which he communicates to them the fact, s would seem to be supposed by the Committee Foreign Relations, that this company were derous of sending on engineers to pursue the work, not found in the correspondence. There is no count of it. Mr. Letcher made some sort of a mmunication, soliciting for some engineers, upon me terms, the right to go over there and make a rvey. Did Mr. Letcher tell the Mexican Govment when he made this application, that the gineers were the servants of this company, that eholders of the Garay grant were about to comence operations, and that he wished passports them? You cannot tell. So far as Mr. Letchs application is concerned, there is a perfect cuum. We do not know what he said, but I nk the Senate will be at no loss to gather what was, from the answer made by the Mexican nister, Mr. Lacunza,'to the Governor of Oaxaca, cause in that he recites the application to him. te letter of Mr. Lacunza is in these words:

MEXICO, April 5, 1850.

MOST EXCELLENT SIR: Several American engineers ving been appointed for the purpose of examining the poslity of opening a communication between the two seas, way of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and desirous as is Excellency the President, during their travels in your te, that they should meet with no embarrassments, but, the contrary, be treated with all hospitality, he has been ased to direct that his wishes should be communicated to , as I now have the honor to do, officially; repeating, at same time, the assurances of my esteem. God and -rty! LACUNZA.

Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Hale.

of the United States; and finding that this Goyernment had appointed its engineers to ascertain the practicability of this great work, which was to do so much for Mexico, for the United States, and for the world, they did what was becoming the offices of a friendly Government. They issued a request to the Governor of the State through which the engineers were to pass, that they might be hospitably received and treated while they were ascertaining the practicability of this communication.

These are all the reasons assigned by the Committee on Foreign Relations to show that Mexico has recognized this grant, except what is to be found in the treaty itself; that is, the treaty which was signed by the Mexican and the American Ministers, and transmitted to this Government, ratified by the American Senate, and rejected by the Mexican Congress. Now, I take it for granted that I need not argue before this enlightened body that nothing in such a treaty as that can by any possibility be binding upon Mexico. Who ever heard that a treaty reduced to writing, and signed and ratified by one Government, imposed any obligations upon a Government which rejected it? It is a new doctrine, and one which cannot be sustained. With all deference to this honorable committee, I think they must have been hard pushed for reasons when they undertook to find, in the fact that the Garay grant was acknowledged in a treaty which Mexico rejected, evidence that Mexico had admitted the grant. But even that bare apology of a reason does not exist, because there is nothing of that sort in the treaty; but there is a simple provision that the actual holder of the right, be he who he may, should be consulted.

Thus I have disposed of the reasons why Mexico has acknowledged this right, so far as the Committee on Foreign Relations are concerned. But Mr. Webster, in one of his letters, has more reasons than the committee, if they are not better. In a letter to Mr. De la Rosa, dated Washington, April 30, 1851, (after Mr. De la Rosa had notified him, and after this Government had been notified times innumerable that Mexico did not and would not recognize this grant,) Mr. Webster wrote back, evidently with a good deal of temper, and told them that Mexico did recognize it. Mr. De la Rosa wrote an earnest and respectful letter to Mr. Webster, telling him that his Government never could recognize the Garay grant, and Mr. Webster wrote back telling him that Mexico did recognize it. Mr. Webster went on and gave eleven reasons to show that Mexico acknowledged the grant.

His first reason is the decree of the Mexican Government of the 1st March, 1842. Well, sir, as that expired in 1844, it seems to me that the first reason of the eleven must fall to the ground.

The second is the contract made between the Mexican Minister of Foreign Relations and Don José de Garay. Under that decree the contract was limited to the time specified in the decree, and died with it; that is to say, in July, 1844, but was subsequently extended to 1845. The third reason given by Mr. Webster is the Mexican decree of the 9th of February, 1843. That was a decree giving the lands that were conveyed by the contract of the 7th of January, 1847, into the possession of Garay; and how the sagacious mind of Mr. Webster could have gathered from the fact that Mexico consented that the lands which were afterwards assigned to Manning & Mackintosh for colonization should be given up to Garay, was proof that they had recognized the existence of this grant, which expired in 1845, and afterwards in 1848, passes my comprehension.

The next reason given by Mr. Webster is the decree of the same Government, of the 4th of October, 1843; that is the decree permitting engineers to go on and make a survey. The fifth reason is the decree of the same Government, of the 28th of December, 1843; that is the one which extended the grant to 1845. The sixth reason is the Mexican decree of November 5th, 1846; that is the decree of Salas, which expired in 1848, and how Mr. Webster could find evidence in the fact that a decree which expired in 1848 acknowledged the

that I cannot comprehend. The seventh reason is the note of the Mexican Commissioners to Mr.

Trist, of September 6th, 1847. I have already

SENATE.

commented upon that, and I have shown that that note had nothing to do with the Garay grant, properly so called, but related to colonization. Mr. Webster's eighth reason is certainly a curious one, and it is "the note of Mr. Clifford to Mr. Lacunza, of the 20th of June, 1849." Mr. Clifford wrote to Mr. Lacunza, inquiring of him if the grant had been annulled. Mr. Lacunza answered that it had not been annulled, but that it was liable

to be annulled for the reason that its conditions

had not been complied with. How Mr. Webster could find in that inquiry of Mr. Clifford any evidence that the Mexican Government acknowledged the existence of the grant subsequent to 1848, I confess I cannot conceive.

The ninth reason of Mr. Webster is the letter of Messrs. Manning & Mackintosh to Mr. Lacunza, of the 25th of July, 1849. That was the letter in which Manning & Mackintosh inform the Government of Mexico that they had become the assignees of the Garay grant, and that Government refused to recognize them as such, and in that fact Mr. Webster finds evidence that Mexico had assented to it. Manning & Mackintosh told the Government of Mexico that they were the assignees of Garay. Mexico said, We cannot recognize you as such; yet that is cited as a reason to prove that Mexico did recognize them.

The tenth reason is the letter of Mr. Lacunza to Mr. Letcher, of the 5th of April, 1850, communicating a copy of an order of the same date issued by the Mexican Government to the Governor of the State of Oaxaca, directing him to receive with hospitality the American engineers who had been appointed to survey the Tehuantepec route. Mr. Webster here evidently treats it as if American engineers had been appointed by the Government, and in the fact that they were hospitably received by Mexico, he finds evidence that Mexico acknowledged the grant.

The eleventh and last reason of Mr. Webster is the same as that suggested by the Committee on Foreign Relations, the articles of the treaty which had not been accepted, but on the other hand had been rejected by Mexico.

In these eleven reasons, and in the three or four assigned by the Committee on Foreign Relations, are to be found the reasons which render it incompatible with the dignity of this Government any longer to negotiate with Mexico on this subject. Now, what has been the course of Mexico? What has she done? Has Mexico refused to treat with the Government of the United States? Has Mexico, like China, shut herself up within her own borders, and said there shall be no egress or ingress, or passing across her territory? Far from it. Mexico, from first to last, has not only been willing, but has been anxious to open this communication. Read the letters. I shall not

weary the Senate by going over them. But any one who will read the letters of Mr. Letcher to the Mexican Government, and the answers, will find that Mexico was earnestly and anxiously desirous to have this communication opened; but this Garay grant she would not confirm. Mexico says she will not give up the sovereignty of her soil to a mere private corporation. Mr. Letcher wrote home and told the Government that he had been informed by the Mexican Minister, "Once remove this Garay grant, and there will be no difficulty at all in making a treaty.' This is a very important point, and therefore I will read from Mr. Letcher's letter. In the letter from him to Mr. Webster, dated 14th December, 1851, relating a conversation which he had with General Arista, the President of Mexico, he says that Arista told him

"That Mexico was poor and oppressed, but so far as he had it in his power to guard and protect her honor, he was determined she should not only be free from just reproach, but should stand upon elevated grounds before the world, in every particular, in reference to a matter of so much importance; that although she had been, and was at this moment, badly treated by many of my countrymen, still, from motives of sound policy, she was disposed, and such was his own sincere wish, to concede to the United States, in preference to any other Power, all the privileges which might be necessary to accomplish the greatest enterprise of the age; but that, in the event of such concession, no allusion must be made to the Garay grant.

"Leave out that grant-say nothing about it, and I am ready,' said he, to enter into a treaty with you which I think will be satisfactory to both countries.""

How was this Garay grant looked upon in Mexico? Let me show you how it was looked

2D CONG.....2D SESS.

zion she has fortified herself in a position too regnable to be assaulted by your artillery. y, sir? Because she has appealed to a feeling he human heart which we will not disregard will never forget, and that is to our magnaty-to our sense of justice-to the regard with ch the strong should ever consider the weak. has placed her argument before us; she has onstrated,, to say the least, to her own satison the integrity of her position and the jusof her cause; and when you reply to this eal that you are going to take forcible possesof her territory, what is her answer? You strong-we are weak; take what you will; we go no further." Sir, this country will learn uch a contest as that, that there are forces more nidable than armies, and one such force is the ghtened public opinion of the civilized and istian world. And that same public opinion ch threw the aegis of its protection around the nderer Kossuth in the Turkish realms, and ed him secure from the gigantic power of Ruswill shield and protect Mexico from any aults which have been threatened upon her by ■ Administration.

know, sir, that I have taken what will be ed an unpopular side of this question; I have en the Mexican side. I know that, in the cant I popular phrase of the day, it will be said I against my country. Sir, I am for my coun

I desire that her fame may be preserved arnished. I desire that justice may mark her gress. I desire no interests, no attainments for - that are inconsistent with the highest regards tare due to the rights of our neighbors, and more rticularly and emphatically our weaker neighrs. Such I believe to be the position of Mexico. e is strong in her weakness. She is strong in the peal which she makes to our magnanimity, to justice. I stand here, then, to-day, sir, pleadg not for Mexico, but for my own country; and ask that you will not tarnish the fair fame of Republic. I ask that you will not commit this -ong which you are threatening to perpetrate on a nation which may be said literally to be lpless at your feet; that you will not in that ay tarnish the reputation which yet has conued to be the pride and boast and the inheritce of all our people. No, sir; let the interests the nation, of the age, of humanity, of com. erce, of social intercourse, of Christianity and ilization, be taken out of the broker's board. r, we want somebody to come in, as the Saviour old went into the Temple of Jerusalem, and ove the money-changers out of the Temple. We want to bring to the deliberation of this queson those considerations which pertinently and propriately belong to it. When that is done, hen this Government is content to advocate these eat interests, and leave those who may have ade contracts with the Mexican Government to e appropriate remedy under Mexican laws, en, and not till then, shall we put ourselves ght.

I believe that it is our duty, as is suggested in ne of the resolutions reported by the Committee n Foreign Relations, "to review our existing elations with Mexico;" and it is our duty to iscard entirely the Garay grant; it is our duty o throw it aside. As was well suggested the ther day, we are changing the venue. The issue as properly triable in Mexico. It has been ied there, and the grant has been condemned mere. It was tried, abandoned, and condemned, efore any citizen of the United States had any. hing to do with it. I protest, then, that we shall ot be brought in, as second-rate lawyers, to ake up and advocate a dishonored obligation, and ave our negotiations reduced to that low standard. f we are going to be practicing attorneys for Mr. Hargous, to assert his claim, let him bring us a claim that is not dishonored upon its face. Sir, t is an insult to us when he comes and asks the United States to lend their diplomacy to enforce is claim, when he presents us a claim which is dishonored on its face; which has been defeated and has expired. We are not the first attorneys that have been applied to. The claim was first transferred to Great Britain, and she refused to touch it. Six months it remained in that situation, and then, in July, 1849, an appeal was made to the American Government. This Government com

menced its negotiations with the Mexican Government, as disclosed in the document which I have before me, continued and ended with the Garay grant.

Sir, I will not intimate, because I do not believe, and I have no opinion on the subject, that there were any undue influences brought to bear upon anybody, at any time, in reference to this grant; but I will say that I think there was force in the suggestion which General Arista made to Mr. Fillmore, in his answer, when he told him that there was something a little mysterious about it. I leave the thing there.

SENATE.

I have looked to the question solely in a national point of view. I have regarded the great national interests that are at stake. Why, sir, this crossing, as we all know, was deemed of so much importance by Mr. Polk, before the golden treasures of California had developed themselves, that, through Mr. Buchanan, his Secretary of State, he authorized Mr. Trist, his negotiator of the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, to offer Mexico $15,000,000 for it, and for it alone. How was Mr. Trist answered? By the assertion on the part of the Mexican negotiators, I may say on the part of the Mexican Government, that this conI have thus, sir, in, I know, a very imperfect cession could not be made to the United States manner, laid before the Senate the facts which I because it was already in the hands of English subhave collected in relation to this matter. I have jects, acquired by virtue of a grant which had been spent some time upon it. I have devoted some made some years previous. And notwithstanding labor to it, because I have felt, and felt deeply, the assertion of the honorable Senator from New upon it. I have not laid the facts before you as Hampshire, I here assert, with the proof in my succinctly and distinctly as I might, but I think I hand, or before my eyes, that Mexico never did have laid before the Senate enough to satisfy any make any objection to the grant, either on account man who will look at the question with an unbi- of its invalidity, or on account of its having exased judgment, that duty and honor and human-pired by its own limitation, until it had come into ity and self-respect, demand of us that we take the hands of American citizens. When it was the this Garay grant and throw it out of this Cham- property of English subjects, she regarded the ber, so that we shall be left free from any such grant of such validity and of such sanctity, that disturbing influences, and come to the considera- she was willing to refuse the tempting offer of tion of those great questions which should appro- $15,000,000 for it; but when she found that it had priately engage the deliberations of the American been transferred to American citizens, then it was Senate, when we are investigating such weighty that she began to complain of its invalidity.

matters.

THE TENUANTEPEC GRANT.

SPEECH OF HON. W. BROOKE, OF MISSISSIPPI,

On the Resolutions reported from the Committee on Foreign Relations, in regard to the Tehuantepec Grant.

IN THE SENATE, February 15, 1853,

Mr. BROOKE said: Mr. President, I regret exceedingly to attempt to address the Senate at so late an hour, but there are so many special orders ahead, that I am very much afraid if we let this matter go over now, we shall never get in sight of it again, and therefore, with the permission of the Senate, I will offer a very few observations upon this subject at this time.

I am very glad, sir, that the opposition to these resolutions, so far as it has been developed, has come from the quarter from which it has come. The discussion has developed that the opposition comes from that spirit which looks with feelings of hostility upon every object of interest that is not located north of a certain line. It indicates to my mind that spirit which is willing to strike at the dearest interests of the nation, if the blow is struck through a southern heart.

The Senator from New Hampshire has well said, and with prophetic foresight, that he would be charged with having taken the Mexican side of this question. He has well said it. The Senator from New York in his remarks the other day undertook so to adjust the lens of history, as to concentrate its rays upon this perplexed and difficult subject. The Senator from New Hampshire, I suppose, has attempted to assist him in the operation; but those Senators should know that in all optical instruments, unless the adjustment is made with the most truthful accuracy, confusion instead of illumination is apt to ensue. Unless the adjustment is perfect, it may be that the objects of sight upon which it is turned may be swelled to large and unnatural proportions. It may. But again, it may be that they may be diminished to equally unnatural and ridiculous insignificance. Such, I think, has been the result, with all due deference to those gentlemen, of the experiments of each of them. When they turned their historical telescope upon Mexican rights and Mexican interests, those rights and those interests loomed up in most portentous magnitude; but when it was turned upon American rights and American interests, those rights and interests were converted into seeming non-entity.

Mr. President, in the anxiety which I have felt in reference to this question, the interests of the company and of the private individuals who own this grant, have had no weight whatever with me.

It will be recollected that the honorable Senator from New Hampshire sent to the Secretary's desk to be read, the notice of the Mexican Minister to Don José Garay, that Mexico regarded this grant as no longer binding-as no longer possessing any validity. What was the date of that notice? According to my recolle tion, it was some time in the month of April, 1819, and it was based upon a notice given to the Mexican Government in January, 1849. If the Senator had examined with a little more care and attention the American side of this document, he would have found that there was in existence a document transferring this grant to Mr. Hargous in October, 1848. I frankly admit that I have no evidence that Mexico had knowledge of this transfer to Hargous, but it was made in the city of Mexico and acknowledged before a notary. Still, although she may have had no notice of that fact, I am authorized to say from the evidence that it was not until that transfer from Manning & Mackintosh to Hargous that Mexico ever made any objection to the validity of the grant.

We are told by the Senator from New Hampshire that Mexico has always been willing, and is still willing, to concede this privilege, provided the Garay grant is thrown aside. I admit it. But she is not willing, and has never been willing, to concede it to American citizens on such terms as would be consistent with the honor and the interests of the American people.

I hold in my hand a decree of the Mexican Government, issued on the 14th of April, 1852, which contains the terms on which she is willing to make this grant, and by those terms she reserves to herself the full control of the work. She reserves to herself full and complete sovereignty over the whole of it, with a right to impose such obstacles and such charges as she may think proper. In order to show further the disposition of the Government of Mexico, I would state that a gentleman of the name of Sloo made a proposition to that Government last spring.

At the request of Senators the honorable Senator here gave way, and the Senate adjourned.

32D CONG.....2D SESS.

ruption, that charge lies not only at their door, but at the door of every member of the Senate who concurs with them in opinion, because our opinions are based upon the same facts and reasoning as theirs. All that I have to say in reference to Mr. Hargous, the representative of the holders of this grant, is, that he is not the gentleman at whose house our Minister to Mexico boarded. That gentleman has not now, and never has had any connection whatever with this grant. But, sir, has it come to this, that a member of this body shall go among the officials and the attaches of a foreign embassy to make inquiries as to the place of boarding and the place of sleeping of our foreign Ministers, prying into their privacy, for the purpose of ascertaining their motives of action?

Mr. BORLAND. Will my friend from Mississippi here permit me to say a few words in justice to Mr. Hargous?

Mr. BROOKE. Certainly, sir. Mr. BORLAND. I heard with great regret yesterday the allusion made to Mr. Hargous, and the imputations which were indirectly, at any rate, cast upon him by the Senator from New Hampshire, [Mr. HALE.] I ask permission of the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. BROOKE] to say a word here for this reason, and this only. I was in Mexico for a large portion of the time when we were engaged in the war with that country, and it so happened that I formed an acquaintance with Mr. Hargous, the one who still resides in Mexico, a somewhat close and altogether favorable acquaintance; and from the opportunities I then had to know him, and learn his character and habits, I well understand, and trust I justly appreciate his course in opening his house to the American Minister, or any other respectable American citizen, who might chance to be in Mexico. Mr. Hargous had resided in Mexico many years, and his position there, and his means, were such as to enable him to do much for the convenience, comfort, and real welfare of any of our citizens, who might need or desire his services and attentions. And, sir, from my personal observation, and from other sources of reliable information, I feel fully authorized to say, and I have much satisfaction in saying it, that those services and those attentions were never withheld; but, on the contrary, that not only his house, but his heart and his purse were always wide open to his countrymen. I am glad of an opportunity to say this. And more, I refer to the reports of our military commanders in Mexico, during the war, in evidence of his patriotic and valuable services in the prosecution of that war. I refer, among others, particularly to those of General Worth, on whose staff he served as a volunteer aid-de-camp, in which service it was my fortune to be associated with him. And in the positions in which we have seen or heard of him, he has been found manifesting the spirit of true Americanism-an open, and warm-hearted, hospitable, patriotic Americanism, which it does an American heart good to contemplate. For such a spirit, no man stands more prominent, or more favorably before the country than Mr. Hargous. From his knowledge of Mexico, from his large means, and his patriotic spirit, few men were able to contribute more, and I doubt whether any one did contribute so much, to the successful operations of our army during the war than this gentleman.

So far, then, from its being matter of complaint or reproach to Mr. Hargous, or assumed as ground of suspicion of impropriety, that he has extended hospitality to the American Minister in Mexico, it is but in accordance with his uniform and praiseworthy course as an American gentleman; and instead of exciting our prejudice against any claim he may prefer, or any one of his name may have, it should the rather serve, certainly, as a favorable introduction of him to our consideration, and dispose us to do, in his behalf, with zeal and alac rity, whatever we may find to do justly. For, so far from finding fault with what he is found to have done, he stands conspicuously before us as a man entitled to the respect of all who respect and appreciate manly hospitality, noble generosity, and true American feeling.

Mr. BROOKE. Mr. President, the honorable Senator from New Hampshire ought to have prosecuted his inquiries a little further. He ought to have descended to the culinary department of

Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Brooke.

the embassy, and inquired of these Mexican attachés

"Upon what meats hath this, our Letcher fed,
That he is grown so great?"

That would have been conduct equally pertinent, equally dignified, and equally Senatorial. Sir, I have more than once had occasion to wonder at the very low estimate that that Senator seemed disposed to place on the integrity of the officials of this Government. I have heard him on more than one occasion assail the fugitive slave law because it gave a commissioner ten dollars when he returned a fugitive to his master, and only five dollars when he set the negro free, thus in effect charging that the commissioners of the United States in the part of the country where he resides, are liable to have their judgments influenced by the paltry sum of five dollars. Accordingly, in that spirit he has thrown out an imputation upon our Minister in Mexico, and upon our late distinguished Secretary of State, that they were liable to be influenced by improper motives at the suggestion of the Messrs. Hargous. Sir, I should hate to carry such thoughts in my bosom. I should deem them but the reflex of my own mind. I should fear that instead of holding the mirror up to others I was but delineating the corruptions of my own heart. I commend to the Senator the well-known motto of the Order of the Garter, "Honi soit qui mal y pense," "Evil be to him who evil thinks."

When I ceased to address the Senate yesterday evening, I was attempting to show that now was the favorable moment for us to obtain this grant, and that judging from the past acts of Mexico, we never could, in all future time, expect to obtain a franchise so favorable to American interests, American honor, and American commerce, as the present. I referred to a decree passed by the Mexican Congress last spring, in reference to this right of way, in which Mexico reserved to herself the full and entire control of passengers and freight across the Isthmus in all future grants. And I was about to refer to a contract that had been partially entered into with Mr. Sloo, as illustrative of some of the burdens that she is determined in future to impose upon all undertakings of this sort. It is a long one, and I will only refer to two articles of it. One, the sixteenth, is in these words:

"The company binds itself under the Mexican flag, and the laws of the country, to establish a line of steamers from Vera Cruz to the head of navigation on the Coatzoalcos river."'

So that Mexico contemplates in all future grants, in all future undertakings, to open this right of way that the steamers which connect it with our country, shall sail under the Mexican flag.

Again, she insists that any future company "shall not construct fortifications upon the Isthmus, form any military organization, nor transport any military forces, national or foreign, without the express authorization of the Government. That is, that in the event of a war, we cannot cross this Isthmus, cannot transport our armies and munitions of war, without the consent of Mexico. I ask Senators whether they are willing that this country shall put itself under such humiliating conditions as not to be able to connect that Isthmus with our own shores, unless by vessels sailing under the Mexican flag, and that we shall not have permission to carry our military stores, munitions of war, and soldiers, across this Isthmus, unless we bend the knee and ask permission of the Government of Mexico?

Mr. President, I propose very briefly to refer to some of the advantages that would accrue to this country from the acquisition of this right of way as it now stands and as it now belongs to our citizens. You are aware, sir, that the Isthmus of Tehuantepec is the most northern of those narrow crossings which indent the outline of the strip of land connecting the continents of North and South America; and here is a point of vast importance to us; it is the only one that has its eastern terminus upon the Gulf of Mexico. With reference to both the crossing at Panama and at Nicaragua our commerce and travel have to go outside of the Gulf to connect with vessels on the Pacific shore. It is an old maxim, and a good one, that in time of peace we should prepare for war; and in the event of a war all our commerce to the Pacific, by way of Panama and

SENATE

Nicaragua, would be exposed on its tranz the present route. I have before me a staramy drawn up by Lieutenant Maury, in refereRY the course that vessels have to travel dung months of the year from New Orleans & peninsula of Yucatan or the Island of Jens On looking at the map one would suppose i the route at all times, from the city of New leans to the Island of Jamaica or to the permi of Yucatan, would be directly in a straig across the Gulf, a distance of not more that or six hundred miles; but we are informe Lieutenant Maury, that in consequence er Gulf monsoons, which blow some six ment the year, and in consequence of the street the Gulf stream, sail vessels from New Cre instead of passing along this direct line, har go through the Straits of Florida, outside gi Gulf of Mexico entirely, and come again ne Gulf with the Gulf stream current; so that have before remarked, in the event of a we, only our whole commerce from the city i York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Richmond, Try folk, and Charleston, but also from the sce Mobile and New Orleans, at least six met the year would have to pass outside of whe- ! be termed our own sea, and down into the ibbean Gulf and go to its ports of destr But suppose that this crossing is in our per by defending the two narrow passes betwee Island of Cuba and Florida on the one hand, t Cuba and Yucatan on the other, which en done with much less outlay than the defers our whole commerce outside of those in would cost, we would have our commerce e within a close sea-a mare clausum—the Ga Mexico.

There is another matter in the considerar this question worthy of great attention. Francisco, by the Tehuantepec route, is seve hundred miles nearer to the city of New Or than it is by the crossing at Nicaragua; an eleven hundred miles nearer to the aty of York; and I am informed by those who gri acquainted with the subject, that the vore be made from San Francisco to New Yea Tehuantepec, in seventeen days. There w be a saving of seven days over the shortes which has ever yet been made by either e southern crossings.

Nor do I conceive that this project confer all with the great enterprise of a Pacifier There are, it is well known, many articles whit ever require water transportation. For insta the article of coal, which, I am told, loses mo[ average five per cent. for every one hundred it is transported on a railroad. We are nowej on the Pacific ocean about two hundred the tons per annum, and all this must be transpers. California by as short a railroad transit as poss The conveyance must be nearly all by wate cause on a railroad two thousand miles in from the Pacific to the Mississippi, accord the rule of computation I have referred to, it v be all wasted away to dust by the time it re its destination. I merely cite this single insta but it is manifest that railroads can never sl sede water as a means of commercial interca and even were the Pacific railroad built, the ent water communications must ever be of int pensable necessity.

But, sir, manifest as are these advantage would not insist upon them if we had to see crossing without color of authority, without e of title, or without justice; and it is only be I conceive we have a right to insist upon and complete title which is now vested in Ay ican citizens that I advocate the passage of resolutions reported by the Committee on For Relations. I will but briefly review that s and then address myself to some of the argus that were used against it by the honorable Se tors from New York [Mr. SEWARD] and Ne Hampshire, [Mr. HALE.]

The title arises in this way: In March, Don José de Garay, a Mexican citizen, appa Santa Anna, then President of the Repre Mexico, for a grant of the right of way to const railroad or canal across the Isthmus of Tehr pec. That privilege and concession were by Sara Anna freely accorded to Mr. Garay—accorded t him under the most solemn assurances and pledge