Mr. Seward to Mr. Asboth
Sir: I have to acknowledge the receipt of your despatch of the 2d of February. It is accompanied by a correspondence which has taken place between yourself and Madison S. Hollister, esq., consul of the United States at Buenos Ayres.
Two subjects are discussed in that correspondence. The first is the case of Harry C. Albee and P. O. Gondon, two persons who claim to be citizens of the United States, and who have complained to you that the consul refused to give them duplicates of “protection papers” so called.
The other subject is a question of the allowance of an account of $630 for medical attendance on John Larsen, a destitute American seaman.
I shall treat in this paper only of the first subject. It appears from the correspondence [Page 156] that the two persons, Albee and Gondon, left the United States some years ago, leaving no families here, and with no fixed intention of returning hither, and have ever since made the Argentine Republic the place of their business and residence. It further appears, that in some portions of the Argentine Republic there has been during the last year a rebellious rising against its authority, that the public authorities ordered the enrolment of the national guard, and that in some portions of the republic martial law was proclaimed by the government and arrests were made of some persons suspected of hostile intentions, and of others who had failed and refused to enroll their names in the national guard; that Albee and Gondon applied to the consul for “protection papers,” with a view to escape from arrest and to protect themselves from military service for the preservation of order and the enforcement of the laws.
In the absence of treaties, citizens of the United States who have become and pre remaining domiciled in foreign countries could not be exempt from certain common obligations of citizens of those countries to pay taxes and perform duties imposed for the preservation of public order and the maintenance of the government. The treaty between the United States and the Argentine Republic exempts citizens of the United States from the performance of all compulsory military service and from the payment of all forced loans, requisitions and military exactions. In assigning this effect to the treaty, your proceeding is approved.
On the other hand, your instruction to the consul to issue “protection papers” to Albee and Gondon is not approved. Passports are the only “protection papers” known in the law, or sanctioned by this department. What are technically called “protection papers” are used in our international intercourse with pincivilized nations. Protection papers are a feature in the principle of asylum, which we maintain with barbarous or semi-civilized states, but nowhere else. It will be time enough for Messrs. Albee and Gondon to apply for the interposition of this government when their rights as citizens of the United States are directly invaded or menaced by the exactions of military service or of war contributions. When such a complaint is made to you, it will be your duty to ascertain not only the justice of the complaint, but also the fact of the citizenship of the complainant, and then to address yourself to the government requiring the performance of the treaty stipulation. In such a case the Argentine government or its agents might reasonably be expected to grant to the claimants some form of certificate of protection or safe-conduct such as is technically known as “projection papers.”
A consular certificate in the form of a “protection paper” being unauthorized by law, is not such conclusive evidence as you could base a claim upon or the government of the Argentine Rupublic would be obliged to accept.
You will please communicate the effect of this instruction to the consul, to the end that the practice of granting so-called “protection papers,” which seems to have heretofore prevailed in the consulate of Buenos Ayres, may be discontinued.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
Alexander Asboth, Esq., &c., &c., &c.