It is not deemed necessary to dwell upon any particular cases, the record of
which is in the legation at Constantinople, for it is assumed that you will
have familiarized yourself therewith as one of the initial duties incumbent
upon you. While from the nature of these cases the conduct of this class of
questions must be largely intrusted to your discretion, yet it is not to be
supposed that you will be any less active than your predecessors in
endeavoring by every means known to the intercourse of sovereign states to
secure all due protection and redress for your countrymen who take up their
abode in Turkey and observe its laws.
You will communicate freely with the Department on this subject as you may
deem it necessary, and while giving your own views as to the result of the
practical knowledge you may be able to obtain on the spot, you will ask such
special instructions as you may think needful. You will rest assured that it
is the purpose of this Government to go to all proper limits in protecting
American rights and interests in Turkey, and any suggestions that you may
offer as to the proper method of doing so will have careful consideration.
At the same time you will not disguise from the Porte our sense of
disappointment at the inadequacy of the protection accorded to law-abiding
citizens of the United States in Turkey, and the bad impression which must
be created from the continued failure to punish offenders whose identity has
been amply established. The Turkish Government is no less concerned than
ourselves in seeing to it that no imputation on its good faith shall be
possible, and that no culprit shall be screened from the consequences of his
acts. The Government of the United States recognizes in the missionaries an
honest and worthy set of men who have achieved a vast amount of good and
whose welfare is dear to multitudes in this country. They not only deserve
all the protection possible, but should be shown every proper sympathy in
their life-work.
Adding, in conclusion, that the Department hopes soon to be favored with such
practical views as you may find occasion to present in regard to this
important subject,
[Inclosure 1 in No. 9.]
Mr. Clark to the
President.
American Board of Commissioners for Foreign
Missions,
Congregational
House, 1 Somerset
Street,
Boston,
July 29, 1885.
Sir: In behalf of the American Board of
Commissioners for Foreign Missions I beg to call your attention to the
need of more efficient protection of American
interests in the Turkish Empire. You are aware that the larger
part of American residents in that empire are connected with different
missionary societies, hence the officials of the United States of
different grades will naturally be brought into relations with them
quite as often as with other Americans, perhaps oftener.
The following statistics will indicate in some measure the extent of the
work in charge of the missionaries of the American and Presbyterian
Boards of Missions within the limits of the Turkish Empire. The number
of missionaries, men and women, from this country is over two hundred.
They are to be found at the most influential centers of influence, from
Macedonia to the borders of Persia on the east, and from the Black Sea
on the north to Arabia on the south. Between three and four hundred
towns and cities are occupied by missionaries in person or by their
agents. About one hundred and fifty churches have been gathered with
over ten thousand members.
Nearly a minion of dollars is invested in educational and publication
enterprises, including
[Page 857]
eight
institutions of college grade attended by over one thousand students,
and from seventy-five to eighty high schools and seminaries with some
twenty-five hundred pupils.
Not far from two hundred millions of pages of works for educational and
religious purposes have been issued from the press in six different
languages.
Rev. Dr. Gilman, one of the secretaries of the American Bible Society,
has kindly given me the following items, touching the work of his
society:
The American Bible Society has large investments at Constantinople and
Beirut in electrotype plates, printed books and sheets, and electrotype
apparatus—the value of the same being not far from $125,000.
At those two points it manufactures not far from fifty thousand volumes a
year in Turkish, Armenian, Bulgarian, and other languages used in the
Turkish Empire.
Its whole work is philanthropic and benevolent and aims to make it
possible for the subjects of the Turkish Empire, of whatever language or
ancestry, to become possessors of the Holy Scriptures which have done so
much for ths prosperity of the United States.
No commercial profit is sought for or received; but no attempt is made to
force the Scriptures upon persons reluctant to receive them.
Besides the property of the Bible Society, the trustees of the Bible
House have a building at Constantinople, which, with the land on which
it stands, cost not far from $80,000.
The missionaries and others connected with the interests above outlined
ask, and we ask for them, only the enjoyment of the rights and
privileges accorded by treaty stipulations to American citizens as such.
We ask no favors for them as missionaries, but only as American citizens
in the prosecution of lawful callings.
It is not to be disguised, however, that the Turkish Government of late
years has become more and more jealous of our influence, and of the work
we are doing in enlightening the people. Hence restrictions have been
laid upon us in many ways, and the protection and the privileges granted
to other nationalities are no longer accorded to us as in former
years.
- (1)
- The first restriction to which I would refer relates to the
distribution and sale of publications, such as have been duly
approved by Government censors, and which are, therefore, property
to be regarded as objects of commerce. In repeated instances of late
men employed to sell publications have been arrested and the
property in their hands seized. After due representation to the
civil authorities, and wearisome delays, the individuals arrested
have been released and property restored, but no adequate reparation
has been made for the loss of time and for the damage done by the
detention of property. The Government has made promises of
reparation again and again, but the promises have not been
fulfilled. In one case, that which occurred at Gallipoli, General
Wallace demanded £100 Turkish indemnity for losses incurred, but our
Government did not sustain him in pressing the claim, and so it was
dropped. Of late similar cases have occurred in the region of
Erzeroom, and to such an extent have these restrictions been
enforced as seriously to interfere with the prosecution of our
labors in this direction.
- (2)
- Another restriction which has greatly hindered our work of late
has been the withholding of the usual permits for the erection of
school buildings. We have been allowed to publish school books to a
large extent, and to educate teachers, but when we ask permission to
erect school buildings for the proper carrying out of this branch of
the service, these permits are either withholden altogether, or we
have been subjected to ruinous delays. These permits have been given
in most instances to the French, but re not given to
Americans.
- (3)
- The gravest matter of which we have to complain is lack of
security for the lives and property of missionaries, especially in
the interior. Not only are permits or safe conducts withheld in some
cases, as at Erzeroom and Van, from missionaries desiring to travel
in the prosecution of their work—safe conducts by which they could
secure guards for their protection—but two of our missionaries about
two years since were striken down on the highway and severely
wounded by repeated sword-cuts and no redress has ever been secured
for this outrage. The principal man concerned is well known and
representations have been made touching the case to the Turkish
Government, and promises abundant have been made that he should be
arrested and punished, but nothing has been done. On the contrary,
this man is treated with very distinguished consideration by the
local authorities and his example is referred to as evidence that
Americans, as such, have no rights and no just claim on the
protection of the Turkish authorities.
In this case also General Wallace, on being instructed by the United
States Government to press the matter of redress with vigor, and to
secure proper indemnity, did so, expecting the support of his Government
in such demands as he might make. He demanded £1,000 Turkish, as
indemnity for the injuries done to one of these gentlemen, Dr. Reynolds,
and £500 Turkish indemnity for injuries done to Mr. Knapp, his
associate; but when he came to press these claims on the Turkish
Government he was again held in check by his own Government, and
everything was left to the good sense and kind feeling of the
[Page 858]
Turkish authorities. I am
sorry to he obliged to refer to such neglect of American citizens on the
part of its Government, neglect now so continued and repeated in so many
instances as to make our American citizens blush at the very name
“American.” Is it not possible for Americans, as such, to enjoy in
Turkey the same immunities and the same protection which other
nationalities accord to their subjects?
I might add to these instances other illustrations. It may be enough to
name one.
Mr. Knapp, some twenty years ago, purchased of the Turkish Government a
house in Bitlis; but of late the order has been given, first through
local courts and afterwards confirmed by the authorities at
Constantinople, that he give up his house to one who comes forward as a
claimant of the property, and not only give up the house, with all the
improvements made on it, but pay twenty years’ rent thereon. This is in
a city in which the American name has been so discredited by failure to
secure the proper punishment of Moussa Bey, the principal man involved
in the outrage upon the persons of Messrs. Knapp and Reynolds.
These matters and others will come to the early attention doubtless of
Mr. Cox on reaching Constantinople. He will find in the files of his
office abundant information touching these matters. Mr. Heap, the
consul-general of the United States, in consequence of ill health, has
been worried, doubtless, by many of these complaints, and has shown less
sympathy and less readiness to secure redress for our grievances. In one
instance a civil suit, which, in accordance with former precedents, and
in accordance with the judgment of English and French consuls, should
have been settled in a consular court, was thrown into one of the
Turkish courts, where it was a foregone conclusion that unfavorable
judgment would be rendered on our claims.
The reason alleged by Mr. Heap, as reported to me, was that the consular
court had no power to enforce its decisions. This was a new revelation,
and I cannot but hope that my informant was mistaken. It was too painful
a confession of the entire weakness of the United States officials in
the Turkish Empire to secure redress for our citizens.
I will only add the strong conviction, grounded on former precedents,
that the occasional presence of our Mediterranean fleet in Turkish
waters, or the frequent visit of some of our ships of war at Smyrna, the
Dardanelles, or Salonica—not as a menace, but as a reminder to the
Turkish Government of the existence of the United States as one of the
great powers of the world—would add very much to the influence of the
American minister, restore the credit and the prestige of the American
name, and contribute not a little to securing the rights and privileges
of American citizens in accordance with treaty stipulations.
Yours, &c.,
[Inclosure 2 in No. 9.]
Mr. Bayard to Mr.
Clark.
Department of State,
Washington, August 17,
1885.
Sir: Your letter of the 29th ultimo to the
President, advocating the cause of American missionaries in Turkey, has
been received and referred to me for reply. A copy of it will be at once
sent to Mr. Cox, our present representative at Constantinople, to whose
discretion the conduct of this class of questions must be largely
intrusted. He will doubtless feel it a pleasure as well as a duty to
interest himself in the matter, and it is not supposed that he will be
any less active than his predecessors in endeavoring by every means
known to the intercourse of sovereign states to secure all due
protection and redress for American citizens who take up their abode in
Turkey and observe the laws of the Ottoman Empire.
Your letter intimates an opinion that past administrations have been lax
in not pressing and enforcing demands for reparation and pecuniary
indemnity in certain cases to which you advert. I find that the
peremptory demands in question were made by Mr. Wallace without due
prior authority; and having been refused by the Turkish Government, an
insistence upon them, and especially a determination to enforce them,
would have entailed great responsibilities. Had it been the purpose of
the last administration to proceed to any international extremity, the
order to demand indemnity would doubtless have proceeded in the first
instance from the Department of State. The wisdom of presenting, by way
of ultimatum, peremptory demands for money payment in cases of this
character is not apparent, for it is a rule of international law that
sovereigns are not jiable, in diplomatic procedure, for damages to a
foreigner when arising from the misconduct
[Page 859]
of agents acting out of the range not only of
their real but of their apparent authority. This Government could not
admit such a demand upon it on the part of any foreign power, and it
cannot be expected to make such a demand against a nation with which it
treats as an equal sovereign, unless it has acquired by treaty the right
to do so.
But this view of the matter is qualified by the right to expect that,
when the circumstances of the case warrant it, the Government found
morally in default will hasten to render proper reparation to the
injured party. This is what Mr. Wallace appears to have been directed to
press for by every means in his power, and Mr. Cox will be instructed in
the like sense. He will spare no efforts to impress on the Government of
the Porte our earnest conviction that we have a right to expect that
justice will be meted out to the offenders, and that such reparation
will be tendered for the injuries suffered as will comport with a due
sense of justice and of deference toward a friendly power.
I am, &c.,
