Mr. Foster to Mr. Conger.
Washington, July 13, 1892.
Sir: Several years ago the Brazilian Government granted a concession to the Dom Pedro Segundo Company to lay a cable between Brazil and the United States, guarantying it an exclusive monopoly of cable communication between the two countries. The cable was not built, and the concession lapsed April 13, 1889. Three days thereafter the Brazilian directory of public works advertised for proposals for a new concession. Among the conditions upon which the Brazilian Government advertised to grant the concession were the following:
- (1)
- The Imperial Government grants to the contracting party authorization to establish telegraphic communication, by means of one or more submarine cables, between the village of Vizen, in the province of Para, and the coast of the United States of North America; the said contracting party to use the means within his reach to obtain a concession for that purpose from the Government of this latter country.
- (2)
- * * * The Imperial Government guaranties to said cable or cables the exclusive right of transmitting telegrams delivered at the telegraph stations of the State destined for the United States, or coming from that country.
- (3)
- The present concession shall be in force for the space of —— years, counted from this date, and during this space of time no other submarine telegraph line shall be authorized between Brazil and the United States.
In February, 1890, this concession was granted for a period of thirty-five years to the “Société Française des Telegraphies Sous Marins,” a French corporation which has constructed its cable from Vizen to Puerto Plata, Santo Domingo.
On the 2d of December last another French company, the Compagnie Française de Paris à New York, applied to the President for permission to land a cable on our shores from Puerto Plata. It was its purpose to connect its cable there with the cable from Vizen of the “Société Française de Telegraphes Sous Marins,” thus completing the monopolistic line between the United States and Brazil which was contemplated in the Brazilian concession.
The application to this Government was not granted, and as its refusal was given considerable publicity at the time it is not unlikely that it may have come to the knowledge of the Brazilian Government. In order to avoid any misunderstaning with respect thereto, and in deference to the friendly relations between that Government and this, it seems proper that I should frankly state in brief the reason why permission to land the cable in question was not given.
It has always been contrary to the policy of this Government to allow a cable to be landed upon our shores which possessed from a foreign country exclusive privileges with respect to cable communication between that country and this. The cable which it was desired to land [Page 17] from Puerto Plata was simply intended as the terminal of a system of cables possessing such a monopoly. To have permitted it would have effectually prevented the laying of any other cable between the United States and Brazil. The citizens of this country, who have an equal interest with the citizens of Brazil in cable communication between the two countries, would have been prevented from participating in such cable business and deprived of all the benefits of fair and legitimate competition. Its injustice to our people is the more manifest in view of the fact that for some time the “Central and South American Telegraph Company,” an American corporation, possessing no exclusive privileges from this Government and asking none of the Government of Brazil, has in vain sought the consent of that Government to lay a cable from New York direct to Rio, and also from Rio to Buenos Ayres to connect with its transandean land lines and Pacific coast cables to Galveston, Tex.
This Government appreciates the necessity for direct cable communication between the two countries, and would welcome a cable from Brazil of a Brazilian or any other company which would not exclude like cables of an American company from equal privileges.
You may communicate these views to the Brazilian minister of foreign affairs in such manner as you may deem most expedient.
I am, etc.,