File No. 2491/83.
The Costa Rican Minister on Special Mission to the Secretary of State.
Washington, October 18, 1909.
Excellency: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your kind communication of this date, wherein, referring to the pending negotiations for the satisfactory settlement of the boundary dispute between the Republics of Costa Rica and Panama, your excellency has been pleased to reiterate the proffer of the good offices of your Government to bring about the arbitration which is to put an end to the controversy, your excellency at the same time informing me that your Government is also advised that the Government of Panama is willing to submit to the Chief Justice of the United States, as sole arbitrator, the final decision as to which of the two boundary lines between Costa Rica and Panama under the Loubet award is the correct one, on condition that the Government of Costa Rica enters into a formal agreement with the United States Government that the decision of the arbitrator, whatever it be, shall be accepted by Costa Rica as final.
The Government of Costa Rica being desirous, as it in fact is, of reaching, as soon as possible, the definite solution of this, its only controversy of an international character, welcomes with real satisfaction this attitude of the Republic of Panama. Therefore it gives me much pleasure to say to your excellency that my Government is entirely disposed forthwith to enter into a convention of arbitration, whereby Costa Rica as well as Panama should submit to the arbitration of the Chief Justice of the United States, as sole arbitrator:
- First. Which of the two interpretations given by the interested parties to the Loubet award should prevail as the correct one according to law.
- Second. Whether the Loubet award, understood in the way Colombia, now Panama, interprets it, would or would not be obligatory.
The arbitral award of the Chief Justice of the United States must, in the very nature of things, be considered as final and binding by both countries.
The Government of Costa Rica stands ready to sign a treaty in the sense I have above outlined, and it would be a great gratification to have the United States join as a party to said treaty.
In communicating the foregoing to your excellency I cherish the hope that this old question that has for such a long time separated Costa Rica and Panama will be promptly and forever settled through your timely and happy intervention; and it gives me pleasure to acknowledge on the part of my Government its profound gratitude toward that of the United States for the valued service it is rendering in this important matter.
Accept, etc.,