File No. 815.77/101.
[Inclosure—Translation.]
The Minister for Foreign
Affairs to the American
Minister.
Foreign Office,
Tegucigalpa,
February 7, 1912.
Mr. Minister: I have the honor to
acknowledge receipt of your excellency’s courteous note addressed to
me under yesterday’s date in which you advise me that according to
representations made by the attorneys of Mr. Washington S. Valentine
it appears that he fears that he may be dispossessed of the railroad
and wharf of Puerto Cortes without the adjustment of his claims
connected with both properties having been made; that said attorneys
of Mr. Valentine
[Page 597]
affirm
that he is willing to relinquish control and management of said
railroad and wharf provided his interests be duly protected; but
that he protests against any act by the Government of Honduras by
which he might be deprived in any measure of his properties without
adequate compensation.
Your excellency adds that your Government, without discussing at
present the legal merits of the claim of Mr. Valentine, is convinced
that his claim possesses certain equities that should be
satisfactorily, met; and that any act violative of such equities
could not be considered by your Government as an indication of the
friendship with which it would like to see the acts of my Government
toward American enterprise animated.
In reply, and under instructions of the President, to whom I have
given account of your excellency’s important note, I have the honor
to inform you that there is no reason whatever for complaint on the
part of the representative of Mr. Valentine because of the action of
the Government in respect to the railroad of Puerto Cortés, to which
the decree issued yesterday and sent to the Gobernador Político of
Cortés for execution was confined.
As your excellency must know, the railroad of Puerto Cortes,
exclusive property of the Government, was turned over on August 1,
1908, to Mr. Valentine, with whom a contract of lease was made which
was never perfected in the form prescribed by the Constitution of
the country, which requires for the validity of these contracts the
approval of Congress. Nevertheless Mr. Valentine has in fact been
administering and managing the railroad and enjoying the proceeds
from it without having any right thereto.
The Congress now in session—in view of the contracts entered into
with Mr. Valentine and the fact that, in spite of the invalidity of
the same, Mr. Valentine continued in possession and control of the
railroad—declared by Decree No. 28 of the 5th instant that the
Executive proceeded hastily and unconstitutionally in delivering the
railroad to Mr. Valentine by virtue of a contract which, to be
perfected, needed the approval of the Legislative Assembly; and
directed the said Executive Power, availing itself of the most
proper and efficacious means, to proceed immediately to recover that
property and to determine the consequent obligations toward (deducir
las responsabilidades consiguientes al) Mr. Valentine.
By virtue whereof and in compliance with the said decree the
Government, through the Ministry of Fomento and Public Works, issued
a decree, which your excellency will find enclosed1 as an annex to this note,
in which it is ordered: (1) that “the Gobernador Politico of the
Department of Cortes, with previous injunction (requerimiento) and
notification of the Decree of Congress of which mention has been
made and of the present order to the administrator or agent of Mr.
Washington S. Valentine, take possession of the railroad with the
appurtenances and accessories, with formal judicial inventory,
advising the said administrator or agent in order that he may attend
the transfer and inventory if he wishes to do so; (2) that Mr.
Valentine be required to give account of the returns from the
railroad during the time he has exploited it, and that liquidation
be made in order that there may be adjudicated to each of the
parties the portion that belongs to it.”
As your excellency will see, the Government in taking possession of
the railroad has taken possession of an enterprise entirely the
property of the nation and not of Mr. Valentine, a property that
figures in the inventories of transfer subscribed by the
representative of the said Mr. Valentine on August 1, 1908, with a
value of $1,140,976.35, plus the warehouses, etc., at $33,428.94,
values which illegally and without the approval of Congress as the
Constitution provides had been turned over to Mr. Valentine.
But the Government in issuing the order cited, in compliance with the
legislative decree to which I have made reference, has desired to
clothe the act with every kind of guaranty for Mr. Valentine;
wherefore it ordered that a formal judicial inventory be made, being
disposed, upon liquidation of accounts, to recognize and pay the sum
or sums, if there should be any, due to Mr. Valentine by reason of
the transaction.
My Government has no knowledge of any claim on the part of Mr.
Valentine connected with the railroad. It has confined itself to the
exercise of a right conferred by the Constitution, and your
excellency may be sure that it is and always will be the most
faithful guardian of the rights and privileges of foreigners that
reside in Honduras, and very especially of Americans.
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Your excellency is well aware that in Honduras the interests of
American citizens enjoy every kind of security, it being the
aspiration of my Government to demonstrate to your excellency its
most sincere and cordial friendship by the protection that it
affords to American undertakings established in Honduras, of which
an example is the New York, Rosario & Honduras Mining Co., of
which the same Mr. Valentine is a director, including important
negotiations which it has pending with American enterprises, which
are the most cordial examples of its friendship for America and the
Americans.
My Government, Mr. Minister, cherishes the hope that your excellency,
in view of these documents, will recognize the right that warrants
the act of recovery of the railroad and will also see that no
prejudice be done to the rights which Mr. Valentine may claim—not
over the railroad, for this is the property of the Government,
but—with reference to the participation which he may have in the
proceeds of the railroad.
I pray your excellency kindly to take note of these explanations and
of the sentiments expressed by my Government, and I avail [etc.]
