File No. 812.00/23469.
The Special Commissioners to the Secretary of State.
We have just returned from a meeting of the Mediators Which began with the discussion of Paragraph 1, as to the transfer of power.* * * As a result of a lengthy conference it was substantially agreed that Paragraph 1 should read as follows:
Paragraph 1. A Provisional Government for the United Mexican States, constituted as hereinafter provided, shall be recognized at Mexico City at noon on the day____of___, 1914, at which time it shall assume and thereafter exercise governmental powers until the election and inauguration of a constitutional president.
It is proposed that this paragraph be protocolized tomorrow, the Mediators claiming that the only way to make progress is to put [Page 527] in definite and final form what has been agreed upon by both parties, and unless you object we will enter the meeting and agree to the protocolization of the above, for which we have been contending for ten days. While the language is somewhat different, we think it carries out in substance and detail our understanding of the views of the President.* * *