412.11 C 8315/–: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the Chargé in Mexico (Schoenfeld)
181. Your 307, August 10, 1 p.m., and 310, August 10, 7 p.m. Department is informed through New York Times that De Courcy is now en route to this country.
The Department now desires you to present a formal note to the Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs reciting therein all the pertinent facts in the case. You will conclude the note in the sense of the following:
“In view of the arbitrary manner of Mr. de Courcy’s arrest without any known charges having been made against him, and in view of the fact that he was held incommunicado without food or sleeping accommodations, I am instructed by my Government to make an emphatic protest against the harsh treatment accorded this American citizen and to point out that the failure of the Mexican authorities to inform the Embassy of the detention and of the charges on which he was detained and the pretensions of the Mexican authorities to have no knowledge of De Courcy’s arrest even after the Embassy had learned thereof through other sources and had inquired of the Foreign Office, is in violation of the informal understanding between this Embassy and the Foreign Office reached about three years ago. I am further instructed by my Government urgently to request that instructions be issued to the competent authorities of Your Excellency’s Government to the end that American citizens may in the future not be subjected to detention of this sort with no formal charge having been brought against them and that they may in all cases be permitted to communicate [Page 256] with this Embassy or the Consulate General; and further that the Embassy be notified of such cases in accordance with the existing understanding on the subject.”
In presenting this note you may orally discuss with the Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs the provisions of Article Sixteen of the Mexican Constitution79 as well as the informal understanding above mentioned and state that while the cooperation of the Foreign Office in this case is appreciated, the arbitrary action of other authorities of Mexico in this and other recent cases cannot but be regarded by the American Government as contrary to the practice of nations.