32D CONG.....2D SESS.

stalking-horse by which one Administration was to get into power, and the other to be thrown out. The consequence was, that in an evil hour for the interests of the world, as well as for the two countries, the Congress of Mexico were induced to reject the treaty. At the time that convention was rejected, the American holders of this grant were upon the Isthmus, in the act of completing their surveys, preparatory to the work. They had been invited to go there by the Government of Mexico-orders had been issued by the central authority of Mexico to the States through which the road was to pass, not only to throw no obstructions or difficulties in the way, but to receive the engineers and their party with hospitality-to place the resources of the country at their disposal, and to give them every facility in their power to execute the work. A previous order which had been issued by the Government of Mexico was reaffirmed, requiring that when they were ready to commence the work, three hundred convicts should be put at the disposal of the company as public laborers. This party had been there from December to June, a period of some seven months -a party consisting, according to my recollection, of nearly one hundred men, in charge of Major Barnard, an officer of our own service, who had been invited to take charge of the work, and who had been allowed to go there by the Government. An immense expenditure had been incurred by the American holders of this grant, in order to effect that survey. They had not only sent this very large body of men, but they had necessarily to send a large store of materials in the form of implements, &c. They had sent provisions; they had chartered ships and steamboats to aid in it, until their expenditure, as I am informed, reached some $300,000.

Thus, while they were at work under the auspices of Mexico-at the invitation of Mexicothe Congress of that Republic, without notice of any kind whatever, passed a law repealing, substantially, the grant to Garay; and an order was immediately issued, in the month of June, 1851, requiring that the whole engineering party then on the Isthmus, should be forthwith expelled-contumeliously expelled-from the territory of Mexico. I do not look upon that as an indignity intended towards this Government. I look upon it only as evidence of the unfortunate imbecility of the country from which it emanated-an imbecility which renders them incapable of maintaining government, even from month to month. It was a sort of wretched oblation by the party that obtained power, to the prejudices of an ignorant race, by filling their minds with strange, vague, and indefinite apprehensions of what the consequences would be, if our people got a foothold anywhere within their territory. The engineering party were expelled from the Isthmus. They were required to discontinue their work at once, and to abandon the country without stretching another line. They did so; the party was disbanded, and returned home.

Protection is always due by Government to its citizens-our Army and Navy is maintained and built only for such purpose-and, in this case, it would seem more eminently due, because these heavy losses were sustained in an enterprise of great value to the country, to which our people had been invited by the despoiling Power, and to which the Government had lent its sanction, in the free use of the treaty-making power.

In the report of the committee to which I have alluded, the ground upon which the law of the Mexican Congress was passed, repealing substantially and in effect this grant to Garay, is fully set forth. It appears from the recital contained in the report, that when the grant was made in 1842, a certain time was given to the grantee within which to commence the work. Before the time expired, a further decree was issued by the Mexican Government extending the time. In 1846, when General Salas came into power as President with supreme power, (as Santa Anna and Bravo had been before him,) the time had elapsed within which the work was to be commenced. Surveys had been made, but the work had not actually commenced, and the grant might have been considered forfeited by a course of judicial proceeding; but that forfeiture was cured. General Salas, in November, 1846, issued a decree giving further

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Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Mason.

time for two years to the holders of the grant to commence this work, and by that decree ingrafted upon the grant additional stipulations and additional provisions, thus constituting a consideration or equivalent for the extension granted. The decree is set out at large in the volume to which I have referred, and can be seen by any Senator.

The time for the commencement of the work thus extended in November, 1846, expired in November, 1848, before which the work was actually commenced, as is admitted on all hands, and thus the grant was saved. The single ground assumed by Mexico for thus repealing the decree of President Salas is, that he had no authority to make it.

This is a simple, and a very narrow issue, and the first remark I should note is, that if this were so, the judiciary was the proper tribunal to determine the question.

If the grant was valid, it was a contract made for valuable considerations, and was beyond the reach of legislation. The sanction of a contract so made, is the honor and faith of the nation that is party to it, and both of these are expressly pledged by the terms of the grant. But Mexico did not choose to remit the party to her courts. Violence, the law of the tyrant, was a more speedy and certain resort.

As to the authority of Salas, it is enough to say that he was, for the time, the sole depositary of power, and that power was supreme. His title was, "President with supreme power." In his will was concentrated the will of the nation, as the Government de facto-and he was so recognized and submitted to by all Mexico, until the Government was changed.

This was not the only decree in the nature of a general law which emanated from this " supreme power "whilst President Salas held it.

Looking through the history of the times, we find the following, amongst others:

1. A decree organizing the Bureau of General Archives.

2. A decree relative to the liberty of the press.

3. A decree relative to colonization. 4. A decree relative to literary property. 5. A decree authorizing popular meetings. 6. A decree concerning naturalization. All these decrees, and with them that concerning the Garay grant, were communicated to the Congress which Salas convoked, by his Ministers, as laws enacted by the Provisional Government.

They were received and submitted to as such. No protest against them as usurpations was made, not a word from the press even, questioning their validity, or the power that enacted them. On the contrary, the very Congress that subsequently repealed this decree of Salas, on the ground that he had not authority to make it, annulled a law of the State of Sonora, because it violated Salas's decree relative to colonization. It would seem that his power was undoubted for every purpose, save to extend this grant. This needs no further com

ment.

I have caused to be prepared a paper intended to show, and I believe it does correctly show, the difference, both in time and distance, in passing from different points of the North American continent to the Pacific by these respective ways. The distance from New York to San Francisco, via Chagres, is six thousand six hundred and fifty miles, and the distance between the same points by the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, is four thousand nine hundred and seventy miles, making a difference in the distance of one thousand six hundred and eighty miles. Between New Orleans and San Francisco, by way of Panama, the distance is five thousand six hundred and seventy-five miles. From New Orleans to San Francisco, by the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the distance is three thousand seven hundred and forty miles, making a difference of one thousand nine hundred and thirty-five miles. Now, as to time, I am informed that the average time now occupied in passing from New York to San Francisco by the Chagres route, is about twenty-eight days, and the quickest time that has been made, is twenty-two days.

Mr. WELLER.' It has never been made in twenty-two days.

Mr. MASON. I would like to know what is

the shortest time.

Mr. WELLER. Twenty-four days.

Mr. President, I have said that the Government of the United States has an interest in this right of way across Tehuantepec which it behooves us to retain, and to insist upon, through the agency of the Garay grant, now in the hands of its own citizens. It is a duty which the Government owes both to itself and to the citizens of the country. This right of way is within the limits of Mexico, and we are not without evidence that, if the Government of Mexico be permitted to repudiate the grant, we shall not have a transit across Tehuantepec for half a century. The Garay grant was a very liberal one. It conceded to the grantee ten leagues (or thirty miles) of the unoccupied lands on each side of the line of communication. It authorized colonization, and gave the colonists almost all the privileges of Mexican citizens. It was very liberal in reference to the tax that was to be exacted on the transit; and Mexico, more than all, precluded herself from imposing any taxes or any political charges on the work for a period of fifty years. The grant, therefore, is a most important one, and if we allow it to be repudiated and annulled, it requires no prophet to foretell that Mexico will either concede no other, or it will be done in such form as to render it valueless as a highway to the world.

How does the matter stand? The Mexican law, to which I have referred, disaffirming the decree of Salas, was passed in May, 1851, nearly two years ago. The Mexican papers inform us that that Government has, from time to time, issued proposals to construct this way by a new company, or in some other form. Two years have elapsed, and yet, notwithstanding the eminent importance to the world of having access across the continent at that point, the whole question stands now just where it stood then. We are informed that in all the propositions which have since emanated from the Mexican Government, in their proposals inviting new companies to construct this work, they have imposed limitations and restrictions which must discourage all from attempting it, or which would have the effect, if complied with, of leaving that work exclusively in the charge of the Mexican Government. The propositions are of this character: The contractors are required, in the first place, to acknowledge the unqualified sovereignty of Mexico over the transit, and her right to impose any political charges whatever upon persons or property passing over it. They are required to acknowledge a concurrent right in the Government of Mexico to fix the corporate charges. They are required to agree to place their mail steamers under the national flag of Mexico, and all their vessels are to be subject to tonnage and lighterage duties. They are required to agree to transport no troops or munitions of war across the Isthmus, except with the express permission of Mexico. They are required to discriminate in favor of such nations as shall guaranty this monopoly, by deducting twenty-five per cent. from the corporate charges in their favor; they are required to transfer the work at cost to Mexico, and, more than all, those who are there constructing this work are required to renounce their right to the protection of their own Governments, and become de facto Mexican citizens. In this point of view, the question becomes exceedingly important to this country.

If Mexico were what Mexico ought to be, an enlightened, intelligent, liberal community, they would do what even those far weaker Central American Republics have done. They would see that it was due to the great family of nations, not to us alone but to the world, that a work of this character, intended to connect the two seas and to pass the immense commerce of those seas, should be under the charge of no one Government, but should have the guarantee and protection of all. They would see that it was a duty which they

32D CONG.....2D SESS.

Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Mason.

ture of our present way across the northern continent. We purchased California from Mexico, paid a large equivalent for it, and we have in fact no way across our own continent to get to it. I cannot call that a way which leads through bands of savages, across trackless deserts, and over inaccessible mountains, for some thousands of miles, when there is before us a short and convenient pass in a neighboring territory that may be overcome by artificial roads in a single day's jour

owed to other nations to make it a common highway, and to renounce the narrow and destructive policy of holding it purely as a Mexican work, subject to the mutations of Mexican policy. And yet it will follow, as certain as night follows day, that if the Mexican Government be allowed to repudiate this grant, it never will become such highway, unless at the cost of continual war. I say then, sir, unhesitatingly, that beside the duty devolved upon us to protect our citizens and their property against the aggression of a foreign Power, there is connected with this subject, a matter of vital importance to our own Gov-treated ernment, and to the safety of our possessions upon the Pacific, which compels us in a manner to insist that this right of way shall be maintained substantially as it has been guarantied by the grant in question.

The duty of the Government to protect its own citizens against foreign aggression, I am sure I need not expound to the Senate. All writers on the law of nations enjoin it as a duty; and the reason is a very plain one, not only because of the relations which must exist between the governor and the governed, but it is a principle of public law, as it is of common sense, that the property of the citizen is, to some extent, the property of the Government. It constitutes the respublicathe commonwealth-and thus a Government, in protecting the property of the citizen, is protecting its own property; as in protecting the rights of the citizen, it is protecting its own rights; and this is the sum of what is proposed to be done for the holders of this grant. If their title be good-and I think there will be no question about that with those who will examine it-if they have been induced, as there can be no doubt they have been, to expend large sums of money in order to give effect to that title under the sanction, as well as by the invitation of a foreign Government, we should not allow that Government to crush and to destroy them.

But, sir, I go beyond that. We cannot get anywhere upon the southern continent, or upon the strip of land which connects the two continents, any right of way that will be so purely of a domestic character as this at Tehuantepec. If you look at it, you will find that its Atlantic terminus is in our own domestic basin, the Gulf of Mexico. There is not now a foreign gun mounted in that basin except upon the coast of Mexico; and if I appreciate the spirit of the American people, there never will be a foreign gun mounted in the Gulf of Mexico, unless it be by the coterminous Power, the Republic of Mexico. We have it then, here, comparatively at home. We have access to it from the mouth of the Mississippi, without passing anywhere (except upon the coast of Mexico) within reach of any foreign Power. The mouth of the river Coatzacoalcos, the terminus of the Tehuantepec road, is distant but nine hundred miles from the city of New Orleans, a distance which can be overcome by steamers in three days. It is thus, as it were, almost a part of our own territory, certainly so in regard to proximity.

I come now to look at this question in another point of view. I lay it down, without hesitancy and without fear, that we have a right to a way across Tehuantepec. According to public law, this Government may demand of Mexico a way across Tehuantepec; and Mexico cannot refuse it unless she becomes disloyal to the general compact of nations. What is a right of way? Every one is familiar with that. It pertains to individuals in life as it pertains to nations. I understand that writers upon public law derive it from that primitive state, when the entire earth was common to all men, and passage over it was free to all, according to their varied necessities. Such was the nature of this right before government was formed, or the institution of separate property ordained. By these the right in question, was only limited in its exercise; it was not destroyed; and it revives and resuscitates whenever there is a necessity making the way indispensable. It is illustrated in familiar life every day. If I purchase a piece of land so surrounded by the possessions of him from whom it is derived that I have no way out to mill or to market, I may take it, as a right incident to the acquisition. It is a principle resulting from necessity, and is modified as circumstances may require. A way impracticable in its use is the same thing as no way at all; and such is the exact pos

ney.

The principles governing this right are thus by Vattel, a work of admitted authority: "The right of passage is also a remnant of a primitive state of communion, in which the entire earth was common to all mankind, and the passage was everywhere free to each individual, according to his necessities. Nobody can be entirely deprived of this right, but the exercise of it is limited by the introduction of domain and property. " * *

"When, therefore, the owner of a territory thinks proper to refuse you admission into it, you must, in order to enter it in spite of him, have some reason more cogent than all his reasons to the contrary. Such is the right of necessity: this authorizes an act on your part, which on other occasions would be unlawful, viz: an infringement of the right of domain, when a real necessity obliges you to enter into the territory of others; for instance, if you cannot otherwise escape from imminent danger, or if you have no other passage for procuring the means of subsistence, or those of satisfying some other indispensable obligation-you may force a passage when it is unjustly refused."

Now, sir, I confidently say, there is an "indispensable obligation" on this Government to secure for itself a practicable and certain way to its connections on the Pacific; and I as confidently say, that at present there is none, without exposure at sea to the armaments of foreign Powers, which dot the whole ocean border through the Antilles and the Caribbean sea; and I further say, whatever respect and forbearance may be due to the dominions of our neighboring Republic, that forbearance may be tested too far: there is a point at which it ceases to be a virtue, and it may rest with her to determine when it shall be passed.

Now, sir, I mean to wage no war in this, with those who say that a railroad can be made across the continent through our own territory. I have no doubt it is in the power of the country to make such a road, but I doubt exceedingly whether it can be used effectively after it has been made. You may make a railroad ten thousand miles long as easily as one ten miles long, if you have the means; but it depends at last upon the climate, and the nature of the physical obstructions you meet, what is to be the use of it after it has been made. Compare a railroad stretched across the northern part of the continent with one at the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, but one hundred and seventy miles in length. We can use the seas with certainty. Steam navigation has proved that; and there is no danger of obstruction from ice either in the Gulf of Mexico or on the Pacific side. But in this Herculean work, which is projected to throw a road between the Mississippi and the Pacific, there can be no security of passage whatsoever. Passing over the depredations of hostile Indians, you are to traverse deserts destitute of either wood or waterboth indispensable to motive power. For nearly two thousand miles you are beyond the reach of any resources but such as travel with you; and to end the whole, for nearly half the year the way when opened is obstructed by impassable barriers of ice and snow.

There can be no comparison between the two routes, so far as certainty and security of passage is concerned; and if this railroad across our own continent should be made, the country will find, when done, that there are months in the year when it cannot be used. I say then at once, that comparing any way that can be made across the northern part of this continent with that which can be made at the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the one furnishes a communication certain and secure, and the other a communication of the utmost uncertainty and insecurity.

I have taken no part in the discussions which have arisen on the bill introduced by the honorable Senator from California [Mr. GWIN] for the construction of this railroad to the Pacific ocean; but the most cursory examination of the bill will show that the whole plan it proposes is crude and immature, not by any means from want of ability in those who project, but from vices inherent in the subject itself; and I understood the honorable Senator to say that he could not refer

SENATE.

it to a committee, because former committees had tried in vain to perfect its details.

Here is a work to cost, I suppose, a hundred millions of dollars or more, running for two thousand miles through deserts, amidst hostile Indians, over stony mountains, and yet you cannot have the details of it adjusted, although you expect to make the road. I have not seen the bill that the honorable Senator from Texas [Mr. RUSK] proposes to substitute for it; but I learn that the chief difference between the two is, that one proposes that the road shall be made by a grant of land, and the other by a grant of money as an auxiliary to the land. Whenever this road shall be made and doubtless it will be at some day after the territory through which it passes is populated-I apprehend it must be done, as all other roads have been, by previous careful survey and exploration. You cannot undertake to make a railroad without knowing where it is to go, and the country through which it is to pass, the grade which it is to be overcome, and the mountains and the rivers which it is to traverse, or whether it can be done at all. Why, it is undertaking to order a railroad to be made by our fiat, whether nature will or will not permit it. I do not mean to assert that this railroad will never be made, for in all human probability it will be; but I doubt much if any man now living will ever pass over it. If you could have an appropriation to-morrow in the form in which it is asked, and supplying all the necessary funds, if I know anything of human affairs, my life upon it the road would not be built in twenty years.

But, I ask, what conflict is there between the two roads? None whatever. The Government embarks no money in this enterprise. In what I propose, the Government will do nothing more than hold Mexico to her public faith. That will insure the making of the road. The work will be in the hands of private enterprise altogether; but when it is done, there will of necessity be conventions between the Governments interested to see that it is held as a common highway.

Sir, it is my purpose to ask the Senate to adopt the resolutions reported by the Committee on Foreign Relations. They go as far as the committee deemed it necessary or proper to go at the time they were reported. Their purpose is to let the Government of Mexico know, as the deliberate judgment of the Senate, that good faith be preserved on her part in reference to this grant. So far we insist now, and when the time comes, as we may confidently hope it will, when Mexico shall once again enjoy a responsible Government -a Government capable of conducting its affairs, and in a position to be treated with by other Powers, there may at last be no difficulty in adjusting the whole subject. Our relations with Mexico at present are in a very embarrassed condition; not from this alone, but from additional causes; and they must continue to be more and more embarrassed as long as each subject of disagreement and dissension is left unadjusted. I confidently hope, indeed I entertain no doubt, that the Administration which is to come into power, now within a few days, will send to Mexico an able and competent man as Minister; that he will go there under instructions to assure the Government of Mexico that there is no purpose on the part of this Government to oppress or injure them; that all our feelings-the feeling of our whole people, as well as of the Government-are fraternal and kind towards her. All that we ask is, that they will do what any other Government upon earth would have done long since, to allow that way to be opened as a highway of nations; that we will give them aid and encouragement and countenance in doing it; but that we are pledged to hold fast to this grant because of well-founded apprehensions, if it be yielded, the most available and speedy transit between the two oceans which wash our shores, as well as hers, will remain closed to the world."

Should Mexico consider the concessions in this particular grant too liberal on her part, modifica tions may well be made, based on proper equivalents to the grantees, making the concession more acceptable to her or to her people. But the right of way which that grant concedes, is a sine qua non, and we must hold to it. I should think it would be in the power of a Minister, under proper

32D CONG....2D Sess.

THE TEHUANTEPEC GRANT.

Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Downs.

to discuss the expediency, the propriety, or the necessity of the Government of the United States taking prompt action on this subject. The period for any such doubts has long since passed. This Government, in the most solemn manner, has taken its position on this subject; and however doubtful it might have been at first (I never had any) I cannot see that there is any room for doubt now. But if anybody more scrupulous than myself might have raised a doubt as to whether it was the duty of the Government to interpose in a matter of this kind, and protect its citizens, the time for doubt has passed. The Government, in the most solemn and formal manner, has interposed, and has said that its duty is to protect its citizens in their rights in this matter; and it would be unbecoming the dignity of the nation; it would weaken our influence abroad; it would be unworthy of the American people, if now, after the Government has taken this position, it should be receded from. The Government's position has been taken, not merely in a casual correspondence of the Secretary of State, but in the most formal manner. Not only that, but it has even gone beyond the ordinary form of diplomatic intercourse. The President of the United States has felt it to be so important and so interesting a subject, that he has departed from the usual course of diplomatic intercourse, and addressed a private letter to the President of Mexico, remonstrating against the course which that Government was then likely to pursue, and warning him of the consequences if it should violate what the Government of the United States considered to be the interests of its

OF LOUISIANA,

IN THE SENATE, February 2, 1853. The Senate having under consideration the following resolutions reported from the Committee on Foreign Relations, in reference to the Tehuantepec Grant:

Resolved, (as the judgment of the Senate,) That in the present posture of the question on the grant of a right of way through the territory of Mexico, at the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, conceded by that Republic to one of its citizens, and now the property of citizens of the United States, as the same is presented by the correspondence and documents accompanying the message of the President of the United States of the 27th July, 1852, it is not compatible with the dignity of this Government to prosecute the subject further by negotiation.

2. Should the Government of Mexico propose a renewal of such negotiation, it should be acceded to only upon distinct propositions from Mexico, not inconsistent with the demands made by this Government in reference to said grant.

3. That the Government of the United States stands committed to all its citizens to protect them in their rights, abroad as well as at home, within the sphere of its jurisdiction; and should Mexico, within a reasonable time, fail to reconsider her position concerning said grant, it will then become the duty of this Government to review all existing relations with that Republic, and to adopt such measuras as will preserve the honor of the country and the rights of its citizens:

Mr. DOWNS said: Mr. President, I shall not discuss many of the important questions connected with this subject, which were so ably presented yesterday by the honorable chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, [Mr. MASON.] It is unnecessary to do so, because he has suggested everything which the occasion required, much better than I could do; and I would not weaken the very able argument which he has made, or dilute it by repeating what he has said. Therefore, in the course which I shall take, I shall assume at once that the various propositions contended for by the honorable Senator must be considered as established; that the Garay grant was a valid one, made by competent authority; that various other acts of the Government of Mexico-that the negotiations entered into that the whole history of the transaction, which I shall not go into, established this. I shall therefore take for granted all the facts which have been so clearly and so ably presented in the report made by the Committee on Foreign Relations at the last session, and in the speech of the honorable chairman yesterday. I shall offer no argument to the Senate on those points. I shall say very little on another matter connected with this subject, as to the importance and necessity of this communication, and as to the question of how far it may conflict with the proposed Pacific railroad.

Mr. President, in my opinion it is too late

In a letter from the Secretary of State to Señor Luis de la Rosa, the Mexican Minister at Washington, dated April 30, 1851, after an able and comprehensive review of the whole question, the Secretary, referring to the probable rejection of the treaty by Mexico, (which a letter of the Mexican Minister led him to anticipate,) concludes in the following emphatic terms:

"The President of the United States cannot persuade himself that such a calamity as its rejection by Mexico now impends over the two countries."

Again, in a letter to Mr. La Vega, the successor to Señor La Rosa, of the 15th March, 1852, the Secretary of State says:

"If, however, these hopes should prove to be unfounded, and the convention should not go into effect, this Government will feel itself compelled to take into consideration the measures which its duty to its own citizens may require it to adopt, to protect their rights under a voluntary grant made by Mexico of the transit way across the Isthinus. The Government of the United States can in no event be expected to abandon those rights, and ardently hopes that the Mexican Government will do justice to them in season."

And, finally, in view of the great importance of the occasion, and to avert, if possible, consequences of the magnitude of which to the two countries, whilst this question remains unsettled, none can be blind, the President of the United States addressed himself directly to the President of Mexico by a letter of the 19th of March, 1852, from which the committee quote as follows:

"In addition to the motives I have urged for the speedy adjustment of this matter, I beg leave most earnestly to call the attention of your Excellency to the probable difficulties that may grow up between the two nations, should Mexico break her plighted faith in the grant to Garay. Our citizens, relying upon her good faith, have become interested in that grant; they have advanced large sums of money for the purpose of carrying out its objects; they have surveyed a route for a railroad, and demonstrated the practicability of constructing it; and it is not possible that they should now be deprived of the privileges guarantied by that grant, and sustain the heavy losses that must ensue, without appealing to their own Government for the enforcement of their rights. My anxious desire is to avoid the too probable consequences that must result from such an appeal. We cannot, if we would, be indifferent to it. It is a duty which every Government owes to its own citizens, to protect their rights at home and abroad; and the consequences growing out of the disagreement of the proprietors of the Garay grant and the Government of Mexico are such as no true friend of this country or of Mexico can look upon with indifference."

This, Mr. President, is the position that has been taken in the most solemn manner by the Government of the United States; and if there ever was a time to waver, or to doubt, that time has passed. We have not only the right to interpose, but our Government has pledged itself to interpose in this matter; and we have no option left. It may be urged that Mexico is now weak; that she is in a state of anarchy; that it is hard to proceed against

SENATE.

her under such circumstances, and that we ought to be more mild and more moderate to her. There is much in that suggestion, under the peculiar circumstances of Mexico. Perhaps I have as much sympathy for the troubles of that sister Republic as any man can have. I have recently seen the message of the late President of Mexico to the Congress of that Republic, and I consider it a paper of the most melancholy character, and one calculated to excite the sympathy of the lovers of freedom and of mankind everywhere. I have never seen a document of that kind which so deeply and so permanently affected my feelings. It is one of the most affecting documents that I have ever heard of in the annals of any country. He saw his country sinking into anarchy and misfortune; he saw its utterly hopeless condition, and was evidently stim. ulated by patriotic motives, and anxious to do what he could to save his falling country; but his efforts have turned out to be utterly fruitless. In reading that document, I could not but contrast the prostrate and miserable condition of Mexico with that of the United States. I could not but express the sanguine anticipation that long might it be before the President of the United States should have occasion to send to the Congress of the United States such a message as that.

My feelings, then, towards Mexico, on account of her condition, have much weight with me on this question. I would, therefore, under ordinary circumstances, so far as depends on me, forbear; I would say nothing, I would do nothing to embarrass her in her present condition; and I would if I could wait until more prosperous circumstances should attend her; but I consider that we have no option in this matter. The dispute did not commence lately. If so, perhaps I should be willing to postpone it until the next Administration comes into power; but it was commenced before the present disasters of Mexico arose; and it was absolutely necessary, in my opinion, that the Government of the United States should take the position which it did take at the time; and that position cannot now be abandoned without injury to our character and to our country. We know very well how carefully the Mexicans watch our conduct, how ready they are to take advantage of everything like wavering and indecision on our part, and we ought to be sensible of the great injustice and dishonor which has been imposed upon us by the course which she has taken heretofore. If now, under the promptings of any generous motives, we should forbear to act, and to act as becomes our dignity and honor, Mexico will very probably conclude that she is at liberty to do as she pleases in this matter, without any danger of interference on our part. I consider, therefore, that no option is left us. We must act, and we must act at this time. Our honor is invaded. Let us have sympathy and good will for Mexico, but when our honor is involved we have no option; we must first protect that, and then we may act under the dictates of humanity towards Mexico.

I would ask gentlemen to look for a moment at the aspect of this question. I feel rather astonished that the people of the United States have borne with the conduct of Mexico for such a length of time. What is the position of this question? This grant was considered by Mexico when we negotiated with her for the treaty of peace in 1847, as so well established that she absolutely refused to enter into negotiations with us on the subject because the grant had been ceded to an English company. The rights of that company are now vested in American citizens. Mexico has twice entered into treaty stipulations recognizing the validity of the grant. By special orders and instructions and passports, she has permitted our engineers and officers to go there and survey the route. Yet, suddenly, under circumstances which the Senator from Virginia so graphically and so ably described yesterday, by a mere political turn of the wheel, she took it into her head that the grant must be abrogated, and that the treaty must not be concluded. The Mexican Congress passed an act abrogating the grant. Not only was that done, but the Mexican Government drove from the country the engineers and officers of the company sent there by her special permission.

Mr. HALE. I wish to ask the honorable Senator a question. He speaks of the assignment of

Mr. DOWNS. Rejected or not acted upon. I give the President and Secretary of State great credit for their course in this transaction, so far as they have gone, but, in my opinion, they might and ought to have gone a step further. When this ignominy was imposed upon our citizens of sending off officers and engineers who had been invited to go there-and one of them was an officer of the United States of high rank-I think it was an indignity which the Government ought to have resented, and not to have permitted quietly to pass by. Then was a proper time to vindicate the honor, and to show the strength of this country. If, instead of pocketing the insult, the President of the United States had ordered one or two of our vessels-of-war, that are not doing much in the Gulf of Mexico, to the mouth of the Coatzakalcos, and had suggested to the company to send their engineers there and put them to work, and that the Government would protect them, they would have gone to work on the surveys, they would have finished them, and the road would have been in progress, and perhaps half completed by this time; and there would have been not only no war with Mexico, but no cause of war. But that is not all.

What has Mexico been doing? After this grant had been thus solemnly made, thus sanctioned in so many different decrees of the Government, and by treaties entered into by this country-after the Senate had sanctioned the treaty of 1851, and it was only waiting the ratification of the Mexican Government, what did Mexico do? Considering all her obligations, considering her faith pledged to the United States as nothing, she held up this grant, huckstering it all over the world to everybody, to see what price she could get for it. If she is allowed to do that, if the United States can stand by tamely and allow that to be done, she would be very apt next month or next year to set up California for sale, and turn out my friends [Messrs. WELLER and GWIN] who so ably represent that State. Or, on the same principle, Spain might set up a right to sell Florida, or France to sell Louisiana; for, in my opinion, the obligations by which those Territories were ceded are scarcely less binding than the obligations which the Mexican Government entered into in making this grant. How, then, can we pause; how can we hesitate in regard to the policy which we should pursue? We cannot pause; we cannot hesitate, unless we say to the world that we will submit to anything, to any indignity that may be imposed upon us; that we are so fond of peace that we will permit everybody to insult us.

Mr. President, this is an appropriate subject for practical action, and not for discussion as a mere abstraction, and I am glad to have such a question upon which to express my views. I prefer it to an abstraction. Abstractions may do well enough for others, but I think the course of policy of our country is better illustrated by acts than by words. And now, when we have a question before us which requires it, I think it is a proper occasion for decided action, and that it will have more effect than any resolutions which we might pass, which are not so practical as these which are before us. I am not in favor of aggressive or violent measures towards any nation. I would not stimulate the military feeling of the people of the United States or their disposition to acquire territory. I think both are perhaps already too great; but I feel that it is our duty to protect our honor and preserve our proper position among the nations of the earth, and show that on all proper occasions our strength and power will be exercised, and that too in such a way as to make it perfectly understood by the whole world; and I think this is a proper occasion for that purpose. Let it not be said that the measures proposed by the resolution are extraordinary, or that there would be anything extraordinary in resolutions, even stronger than these. Not at all. It is not the first time in the history of this country, or of other countries, that

Tehuantepec Grant-Mr. Downs.

a Government has assumed a right to and even taken possession of a territory, and negotiated afterwards. There are many instances of such a course in history. Why, sir, in my own State, for seven years after the cession of Louisiana, from 1803 to 1810, a large portion of the present State of Louisiana remained in the possession of the Spanish Government and under the Spanish authority. In 1810, it was taken possession of by our Government before the treaty of 1819, and it was in our possession for nine years, and the title was settled by the negotiation in 1819 at last. Did it lead to war? No; it produced no war. had the right, we seized on the territory, and then negotiated for it afterwards, and it caused no war.

We

SENATE.

vernment towards many of the South American Republics, and particularly towards Mexico, has been a great mistake from the beginning, and I wish to see it changed. At first it was very natural, and I cast no censure on any one for that policy. Those States had revolted from the mother countries, and were struggling to be successful. We wished to lend them a helping hand. It was natural, therefore, that we should treat them with the utmost leniency; that we should not be harsh with, or exact too much from them. But when they established their Republies, when they commenced their career in the world as independent nations, there was no necessity for our pursuing so indulgent a policy. We ought then to have treated them as we did other nations, not exacting

son.

performing what was due to us. If we had done so, should we have been subjected to the difficulties to which we have been subjected? I think not. What has been the history of our intercourse with Mexico? One continual series of aggressions on her part, and of complaints and treaties and negotiations on ours. During the whole period since she acquired her independence, there has scarcely been a time, either before the war or since, when an American vessel or an American citizen could go into a port of Mexico with any guarantee for the safety of property or even of perEven your consuls have been sent to jail and imprisoned, and been insulted, and been subjected to all kinds of ignominies; and when the facts have been reported to our Government, instead of demanding that peremptory redress which we should have demanded, and which other nations do demand, the reply was given to the sufferers, as in a case which occurred lately, that we would negotiate with the Mexican Government on the subject. That is not the right policy. There are some nations, in controversies with which the only language that you can speak is cannon and musketry. We should not have had to use so much of that, perhaps none at all, with Mexico if we had acted right in the beginning.

Again: gentlemen must not suppose that every foot we place upon foreign territory is an encroach-anything wrong from them, but insisting on their ment, and is a cause for war. We have not been so particular heretofore in matters of this sort. Long ago, before we acquired Florida, you know, and the country knows, General Jackson marched an army into Florida, and he actually seized and executed some of the incendiaries who had been exciting Indian hostilities against us, and his course was fully vindicated by the Administration then in power. It would, then, be no novel thing in the history of our country, or of other coun tries, if, when such an indignity had been imposed upon us by the Mexican Government, we had vindicated our rights, and sent such a force into that territory as was necessary to protect the surveyors and let them go on with the work. It would have led to no war. On the contrary, it would probably have tended to an adjustment of the question in a manner satisfactory to all the parties long ago. So far from energetic measures promoting a war, or not being our true policy, they are often the very best means of preventing war. We sometimes get into wars by hesitating and doubting too much. I believe, sir, in all probability the Mexican war itself would never have taken place, if the Mexicans had been convinced from the first that we would insist on our rights, that we would not hesitate and doubt. But we had claims against them for spoliations upon our citizens; we negotiated treaties of indemnity; there were difficulties in the execution of them; we temporized with the Mexicans; we gave them time; we showed them almost every indulgence. Then we had a dispute with them about the boundaries of Texas. They claimed land east of the Rio Grande, and we were careful not to offend them in that until they came to the conclusion that they could persuade or induce us to do almost anything, and finally they were led to acts which resulted in

war.

That was forced upon us. I believe there would have been no Mexican war at all if the moment they had failed to fulfill the indemnity stipulated for, we had exacted it at the cannon's mouth, if necessary. Or, when the question was started about the boundary on the Rio Grande, if, instead of negotiating and sending ministers about it, we had sent an army to the Rio Grande, as at last we had to send General Taylor, to arrest their steps, and told them that there they should remain, we would not have had the Mexican war. If those prompt measures had been taken, we should have avoided all that difficulty.

So now, if we act peremptorily in this matterif we show to the world that we will protect our citizens and vindicate our honor, there will be no war. That will be the best way to avoid war. But if we temporize, and vacillate, and express doubt and hesitation in our action, that very consequence will take place, and we shall go on to quarrel more and more. One change in the Mexican Government has produced the difficulty which now exists between us. When another comes into power, particularly if that arch-enemy of the Union, Santa Anna-as probably he will be-be placed at the head of affairs, we see at once he will think that if this Government tolerated the course pursued by his feeble predecessor, he, with his new power and ability, can take much greater liberty; and, perhaps, being a little vexed at the result of the last war, he will be willing to promote a contest with us; and he will very likely do it, if we temporize, and forbear, and hesitate. Let us lay down the rule, then, to say what our rights are, and that we shall insist on them. If we do so, we shall not be subjected to that difficulty. Mr. President, I think the policy of our Gov

I am told-though I do not know whether it is a fact that very often when these outrages were committed upon our vessels and citizens, the mere accidental arrival in a Mexican port of an American vessel-of-war, immediately produced redress without any exercise of force, or any very peremptory demands; and if it had been generally understood that our cruisers, under all reasonable circumstances, had been instructed to redress such grievances, our citizens and vessels would not have experienced such a continual series of insults. I do not wish unnecessarily to act rigorously towards Mexico, or towards any other country; but I do wish such a policy to be adopted by this Government, that our citizens, when they go into Vera Cruz, Acapulco, or any other port, may feel that, as American citizens, their property and persons are to be protected. I believe that has not been the case heretofore; and I believe it will not be the case while the tame and vacillating course that has been pursued, is persisted in. I wish to see the American character more respected abroad than it has been. I do not know how it happens that a people so sensible of their honor, personal and national too, submit so tamely, and so much more so than other nations do, to insults offered to the persons, as well as the property of our citizens elsewhere. I would wish to see that Roman feeling, which existed under the ancient Republic, cherished by our people. I would wish that the American citizen should be protected, not by cannon, or vessels-of-war, or by our minister or consul. I wish to see this Government conducted in such a way-and if it were conducted as, in my opinion, it would be proper to conduct it, such a state of things would exist-that the only passport an American citizen would require anywhere, would be that only passport which the Roman citizen required-"I am a Roman citizen." "I am an American citizen." It is not so now; and it never will be so while this tame, vacillating, and uncertain, and not peaceful, but dangerous policy is pursued, for it will lead to more wars and squabbles than an energetic course would do.

I trust then, Mr. President, that the resolutions will be adopted. While, under different circumstances, I should perhaps wish to have them amended, so as to make them more energetic, yet