of the Latin-American republics has increased with regard to the use we might make of that power in dealing with them.

Unfortunately we gave one very disquieting example of what we might do when we went to war with Mexico in Mr. Polk's time and got out of that war a great addition to our national territory.

The suspicion of our southern neighbors, their uneasiness as to our growing power, their jealousy that we should assume to play Big Brother to them without their invitation to do so, has constantly stood in the way of the amicable and happy relations we wished to establish with them. Only in very recent years have they extended their hands to us with anything like cordiality, and it is not likely that we shall ever have their entire confidence until we have succeeded in giving them satisfactory and conclusive proofs of our own friendly and unselfish purpose.

What is needed for the firm establishment of their faith in us is that we should give guaranties of some sort, in conduct as well as in promise, that we will as scrupulously respect their territorial integrity and their political sovereignty as we insist that European nations should respect them.

If we should intervene in Mexico, we would undoubtedly revive the gravest suspicions throughout all the states of America. By intervention I mean the use of the power of the United States to establish internal order there without the invitation of Mexico and determine the character and method of her political institutions. We have professed to believe that every nation, every people, has the right to order its own institutions as it will, and we must live up to that profession in our actions in absolute good faith.

conces

Moreover, "order" has been purchased in Mexico at a terrible cost when it has been obtained by foreign assistance. The foreign assistance has generally come in the form of financial aid. That financial aid has almost invariably been conditioned upon sions" which have put the greater part of the resources of the country which have as yet been developed in the hands of foreign. capitalists, and by the same token under the "protection" of foreign governments.

Those who have successfully maintained stable order in Mexico by such means have, like Diaz, found that they were the servants, not of Mexico, but of foreign concessionaires.

The economic development of Mexico has so far been accomplished by such "concessions" and by the exploitation of the fertile lands of the republic by a very small number of owners who have accumulated

under one title hundreds of thousands of acres, swept within one ownership the greater part of states, and reduced the population of the country to a sort of peonage.

Mexico is one of the treasure houses of the world. It is exceedingly to be desired by those who wish to amass fortunes. Its resources are indeed serviceable to the whole world and are needed by the industries of the whole world. No enterprising capitalist can look upon her without coveting her. The foreign diplomacy with which she has become bitterly familiar is the "dollar diplomacy," which has almost invariably obliged her to give precedence to foreign interests over her own. What she needs more than anything else is financial support which will not involve the sale of her liberties and the enslavement of her people.

Property owned by foreigners, enterprises conducted by foreigners, will never be safe in Mexico so long as their existence and the method of their use and conduct excite the suspicion and, upon occasion, the hatred of the people of the country itself.

I would not be understood as saying that all or even the majority of the foreigners who have owned property in Mexico or who have developed her extraordinary resources have acted in a way to excite the jealousy or deserve the dislike of the people of the country. It is fortunately true that there have been a great many who acted with the same honor and public spirit there that characterized them at home, and whose wish it has never been to exploit the country to its own hurt and detriment.

I am speaking of a system and not uttering an indictment. The system by which Mexico has been financially assisted has in the past generally bound her hand and foot and left her in effect without a free government. It has almost in every instance deprived her people of the part they were entitled to play in the determination of their own destiny and development.

This is what every leader in Mexico has to fear, and the history of Mexico's dealings with the United States cannot be said to be reassuring.

It goes without saying that the United States must do as she is doing-she must insist upon the safety of her borders; she must, so fast as order is worked out of chaos, use every instrumentality she can in friendship employ to protect the lives and the property of her citizens in Mexico.

But she can establish permanent peace on her borders only by a resolute and consistent adoption in action of the principles which

underlie her own life. She must respect the liberties and the selfgovernment of Mexicans as she would respect her own. She has professed to be the champion of the rights of small and helpless states, and she must make that profession good in what she does. She has professed to be the friend of Mexico, and she must prove it by seeing to it that every step she takes is a step of friendship and helpfulness. Our own principles and the peace of the world are conditioned upon the exemplification of those professions in action by ourselves and by all the nations of the world, and our dealings with Mexico afford us an opportunity to show the way.

Mexico must no doubt struggle through long processes of blood and terror before she finds herself and returns to the paths of peace and order; but other nations, older in political experience than she, have staggered and struggled through these dark ways for years together to find themselves at last, to come out into the light, to know the price of liberty, to realize the compulsion of peace, and the orderly processes of law.

It is painful to observe how few of the suggestions as to what the United States ought to do with regard to Mexico are based upon sympathy with the Mexican people or any effort even to understand what they need and desire. I can say with knowledge that most of the suggestions of action come from those who wish to possess her, who wish to use her, who regard her people with condescension and a touch of contempt, who believe that they are fit only to serve and not fit for liberty of any sort. Such men can not and will not determine the policy of the United States. They are not of the true American breed or motive.

America will honor herself and prove the validity of her own principles by treating Mexico as she would wish Mexico to treat her.

(4) MEMORANDUM ON THE RIGHT OF AMERICAN CITIZENS TO TRAVEL UPON ARMED MERCHANT SHIPS, TRANSMITTED TO THE COмMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, MARCH 4, 1916

The question to be considered in the present memorandum is whether Americans intending to travel on armed belligerent merchant vessels should be warned by the United States that in doing so they travel at their own risk, and that the United States should so warn its citizens about to embark upon armed belligerent merchant vessels. This raises the question whether or not a neutral citizen and subject can avail himself of a belligerent armed vessel for the transport of his person or goods, the determination of which seems to depend upon the further and the fundamental question whether a belligerent merchant ship may, without violation of law, carry armament to defend itself against attack upon the high seas.

The conclusions to be sustained by this memorandum, and which it is believed are supported by the practice of nations, are that a neutral has the right to transport his person and property upon armed belligerent merchant ships; that the vessels so armed may defend themselves if attacked by the enemy; that, in so doing, they are within their rights under the law of nations as interpreted and applied by the Supreme Court of the United States; and that the neutral does not partake of a belligerent character although he is on board the belligerent merchant vessel, nor does he sacrifice his neutral character nor the neutral quality of his goods, according to the law of nations as interpreted by the Supreme Court of the United States, if the armed belligerent merchant vessel resists attack, unless the neutral actually took part in the hostilities committed under these circumstances by the armed belligerent merchant vessel upon which his person may happen to be.

The memorandum will also endeavor to show that, while the outbreak of war authorizes a belligerent to capture the private property of his enemy upon the high seas, the declaration of war does not operate as a confiscation of the property, but only authorizes the belligerent to use the force necessary to capture the property, and that, according to the law of nations, the formalities hitherto recognized must be complied with-namely, that a merchant vessel of the enemy. before capture must be summoned to surrender, and that upon its surrender, whether after the use of force or an attempt to escape the

capturing vessel, it shall not be sunk or destroyed without first putting in a place of safety the persons on board and, if possible, the property; that the use of an agent or instrumentality such as the submarine that does not and cannot comply with these requirements is not authorized by the law of nations to capture the enemy vessel; that the law ought not to be changed to suit the convenience of the submarine or of the belligerent, but that the agency of the belligerent ought to be changed to meet the requirements of the law; and that the requirements of this law cannot be overcome by an ex parte announcement or warning issued by a belligerent government that it will destroy without warning any merchant vessel of the enemy which the commanding officer of that vessel may, before visit and search, decide to be an armed enemy vessel.

The right of a belligerent vessel to arm is not the result of a sudden decision on the part of a belligerent in order to protect his merchant vessels from capture upon the high seas, but has been for centuries the practice of nations. An armed merchant vessel differs from a privateer, which was a vessel owned by a private personalthough commissioned by a belligerent and, by virtue of its commission, authorized to commit hostilities and to make captures—in that the merchant vessel carries its armament for defensive purposes and is not commissioned by the government whose flag it flies. It is therefore a merchant vessel, having none of the marks of a war vessel, and its arms are for purely defensive purposes, to protect it from capture, a protection it would enjoy without armament if the policy of the United States, extending over a period of a century, were recognized to-day-as it was, in 1785, recognized by Prussia in the treaty of September 10 of that year. It is not, however, necessary to consider this matter in the light of history or in the light of theory, because, in so far as the United States is concerned, the right of an enemy merchant vessel to arm itself for defensive purposes has been solemnly adjudged in the case of the Nereide (9 Cranch 388), decided in 1815, and, upon reconsideration, affirmed three years later in the case of the Atalanta (3 Wheaton 409). The judgment of the court in the first, which is the leading case on the subject, was written and delivered by Chief Justice Marshall, in the course of which he said:

A belligerent has a perfect right to arm in his own defence and a neutral has a perfect right to transport his goods in a belligerent vessel. These rights do not interfere with each other. The neutral has no control over the belligerent right to arm-ought he to be accountable for the exercise of it? By placing neutral property in a belligerent ship, that property, according to the positive rules of law, does