Cases of Moreno and Suaste.

August 5, 1895, two persons named Sears and Mierhaus were shot, the former fatally, at Yreka, California. Two persons named Stemler and Moreno, the latter a Mexican, were arrested and put in jail on the charge of having committed the crime, and both were identified by Mierhaus. On the night of August 26, 1895, both Moreno and Stemler and two other persons, all of whom were charged with murder, were taken from the jail at Yreka by a mob and escorted to the court-house park, where they were hanged. In May, 1896, Mr. Romero, Mexican minister at Washington, asked that the persons concerned in the lynching be punished, and that a suitable indemnity be paid to Moreno's family. The Department of State requested the governor of California to investigate the affair and report the facts. He replied, July 17, 1896, that shortly after the lynching he took steps to have the guilty parties punished, but that the grand jury failed to find an indictment, no clue to the identity of the persons concerned having been discovered. The governor made a later report to the same. effect, in which he declared that he did not think it within the bounds of possibility that any person connected with the affair would ever divulge it. Copies of these reports were furnished to the Mexican Government, which renewed its request for indemnity. In a report to the President, January 14, 1898, Mr. Sherman, as Secretary of State, said: "The case is similar to that of the lynching of the Italian subjects at Hahnville, La., which was brought to the attention of Congress on May 3 and 24, 1897. (See House Doc. No. 37, Fifty-fifth Congress, first session, and Senate Doc. No. 104, same Congress and session.) In this latter case Congress, in the defi ciency appropriation act approved July 19, 1897, appropriated, out of humane consideration and without reference to the question of liability therefor, the sum of $6,000 as full indemnity to the heirs of the three Italian subjects lynched. I have the honor to recommend that the same course be pursued in the case of the lynching of Moreno, and that Congress be requested, without question of the liability of the United States, to appropriate the sum of $2,000 as full indemnity to his heirs."

Message of President McKinley, Jan. 18, 1898, H. Doc. 237, 55 Cong. 2

sess.

By the act of July 7, 1898, Congress appropriated the sum of $2,000 to be paid "out of humane consideration, without reference to the question of liability therefor, to the Mexican Government, as full indemnity to the heirs of Luis Moreno, who was lynched in 1895 at Yreka, California." (30 Stat. 653.)

By the act of March 3, 1901, Congress made an appropriation of the same amount in similar terms to be paid to the Mexican Government as indemnity to the heirs of Florentino Suaste, a Mexican citizen who was lynched in Lasalle County, Texas. (31 Stat. 1010.) With refer

ence to this case, Mr. Hay, Secretary of State, in a report to the President, December 4, 1900, said: The case is similar to that of the lynching of the Mexican citizen Luis Moreno, at Yreka, California, in August 1895." (Message of President McKinley, Dec. 6, 1900, S. Rep. 1832, 56 Cong. 2 sess. 2.)

In a report in favor of the appropriation which was made in the case of Suaste, Mr. Lodge, from the Committee on Foreign Relations, January 9, 1901, said: "While the contention of the Government of the United States has always been in answer to claims of this nature that the only guaranty provided by treaty stipulations is that aliens residing in this country shall have the same protection under the laws and in the courts provided for its own citizens, and while this position has been in every respect tenable and in a strictly legal sense justifiable, yet in almost every instance we have deemed it advisable, as a matter of equity and justice and good policy and out of humane consideration, to pay indemnities and make reparation.” (S. Rept. 1832, 56 Cong. 2 sess.)

7. CASE OF DON PACIFICO.

§ 1028.

Few cases of mob violence are so celebrated as that of the Chevalier Pacifico, commonly called Don Pacifico, a British subject, who suffered injuries at the hands of a mob in Athens in the spring of 1847. This case, not by itself, but in connection with other cases, one of which involved the taking of the property of a British subject by the Greek Government without proper compensation, and another the arrest of a boat belonging to a British man-of-war, formed the subject of reprisals by Great Britain against Greece. The facts in the case of Don Pacifico were that it had for some years been the custom at Athens to burn on Easter day an effigy of Judas Iscariot. In 1847 the Government, in consequence of the presence of Baron C. M. de Rothschild, at Athens, endeavored to prevent the custom from being observed. A report was spread, however, to the effect that this interference with the popular custom was due to the Chevalier Pacifico, who was of the Jewish faith. His house was therefore attacked in the middle of the day by several hundred persons, who, as Sir Edmund Lyons, then British minister at Athens, declared "were aided, instead of being repressed, by soldiers and gendarmes, and who were accompanied and encouraged, if not headed, by persons whose presence naturally induced a belief amongst the soldiers and the mob, that the outrages they were committing would be indulgently treated by the Government." This charge was directly made to the Greek Government, together with a suggestion of compensation, on April 26, 1847. No answer was made to this letter, and on September 14 Sir E. Lyons sent to the minister of foreign affairs, by direction of Lord Palmerston, a demand for redress. The Greek Government took no notice of either of these notes. The names of some of those

who participated in the outrage were given. Some of these persons, one of whom was said to be a son of General Tzavellas, again broke into Don Pacifico's house October 12, 1847.

No reply was made by the Greek Government till December 27, 1847. At length, upon the refusal of the Greek Government to comply with the British demands, reprisals were resorted to.

.

The

Palmerston, in his speech of June 25, 1900, said: "In the middle of the town of Athens M. Pacifico, living in his house, within forty yards of the great street, within a few minutes' walk of a guardhouse, where soldiers were stationed, was attacked by a mob. Fearing injury, when the mob began to assemble, he sent an intimation to the British minister, who immediately informed the authorities. Application was made to the Greek Government for protection. No protection was afforded. The mob, in which were soldiers and gens-d'arms, who, even if officers were not with them, ought, from a sense of duty to have interfered and to have prevented plunder-that mob, headed by the sons of the minister of war, not children of eight or ten years old, but older—that mob, for nearly two hours, employed themselves in gutting the house of an unoffending man, carrying away or destroying every single thing the house contained, and left it a perfect wreck. Greek Government neglected its duty, and did not pursue judicial inquiries, or institute legal prosecutions as it might have done for the purpose of finding out and punishing some of the culprits." Lord Palmerston also argued that Pacifico was not required to proceed at law for individual redress, (1) because the tribunals were "at the mercy of the advisers of the Crown, the judges being liable to be removed, and being often actually removed upon grounds of private interest and personal feeling," and (2) because any attempt to obtain reparation from individuals would be futile. He quoted Pacifico's statement that if the man he prosecuted was rich he would be acquitted, and that if he was a poor man he had nothing with which to make compensation if he was condemned. In fine, Palmerston said: "The Greek Government having neglected to give the protection they were bound to extend, and having abstained from taking means to afford redress, this was a case in which we were justified in calling on the Greek Government for compensation for the losses, whatever they might be, which M. Pacifico had suffered."

Lord Palmerston, as it appears, defended his action in the Pacifico case on three grounds: (1) That there was a neglect to render protection, (2) that no measures were taken to afford redress, and (3) that there were no tribunals in Athens that could be trusted for that purpose.

39 Brit. & For. State Papers, 332; Hansard's Debates, 3d series, CXII. 394. See further, as to the case of Don Pacifico, infra, § 1096.

8. CASE OF U. S. S. BALTIMORE, AND OTHER CASES.

§ 1029.

"The civil war in Chile, which began in January last, was continued, but fortunately with infrequent and not imBaltimore case. portant armed collisions, until August 28, when the Congressional forces landed near Valparaiso and, after a bloody engagement, captured that city. President Balmaceda at once recognized that his cause was lost, and a provisional government was speedily established by the victorious party. Our minister was promptly directed to recognize and put himself in communication with this Government so soon as it should have established its de facto character, which was done. During the pendency of this civil contest frequent indirect appeals were made to this Government to extend belligerent rights to the insurgents and to give audience to their representatives. This was declined, and that policy was pursued throughout, which this Government, when wrenched by civil war, so strenuously insisted upon on the part of European nations. The Itata, an armed vessel commanded by a naval officer of the insurgent fleet, manned by its sailors and with soldiers on board, was seized under process of the United States court at San Diego, California, for a violation of our neutrality laws. While in the custody of an officer of the court the vessel was forcibly wrested from his control and put to sea. It would have been inconsistent with the dignity and self-respect of this Government not to have insisted that the Itata should be returned to San Diego to abide the judgment of the court. This was so clear to the Junta of the Congressional party, established at Iquique, that, before the arrival of the Itata at that port, the secretary of foreign relations of the provisional government addressed to Rear-Admiral Brown, commanding the United States naval forces, a communication, from which the following is an extract:

"The Provisional Government has learned by the cablegrams of the Associated Press that the transport Itata, detained in San Diego by order of the United States for taking on board munitions of war and in possession of the marshal, left the port, carrying on board this official, who was landed at a point near the coast, and then continued her voyage. If this news be correct, this government would deplore the conduct of the Itata, and, as an evidence that it is not disposed to support or agree to the infraction of the laws of the United States, the undersigned takes advantage of the personal relations you have been good enough to maintain with him since your arrival in this port to declare to you that as soon as she is within reach of our orders his government will put the Itata, with

the arms and munitions she took on board in San Diego, at the disposition of the United States.'

"A trial in the district court of the United States for the southern district of California has recently resulted in a decision holding, among other things, that, inasmuch as the Congressional party had not been recognized as a belligerent, the acts done in its interest could not be a violation of our neutrality laws. From this judgment the United States has appealed, not that the condemnation of the vessel is a matter of importance, but that we may know what the present state of our law is; for, if this construction of the statute is correct, there is obvious necessity for revision and amendment. During the progress of the war in Chile this Government tendered its good offices to bring about a peaceful adjustment, and it was at one time hoped that a good result might be reached; but in this we were disappointed.

66

"The instructions to our naval officers and to our minister at Santiago, from the first to the last of this struggle, enjoined upon them the most impartial treatment and absolute noninterference. I am satisfied that these instructions were observed and that our representatives were always watchful to use their influence impartially in the interest of humanity, and, on more than one occasion, did so effectively. We could not forget, however, that this Government was in diplomatic relations with the then established Government of Chile, as it is now in such relations with the successor of that Government. I am quite sure that President Montt, who has, under circumstances of promise for the peace of Chile, been installed as President of that Republic, will not desire that, in the unfortunate event of any revolt against his authority, the policy of this Government should be other than that which we have recently observed. No official complaint of the conduct of our minister or of our naval officers during the struggle has been presented to this Government; and it is a matter of regret that so many of our own people should have given ear to unofficial charges and complaints that manifestly had their origin in rival interests and in a wish to pervert the relations of the United States with Chile.

"The collapse of the government of Balmaceda brought about a condition which is unfortunately too familiar in the history of the Central and South American states. With the overthrow of the Balmaceda government, he and many of his councilors and officers became at once fugitives for their lives and appealed to the commanding officers of the foreign naval vessels in the harbor of Valparaiso and to the resident foreign ministers at Santiago for asylum. This asylum was freely given, according to my information, by the naval vessels of several foreign powers and by several of the legations at Santiago. The American minister, as well as his colleagues,