1. To issue a proclamation on your arrival, the principal ideas of which will be indicated to you. 2. To receive with the greatest kindness all Mexicans who may join you. 3. To espouse the quarrel of no party, but to announce that all is provisional until the Mexican nation shall have declared its wishes; to show a great respect for religion, but to reassure at the same time the holders of national property. 4. To supply, pay, and arm, according to your ability, the auxiliary Mexican troops to give them the chief part in combats. 5. To maintain among your troops, as well as among the auxiliaries, the most severe discipline; to repress with vigor every act, every design, which might wound the Mexicans, for their pride of character must not be forgotten, and it is of the first importance to the success of the undertaking to conciliate the good will of the people. When we shall have reached the city of Mexico, it is desirable that you should have an understanding with the notable persons of every shade of opinion who shall have espoused our cause, in order to organize a provisional government. This government will submit to the Mexican people the question of the form of political rule which shall be definitively established. An assembly will be afterward elected in accordance with the Mexican laws. You will aid the new government to introduce into the administration of affairs, and especially into the finances, that regularity of which France offers the best example. To effect this, persons will be sent thither capable of aiding this new organization. The end to be attained is not to impose upon the Mexicans a form of government which will be distasteful to them, but to aid them to establish, in conformity with their wishes, a government which may have some chance of stability, and will assure to France the redress of the wrongs of which she complains. It is not to be denied that if they prefer a monarchy it is in the interest of France to aid them in this path. Persons will not be wanting who will ask you why we propose to spend men and money to establish a regular government in Mexico. In the present state of the world's civilization Europe is not indifferent to the prosperity of America; for it is she which nourishes our industry and gives life to our commerce. It is our interest that the Republic of the United States shall be powerful and prosperous, but it is not at all to our interest that she should grasp the whole Gulf of Mexico, rule thence the Antilles as well as South America, and be the sole dispenser of the products of the New World. We see to-day, by sad experience, how precarious is the fate of an industry which is forced to seek its raw material in a single market, under all the vicissitudes to which that market is subject. If, on the contrary, Mexico preserve its independence, and maintain the integrity of its territory, if a stable government be there established with the aid of France, we shall have restored to the Latin race on the other side of the ocean its force and its prestige; we shall have guaranteed the safety of our and the Spanish colonies in the Antilles. We shall have established our benign influence in the centre of America, and this influence, while creating immense outlets for our commerce, will procure the raw material which is indispensable to our industry. Mexico, thus regenerated, will always be favorable to us, not only from gratitude but also because her interests will be identical with our own, and because she will find support in the good will of European powers. To-day, therefore, our military honor is involved, the demands of our policy, the interest of our industry and our commerce, all impose upon us the duty of marching upon Mexico, there boldly planting our flag, and establishing perhaps a monarchy, if not incompatible with the national sentiment of the country, but at least a government which will promise some stability. NAPOLEON 95. DECREE OF THE ASSEMBLY OF NOTABLES ESTABLISHING A MONARCHY IN MEXICO [July 11, 1863. Senate Documents, 38th Congress, 2d Session, 260.] M. Saligny, personal representative of Napoleon III in Mexico, instructed General Forey on June 16, 1863, to decree the formation of a Superior Junta of Government and an assembly of notables. The latter issued on the same day the famous decree creating the Assembly of Notables and the Executive Power. This was followed on June 18 with the same officer's decree appointing the members of the Superior Junta 1 Senate Documents, 38th Congress, 2d Session, 254-255. 2 Ibid., 255-256. of Government. This body issued a manifesto to the Mexican nation on June 24, 1863.2 The Assembly of Notables met in Mexico City on July 8, 1863. A committee, selected to determine the form of government for Mexico, made its report two days later. On July 11 the main propositions of the committee's report were incorporated in the following decree: The Provisional Supreme Executive Power of the Nation to the inhabitants thereof: Know ye the Assembly of the Notables has thought fit to decree as follows: The Assembly of Notables, in virtue of the decree of the 16 ultimo, that it should make known the form of government which best suited the nation, in use of the full right which the nation has to constitute itself, and as its organ and interpreter, declares, with absolute liberty and independence, as follows: 1. The Mexican nation adopts as its form of government a limited hereditary monarchy, with a Catholic prince. 2. The sovereign shall take the title of Emperor of Mexico. 3. The imperial crown of Mexico is offered to his imperial and royal highness the Prince Frederick Maximilian, Archduke of Austria, for himself and his descendants. 4. If, under circumstances which cannot be foreseen, the Archduke of Austria, Ferdinand Maximilian, should not take possession of the throne which is offered him, the Mexican nation relies on the good-will of his majesty Napoleon III., Emperor of the French, to indicate for it another Catholic prince. Given in the Hall of Sessions, of the Assembly, on the 10th of July, 1863. TEODOSIO LARES, President. ALLEJAMDRO ARANGO Y ESCANDON, Secretary. Therefore let it be printed, published by national edict, and circulated, and let due fulfilment be given thereto. Given in the palace of the Supreme Executive Power of Mexico, on the 11th of July, 1863. JUAN N. ALMONTE 1 Senate Documents, 38th Congress, 2d Session, 256–257. 2 Ibid., 258-259. 96. THE OFFER OF THE MEXICAN CROWN TO MAXIMILIAN [Miramar, October 3, 1863. Senate Documents, 38th Congress, 2d Session, 261-262.] As one of its first acts the regency created by the Assembly of the Notables appointed a commission to lay before the Archduke Maximilian the resolution of the assembly and formally offer him the crown of Mexico. The presidency of the commission was given to Señor José Manuel Gutiérrez de Estrada, a former Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and a man prominent in the political affairs of the country. Gutiérrez addressed the Archduke as follows: Prince: The powerful hand of a generous monarch had hardly restored liberty to the Mexican nation, when he despatched us to your imperial highness, cherishing the sincerest wishes and warmest hopes for our mission. We shall not dwell upon the visitations which Mexico has had to undergo, and which, as they are notorious, have reduced our country to the verge of despair and ruin. There are no means we have not employed, no way we have not tried, to escape a situation full of misery for the present, and foreboding catastrophes for the future. We have long endeavored to extricate ourselves from the fatal and ruinous position into which the country had fallen, on adopting, with credulous inexperience, republican institutions, at variance with its natural arrangements, its customs, and traditions; institutions which, though they resulted in the greatness and prosperity of a neighboring nation, have only become a source of trials and desperate disappointments in our case. Nearly half a century, Prince, has elapsed, carrying with it for Mexico barren tortures and intolerable humiliation, but without deadening the spark of hope and indomitable vitality in our breasts. Full of unshaken confidence in the Ruler of human destinies, we never ceased to look out for a cure of our ever-growing national malady. We may say we awaited its advent true to ourselves. Our faith was not in vain. The ways of Providence have become manifest, opening up a new era, and exciting the admiration of the greatest minds by an unexpected turn of fortune. Once again master of her destinies, Mexico, taught by experience, is at this moment making a last effort to correct her faults. She is changing her institutions, being firmly persuaded that those now selected will be even more salutary than the analogous arrangements which existed at the time she was the colony of a European state. This will be all the more certain if we should be destined to see at our head a Catholic Prince, who, with the high and recognized worth of his character, with the nobility of his feelings, knows how to couple that firmness of will and self-sacrificing devotion which are the inheritance of those only who have been selected by God Almighty, in decisive moments of public danger and social ruin, to save sinking peoples and restore them to a new life. Mexico expects much from the spirit of those institutions which have governed it for three centuries, and which, when they fell, left us a brilliant, but, alas! now spoiled inheritance. The democratic republic endeavored to do away with the traces of former grandeur. But whatever may be our confidence in such institutions, their efficiency will be only perfect when crowned in the person of your imperial highness. A king, the heir of an old monarchy, and representing solid institutions, may render his people happy, even in the absence of distinguished qualities of mind and character; but very different and exceptional qualities are required in a prince who intends to become the founder of a new dynasty and the heir of a republic. believe it from these lips which have never Without you, Prince served the purposes of flattery - without you, all our efforts to save the country will be in vain. Without you will not be realized the generous intentions of a great sovereign, whose sword restored us to liberty and whose powerful arm now supports us in this decisive hour. With you, however, experienced in the difficult art of government, our institutions would become what they ought to be, if the happiness and prosperity of our country are to be guaranteed. With you they would have for their foundation that genuine liberty which is coupled with justice and moderation—not the spurious counterfeit we have become conversant with during half a century's ruinous wars and quarrels. Such institutions, equally as they are in harmony with the spirit of the age, will also become the unshakable corner-stone of our national independence. These sentiments, these hopes, which have been long entertained by all true friends of Mexico, are now in the hearts of all in our country. In Europe, too, whatever sympathies or |