The Venezuelan boundary controversy

THE VENEZUELAN
OUNDARY CONTROVERSY

GROVER CLEVELAND

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THE VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY
CONTROVERSY

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The Cleveland Memorial Tower

Graduate College

Princeton

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THE VENEZUELAN
BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

BY

GROVER CLEVELAND

w

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
PRINCETON

LONDON : HUMPHREY MILFORD
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

1913

» • * t- '• » •

UNIV. OF CALIiiihttlA
WITHDRAWN

Copyright, 1913, by
Princeton University Press

Published October, 1913

Z33\

PREFATORY NOTE

President Cleveland first visited Princeton at
the time of the Sesquicentennial Celebration
and made the chief address of that occasion on
October 22, 1896. A fev^ months later he
retired from the Presidency and made Prince-
ton his home for the remaining eleven years of
his life. For the last seven of these years he
served as Trustee of Princeton University and
for the closing four years also acted as Chair-
man of the Committee on the Graduate School
having special charge of the project for the
residential Graduate College. He died on June
24, 1908, and w^as buried, as he desired, in
his family plot in Princeton. By express pro-
vision of his v^ill the only monument to mark
his grave v^as to be the simple one v^hich has
already been erected.

Shortly after Mr. Cleveland came to live in
Princeton it was proposed to found a Lecture-
ship on Public Affairs in his honor. In the

iii

iv PREFATORY NOTE

early summer of 1899 Mr. Henry Stafford
Little, an alumnus of the University, endowed
the lectureship and expressed the hope that Mr.
Cleveland would consent to hold it, or at any
rate to be the first incumbent. Mr. Cleveland
was reluctant to undertake any new work at
that time, but on receiving special word from
Mr. Little, who was then critically ill, agreed
to prepare an address for the next year.

On April 9 and 10, 1900, every seat in
Alexander Hall was taken and there were
throngs standing to hear his two addresses on
"The Independence of the Executive." The
next spring he lectured twice on ''The Vene-
zuelan Boundary Question." For the next two
years there were no lectures, and in 1904
Mr. Cleveland read one lecture on ''The
Government in the Chicago Strike." He
always had crowded audiences, both for him-
self and the grave importance of the questions
he treated. He was heard with the closest
attention and repeatedly welcomed with affec-
tionate enthusiasm.

Seventeen years ago to the day since Mr.
Cleveland first spoke in Princeton, his Prince-

PREFATORY NOTE v

ton lectures are now republished in expanded
form on the day of the dedication of the
Graduate College he so strongly supported and
did not live to see realized, and also the dedi-
cation day of the Cleveland Memorial Tower,
erected by national subscription and built into
the Graduate College for which he labored.

The lectures here reprinted are disclosures
of the meaning of important happenings in our
national history. They are even more; for
they make clear as light that plain, strict, un-
swerving and unaffected honesty which was
the vigorous central power in Grover Cleve-
land's life. It is well his words should be
heard again at the time we gather to dedicate
his national monument.

Andrew F. West.

The Graduate College

Princeton University

October 22, 191 3

* , . • • * •

THE VENEZUELAN BOUNDARY
CONTROVERSY

I

There is no better illustration of the truth
that nations and individuals are affected in the
same manner by like causes than is often fur-
nished by the beginning, progress, and results
of a national boundary dispute. We all knovsr
that among individuals, when neighbors have
entered upon a quarrel concerning their divi-
sion-line or the location of a line fence, they
will litigate until all account of cost and all
regard for the merits of the contention give
place to a ruthless and all-dominating deter-
mination, by fair means or foul, to win; and
if fisticuffs and forcible possession are resorted
to, the big, strong neighbor rejoices in his
strength as he mauls and disfigures his small
and weak antagonist.

It will be found that nations behave in like
fashion. One or the other of two national

Cl.« 1... > , •«

2 THE VENEZUELAN

neighbors claims that their dividing-Hne should
be defined or rectified in a certain manner. If
this is questioned, a season of diplomatic un-
truthfulness and finesse sometimes intervenes
for the sake of appearances. Developments
soon follow, however, that expose a grim de-
termination behind fine phrases of diplomacy;
and in the end the weaker nation frequently
awakens to the fact that it must either accede
to an ultimatum dictated by its stronger ad-
versary, or look in the face of war and a spolia-
tion of its territory; and if such a stage is
reached, superior strength and fighting ability,
instead of suggesting magnanimity, are grasp-
ingly used to enforce extreme demands if not
to consummate extensive conquest or complete
subjugation.

I propose to call attention to one of these un-
happy national boundary disputes, between the
kingdom of Great Britain and the South
American republic of Venezuela, involving the
boundary-line separating Venezuela from the
English colony of British Guiana, which ad-
joins Venezuela on the east.

Venezuela, once a Spanish possession, de-
clared her independence in i8io, and a few

\/

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 3

years afterward united with two other of
Spain's revolted colonies in forming the old
Colombian federal union, which was recog-
nized by the United States in 1822. In 1836
this union was dissolved and Venezuela became
again a separate and independent republic, be-
ing promptly recognized as such by our Gov-
ernment and by other powers. Spain, however,
halted in her recognition until 1845, when she
quite superfluously ceded to Venezuela by
treaty the territory which as an independent
republic she had actually owned and possessed
since 1810. But neither in this treaty nor in~l
any other mention of the area of the republic
were its boundaries described with more defi-
niteness than as being "the same as those which
marked the ancient viceroyalty and captaincy-
general of New Granada and Venezuela in the
year 1810." T^

England derived title to the colony of
Guiana from Holland in 18 14, by a treaty in
which the territory was described as "the Cape
of Good Hope and the establishments of De-
merara, Essequibo, and Berbice." No botin-
daries of those settlements or "establishments"
were given in the treaty, nor does it appear that .

y

4 THE VENEZUELAN

any such boundaries had ever been particularly
defined.

It is quite apparent that the limits of these
adjoining countries thus lacking any mention
of definite metes and bounds, were in need of
extraneous assistance before they could be ex-
actly fixed, and that their proper location was
quite likely to lead to serious disagreement.
In such circumstances threatening complica-
tions can frequently be avoided if the adjoin-
ing neighbors agree upon a divisional line
promptly, and before their demands are stimu-
lated and their tenacity increased by a real or
fancied advance in the value of the possessions
to be divided, or other incidents have intervened
to render it more difificult to make concessions.

I shall not attempt to sketch the facts and
arguments that bear upon the exact merits
of this boundary controversy between Great
Britain and Venezuela. They have been thor-
oughly examined by an arbitral tribunal to
which the entire difficulty was referred, and by
whose determination the boundary between the
two countries has been fixed — perhaps in strict
accord with justice, but at all events finally and
irrevocably. Inasmuch, however, as our own

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 5

country became in a sense involved in the con-
troversy, or at least deeply concerned in its
settlement, I have thought there might be in-
terest in an explanation of the manner and the
processes by which the interposition of the ./
United States Government v^as brought about.
I must not be expected to exclude from men-
tion every circumstance that may relate to the
merits of the dispute as between the parties
primarily concerned; but so far as I make U3e
of such circumstances I intend to do so only
in aid and simplification of the explanation I
have undertaken.

This dispute began in 1841. On October 5
of that year the Venezuelan minister to Great
Britain, in a note to Lord Aberdeen, Princi-
pal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,
after reminding the secretary that a proposal
made by Venezuela on the 28th of January,
1 841, for joint action in the matter of fixing a
divisional boundary, still awaited the accept-
ance of Great Britain, wrote as follows :

The Honorable Earl of Aberdeen may now
judge of the surprise of the Government of Ven-
ezuela upon learning that in the territory of the

6 THE VENEZUELAN

Republic a sentry-box has been erected upon which
the British flag has been raised. The Venezuelan
Government is in ignorance of the origin and
purport of these proceedings, and hopes that they
may receive some satisfactory explanation of this
action. In the meantime the undersigned, in
compliance with the instructions communicated to
him, urges upon the Honorable Earl of Aberdeen
the necessity of entering into a treaty of boun-
daries as a previous step to the fixation of limits,
and begs to ask for an answer to the above-
mentioned communication of January 28.

Lord Aberdeen, in his reply, dated October
21, 1 841, makes the following statement:

Her Majesty's Government has received from
the Governor of British Guiana, Mr. Schom-
burgk's report of his proceedings in execution of
the commission with which he has been charged.
That report states that Mr. Schomburgk set out
from Demerara in April last and was on his re-
turn to the Essequibo River at the end of June.
It appears that Mr. Schomburgk planted boun-
dary posts at certain points of the country which
he has surveyed, and that he was fully aware that
the demarcation so made was merely a prelimin-

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 7

ary measure, open to further discussion between
the Governments of Great Britain and Venezuela.
But it does not appear that Mr. Schomburgk left
behind him any guard-house, sentry-box, or other
building having the British flag.

With respect to the proposal of the Venezuelan
Government that the Governments of Great
Britain and Venezuela should conclude a treaty
as a preliminary step to the demarcation of the
boundaries between British Guiana and Vene-
zuela, the undersigned begs leave to observe that
it appears to him that if it should be necessary to
make a treaty upon the subject of the boundaries
in question, such a measure should follow rather
than precede the operation of the survey.

In a communication dated the i8th of No-
vember, 1 841, the Venezuelan minister, after
again complaining of the acts of Schomburgk
and alleging that he "has planted at a point on
the mouth of the Orinoco several posts bearing
Her Majesty's initials, and raised at the same
place, with a show of armed forces, the British
flag, and also performed several other acts of
dominion and government," refers to the great
dissatisfaction aroused in Venezuela by what
he calls "this undeserved offense," and adds:

8 THE VENEZUELAN

*'The undersigned therefore has no doubts but
that he will obtain from Her Majesty's Gov-
ernment a reparation for the wrong done to
the dignity of the Republic, and that those
signs which have so unpleasantly shaken public
confidence will be ordered removed."

No early response having been made to this
communication, another was addressed to Lord
Aberdeen, dated December 8, 1841, in which
the representative of Venezuela refers to his
previous unanswered note and to a recent order
received from his government, which he says
directs him "to insist not only upon the con-
clusion of a treaty fixing the boundaries be-
tween Venezuela and British Guiana, but also,
and this very particularly, to insist upon the
removal of the signs set up, contrary to all
rights, by the surveyor R. H. Schomburgk in
Barima and in other points of the Venezuelan
territory"; and he continues: "In his afore-
mentioned communication of the i8th of last
month, the undersigned has already informed
the Honorable Earl of Aberdeen of the dis-
satisfaction prevailing among the Venezuelans
on this account, and now adds that this dis-
satisfaction, far from diminishing, grows

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 9

stronger — as is but natural — as time goes on
and no reparation of the wrongs is made."

These two notes of the Venezuelan minister
were answered on the eleventh day of Decem-
ber, 1 84 1. In his reply Lord Aberdeen says:

The undersigned begs leave to refer to his note
of the 2 1st of October last, in which he explained
that the proceeding of Mr. Schomburgk in plant-
ing boundary posts at certain points of the
country which he has surveyed was merely a
preliminary measure open to future discussion
between the two Governments, and that it would
be premature to make a boundary treaty before
the survey will be completed. The undersigned
has only further to state that much unnecessary
inconvenience would result from the removal of
the posts fixed by Mr. Schomburgk, as they will
afford the only tangible means by which Her
Majesty's Government can be prepared to discuss
the question of the boundaries with the Govern-
ment of Venezuela. These posts were erected
for that express purpose, and not, as the Ven-
ezuelan Government appears to apprehend, as
indications of dominion and empire on the part
of Great Britain.

10 THE VENEZUELAN

In a reply to this note, after referring to the
explanation of the purpose of these posts or
signs which Lord Aberdeen had given, it was
said, in further urging their removal : "The
undersigned regrets to be obliged to again in-
sist upon this point ; but the damages sustained
by Venezuela on account of the permanence
of said signs are so serious that he hopes in
view of those facts that the trouble resulting
from their removal may not appear useless."
The minister followed this insistence with such
earnest argument that on the thirty-first day of
January, 1842, nearly four months after the
matter was first agitated, Lord Aberdeen in-
formed the Venezuelan minister that instruc-
tions would be sent to the governor of British
Guiana directing him to remove the posts
which had been placed by Mr. Schomburgk
near the Orinoco. He, however, accompanied
this assurance with the distinct declaration
"that although, in order to put an end to the
misapprehension which appears to prevail in
Venezuela with regard to the object of Mr.
Schomburgk's survey, the undersigned has
consented to comply with the renewed repre-
sentation of the Minister upon this affair, Her

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY n

Majesty's Government must not be understood
to abandon any portion of the rights of Great
Britain over the territory which was formerly
held by the Dutch in Guiana." ^

It should be here stated that the work which
Schomburgk performed at the instance of the
British Government consisted not only in plac-
ing monuments of some sort at the mouth of
the Orinoco River, upon territory claimed by
Venezuela, but also in locating from such
monuments a complete dividing-line running
far inland and annexing to British Guiana on
the west a large region which Venezuela also
claimed. XhisJiae, as originally located or as
afterward still further extended to the west, ^
came to be called ''the_Scliomburgk line." ^

The Orinoco River, flowing eastward to the
sea, is a very broad and deep waterway, which,
with its affluents, would in any event, and how-
ever the bounds of Venezuela might be limited,
traverse a very extensive portion of that coun-
try's area; and its control and free navigation
are immensely important factors in the prog-
ress and prosperity of the republic. Substan-
tially at the mouth of the Orinoco, and on its
south side, two quite large rivers, the Barima

/

V

12 THE VENEZUELAN

and the Amaciiro, flow into the sea. The re-
gion adjacent to the mouth of those rivers has,
sometimes at least, been called Barima; and it
was here that the posts or signs complained of
by Venezuela were placed.

The coast from the mouth of the Orinoco
River slopes or drops to the east and south;
and some distance from that river's mouth, in
the directions mentioned, the Essequibo, a
large river flowing for a long distance from
the south, empties into the sea.
/ After the correspondence I have mentioned,
which resulted in the removal of the so-called
initial monuments of the Schomburgk line from
the Barima region, there seems to have been
less activity in the boundary discussion until
January 31, 1844, when the Venezuelan min-
ister to England again addressed Lord Aber-
deen on the subject. He referred to the
erection of the Schomburgk monuments and the
complaints of Venezuela on that account, and
stated that since the removal of those monu-
ments he had not ceased to urge Lord Aber-
deen "to commence without delay negotiations
for a treaty fixing definitely the boundary-line
that shall divide the two countries." He adds

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 13

the following very sensible statement: "Al-
though it was undoubtedly the duty of the one
who promoted this question to take the first
step toward the negotiation of the treaty, the
undersigned being well aware that other im-
portant matters claim the attention of Her
Majesty's Government, and as he ought not to
wait indefinitely, hastens to propose an agree-
ment which, if left for a later date, may be
difficult to conclude." It is disappointing to
observe that the good sense exhibited in this
statement did not hold out to the end of the
minister's communication. After a labored
presentation of historical incidents, beginning
with the discovery of the American continent,
he concludes by putting forward the Essequibo
River as the proper boundary-line between the
two countries. This was a proposition of such
extreme pretensions that the Venezuelan rep-
resentative knew% or ought to have known, it
would not be considered for a moment by the
Government of Great Britain; and it seems to
me that a diplomatic error was made when,
failing to apprehend the fact that the exigen-
cies of the situation called for a show of con-
cession, the Venezuelan minister, instead of

14

THE VENEZUELAN

intimating a disposition to negotiate, gave
Great Britain an opportunity to be first in mak-
ing proposals apparently calculated to meet
the needs of conciliation and compromise.

Thus two months after the receipt of this
communication, — on the thirtieth day of
March, 1844, — ^Lord Aberdeen sent his reply.
After combating the allegations contained in
the letter of the Venezuelan representative, he
remarked that if he were inclined to act upon
the spirit of that letter, it was evident that he
ought to claim on behalf of Great Britain, as
the rightful successor to Holland, all the coast
from the Orinoco to the Essequibo. Then fol-
lows this significant declaration:

*

But the undersigned believes that the nego-
tiations would not be free from difficulties if
claims that cannot be sustained are presented, and
shall not therefore follow Sefior Fortique's ex-
ample, but state here the concessions that Great
Britain is disposed to make of her rights,
prompted by a friendly consideration for Ven-
ezuela and by her desire to avoid all cause of
serious controversies between the two countries.
Being convinced that the most important object

J

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 15

for the interests of Venezuela is the exclusive
possession of the Orinoco, Her Majesty's Gov-
ernment is ready to yield to the Republic of
Venezuela a portion of the coast sufficient to in-
sure her the free control of the mouth of this her
principal river, and to prevent its being under
the control of any foreign power.

Lord Aberdeen further declared that, "with
this end in view, and being persuaded that a
concession of the greatest importance has been
made to Venezuela," he would consent on be-
half of Great Britain to a boundary which he
particularly defined, and in general terms may
be described as beginning in the mouth of the
Moroco River, which is on the coast southeast
of the mouth of the Orinoco River and about
two thirds of the distance between that point
and the Essequibo River, said boundary run-
ning inland from that point until it included
in its course considerably more territory than
was embraced within the original Schomburgk
line, though it excluded the region embraced
within that line adjacent to the Barima and
Amacuro rivers and the mouth of the Orinoco.

This boundary, as proposed by Lord Aber-

l6 THE VENEZUELAN

deen, was not satisfactory to Venezuela; and
soon after its submission her diplomatic repre-
sentative died. This interruption was quickly
followed by a long period of distressing inter-
nal strifes and revolutions, which so distracted
and disturbed her government that for more
than thirty years she was not in condition to
renew negotiations for an adjustment of her
territorial limits.

During all this time Great Britain seemed
not especially unwilling to allow these negotia-
tions to remain in abeyance.

This interval was not, however, entirely de-
_ void of boundary incidents. In 1850 great ex-

_^ citement and indignation were aroused among

the Venezuelans by a rumor that Great Britain
intended to take possession of Venezuelan Gui-
ana, a province adjoining British Guiana on
the west, and a part of the territory claimed by
Venezuela ; and the feeling thus engendered be-
came so extreme, both among the people and
on the part of the government of the republic,
that all remaining friendliness between the
two countries was seriously menaced. Demon-
strations indicating that Venezuela was de-
termined to repel the rumored movement as an

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

17

invasion of her rights, were met by instructions
given by Great Britain to the commander of
her Majesty's naval forces in the West Indies
as to the course he was to pursue if the Ven-
ezuelan forces should construct fortifications
within the territory in dispute. At the same
time, Mr. Balford Hinton Wilson, England's
representative at Caracas, in a note addressed
to the Minister of Foreign Affairs for Vene-
zuela, indignantly characterized these disquiet-
ing rumors of Great Britain's intention to
occupy the lands mentioned, as mischievous,
and maliciously false ; but he also declared that,
on the other hand, her Majesty's Government
would not see with indifference the aggressions
of Venezuela upon the disputed territory.

This note contained, in addition, a rather im-
pressive pronouncement in these words :

The Venezuelan Government, in justice to
Great Britain, cannot mistrust for a moment the
sincerity of the formal declaration, which is now
made in the name and by the express order of
Her Majesty's Government, that Great Britain has
no intention to occupy or encroach upon the terri-
tory in dispute ; therefore the Venezuelan Gov-

l8 THE VENEZUELAN

ernment, in an equal spirit of good faith and
friendship, cannot refuse to make a similar
declaration to Her Majesty's Government,
namely, that Venezuela herself has no intention to
occupy or encroach upon the territory in dispute.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs for Vene-
zuela responded to this communication in the
following terms :

The undersigned has been instructed by His
Excellency the President of the Republic to give
the following answer: The Government never
could be persuaded that Great Britain, in con-
tempt of the negotiation opened on the subject
and the alleged rights in the question of limits
pending between the two countries, would want
to use force in order to occupy the land that each
side claims — much less after Mr. Wilson's re-
peated assurance, which the Executive Power
believes to have been most sincere, that those
imputations had no foundation whatever, being,
on the contrary, quite the reverse of the truth.
Fully confident of this, and fortified by the pro-
test embodied in the note referred to, the Gov-
ernment has no difficulty in declaring, as they
do declare, that Venezuela has no intention of

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

19

occupying or encroaching upon any portion of
the territory the possession of which is in con-
troversy; neither will she look with indifference
on a contrary proceeding on the part of Great
Britain.

In furtherance of these declarations the
English Government stipulated that it v^ould
not ''order or sanction such occupations or en-
croachments on the part of the British authori-
ties"; and Venezuela agreed on her part to
"instruct the authorities of Venezuelan Guiana
to refrain from taking any step which might
clash with the engagement hereby made by the
Government."

I suspect there was some justification on
each side for the accusations afterward inter-
changed between the parties that this under-
standing or agreement, in its strict letter and
spirit, had not been scrupulously observed.

As we now pass from this incident to a date
more than twenty-five years afterward, when
attempts to negotiate for a settlement of the
boundary controversy were resumed, it may be
profitable, before going further, to glance at
some of the conditions existing at the time of
such resumption.

II

In 1876 — thirty-two years after the discon-
tinuance of efforts on the part of Great Britain
and Venezuela to fix by agreement a Hne which
should divide their possessions — Venezuela
was confronted, upon the renewal of nego-
tiations for that purpose, by the following
conditions :

The claim by her, of a divisional line,
founded upon her conception of strict right,
which her powerful opponent had insisted
could not in any way be plausibly supported,
and which therefore she would in no event
accept.

An indefiniteness in the limits claimed by
Great Britain — so great that, of two boundary-
lines indicated or suggested by her, one had
been plainly declared to be "merely a prelim-
inary measure open to future discussion be-
tween the Governments of Great Britain and
Venezuela," while the other was distinctly
claimed to be based not on any acknowledg-

20

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 21

ment of the republic's rights, but simply upon
generous concessions and a ''desire to avoid all
cause of serious controversies between the two
countries."

A controversy growing out of this situation
impossible of friendly settlement except by
such arrangement and accommodation as
would satisfy Great Britain, or by a submission
of the dispute to arbitration.

A constant danger of such an extension of
British settlements in the disputed territory as
would necessarily complicate the situation and
furnish a convenient pretext for the refusal of
any concession respecting the lands containing
such settlements.

A continual profession on the part of Great
Britain of her present readiness to make benev-
olent concessions and of her willingness to co-
operate in a speedy adjustment, while at the
same time neither reducing her pretensions, nor
attempting in a conspicuous manner to hasten
negotiations to a conclusion.

A tremendous disparity in power and
strength between Venezuela and her adversary,
which gave her no hope of defending her terri-
tory or preventing its annexation to the pos-

/

22 THE VENEZUELAN

sessions of Great Britain in case the extremity
of force or war was reached.

The renewed negotiations began with a com-
munication dated November 14, 1876, ad-
dressed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs for
Venezuela to Lord Derby, then Great Britain's
principal Secretary of State. In this communi-
cation the efforts made between the years 1841
and 1844 to establish by agreement a divisional
line between the two countries, and their inter-
ruption, were referred to, and the earnest de-
sire was expressed that negotiations for that
purpose might at once be resumed. The minis-
ter suggested no other line than the Essequibo
River, but in conclusion declared that the Pres-
ident of Venezuela was led to "hope that the
solution of this question, already for so many
years delayed, will be a work of very speedy
and cordial agreement."

On the same day that this note was written
to Lord Derby, one was also written by the
same Venezuelan official to Mr. Fish, then our
Secretary of State. After speaking of the
United States as "the most powerful and the
oldest of the Republics of the new continent,
and called on to lend to others its powerful

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

23

/

moral support in disputes with European na-
tions," the minister directs attention to the
boundary controversy between Venezuela and
Great Britain and the great necessity of bring-
ing it to a speedy termination. He concludes
as follows : ''But whatever may be the result
of the new steps of the Government, it has de-
sired that the American Government might at
once take cognizance of them, convinced, as it
is, that it will give the subject its kind consider-
ation and take an interest in having due jus-
tice done to Venezuela." A memorandum was
inclosed with the note, setting forth the claims
of Venezuela touching the boundary location.

This appears to be the first communication
addressed to our Government on the subject of
a controversy in which we afterward became
very seriously concerned.

A short time after the date of these com-
munications, a Venezuelan envoy to Great
Britain was appointed; and, on the thirteenth
day of February, 1877, he addressed to Lord
Derby a note in which, after asserting the right
of Venezuela to insist upon the boundary pre-
viously claimed by her, he declared the will-
ingness of his government "to settle this

24 THE VENEZUELAN

long-pending question in the most amicable
manner," and suggested either the acceptance
of a boundary-line such as would result from
a presentation by both parties of Spanish and
Dutch titles, maps, documents, and proofs ex-
isting before the advent in South America of
either Venezuela or British Guiana, or the
adoption of ''a conventional line fixed by
mutual accord between the Governments of
Venezuela and Great Britain after a careful
and friendly consideration of the case, keeping
in view the documents presented by both sides,
solely with the object of reconciling their mu-
tual interests, and to fix a boundary as equit-
able as possible." The suggestion is made that
the adoption of a divisional line is important
"to prevent the occurrence of serious differ-
ences in the future, particularly as Guiana is
attracting the general attention of the world on
account of the immense riches which are daily
being discovered there."

Let us here note that this renewal by Vene-
zuela of her efforts to settle her boundary-line
was accompanied by two new features. These,
though in themselves entirely independent, be-
came so related to each other, and in their

J

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 25

subsequent combination and development they
so imperiously affected our Government, that
their coincident appearance at this particular
stage of the controversy may v^ell strike us as
significant. One of these features was the
abandonment by Venezuela of her insistence 1^
upon a line r^presenfirig her extreme claims, f\\
and which England would~nor~irrahy contih-
gency accept, thus clearing the field for possi-
ble arbitration ; and the other was her earnest
appeal to us for our friendly aid. Neither
should we fail to notice the new and important
reference of the Venezuelan envoy to the im-
mense riches being discovered in the disputed
territory. Gold beneath soil in controversy
does not always hasten the adjustment of un-
certain or disputed boundary-lines.

On the twenty-fourth day of March, 1877, ^
Lord Derby informe3~~the Venezuelan envoy
that the governor of British Guiana was shortly
expected in London, and that he was anxious
to await his arrival before taking any steps in
the boundary discussion. ^

After waiting for more than two years for a
further answer from the English Government,
the Venezuelan representative in London, on

i

20 THE VENEZUELAN

the 19th of May, 1879, addressed a note on the
subject to Lord Salisbury, who, in the mean-
time, had succeeded Lord Derby. In this note
reference was made to the communication sent
to Lord Derby in 1877, to the desire expressed
by him to await the arrival of the governor of
British Guiana before making reply, and to the
fact that the communication mentioned still
remained unanswered ; and on behalf of Vene-
zuela her representative repeated the alterna-
tive proposition made by him in February,
1877, in these words: "The boundary treaty
may be based either on the acceptance of the
line of strict right as shown by the records,
documents, and other authoritative proofs
which each party may exhibit, or on the ac-
ceptance at once by both Governments of a
frontier of accommodation which shall satisfy
the respective interests of the two countries";
X and he concluded his note as follows:

^ If Her Britannic Majesty's Government should
[ prefer the frontier of accommodation or con-
venience, then it would be desirable that it should
vouchsafe to make a proposition of an arrange-
ment, on the understanding that, in order to

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

27

I

obviate future difficulties and to give Great
Britain the fullest proof of the consideration and
friendship which Venezeula professes for her,
my Government would not hesitate to accept a
demarcation that should satisfy as far as possible
the interests of the Republic. •

At all events, my Lord, something will have to
be done to prevent this question from pending
any longer.

Thirty-eight years ago my Government wrote
urging Her Majesty's Government to have the
Boundary Treaty concluded, and now this affair
is in the same position as in 1841, without any
settlement; meanwhile Guiana has become of
more importance than it was then, by reason of
the large deposits of gold which have been and
still are met with in that region. ■ I

Now, at the date of this communication\
England's most extreme claims were indicated
either by the Schomburgk line or by the line
which Lord Aberdeen suggested in 1844 as a
concession. These were indeed the only lines
which Great Britain had thus far presented.
When in such circumstances, and with these
lines distinctly in mind, the envoy of Vene-
zuela offered to abandon for his country her

/

28 THE VENEZUELAN

most extreme claims, and asked that Great
Britain should 'Vouchsafe to make a proposi-
tion of an arrangement" upon the basis of a
''frontier of accommodation or convenience,"
what answer had he a right to expect? Most
assuredly he had a right to expect that if
Great Britain should prefer to proceed upon
the theory of "accommodation or convenience,"
she would respond by offering such a reduc-
tion of the claims she had already made as
would indicate a degree of concession or
"accommodation" on her part that should en-
title her to expect similar concession from
Venezuela.

What was the answer actually made ? After
a delay of nearly eight months, on the tenth
day of January, 1880, Lord Salisbury replied
that her Majesty's Government were of the
opinion that to argue the matter on the ground
of strict right would involve so many intricate
questions that it would be very unlikely to lead
to a satisfactory solution of the question, and
they would therefore prefer the alternative "of
endeavoring to come to an agreement as to the
acceptance by the two Governments of a fron-
tier of accommodation which shall satisfy the

/

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 29

respective interests of the two countries." He
then gives a most startHng statement of
the Enghsh Government's claim, by specifying
boundaries which overlap the Schomburgk line
and every other line that had been thought of
or dreamed of before, declaring that such
claim is justified ''by virtue of ancient treaties
with the aboriginal tribes and of subsequent
cessions from Holland." He sets against this
claim, or ''on the other hand," as he says, the
fact that the President of Venezuela, in a mes-
sage dated February 20, 1877, "put forward a
claim on the part of Venezuela to the river
Essequibo as the boundary to which the Re-
public was entitled" — thereby giving prejudi-
cial importance to a claim of boundary made
by the President of Venezuela three years be-
fore, notwithstanding his Lordship was ans-
wering a communication in which Venezuela's
present diplomatic representative distinctly
proposed "a frontier of accommodation." His
declaration, therefore, that the boundary which
was thus put forward by the President of
Venezuela would involve "the surrender of a
province now inhabited by forty thousand
British subjects," seems quite irrelevant, be-

/

THE VENEZUELAN

tise such a boundary was not then under
consideration; and in passing it may occur to
us that the great delay in settling the boun-
daries between the two countries had given
abundant opportunity for such inhabitation as
Lord Salisbury suggests. His Lordship hav-
ing thus built up a contention in which he puts
on one side a line which for the sake of pacific
accommodation Venezuela no longer proposes
to insist upon, and on the other a line for
Great Britain so grotesquely extreme as to ap-
pear fanciful, soberly observes :

The difference, therefore, between these two
claims is so great that it is clear that, in order to
arrive at a satisfactory arrangement, each party
must be prepared to make considerable conces-
sions to the other ; and although the claim of Ven-
ezuela to the Essequibo River boundary could
not under any circumstances be entertained, I
beg leave to assure you that Her Majesty's Gov-
ernment are anxious to meet the Venezuelan
Government in a spirit of conciliation, and would
be willing, in the event of a renewal of negotia-
tions for a general settlement of boundaries, to
waive a portion of what they consider to be their

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 31

strict right, if Venezuela is really disposed to
make corresponding concessions on her part.

And ignoring entirely the humbly respectful
request of the Venezuelan minister that Great
Britain would "vouchsafe to make a proposi-
tion of an arrangement," his Lordship thus
concludes his communication : ''Her Majesty's
Government will therefore be glad to receive,
and will undertake to consider in the most
friendly spirit, any proposal that the Venezue- /
Ian Government may think fit to make for the
establishment of a boundary satisfactory to
both nations."

This is diplomacy — of a certain sort. It is a
deep and mysterious science; and we probably
cannot do better than to confess our inability
to understand its intricacies and sinuosities;
but at this point we can hardly keep out of
mind the methods of the shrewd, sharp trader
who demands exorbitant terms, and at the same
time invites negotiation, looking for a result
abundantly profitable in the large range for
dicker which he has created.

An answer was made to Lord Salisbury's
note on the twelfth day of April, 1880, in

32 THE VENEZUELAN

y which the Venezuelan envoy stated in direct
terms that he had received specific instructions
from his government for the arrangement of
the difficulty, by abandoning the ground of
strict right and ''concurring in the adoption for
both countries of a frontier mutually conven-
ient, and reconciling in the best possible
manner their respective interests — each party
having to make concessions to the other for the
purpose of attaining such an important result."
It will be remembered that in 1844, when
this boundary question was under discussion,
Lord Aberdeen proposed a line beginning in
the mouth of the Moroco River, being a point
on the coast south and east of the mouth of the
Orinoco, thus giving to Venezuela the control
of that river, but running inland in such a man-
ner as to include, in the whole, little if any
less area than that included in the Schomburgk
line; and it will also be recalled that this line
was not then acceptable to Venezuela. It ap-
pears, however, that the delays and incidents
of thirty-six years had impressed upon the
government of the republic the serious disad-
vantages of her situation in contention with

L Great Britain ; for we find in this reply of the

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 33

Venezuelan envoy the inquiry ''whether Her
Britannic Majesty's Government is disposed
now, as it was in 1844, to accept the mouth of
the river Moroco as the frontier at the coast."
To this Lord SaHsbury promptly responded
that the attorney-general for the colony of
British Guiana was shortly expected in Eng-
land, and that her Majesty's Government
would prefer to postpone the boundary dis- ,
cussion until his arrival. ' v

This was followed by a silence of five
months, with no word or sign from England's
Foreign Office; and in the meantime Earl
Granville had succeeded Lord Salisbury as
Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Af-
ter waiting thus long, the representative of
Venezuela, on the 23d of September, 1880, re-
minded Lord Granville that in the preceding
April his immediate predecessor had informed
him that the arrival of the attorney-general of
British Guiana was awaited before deciding
the question of boundaries between the two
Guianas; and as he had not, after the lapse of
five months, been honored with a communica-
tion on the subject, he was bound to suppose
that the attorney-general had not accomplished

^y

\

34

THE VENEZUELAN

his voyage, in which case it was useless longer
to wait for him. He further reminded his
Lordship that on the 24th of March, 1877,
Lord Derby, then in charge of British foreign
affairs, also desired to postpone the consider-
ation of the question until the arrival in Lon-
don of the governor of British Guiana, who
was then expected, but who apparently never
came. He then proceeds as follows :

\j/ Consequently it is best not to go on waiting
either for the Governor or for the Attorney-
General of the Colony, but to decide these ques-
tions ourselves, considering that my Government
is now engaged in preparing the official map of
the Republic and wishes of course to mark out
the boundaries on the East.

In my despatch of the 12th of April last, I in-
formed your Excellency [Excellency's predeces-
sor?] that as a basis of a friendly demarcation my
Government was disposed to accept the mouth of
the River Moroco as the frontier on the coast.
If Her Britannic Majesty's Government should
accept this point of departure, it would be very
easy to determine the general course of the fron-
tier, either by means of notes or in verbal con-
ferences, as your Excellency might prefer.

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 35

On the twelfth day of February, 1881, Lord
Granville, replying to Venezuela's two notes
dated April 12 and September 23, 1880, in-
formed her representative, without explanation,
that her Majesty's Government would not ac-
cept the mouth of the Moroco as the divisional
boundary on the coast.

A few days afterward, in an answer to this ^
refusal, Venezuela's representative mentioned
the extreme claims of the two countries and
the fact that it had been agreed between the
parties that steps should be taken to settle upon
a frontier of accommodation ; that in pursuance
thereof he had proposed as the point of depar-
ture for such a frontier the mouth of the
Moroco River, which was in agreement thus
far with the proposition made by Lord Aber-
deen on behalf of Great Britain in 1844; and
pertinently added: "Thus thirty-seven years
ago Her Britannic Majesty's Government
spontaneously proposed the mouth of the Mo-
roco River as the limit on the coast, a limit
which your Excellency does not accept now,
for you are pleased to tell me so in the note
which I have the honor of answering." He
thereupon suggests another boundary, begin-

/

36 THE VENEZUELAN

ning on the coast at a point one mile north of
the mouth of the Moroco River and thence ex-
tending inland in such manner as to constitute
a large concession on the part of Venezuela,
but falling very far short of meeting the
claims of Great Britain. He declares, how-
ever, that this demarcation ''is the maximum
of all concessions which in this matter the
Government of Venezuela can grant by way
of friendly arrangement."
5J{ Apparently anticipating, as he well might,

that the boundary he proposed would fail of
acceptance, he suggests that in such case the
two governments would have no alternative but
to determine the frontier by strict right, and
that on this basis they would find it impossible
to arrive at an agreement. Therefore he de-
clares that he has received instructions from
his government to urge upon Great Britain the
submission of the question to an arbitrator, to
be chosen by both parties, to whose award both
qf!,;> governments should submit.

In this proposal of arbitration by Venezuela
we find an approach to a new phase of the
controversy. At first, the two countries had
stood at arm's-length, each asserting strict

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

37

right of boundary, only to be met by obstinate
and unyielding resistance. Next, the field of
mutual concession and accommodation had /
been traversed, with no result except dama-
ging and dangerous delay. And now, after
forty years of delusive hope, the time seemed
at hand when the feebler contestant must con-
template ignominious submission to dictatorial •
exaction, or forcible resistance, futile and dis-
tressing, unless honorable rest and justice
could be found in arbitration — the refuge
which civilization has builded among the na-
tions of the earth for the protection of the \
weak against the strong, and the citadel
from which the ministries of peace issue
their decrees against the havoc and barbarism
of war.

The reply of Lord Granville to the com-
munication of the envoy of Venezuela pro-
posing an alternative of arbitration was delayed
for seven months; and when, in September,
1 88 1, it was received, it contained a rejection
of the boundary offered by Venezuela and a
proposal of a new line apparently lacking al-
most every feature of concession; and, singu-
larly enough, there was not in this reply thci

38 THE VENEZUELAN

slightest allusion to Venezuela's request for
.arbitration.

I do not find that this communication of
Great Britain was ever specifically answered,
though an answer was often requested. No
further steps appear to have been taken until
September 7, 1883, when Lord Granville in-
structed the British minister to Venezuela to
Invite the serious attention of the Venezuelan
, Government to the questions pending between
the two countries, with a view to their early"
settlement. These questions are specified as
relating to the boundary, to certain differential

^ / duties imposed on imports from British colo-
nies, and to the claims of British creditors of
the republic. His Lordship declared in those
instructions that as a preliminary to entering
upon negotiations it was indispensable that an
answer should be given to the pending pro-
posal which had been made by her Majesty's
Government in regard to the boundary.

The representations made to the Govern-
ment of Venezuela by the British minister, in
obedience to those instructions, elicited a reply,

\J in which a provision of the Venezuelan consti-
tution was cited prohibiting the alienation or

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 39

cession of any part of the territory of the re-
public; and it was suggested that, inasmuch as
the Essequibo Hne seemed abundantly sup-
ported as the true boundary of Venezuela, a
concession beyond that line by treaty would
be obnoxious to this constitutional prohibition,
whereas any reduction of territory brought
about by a decree of an arbitral tribunal
would obviate the difficulty. Therefore the
urgent necessity was submitted for the selec-
tion of an arbitrator, "who, freely and unani-
mously chosen by the two Governments, would
judge and pronounce a sentence of a definitive J
character."

The representative of her Majesty's Govern- '
ment, in a response dated February 29, 1884,
commented upon the new difficulty introduced
by the statement concerning the prohibition
contained in the constitution of the republic,
and expressed a fear that if arbitration was
agreed to, the same prohibition might be in-
voked as an excuse for not abiding by an
award unfavorable to Venezuela; and it was
declared that if, on the other hand, the arbi-
trator should decide in favor of the Venezuelan
Government to the full extent of their claim, /

Ky

40 THE VENEZUELAN

"a. large and important territory which has

for a long period been inhabited and occupied

by Her Majesty's subjects and treated as a

part of the Colony of British Guiana would be

severed from the Queen's dominions." This

declaration is immediately followed by a con-

\ elusion in these words :
\

For the above-mentioned reasons, therefore,
the circumstances of the case do not appear to
Her Majesty's Government to be such as to
render arbitration applicable for a solution of
the difficulty; and I have accordingly to request
you, in making this known to the Venezuelan
Government, to express to them the hope of Her
Majesty's Government that some other means
may be devised for bringing this long-standing
matter to an issue satisfactory to both powers.

^ Let us pause here for a moment's examina-
tion of the surprising refusal of Great Britain
to submit this difficulty to arbitration, and the
more surprising reasons presented for its justi-
fication. The refusal was surprising because
the controversy had reached such a stage that
\ arbitration was evidently the only means by

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 41

which it could be settled consistently with har- )
monious relations between the two countries.

It was on this ground that Venezuela pro-
posed arbitration; and she strongly urged it
on the further ground that inasmuch as the
prohibition of her constitution prevented the
relinquishment, by treaty or voluntary act, of
any part of the territory which her people and
their government claimed to be indubitably
Venezuelan, such a relinquishment would pre-
sent no difficulties if it was in obedience to a
decree of a tribunal to which the question of
ownership had been mutually submitted.

In giving her reasons for rejecting arbitra-
tion Great Britain says in effect: The plan
you urge for the utter and complete elimina-
tion of this constitutional prohibition — for its
expurgation and destruction so far as it is re-
lated to the pending dispute — is objectionable,
because we fear the prohibition thus eliminated,
expunged, and destroyed will still be used as a
pretext for disobedience to an award which, ,
for the express purpose of avoiding this con- ^
stitutional restraint, you have invited.

The remaining objection interposed by
Great Britain to the arbitration requested by

n/

42

THE VENEZUELAN

Venezuela is based upon the fear that an
award might be made in favor of the Vene-
zuelan claim, in which case "a large and im-
portant territory which has for a long period
been inhabited and occupied by Her Majesty's
subjects and treated as a part of the Colony
of British Guiana would be severed from the
Queen's dominions."

It first occurs to us that a contention may
well be suspected of weakness when its sup-
porters are unwilling to subject it to the test
of impartial arbitration. Certain inquiries are
also pertinent in this connection. Who were
the British subjects who had long occupied
the territory that might through arbitration
be severed from the Queen's dominions ? How
many of them began this occupancy during
the more than forty years that the territory
had been steadily and notoriously disputed?
Did. they enter upon this territory with knowl-
edge of the dispute and against the warning
^ of the government to which they owed allegi-
ance, or were they encouraged and invited to
such entry by agencies of that government
who had full notice of the uncertainty of the
British title ? In one case, being themselves in

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 43

the wrong, they were entitled to no consider-
ation ; in the other, the question of loss and in-
demnification should rest between them and
their government, which had impliedly guar-
anteed them against disturbance. In any
event, neither case presented a reason why
Great Britain should take or possess the lands
of Venezuela; nor did either case furnish an
excuse for denying to Venezuela a fair and
impartial adjudication of her disputed rights.
By whom had this territory "been treated as
a part of the Colony of British Guiana"?
Surely not by Venezuela. On the contrary,
she had persistently claimed it as her own, and
had "treated" it as her own as far as she could
and dared. England alone had treated it as a
part of British Guiana; her immense power
had enabled her to do this ; and her decrees in
her own favor as against her weak adversary
undoubtedly promised greater advantages than
arbitration could possibly assure. -^

&

Ill

The Secretary of State of Venezuela, soon
after this refusal of Great Britain to submit
the boundary dispute to arbitration, in a de-
spatch dated the second day of April, 1884,
still urged that method of settlement, citing
precedents and presenting arguments in its
favor; and in conclusion he asked the minister
of the English Government at Caracas ''to
have the goodness to think out and suggest any
acceptable course for attaining a solution of
the difficulty." This was followed, a few days
afterward, by another communication from the
Venezuelan Secretary of State, repeating his
urgent request for arbitration. From this
communication it may not be amiss to make
the following quotation:

Venezuela and Great Britain possess the same
rights in the question under discussion. If the
Republic should yield up any part of her pre-
tensions, she would recognize the superior right
of Great Britain, would violate the above-quoted

44

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

45 (^

article of the Constitution, and draw down the^:
censure of her fellow-citizens. But when both
nations, putting aside their independence of
action in deference to peace and good friendship,
create by mutual consent a Tribunal which may
decide in the controversy, the same is able to pass
sentence that one of the two parties or both of
them have been mistaken in their opinions con-
cerning the extent of their territory. Thus the
case would not be in opposition to the Constitu-
tion of the Republic, there being no alienation of
that which shall have been determined not to be,;
her property. ^

On the tenth day of June, 1884, arbitration
v^as again refused in a curt note from Lord
Granville, declaring that "Her Majesty's Gov-
ernment adhere to their objection to arbitra-
tion as a mode of dealing w^ith this question."

About this time complaints and protests of
the most vigorous character, based upon al-
leged breaches of the agreement of 1850 con-
cerning the non-occupation of the disputed
territory broke out on both sides of the con-
troversy, and accusations of aggression and
occupation v^ere constantly made. I shall not
attempt to follow them, as in detail they are

4

- xA

46 THE VENEZUELAN

not among the incidents which I consider es-
pecially relevant to the presentation of my
theme.

On the thirteenth day of December, 1884,
Venezuela, in reply to a proposition of the
British Government that the boundary question
and certain other differences should be settled
simultaneously, suggested, in view of the un-
willingness of Great Britain to submit the
boundary dispute to arbitration, that it should
s be presented for decision to a court of law,
\ the members of which should be chosen by the
parties respectively.

The British Government promptly declined
this proposition, and stated that they were
not prepared to depart from the arrangement
made in 1877 to decide the question by adopt-
ing a conventional boundary fixed by mutual
accord between the two governments. This
was in the face of the eft'orts which had been
made along that line and found utterly
L fruitless.

Immediately following the last-mentioned

proposition by Venezuela for the presentation

\ I of the difficulty to a court of law mutually

chosen, negotiations were entered upon for the

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

47

g)'»

n

^

conclusion of a treaty between Great Britain
and Venezuela, which should quiet a difference
pending between the two countries relating to \
differential duties and which should also dis- ■
pose of other unsettled questions. In a draft
of such a treaty submitted by Venezuela there
was inserted an article providing for arbitra-
tion in case of all differences which could not
be adjusted by friendly negotiation. To this
article Great Britain suggested an amendment,
making such arbitration applicable only to mat-
ters arising out of the interpretation or exe-
cution of the treaty itself, and especially
excluding those emanating from any other
source ; but on further representation by Vene-
zuela, Lord Granville, in behalf of the Gov-
ernment of Great Britain, expressly agreed
with Venezuela that the treaty article relating
to arbitration should be unrestricted in its
operation. This diplomatic agreement was in
explicit terms, her Majesty's Government
agreeing "that the undertaking to refer differ-
ences to arbitration shall include all differences
which may arise between the High Contract-
ing Parties, and not those only which arise on .
the interpretation of the Treaty." — '

i

48 THE VENEZUELAN

This occurred on the fifteenth day of May,
1885. Whatever Lord Granville may have in-
tended by the language used, the Government
of Venezuela certainly understood his agree-
ment to include the pending boundary dispute
as among the questions that should be sub-
mitted to arbitration; and all other matters
which the treaty should embrace seemed so
easy of adjustment that its early comple-
tion, embodying a stipulation for the final
arbitration of the boundary controversy, was
confidently and gladly anticipated by the re-
public.

The high hopes and joyful anticipations of
^ Venezuela born of this apparently favorable
situation were, however, but short-lived.
y On the twenty-seventh day of July, 1885,
Lord Salisbury, who in the meantime had suc-
ceeded the Earl of Granville in Great Britain's
Foreign Office, in a note to Venezuela's envoy,
declared: "Her Majesty's Government are
unable to concur in the assent given by their
predecessors in office to the general arbitration
article proposed by Venezuela, and they are
unable to agree to the inclusion in it of mat-
ters other than those arising out of the inter-

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

49

pretation or alleged violation of this particular
treaty."

No assertion of the irrevocability of the
agreement which Venezuela had made with his
predecessor, and no plea or argument of any
kind, availed to save the enlarged terms of
this arbitration clause from Lord Salisbury's
destructive insistence.

On the twentieth day of June, 1886, Lord
Rosebery suggested for Great Britain, and as
a solution of the difficulty, that the territory
within two certain lines which had been al-
ready proposed as boundaries should be equally
divided between the contestants, either by arbi-
tration or the determination of a mixed
commission.

This was declined by Venezuela on the
twenty-ninth day of July, 1886, upon the same
grounds that led to the declination of prior
proposals that apparently involved an absolute
cession of a part of her territory ; and she still
insisted upon an arbitration embracing the en-
tire disputed territory as the only feasible
method of adjustment.

This declination on the part of Venezuela
of Lord Rosebery's proposition terminated the

\J

J

J

50 THE VENEZUELAN

second attempt in point of time, to settle this
vexed question. In the meantime the aggres-
sive conduct which for some time the officials
of both countries had exhibited in and near the
contested region had grown in distinctness and
significance, until Great Britain had openly and
with notorious assertion of ownership taken
i possession of a valuable part of the territory
V in dispute. On the 26th of October, 1886, an
official document was published in the London
"Gazette" giving notice that no grants of land
made by the Government of Venezuela in the

J territory claimed by Great Britain would be
admitted or recognized by her Majesty; and
this more significant statement was added : "A
map showing the boundary between British
Guiana and Venezuela claimed by Her Maj-
esty's Government can be seen in the library
of the Colonial Office, Downing Street, or at
the Office of the Government Secretary,
Georgetown, British Guiana." The boundary
here spoken of, as shown on the map to which
attention is directed, follows the Schomburgk
line. Protests and demands in abundance on
the part of Venezuela followed, which were ut-
( terly disregarded, until, on the thirty-first day

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

51

of Januaiy, 1887, the Venezuelan Secretary of v
State distinctly demanded of Great Britain the
evacuation of the disputed territory which she
was occupying in violation of prior agreement
and the rights of the republic, and gave formal
notice that unless such evacuation should be
completed, and accompanied by acceptance of
arbitration as a means of deciding the pending
frontier dispute, by the twentieth day of Feb-
ruary, 1887, diplomatic relations between the \
two countries would on that day cease.

These demands were absolutely unheeded;
and thereupon, when the twentieth day of Feb-
ruary arrived, Venezuela exhibited a long list
of specific charges of aggression and wrong-
doing against Great Britain, and made the fol-
lowing statement and final protest:

J

In consequence, Venezuela, not deeming it
fitting to continue friendly relations with a state i
which thus injures her, suspends them from
to-day.

And she protests before the Government of
Her Britannic Majesty, before all civilized
nations, before the whole world, against the acts
of spoliation which the Government of Great

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52 THE VENEZUELAN

Britain has committed to her detriment, and
which she will never on any consideration recog-
nize as capable of altering in the slightest degree
the rights which she has acquired from Spain,
and respecting which she will be always ready to
submit to a third power, as the only way to
a solution compatible with her constitutional
r principles.

Notwithstanding all this, three years after-
ward, and on the tenth day of January, 1890,
an agent of Venezuela, appointed for that pur-
pose, addressed a note to Lord Salisbury, still
in charge of Great Britain's foreign relations,
expressing the desire of Venezuela to renew
diplomatic relations with Great Britain, and
requesting an interview to that end.

A short time thereafter the Government of
Great Britain expressed its satisfaction that a
renewal of diplomatic relations was in pros-
pect, and presented to the representative of
Venezuela "a statement of the conditions
which Her Majesty's Government considered
necessary for a satisfactory settlement of the
questions pending between the two countries."

As the first of these conditions it was de-

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BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

53

clared that ''Her Majesty's Government could
not accept as satisfactory any arrangement
which did not admit the British title to the
territory comprised within the line laid down
by Sir R. Schomburgk in 1841 ; but they
would be willing to refer to arbitration the
claims of Great Britain to certain territory to
the west of that line."

Naturally enough, this statement was re-
ceived by Venezuela with great disappointment
and surprise. Her representative promptly re-
plied that his government could not accept any
single point of the arbitrary and capricious
line laid down by Sir R. Schomburgk in 1841,
which had been declared null and void even by
the Government of her Majesty; and that it
was not possible for Venezuela to accept arbi-
tration in respect to territory west of that line.
He further expressed his regret that the con-
ditions then demanded by Lord Salisbury were
more unfavorable to Venezuela than the pro-
posals made to the former agent of the re-
public prior to the suspension of diplomatic
relations.

On the 19th of March, 1890, the British
Government reiterated its position more in de-

^

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54 THE VENEZUELAN

tail. Its refusal to admit any question as to
Great Britain's title to any of the territory
within the Schomburgk line was emphatically
repeated, and the British claim was defined to
extend beyond any pretension which I believe
had ever been previously made except by Lord
Salisbury himself in 1880. A map was pre-
sented indicating this extreme claim, the
Schomburgk line, and a certain part of the
territory between the boundary of this ex-
treme claim on the west and the Schomburgk
line, which Great Britain proposed to submit
to arbitration, abandoning all claim to the re-
mainder of the territory between these last-
named two lines. This scheme, if adopted,
would give to England absolutely and with-
out question the large territory between Brit-
ish Guiana's conceded western boundary and
the Schomburgk line, with an opportunity to
lay claim before a board of arbitration for
extensive additional territory beyond the
Schomburgk line.

This is pitiful. The Schomburgk line,
which was declared by the British Government,
at the time it was made, to be "merely a pre-
liminary measure, open to further discussion

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

55

between the Governments of Great Britain and "n^
Venezuela," and which had been since largely
extended in some mysterious way, is now de-
clared to be a line so well established, so in-
fallible, and so sacred that only the territory
that England exorbitantly claims beyond that
line is enough in dispute to be submitted to im-
partial arbitration. The trader is again in evi-
dence. On this basis England could abundantly
afford to lose entirely in the arbitration she at ,
length conceded.

And yet Venezuela was not absolutely dis-
couraged. Soon after the receipt of Great
Britain's last depressing communication, she
appointed still another agent who was to try
his hand with England in the field of diplo-
macy. On the twenty-fourth day of June,
1890, this new representative replied to the
above proposal made to his predecessor by her
Majesty's Government, and expressed the
great regret of Venezuela that its recent pro-
posals for a settlement of the boundary dif^-
culty by arbitration affecting all the disputed
territory had been peremptorily declined. He
also declared that the emphatic statement con-
tained in Great Britain's last communication in

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56 THE VENEZUELAN

leference to this question created for his
government ''difficulties not formerly contem-
plated," and thereupon formally declined on
behalf of Venezuela the consideration of the
proposals contained in said communication.
This statement of discouraging conditions was,
however, supplemented by a somewhat new
suggestion to the effect that a preliminary
agreement should be made containing a dec-
laration on the part of the Government of
Venezuela that the river Essequibo, its banks,
and the lands covering it belong exclusively to
British Guiana, and a declaration on the part
of her Majesty's Government that the Orinoco
River, its banks, and the lands covering it be-
long exclusively to Venezuela, and providing
that a mixed commission of two chief engi-
neers and their staffs should be appointed to
make, within one year, careful maps and charts
of the region to the west and northwest of the
Essequibo River, toward the Orinoco, in order
to determine officially the exact course of its
rivers and streams, and the precise position of
its. mountains and hills, and all other details
that would permit both countries to have re-
liable official knowledge of the territory which

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

57

was actually in dispute, enabling them to de-
termine with a mutual feeling of friendship
and good will a boundary with perfect knowl-
edge of the case; but in the event that a de-
termination should not be thus reached, the
final decision of the boundary question should
be submitted to two arbitrators, one selected by
each government, and a third chosen by the
other two, to act as umpire in case of disagree-
ment, who, in view of the original titles and
documents presented, should fix a boundary-
line which, being in accordance with the
respective rights and titles, should have the
advantage as far as possible of constituting a
natural boundary; and that, pending such de-
termination, both governments should remove
or withdraw all posts and other indications
and signs of possession or dominion on said
territory, and refrain from exercising any
jurisdiction within the disputed region.

On the 24th of July, 1890, Lord Salisbury
declined to accept these suggestions of the
Venezuelan representative, and declared :
"Her Majesty's Government have more than
once explained that they cannot consent to sub-
mit to arbitration what they regard as their

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58 THE VENEZUELAN

indisputable title to districts in the possession
of the British Colony."

Is it uncharitable to see in this reference to
"possession" a hint of the industrious man-
ner in which Great Britain had attempted to
improve her position by permitting coloniza-
tion, and by other acts of possession, during
the half-century since the boundary dispute
began ?

Efforts to settle this controversy seem to
\ have languished after this rebuff until March,
1893, when still another agent was appointed
^ by Venezuela for the purpose of reestablishing
diplomatic relations with Great Britain, and
\j settling, if possible, the boundary trouble and
such other differences as might be pending be-
tween the two countries. As a means to that
end, this agent, on the twenty-sixth day of
May, 1893, presented a memorandum to the
British Government containing suggestions for
such settlement. The suggestion relating to
the adjustment of the boundary question rested
upon the idea of arbitration and did not ma-
terially differ from that made by this agent's
immediate predecessor in 1890, except as to
the status quo, pending final adjustment, which

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

59

it was proposed should be the same as that ex-
isting after the agreement of non-interference
in the disputed territory made by the two gov-
ernments in 1850.

The plan thus suggested was declined by the
Government of Great Britain, because, in the
first place, it involved an arbitration, "which
had been repeatedly declined by Her Majesty's
Government," and, further, because it was, in
the language of the British reply, "quite im-
possible that they should consent to revert to
the status quo of 1850 and evacuate what has
for some years constituted an integral portion
of British Guiana."

A further communication from the agent of
Venezuela, offering additional arguments in
support of his suggestions, brought forth a re-
ply informing him that the contents of his
note did not "appear to Her Majesty's Gov-
ernment to afford any opening for arriving at
an understanding on this question which they
could accept."

Six months afterward, on the twenty-ninth
day of September, 1893, a final communication
was addressed by the representative of Vene-
zuela to the British Government, reviewing the

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60 THE VENEZUELAN

situation and the course of past efforts to ar-
rive at a settlement, and concluding with the
words :

I must now declare in the most solemn manner,
and in the name of the Government of Venezuela,
that it is with the greatest regret that that Gov-
ernment sees itself forced to leave the situation
produced in the disputed territory by the acts of
recent years unsettled, and subject to the serious
disturbances which acts of force cannot but pro-
duce; and to declare that Venezuela will never
consent to proceedings of that nature being
accepted as title-deeds to justify the arbitrary
occupation of territory which is within its juris-
diction.

Here closed a period in this dispute, fifty-
two years in duration, vexed with agitation,
and perturbed by irritating and repeated fail-
ures to reach a peaceful adjustment. Instead
of progress in the direction of a settlement of
their boundaries, the results of their action
were increased obstacles to fair discussion, in-
tensified feelings of injury, extended assertion
of title, ruthless appropriation of the territory
in controversy, and an unhealed breach in dip-
lomatic relations.

IV

I have thus far deah with this dispute as
one in which Great Britain and Venezuela,
the parties primarily concerned, were sole par-
ticipants. We have now, however, reached a
stage in the affair which requires a recital of
other facts which led up to the active and posi-
tive interference of our own Government in
the controversy. In discussing this branch of
our topic it will be necessary not only to deal
with circumstances following those already
narrated, but to retrace our steps sufficiently to
exhibit among other things the appeals and ^
representations made to the Government of the
United States by Venezuela, while she was still
attempting to arrive at an adjustment with
Great Britain.

I have already referred to the first communi-
cation made to us by Venezuela on the sub-
ject. This, it will be remembered, was in 1876,
when she sought to resume negotiations with
Great Britain, after an interruption of thirty-
two years. I have also called attention to the

61

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62 THE VENEZUELAN

fact that coincident with this communication
Venezuela presented to Great Britain a wilHng-
ness to relax her insistence upon her extreme

J boundary claim, based upon alleged right, and
suggested that a conventional line might be
fixed by mutual concession.

Venezuela's first appeal to us for support
and aid amounted to little more than a vague
and indefinite request for countenance and
sympathy in her efforts to settle her differ-
ences with her contestant, with an expression
of a desire that we would take cognizance of
her new steps in that direction. I do not find
that any reply was made to this communication,

/ Five years afterward, in 1881, the Vene-
zuelan minister in Washington presented to
Mr. Evarts, then our Secretary of State, in-
formation he had received that British vessels
had made their appearance in the mouth of the
Orinoco River with materials to build a tele-
graph-line, and had begun to erect poles for
that purpose at Barima : and he referred to the
immense importance to his country of the Ori-
noco; to the efforts of his government to ad-
just her difficulty with Great Britain, and to
the delays interposed ; and finally expressed his

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 63

confident belief that the United States would
not view with indifference what was being
done in a matter of such capital importance.

Mr. Evarts promptly replied, and informed '
the Venezuelan representative that *'in view of
the deep interest which the Government of the
United States takes in all transactions tend-
ing to attempted encroachments of foreign
powers upon the territory of any of the re-
publics of this continent, this Government
could not look with indifference to the forcible
acquisition of such territory by England, if the
mission of the vessels now at the mouth of the
Orinoco should be found to be for that end." J^

Again, on the thirtieth day of November,
1 88 1, our minister to Venezuela reported to /
Mr. Blaine, who had succeeded Mr. Evarts as ^
Secretary of State, an interview with the Presi-
dent of Venezuela at his request, in which the
subject of the boundary dispute was discussed.
Our minister represented that the question was
spoken of by the President as being of essen-
tial importance and a source of great anxiety
to him, involving a large and fertile territory /
between the Essequibo and Orinoco, and prob- ^
ably the control of the mouth and a consider-

64 THE VENEZUELAN

able portion of the latter river; and he alleged
that the policy of Great Britain, in the treat-
ment of this question, had been delay — the in-
terval being- utilized by gradually but steadily
extending her interest and authority into the
disputed territory; and "that, though the
rights of Venezuela were clear and indispu-
^ table, he questioned her ability, unaided by
some friendly nation, to maintain them."

In July, 1882, Mr. Frelinghuysen, successor

to Mr. Blaine, sent to our representative at

Venezuela a despatch to be communicated to

the government of the republic, in which he

stated that, if Venezuela desired it, the United

States would propose to the Government of

^-__^ Great Britain that the boundary question be

[^ submitted to the arbitrament of a third power.

It will be remembered that a proposition for

arbitration had been made by Venezuela to

>y Great Britain in February, 1881, and that

Great Britain had refused to accede to it.

In July, 1884, Mr. Frelinghuysen sent a con-
fidential despatch to Mr. Lowell, our minister
to Great Britain, informing him that Guzman
Blanco, ex-President of Venezuela, who had
recently been accredited as a special envoy

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 6^ j

from his country to Great Britain, had called >^
on him relative to the objects of his mission,
in respect of which he desired to obtain the
good offices of this Government, and that
doubtless he would seek to confer with Mr.
Lowell in London. He further informed Mr.
Lowell that he had told the Venezuelan envoy
that, ''in view of our interest in all that touches
the independent life of the Republics of the
American Continent, the United States could
not be indifferent to anything that might im-
pair their normal self-control" ; that ''the moral
position of the United States in these matters
was well known through the enunciation of
the Monroe Doctrine," though formal action
in the direction of applying that doctrine to a
speculative case affecting Venezuela seemed to
him to be inopportune, and therefore he could
not advise Venezuela to arouse a discussion of
that point. He instructed our minister to show
proper consideration to the Venezuelan envoy,
and to "take proper occasion to let Lord Gran-
ville know that we are not without concern as
to whatever may affect the interest of a sister
Republic of the American Continent and its
position in the family of nations."

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66 THE VENEZUELAN

In July, 1885, the Venezuelan minister to
the United States addressed a communication
to Secretary of State Bayard, setting forth the
correspondence which had already taken place
between our Government and that of Vene-
zuela touching the boundary dispute, and re-
ferring to the serious conditions existing on
account of the renewed aggressions of Great
Britain.

Mr. Bayard thereupon sent a despatch on
the subject to Mr. Phelps, our diplomatic rep-
resentative to England, in which, after stating
that the Venezuelan Government had never
definitely declared what course she desired us
to pursue, but, on the contrary, had expressed
a desire to be guided by our counsel, he said:
"The good offices of this Government have
been tendered to Venezuela to suggest to Great
Britain the submission of the boundary dis-
pute to arbitration; but when shown that such
action on our part would exclude us from act-
ing as arbitrator, Venezuela ceased to press the
matter in that direction" ; and the next day
after writing this despatch Mr. Bayard in-
formed the Venezuelan minister that the Presi-
dent of the United States could not entertain a

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

67

request to act as umpire in any dispute un-
less it should come concurrently from both
contestants.

In December, 1886, our minister to Vene-
zuela addressed a despatch to Mr. Bayard,
in which he reported that matters looked very
angry and threatening in Venezuela on account
of fresh aggressions on the part of Great
Britain in the disputed territory; and he ex-
pressed the fear that an open rupture might
occur between the two countries. He inclosed
a statement made by the Venezuelan Minister
of Foreign Affairs, containing a list of griev-
ances, followed by this declaration: ''Vene-
zuela, listening to the advice of the United
States, has endeavored several times to obtain
that the difference should be submitted to the
award of a third power. . . . But such efforts
have proven fruitless, and the possibility of
that result, the only one prescribed by our con-
stitution, being arrived at, becomes more and
more remote from day to day. Great Britain
has been constant in her clandestine advances
upon the Venezuelan territory, not taking into
consideration either the rights or the com-
plaints of this Republic." And he adds the

1

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68 THE VENEZUELAN

r following declaration: "Under such circum-
stances the Government has but two courses
left open: either to employ force in order to
recover places from which force has ejected
the Republic, since its amicable representations
on the subject have failed to secure redress,
or to present a solemn protest to the Govern-
ment of the United. States against so great an
abuse, which is an evident declaration of war

^ — a provocative aggression."
/ Thereupon, and on the twentieth day of De-
cember,_jL886,.. a despatch was sent by Mr.
Bayard to Mr. Phelps, in which the secretary
comments on the fact that at no time thereto-
fore had the good offices of our Government
been actually tendered to avert a rupture be-
tween Great Britain and Venezuela, and that
our inaction in this regard seemed to be due to
the reluctance of Venezuela to have the Gov-
ernment of the United States take any steps
having relation to the action of the British
Government which might, in appearance even,
prejudice the resort to our arbitration or medi-
ation which Venezuela desired; but that the
intelligence now received warranted him in

^ tendering the good offices of the United States

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 69

to promote an amicable settlement of the diffi-
culty between the two countries, and offering
our arbitration if acceptable to both countries
— as he supposed the dispute turned upon
simple and readily ascertainable historical
facts.

Additional complaints against Great Britain
on account of further trespasses on Venezue-
lan territory were contained in a note from
the Venezuelan minister to Mr. Bayard, dated
January 4, 1887. I shall quote only the fol-
lowing passage :

J

My Government has tried all possible means to
induce that of London to accept arbitration, as
advised by the United States ; this, however, has
resulted in nothing but fresh attempts against the (Qj^'^'^
integrity of the territory by the colonial authori-
ties of Demerara. It remains to be seen how long
my Government will find it possible to exercise
forbearance transcending the limits of its positive
official duty.

Pursuant to his instructions from Mr. Bay-
ard, our minister to Great Britain formally
tendered to the English Government, on the

70 THE VENEZUELAN

C eighth day of February, 1887, the good offices
of the United States to promote an amicable
settlement of the pending controversy, and
offered our arbitration, if acceptable to both
parties.

A few days afterward Lord Salisbury, on
behalf of Great Britain, replied that the atti-
tude which had been taken by the President of
Lthe Venezuelan republic precluded her Maj-
esty's Government from submitting the ques-
tion at that time to the arbitration of any third
power.

The fact that Lord Salisbury had declined
our offer of mediation and arbitration, was
promptly conveyed to the government of Vene-
zuela; and thereupon, on the fourth day of
May, 1887, her minister at Washington ad-
dressed another note to our Secretary of State
indicating much depression on account of the
failure of all efforts up to that time made to
induce Great Britain to agree to a settlement
of the controversy by arbitration, and express-
ing the utmost gratitude for the steps taken by
our Government in aid of those efforts. He
also referred to the. desire his government once
entertained that, in case arbitration could be

V

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

71

attained, the United States might be selected as
arbitrator, and to the fact that this desire had
been rehnquished because the maintenance of
impartiality essential in an arbitrator would
"seriously impair the efficiency of action which
for the furtherance of the common interests of
America, and in obedience to the doctrine of
the immortal Monroe, should possess all the
vitality that the alarming circumstances de-
mand" ; and he begged the secretary to instruct
our representative in London "to insist, in the
name of the United States Government, upon
the necessity of submitting the boundary ques- /
tion between Venezuela and British Guiana to
arbitration."

I have heretofore refrained from stating in
detail the quite numerous instances of quarrel
and collision that occurred in and near the dis-
puted territory, with increasing frequency,
during this controversy. One of these, how-
ever, I think should be here mentioned. It
seems that in 1883 two vessels belonging to
English subjects were seized and their crews
taken into custody by Venezuelan officials in
the disputed region, for alleged violations of
the laws of Venezuela within her jurisdiction,

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72 THE VENEZUELAN

and that English officials had assumed, without
any judicial determination and without any

yr^ ^J notice to Venezuela to assess damages against
her on account of such seizure and arrests, in

C^^ I an amount which, with interest, amounted in
N^^s 1887 to about forty thousand dollars. On the
seventh day of October in that year, the gover-
nor of Trinidad, an English island near the
mouth of the Orinoco, in a letter to the Minis-
ter of Foreign Affairs for Venezuela, declared
that her Majesty's Government could not per-
mit such injuries to remain unredressed, or
their representations to be disregarded any
longer, and thereupon it was demanded that
the money claimed, with interest, be paid with-
in seven days from the delivery of said letter.
The letter concluded as follows :

Failing compliance with the above demands
Her Majesty's Government will be reluctantly
compelled to instruct the Commander of Her
Majesty's naval forces in the West Indies to take
such measures as he may deem necessary to obtain
that reparation which has been vainly sought for
by friendly means ; and in case of so doing they
will hold the Venezuelan Government responsible
for any consequences that may arise.

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BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 73

Venezuela did not fail to appreciate and
frankly acknowledge that, in her defenseless
condition, there was no escape from the pay-
ment of the sum which England, as a judge
in its own cause, had decreed against her. The
President of the republic, however, in a prompt
reply to the governor's note, characterized its
terms as "offensive to the dignity of the na-
tion and to the equality which, according to
the principles of the rights of nations, all
countries enjoy without any regard to their
strength or weakness." Thereupon he sought
the good offices of our minister to Venezuela
in an effort to procure a withdrawal of the
objectionable communication. This was at-
tempted in a note sent by the American minis-
ter to the governor of Trinidad, in which he
said :

I hope your Excellency will permit me to sug-
gest as a mutual friend of both parties, the
suspension or withdrawal of your note of the
7th instant, so that negotiations may at once be
opened for the immediate and final settlement of
the afore-mentioned claims without further re-
sort to unpleasant measures. From representa-

7

74 THE VENEZUELAN

tions made to me, I am satisfied that if the note
of the 7th instant is withdrawn temporarily even,
Venezuela will do in the premises that which will
prove satisfactory to your Government.

A few days after this note was sent, a reply
was received in which the governor of Trini-
dad courteously expressed his thanks to our
minister for his good offices, and informed him
that, as the Government of Venezuela regarded
his note of October 7 "as offensive, and ap-
peared desirous of at last settling this long-
pending question in a friendly spirit," he
promptly telegraphed to her Majesty's Gov-
ernment asking permission to withdraw that
note and substitute a less forcible one for it;
and that he had just been informed by his
home government in reply that this arrange-
ment could not be sanctioned.

Our minister reported this transaction to his
home government at Washington on the fourth
day of November, 1887, and stated that the
money demanded by Great Britain had been
paid by Venezuela under protest.

Venezuela may have been altogether at fault
in the transaction out of which this demand

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

75

arose ; the amount which England exacted may
not have been unreasonable; and the method
of its assessment, though not the most consid-
erate possible, has support in precedent; and
even the threat of a naval force may sometimes
be justified in enforcing unheeded demands.
I have not adverted to this incident for the
purpose of inviting judgment on any of its
phases, but only to call attention to the fact
that it was allowed to culminate with seem-
ingly studied accompaniments of ruthlessness
and irritation, at a time when a boundary ques-
tion was pending between the two nations,
when the weaker contestant was importuning
the stronger for arbitration, and when a desire
for reconciliation and peace in presence of
strained relations should have counseled con-
siderateness and magnanimity — all this in
haughty disregard of the solicitous and ex-
pressed desire of the Government of the United
States to induce a peaceful adjustment of the
boundary dispute, and in curt denial of our
request that this especially disturbing incident
should be relieved of its most exasperating
features.

In the trial of causes before our courts, evi-

76 THE VENEZUELAN

dence is frequently introduced to show the ani-
mus or intent of litigating parties.

Perhaps strict decorum hardly permits us to
adopt the following language, used by the
Venezuelan minister when reporting to our
Secretary of State the anticipated arrival of a
British war-steamer to enforce the demand of
Great Britain:

Such alarming news shows evidently that the
Government of Her Britannic Majesty, en-
couraged by the impunity on which it has counted
until now for the realization of its unjust designs
with regard to Venezuela, far from procuring a
pacific and satisfactory agreement on the dififer-
ent questions pending with the latter, is especially
eager to complicate in order to render less possi-
ble every day that equitable solution which has
been so fully the endeavor of my people.

On the fifteenth day of February, 1888, the
Venezuelan minister, in communicating to our
Government information he had received touch-
ing a decree of the governor of Demerara
denying the validity of a contract entered into
by the Government of Venezuela for the con-

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 77

struction of a railway between certain points in
the territory claimed by Venezuela, commented
on the affair as follows :

England has at last declared emphatically that
her rights are without limit, and embrace what- ^\
ever regions may be suggested to her by her ^iM$^^r<J
insatiate thirst for conquest. She even goes so
far as to deny the validity of railway grants
comprised within territory where not even the
wildest dream of fancy had ever conceived that
the day would come when Venezuela's right
thereto could be disputed. The fact is that until
now England has relied upon impunity. She be-
holds in us a weak and unfriended nation, and
seeks to make the Venezuelan coast and territor-
ies the base of a conquest Which, if circumstances
are not altered, will have no other bounds than J
the dictates of her own will.

V

Mr. Bayard, in a despatch transmitting this
to our minister to England, says that our Gov-
ernment has heretofore acted upon the assump-
tion that the boundary controversy between
Great Britain and Venezuela was one based on
historical facts, which without difficulty could
be determined according to evidence, but that
the British pretension now stated gives rise to
grave disquietude, and creates the apprehen-
sion that their territorial claim does not follow
historical traditions or evidence, but is appar-
ently indefinite. He refers to the British Colo-
nial Office list of previous years, and calls
attention to the wide detour to the westward
in the boundaries of British Guiana between
the years 1877 and 1887, as shown in that
record. He suggests that our minister "ex-
press anew to Lord Salisbury the great gratifi-
cation it would afford our Government to see
the Venezuelan dispute amicably and honor-
ably settled by arbitration or otherwise," and

78

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 79

adds: ''If indeed it should appear that there
is no fixed Hmit to the British boundary claim,
our good disposition to aid in a settlement
might not only be defeated, but be obliged to
give place to a feeling of grave concern."

It was about this time that the Venezuelan
minister, in a note expressing his appreciation
of our efforts to bring about a settlement of the
dispute, made the following statement :

Disastrous and fatal consequences would ensue
for the independence of South America if, under
the pretext of a question of boundaries. Great
Britain should succeed in consummating the
usurpation of a third part of our territory, and
therewith a river so important as the Orinoco.
Under the pretext of a mere question of boun-
daries which began on the banks of Essequibo,
we now find ourselves on the verge of losing
regions lying more than five degrees away from
that river.

On May i, 1890, Mr. Blaine, Mr. Bayard's
successor as Secretary of State, instructed Mr.
Robert T. Lincoln, our minister to England,
"to use his good offices with Lord Salisbury to

^/

8o THE VENEZUELAN

bring about the resumption of diplomatic inter-
course between Great Britain and Venezuela
as a preliminary step toward the settlement of
the boundary dispute by arbitration." He also
requested him ''to propose to Lord Salisbury,
with a view to an accommodation, that an in-
formal conference be had in Washington or in
London of representatives of the three pow-
ers." The secretary added: 'Tn such confer-
J ence the position of the United States is
one solely of impartial friendship toward both
litigants."

• In response to this instruction Mr. Lincoln
had an interview with Lord Salisbury. On
this occasion his Lordship said that her Maj-
esty's Government had not for some time been
keen in attempts to settle the dispute, in view
of their feeling of uncertainty as to the sta-
bility of the present Venezuelan Government
and the frequency of revolutions in that quar-
ter; but that he would take pleasure in con-
sidering our suggestion after consulting the
Colonial Office, to which it would first have to
be referred. Mr. Lincoln, in giving his im-
pressions derived from the interview, says that
"while Lord Salisbury did not intimate what

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 8l

would probably be the nature of his reply, there
was certainly nothing unfavorable in his man-
ner of receiving the suggestion" ; and he fol-
lows this with these significant words : ''If the
matter had been entirely new and dissociated
with its previous history, I should have felt
from his tone that the idea of arbitration in
some form, to put an end to the boundary
dispute, was quite agreeable to him."

On the 26th of May, 1890, Lord Salisbury
addressed a note to Mr. Lincoln, in which his
Lordship stated that her Majesty's Govern-
ment was at that moment in communication
with the Venezuelan minister in Paris, who
had been authorized to express the desire of
his Government for the renewal of diplomatic
relations, and to discuss the conditions on
which it might be effected; that the terms on
which her Majesty's Government considered
that a settlement of the question in issue be-
tween the two countries might be made, had
been communicated to Venezuela's representa-
tive; that his reply was still awaited, and that
the British Government "would wish to have
the opportunity of examining that reply, and
ascertaining what prospect it would afford of

n;

82 ■ THE VENEZUELAN

an adjustment of existing differences, before
considering the expediency of having recourse
to the good offices of a third party."

No mention was made, in this communica-
tion, nor at any time thereafter, so far as I
can discover, of Mr. Blaine's proposal of a
conference among representatives of the three
nations interested in an adjustment.

Lord Salisbury, in a despatch to the English
representative at Washington, dated Novem-
ber II, 1891, stated that our minister to Eng-
land had, in conversation with him, renewed,
on the part of our Government, the expression
of a hope that the Government of Great Britain
would refer the boundary dispute to arbitra-
p tion; that his Lordship had expressed his
willingness to submit to arbitration all the
questions which seemed to his government to
^~^)^ be fairly capable of being treated as questions
of controversy ; that the principal obstacle was
the rupture of diplomatic relations caused by
Venezuela's act; and that before the Govern-
ment of Great Britain could renew negotiations
they must be satisfied that those relations were
about to be resumed with a prospect of their
^ continuance.

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 83

While our Government was endeavoring to
influence Great Britain in the direction of fair
and just arbitration, and receiving for our
pains only barren assurances and procrastinat-
ing excuses, the appeals of Venezuela for help, ^
stimulated by allegations of constantly in-
creasing English pretensions, were incessantly
ringing in our ears.

Without mentioning a number of these ap-
peals, and passing over a period of more than
two years, I shall next refer to a representation
made by the Venezuelan minister at Washing-
ton on March 31, 1894, to Mr. Gresham, who
was then our Secretary of State. In this com-
munication the course of the controversy and
the alleged unauthorized acts of England from
the beginning to that date were rehearsed with
circumstantial particularity. The conduct of
Great Britain in refusing arbitration was again
reprobated, and pointed reference was made to
a principle which had been asserted by the ^
United States, "that the nations of the Ameri-
can continent, after having acquired the liberty
and independence which they enjoy and main-
tain, were not subject to colonization by any
European power." The minister further de-

84 THE VENEZUELAN

I clared that ''Venezuela has been ready to ad-
here to the conciHatory counsel of the United
States that a conference, consisting of its own
Representative and those of the two parties,
should meet at Washington or London for the
purpose of preparing an honorable reestablish-
ment of harmony between the litigants," and
that ''Great Britain has disregarded the equit-
able proposition of the United States."

On July 13, 1894, Mr. Gresham sent a de-
spatch to Mr. Bayard, formerly Secretary of
State, but then ambassador to England, in-
closing the communication of the Venezuelan
minister, calling particular attention to its con-
tents, and at the same time briefly discussing
the boundary dispute. In this despatch Mr.
^Gresham said :

The recourse to arbitration first proposed in
1 88 1, having been supported by your predecessors,
was in turn advocated by you, in a spirit of
friendly regard for the two nations involved. In
the meantime successive advances of British set-
tlers in the region admittedly in dispute were
followed by similar advances of British Colonial
SJ I administration, contesting and supplanting Vene-
zuelan claims to exercise authority therein.

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 85

He adds: "Toward the end of 1887, thel
British territorial claim, which had, as it would i
seem, been silently increased by some twenty-
three thousand square miles between 1885 and ^
1886, took another comprehensive sweep west-
ward to embrace" a certain rich mining dis-
trict. ''Since then," the secretary further \
states, "repeated efforts have been made by
Venezuela as a directly interested party, and
by the United States as the impartial friend of
both countries, to bring about a resumption of
diplomatic relations, which had been suspended
in consequence of the dispute now under con-
sideration."

This despatch concludes as follows :

The President is inspired by a desire for a
peaceable and honorable adjustment of the exist-
ing difficulties between an American state and a
powerful transatlantic nation, and would be glad
to see the reestablishment of such diplomatic re-
lations between them as would promote that end.
I can discover but two equitable solutions to the
present controversy. One is the arbitral deter-
mination of the rights of the disputants as the
respective successors to the historical rights of

0

v/

86 THE VENEZUELAN

Holland and Spain over the region in question.
The other is to create a new boundary-line in
accordance with the dictates of mutual expedi-
ency and consideration. The two Governments
having so far been unable to agree on a conven-
tional line, the consistent and conspicuous
advocacy by the United States and England of
the principle of arbitration, and their recourse
thereto in settlement of important questions aris-
ing between them, makes such a mode of adjust-
ment especially appropriate in the present
instance ; and this Government will gladly do
what it can to further a determination in that
sense.

In another despatch to Mr. Bayard, dated
December i, 1894, Mr. Gresham says:

I cannot believe Her Majesty's Government
will maintain that the validity of their claim to
territory long in dispute between the two coun-
tries shall be conceded as a condition precedent to
the arbitration of the question whether Venezuela
is, entitled to other territory, which until a recent
period was never in doubt. Our interest in the
question has repeatedly been shown by our
friendly efforts to further a settlement alike hon-

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 87

orable to both countries, and the President is
pleased to know that Venezuela will soon renew
her efforts to bring about such an adjustment.

Two days afterward, on December 3, 1894,
the President's annual message was sent to the
Congress, containing the following reference
to the controversy :

The boundary of British Guiana still remains
in dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela.
Believing that its early settlement on some just
basis alike honorable to both parties is in the line
of our established policy to remove from this
hemisphere all causes of difference with powers
beyond the sea, I shall renew the efforts hereto-
fore made to bring about a restoration of diplo-
matic relations between the disputants and to
induce a reference to arbitration — a resort which
Great Britain so conspicuously favors in principle
and respects in practice, and which is earnestly
sought by her weaker adversary.

On the twenty-second day of February,
1895, a joint resolution was passed by the Con-
gress, earnestly recommending to both parties
in interest the President's suggestion "that

J

88 THE VENEZUELAN

Great Britain and Venezuela refer their dis-
pute as to boundaries to friendly arbitration."
A despatch dated February 23, 1895, from
Great Britain's Foreign Office to the English
ambassador at Washington, stated that on the
twenty-fifth day of January, 1895, our ambas-
sador, Mr. Bayard, had, in an official interview,
referred to the boundary controversy, and said
"that his Government would gladly lend their
good offices to bring about a settlement by
means of an arbitration." The despatch fur-
ther stated that Mr. Bayard had thereupon
been infomied that her Majesty's Government
had expressed their willingness to submit the
question, within certain limits, to arbitration,
but could not agree to the more extensive ref-
erence on which the Venezuelan Government
insisted; that Mr. Bayard called again on the
twentieth day of February, when a memoran-
dum was read to him concerning the situation
and a map shown him of the territory in dis-
pute; that at the same time he was informed
that the Venezuelans had recently made an ag-
gression upon the territory of English occupa-
tion, and, according to report, ill-treated some
of the colonial police stationed there, and that

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 89

it was the boundary defined by the Schomburgk
line which had thus been violated in a marked
manner by the Venezuelans.

This despatch concludes as follows :

On Mr. Bayard's observing that the United
States Government was anxious to do anything
in their power to facilitate a settlement of the
difficulty by arbitration, I reminded his Excel-
lency that although Her Majesty's Government
were ready to go to arbitration as to a certain
portion of the territory which I had pointed out
to him, they could not consent to any departure
from the Schomburgk line.

It now became plainly apparent that a new
stage had been reached in the progress of our
intervention, and that the ominous happenings
embraced within a few months had hastened
the day when we were challenged to take our
exact bearings, lest we should miss the course
of honor and national duty. The more direct
tone that had been given to our despatches con-
cerning the dispute, our more insistent and em-
phatic suggestion of arbitration, the serious
reference to the subject in the President's mes-

90

THE VENEZUELAN

^sage, the significant resolution passed by Con-
gress earnestly recommending arbitration, all
portended a growth of conviction on the part
of our Government concerning this contro-
versy, which gave birth to pronounced disap-
pointment and anxiety when Great Britain,
concurrently with these apprising incidents, re-
peated in direct and positive terms her refusal
to submit to arbitration except on condition
that a portion of the disputed territory which
Venezuela had always claimed to be hers
hould at the outset be irrevocably conceded to
England.
/ During a period of more than fourteen years
our Government, assuming the character of a
mutual and disinterested friend of both coun-
tries, had, with varying assiduity, tendered its
good offices to bring about a pacific and amica-
ble settlement of this boundary controversy,
only to be repelled with more or less civility by
Great Britain. We had seen her pretensions
in the disputed regions widen and extend in
such manner and upon such pretexts as seemed
to constitute an actual or threatened violation
.1 of a doctrine which our nation long ago estab-
\^</tjished, declaring that the American continents

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY qi

are not to be considered subjects for future '***
colonization by any European power; and de-
spite all this we had, nevertheless, hoped, dur-
ing all these years, that arrangement and
accommodation between the principal parties
would justify us in keeping an invocation of
that doctrine in the background of the discus-
sion. Notwithstanding, however, all our ef-
forts to avoid it, we could not be unmindful
of the conditions which the progress of events
had created, and whose meaning and whose ex-
igencies inexorably confronted us. England
had finally and unmistakably declared that all
the territory embraced within the Schomburgk
line was indisputably hers. Venezuela pre-
sented a claim to territory within the same
limits, w.hich could not be said to lack strong
support. England had absolutely refused to
permit Venezuela's claim to be tested by arbi-
tration; and Venezuela was utterly powerless
to resist by force England's self-pronounced
decree of ownership. If this decree was not
justified by the facts, and it should be enforced
against the protest and insistence of Venezuela
and should result in the possession and coloni-
zation of Venezuelan territory by Great Brit- \ \ ^

0

92

THE VENEZUELAN

ain, it seemed quite plain that the American
doctrine which denies to European powers the
\ j colonization of any part of the American con-
tinent would be violated.

If the ultimatimi of Great Britain as to her
claim of territory had SLpptaxcd to us so thor-
oughly supported upon the facts as to admit of
small doubt, we might have escaped the respon-
sibility of insisting on an observance of the
Monroe Doctrine in the premises, on our own
account, and have still remained the disinter-
ested friend of both countries, merely content-
ing ourselves with benevolent attempts to
reconcile the disputants. We are, however, far
from discovering such satisfactory support in
the evidence within our reach. On the con-
trary, we believe that the effects of our acqui-
escence in Great Britain's pretensions would
amount to a failure to uphold and maintain a
principle universally accepted by our Govern-
ment and our people as vitally essential to our
national integrity and welfare. The arbitra-
tion, for which Venezuela pleaded, would have
adjudged the exact condition of the rival
claims, would have forever silenced Vene-
zuela's complaints, and would hare displaced

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

93

^ J

by conclusive sentence our unwelcome doubts
and suspicions; but this Great Britain had re-
fused to Venezuela, and thus far had also
denied to us.

Recreancy to a principle so fundamentally
American as the Monroe Doctrine, on the part
of those charged with the administration of
our Government, was of course out of the ques-
tion. Inasmuch, therefore, as all our efforts to
avoid its assertion had miscarried, there was
nothing left for us to do consistently with
national honor but to take the place of Vene-
zuela in the controversy, so far as that was /
necessary, in vindication of our American -^
doctrine. Our mild and amiable proffers of
good offices, and the hopes we indulged that
at last they might be the means of securing to
a weak sister republic peace and justice, and
to ourselves immunity from sterner interpo-
sition, were not suited to the new emergency.
In the advanced condition of the dispute, sym-
pathy with Venezuela and solicitude for her
distressed condition could no longer constitute
the motive power of our conduct, but these
were to give way to the duty and obligation
of protecting our own national rights.

94

THE VENEZUELAN

Mr. Gresham, who since the fourth day of
March, 1893, had been our Secretary of State,
died in the latter days of May, 1895. His
love of justice, his sympathy with every cause
that deserved sympathy, his fearless and dis-
interested patriotism, and his rare mental en-
dowments, combined to make him a noble
American and an able advocate of his country's
honor. To such a man every phase of the
Venezuelan boundary dispute strongly ap-
pealed; and he had been conscientiously dili-
gent in acquainting himself with its history
and in considering the contingencies that might
arise in its future development. Though his
death was most lamentable, I have always con-
sidered it a providential circumstance that the
Government then had among its Cabinet offi-
cers an exceptionally strong and able man, in
every way especially qualified to fill the vacant
place, and thoroughly familiar with the pend-
ing controversy — which seemed every day to
bring us closer to momentous duty and
responsibility.

Mr. Olney was appointed Secretary of State^
early in June, 1895 ; and promptly thereafter,
at the suggestion of the President, he began,

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

95

with characteristic energy and vigor, to make
preparation for the decisive step which it
seemed should no longer be delayed.

The seriousness of the business we had in
hand was fully understood, and the difficulty or
impossibility of retracing the step we contem-
plated was thoroughly appreciated. The ab-
solute necessity of certainty concerning the
facts which should underlie our action was, of
course, perfectly apparent. Whatever our be-
liefs or convictions might be, as derived from
the examination we had thus far given the
case, and however strongly we might be per- .
suaded that Great Britain's pretensions could V
not be conceded consistently with our mainte-
nance of the Monroe Doctrine, it would, never-
theless, have been manifestly improper and
heedless on our part to find conclusively
against Great Britain, before soliciting her ,
again and in new circumstances to give us
an opportunity to judge of the merits of
her claims through the submission of them to
arbitration.

It was determined, therefore, that a commu-
nication should be prepared for presentation 0
to the British Government through our ambas-

0

96 THE VENEZUELAN

sador to England, detailing the progress and
incidents of the controversy as we appre-
hended them, giving a thorough exposition of
the origin of the Monroe Doctrine, and the rea-
sons on which it was based, demonstrating our
interest in the controversy because of its rela-
tion to that doctrine, and from our new stand-
point and on our own account requesting Great
Britain to join Venezuela in submitting to ar-
bitration their contested claims to the entire
territory in dispute.

This was accordingly done; and a despatch
to this effect, dated July 20, 1895, was sent
by Mr. Olney to her Majesty's Government
through Mr. Bayard, our ambassador.

The Monroe Doctrine may be abandoned ;
we may forfeit it by taking our lot with na-
tions that expand by following un-American
ways; we may outgrow it, as we seem to be
outgrowing other things we once valued; or
it may forever stand as a guaranty of protec-
tion and safety in our enjoyment of free in-
stitutions; but in no event will this American
principle ever be better defined, better defend-
ed, or more bravely asserted than was done by
Mr. Olney in this despatch.

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

97

After referring to the various incidents of
the controversy, and stating the conditions then
existing, it was declared :

The accuracy of the foregoing analysis of the
existing status cannot, it is believed, be chal-T
lenged. It shows that status to be such, that
those charged with the interests of the United
States are now forced to determine exactly what
those interests are and what course of action
they require. It compels them to decide to what
extent, if any, the United States may and should
intervene in a controversy between, and primarily
concerning, only Great Britain and Venezuela,
and to decide how far it is bound to see that the
integrity of Venezuelan territory is not impaired
by the pretensions of its powerful antagonist. J

After an exhaustive explanation and vindi-
cation of the Monroe Doctrine, and after as-
serting that aggressions by Great Britain on
Venezuelan soil would fall within its purview,
the despatch proceeded as follows :

J

While Venezuela charges such usurpation,
Great Britain denies it; and the United States,
until the merits are authoritatively ascertained,

\

^

98 THE VENEZUELAN

can takes sides with neither. But while this is so,
— while the United States may not under existing
circumstances at least, take upon itself to say
which of the two parties is right and which is
wrong, — it is certainly within its right to demand
that the truth be ascertained. Being entitled to
resent and resist any sequestration of Venezuelan
soil by Great Britain, it is necessarily entitled to
know whether such sequestration has occurred
or is now going on. ... It being clear, therefore,
that the United States may legitimately insist
upon the merits of the boundary question being
determined, it is equally clear that there is but
one feasible mode of determining them, viz.,
peaceful arbitration.

The demand of Great Britain that her right
to a portion of the disputed territory should be
acknowledged as a condition of her consent to
arbitration as to the remainder, was thus
characterized :

It is not perceived how such an attitude can be
defended, nor how it is reconcilable with that
love of justice and fair play so eminently charac-
teristic of the English race. It in effect deprives
Venezuela of her free agency and puts her under

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

y

99

virtual duress. Territory acquired by reason of
it will be as much wrested from her by the
strong hand as if occupied by British troops or
covered by British fleets.

The despatch, after directing the presenta-
tion to Lord Salisbury of the views it con-
tained, concluded as follows :

They call for a definite decision upon the point
whether Great Britain will consent or decline to
submit the Venezuelan boundary question in its
entirety to impartial arbitration. It is the earnest
hope of the President that the conclusion will be
on the side of arbitration, and that Great Britain
will add one more to the conspicuous precedents
she has already furnished in favor of that wise
and just mode of settling international disputes.
If he is to be disappointed in that hope, however,
a result not to be anticipated, and in his judgment
calculated to greatly embarrass the future rela-
tions between this country and Great Britain, —
it is his wish to be made acquainted with the fact
at such early date as will enable him to lay the
whole subject before Congress in his next annual
message.

VI

The reply of Great Britain to this commu-
nication consisted of two despatches addressed
/ by Lord SaHsbury to the British ambassador
at Washington for submission to our Govern-
ment. Though dated the twenty-sixth day of
November, 1895, these despatches were not
presented to our State Department until a
number of days after the assemblage of the
Congress in the following month. In one of
these communications Lord Salisbury, in deal-
ing with the Monroe Doctrine and the right or
propriety of our appeal to it in the pending
controversy, declared: "The dangers which
t were apprehended by President Monroe have
Jl no relation to the state of things in which we
live at the present day." He further declared :

But the circumstances with which President
Monroe was dealing and those to which the pres-
ent -American Government is addressing itself
have very few features in common. Great Britain
is imposing no ''system" upon Venezuela and is

100

\)

4 ■> -> J

^ It >

J J
J '

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY' '"' loi

not concerning herself in any way with the nature ^
of the political institutions under which the Vene-
zuelans may prefer to live. But the British
Empire and the Republic of Venezuela are
neighbors, and they have differed for some time
past, and continue to differ, as to the line by
which their dominions are separated. It is a
controversy with which the United States have
no apparent practical concern. . . .The disputed
frontier of Venezuela has nothing to do with any >|,
of the questions dealt with by President Monroe.

His Lordship, in commenting upon our posi-
tion as developed in Mr. Olney's despatch, de-
fined it in these terms : "If any independent
American state advances a demand for terri-
tory of which its neighbor claims to be the
owner, and that neighbor is a colony of an
European state, the United States have a right
to insist that the European state shall submit
the demand and its own impugned rights to
arbitration." -*

I confess I should be greatly disappointed
if I believed that the history I have attempted
to give of this controversy did not easily and
promptly suggest that this definition of our

It t
'* * • ^ *

' *. •

l^

102 '*tHE VENEZUELAN

contention fails to take into account some of
its most important and controlling features.

Speaking of arbitration as a method of ter-
minating international differences, Lord Salis-
bury said :

It has proved itself valuable in many cases,
but it is not free from defects which often
operate as a serious drawback on its value. It
is not always easy to find an arbitrator who is
competent and who, at the same time, is wholly
free from bias ; and the task of insuring compli-
ance with the award when it is made is not
exempt from difficulty. It is a mode of settlement
of which the value varies much according to the
nature of the controversy to which it is applied
and the character of the litigants who appeal to it.
Whether in any particular case it is a suitable
method of procedure is generally a delicate and
difficult question. The only parties who are
competent to decide that question are the two

Z' parties whose rival contentions are in issue. The

f claim of a third nation which is unaffected by the

cf^ controversy to impose this particular procedure

I on either of the two others cannot be reasonably

I justified and has no foundation in the law of

V nations.

Immediately following this statement his

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

103

¥

Lordship again touched upon the Monroe Doc- *!

trine for the purpose of specifically disclaiming ^

its acceptance by her Majesty's Government as \ IS^' "^ ft•^>*'

a sound and valid principle. He says : -Aa^w^H

It must always be mentioned with respect, on i hjk

account of the distinguished statesman to whom it I ^

is due and the great nation who have generally >o)

adopted it. But international law is founded on
the general consent of nations ; and no statesman,
however eminent, and no nation, however, power-
ful, are competent to insert into the code of inter-
national law a novel principle which was never
recognized before, and which has not since been
accepted by the Government of any other country.
The United States have a right, like any other
nation, to interpose in any controversy by which
their own interests are affected; and they are
the judge whether those interests are touched
and in what measure they should be sustained.
But their rights are in no way strengthened or
extended by the fact that the controversy affects
some territory which is called American.

In concluding this despatch Lord Salisbury
declared that her Majesty's Government ''fully
concur with the view which President Monroe

J * ^

104 THE VENEZUELAN

apparently entertained, that any disturbance
of the existing territorial distribution in that
hemisphere by any fresh acquisitions on the
> part of any European state would be a highly
inexpedient change. But they are not prepared
to admit that the recognition of that expedi-
ency is clothed with the sanction which belongs
to a doctrine of international law. They are
not prepared to admit that the interests of the
United States are necessarily concerned in any
frontier dispute which may arise between any
two of the states who possess dominions in the
Western Hemisphere; and still less can they
accept the doctrine that the United States are
entitled to claim that the process of arbitration

; shall be applied to any demand for the sur-
render of territory which one of those states

\f\ I may make against another."

The other despatch of Lord Salisbury, which
accompanied the one upon which I have com-
mented, was mainly devoted to a statement of
facts and evidence on Great Britain's side in
the boundary controversy ; and in making such
statement his Lordship in general terms desig-
nated the territory to which her Majesty's Gov-
ernment was entitled as being embraced within

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

105

the lines of the most extreme claim which she
had at any time presented. He added :

A portion of that claim, however, they have ^
always been willing to waive altogether ; in regard
to another portion they have been and continue
to be perfectly ready to submit the question of
their title to arbitration. As regards the rest,
that which lies within the so-called Schomburgk
line, they do not consider that the rights of Great
Britain are open to question. Even within that
line they have on various occasions offered to
Venezuela considerable concessions as a matter
of friendship and conciliation and for the purpose
of securing an amicable settlement of the dispute.
If, as time has gone on, the concessions thus
offered have been withdrawn, this has been the
necessary consequence of the gradual spread over
the country of British settlements, which Her
Majesty's Government cannot in justice to the
inhabitants offer to surrender to foreign rule.

/

In conclusion his Lordship asserts that his
Government has

repeatedly expressed their readiness to submit to /
arbitration the conflicting claims of Great Britain
and Venezuela to large tracts of territory which

I06 THE VENEZUELAN

' i * from their auriferous nature are known to be of
almost untold value. But they cannot consent to
entertain, or to submit to the arbitration of an-
other power or of foreign jurists however emi-
nent, claims based on the extravagant pretensions
of Spanish officials in the last century and in-
volving the transfer of large numbers of British
subjects, who have for many years enjoyed the
settled rule of a British colony, to a nation of
different race and language, whose political sys-
tem is subject to frequent disturbance, and whose
institutions as yet too often afford very inade-
*r I quate protection to life and property.

These despatches exhibit a refusal to admit
such an interest in the controversy on our part
as entitled us to insist upon an arbitration for
the purpose of having the line between Great
Britain and Venezuela established ; a denial of
^ such force or meaning to the Monroe Doctrine
<^ as made it worthy of the regard of Great Brit-
ain in the premises; and a fixed and continued
determination on the part of her Majesty's
y Government to reject arbitration as to any
territory included within the extended Schom-
urgk line. They further indicate that the
existence of gold within the disputed territory

e^^-

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

107

had not been overlooked; and they distinctly

put forward the colonization and settlement by

English subjects in such territory, during more

than half a century of dispute, as creating a

claim to dominion and sovereignty, if not \ \t I f

strong enough to override all question of right

and title, at least so clear and indisputable as to

be properly considered as above and beyond the '

contingencies of arbitration.

If we had been obliged to accept Lord Salis-
bury's estimate of the Monroe Doctrine, and
his ideas of our interest, or rather want of in-
terest, in the settlement of the boundary be- ^y^
tween Great Britain and Venezuela, his
despatches would have certainly been very de-
pressing. It would have been unpleasant for
us to know that a doctrine which we had sup-
posed for seventy years to be of great value
and importance to us and our national safety \ ( f H
was, after all, a mere plaything with which we
might amuse ourselves ; and that our efforts to /
enforce it were to be regarded by Great Britain
and other European nations as meddlesome in-
terferences with affairs in which we could have
no legitimate concern.

The reply of the English Government to

lo8 THE VENEZUELAN

Mr. Olney's despatch, whatever else it accom-
phshed, seemed absolutely to destroy any hope
h ) ' uj) we might have entertained that, in our changed
* ^ ^^ position in the controversy and upon our inde-
pendent solicitation, arbitration might be con-
ceded to us. Since, therefore. Great Britain
was unwilling, on any consideration, to coop-
erate with Venezuela in setting on foot an in-
vestigation of their contested claim, and since
prudence and care dictated that any further
steps we might take should be proved to be as
»j^ fully justified as was practicable in the circum-
^Vi*^ stances, tfiere seemed to be no better way open

^K V"*^ ^fo us than to inaugurate a careful independent
^^ \^ investigation of the merits of the controversy.

iV/.^r

^V investis^ation of the merits of the controversy,

on our own motion, with a view of determining

as accurately as possible, for our own guid-

..»\\ ance, where the divisional line between the two

' ^^countries should be located.

Mr. Olney's despatch and Lord Salisbury's
/ reply were submitted to the Congress on the
seventeenth day of December, 1895, accompa-
nied by a message from the President.

In this message the President, after stating
Lord Salisbury's positions touching the Mon-
roe Doctrine, declared :

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

109

Without attempting extended argument in re*^
ply to these positions, it may not be amiss to
suggest that the doctrine upon which we stand
is strong and sound, because its enforcement is
important to our peace and safety as a nation, and
is essential to the integrity of our free institutions
and the tranquil maintenance of our distinctive
form of government. It was intended to apply to
every stage of our national life, and cannot be-
come obsolete while our Republic endures. If
the balance of power is justly a cause for jealous
anxiety among the governments of the Old World
and a subject for our absolute non-interference,
none the less is the observance of the Monroe
Doctrine of vital concern to our people and their r
Government.

Speaking of the claim made by Lord Salis- /
bury that this doctrine had no place in interna- j f
tional law, it was said in the message : *'The j
Monroe Doctrine finds its recognition in those!
principles of international law which are based/
upon the theory that every nation shall have its'
rights protected and its just claims enforced." ^

Referring to the request contained in Mr.
Olney's despatch that the entire boundary zox\-y

no THE VENEZUELAN

troversy he submitted to arbitration, the fol-
lowing language was used :

It will be seen from the correspondence here-
with submitted that this proposition has been
/Trxieclined by the British Government upon grounds
V^which in the circumstances seem to me to be far
from satisfactory. It is deeply disappointing
that such an appeal, actuated by the most friendly
feelings toward both nations directly concerned,
addressed to the sense of justice and to the
magnanimity of one of the great powers of the
world, and touching its relations to one compara-
tively weak and small, should have produced no
better results.
r^ The course to be pursued by this Government
in view of the present condition does not appear
to admit of serious doubt. Having labored faith-
^ fully for many years to induce Great Britain to
submit their dispute to impartial arbitration, and
having been finally apprised of her refusal to do
so, nothing remains but to accept the situation, to
recognize its plain requirements, and deal with it
accordingly. Great Britain's present proposition
has never thus far been regarded as admissible
by Venezuela, though any adjustment of the
boundary which that country may deem for her

U

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

III

advantage and may enter into of her own free
will cannot, of course, be objected to by the
United States. Assuming, however, that the
attitude of Venezuela will remain unchanged, the
dispute has reached such a stage as to make it
now incumbent upon the United States to take
measures to determine with sufficient certainty /((
for its justification what is the true divisional line ^i»
between the Republic of Venezuela and British
Guiana. The inquiry to that end should, of
course, be conducted carefully and judicially; and
due weight should be given to all available evi-
dence, records, and facts in support of the claims
of both parties.

After recommending to the Congress an ade- ■
quate appropriation to meet the expense of a
commission v\^hich should make the suggested
investigation and report thereon with the least
possible delay, the President concluded his
message as follows :

y^

^

When such report is made and accepted, it will,

in my opinion, be the duty of the United States to yj)v

resist by every means in its power, as a wilful ag- --»

gression upon its rights and interests, the appro- ^

^

112 THE VENEZUELAN

y;

J

priation by Great Britain of any lands or the

exercise of governmental jurisdiction over any

territory which after investigation we have deter-

» ^ -»rnined of right belongs to Venezuela.

\ M I In making these recommendations I am fully

alive to the responsibility incurred, and keenly

^v^ii/^ realize all the consequences that may follow.

I am, nevertheless, firm in my conviction that

\H while it is a grievous thing to contemplate the two

4^ great English-speaking peoples of the world as

being otherwise than friendly competitors in the

|yy/v^ onward march of civilization, and strenuous and

worthy rivals in all the arts of peace, there is no

calamity which a great nation can invite which

equals that which follows a supine submission to

wrong and injustice, and the consequent loss of

national self-respect and honor, beneath which

are shielded and defended a people's safety and

^ ' * \Lj^reatness.

The recommendations contained in this mes-
sage were acted upon with such promptness
and unanimity that on the twenty-first day of
December, 1895, four days after they were
submitted, a law was passed by the Congress
^^ — -^authorizing the President to appoint a com-
" ^mission ''to investigate and report upon the

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

113

true divisional line between the Republic of ^
Venezuela and British Guiana," and making an /
ample appropriation to meet the expenses of its J
work. w

On the first day of January, 1896, five of
our most able and distinguished citizens were
selected to constitute the commission ; and they
immediately entered upon their investigation.
At the outset of their labors, and on the fif-
teenth day of January, 1896, the president of
the commission suggested to Mr. Olney the
expediency of calling the attention of the Gov-
ernments of Great Britain and Venezuela to
the appointment of the commission, adding:
"It may be that they would see a way entirely
consistent with their own sense of international
propriety to give the Commission the aid that
it is no doubt in their power to furnish in the
way of documentary proof, historical narra-
tive, unpublished archives, or the like." This
suggestion, on its presentation to the Gov-
ernment of Great Britain, was met by a most
courteous and willing offer to supply to our
commission every means of information touch-
ing the subject of their investigation which
was within the reach of the English authori-/

J

i

114 THE VENEZUELAN

ties; and at all times during the labors of
the commission this offer was cheerfully
fulfilled.

In the meantime, and as early as February,
1896, the question of submitting the Venezue-
lan boundary dispute to mutual arbitration was
again agitated between the United States and
Great Britain.

Our ambassador to England, in a note to
Lord Salisbury, dated February 27, 1896, after
speaking of such arbitration as seeming to be
^'almost unanimously desired by both the
United States and Great Britain," proposed,
in pursuance of instructions from his Govern-
ment, "an entrance forthwith upon negotia-
tions at Washington to effect this purpose, and
that Her Majesty's Ambassador at Washing-
ton should be empowered to discuss the ques-
tion at that capital with the Secretary of State."
He also requested that a definition should be
given of "settlements" in the disputed territory
which it was understood her Majesty's Goy-
ernment desired should be excluded from the
proposed submission to arbitration.

Lord Salisbury, in his reply to this note,
dated March 3, 1896, said:

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY nc

\

The communications which have already passed
between Her Majesty's Government and that of
the United States have made you acquainted with
the desire of Her Majesty's Government to bring
the difference between themselves and the Repub-
lic of Venezuela to an equitable settlement. They
therefore readily concur in the suggestion that
negotiations for this purpose should be opened at
Washington without unnecessary delay. I have
accordingly empowered Sir Julian Pauncefote to
discuss the question either with the representa-
tive of Venezuela or with the Government of the
United States acting as the friend of Venezuela^/

With this transfer of treaty negotiations to~,
Washington, Mr. Olney and Sir Julian Paunce- ^
fote, the ambassador of Great Britain to thisl
country, industriously addressed themselves to^
the subject. The insistence of Great Britain
that her title to the territory within the
Schomburgk line should not be questioned,
was no longer placed by her in the way of sub-
mitting the rights of the parties in the entire
disputed territory to arbitration. She still in-
sisted, however, that English settlers long in
the occupancy of any of the territory in con-
troversy, supposing it to be under British do-

^

lie THE VENEZUELAN

minion, should have their rights scrupulously
considered. Any difference of view that arose
from this proposition was adjusted without se-
rious difficulty, by agreeing that adverse hold-
ing or prescription during a period of fifty
years should make a good title, and that the
arbitrators might deem exclusive political con-
trol of a district, as well as actual settlement,
sufficient to constitute adverse holding or to
make title by prescription.

On the loth of November, 1896, Mr. Olney
addressed a note to the president of the com-
mission which had been appointed to investi-
gate the boundary question on behalf of our
Government, in which he said: ''The United
States and Great Britain are in entire accord
as to the provisions of a proposed treaty be-
tween Great Britain and Venezuela. The
treaty is so eminently just and fair as re-
spects both parties — so thoroughly protects the
rights and claims of Venezuela — that I cannot
conceive of its not being approved by the Vene-
zuelan President and Congress. It is thor-
oughly approved by the counsel of Venezuela
here and by the Venezuelan Minister at this
Capital." In view of these conditions he sug-

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 117

gested a suspension of the work of the
commission.

The treaty was signed at Washington by the
representatives of Great Britain and Vene-
zuela on the second day of February, 1897.
No part of the territory in dispute was reserved
from the arbitration it created. It was dis-
tinctly made the duty of those appointed to
carry out its provisions, *'to determine the
boundary-line between the Colony of British
Guiana and the United States of Venezuela."

The fact must not be overlooked that, not-
withstanding this treaty was promoted and ne-
gotiated by the officers of our Government, the
parties to it were Great Britain and Vene-
zuela. This was a fortunate circumstance, in-
asmuch as the work accomplished was thus
saved from the risk of customary disfigure-
ment at the hands of the United States Senate, v/

The arbitrators began their labors in the
city of Paris in January, 1899, and made their
award on the third day of October in the
same year.

The line they determined upon as the boun-
dary-line between the two countries begins in
the coast at a point considerably south and

Q

J

Il8 THE VENEZUELAN

'^^ east of the mouth of the Orinoco River, thus
giving to Venezuela the absolute control of
that important waterway, and awarding to her
valuable territory near it. Running inland, the
line is so located as to give to Venezuela quite
a considerable section of territory within the
Schomburgk line. This results not only in the
utter denial of Great Britain's claim to any
territory lying beyond the Schomburgk line,
but also in the award to Venezuela of a part
of the territory which for a long time England
had claimed to be so clearly hers that she
i\! f would not consent to submit it to arbitration.
^ < * Thus, we have made a laborious and patient

journey through the incidents of a long dis-
V pute, to find at last a peaceful rest. As we
look back over the road we have traversed, and
view again the incidents we have passed on our
way, some may be surprised that this contro-
versy was so long chronic, and yet, in the end,
yielded so easily to pronounced treatment. I

/ know that occasionally some Americans of a
certain sort, who were quite un-American when
the difficulty was pending, have been very fond
of lauding the extreme forbearance and kind-
ness of England toward us in our so-called

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY 119

belligerent and ill-advised assertion of Ameri- .
can principle. Those to whom this is a
satisfaction are quite welcome to it. )|)||

My own surprise and disappointment have ''*
arisen more from the honest misunderstanding
and the dishonest and insincere misrepresen- ^ \

tation, on the part of many of our people, xM^"^

regarding the motives and purposes of the in- ^
terference of the Government of the United
States in this affair. Some conceited and dog-
gedly mistaken critics have said that it was
dreadful for us to invite war for the sake of a
people unworthy of our consideration, and for
the purpose of protecting their possession of
land not worth possessing. It is certainly
strange that any intelligent citizen, professing
information on public affairs, could fail to see
that when we aggressively interposed in this
controversy it was because it was necessary in
order to assert and vindicate a principle dis-
tinctly American, and in the maintenance of
which the people and Government of the
United States were profoundly concerned. It
was because this principle was endangered, and
because those charged with administrative re- \\\\\
sponsibility would not abandon or neglect it, * « * * * ♦

^

i

120 THE VENEZUELAN

that our Government interposed to prevent any
yi ^ further colonization of American soil by a Eu-

4^ »- ropean nation. In these circumstances neither

* the character of the people claiming the soil

as against Great Britain, nor the value of the
lands in dispute, was of the least consequence
to us; nor did it in the least concern us which
of the two contestants had the best title to any
part of the disputed territory, so long as Eng-
land did not possess and colonize more than
belonged to her — however much or however
little that might be. But we needed proof
of the limits of her rights in order to determine
our duty in defense of our Monroe Doctrine;
and we sought to obtain such proof, and to
secure peace, through arbitration.

But those among us who most loudly repre-
hended and bewailed our vigorous assertion of
the Monroe Doctrine were the timid ones who
feared personal financial loss, or those engaged
in speculation and stock-gambling, in buying
much beyond their ability to pay, and generally
in living by their wits. The patriotism of
such people traverses exclusively the pocket
nerve. They are willing to tolerate the Mon-
roe Doctrine, or any other patriotic principle,

BOUNDARY CONTROVERSY

121

\J

I

\

SO long as it does not interfere with their plans,
and are just as willing to cast it off when it
becomes troublesome. ^"T^

But these things are as nothing when /
weighed against the sublime patriotism and de- / /
votion to their nation's honor exhibited by the
great mass of our countrymen — the plain
people of the land. Though, in case of the last
extremity, the chances and suffering of con-
flict would have fallen to their lot, nothing
blinded them to the manner in which the in-
tegrity of their country was involved. Not
for a single moment did their Government
know the lack of their strong and stalwart
support.

I hope there are but few of our fellow-citi-
zens who, in retrospect, do not now acknowl-
edge the good that has come to our nation
through this episode in our history. It has es-
tablished the Monroe Doctrine on lasting foun-
dations before the eyes of the world; it has
given us a better place in the respect and con-
sideration of the people of all nations, and es-
pecially of Great Britain ; it has again confirmed
our confidence in the overwhelming prevalence
among our citizens of disinterested devotion

J

122 THE VENEZUELAN

to American honor; and last, but by no means
least, it has taught us where to look in the
ranks of our countrymen for the best
patriotism.

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