In view of the interests of the United States and of its relation to the Washington Conventions, appeal against this situation has long since been made to this Government by a majority of the Central American republics. There is now added the appeal, through the revolution, of a great body of the Nicaraguan people.

Two Americans who, this Government is now convinced were officers connected with the revolutionary forces, and therefore entitled to be dealt with according to the enlightened practice of civilized nations, have been killed by direct order of President Zelaya. Their execution is said to have been preceded by barbarous cruelties. The consulate at Managua is now officially reported to have been menaced. There is thus a sinister culmination of an administration also characterized by a cruelty to its own citizens which has, until the recent outrage, found vent in the case of this country in a succession of petty annoyances and indignities which many months ago made it impossible to ask an American minister longer to reside at Managua. From every point of view it has evidently become difficult for the United States further to delay more active response to the appeals so long made to its duty to its citizens, to its dignity, to Central America, and to civilization.

The Government of the United States is convinced that the revolution represents the ideas and the will of a majority of the Nicaraguan people more faithfully than does the government of President Zelaya, and that its peaceable control is well-nigh as extensive as that hitherto so sternly attempted by the government at Managua.

There is now added the fact, as officially reported from more than one quarter, that there are already indications of a rising in the western. provinces in favor of a presidential candidate intimately associated with the old régimé. In this it is easy to see new elements tending toward a condition of anarchy which leaves, at a given time, no definite responsible source to which the Government of the United States could look for reparation for the killing of Messrs. Cannon and Groce, or, indeed, for the protection which must be assured American citizens and American interests in Nicaragua.

In these circumstances the President no longer feels for the government of President Zelaya that respect and confidence which would make it appropriate hereafter to maintain with it regular diplomatic relations, implying the will and the ability to respect and assure what is due from one state to another.

The Government of Nicaragua, which you have hitherto represented,

is hereby notified, as will be also the leaders of the revolution, that the Government of the United States will hold strictly accountable for the protection of American life and property the factions de facto in control of the eastern and western portions of the Republic of Nicarauga.

As for the reparation found due, after careful consideration, for the killing of Messrs. Groce and Cannon, the Government of the United States would be loth to impose upon the innocent people of Nicarauga a too heavy burden of expiating the acts of a régimé forced upon them, or to exact from a succeeding government, if it have quite different policies, the imposition of such a burden..

Into the question of ultimate reparation there must enter the question of the existence at Managua of a government capable of responding to demands. There must enter also the question how far it is possible to reach those actually responsible and those who perpetrated the tortures reported to have preceded the execution, if these be verified; and the question whether the government be one entirely dissociated from the present intolerable conditions and worthy to be trusted to make impossible a recurrence of such acts, in which case the President, as a friend of your country, as he is also of the other republics of Central America, might be disposed to have indemnity confined to what was reasonably due the relatives of the deceased and punitive only in so far as the punishment might fall where really due.

In pursuance of this policy, the Government of the United States will temporarily withhold its demand for reparation, in the meanwhile taking such steps as it deems wise and proper to protect American interests.

To insure the future protection of legitimate American interests, in consideration of the interest of the majority of the Central American republics, and in the hope of making more effective the friendly offices exerted under the Washington conventions, the Government of the United States reserves for further consideration at the proper time the question of stipulation, also that the constitutional government of Nicaragua obligate itself by convention, for the benefit of all the governments concerned, as a guarantee for its future loyal support of the Washington conventions and their peaceful and progressive aims.

From the foregoing it will be apparent to you that your office of chargé d'affaires is at an end. I have the honor to inclose your passports for use in case you desire to leave this country. I would add at the same time that, although your diplomatic quality is terminated, I shall be happy to receive you, as I shall be happy to receive the repre

sentative of the revolution, each as the unofficial channel of communication between the Government of the United States and the de facto authorities to whom I look for the protection of American interests pending the establishment in Nicaragua of a government with which the United States can maintain diplomatic relations.

Accept, sir, the renewed assurances of my high consideration.

Felipe Rodriguez, Esquire, etc., etc., etc.

P. C. KNOX.

NOTE OF THE SECRETARY OF STATE OF THE UNITED STATES INVITING THE REPUBLICS OF AMERICA TO A PAN-AMERICAN CONGRESS.

Mr. Blaine to Mr. Osborn.1

DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, November 29, 1881.

Sir: The attitude of the United States with respect to the question of general peace on the American continent is well known through its persistent efforts for years past to avert the evils of warfare, or, these efforts failing, to bring positive conflicts to an end through pacific counsels or the advocacy of impartial arbitration. This attitude has been consistently maintained, and always with such fairness as to leave no room. for imputing to our government any motive except the humane and disinterested one of saving the kindred states of the American continent from the burdens of war. The position of the United States as the leading power of the New World might well give to its governinent a claim to authoritative utterance for the purpose of quieting discord among its neighbors, with all of whom the most friendly relations exist. Nevertheless, the good offices of this government are not and have not at any time been tendered with a show of dictation or compulsion, but only as exhibiting the solicitous good-will of a common friend.

For some years past a growing disposition has been manifested by certain states of Ceneral and South America to refer disputes affecting grave questions of international relationship and boundaries to arbitration rather than to the sword. It has been on several such occasions a source of profound satisfaction to the Government of the United States to see that this country is in a large measure looked to by all the American powers as their friend and mediator. The just and impartial counsel

1 For Rel. of U. S., 1881, p. 13.

of the President in such cases has never been withheld, and his efforts have been rewarded by the prevention of sanguinary strife or angry contentions between peoples whom we regard as brethren.

The existence of this growing tendency convinces the President that the time is ripe for a proposal that shall enlist the good-will and active cooperation of all the states of the western hemisphere, both north and south, in the interest of humanity and for the common weal of nations. He conceives that none of the governments of America can be less alive than our own to the dangers and horrors of a state of war, and especially of war between kinsmen. He is sure that none of the chiefs of governments on the continent can be less sensitive than he is to the sacred duty of making every endeavor to do away with the chances of fratricidal strife. And he looks with hopeful confidence to such active assistance from them as will serve to show the broadness of our common humanity and the strength of the ties which bind us all together as a great and harmonious system of American commonwealths.

Impressed by these views, the President extends to all the independent countries of North and South America an earnest invitation to partici pate in a general congress to be held in the city of Washington on the 24th day of November, 1882, for the purpose of considering and discussing the methods of preventing war between the nations of America. He desires that the attention of the congress shall be strictly confined to this one great object; that its sole aim shall be to seek a way of permanently averting the horrors of cruel and bloody combat between countries, oftenest of one blood and speech, or the even worse calamity of internal commotion and civil strife; that it shall regard the burdensome and far-reaching consequences of such struggles, the legacies of exhausted finances, of oppressive debt, of onerous taxation, of ruined cities, of parayzed industries, of devastated fields, of ruthless conscription, of the slaughter of men, of the grief of the widow and the orphan, of embittered resentments, that long survive those who provoked them and heavily afflict the innocent generations that come after.

The President is especially desirous to have it understood that, in putting forth this invitation, the United States does not assume the position of counseling, or attempting, through the voice of the congress, to counsel any determinate solution of existing questions which may now divide any of the countries of America. Such questions can not properly come before the congress. Its mission is higher. It is to provide for the interests of all in the future, not to settle the individual differences of the present. For this reason especially the President has indicated a day

for the assembling of the congress so far in the future as to leave good ground for hope that by the time named the present situation on the South Pacific coast will be hapilly terminated, and that those engaged in the contest may take peaceable part in the discussion and solution of the general question affecting in an equal degree the well-being of all.

It seems also desirable to disclaim in advance any purpose on the part of the United States to prejudge the issues to be presented to the congress. It is far from the intent of this government to appear before the congress as in any sense the protector of its neighbors or the predestined and necessary arbitrator of their disputes. The United States will enter into the deliberations of the congress on the same footing as the other powers represented, and with the loyal determination to approach any proposed solution, not merely in its own interest, or with a view to asserting its own power, but as a single member among many coordinate and coequal states. So far as the influence of this government may be potential, it will be exerted in the direction of conciliating whatever conflicting interests of blood, or government, or historical tradition may necessarily come together in response to a call embracing such vast and diverse elements.

You will present these views to the minister of foreign relations of the Argentine Republic, enlarging, if need be, in such terms as will readily occur to you, upon the great mission which it is within the power of the proposed congress to accomplish in the interest of humanity, and upon the firm purpose of the United States to maintain a position of the most absolute and impartial friendship towards all. You will thereupon, in the name of the President of the United States, tender to His Excellency the President of the Argentine Republic, a formal invitation. to send two commissioners to the congress, provided with such powers and instructions on behalf of their government as will enable them to consider the questions brought before that body within the limit of submission contemplated by this invitation. The United States, as well as the other powers, will, in like manner, be represented by two commissioners, so that equality and impartiality will be amply secured in the proceedings of the congress.

In delivering this invitation through the minister of foreign affairs, you will read this dispatch to him and leave with him a copy, intimating that an answer is desired by this government as promptly as the just consideration of so important a proposition will permit.

I am, &c.,

JAMES G. BLAINE.