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"Mr. Forsyth to Chevalier de Argaiz, 12th December,
1839." U.S. Congress. House. Africans Taken in the Amistad. 26th Congress.,
1st sess., 1840.H. Doc. 185.
Mr. Forsyth to the Chevalier de Argaiz.
DEPARTMENT OF STATE,
Washington, December 12,1839.
The undersigned, Secretary of State of the United States, has the honor to acknowledge
the receipt of two notes addressed to him on the 1st and 26th of last month, by the
Chevalier de Argaiz, envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of Spain; the
one complaining of delay in the decision of the Government of the United States on
his application for the surrender of the schooner Amistad, her cargo, and the negroes
found on board; and the other, claiming the agency of the Executive in the defence
of Don Jose Ruiz, in a civil suit against him, now pending before a court of law
in the city of New York, and the security of the United States in a bail-bond for
his release from arrest in the suit referred to.
[27]
In the note which the undersigned addressed to Mr. Calderon de la Barca on the
16th September last, he stated that the application for the delivery of the "Amistad,"
and the property found on board, had been submitted for the consideration of the
President, and that his decision would, as soon as received, be communicated to the
Spanish legation. In another note, of the 23d of the same month, calling for evidence
deemed useful in the examination of the questions arising from the case of the "Amistad,"
the minister of Spain might have found a proof that his application was receiving
all the notice and respect which was due to the source from which it emanated; and
it was hoped that, in the various conversations which have since taken place with
the Chevalier de Argaiz at this department, on the same subject, he would have discovered
additional evidence of the desire of the United States Government to do justice to
the demand and representations addressed to it in the name of that of Spain, as fully
and as promptly as the peculiar character of the claim admitted. From the repeated
communications of the Chevalier de Argaiz, pressing for the disposal of the question;
from his reiterated offer of suggestions as to the course by which he deems it incumbent
upon this Government to arrive at a final decision; and from the arguments in support
of those suggestions, which the undersigned does not perceive the utility of combating
at the present stage of the transaction; the Government of the United States cannot
but perceive with regret that the Chevalier de Argaiz has not formed an accurate
conception of the true character of the question, nor of the rules by which, under
the constitutional institutions of the country, the examination of it must be conducted;
nor a correct appreciation of the friendly disposition towards Her Catholic Majesty's
Government, with which that examination was so promptly entered upon. In connexion
with one of the points in the Chevalier de Argaiz's last note, the undersigned will
assure him that, whatever be, in the end, the disposal of the question, it will be
in consequence of a decision emanating from no other source than the Government of
the United States; and that, if the agency of the judicial authority shall have been
employed in conducting the investigation of the case, it is because the judiciary
is, by the organic law of the land, a portion, though an independent one, of that
Government
As to the delay which already has attended, and still may attend, a final decision,
and which the Chevalier de Argaiz considers as a legitimate subject of complaint,
it arises from causes which the undersigned believes that it would serve no useful
purpose to discuss at this time, further than to say that they are beyond the control
of this department, and that it is not apprehended that they will affect the course
which the Government of the United States may think it fit ultimately to adopt.
The undersigned indulges the hope that, upon a review of the circumstances of the
case, and of the questions it involves, the Chevalier de Argaiz will agree with him
in thinking that the delay which has already occurred is not more than commensurate
with the importance of those questions; that such delay is not uncommon in the proceedings
and deliberations of Governments desirous of taking equal justice as the guide of
their actions; and that the caution which it has been found necessary to observe
in the instance under consideration, is yet far from having occasioned such procrastination
as it has been the lot of the United States frequently to encounter in their intercourse
with the Government of Spain.
[28]
With regard to the imprisonment of Don Jose Ruiz, it is again the misfortune of
this Government to have been entirely misapprehended by the Chevalier de Argaiz,
in the agency it has had in this, an entirely private concern of a Spanish subject.
It was no more the intention of this department, in what has already been done, to
draw the Chevalier de Argaiz into a polemical discussion with the attorney of the
United States for the district of New York, than to supply Don Jose Ruiz, gratis,
with counsel in the suit in which he had been made a party. The offer made to that
person of the advice and assistance of the district attorney, was a favor--an entirely
gratuitous one--since it was not the province of the United States to interfere in
a private litigation between subjects of a foreign state, for which Mr. Ruiz is indebted
to the desire of this Government to treat with due respect the application made in
his behalf in the name of Her Catholic Majesty, and not to any right he ever had
to be protected against alleged demands of individuals against him or his property.
And in communicating to the Chevalier de Argaiz the legal opinion of the district
attorney, this department had no other object or expectation than to produce in his
mind, by arguments founded upon the laws both of this country and of Spain, a conviction
that this Government can no more grant the request set up in behalf of Don Jose Ruiz
than it could undertake to decide upon the legality of the claim preferred against
him by the plaintiffs in the suit which occasioned his imprisonment.
In support of his application for Executive intervention in the liberation of Don
Jose Ruiz, the Chevalier de Argaiz quotes the 7th article of the treaty of 1795 between
the United States and Spain; and then puts the following questions, which the undersigned
will answer by stating the facts as they have come to his knowledge:
Have Messrs. Montes and Ruiz received in the United States "all favor, protection,
and help?"
Have they been detained, or not?
Have they, or not, in any manner been prevented from leaving the ports or roads of
the United States?
Have they been allowed to remove or depart when and as they pleased, without any
let or hindrance?
Messrs. Ruiz and Montes were first found near the coast of the United States, deprived
of their property and of their freedom, suffering from lawless violence in their
persons, and in imminent and constant danger of being deprived of their lives also.
They were found in this distressing and perilous situation by officers of the United
States, who, moved towards them by sympathetic feeling, which subsequently became,
as it were, national, immediately rescued them from personal danger, restored them
to freedom, secured their oppressors that they might abide the consequences of the
acts of violence perpetrated upon them, and placed under the safeguard of the laws
all the property which they claimed as their own, to remain in safety until the competent
authority could examine their title to it, and pronounce upon the question of ownership,
agreeably to the provisions of the 9th article of the treaty of 1795.
[29]
From the moment of their liberation, they were left perfectly free to remain in
the United States, to visit any part of the country, or to depart from it, without
let or hindrance, as their business or inclination might suggest. Their property
was under the protection of this Government, and its authority acknowledged by the
legation of Her Catholic Majesty; and if they chose to continue in the State into
which they were first conducted, or to travel into other States, they remained under
the ordinary protection of the laws of the United States, the benefits of which have
not been, and will not be, denied to them. And in proof of this, one of them, Don
Pedro Montes, is no longer within American jurisdiction.
All the stipulations in the 7th article of the treaty have been fulfilled by the
agents of the United States, in all that regards the personal rights of those two
Spanish subjects, with a promptitude, fidelity, and kindness, in which they were
supported and approved by public sentiment, so far as it lay in their power to enforce
them; and no cause of dissatisfaction would have arisen in that respect, had they
not deferred availing themselves of their freedom to leave the country until arrested,
at the suit of individuals, alleging against them private claims, which constitutes,
in the eye of the law of the land, liabilities; the extent and validity of which
can only be determined by a court of competent jurisdiction. To such a court, and
for such a purpose, the plaintiffs have resorted; and if the proceedings of that
court have been according to law, and the same as if the parties defending were citizens
of the United States, nothing is perceived in those proceedings which can be justly
made a subject of complaint against the Government of the United States, under existing
treaties. Among the powers within the competency of the court before which the case
is pending, is that of releasing the defendant from actual imprisonment, upon his
giving the usual security, not for the payment of the damages claimed by the plaintiffs,
but merely for his appearance to abide the decision of the court. If Mr. Ruiz, relying
upon other protection, has declined availing himself of the only one which the law
provides and places within his own reach, the hardship he suffers, and of which the
Chevalier de Argaiz complains in his behalf, is in some degree voluntary, and can
only be made to cease when he shall himself apply the proper remedy, or when the
tribunal shall, by due course of legal proceedings, have arrived at a judgment, which
the undersigned has no doubt will ultimately answer all the demands of justice. If
the proceedings against Mr. Ruiz shall be found to have been unwarranted by the existing
law, all the meddling persons who can be shown to have been parties to his imprisonment
are [ ]erable to him, by the laws of the country; and proper remuneration will be,
no doubt, obtained, if he chooses to resort to the tribunals to enforce his claims
upon them.
The undersigned cannot conclude this communication without calling the attention
of the Chevalier de Argaiz to the fact, that, with the single exception of the vexatious
detention to which Messrs. Montes and Ruiz have been subjected in consequence of
the civil suit instituted against them, all the proceedings in the matter, on the
part of both the executive and judicial branches of the Government, have had their
foundation in the assumption that those persons alone were the parties aggrieved;
and that their claim to the surrender of the property was founded in fact and in
justice. This circumstance alone, independently of those above stated should, in
the opinion of the undersigned, have been sufficient to convince the Chevalier de
Argaiz that the condition of Messrs. Ruiz and Montes had, like the interposition
of Her Catholic Majesty's Government in their behalf, found every proper degree of
favor and consideration at the hands of the United States Government.
[30]
The undersigned avails himself of the occasion to renew to the Chevalier de Argaiz assurances of his distinguished consideration.
JOHN FORSYTH.
The Chevalier DE ARGAIZ, &c.
