DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE AND FOREIGN RELATIONS. 



241 



persons who may have Buffered by the seizure or by 

 tin- drtriition. 



oaderabrned avails himself of this occasion to 



I, ..]../ Roberts the renewed assurance 

 of hia hik'lu'st consideration. 



HAMILTON FISH, Secretary of Stnto. 

 Sefior Don M. LOPEZ BODKRTS, etc., etc. 



On tbo 27th of April following, the vessel 

 cleased. Shortly afterward the Spanish 

 : -iinu-nt agreed that the claim of the own- 

 < iinli-iiinity for the improper detention 

 of the vessel should be submitted to two cora- 

 IH r-i, one appointed by onch government, 

 with power to select an umpire. The com- 

 missioners met and agreed upon an award in 

 favor of the claimants. This award was 

 promptly paid by the Spanish Government, 

 :m<l the case closed to the satisfaction of the 

 1'uited States Government. 



^\itturalised Citizens of the United States in 

 Cuba. The arrest and imprisonment of Gabriel 

 Sunn-/ del Villar, United States citizen by natu- 

 ralization, at Trinidad do Cuba, gave rise to 

 the following instructions of the Secretary and 

 Assistant Secretary of State as to the status 

 of naturalized citizens of the United States in 

 the country of their nativity, and to the true 

 interpretation of the doctrine asserted by Mr. 

 Maroy in the case of Martin Kosta. The letters 

 are given in full : 



DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Miy 8, 1870. 



I have to acknowledge the receipt of your dispatch 

 No. 80, stating that in several cases native-born 

 Cubans, after having been naturalized as citizens 

 of the United States, have returned to Cuba, have 

 resided there permanently without disclosing the 

 change in their allegiance, and in some cases have 

 accepted offices that can only be held by Spanish 

 subjects ; and asking instructions to guide you in 

 such cases, should your official interference be asked. 

 In reply I have to say that it is manifestly impossible 

 to lay down rules to govern your proceedings in every 

 such case that may arise. 



Naturalized and native-born citizens are entitled to 

 the same protection from the Government when in a 

 foreign country; and both in such case are ordinarily 

 subject to the laws of such country, and are bound to 

 observe such laws to the same extent to which its own 

 citizens or subjects are bound. 



If they reside in such foreign country so as to be- 

 come domiciled there, they further take upon them- 

 selves the duties and obligations toward the govern- 

 ment of that country which attach to permanent 

 residents. 



It is also possible for a naturalized citizen, by re- 

 turning to hU native country and residing there with 

 an evident intent to remain, or by accepting offices 

 there inconsistent with his adopted citizenship, or by 

 concealing for a length of time the fact of his natu- 

 ralization, and passing himself as a citizen of his 

 native country, until occasion may make it his interest 

 to ask the intervention of the country of his adop- 

 tion, or in other ways which may show an intent to 

 abandon his acquired rights, to so far resume his 

 original allegiance as to absolve the government of 

 his adopted country from the obligation to protect him 

 as a citizen while no remains in his native land. 



In the cases that may come before you, you must 

 exercise a sound discretion in determining whether 

 each applicant for your interference has in good faith 

 maintained his allegiance to the United States, as- 

 sured that this Department will sustain you so long 

 as you adhere to the principles of this instruction. 



I am, etc., etc., HAMILTON FISH. 



VOL. x. 16 A 



On May 12th the Department addressed the 

 consul at 'Trinidad as follows: 



DEPABTHEirr or STATE, ) 

 WASHIKOTOJC, May 12, 1869. f 



Sin : Your dispatch No. 6, enclosing copies of 

 correspondence between yourself and the Governor 

 of Trinidad do Cuba, relative to the arrest and de- 

 tention of four certain persons, all of Spanish origin, 

 who (you claimed) were entitled to your oiliciul 

 intervention, has been received. 



It appears that, in April last, Jose 1 M. Valdespino, 

 Rafael Vingut, Gabriel Suaroz del Villar, and Fran- 

 cisco do Yrurugorri. were arrested by order of the 

 authorities at Trinidad de Cuba; that you interfered 

 in their behalf, asking for the motives of ' their 

 arrest,' claiming, as vice-consul of the United States, 

 that they were American citizens ; that correspond- 

 ence in regard to this claim ensued, in the course 

 of which you forwarded to the governor copies of the 

 naturalization papers of each of these gentlemen: 

 that the governor replied to this that he had examined 

 the papers forwarded by you, and it appeared that 

 only Mr. Suarez del Villar was a naturalized citizen 

 of the United States, and that each of the other 

 gentlemen had only declared his intention to become 

 such citizen ; that the governor thereupon conceded 

 that Mr. Suarez del Vular was entitled to the pre- 

 rogatives of United States citizenship, unless he bad 

 broken the laws of Cuba, or had renounced his 

 adopted citizenship; and that. as to the three other 

 persons, the governor demanded to know_ whether 

 you still claimed for them the rights of citizens of 

 the United States ; that you replied, reasserting the 

 right of these gentlemen to your official intervention 

 and protection (referring to the case of Martin 

 Kpsta), and further saying that the case was sub- 

 mitted to your Government, and you must abide by 

 its decision ; and that the governor replied, reassert- 

 ing his position, and denying the applicability of the 

 Kosta precedent. 



In reply, now, to your dispatch, I have to say 

 that your action touching Mr. Gabriel Suarez del 

 Villar is approved, and that your action in regard to 

 the other gentlemen named in the correspondence is 

 not approved. 



The late distinguished Secretary of State, Mr. 

 Marcy, was very careful, in his elaborate letter con- 

 cerning the case of Martin Kosta, not to commit this 

 Government to the obligation or to the propriety of 

 using the force of the nation for the protection of 

 foreign-born persons who, after declaring their in- 

 tention to become at some future time citizens of the 

 United States, leave its shores to return to their 

 native country. He showed clearly that Kosta had 

 been expatriated by Austria, and required to reside 

 outside her jurisdiction ; that at the time of his 

 seizure he was not on Austrian soil, or where Austria 

 could claim him by treaty stipulations ; that the 

 seizure was an act of lawless violence, which every 

 law-abiding man was entitled to resist ; and he took 

 especial care to insist that the case was to be judged, 

 not by the municipal laws of the United States, not 

 by the local laws of Turkey, not by the conventions 

 between Turkey and Austria, but by the great prin- 

 ciples of international law. It is true that in the 

 concluding part of that masterly dispatch he did say 

 that a nation might at its pleasure clothe with the 

 rights of its nationality persons not citizens, who 

 were permanently domiciled in its borders. But it 

 will be observed by the careful reader of that letter 

 that this portion is supplemental merely to the main 

 line of the great argument, and that the Secretary 

 rests the right of the Government to clothe the indi- 

 vidual with the attributes of nationality, not upon 

 the declaration of intention to become a citizen } out 

 upon the permanent domicile of the foreigner within 

 the country. 



To extend this principle beyond the careful limita- 

 tion put upon it by Secretary Marcy would be dan- 

 gerous to tha peace of the country. It has been* 



