150 



CONGRESS. (THE PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE.) 



were several citizens of the United States, who were 

 either convicted by a military court and sentenced 

 to death, imprisonment, or fine, or were deported 

 without (rial. The United States, while denying 

 protection to such as had taken the Hawaiian oath 

 of allegiance, insisted that martial law, though 

 altering the forms of justice, could not supersede 

 justice itself, and demanded stay of execution until 

 the proceedings had been submitted to this Govern- 

 ment and knowledge obtained therefrom that our 

 citizens had received fair trial. The death sen- 

 tences were subsequently commuted or were re- 

 mitted on condition of leaving the islands. The 

 cases of certain Americans arrested and expelled 

 by arbitrary order without formal charge or trial 

 have had attention, and in some instances have 

 been found to justify remonstrance- and a claim 

 for indemnity, which Hawaii has not thus far con- 

 ceded. 



Mr. Thurston, the Hawaiian minister, having 

 furnished this Government abundant reason for 

 asking that he be recalled, that course was pursued, 

 and his successor has lately been received. 



The deplorable lynching of several Italian labor- 

 ers in Colorado was naturally followed by inter- 

 national representations, and I am happy to say 

 that the best efforts of the State in which the out- 

 rages occurred have been put forth to discover and 

 Sunish the authors of this atrocious crime. The 

 ependent families of some of the unfortunate vic- 

 tims invite by their deplorable condition gracious 

 provision for their needs. 



These manifestations against helpless aliens may 

 be traced through successive stages to the vicious 

 padroni system, which, unchecked by our immigra- 

 tion and contract-labor statutes, controls these 

 workers from the moment of landing on our shores, 

 and farms them out in distant and often rude re- 

 gions, where their cheapening competition in the 

 fields of bread-winning toil brings them into col- 

 lision with other labor interests. While welcoming, 

 as we should, those who seek our shores to merge 

 themselves in our body politic and win personal 

 competence by honest effort, we can not regard such 

 assemblages of distinctively alien laborers, hired 

 out in the mass to the profit of alien speculators 

 and shipped hither and thither as the prospect of 

 gain may dictate, as otherwise than repugnant to 

 the spirit of our civilization, deterrent to individual 

 advancement, and hindrances to the building up of 

 stable communities resting upon the wholesome 

 ambitions of the citizen and constituting the prime 

 factor in the prosperity and progress of our nation. 

 If legislation- can reach this growing evil, it cer- 

 tainly should be attempted. 



Japan has furnished abundant evidence of her 

 vast gain in every trait and characteristic that con- 

 stitutes a nation's greatness. We have reason for 

 congratulation in the fact that the Government of 

 the United States, by the exchange of liberal treaty 

 stipulations with the new Japan, was the first to 

 recognize her wonderful advance and to extend to 

 her the consideration and confidence due to her 

 national enlightenment and progressive character. 



The boundary dispute which lately threatened to 

 embroil Guatemala and Mexico has happily yielded 

 to pacific counsels, and its determination has, by 

 the joint agreement of the parties, been submitted 

 to the sole arbitration of the United States minister 

 to Mexico. 



The commission appointed under the convention 

 of Feb. 18, 1889, to s<-r new monuments along the 

 boundary IK-I ween the United States and Mexico 

 ipleted its task. 



! to the failure of a scheme for the 

 colonization in Mexico of negroes, mostly emigrants 

 from Alabama under contract, a great number of 



these helpless and suffering people, starving and 

 smitten with contagious disease, made their way or 

 were assisted to the frontier, where, in wretched 

 plight, they were quarantined by the Texas author- 

 ities. Learning of their destitute condition, I di- 

 rected rations to be temporarily furnished them 

 through the War Department. At the expiration 

 of their quarantine they were conveyed by the rail- 

 way companies at comparatively nominal rates to 

 their homes in Alabama, upon my assurance, in the 

 absence of any fund availiable for the cost of their 

 transportation, that I would recommend to ( Y>n- 

 gress an appropriation for its payment. I now 

 strongly urge upon Congress the propriety of mak- 

 ing such an appropriation. It should be remem- 

 bered that the measures taken were dictated not 

 only by sympathy and humanity, but by a convic- 

 tion that it was not compatible with the dignity of 

 this Government that so large a body of our' de- 

 pendent citizens should be thrown for relief upon 

 the charity of a neighboring State. 



In last year's message I narrated at some length 

 the jurisdictional questions then freshly arisen in 

 the Mosquito Indian strip of Nicaragua. Since 

 that time, by the voluntary act of the Mosquito 

 nation, the territory reserved to them has been in- 

 corporated with Nicaragua, the Indians formally 

 subjecting themselves to be governed by the gen- 

 eral laws and regulations of the republic instead 

 of by their own customs and regulations, and thus 

 availing themselves of a privilege secured to them 

 by the treaty between Nicaragua and Great Britain 

 of Jan. 28, 1860. 



After this extension of uniform Nicaraguan ad- 

 ministration to the Mosquito strip, the case of the 

 British vice consul, Hatch, and of several of his 

 countrymen who had been summarily expelled 

 from Nicaragua and treated with considerable in- 

 dignity, provoked a claim by Great Britain upon 

 Nicaragua for pecuniary indemnity, which, upon 

 Nicaragua's refusal to admit liability, was enforced 

 by Great Britain. While the sovereignty and juris- 

 diction of Nicaragua was in no way questioned by 

 Great Britain, the former's arbitrary conduct in re- 

 gard to British subjects furnished the ground for 

 this proceeding. 



A British naval force occupied without resistance 

 the Pacific seaport of Corinto, but was soon after 

 withdrawn upon the promise that the sum de- 

 manded would be paid. Throughout this incident 

 the kindly offices of the United States were invoked 

 and were employed in favor of as peaceful a settle- 

 ment and as much consideration and indulgence 

 toward Nicaragua as were consistent with the na- 

 ture of the case. Our efforts have since been made 

 the subject of appreciative and grateful recognition 

 by Nicaragua. 



The coronation of the Czar of Russia at Moscow 

 in May next invites the ceremonial participation of 

 the United States, and in accordance with usage 

 and diplomatic propriety our minister to the im- 

 perial court has been directed to represent our 

 Government on the occasion. 



Correspondence is on foot touching the practice 

 of Russian consuls within the jurisdiction of the 

 United States to interrogate citizens as to their 

 race and religious faith, and upon ascertainment 

 thereof to deny to Jews authentication of passports 

 or legal documents for use in Russia. Inasmuch as 

 such a proceeding imposes a disability, which in the 

 case of succession to property in Russia may be 

 found to infringe the treaty rights of our citizens, 

 and which is an obnoxious invasion of our territorial 

 jurisdiction, it has elicited fitting remonstrance, the 

 result of which it is hoped will remove the cause of 

 complaint. 



The pending claims of sealing vessels of the 



