466 



MEXICO. 



guarantee the security of the respective na- 

 tionalities, and to assure the payment of ar- 

 rears. 



The condition of the country continued most 

 deplorahle. The defeated Church party con- 

 stantly endeavored to upset the existing govern- 

 ment at any cost, and without any regard to the 

 means employed. A prominent method was to 

 stir up the people against foreigners. At the 

 Batne time the roads throughout the country, and 

 even the streets of the capital, were infested 

 by plunderers whom the leaders of the Church 

 party did not hesitate to call their friends. 

 The murders and torturings which took place 

 were the work of men led by Marquez, a noted 

 partisan and the chief hope of the priests, and 

 the same who murdered the American physi- 

 cian at Tacubaya. When the Clerical party 

 exercised power, exactions, arbitrary acts, and 

 failures were the order of the day in Mexico. 

 Spain, nevertheless, entered no complaint, and 

 made no effort to provoke intervention against 

 Miramon and his friends, who made forced 

 levies of Spanish subjects for military service, 

 with a view to compel them to purchase their 

 liberty by paying a ransom. To-day it is on 

 Miramon she relies, and it is by the aid of the 

 Clerical party she wishes to open access to the 

 country. 



That party, out of power, encouraged the tur- 

 bulence and anarchy which were the basis of 

 those complaints that form the bond of the al- 

 liance against the existing liberal Government ; 

 and it is an extraordinary fact that the United 

 States Administration, having recognized Juarez 

 as the constitutional President, and made trea- 

 ties with him, with the full knowledge and un- 

 derstanding that he is exerting himself to restore 

 order and, in a manner more personally disin- 

 terested than any former ruler of Mexico, to 

 extend trade and develop the national resources, 

 should, by mere internal circumstances arising 

 out of its own political affairs, be obliged to 

 practically abandon the Monroe doctrine, and 

 yield its acquiescence to a coalition to over- 

 throw that constitutional Government, in the 

 interest of that Church party, to the barbarism 

 and superstition of which are owing nearly all 

 the evils that afflict that unhappy country. 



The American Government, itself struggling 

 for constitutional existence, must witness the 

 onslaught upon a neighboring constitutional 

 government, and in derogation of that princi- 

 ple cherished in every American bosom. 



The immediate causes of complaints on the 

 part of the three nations may be summed, up 

 thus : England and France had specially to make 

 good their money claims, and to protest against 

 the decree of the 23d of August last, imposing 

 a tax of 10 per cent, on all fortunes exceeding 

 a capital of $2,000. France had besides to ask 

 satisfaction for an attack on the person of her 

 Charge d" 1 Affaires, M. Dubois de Saligna. The 

 Mexican Government replied that, as regards 

 that unfortunate affair, it set on foot an inquiry 

 as soon as the fact of the violence was com- 



municated to it by the foreign Ministers, and 

 that it was ready to communicate with the 

 parties interested concerning the resets of the 

 inquiry. 



On her part, Spain claimed to have been at- 

 tacked in the person of several of her subjects, 

 who were assassinated, without the Mexican 

 Government having taken measures to punish 

 the murderers ; but she did not state whether 

 the blame of the killing or maltreating of her 

 subjects lay at the door of the present Govern- 

 ment or the one that preceded it. 



England, juster in her legitimate resentment, 

 does not saddle Juarez with the responsibility 

 of the appropriation by Mexican generals of 

 moneys under convoy, to the detriment of Eng- 

 land's own agents ; but, like France, she con- 

 fines herself to claiming proper treatment for 

 the foreigners resident in Mexico, the efficacious 

 protection of the local authorities, and the pay- 

 ment of arrears. 



The three Governments, being in accord as to 

 their claims and determination respecting them, 

 and having escaped all former difficulties in the 

 way, growing out of the rights and interests of 

 the United States, proceeded to form an alliance. 

 A European journal, on Sept. 27, remarked : 

 " It will be said that these three European pow- 

 ers have taken advantage of the dissensions of 

 the North American Union to carry out plans 

 Avhich verge upon a violation of the Monroe 

 doctrine. For years, it will be argued, the 

 Mexicans have been cheating, and insulting, and 

 robbing Englishmen, but as long as the United 

 States existed in their integrity, and a quick- 

 tempered democracy was on the watch for an 

 excuse for a quarrel with England, we abstain- 

 ed from avenging ourselves. But now that the 

 hands of the Americans are turned against each 

 other in a fratricidal contest, the league which 

 Lord Aberdeen and M. Guizot were foiled in 

 making sixteen years ago is revived, and " the 

 American balance of power" is sought to be 

 established by a joint expedition of the monar- 

 chies of Europe. 



" This is a plausible objection, but it lias no 

 solid basis. The full assent of the American 

 President has been given to the expedition." 



The negotiation of the three powers proceed- 

 ed, but it was not until the 21st of October 

 that the treaties were signed. These were as 

 follows : 



Convention between Her Majesty, the Queen of Spain, 

 and the. Emperor of the French, relative to combined 

 operations against Mexico. 



Her Majesty the Queen of the .United Kingdom of 

 Great Britain and Ireland, Her Majesty the Queen of 

 Spain, and His Majesty the Emperor of the French, 

 feeling themselves compelled, by the arbitrary and 

 vexatious conduct of the authorities of the Republic 

 of Mexico, to demand from those authorities more ef- 

 ficacious protection for the persons and properties of 

 their subjects, as well as a fulfillment of the obligations 

 contracted towards their Majesties by the Republic of 

 Mexico, have agreed to conclude a convention, with a 

 view to combine their common action, and, for this 

 purpose, have named as their Plenipotentiaries, that 

 is to say : 



