Excellent to Monsieur E. D. Bassett, July 17, 1875

Mr. Excellent to Mr. Bassett.

Mr. Minister: I have had the honor to receive the note which you addressed to me the 12th instant, in response to my dispatch of the 8th of the said month. I hastened to submit this note to the attention of my government, and I am authorized to make to you the following response:

You say, Mr. Minister, relative to the government’s legitimate demand for the delivery of Messieurs Boisrond Canal and his associates, that your Government, as you had already announced it to me, has authorized you to enter into negotiations upon this affair only and solely with the view of embarking these persons. To this effect you expose to me some considerations, and express reflections, which have had the serious attention of the government. Permit me at first, Mr. Minister, to cause to he observed to you that the several notes of the 28th ultimo, all treating of the same subject, having been remitted to me at the same time, I did not think it necessary to respond to them separately.

The government does not believe itself authorized to permit the embarkation of persons who have rendered themselves guilty of voluntary homicide (coupables de meurtres volontairement) and who are amenable to the laws of the country (lois intérievres.) In this is a question of morality which it believes itself obliged to defend, and in which ought to participate all the nations interested in the defense of social order.

The affair having been brought before the cabinet at Washington, it has not come to the knowledge of the government of Hayti, through our minister in the United States, that any decision has been taken by the Federal Government, which, on the contrary, announced that it had not the necessary information for pronouncing itself upon the affair. Before the government of Hayti can enter upon negotiations upon this affair, in the sense which you ask of it, it is necessary that the decision of the Federal Government should come to it from its minister at Washington. The circumstances infinitely regrettable which have moreover occurred have occasioned the measures which the government has taken to prevent the escape of several refugees whose presence at your house was kept secret (a été tué) during a mouth indeed after that one had demanded of you to declare if they were with you. Nevertheless the Haytian government comprehends too well its duties toward the agents of friendly powers not to give to them every guarantee relative to the immunities and the respect to which they have the right. As to your official residence in the country, I refer you to all that which I have already had the honor to say to you, especially to the formal assurances contained in my dispatch of the 8th instant. The Government of the United States, which observes before all peoples the prescriptions of international law, holding to that which must be observed in its own regard, cannot approve, as the Haytian government has the profound conviction that au American diplomatic agent should guard, during thirty days and more, refugees, armed it is said and guilty of homicide (coupables demeurtres,) without giving notice of it to the government near which he is accredited. I will not end, Mr. Minister, without expressing to you again how much in the question i which occupies us, the government believes founded the observations which it has addressed to you. Permit that I add a new assurance of the sincere desire which it . nourishes to seethe relations of Hayti with the United States continued with the same sympathy and the same cordiality which have always existed between them.

Be pleased to accept, Mr. Minister, the new assurance of my very high consideration.