PORTER, Assistant Secretary to Messrs. A. S. Lazarus & Co, October 31, 1885

Mr. Porter to Messrs. A. S. Lazarus & Co.

Gentlemen: Your letter of the 26th instant has been received. You therein ask whether the recent proclamation of the President of the United States of Colombia, declaring that on and after December 1, 1880, import duties will be levied on imports into Aspinwall (Colon) and Panama “is not in contravention of treaties now existing between this country and that Republic.”

In response I inclose a printed copy of the treaty of 1846 between the United States and New Granada, now Colombia. You will perceive that the thirty-fifth article thereof stipulates that citizens of the United States shall have in the territory of the interoceanic transit—

“All the exemptions, privileges, and immunities concerning commerce and navigation, which are now or may hereafter been enjoyed by Granadian citizens, their vessels, and merchandise”; that this equality of treatment extends to the transit, and, further, “that no other tolls or charges shall be levied or collected upon the citizens of the United States, or their said merchandise thus passing over any road or canal that may be made by the Government of New Granada, or by the authority of the same, than is under like circumstances levied upon and collected from the Granadian citizens; that any lawful produce, manufactures, or merchandise, belonging to citizens of the United States, thus passing from one sea to the other, in either direction for the purpose of exportation to any other foreign country, shall not be liable to any import duties whatever, or, having paid such duties, they shall be entitled to drawback upon their exportation,” &c.

From this it is seen that there is no treaty obligation to make Colon and Panama free ports; that the guarantee of the treaty is limited to equal treatment of American goods with those of native Colombians or of the most favored nation, with an exemption from customs duties in the case of merchandise, &c., passing over the transit to countries beyond.

Should the collection of duties on imports into Colombia at Aspinwall and Panama be enforced in such a way as to hamper the stipulated free transit this Government would feel bound to complain.

I am, &c.,