Rochechouart to the Tsungli Yamen, April 6, 1875

Joint note of five ministers to the Tsungli Yamen.

The undersigned, representatives of England, Russia, the United States, Germany, and France, have considered with careful attention the two memoranda placed in their hands by the ministers of the Tsungli Yamen on the 11th March.

From the tone of these it is plain that some misconception exists regarding the relation of the undersigned to the Yamen in the late conferences regarding the Cuban question; some misapprehension also of the purport of what has fallen from the undersigned.

In November, 1873, the five legations of France, Germany, Great Britain, Russia, and the United States were invited by the Tsungli Yamen, and M. Otin, representative of Spain, to form a court of arbitration, on certain issues not very precisely stated, which were to be submitted to that court whenever the report of a Chinese commission, then about to proceed to Cuba, should be received by the Yamen.

It having become evident, when the commission returned in November, 1874, that much time must elapse before the arbitrators could be put in possession of the evidence to he laid before them, and that whenever a court should be formed its proceedings would he attended with much difficulty, and probably with little or no practical result, the two appellants were sounded as to possibility of some adjustment of their differences without submitting them to arbitration.

The Yamen was unprepared with any alternative course. Mr. Otin, after some deliberation, produced a draught-convention, which, with certain modifications suggested by the undersigned, they have recommended the Yamen to accept.

In recommending it, the undersigned were moved by the consideration that the object which the Chinese government professes to have specially at heart—a speedy amelioration of the status of the Chinese now in Cuba—would be at once commenced and gradually achieved; their protection against wrong in the time to come being at the same time provided for.

In their consideration of Mr. 0 tin’s draught-convention, and in their recommendation of it to the Yamen, the undersigned have been acting, not as arbitrators, but as mediators. As arbitrators they could have done nothing until the whole of the evidence was laid before them. Then, being duly advised of the particular issues on which their decision was desired, and being formally assured by both parties that, whatever might be the decision of the court of arbitration, it would be accepted as final, they would have proceeded to examine the evidence. So much for the relation of the undersigned to the two parties en litige.

Next, to the misapprehension on one or two points of the meaning of what they have said.

In their memoranda the ministers of the Yamen assume that the undersigned admit the truth of the evidence taken by the commission sent to Cuba. The undersigned have made no such admission, and could not have made it consistently with the duty which would have been imposed upon them as arbitrators.

There is a further assumption in the memoranda that the concessions made in Articles I, III, VII, and IX of the draught-convention have been made unconditionally, and that the undersigned are pledged with Mr. Otin to their accordance.

The ministers of the Yamen, in advancing this statement, evidently forget that the proposals laid by Mr. Otin before them form a whole, and can be considered as binding upon the Spanish representatives only if accepted in toto; the undersigned certainly have neither the power nor the right to press upon Mr. Otin what he declares his inability to concede.

As mediators, however, they feel bound to urge once more upon the Yamen the inexpediency of declining Mr. Otin’s convention.

By its acceptance—

• First. The quarrel between China and Spain, now open since 1872, is closed, and with it all question of the indemnity claimed by Spain.
• Secondly. The surrender of Spain’s treaty-right to engage laborers under contract in China puts an end to impressment by crimps and kidnapers, a result the ministers of the Yamen have repeatedly declared themselves very anxious to obtain.
• Thirdly. The condition that the Chinese laborer is henceforth to be a voluntary emigrant (proceeding to Cuba under the same conditions as Chinese now proceeding to California) guarantees immediate effort on the part of Cuba to remove causes of complaint.
• Fourthly. The provision that the form of contract under which henceforth Chinese are to engage themselves in Cuba shall be prepared in Peking, enables the Yamen to secure insertion of all reasonable conditions respecting the laborer’s term of service, his rate of wages, support, general treatment, and repatriation.
• Fifthly. The Chinese of condition now in Cuba are to be immediately repatriated, as also those whose infirmity incapacitates them for work.
• Sixthly. Chinese now detained under the vagrance laws by the local government, if they cannot be at once repatriated, are to be provided with fresh contracts to enable them to work out their repatriation at an improved rate of wages.
• Seventhly. The convention is intended to guarantee redress by law to any Chinese laborer ill treated by his employer, and the undersigned are authorized by Mr. Otin to state that such redress will be obtainable for all parties aggrieved in the future as well as in the past; and will not be confined, as the Yamen appears to believe, to those only who have already sent in petitions to the Chinese commission.
• Eighthly. The appointment of a consul insures to the Chinese plaintiff the assistance of his own authorities before the Spanish courts; the enforcement of the contract; the protection of the Chinese when uncontracted; and the denunciation and therefore speedy redress of defects and abuses in existing laws or regulations.

The Yamen’s memoranda draw special attention to the punishment of Chinese by their employers. The Spanish regulations admit the punishment by the employer only in the manner and under the circumstances mentioned in the annexed copy of articles 69 and 70 of the “Rules for the introduction of Chinese Colonists.”

It will therefore be the duty of the Chinese consul to watch over the enactment of the Spanish laws as far as his countrymen are concerned; and in the performance of this duty he will without doubt meet with the ready and effectual assistance of the Spanish authorities and courts of justice.

But the Yamen must not expect that the Chinese consul will be invested with powers, over his nationals not accorded to the consul of any other power represented in Cuba, or that rights will be granted to China which are not possessed by any other nation.

With regard to the measure of repatriation desired by the Yamen, the undersigned have been informed by Mr. Otin that he cannot go further than he has already done in his proposal laid before the Yamen.

It will therefore rest with the Chinese ministers to decide if, by insisting on a demand which they have not pressed in their negotiations with other powers, they are prepared to cause the present negotiations to be broken off, and to prolong a state of things in Cuba of which they complain, and with it those evils from which their countrymen are charged to be suffering, and which the ministers profess so strong an anxiety to alleviate.

The undersigned, in recommending once more the acceptance of the proposals of Mr. Otin as the only available way to arrive at a speedy and practical result, feel it their duty to inform the Yamen that unless by the acceptance of the proposed conventions as modified by the declarations contained in this note, and which Mr. Otin has expressed his readiness to accept, a practical basis is found for the continuation of the mediation, they are persuaded of the inutility of further negotiations in this direction, and are further of the opinion that arbitration, while it would consume much time, would leave the question still undecided as to the objects which the Yamen has most at heart.