Part 13

In response to the resolution of the Senate of January 23, 1900, requesting the President, "if in his opinion it is not incompatible with the public interest, to furnish the Senate with copies of the correspondence with the Republic of Colombia in relation to the Panama Canal and to the treaty between this Government and New Granada concluded December 12, 1846, not heretofore communicated," I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of State, with accompanying papers.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, March 27, 1900_.

_To the House of Representatives_:

In response to the resolution of the House of Representatives of March 24, 1900, reading as follows:

WHEREAS the commercial community of the United States is deeply interested in ascertaining the conditions which are to govern trade in such parts of the Chinese Empire as are claimed by various foreign powers to be within their "areas of interest"; and

WHEREAS bills are now pending before both Houses of Congress for the dispatch of a mission to China to study its economic condition: Therefore, be it

_Resolved_, That the President of the United States be requested to transmit to the House of Representatives, if not incompatible with the public service, such correspondence as may have passed between the Department of State and various foreign Governments concerning the maintenance of the "open door" policy in China,

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of State, with accompanying papers.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, April 2, 1900_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith a copy of a letter from Mr. Ferdinand W. Peck, Commissioner-General of the United States to the Paris Exposition of 1900, dated November 17, 1899, submitting a detailed statement of the expenditures incurred under authority of law.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _April 17, 1900_.

_To the House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of State in response to the resolution of the House of Representatives of March 23, 1900, calling for copies of any and all letters on file in the Department of State from citizens of the United States resident in the South African Republic from January 1, 1899, to the present time, making complaints of treatment by the South African Republic.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, May 3, 1900_.

_To the House of Representatives_:

I herewith return, without approval, House bill No. 4001, entitled "An act authorizing the rights of settlers on the Navajo Indian Reservation, Territory of Arizona." My objections to the bill are embodied in the following statement:

This tribe has a population of about 20,500 souls, of whom 1,000 dress in the manner of white men, 250 can read, and 500 use enough English for ordinary conversation. Last year they cultivated 8,000 acres, and possessed approximately 1,000,000 sheep, 250,000 goats, 100,500 cattle, 1,200 swine, and very considerable herds of horses and ponies.

Prior to January last the reservation, which is in the extreme northeastern portion of the Territory of Arizona, consisted of lands set apart for the use of these Indians under the treaty of June 1, 1863 (15 Stat., 667), and subsequent executive orders. On account of the conditions naturally prevailing in that section, the reservation, as then constituted, was altogether inadequate for the purpose for which it was set apart. There was not a sufficient supply of grass or water within its borders for the flocks and herds of the tribe, and in consequence more than one-third of the Indians were habitually off the reservation with their flocks and herds, and were in frequent contention and strife with whites over pasturage and water.

After most careful inquiry and inspection of the reservation as it then existed, and of adjacent land by efficient officers in the Indian service, the Commission of Indian Affairs, with the concurrence of the Secretary of the Interior, recommended that the limits of the reservation be extended westward so as to embrace the lands lying between the Navajo and Moqui Indian reservations on the east and the Colorado and Little Colorado Rivers and the Grand Canyon Forest Reserve on the west. This recommendation was supported by a very numerously signed petition from the white residents of that section, and also by a letter from the Governor of the Territory of Arizona, in which it was said:

I understand that a petition has been forwarded asking that the western limit be fixed at the Little Colorado River, as being better for all concerned and less liable to cause friction between the Indians and the whites. I earnestly hope that the prayer of the petitioners be granted, for the reason that the Little Colorado could be made a natural dividing line, distinct and well defined, and would extend the grazing territory of the Navajoes to a very considerable extent without seriously encroaching upon the interests of white settlers who have their property in that neighborhood.

I think great care should be exercised in questions of this nature because of possible serious friction which may occur if the interests of all concerned are not carefully protected.

The investigation which preceded this recommendation, and upon which it was in part based, showed that with the boundaries of the reservation thus extended the Indians would be able to obtain within the limits of the reservation sufficient grass and water for their flocks and herds, and the Government would therefore be justified in confining them to the reservation, thus avoiding the prior contention and friction between them and the whites.

It appearing that but little aid had been extended to these Indians by the Government for many years, that they had taken on habits of industry and husbandry, which entitled them to encouragement, and that it was neither just nor possible to confine them to the limits of a reservation which would not sustain their flocks and herds, an order was issued by me January 8 last, extending the reservation boundaries as recommended. The Indians have accepted this as an evidence of the good faith of the Government toward them, and it is now the belief of those charged with the administration of Indian affairs that further contention and friction between the Indians and whites will be avoided, if this arrangement is not disturbed.

The present bill proposes to open to miners and prospectors, and to the operation of the mining laws, a substantial portion of this reservation, including a part of the lands covered by the recent order. There has been no effort to obtain from the Indians a concession of this character, nor has any reason been presented why, if these lands are to be taken from them--for that will practically result from this bill, if it becomes a law, even though not so intended--it should not be done in pursuance of negotiations had with the Indians as in other instances.

The Indians could not understand how lands given to them in January as necessary for their use should be taken away without previous notice in May of the same year. While the Indians are the wards of the Government, and must submit to that which is deemed for their best interests by the sovereign guardian, they should, nevertheless, be dealt with in a manner calculated to give them confidence in the Government and to assist them in passing through the inevitable transition to a state of civilization and full citizenship. Believing that due consideration has not been given to the status and interests of the Indians, I withhold my approval from the bill.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, May 12, 1900_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

In reply to the resolution of the Senate, dated March 2, 1900, I send herewith copy of an order to the provost marshal general of Manila, dated March 8, 1900, and the various endorsements and reports thereon, whereby it appears that the traffic in wine, beer, and liquor in the city of Manila is now controlled under a rigidly enforced high-license system; that the number of places where the liquor is sold has greatly decreased; that all such places are required to be closed at 8:30 in the evening on week days and to be kept closed on Sundays, and that the orderly condition of the city compares favorably with cities of similar size in the United States.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _May 12, 1900_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

In response to a resolution of the Senate of April 11, 1900, reading as follows:

_Resolved_, That the President be, and is hereby, requested, if not incompatible with public interest, to inform the Senate whether persons have been executed in Puerto Rico by the Spanish method of garrote since he has been governing that country as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States; and if so, the President is requested to inform the Senate why this mode of execution was adopted.

I transmit herewith copies of reports from Brig.-Gen. George W. Davis, United States Volunteers, military governor of Puerto Rico, which contain the information called for.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, May 19, 1900_.

_To the Senate_:

In response to the following resolution of the Senate of April 28, 1900:

_Resolved_, That the President be, and he is hereby requested, if not incompatible with the public interest, to inform the Senate whether General Torres, one of the officers of the Philippine army, came to General Otis with a flag of truce on February 5, 1899, the day after the fighting commenced between our forces and those of the Filipinos, and stated to General Otis that General Aguinaldo declared that fighting had been begun accidentally, and was not authorized by him, and that Aguinaldo wished to have it stopped, and that to bring about a conclusion of hostilities he proposed the establishment of a neutral zone between the two armies of a width that would be agreeable to General Otis, so that during the peace negotiations there might be no further danger of conflict between the two armies, and whether General Otis replied that fighting having once begun, must go on to the grim end. Was General Otis directed by the Secretary of War to make such an answer? Did General Otis telegraph the Secretary of War on February 9, 1899, as follows: "Aguinaldo now applies for a cessation of hostilities and conference. Have declined to answer?" And did General Otis afterwards reply? Was he directed by the Secretary of War to reply, and what answer, if any, did he or the Secretary of War make to the application to cease fighting?

The President is also requested to inform the Senate whether the flag of the Philippine Republic was ever saluted by Admiral Dewey or any of the vessels of his fleet at any time since May 1, 1898. "Did Admiral Dewey, at the request of Aguinaldo, or any officer under him, send the vessels _Concord_ and _Raleigh_ to Subig Bay to assist Aguinaldo's forces in the capture of the Spanish garrison at that place? Did said vessels assist in the capture of the Spanish garrison, and after the capture did they turn the prisoners thus taken over to the Philippine forces?"

I herewith transmit a copy of a cable dispatch to General Otis, dated April 30, 1900, and of his reply, dated May 1, 1900.

General Otis was not directed by the Secretary of War to make such an answer as is set forth in the resolution, nor were any answers to communications upon the subject of the cessation of hostilities prescribed by the Secretary of War to General Otis, but he was left to exercise in respect thereof his own judgment, based upon his superior knowledge of the conditions surrounding the troops under his command.

I also transmit a copy of a cable dispatch from General Otis, sent from Manila February 8, 1899, received in Washington February 9, 1899, being the same dispatch to which he refers in his reply of May 1, 1900 as misleading. So far as I am informed, General Otis did not afterwards reply, except as set forth in his dispatch of May 1, 1900. He was not directed by the Secretary of War to reply, and no answer was made by him or the Secretary of War to an application to cease fighting. There appears to have been no such application.

I further transmit a copy of a letter from the Secretary of the Navy to Admiral George Dewey, dated May 14, 1900, and a copy of the Admiral's reply, dated May 17, 1900.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _May 22, 1900_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith a report from the Secretary of State, with accompanying papers, relative to the status of Chinese persons in the Philippine Islands.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _May 22, 1900_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:

I transmit herewith, for the information of Congress, a communication from the Secretary of Agriculture, forwarding a report on the progress of the beet-sugar industry in the United States during the year 1899. It embraces the observations made by a special agent on the various phases of the beet-sugar industry of the Hawaiian Islands; also the results of analyses of sugar-beets received by the Department of Agriculture from the different States and Territories, together with much other information relating to the sugar industry.

Your attention is invited to the recommendation of the Secretary of Agriculture that 20,000 copies of the report be printed for the use of the Department, in addition to such number as may be desired for the use of the Senate and House of Representatives.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, May 26, 1900_.

_To the Senate_:

I transmit herewith, in answer to the resolution of the Senate of May 22, 1900, a report from the Secretary of State showing that the consul of the United States at Pretoria was directed on May 8, 1900, to forward copies of the constitutions of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State by return mail. Translations thereof will be communicated to the Senate at the earliest practicable date.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, June 2, 1900_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

I transmit herewith, in further reply to the resolution of the Senate of April 10, 1900, having reference to Senate Document No. 336, Fifty-sixth Congress, first session, a further report from the Secretary of State, showing the places of residence of experts, clerks, officers, and employees of the Commission of the United States to the Paris Exposition of 1900, as well as the items of expenditures of the Commission for the months of January, February, and March, 1900, amounting to $211,583.25.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, June 6, 1900_.

_To the Senate of the United States_:

In further response to the resolution of the Senate of January 17, 1900, requesting, among other things, information tending to throw light upon the conduct and events of the insurrection against the authority of the United States in the Philippine Islands, I transmit herewith a correspondence between the Secretary of War and the officers of the Second Division of the Eighth Army Corps.

WILLIAM McKINLEY.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _December 3, 1900_.

_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:

At the outgoing of the old and the incoming of the new century you begin the last session of the Fifty-sixth Congress with evidences on every hand of individual and national prosperity and with proof of the growing strength and increasing power for good of Republican institutions. Your countrymen will join with you in felicitation that American liberty is more firmly established than ever before, and that love for it and the determination to preserve it are more universal than at any former period of our history.

The Republic was never so strong, because never so strongly intrenched in the hearts of the people as now. The Constitution, with few amendments, exists as it left the hands of its authors. The additions which have been made to it proclaim larger freedom and more extended citizenship. Popular government has demonstrated in its one hundred and twenty-four years of trial here its stability and security, and its efficiency as the best instrument of national development and the best safeguard to human rights.

When the Sixth Congress assembled in November, 1800, the population of the United States was 5,308,483. It is now 76,304,799. Then we had sixteen States. Now we have forty-five. Then our territory consisted of 909,050 square miles. It is now 3,846,595 square miles. Education, religion, and morality have kept pace with our advancement in other directions, and while extending its power the Government has adhered to its foundation principles and abated none of them in dealing with our new peoples and possessions. A nation so preserved and blessed gives reverent thanks to God and invokes His guidance and the continuance of His care and favor.

In our foreign intercourse the dominant question has been the treatment of the Chinese problem. Apart from this our relations with the powers have been happy.

The recent troubles in China spring from the antiforeign agitation which for the past three years has gained strength in the northern provinces. Their origin lies deep in the character of the Chinese races and in the traditions of their Government. The Taiping rebellion and the opening of Chinese ports to foreign trade and settlement disturbed alike the homogeneity and the seclusion of China.

Meanwhile foreign activity made itself felt in all quarters, not alone on the coast, but along the great river arteries and in the remoter districts, carrying new ideas and introducing new associations among a primitive people which had pursued for centuries a national policy of isolation.

The telegraph and the railway spreading over their land, the steamers plying on their waterways, the merchant and the missionary penetrating year by year farther to the interior, became to the Chinese mind types of an alien invasion, changing the course of their national life and fraught with vague forebodings of disaster to their beliefs and their self-control.

For several years before the present troubles all the resources of foreign diplomacy, backed by moral demonstrations of the physical force of fleets and arms, have been needed to secure due respect for the treaty rights of foreigners and to obtain satisfaction from the responsible authorities for the sporadic outrages upon the persons and property of unoffending sojourners, which from time to time occurred at widely separated points in the northern provinces, as in the case of the outbreaks in Sze-chuen and Shan-tung.

Posting of antiforeign placards became a daily occurrence, which the repeated reprobation of the Imperial power failed to check or punish. These inflammatory appeals to the ignorance and superstition of the masses, mendacious and absurd in their accusations and deeply hostile in their spirit, could not but work cumulative harm. They aimed at no particular class of foreigners; they were impartial in attacking everything foreign.

An outbreak in Shan-tung, in which German missionaries were slain, was the too natural result of these malevolent teachings. The posting of seditious placards, exhorting to the utter destruction of foreigners and of every foreign thing, continued unrebuked. Hostile demonstrations toward the stranger gained strength by organization.

The sect, commonly styled the Boxers, developed greatly in the provinces north of the Yang-Tse, and with the collusion of many notable officials, including some in the immediate councils of the Throne itself, became alarmingly aggressive. No foreigner's life, outside of the protected treaty ports, was safe. No foreign interest was secure from spoliation.

The diplomatic representatives of the powers in Peking strove in vain to check this movement. Protest was followed by demand and demand by renewed protest, to be met with perfunctory edicts from the Palace and evasive and futile assurances from the Tsung-li Yamen. The circle of the Boxer influence narrowed about Peking, and while nominally stigmatized as seditious, it was felt that its spirit pervaded the capital itself, that the Imperial forces were imbued with its doctrines, and that the immediate counselors of the Empress Dowager were in full sympathy with the antiforeign movement.

The increasing gravity of the conditions in China and the imminence of peril to our own diversified interests in the Empire, as well as to those of all the other treaty governments, were soon appreciated by this Government, causing it profound solicitude. The United States from the earliest days of foreign intercourse with China had followed a policy of peace, omitting no occasions to testify good will, to further the extension of lawful trade, to respect the sovereignty of its Government, and to insure by all legitimate and kindly but earnest means the fullest measure of protection for the lives and property of our law-abiding citizens and for the exercise of their beneficent callings among the Chinese people.

Mindful of this, it was felt to be appropriate that our purposes should be pronounced in favor of such course as would hasten united action of the powers at Peking to promote the administrative reforms so greatly needed for strengthening the Imperial Government and maintaining the integrity of China, in which we believed the whole western world to be alike concerned. To these ends I caused to be addressed to the several powers occupying territory and maintaining spheres of influence in China the circular proposals of 1899, inviting from them declarations of their intentions and views as to the desirability of the adoption of measures insuring the benefits of equality of treatment of all foreign trade throughout China.

With gratifying unanimity the responses coincided in this common policy, enabling me to see in the successful termination of these negotiations proof of the friendly spirit which animates the various powers interested in the untrammeled development of commerce and industry in the Chinese Empire as a source of vast benefit to the whole commercial world.

In this conclusion, which I had the gratification to announce as a completed engagement to the interested powers on March 20, 1900, I hopefully discerned a potential factor for the abatement of the distrust of foreign purposes which for a year past had appeared to inspire the policy of the Imperial Government, and for the effective exertion by it of power and authority to quell the critical antiforeign movement in the northern provinces most immediately influenced by the Manchu sentiment.

Seeking to testify confidence in the willingness and ability of the Imperial administration to redress the wrongs and prevent the evils we suffered and feared, the marine guard, which had been sent to Peking in the autumn of 1899 for the protection of the legation, was withdrawn at the earliest practicable moment, and all pending questions were remitted, as far as we were concerned, to the ordinary resorts of diplomatic intercourse.

The Chinese Government proved, however, unable to check the rising strength of the Boxers and appeared to be a prey to internal dissensions. In the unequal contest the antiforeign influences soon gained the ascendancy under the leadership of Prince Tuan. Organized armies of Boxers, with which the Imperial forces affiliated, held the country between Peking and the coast, penetrated into Manchuria up to the Russian borders, and through their emissaries threatened a like rising throughout northern China.