DEPARTMENT OF STATE, _Washington, November 29, 1881_.
SIR:[10] The attitude of the United States with respect to the question
of general peace on the American continent is well known through its
persistent efforts for years past to avert the evils of warfare, or,
these efforts failing, to bring positive conflicts to an end through
pacific counsels or the advocacy of impartial arbitration. This attitude
has been consistently maintained, and always with such fairness as to
leave no room for imputing to our Government any motive except the
humane and disinterested one of saving the kindred States of the
American continent from the burdens of war. The position of the United
States as the leading power of the New World might well give to its
Government a claim to authoritative utterance for the purpose of
quieting discord among its neighbors, with all of whom the most friendly
relations exist. Nevertheless, the good offices of this Government are
not and have not at any time been tendered with a show of dictation or
compulsion, but only as exhibiting the solicitous good will of a common
friend.
For some years past a growing disposition has been manifested by certain
States of Central and South America to refer disputes affecting grave
questions of international relationship and boundaries to arbitration
rather than to the sword. It has been on several such occasions a source
of profound satisfaction to the Government of the United States to see
that this country is in a large measure looked to by all the American
powers as their friend and mediator.
The just and impartial counsel of the President in such cases has never
been withheld, and his efforts have been rewarded by the prevention of
sanguinary strife or angry contentions between peoples whom we regard as
brethren.
The existence of this growing tendency convinces the President that the
time is ripe for a proposal that shall enlist the good will and active
cooperation of all the States of the Western Hemisphere, both north and
south, in the interest of humanity and for the common weal of nations.
He conceives that none of the Governments of America can be less
alive than our own to the dangers and horrors of a state of war, and
especially of war between kinsmen. He is sure that none of the chiefs
of Governments on the continent can be less sensitive than he is to the
sacred duty of making every endeavor to do away with the chances of
fratricidal strife. And he looks with hopeful confidence to such active
assistance from them as will serve to show the broadness of our common
humanity and the strength of the ties which bind us all together as a
great and harmonious system of American Commonwealths.
Impressed by these views, the President extends to all the independent
countries of North and South America an earnest invitation to
participate in a general congress to be held in the city of Washington
on the 24th day of November, 1882, for the purpose of considering and
discussing the methods of preventing war between the nations of America.
He desires that the attention of the congress shall be strictly confined
to this one great object; that its sole aim shall be to seek a way of
permanently, averting the horrors of cruel and bloody combat between
countries, oftenest of one blood and speech, or the even worse calamity
of internal commotion and civil strife; that it shall regard the
burdensome and far-reaching consequences of such struggles, the legacies
of exhausted finances, of oppressive debt, of onerous taxation, of
ruined cities, of paralyzed industries, of devastated fields, of
ruthless conscription, of the slaughter of men, of the grief of the
widow and the orphan, of imbittered resentments that long survive those
who provoked them and heavily afflict the innocent generations that come
after.
The President is especially desirous to have it understood that in
putting forth this invitation the United States does not assume the
position of counseling, or attempting through the voice of the congress
to counsel, any determinate solution of existing questions which may now
divide any of the countries of America. Such questions can not properly
come before the congress. Its mission is higher. It is to provide for
the interests of all in the future, not to settle the individual
differences of the present. For this reason especially the President has
indicated a day for the assembling of the congress so far in the future
as to leave good ground for hope that by the time named the present
situation on the South Pacific coast will be happily terminated, and
that those engaged in the contest may take peaceable part in the
discussion and solution of the general question affecting in an equal
degree the well-being of all.
It seems also desirable to disclaim in advance any purpose on the
part of the United States to prejudge the issues to be presented to the
congress. It is far from the intent of this Government to appear before
the congress as in any sense the protector of its neighbors or the
predestined and necessary arbitrator of their disputes. The United
States will enter into the deliberations of the congress on the
same footing as the other powers represented, and with the loyal
determination to approach any proposed solution not merely in its own
interest or with a view to asserting its own power, but as a single
member among many coordinate and coequal States. So far as the influence
of this Government may be potential, it will be exerted in the direction
of conciliating whatever conflicting interests of blood or government or
historical tradition may necessarily come together in response to a call
embracing such vast and diverse elements.
You will present these views to the minister of foreign relations of
Mexico, enlarging, if need be, in such terms as will readily occur to
you, upon the great mission which it is within the power of the proposed
congress to accomplish in the interest of humanity, and upon the firm
purpose of the United States to maintain a position of the most absolute
and impartial friendship toward all. You will thereupon, in the name
of the President of the United States, tender to His Excellency the
President of the Mexican Republic a formal invitation to send two
commissioners to the congress, provided with such powers and
instructions on behalf of their Government as will enable them to
consider the questions brought before that body within the limit of
submission contemplated by this invitation.
The United States as well as the other powers will in like manner be
represented by two commissioners, so that equality and impartiality will
be amply secured in the proceedings of the congress.
In delivering this invitation through the minister of foreign affairs
you will read this dispatch to him and leave with him a copy, intimating
that an answer is desired by this Government as promptly as the just
consideration of so important a proposition will permit.