Jasper County Democrat, Volume 22, Number 55, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 October 1919 — We Are Responsible for All Damages to Foreigners in Mexico Since 1910 [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

We Are Responsible for All Damages to Foreigners in Mexico Since 1910

By SENATOR A. B. FALL

b—Debate in Congress

The Calvo doctrine, as acknowledged and accepted by Latin-American countries, provides simply this, in effect: , No government shall be responsible for damages to any of its citizens occurring during a revolution, or by virtue of a riot. No citizen of a foreign country shall be entitled to collect damages against this government except as a citizen of this country would be entitled to collect damages. Under the Calvo doctrine, as it was presented at The Hague tribunal and refused, we could not have

interfered diplomatically in Mexico to recover damages for any of our citizens, either for death or otherwise. In 1913, prior to the recognition of Carranza when he proclaimed himself first chief of the revolutionary forces, and when he was seeking recognition, he issued a decree known as the Calvo decree, and in that decree he pledged himself to us, because he filed it in the state department of the United States government, that immediately upon the success of his revolution he would go back to the year 1910, to the inception of the Madero revolution, and that he would, by a joint commission, ascertain all damages done to any foreigner or to his property up to the time that he founded his government substantially in the City of Mexico, no matter from what source, whether by revolution or by riot; in other words, that he would not do as they had continuously done, put in a defense that the damage had occurred by revolution. But the decree of 1915, which the president sent to the senate, as the foundation of his recognition of Carranza, repudiated the decree of 1913 and adopted the Calvo rule and we recognized him upon it; and what is the consequence today? That we are bound by every rule not only of morality but of international law to every government under the sun for every dollar of damage done to any foreigner in the Republic of Mexico from the time the revolution occurred in 1910 down to date, because the secretary of state and the president of the United States called upon France and Germany and Great Britain to yield to us in handling Mexican affairs, as was announced by the state department, and they yielded. When they yielded Carranza’s decree agreeing to pay damages was in full force and effect. We handled Mexican affairs, and when we recognized Carranza we recognized him under an absolute repudiation of that decree. Have we not placed the Monroe doctrine at least in pawn to every foreign government?