837.00/3580: Telegram
The Ambassador in Cuba (Welles) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received 3:55 p.m.]
113. As indicated in recent cables to the Department, I consider it indispensable that constitutional guarantees in Habana be restored [Page 326] immediately by President Machado in order that the members of the opposition especially and the citizens of this province in general may no longer be subject to the arbitrary rule of the military and may be afforded the opportunity within customary legal limitations both of meeting and of expressing their opinion without being liable at any given moment to a jail sentence. It is impossible to conceive of a successful outcome of the present negotiations unless this step is taken in the immediate future.
A general amnesty is presumably necessary as a preliminary step in order that members of the Government may be protected against suits brought in the civil courts for acts committed during the past two and one-half years which suits could be undertaken when martial law is raised. Such amnesty must of course in my judgment include all political offenders.
The President of his own accord declared to me that constitutional guarantees would be reestablished before July 16th. No steps have yet been taken towards the drafting or passage of the general amnesty required and I have good reason to believe that certain members of the President’s Cabinet have advised him to delay as long as may be possible. If martial law continues none of the delegates of the opposition will continue negotiations and none of the prominent leaders of the opposition will return from the United States in view of their well-founded fear that they would be subject at any moment to being thrown into prison.
The President is absent from the capital and is expected to return tomorrow. I shall see him immediately upon his return and state to him that I am not willing to continue negotiations unless he will comply with the assurances which he gave me more than a week ago. I should like to have immediate authorization from the Department to state that the Department is fully in accord with the statement which I will make to the President in this sense. All of the factions of the opposition have kept their promise to me to refrain from any acts of violence or attacks upon any of the authorities of the Government. Whatever acts of violence have taken place, and there have only been four during the past 6 weeks, have been committed by individuals not connected with any of the important opposition groups, and the armed forces at the command of the President are more than sufficient to preserve order in any emergency. There is consequently no justification for further procrastination in restoring normal guarantees to the people of Habana and I cannot emphasize too strongly that a continuation of these negotiations will be impossible unless this measure is taken in the immediate future. I beg to request a reply from the Department by cable at the earliest possible moment.