The Chilean Minister to the Secretary of State.
Washington, April 23, 1909.
Sir: I have had the honor to receive the department’s note of yesterday (file No. 1154–124) in which the receipt of the communication I addressed to your excellency under date of the 16th instant is acknowledged and your excellency, referring to the correspondence exchanged between the department and this legation in regard to the claim of Alsop & Co., calls my attention to the fact that the desired documents have not yet been received. Your excellency’s note adds that the department regards this circumstance as confirmatory of my statement to the honorable Mr. Wilson made on April 15, viz, that the Government of Chile has no evidence concerning the merits of the claim which would justify the offer [Page 159] made to the Alsop claimants in settlement of their claim of a sum’ less than that called for by the contract of 1875 with the Government of Bolivia.
I shall, as I did in the case of the department’s previous notes, acquaint my Government with the contents of your excellency’s communication under reply by the next mail. In the meanwhile, and again presenting to your excellency the plea offered in my note of the 16th instant to the effect that the case is that of a Chilean firm and that my Government desires that it continue to be discussed at Santiago, I beg leave to draw your excellency’s attention to the award rendered by the Chilean American tribunal which rejected this claim on the grounds therein set forth, turned over the claimants to the protection of the Government of Chile, and accepted and adopted as its own the declaration made before it by the agent of Chile, in this sense: “If Bolivia signs the treaty, the claim of Alsop & Co., as well as the other claims mentioned, will be promptly paid under the treaty engagement, as a relief to Bolivia from the liabilities which that Government has incurred and for the account of Bolivia.”
The treaty of peace with Bolivia, from which alone flows Chile’s obligation to meet this claim; the last of the awards above referred to which declares Alsop & Co. to be a Chilean firm; the last message of the President of Bolivia which recognized it as such; and the other documents adduced in the note of the minister of foreign relations of Chile to the American minister at Santiago under date of April 9, 1908, are the principal antecedents which my Government stands upon and which it regards as highly important in the estimation of this claim, in which estimation it has reason to feel assured that your excellency will concur.
I beg, etc.,