I have, therefore, regarded it as unnecessary to take the subject into
further consideration without instructions.
Hon. William H. Seward, Secretary of State, Washington, D. C.
[Translation.]
M. Drouyn de Lhuys to Mr. Bigelow
Paris,
November 11, 1865.
Sir: When you handed me last September a
draught of a circular, and a form of emigrant’s engagement,
emanating from the American Emigrant Company of Havre, you were kind
enough to express to me the desire to know if the French
administration would have any changes to propose therein. I hastened
in consequence to submit these documents to the examination of the
ministers of the interior and of commerce, within whose province the
questions of emigration more specially fall, and I have the honor to
communicate to you an abstract of the suggestions made by those two
departments.
My colleagues remark, in the first place, that the circular of the
agency of the American Emigrant Company, and the form of emigrant’s
engagement, apply exclusively to the reciprocal engagements which
are to regulate the final relations between the agency and the
laborers after their arrival in America; but these two documents
make no mention of the price and the conditions of the
transportation of the emigrants, a question which interests more
especially the emigration service in the ports of the empire.
Besides, to prevent the recurrence of difficulties which have arisen
in consequence of operations of the same nature, it would seem
desirable that the engagement relative to the establishment of
emigrants, and the regulation of their personal debts to the
company, should be invested with a purely private character, and
should be independent of the simple contract of transportation. The
French administration would then have nothing to do but to assure
the execution of the contract of transportation in favor of the
emigrants, and the company for its part, would reserve by its other
engagement the means of enforcing the payment of the debts
contracted by the emigrants. Still, it would be well to determine at
once the proportion to be deducted from the wages of the emigrants.
The figure should be fixed, according to the opinion of my
department, so that the wages left to the laborer should still be in
proportion to the wants of material life, in the countries where
they are transported.
Consequently, the agency of the American Emigrant Company should be
requested to produce—
1st. The form of engagement, completed in the sense indicated
above.
2d. Another form of contract, corresponding to that of the agencies
already authorized, indicating the price and the conditions of
transportation.
Only this last document should be invested with the visa of the commissioner of emigration. The first, the use
of which would be simply tolerated by the administration, would
enable the commissioner to reply to all demands for information
which might be addressed him by emigrants, and to assure himself, if
necessary, that the engagements proposed to them should not vary
from the conditions set forth in the form definitely adopted by the
company.
Several copies of the two forms should be sent to the minister of the
interior, to be transmitted by him, with the necessary instructions,
to the commissioners of emigration.
Messrs. de Lavalette and Behie add further, that, with the exception
of the preceding observations, the two documents which you have done
me the honor to communicate to me, do not seem to them open to any
objection.
Accept the assurances of the high consideration with which I have the
honor to be, sir, your very humble and very obedient servant,
Mr. Bigelow, Minister
of the United States at Paris.
