Mr. Romero to Mr. Seward
Mr. Secretary: I have had the honor to receive the note you were pleased to address to me, dated yesterday, in reply to mine of the 9th of January last, with which I transmitted to the department copy of a communication from Mr. Lerdo de Tejada, minister for foreign relations of the Mexican republic, relative to the changes of the stream of the Rio Bravo on the boundary line between Mexico and the United States. With said note you sent me copy of the opinion given November 16th, 1856, to the Department of the Interior, by the Hon. Caleb dishing, at the time Attorney General of the United States, on the same subject, which opinion, you add, contains the principles which the government of the United States profess in this respect.
I have read that opinion with interest, and it has appeared to me that the principles enunciated therein are equitable and founded on the teachings of the most accredited expositors of international law. On this date I transmit to my government a copy thereof, and of your note which accompanies it.
In the opinion spoken of, the proper distinction is taken between the case of change of the stream of a river which serves as boundary between two states, whether gradual or by alluvion, without change in its general direction, and that in which such change occasioned by the force of the river be sudden and complete, and cause a change of current. In the first case it is considered that the actual reach of the river continues to form the divisional line, and that the land gained or lost on each bank is acquired or lost by the state to which the bank belongs which undergoes such changes; and in the second case, that the divisional line cannot follow the new stream, but continues along the abandoned one which the river followed before the violent mutation.
It pertains to the government of Mexico to express its conformity to or dissent from these principles. Until I receive its instructions on this point, which I will duly communicate to you, I hesitate not to adopt them, meanwhile, as reasonable and equitable. As the case about which the government of the State of Chihuahua complained, and which I submitted to you with my cited note of the 9 th of January last, is partially decided by the opinion of Mr. Gushing, I take the liberty to beg you that the document may be officially communicated to the authorities of the United States at Franklin, Texas, and chiefly to the military commanders at Fort Bliss, in the same State, so that they may regulate their proceedings thereby; because, you will remember, in the above-mentioned case, while they considered as property of the United States the portions of Mexican territory which the change of stream of the Rio Bravo has left on the left side, they do not permit the Mexican authorities to consider as Mexican territory that acquired on the same principle, which makes an inequality so marked that the Mexican government had resolved to request that of the [Page 530] United States for an exposition of the principles it wished to observe, that such might be equally applied to both sides.
The opinion of the 16th November, 1856, solves, in the same sense, the question of the several rights that individuals have to property in the lands which the change in the river leaves on one or other of its banks; in which point, also, the United States authorities have not acted with equality in Franklin and at Fort Bliss. Nevertheless, I do not doubt that when they receive this opinion they will conform their procedure to it.
This occasion is very satisfactory to me to renew to you, Mr. Secretary, the assurances of my very distinguished consideration.
Hon. William H. Seward, &c., &c., &c.