Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, Transmitted to Congress, With the Annual Message of the President, December 5, 1881

No. 678
Mr. Fish to Mr. Blaine.

Legation of the United States,
Berne , March 20, 1881. (Received April 2.)

No. 371.]

Sir: I have the honor to inclose herewith an extract from the Bund of this morning, respecting the action of the commune of Böttstein, in the canton of Argovie, in sending to America a girl seventeen years of age, hitherto supported by that commune, who is described as suffering from serious mental infirmity. It is due to the Bund to say that it condemns such proceedings, and recommends that the girl should be sent back by our officials at the cost of the commune indulging in this speculation at the cost of American tax-payers.

I have brought the article to the notice of the collector of the port of New York, but as she is said to have been sent on Sunday last she has a week’s start of my letter. I have also written to Consul Mason, at Basle, asking him to investigate the circumstances of the case.

The absence of legislation on our part to protect us from such abuses is greatly to be regretted.

I have, &c.,

NICHOLAS FISH.

[Inclosure in No. 371,—Extract from Der Bund.—Translation.]

Berne , March 20, 1881.

Argovie.—Last Sunday the commune of Böttstein, according to the Baden Tagblatt, through the medium of the emigration agent, Frei, of Klingnau, shipped off to America an orphan girl of seventeen, whom the commune had hitherto been compelled to support, and who was, not on account of bodily deformity, but from very serious aberration of the mind, unable to support herself. It is to be hoped that the American officials will send the poor girl back, by the same vessel, at the cost of the commune guilty of such speculation. Those agents who indulge in such speculations will have their business forbidden by the new Federal law.