File No. 2956/2–8.
American Legation,
Lisbon, April 22,
1907.
No. 306.]
I transmit herewith a copy of my note to the minister on this
subject.
[Inclosure.]
Minister Bryan
to the Minister for Foreign
Affairs.
American Legation,
Lisbon, April 16,
1907.
Excellency: I have the honor to acknowledge
the receipt of your excellency’s note of January 28 last, in answer
to mine of the 18th of January requesting the release of Francisco
Freitas, an American citizen, who was arrested at Funchal, Madeira,
for failure to perform military service.
[Page 962]
Upon receipt of your excellency’s note, hereinbefore mentioned, I
transmitted a copy and translation thereof to my Government and I
received instructions to ask your excellency to consider that
Freitas went to America when but little over 16 years of age; that
he was duly naturalized as an American citizen September 17, 1906,
when he was 23 years old and after he had resided in the United
States for seven years. It appears that said Freitas left in the
United States a wife and child. My Government recognizes that at the
time he was drafted for military service as stated in your
excellency’s note, viz, 1904, he was not an American citizen, but he
had been domiciled in the United States for over rive years. Had he
been drafted before emigration, the position of your excellency’s
Government would be one which my Government would not feel at
liberty to contest, but it is, on the other hand, unable to
acquiesce in the right of the Portuguese Government to draft and
arrest for military duty one who is domiciled in the United States,
who committed no offense against Portuguese military law when or
before he emigrated, and who, having gone in good faith to cast his
fortunes with the United States of America, was lawfully naturalized
there and afterwards proceeded abroad on a short visit.
I am instructed to call these facts to your excellency’s courteous
attention and to request that this lawfully naturalized citizen of
the United States be released and allowed to return to his wife and
child in America.
As I pointed out in our recent interview on the subject of a
conventional agreement defining the rights and duties of Portuguese
subjects who emigrate to America and there become naturalized, it is
not the desire or the intention of my Government to intervene in
behalf of such as have remained in the United States only long
enough to secure naturalization and have returned to Portuguese
territory in the hope of there residing as American citizens and
thus escaping the obligations imposed upon them by Portuguese law.
But I submit to your excellency that this case is not of that
character; that Freitas is a bona fide citizen of the United States
of America who has come to Portuguese territory upon a visit merely,
leaving his wife and child at his home in America, and who at the
time of his emigration had not committed any offense against
Portuguese military law.
In again asking your excellency’s attention to this case in which my
Government takes a serious interest, I avail, etc.,
