Saturday, December 27, 1924. Controlling Dominican Customs' Revenue.

The Dominican Republic signed a convention with the US to allow the US to control its customs' revenue, which continued until 1941.

It read:

Convention between the United States of America and the Dominican Republic, Signed at Washington, December 27, 1924

Whereas a convention between the United States of America and the Dominican Republic providing for the assistance of the United States in the collection and application of the customs revenues of the Dominican Republic, was concluded and signed by their respective Plenipotentiaries at the City of Santo Domingo, on the eighth day of February, one thousand nine hundred and seven, and

Whereas that convention was entered into to enable the Dominican Government to carry out a plan of settlement for the adjustment of debts and claims against the Government; and

Whereas, in accordance with that plan of settlement, the Dominican Republic issued in 1908, bonds to the amount of $20,000,000, bearing 5 per cent interest, payable in 50 years and redeemable after 10 years at 102–½, and requiring payment of at least 1 per cent per annum for amortization; and

Whereas additional obligations have been incurred by the Dominican Government in the form of the issuance, in 1918, of bonds to the amount of $5,000,000, bearing 5 per cent interest, payable in 20 years, and redeemable at par on each interest date as the amount of amortization fund available on such interest dates will permit, and requiring payment of at least 5 per cent per annum for amortization; and in the form of the issuance of bonds, in 1922, to the amount of $10,000,000, bearing 5-½ per cent interest, payable in 20 years, and redeemable after 8 years at 101. and requiring payment after such period of at least $563,916.67 per annum for amortization; and

Whereas certain of the terms of the contracts under which these bonds have been issued have proven by experience unduly onerous to the Dominican Republic and have compelled it to devote a larger portion of the customs revenues to provide the interest and sinking fund charges pledged to the service of such bonds than is deemed advisable or necessary; and

Whereas it is the desire of the Dominican Government and appears to be to the best interest of the Dominican Republic to issue bonds to a total amount of $25,000,000, in order to provide for the refunding on terms more advantageous to the Republic of its obligations represented by the bonds of the three issues above mentioned still outstanding and for a balance remaining after such operation is concluded to be devoted to permanent public improvements and to other projects designed to further the economic and industrial development of the country; and

Whereas the whole of this plan is conditioned and dependent upon the assistance of the United States in the collection of customs revenues of the Dominican Republic and the application thereof so far as necessary to the interest upon and the amortization and redemption of said bonds, and the Dominican Republic has requested the United States to give and the United States is willing to give such assistance:

The United States of America, represented by Charles Evans Hughes, Secretary of State of the United States of America; and the Dominican Republic, represented by Señor José del Carmen Ariza, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the Dominican Republic in Washington, have agreed:

Article I

That the President of the United States shall appoint, a General Receiver of Dominican Customs, who, with such Assistant Receivers and other employees of the Receivership as shall be appointed by [Page 664]the President of the United States in his discretion, shall collect all the customs duties accruing at the several customs houses of the Dominican Republic until the payment or retirement of any and all bonds issued by the Dominican Government in accordance with the plan and under the limitations as to terms and amounts hereinbefore recited; and said General Receiver shall apply the sums so collected, as follows:

First, to paying the expenses of the receivership; second, to the payment of interest upon all bonds outstanding; third, to the payment of the annual sums provided for amortization of said bonds including interest upon all bonds held in sinking fund; fourth, to the purchase and cancellation or the retirement and cancellation pursuant to the terms thereof of any of said bonds as may be directed by the Dominican Government; fifth, the remainder to be paid to the Dominican Government.

The method of distributing the current collections of revenue in order to accomplish the application thereof as hereinbefore provided shall be as follows:

The expenses of the receivership shall be paid by the Receiver as they arise. The allowances to the General Receiver and his assistants for the expenses of collecting the revenues shall not exceed five per cent unless by agreement between the two Governments.

On the first day of each calendar month shall be paid over by the Receiver to the Fiscal Agent of the loan a sum equal to one twelfth of the annual interest of all the bonds issued and of the annual sums provided for amortization of said bonds and the remaining collection of the last preceding month shall be paid over to the Dominican Government, or applied to the sinking fund for the purchase or redemption of bonds or for other purposes as the Dominican Government shall direct.

Provided, that in case the customs revenues collected by the General Receiver shall in any year exceed the sum of $4,000,000, 10 per cent of the surplus above such sum of $4,000,000 shall be applied to the sinking fund for the redemption of bonds.

Article II

The Dominican Government will provide by law for the payment of all customs duties to the General Receiver and his assistants, and will give to them all needful aid and assistance and full protection to the extent of its powers. The Government of the United States will give to the General Receiver and his assistants such protection as it may find to be requisite for the performance of their duties.

Article III

Until the Dominican Republic has paid the whole amount of the bonds of the debt, its public debt shall not be increased except by previous agreement between the Dominican Government and the United States.

Article IV

The Dominican Government agrees that the import duties will at no time be modified to such an extent that, on the basis of exportation and importations to the like amount and the like character during the two years preceding that in which it is desired to make such modification, the total net customs receipts would not at such altered rates have amounted for each of such two years to at least 1–½ times the amount necessary to provide for the interest and sinking fund charges upon its public debt.

Article V

The accounts of the General Receiver shall be rendered monthly to the Ministry of Finance and Commerce of the Dominican Republic and to the State Department of the United States and shall be subject to examination and verification by the appropriate officers of the Dominican and the United States Governments.

Article VI

The determination of any controversy which may arise between the Contracting Parties in the carrying out of the provisions of this Convention shall, should the two Governments be unable to come to an agreement through diplomatic channels, be by arbitration. In the carrying out of this agreement in each individual case, the Contracting Parties, once the necessity of arbitration is determined, shall conclude a special agreement defining clearly the scope of the dispute, the scope of the powers of the arbitrators, and the periods to be fixed for the formation of the arbitral tribunal and the several stages of the procedure. The special agreement providing for arbitration shall, in all cases, be signed within a period of three months from the date upon which either one of the Contracting Parties shall notify the other Contracting Party of its desire to resort to arbitration. It is understood that on the part of the United States, such special agreements will be made by the President of the United States by and with the advice and consent of the Senate thereto, and on the part of the Dominican Republic, shall be subject to the procedure required by the Constitution and laws thereof.

Article VII

This agreement shall take effect after its approval by the Contracting Parties in accordance with their respective Constitutional methods. Upon the exchange of ratifications of this convention, which shall take place at Washington as soon as possible, the Convention between the United States of America and the Dominican Republic providing for the assistance of the United States in the collection and application of the customs revenues, concluded and signed at the City of Santo Domingo on the 8th day of February, 1907, shall be deemed to be abrogated.

Done in duplicate in the English and Spanish languages at the City of Washington this 27th day of December, nineteen hundred and twenty-four.

Charles Evans Hughes

[seal]

J. C. Ariza

[seal]

The Marines had withdrawn from the country only three months prior.

Last edition:

Boxing Day, 1924. Boundaries.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Chile, Peru, USSR

Thursday, September 18, 1924. Leaving the Dominican Republic.

The U.S. Marine Corps withdrew from the Dominican Republic and turned police powers over to the Dominican Republic. The US intervention had come in 1916.

Related threads:

The United States commences the occupation of the Dominican Republic: May 16, 1916.

Last edition:

Wednesday, September 17, 1924. Upset with the Six Nations.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, 1940s, 1944, Calvin Coolidge, Canada, First Nations, Germany, League of Nations, Monarchy, Ontario, Poland, Six Nations, World War Two

Sunday, July 13, 1924. End of the occupation of the Dominican Republic.

U.S. administration of the Dominican Republic, commenced in 1916, ended with the inauguration of Horacio Vásquez.

Dominican Campaign Medal.

Last edition:

Saturday, July 12, 1924. Transglobal flyers in the Balkans.

Labels: 1920s, 1924, Army, Art, First Around The World Flight, James Montgomery Flagg, United States Air Force

Saturday, March 15, 1924. Passing symbols and elections.

Today In Wyoming's History: March 15: 1924  The wreck of the six masted schooner Wyoming was located off of Pollock Rip, Massachusetts.  She went down with all 18 hands.

Maj. Gen. DeRosey Cabell, age 62, Chief of Staff during the Punitive Expedition under Pershing, died.  He had been retired since 1919.

Cabell.

Brig Gen. Richard Henry Pratt, former head of the Carlisle Indian School and advocate for cultural assimilation of Native Americans, died at age 83.  He coined the word "racism", but also advocated for the policy that he expressed as "Kill the Indian...save the man."

An election was held in the Dominican Republic for its president and Congress.

Kenya held a legislative election under its new constitution

King Fuad I opened the initial session of Egypt's first constitutional parliament.

Wednesday, September 25, 1963. President Kennedy speaks in Laramie.

Today In Wyoming's History: September 25: 1963  John F. Kennedy spoke at the University of Wyoming.  His address:

Senator McGee--my old colleague in the Senate, Gale McGee--Governor, Mr. President, Senator Mansfield, Senator Metcalf, Secretary Udall, ladies and gentlemen:

I want to express my appreciation to you for your warm welcome, to you, Governor, to the President of the University, to Senator McGee, and others. I am particularly glad to come on this conservation trip and have an opportunity to speak at this distinguished university, because what we are attempting to do is to develop the talents in our country which require, of course, education which will permit us in our time, when the conservation of our resources requires entirely different techniques than were required 50 years ago, when the great conservation movement began under Theodore Roosevelt--and these talents, scientific and social talents, must be developed at our universities.

I hope that all of you who are students here will recognize the great opportunity that lies before you in this decade, and in the decades to come, to be of service to our country. The Greeks once defined happiness as full use of your powers along lines of excellence, and I can assure you that there is no area of life where you will have an opportunity to use whatever powers you have, and to use them along more excellent lines, bringing ultimately, I think, happiness to you and those whom you serve.

What I think we must realize is that the problems which now face us and their solution are far more complex, far more difficult, far more subtle, require a far greater skill and discretion of judgment, than any of the problems that this country has faced in its comparatively short history, or any, really, that the world has faced in its long history. The fact is that almost in the last 30 years the world of knowledge has exploded. You remember that Robert Oppenheimer said that 8 or 9 out of 10 of all the scientists who ever lived, live today. This last generation has produced nearly all of the scientific breakthroughs, at least relatively, that this world of ours has ever experienced. We are alive, all of us, while this tremendous explosion of knowledge, which has expanded the horizon of our experience, so far has all taken 'place in the last 30 years.

If you realize that when Queen Victoria sent for Robert Peel to be Prime Minister-he was in Rome--the journey which he took from Rome to London took him the same amount of time, to the day, that it had taken the Emperor Hadrian to go from Rome to England nearly 1900 years before. There had been comparatively little progress made in almost 1900 years in the field of knowledge. Now, suddenly, in the last 100 years, but most particularly in the last 30 years, all that is changed, and all of this knowledge is brought to bear, and can be brought to bear, in improving our lives and making the life of our people more happy, or destroying them. And that problem is the one, of course, which this generation of Americans and the next must face: how to use that knowledge, how to make a social discipline out of it.

There is really not much use in having science and its knowledge confined to the laboratory unless it comes out into the mainstream of American and world life, and only those who are trained and educated to handle knowledge and the disciplines of knowledge can be expected to play a significant part in the life of their country. So, quite obviously, this university is not maintained by the people of Wyoming merely to help all of the graduates enjoy a prosperous life. That may come, that may be a byproduct, but the people of Wyoming contribute their taxes to the maintenance of this school in order that the graduates of this school may, themselves, return to the society which helped develop them some of the talents which that society has made available, and what is true in this State is true across the United States.

The reason why, at the height of the Civil War, when the preservation of the Union was in doubt, Abraham Lincoln signed the Land Grant College Act, which has built up the most extraordinary educational system in the world, was because he knew that a nation could not exist and be ignorant and free; and what was true 100 years ago is more true today. So what we have to decide is how we are going to manage the complicated social and economic and world problems which come across our desks-my desk, as President of the United States; the desk of the Senators, as representatives of the States; the Members of the House, as representatives of the people.

But most importantly, as the final power is held by a majority of the people, how the majority of the people are going to make their judgment on the wise use of our resources, on the correct monetary and fiscal policy, what steps we should take in space, what steps we should take to develop the resources of the ocean, what steps we should take to manage our balance of payments, what we should do in the Congo or Viet-Nam, or in Latin America, all these areas which come to rest upon the United States as the leading great power of the world, with the determination and the understanding to recognize what is at stake in the world--all these are problems far more complicated than any group of citizens ever had to deal with in the history of the world, or any group of Members of Congress had to deal with.

If you feel that the Members of Congress were more talented 100 years ago, and certainly the Senators in the years before the Civil War included the brightest figures, probably, that ever sat in the Senate--Benton, Clay, Webster, Calhoun, and all the rest-they talked, and at least three of them stayed in the Congress 40 years--they talked for 40 years about four or five things: tariffs and the development of the West, land, the rights of the States and slavery, Mexico. Now we talk about problems in one summer which dwarf in complexity all of those matters, and we must deal with them or we will perish.

So I think the chance for an educated graduate of this school to serve his State and country is bright. I can assure you that you are needed.

This trip that I have taken is now about 24 hours old, but it is a rewarding 24 hours because there is nothing more encouraging than for those of us to leave the rather artificial city of Washington and come and travel across the United States and realize what is here, the beauty, the diversity, the wealth, and the vigor of the people.

Last Friday I spoke to delegates from all over the world at the United Nations. It is an unfortunate fact that nearly every delegate comes to the United States from all around the world and they make a judgment on the United States based on an experience in New York or Washington; and rarely do they come West beyond the Mississippi, and rarely do they go to California, or to Hawaii, or to Alaska. Therefore, they do not understand the United States, and those of us who stay only in Washington sometimes lose our comprehension of the national problems which require a national solution.

This country has become rich because nature was good to us, and because the people who came from Europe, predominantly, also were among the most vigorous. The basic resources were used skillfully and economically, and because of the wise work done by Theodore Roosevelt and others, significant progress was made in conserving these resources.
The problem, of course, now is that the whole concept of conservation must change in the 1960's if we are going to pass on to the 350 million Americans who will live in this country in 40 years where 180 million Americans now live--if we are going to pass on a country which is even richer.

The fact of the matter is that the management of our natural resources instead of being primarily a problem of conserving them, of saving them, now requires the scientific application of knowledge to develop new resources. We have come to. realize to a large extent that resources are not passive. Resources are not merely something that was here, put by nature. Research tells us that previously valueless materials, which 10 years ago were useless, now can be among the most valuable natural resources of the United States. And that is the most significant fact in conservation now since the early 1900's when Theodore Roosevelt started his work. A conservationist's first reaction in those days was to preserve, to hoard, to protect every non-renewable resource. It was the fear of resource exhaustion which caused the great conservation movement of the 1900's. And this fear was reflected in the speeches and attitudes of our political leaders and their writers.

This is not surprising in the light of the technology of that time, but today that approach is out of date, and I think this is an important fact for the State of Wyoming and the Rocky Mountain States. It is both too pessimistic and too optimistic. We need no longer fear that our resources and energy supplies are a fixed quantity that can be exhausted in accordance with a particular rate of consumption. On the other hand, it is not enough to put barbed wire around a forest or a lake, or put in stockpiles of minerals, or restrictive laws and regulations on the exploitation of resources. That was the old way of doing it.

Our primary task now is to increase our understanding of our environment to a point where we can enjoy it without defacing it, use its bounty without detracting permanently from its value, and, above all, maintain a living balance between man's actions and nature's reactions, for this Nation's great resources are as elastic and productive as our ingenuity can make them. For example, soda ash is a multimillion dollar industry in this State. A few years ago there was no use for it. It was wasted. People were unaware of it. And even if it had been sought, it could not be found--not because it wasn't here, but because effective prospecting techniques had not been developed. Now soda ash is a necessary ingredient in the production of glass, steel, and other products. As a result of a series of experiments, of a harnessing of science to the use of man, this great new industry has opened up. In short, conservation is no longer protection and conserving and restricting. The balance between our needs and the availability of our resources, between our aspirations and our environment, is constantly changing.

One of the great resources which we are going to find in the next 40 years is not going to be the land; it will be the ocean. We are going to find untold wealth in the oceans of the world which will be used to make a better life for our people. Science is changing all of our natural environment. It can change it for good; it can change it for bad. We are pursuing, for example, new opportunities in coal, which have been largely neglected--examining the feasibility of transporting coal by water through pipelines, of gasification at the mines, of liquefaction of coal into gasoline, and of transmitting electric power directly from the mouth of the mine. The economic feasibility of some of these techniques has not been determined, but it will be in the next decade. At the same time, we are engaged in active research on better means of using low grade coal, to meet the tremendous increase in the demand for coal we are going to find in the rest of this century. This is, in effect, using science to increase our supply of a resource of which the people of the United States were totally unaware 50 years ago.

Another research undertaking of special concern to this Nation and this State is the continuing effort to develop practical and feasible techniques of converting oil shale into usable petroleum fuels. The higher grade deposits in Wyoming alone are equivalent to 30 billion barrels of oil, and 200 billion barrels in the case of lower grade development. This could not be used, there was nothing to conserve, and now science is going to make it possible.

Investigation is going on to assure at the same time an adequate water supply so that when we develop this great new industry we will be able to use it and have sufficient water. Resource development, therefore, requires not only the coordination of all branches of science, it requires the joint effort of scientists, government--State, national, and local--and members of other professional disciplines. For example, we are now examining in the United States today the mixed economic-technical question of whether very large-scale nuclear reactors can produce unexpected savings in the simultaneous desalinization of water and the generation of electricity. We will have, before this decade is out or sooner, a tremendous nuclear reactor which makes electricity and at the same time gets fresh water from salt water at a competitive price. What a difference this can make to the Western United States. And, indeed, not only the United States, but all around the globe where there are so many deserts on the ocean's edge.

It is in efforts, I think, such as this, where the National Government can play a significant role, where the scale of public investment or the nationwide scope of the problem, the national significance of the results are too great to ignore or which cannot always be carried out by private research. Federal funds and stimulation can help make the most imaginative and productive use of our manpower and facilities. The use of science and technology in these fields has gained understanding and support in the Congress. Senator Gale McGee has proposed an energetic study of the technology of electrometallurgy--the words are getting longer as the months go on, and more complicated-an area of considerable importance to the Rocky Mountains.

All this, I think, is going to change the life of Wyoming and going to change the life of the United States. What we regard now as relative well-being, 30 years from now will be regarded as poverty. When you realize that 30 years ago r out of 10 farms had electricity, and yet some farmers thought that they were living reasonably well, now for a farm not to have electricity, we regard them as living in the depths of poverty. That is how great a change has come in 30 years. In the short space of 18 years, really, or almost 20 years, the wealth of this country has gone up 300 percent.

In 1970, 1980, 1990, this country will be, can be, must be--if we make the proper decisions, if we manage our resources, both human and material, wisely, if we make wise decisions in the Nation, in the State, in the community, and individually, if we maintain a vigorous and hopeful 'pursuit of life and knowledge--the resources of this country are so unlimited and science is expanding them so greatly that all those people who thought 40 years ago that this country would be exhausted in the middle of the century have been proven wrong. It is going to be richer than ever, providing we make the wise decisions and we recognize that the future belongs to those who seize it.

Knowledge is power, a saying 500 years old, but knowledge is power today as never before, not only here in the United States, but the future of the free world depends in the final analysis upon the United States and upon our willingness to reach those decisions on these complicated matters which face us with courage and clarity. And the graduates of this school will, as they have in the past, play their proper role.

I express my thanks to you. This building which 15 years ago was just a matter of conversation is now a reality. So those things that we talk about today, which seem unreal, where so many people doubt that they can be done--the fact of the matter is, it has been true all through our history--they will be done, and Wyoming, in doing it, will play its proper role.

Thank you.

He'd fly on to Billings later that day.

On the same day, President Juan Bosch of the Dominican Republic was overthrown in a military coup, having served following his election for only seven months.  His party was Socialist in nature, and the US would oppose another coup in 1965 which sought to restore him to power.

The House of Representatives approved a measure to reduce the Income Tax Rate. The Senate would later follow, and the bill signed into law in February 1964.

Friday, June 30, 1922. End of the Four Courts Seige

An explosion and fire at the Four Courts resulted in a cease fire, and then a surrender of the IRA men occupying the structure.

The United States agreed to end its occupation of the Dominican Republic, which had started in 1916.  The last U.S. troops would withdraw in 1924.

Congress passed the Lodge-Fish Resolution endorsing the Balfour Declaration.  The State Department opposed the move.

Christmas, December 25, 1920.

The 25th was a Saturday in 1920, which means that the Saturday weekly magazines hit the stands on that day.  The Saturday Evening Post chose to go with a holiday theme, which makes sense for a magazine coming out on Christmas Day.

Then, as now, some people work on Christmas Day, and that included this group of Dominican National Guardsmen who were lined up for chow.

The Dominican Republic was under American occupation, which had been a campaign issue in the 1920 election.  William Harding was opposed to continuing the occupation, as were most Americans.  Be that as it may, it would take some time to wind it down and during that time, as this photograph makes clear, the National Guard was very much under American influence.
 

The United States commences the occupation of the Dominican Republic: May 16, 1916.

 Period illustration of U.S. Marines landing under fire in the Dominican Republic.

With U.S. troops deep in Mexico, and the war in Europe growing bloodier, you would think that the US had enough on its hands already, but on this day, in 1916, the US landed Marines in the Dominican Republic.

This intervention came about due to a recent coup in the Dominican Republic and it would last until until 1924 during which period the US would make infrastructure improvements to the nation and governmental changes. The occupation was unpopular in both the United States and the Dominican Republic.

 USS Memphis, which was lost that August as part of the occupation when she was badly damaged in a storm while in harbor, costing the lives of forty-three of her crew.

The entire operation says something about the U.S.'s views about the countries to its south in this era.  It also says something about what it must have been like to be in the Marines, and what the Marines themselves must have been like. 

Last edition:

The Punitive Expedition: The fight at San Miguelito Ranch. May 14, 1916

Labels: 1910s, 1916, Army, cavalry, George S. Patton, Mexican Border War, Mexican Revolution, Mexico, Pancho Villa, Personalities, The Punitive Expedition, wepaons, World War Two

Thursday, August 6, 1914. More declarations of war.

Austro Hungaria declared war on Imperial Russia.

Serbia declared war on Germany.

Italy refused portage to the Goeben and Breslau.  The Germans ships, even though they lacked sufficient coal, were ordered to make a run to Constantinople, partially in the hope that it would cause the Ottoman Empire to enter the war..

The Royal Navy, already pursuing the Goeben and Breslau, commenced pursuit of the SMS Karlsruhe in the West Indies.

The HMS Amphion struck a mine resulting in the first British deaths of the war.

The German airship Zeppelin Z VI was damaged in combat over Belgium and made an emergency crash landing.

The US negotiated a ceasefire in the Dominican civil war.

Woodrow Wilson's first wife Ellen Axson Wilson, died of Bright's disease.  She relayed a dying message to her husband via the White House physician allowing her husband to remarry.

Orthodox Fr. Maxim Timofeyevich Sandovich was executed by Austro Hungarian for actions they deemed to be pro Russian in nature.  He is regarded as a martyr in the Orthodox Church.

Last edition:

Wednesday August 5, 1914. Battle of Liège commences.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, Austro Hungaria, Battle of Liège, Belgium, Canadian Arctic Expedition, Czech Legion, German Army, Montenegro, technology, World War One

Friday, June 26, 1914. Intervening in the Dominican Republic.

Photograph of Salem, Massachusetts. This photograph is the first photo taken from the air recording a disaster.

The US landed Marines and Sailors at Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic, to end the city's bombardment and protect the port from disruption during the country's civil war.

The South African senate passed the Indian Relief Bill abolishing a tax against Indian citizens, recognizing Indian ceremonial marriages, relaxing immigration laws, and pardoning members of the Indian resistance movement, which Mahatma Gandhi then suspended.

Last prior edition:

Thursday, June 25, 1914. Deaths and a disaster.

Labels: 1910s, 1914, Canadian Arctic Expedition, Disaster, Massachusetts, Massachusetts Army National Guard, Massachusetts Naval Militia, National Guard, Naval Militia