The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-12-30

compelled the Dutch to cede her portion
of Guiana. This colony is known as Brit
ish Guiana. 1t adjOins Venezuela on the
south. The boundary line of this province
has long been in dispute. The British
have occupied the disputed territory, and
British miners and colonizers have seized
on the fertile fields and gold mines there
Failing to get any satisfaction from
England after various requests to vacate
the territory, Venezuela appealed to the
United States. For several years our only
reply to this appeal was in the form of
mild suggestions to England. These sug
gestions had little effect.
A little stronger stand was taken in our
next communication Oh the subject. Eng
land was asked TO submit the question of
the boundary dispute to arbitration. Lord
Salisbury s recent answer to this was that
Great Britain had nothing to arbitrate.
President CIeveland's message to con-
gress, which has caused all the war talk,
proposes that a commission be appointed
to settle the question. Then, if England
is found to be encroaching on Venezuelan
territory, she will either have to give up
and get out or fight, provided Uncle Sam
does not back down, and there is not much
danger of his doing that.
The whole question, according to the
American view of it, is one of boundary
lines, and to settle it the commission will
have to turn back several pages of history
and search many musty records.
Purely a Territorial Controversy.
The dispute turns wholly upon the
strong demand made by our government
that the territorial controversy lin its en-
tirety'' shal1 be submitted to impartial ar
bitration The outline which the presi-
dent gives in his annual message of Secre-
tary Olney's July dispatch to ambassador
Bayard says with great formality that our
government insists on arbitration as to the
whole of the territory, and in the most
significant words England's assumption
that a portion of the territory already be-
longs to her, and therefore cannot be put
to the risk of arbitration, is utterly re-
jected.
In the language of the message, fthe
resort to such arbitration should include
the whole controversy and is not satisfied
If one of the powers concerned is permitted
to draw an arbitrary line through the ter
ritcry in debate and to declare that it will
submit to arbitration only the portion "
ing on one side of it,
The arbitrary Iine'' referred to in the
presidents message is the famous Schom-
burgk line, beginning at the mouth of the
Orinoco river and pursuing an irregular
| course southwark to the Brazilian frontier
This is the line that Lord Salisbury now
insists upon as the extreme possible bound
airy of the Venezuelan republic, and he
refuses absolutely to submit to arbitration
any of the territory east of it. As a matter
of fact, England is now and has been for
moro than ten years in full control of all
| the country east of the Schomburgk. But
Venezuela asserts that throughout that
region, extending as far as the Essequibo
! river, the British are mere usurpers, and
| the United States substantially Endorses
the assertion by refusing to sanction Brit
ish occupation there unless the English
| title can be established by impartial arbi-
tration.
To fully understand the significance of
our governments position respecting the
merits of the case and its support of Vene-
zuola' demand for arbitration of the terri
torial question Gin its entirety it is nee
essary to go back for a period Of about
nine years.
On Feb. II, 1888, Mr.. Bayard, then sec
rotary of state, addressed to Minister
Phelps in London a long communication
regarding recent acts of British aggression
in Venezuelan territory. In it he said:
The government of the uDited States
has hitherto taken an earnest and friendly
interest in the question of boundaries so
long in dispute between Great Britain and
Venezuela, and, so far as its disinterested
! counsels were admissible, has advocated