Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1918-10-24
Status of American Invest.
 ments in This Country of Much Interest.
MINERALS AND OIL
 QUESTION IN COURT
Tampico Production is Now Leading Oils of the En-
 tire World, 'Tls Said

Washington, Oct. 23-The status of American investment in Mexico is an object of concern in the Unit ed States. Future commercial rela- ticn. not only with Mexico, but with the whole of Latin America, may be affected by the outcome of the dis pute over the possession of land and mineral rights in the Tampico oil district, says a review of the oil situation just issued by the Depart ,nent of Commerce.
 The government, as well as oil in terests, is watching carefully the p1CeTess of suits instituted in the Mexican courts by the American, British, French and Dutch oil com li,njes for relief from the program Of the Carranza government, arising from "a, provision of the Mexican con- stirution of 1917 which attempts to vest in the nation only the right to minerals and oils under the soil of the republic.
 ''In it's bearing on our future com mercial relations with Latin Ameri- ca" declares the review of the De- partment of Commerce, "the status of our Tinvestments in Mexico in wolves farreaching possibilities. If all our foreign investments were to be transferred from the state of property, duly acquired with guar an1ees of permanence (such as oc- cur in the Mexican mining laws of 1884, 1892 and 1909) to the state of temporary concessions requiring re- newal form time by contracts, in the wording of which we have no share, we should have to face an unprece- dented situation. Our commercial re- lations, not only with Mexico but with all of Latin America. depends upon mutual confidence. The liberal supplies which the United States las granted to Mexico, together with Ambassador Fletcher's note of April 2, constitute our side of the pres ent case. A signal factor, however, will be the decision of the Mexican courts upon the suits now in prog ress."
 The note of April referred to was after all oil companies operating il the Tampic fields had been ordered to file manifests of property under teen decreed that new taxes called
 
 inlrosed. It is declared that 'the United States cannot acquiesce i'll any procedure ostensibly or nomin- ai:y in the form of taxation or the exercise of eminent domain but really resulting in confiscation and arbl. trary deprivation of vested rights At the same time the British. French and Dutch governments notified the CarranZa government that in the event confiscatory measures were put into effect, they would be obligated to protect their own interests" This resulted in modification of the de- cree of confiscatiOn.
 Article 27 of the new Mexican con- stitution is the center of the dls- rute Three dercees have been issued under it's provisions, impos- ing conditions on the oil companies which they regard as confiscatlon The constitutional article provides that ownership of all petroleum is vested in the nation; that only fMexl- cans by birth sor naturalization have the right to acquire ownership in lards, waters or mineral fuels Ill the republic, but that the government may grant the same right to foreign CTS. if they agree to be considered and treated as Mexicans and waive all right of protection from their home governments, forfeiture of their property being the penalty for such an appeal.
 It has been openly charged that the Mexican government was undly ln- fiuenced by German agents who hoped through the decree to cut off the supplies of fuel oil needed to keep the allied navies and merchant fleets at sea as the vesting of the sole rights to this fuel in neutral government would make the Tampico