in England. So far as it seemed to imply, as the language has often been construed to do, that the United States possessed the right, by means of an ex parte commission, appointed by itself and composed of its own citizens, authoritatively to fix the boundary between two other independent nations, it went beyond the immediate necessities of the case. If the commission had ever reported, its conclusions probably would have been treated as advisory rather than definitive, and would have been made the basis of further correspondence with both governments.
The actual position insisted upon in Mr. Olney's instructions to Mr. Bayard, as well as in the rest of President Cleveland's message, was that the United States would resist the palpable and substantial seizure and appropriation by Great Britain of Venezuelan territory. This position was quite in harmony with the spirit of the Monroe Doctrine. Congress unanimously provided for the appointment of a commission of investigation; but the commission, immediately after its organization, addressed to Mr. Olney, through its president, Mr. Justice Brewer, a letter setting forth its peaceful and non-partisan character and the desirability of securing the co-operation of Great Britain and Venezuela in obtaining evidence. At the close of his letter, Mr. Justice Brewer observed: "The purposes of the pending investigation are certainly hostile to none, nor can it be of advantage to any that the machinery devised by the government of the United States to secure the desired information should fail of its purpose."
This statement was communicated to Great Britain as well as to Venezuela, and both governments promptly responded to the appeal. The labors of the commission were, however, brought to a close by the conclusion of a treaty of arbitration, signed by Great Britain and Venezuela, but negotiated between Great Britain and the United States, the predominant feature of which was the application of the principle of prescription, under the definite rule that fifty years' adverse holding of a district, either by exclusive political control or by actual settlement, should suffice to constitute national title. The adoption of the principle of prescription, on which the arbitrators would necessarily have acted, even if it had not been incorporated into the treaty, at once rendered nugatory the greater part of the Venezuelan claim. Although the extreme British claim was not allowed, the territorial results of the arbitration were decidedly favorable to that government. It must, however, be conceded that the most important political result of the Venezuelan incident was not the decision upon the territorial question, but the official adoption of the Monroe Doctrine by the Congress of the United States, and its explicit acceptance by the principal maritime power of Europe.
The latest official exposition of the Monroe Doctrine was given by President Roosevelt in his annual message of December 3, 1901, in which he said: "The Monroe Doctrine is a declaration that there must be no territorial aggrandizement by any non-American power at the expense of any American power on American soil. It is in no wise intended as hostile to any nation in the Old World. . . . This doctrine has nothing to do with the commercial relations of any American power, save that it in truth allows each of them to form such as it desires. . . . We do not guarantee any state against punishment if it misconducts itself, provided that punishment does not take the form of the acquisition of territory by any non-American power." An occasion for the practical application of this definition soon arose. On December 11, 1901, the German ambassador at Washington left at the Department of State a memorandum in which it was stated that the German government proposed to take certain coercive measures against Venezuela, for the satisfaction of claims, based partly on breaches of contract and partly on violent wrongs, which it had been found to be impracticable otherwise to bring to a settlement. At the same time the memorandum declared that "under no circumstances" would the German government consider in its proceedings "the acquisition or the permanent occupation of Venezuelan territory." In acknowledging the receipt of this memorandum, on the 16th of December, Mr. Hay adverted to the fact that the German ambassador, on his recent return from Berlin, had conveyed personally to
