Page:Messages of the President of the United States on the Relations of the United States to Spain (1898).djvu/26

 To the Senate of the United States:

I transmit herewith, in response to a resolution of the Senate of the 14th of February last calling for information and correspondence in regard to the condition of the Island of Cuba and to negotiations for commercial relations between the United States and that island, a report of the Secretary of State, with its accompanying correspondence covering the first inquiry of the resolution, together with a report of the special commissioner plenipotentiary charged with commercial negotiations under the provisions of the tariff act approved July 24, 1897, in response to the second inquiry.

2em

Washington, April 11, 1898.

The

The Secretary of State has had the honor to receive, by reference from the President, a resolution adopted in the Senate of the United States on the 14th of February last, reading as follows:

This resolution contemplates answer being made to two separate inquiries: First, in relation to the present condition of affairs in Cuba, and, secondly, with regard to the action had in view of the overtures of the Government of Spain for a reciprocal commercial agreement covering, particularly, the trade between the United States and the Island of Cuba.

The conduct of commercial negotiations under the authority and in accordance with the conditions found in sections 3, 4, and 5 of the existing tariff act approved July 24, 1897, having been intrusted to a spe-