Page:Mexico under Carranza.djvu/194

178 the persons and property of Americans in Mexico and along the border were committed by various revolutionary bands. During this period our country was under a republican administration, and the officers of that administration adopted the course of refusing protection to American citizens against offences from armed Mexicans, which appears to have been followed by our Government continuously since that time. In a speech made in the United States Senate on March 9, 1914, the Honorable Albert B. Fall, United States Senator from New Mexico, in criticizing the failure of President Taft's administration to afford protection to Americans against lawless invasion of their rights by Mexicans, said in reference to the killing of our citizens in El Paso by bullets from the guns of Mexican revolutionists:

 "The United States troops patrolled the city, the streets, the water front, and the boundary line. Telegrams were sent backward and forward, one of the officers, at least, demanding that he be allowed to go across into Mexico for the purpose of preventing the threatened danger to Americans on this side, in a city of 50,000 people. But they were not allowed to enforce their warning and 18 American citizens, including women, were shot down in the streets of El Paso.

"Mr. President, when their friends asked of the Government of the United States that it might investigate the killing of American citizens on