[Wadsworth, William Henry]:

$1,500 · Offered by William Reese Company

TRADUCCION DEL DICTAMEN DE MR. WADSWORTH SOBRE LAS RECLAMACIONES MEXICANAS PROCEDENTES DE DEPREDACIONES DE LOS INDIOS. The rare Spanish translation of Wadsworth's report responding to the claims of 366 Mexican citizens against the American government relating to trans-border depredations by "Apaches, Comanches, and other Indians" in the territory of the Gadsden Purchase. Together, the Mexican citizens sued the United States for a total of over thirty million dollars for damages to self and property incurred between 1848 and 1853. Wadsworth flatly rejects their claims on a number of grounds. Fundamentally, he states that "1st. It does not appear that the claimants were injured or harmed 'on authority of the United States.' 2nd. The claims of the claimants, which the Mexican government currently asserts, were settled by the two governments by virtue of the treaty which they agreed to on the 30th of December, 1853 [i.e. the Gadsden Purchase]" (our translation). A large part of Wadsworth's argument hangs on the second point, and he dives deep into the semantics and linguistic details of both the Spanish and English versions of the Gadsden Purchase Treaty, which explicitly absolved the United States of all responsibility for the territory imposed by the 1831 and 1848 treaties. This reading is supported personally by Gadsden, who is quoted to the effect that, even if it is accepted that the United States should police the border, the Mexican government's protests against any troop

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