3. For the purposes of this Decree a foreigner with any profession shall be considered as immigrant, whether workman, artisan, labourer, farmer, or professor, who, leaving his home to establish himself in Guatemala, shall accept the passage offered by the Government or by private enterprises from his port of shipment abroad to his landing-place in this country. 4. A foreigner shall also be reputed an immigrant, who, without accepting the passage to which the preceding clause refers, shall state voluntarily, before embarking, to the Consul of Guatemala, that he desires to avail himself of the benefits accorded by this Decree and to fulfil the obligations it imposes. 5. Immigrants are divided into the following categories: (1.) Immigrants without contracts seeking work in the country; (3.) Immigrants contracted for by the Government; of the Republic. The first and last shall have their passage paid from national funds; the second from the funds of the private enterprises. 6. Immigrants contracted by the Government and by private enterprises are bound to fulfil their respective contracts, except when they contain clauses contrary to morality, or to the good customs and laws of the Republic. Chapter II. Of the Immigration Committee. 7. There is created, under the name of the Junta Central de Inmigración" in the capital of the Republic, a departement composed of two agriculturists, two merchants, and two masters of workshops, and the said Committee shall be immediately subordinate to the Minister of the Interior. 8. A special regulation shall determine the duties and attributes of each of its members, and the payment of these employés as also that of the subalterns shall be determined by the Budget Law. 9. The Central Committee of Immigration shall have power to establish in the capitals of the Departments and in the ports of the Republic as may be thought fit, Branch Committees of Immigration, their members being selected from the most honourable and competent persons of the respective locality, and in such a manner that the number shall not exceed three-the persons who are to compose them being agriculturists, merchants, and artisans. 10. The Central Committee of Immigration shall have the followiug duties and obligations: (1.) To discuss and propose to the Government the most adequate means to attract to the country such immigration as, in view of the circumstances of the Republic, shall be the most useful and profitable; (2.) To keep up active correspondence with the Consuls of the Republic in order to make known abroad, the conditions of the country, its nature, customs, state of arts and indrustries, variety of climate and products, and the mode and form of acquiring common lands; (3.) To maintain direct relations with the Branch Committees of Immigration, as also with the authorities of the Republic, in all that relates to the increase of immigration and in such a direction as will make it useful and profitable; (4.) To contract with one or more Shipping Companies for the passage of immigrants to the ports of the Republic whenever the Government shall not exercise the faculties it possesses in this respect, the contracts being subject to the approval of the Government; (5.) To intervene with agency, wharf, and railway Companies for the speedy landing and forwarding of the immigrants and their baggage; (6.) To see that the Steam-ship Companies holding contracts for transporting immigrants carry out their respective contracts; (7.) To seek, by all means in their power, early employment for the immigrants; (8.) To keep a book or register in which shall be stated in order of date the entry into the Republic of each immigrant, giving the name, age, condition, sex, nationality, office, and education; and (9.) To present to the Minister ot the Interior a monthly report on the work carried out, and an annual one showing the number of immigrants entered, their quality, their profession, the benefit which the Republic may have gained thereby, what immigration it is best to encourage, what are the obstacles in the way, and what are the means which in their opinion should be taken in order to give an impetus to immigration. Chapter III. Of the Privileges and Guarantes of Immigrants. 11. With a view to encouraging immigration the Government of the Republic will give to immigrants who arrive without being contracted the following facilities and exemptions: It (1.) Payment of their sea passage from their port of shipment. may also, if thought fit, pay the land passage from the place of residence of the immigrant to the port of his shipment; (2.) Exemption from payment of import dues on articles of use, dress, furniture for domestic use, instruments of agriculture, tools, &c., used in the art or profession exercised, seeds, and domestic animals: provided that there is reasonable ground for believing that it is not the intention to traffic in them, but that they are for immediate and daily use; (3.) Exemption from the payment of Consular fees including those for passports and certificates with which they should come provided, and in which their condition as immigrant is set forth. Immigrants belonging to the first and third categories shall be transferred from the account of private enterprise or of the Government respectively, to the places to which they are destined. 12. The Government of the Republic when it thinks fit, shall grant with free title to immigrants of any of the three classes, who shall have conducted themselves well, and shown a desire to work, lots of common lands in the Departments of Petén, Izabal, and Hueheutenango, not less Nouv. Recueil Gén. 2o S. XXXIV. Ꮓ than two hectares in extent nor more than six, provided they agree to cultivate within two years a third part of the land granted, and, on those conditions being fulfilled, the Executive shall give them full title to the property. 13. The Executive shall assign to this effect, in the Departments mentioned, zones of land suitable for cultivation, and destined solely for immigrants to the Republic. 14. Immigrants shall enjoy in the Republic all the guarantees and rights which the laws concede to Guatemalans, and shall be exempt for life from Municipal offices, except those which they shall accept voluntarily, and from military service, except in the case of international war. 15. Immigrants shall also be exempt from the service of the roads, and Municipal taxes, for a period of four years counting from their arrival in the Republic. Chapter IV. Of the Duties of Immigrants. 16. All immigrants are obliged, from the time of their arrival, to respect and obey the laws and authorities of the Republic. 17. If in conformity with this law, they should be contracted by private individuals or by the Government, it shall be their duty to fulfil their respective contracts, which, however, shall not be for more than four years, and provided such contracts are not opposed to the laws of the country as already established. 18. If they should acquire land, in accordance with Article 12, they must fulfil, within the term indicated, their agreement to cultivate the third part, under penalty of being dispossessed of the land previously granted, without the right to appeal to diplomatic intervention. Chapter V. Of Immigration Agents. 19. All Consuls of the Republic are converted, by this law, into Immigration Agents in all such parts of Europe or of America, which the Govermnent thinks convenient, in order to develop immigration. 20. Their duties and attributes are as follows: (1.) By using the means in their power to make active and efficacious propaganda in favour of immigration to the Republic, to make known its physical and political conditions, its variety of climate and products, actual state of its arts and industries, its means of communication, the advantages of its system for the working immigrant, the mode of obtaining land, the prices of articles of consumption and of its products, and other data that correspond with the ends which this law has in view; (2.) To give, without any remuneration all the data asked of them as to the conditions of the Republic; (3.) To certify as to the conduct and aptitude of the individuals who go to Guatemala as immigrants, and to authenticate the certificates which are given them by the authorities of the country, without requiring for this service any fee, under pain of dismissal; (4.) To watch over the fulfilment of the contracts which the Central Commitee of Immigration or the Government may make with the Steamship Companies for the transport of immigrants; (5,) To intervene, according to the instructions received from the Committee, in the contracts for carriage of immigrants; (6.) To pay the passage of immigrants when authorized thereto by the Central Committee of Immigration or by the Minister of the Interior; (7.) To grant the passages asked for by persons who wish to establish themselves as immigrants in the Republic, in conformity with the contracts made to that end with the Steam-ship Companies; (8.) To render an account every three months of the passages paid by them and those granted according to the powers conferred by the foregoing paragraph; (9.) To conclude contracts with the Shipping Companies for the transport of immigrants in conformity with the instructions which may have been communicated to them by the Committee or by the Minister of the Interior; (10.) To keep a book in which shall be recorded the operations carried out in the development of immigration; as well as another in which in order of date, shall appear the particulars of the immigrants with their name, age, profession, nationality, and the name of ship in which they sailed; (11.) To send annually a detailed memorandum to the Central Committee of Immigration upon the number and class of immigrants forwarded, as also of the causes which are judged to be an obstacle to immigration and of the means which could be employed for its greater extension; and (12.) To receive the correspondence addressed them by the Central Committee, and to give it rapid and safe transmission. Chapter VI. Labour Offices. 21. Both the Central Committee of Immigration and the branches established in the Republic shall have the following attributes: (1.) To endeavour by the means in their power to secure the speedy and satisfactory employment of immigrants, taking care that it be with honourable persons; (2.) To attend to the requests for immigrants which shall be made, whether by the Government or by private persons, paying in each case, and in advance, the expenses which might be occasioned; (3.) To watch over the exact fulfilment of the contracts which may exist between immigrants and private persons, or to intervene, at the solicitation of either party, in the contracts concluded between them; (4.) To keep a record, in a special register, of the number of engagements made, stating the date, kind of work, conditions of the contract and names of the contracting parties. 22. In all places where such offices do not exist, the Jefes Politicos", Commandants of Ports, Political Commissioners, and Municipal Alcaldes shall act in lieu thereof. General Rnles. 23. By this Law, all dispositions opposed to its text are annulled. 24. The Government, in view of the practical result given, shall, in union with the Committee of Immigration, propose to the National Legislative Assembly the reforms which in its opinion are necessary for the greater and more rapid increase of immigration into the Republic. 25. This Law shall take effect on the 1st February of this year. Given in the Palace of the Executive Power, the 25th January, 1896. José Maria Reina Barrios. Manuel Morales, Secretary of State for the Interior. 32. ESPAGNE, MAROC. Convention supplémentaire concernant les outrages riffiens de Melilla et le payement d'indemnités à l'Espagne; signée à Madrid, le 24 janvier 1895.*) **) State Papers. V. LXXXVII. Don Alfonso XIII, by the grace of God and the Constitution King of Spain, in his name and during his minority Doña Maria Christina, Queen-Regent of the Realm, and His Majesty the Sultan of Morocco, desirous of strengthening the good relations now happily existing between Spain and Morocco, and in order that the ends which inspired the Treaty concluded in the city of Morocco on the 5th March, 1894, may be better and more promptly attained, have decided to negotiate a Supplementary Convention, and to appoint as their Plenipotentiaries for the purpose, to wit: Her Majesty the Queen-Regent of the Realm, Don Alijandro Groizard y Gomez de la Sema, Grand Cross of the Royal and Distinguished Order of Charles the Third, of the Eminent Pontifical Order of Christ and of that of Pius IX, Doctor of Jurisprudence, Academician of the Royal Academy of Moral and Political Sciences, Life Senator, &c.; and His Majesty the Sultan of Morocco, his faithful servant, his Councillor, his elected for Embassies Extraordinary, Sidi-el-Hadj-Abd-el-KerimBrischa-Ben-el-Hadj-Mahommed - Brischa-el-Tetanni, Knight of the Grand Cross of the Royal Order of Isabella the Catholic and that of Military Merit; * Les ratifications ont été échangées à Tanger, le 4 avril 1895. |