Neutrality—“The Best Practices of Nations.”—President Wilson’s message to Congress in August,1913:

“For the rest I deem it my duty to exercise the authority conferred upon me by the law of March14, 1912, to see to it that neither side of the struggle now going on in Mexico receive any assistance from this side of the border. I shall follow the best practise of nations in the matter of neutrality by forbidding the exportation of arms and munitions of war of any kind from the United States—a policy suggested by several interesting precedents, and certainly dictated by many manifest considerations of practical expediency. We cannot in the circumstances be the partisans of either party to the contest that now distracts Mexico, or constitute ourselves the virtual umpire between them.”