Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, Transmitted to Congress, With the Annual Message of the President, December 1, 1890
Mr. Reid to Mr. Blaine.
Paris, July 28, 1890. (Received August 9.)
Sir: I have the honor to inclose herewith copies of a letter from Mr. Ribot, minister of foreign affairs, on the pork question and of my reply.
I have, etc.,
Mr. Ribot to Mr. Reid.
Mr. Minister: I hasten to acknowledge the reception of the letter you did me the honor to write me the 3d instant with reference to the rule to which American pork subjected in France.
This communication has been brought to the knowledge of the minister of the interior, who has under his direction the department of public hygiene, and also of my colleagues in the departments of commerce and agriculture. I shall take pains to inform you as early as possible of the results to which it may lead.
In the quite unofficial conversation which I had in your absence with Mr. Vignaud in April last, and to which you are good enough to make allusion, I said that the French Government was quite disposed to endeavor to find conditions upon which the existing rule might be modified, but that it expected its friendly intentions would be reciprocated by the United States Government. The difficulties, of which I had given you a glimpse, have not been, I fear, attenuated by the measures which since that time, were, some of them, finally passed, others voted by the House of Representatives, and which do not fail to raise just complaints on the part of French merchants.
Please accept, etc.,
Mr. Reid to Mr. Ribot.
Paris, July 28, 1890.
Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of a letter from Your Excellency, in which you are good enough to advise me that my communication of the 3d of July on the subject of the continued exclusion of American pork from France has been communicated to your colleagues, the minister of the interior, the minister of commerce, and the minister of agriculture.
Your Excellency remarks that the French Government, in its disposition to modify the existing rule as to the exclusion of American pork, counted that this evidence of good will would be reciprocated by the United States and expresses regret that the customs administrative bill already passed and the new tariff bill voted by the House of Representatives and now under consideration by the Senate have increased the difficulties in the way of such action on the admission of port as has been desired and give just ground of complaint on the part of French merchants.
[Page 289]Your Excellency will pardon me for endeavoring to show that this is a view of the situation which the facts do not warrant.
The existing rule as to the exclusion of American pork has not been modified. Not a step to that end, so far as known, has been taken. What evidence of good will, then, in this regard has France given which the United States could be already expected to reciprocate?
Besides, there would appear to be no similarity or just relation of any kind between the two subjects which Your Excellency couples—the French exclusion of American pork and the two American bills, currently called the McKinley bills—nor is any reason apparent why a continuance of the one should be justified by your apprehensions as to the others.
The American bills are not yet in effect; one of them is not yet even a law, and the nature of their operation must as yet be to some extent a matter of conjecture. The French decree has been in full force for the past 9 years, and its scope and results are perfectly known.
There is every reason, from the history of such legislation in the past, to believe that if experience shows defects or injustice in the working of the American bills they will be modified. The French decree, in spite of argument and remonstrance, in spite, even, of proof that it does nobody any good, has been tenaciously maintained unchanged for 9 years.
The American bills are merely a development of a recognized American policy, understood by all the world, in practice during the greater part of or unational history and continuously for the past 25 years. The French decree is entirely exceptional and not in conformity, so far as known, with any general recognized French practice.
The American bills touch all countries with absolute impartiality. The French decree singles out the United States from all other countries and prohibits its product alone, while the similar products of the rest of the world are admitted.
The American bills make no charges against the quality of the products whose importation they regulate or tax. The French decree is based upon the indefensible charge that the American product excluded is unwholesome, though this charge has been repudiated by the French Academy of Medicine itself, and though this prohibited and unwholesome product has recently been crowned by the highest prize of your own Universal Exposition.
Under these circumstances, I venture to suggest that the French Government is not in a good position to put forward in explanation of its own action anything which the United States may now do in the impartial development of its well-known policy of protection. France is and has been for 9 years past a persistent aggressor. It has absolutely prohibited the importation of an important American product on indefensible charges. It still maintains this prohibition in spite of the demonstrated facts that nothing is thereby gained, either for its own consumers or its own producers, and that the only appreciable effect is to do an injustice to a century-old friend by openly discriminating against that friend in favor of Germany, Italy, and England.
After such a record, and in advance of the slightest known movement to amend it, how can France have reason to expect, as Your Excellency indicates, that its evidence of good will should now be reciprocated by the United States? He who seeks justice should first do justice. Much more should that nation which seeks friendly consideration for its merchants refrain first from injustice to the merchants of the country appealed to and from defamation of that country’s products.
It is proper, further, to call Your Excellency’s attention to the fact that the chief ground on which complaint has been urged against the customs administrative bill, viz, that in cases of alleged undervaluation no appeal could be had from the decision of the custom-house to the courts, is not sustained by the terms of the bill as finally passed. Your Excellency will recall that on the first expression of a friendly complaint on this subject you were assured from Washington that the bill would be modified and the right of appeal granted. I deeply regret that that prompt response from the United States has met with no reciprocal act or recognition on the part of the French Government, and that another friendly act, the total removal of the 30 per cent, duty on works of art by the House of Representatives, passed alike unnoticed, until the Senate committee, seeing no encouragement for steps in this direction, restored the duty.
From our point of view, then, the case stands thus: The French Government has persisted for 9 years in an indefensible act, discriminating specially against United States commerce. Meantime it complains of new measures by the United States Government far less severe and in no way discriminating against French commerce. Its complaints receive prompt and considerate attention, and the friendly disposition thus shown evokes no recognition.
It can not be believed that with a full understanding of the case the French Government deliberately chooses that attitude. Your Excellency has been necessarily much preoccupied of late with other matters, but I can not believe that when you come to [Page 290] give the case full attention you can be satisfied with it. Now, as heretofore, I make my appeal to French friendliness, French justice, and, may I add, to an enlightened sense of French interests.
I avail, etc.,