The Secretary of State to Minister Conger.
Washington, November 18, 1904.
Sir: The department has read very carefully your dispatch No. 1724, of the 13th ultimo, and its inclosure, on the subject of the movement [Page 243] among the foreign merchants in China to secure the postponement for six months of the date on which the new Chinese trademark regulations were to go into effect.
The department sees no reason for changing the views previously expressed on the matter.
The opinion among the foreign mercantile community at Shanghai appears, from the printed inclosures accompanying your dispatch, to be divided between the desirability of putting these trade-mark regulations into effect immediately and of asking the Chinese Government to postpone the enforcement of them. As shown by inclosure No. 3, the opinion of nearly every one of the men interviewed is in favor of the regulations being put into force at once.
The department having already informed both you and the German ambassador here that it sees no reason to ask for a postponement, approves your position, as indicated in the last paragraph of your dispatch, namely, that you would, for the present, take no part in the question of postponement, except in accordance with the department’s telegraphic instructions.
I am, sir, etc.,