I inclose for your information and in answer to your dispatch a copy of
an instruction to the ambassador at St. Petersburg on this subject.
[Inclosure.]
The Acting Secretary of
State to Ambassador
Tower.
Department of State,
Washington, September 15,
1899.
No. 87.]Sir: I have received your dispatch No. 83
of the 28th ultimo, in further relation to the subject of your No.
29 of the 22d of April last, wherein you reported upon an
arrangement proposed to be established in connection with official
ceremonies at the imperial court, whereby a special court costume is
to be prescribed and worn by distinguished foreigners and by
diplomatic representatives who have no uniform.
The department has always distinguished between a “uniform” and a
court dress conforming to local custom. A uniform serves to show the
branch of public
[Page 528]
service
to which the wearer belongs and also the rank or grade held by him
therein. A court dress, denoting no public office or function, when
worn by ununiformed functionaries and private citizens alike without
any indication of individual rank or precedence, is in no sense a
“uniform,” and is not obnoxious to the statutory prohibition. Having
in view the usage of several European courts where, in the absence
of a characteristic uniform an appropriate general court costume may
be prescribed to be worn at official functions, the department, by
paragraph 67 of the Personal Instructions which you quote, has
authorized the wearing of locally appropriate court costume upon
suitable occasion.
The suggestion reported in your No. 29, as having been put forth by
the Russian minister for foreign affairs, appears to be designed to
supply the omission hitherto of a prescribed court dress for the
imperial court. In principle it is entirely unobjectionable. In
practice, the nature of the costume appears, to judge from your
statements, to call for special consideration, having in view the
exceptional character of the Russian climate. Your suggestions in
this regard appear to have been practical and have commended
themselves to the good judgment of Count Mouravieff. If I were to be
invited to make any comment, it would be that a distinction might be
made between daylight and evening functions, assigning to each a
costume fitted to the occasion. In ordinary social use, the frock
coat is worn by day, the dress coat by night. In the public usage of
this capital, as for instance at the audience of a uniformed
minister, which takes place in the daytime, a frock coat is admitted
as appropriate to the hour and place. The usage of this capital runs
against wearing evening dress by daylight, but it is understood that
in other countries, as in France, evening dress is worn on
ceremonial occasions in the daytime by high officers whose rank and
station have no distinguishing uniform.
With these remarks, the matter is left to your own good judgment, in
the belief that it may not be difficult for you and the minister for
foreign affairs, aided by the advice of the grand master of
ceremonies, to agree upon an evening “court dress” to be worn on
occasion of court ceremonial by all foreign participants not using a
uniform denoting an organized public service and their rank in such
service; and to prescribe in addition some modification thereof
suitable for daylight or open-air functions.
I am, sir, etc.,
