The German Ambassador to the Secretary of State .
Washington , April 7, 1906 .
Mr. Secretary of State: As your excellency is aware, the Government of His Majesty the Emperor some time ago resolved to postpone the conference on wireless telegraphy and reserved the right to propose to the invited states another date for the meeting of the conference.
Circumstances now permit that the question of drafting international rules in regard to wireless telegraphy be taken up anew. We propose the date of June 28, 1906, as that of the meeting of the conference. The Universal Postal Congress that meets at Rome in the first week of April, 1906, will not require more than five or six weeks to complete its labors, so that delegates to that congress who may have also to attend the Berlin conference will have ample time to travel the intermediate distance.
Invitations will be extended to the states that have taken part in the previous conference, viz, France, Great Britain, Italy, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Spain, and the United States of America; and also to the states that had been previously invited—Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Monaco, Montenegro, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Roumania, Sweden, Turkey; finalty, Egypt, the Argentine Republic, Brazil, Chile, China, Japan, Mexico, Persia, Peru, Siam, and Uruguay.
The conference is not considered as a diplomatic but a technical one, in accordance with the character of the object of its labors. It is intended to let each invited government determine upon the international agreement to be eventually agreed upon through delegates furnished with full powers to that effect. The Imperial Government, acting on suggestions from other sources and desisting from its previous proposition, deems it best to leave it to the judgment of each invited government to decide as to the number of delegates that should be furnished with full powers to conclude the agreement.
[Page 1514]As to the form to be given to the agreement, if concluded, we believe it would be advisable to proceed on the lines followed in the Berne treaty of October 9, 1874, concerning the foundation of the Universal Postal Union and the Washington Universal Postal Convention of June 15, 1897.
The title and preamble of the draft previously submitted of a “convention Internationale concernant la télégraphie sans fil” would have to be modified as follows:
“Convention internationale concernant la télégraphie sans fil, conclude entre ——.”
“Les soussignés, plénipotentiaires des Gouvernements ci-dessus énumérés, ont d’un commun accord, et sous réserve de ratification, arrêté la convention suivante ——.”
While having the honor to renew, in the name of the Imperial Government, to the Government of the United States of America the invitation to take part in the conference and reserving for a future note communication of the names of the German delegates, I venture to ask for an answer at the earliest possible date and that the names of the American representatives be made known to me in due course.
Accept, etc.,