File No. 774/108–109.
Chargé Vignaud to
the Secretary of State.
American Embassy,
Paris,August 10,
1907.
No. 66.]
Sir: In reply to your cable of the 10th [9th]
instant, I have the honor of inclosing herewith a copy and a translation
of the note of the French Government accepting our invitation to take
part in a commission to investigate the opium question.
I must add that on the same day that the ambassador telegraphed the
department the substance of this note, July 10, a dispatch was prepared
for its transmission which was supposed to have been sent. The
oversight, for which I beg to apologize, has just been discovered.
I have, etc.,
[Page 167]
[Inclosure.—Translation.]
By a verbal note of June 26 last, the American ambassador asked the
minister of foreign affairs to kindly acquaint him with the reply of
the Government of the Republic to the proposition of the Washington
Cabinet, dated February 25, to submit to an international conference
or to cause to be elucidated by commissioners appointed by the
interested powers the question of the commerce of opium in China.
Mr. White added that the British, Japanese, German, and Dutch
Governments had already replied to the above mentioned proposition
that they were ready to join the Government of the United States “in
naming commissioners to study the opium question if the cooperation
of China was assured, and if the investigation to be made should
extend to the production of opium as well as to its
importation.”
The minister of foreign affairs has the honor to inform His
Excellency Mr. White that the Government of the Republic is ready to
have itself represented in an international investigating commission
if the interested powers are likewise disposed to do so, if the
cooperation of China is assured, and if the investigation extends to
the production of opium in China as well as to the importation of
foreign opium into that country.
The Government of the Republic is of the opinion that the procedure
of a commission is more practical than a conference which would not
actually dispose of all the elements necessary to formulate precise
rules, before a commission has proceeded to a detailed inquiry on
the production, commerce, use, and disadvantages (inconvénients) of
opium.
