Office of the Historian

File No. 17231.

[Untitled]

Department of State,
Washington, April 21, 1909.

To the diplomatic officers of the United States.

Gentlemen: I inclose herewith for your information, in case the Government to which you are accredited should mention the matter to you, a copy of an aide-mémoire handed to the chargé des affaires of the Netherlands legation at Washington explaining the intended scope of the department’s instruction of February 19 last concerning the proposed world’s congress for the conservation of natural resources.

I am, etc.,

P. C. Knox.
[Inclosure.]

Aide-mémoire.

On the 12th instant Mr. Royaards, the chargé des affaires of the Netherlands legation, called at the Department of State to inquire on behalf of his Government whether it was convenient for the department to give information as to the disposition of the various Governments to participate in the contemplated International Congress for the Conservation of Natural Resources. The remarks of the Chargé des affaires also conveyed the impression that his Government had been placed under the misapprehension that the Government of the United States might fail to call upon the Netherlands Government to issue the final invitation to foreign Governments to the congress, which it is proposed to hold at The Hague.

The Department of State welcomes the opportunity to dispel so unfortunate an impression. The instructions sent to the diplomatic representatives of the United States were intended merely to cause them to make preliminary inquiry as to the disposition of the various Governments to join in a congress of the kind contemplated. In this way it was sought to determine the question whether there was sufficient international interest to justify going forward with the project, in order that if this first condition were established a date might be fixed whereupon the Government of the Netherlands would naturally be asked to issue an invitation—a step obviously impossible at the time when the holding of the congress is problematical and the date is not fixed.

Department of State,
Washington, April 15, 1909.