Chargé Wheeler to
the Secretary of State.
American Embassy,
St.
Petersburg, May 31,
1910.
No. 176.]
Sir: With reference to the department’s
telegraphic instruction dated March 5, 1909, proposing alternative
procedure for the international prize court and the investment of this
tribunal with the functions of a court of arbitral justice, and to its
unnumbered instruction of November 3, 1909, inclosing an identic
circular note on the subject for transmission to the minister of foreign
affairs, I have the honor herewith to transmit a note, received today
from the foreign office, with translation in English.
I have, etc.,
[Inclosure—Translation.]
The Minister for Foreign
Affairs to Chargé Wheeler.
Ministry for Foreign
Affairs,
May 17–30,
1910.
Monsieur le Chargé d’Affaires: In reply to
the note of November 9, 1909, I have the honor to inform you that
the minister imperial did not fail to submit to a thorough
examination at the hands of a special commission the proposal of the
Cabinet at Washington concerning the signing and ratification of The
Hague convention of October 18, 1907, relative to the establishment
of an international court of prize.
The American plan has been received with the strongest sympathy by
the said ministerial commission, which fully recognizes the high
practical value of the proposal of Mr. Secretary of State Knox as
being able to facilitate the acceptance by all the powers of the
above-mentioned convention concerning the establishment of an
International Prize Court. However, considering the fact that the
actual text of two additional protocols relating thereto, actually
proposed by the American Government, should be first established by
common consent by all the powers interested, and that on the other
hand the project of the convention relative to the establishment of
a court of arbitral justice—whose effective institution occupies so
predominant a place in Mr. Knox’s plans—has not even been signed at
The Hague, and would require, furthermore, to be amplified and
modified in conformity with the American proposals, the ministerial
commission is of the opinion that it would be difficult, if not
impossible, to decide these questions—so complex, so important, and
at the same time interesting all the powers signatory to the
conventions of The Hague—by means of ordinary diplomatic
correspondence. They could, on the other hand, be handled
effectively only by an international conference—inasmuch as these
questions would require, perhaps, the revision, from the standpoint
of form and even, should such be the case, of their content, of the
two conventions of The Hague which are contemplated in the new
proposal of the Government of the United States of America.
Accept, etc.,
