File No. 882.51/319.
The Acting Secretary of State to the Ambassador of the French Republic.
Washington, May 15, 1912.
Excellency: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the note upon a point connected with the loan contract between the Republic of Liberia and a group of American bankers and British, French, and German bankers, which your excellency addressed to the Secretary of State March 30, and which has been receiving most careful consideration, as I had the honor to indicate to your excellency in conversation on the 9th instant, in connection with other considerations entering into this Liberian arrangement which the Government of the United States has so much at heart.
As your excellency points out, the contract provides for nomination of a General Receiver of Customs by the Government of the United States and of three Receivers of Customs, one each by the Governments of France, Germany, and Great Britain, and provides also that during the absence or inability to act of the General Receiver, or during a vacancy, the receiver located at or nearest Monrovia shall act as General Receiver. Your excellency then communicates the suggestion of the Government of France that this incidental duty be given in turn and for a fixed period to each of the three Receivers of Customs, at the same time expressing the view of your Government that such an understanding would contribute to a régime of complete equality amongst all the interests affected by the question thus raised.
[Page 676]As your excellency is well aware, the earnest aim of the Government of the United States has been the discharge of its historic obligations to the Republic of Liberia—a moral purpose to the accomplishment of which it has been willing to give perhaps disproportional efforts. It has been peculiarly gratifying to have in this work the cooperation of British and French bankers and of two Governments whose neighboring territorial interests have made their assistance so valuable. The cooperation of Germany, whose commercial interests undoubtedly predominate at the present time, was likewise welcome; and it is a cause of much satisfaction to the United States to contemplate the success of this whole plan as now so nearly achieved.
As your excellency is aware, the negotiations of the past two years have not been without difficulties. It has been the steadfast purpose of this Government to pursue perfect equality of consideration among the Governments and the Nationals whose cooperation we so highly value. To this end, for example, when the Government of France made the settlement of its boundary controversy with Liberia a condition precedent to its approval of the contract and imposed the additional condition that the French surgeon in the employ of Liberia should be retained, the Government of the United States, as is well known, used its good offices, both directly and indirectly, to cause Liberia to meet the demands of France. Similarly this Government brought Liberia to settle the northwest boundary dispute with Great Britain in accordance with the desires of that Government.
It will be recalled that when the Government of the United States initiated the steps which have led to the present arrangement, there was on foot and not without some prospect of consummation, a plan for the relief of Liberia through a financial reorganization under German auspices which would incidentally have given a particularly advantageous position to the German interests in that country. When the arrangement proposed by the United States was brought forward, this earlier plan was no longer pressed, but it was evidently felt that German interests, being purely commercial and largely centered at Monrovia, should in turn receive a certain measure of special consideration, the more so, no doubt, because the Imperial German Government, after timely acquiescence in the abandonment of the plans of the German bankers and in accepting in general terms the proposition of the United States had, after a full interchange of views, relinquished a number of points which it originally deemed of importance and yielded to the views of the United States on matters which the American Government deemed essential to the plans in which the Governments of France and Great Britain had already joined their efforts to our own.
The General Receiver of Customs, although of course an official of Liberia, is nominated by the Government of the United States and so is, without doubt, measurably under the influence of this Government. According to the loan contract the three Receivers are to act under the direction of the General Receiver. Doubtless having in mind these provisions, the Imperial German Government in July, 1911, in approving the draft loan agreement, expressed the expectation that, owing to Germany’s large share of the trade of Liberia, the General Receiver would place the German Receiver at Monrovia.
[Page 677]Recognizing the relatively greater centering at Monrovia of the at present, preponderant commercial interests of the German Empire in Liberia, and reflecting upon the whole course of these negotiations, your excellency can hardly be surprised that the Government of the United States was not unimpressed by the equity of this suggestion. Apart from the fact of substitution in the absence of the General Receiver, the post of Receiver at Monrovia might be regarded as less desirable in many respects than those at other ports. For example, that officer would have less scope for independent action, being more directly under the supervision of the General Receiver. The Government of the United States would always expect the General Receiver to be guided in the exercise of his authorities by all equitable considerations, but appreciating the fact that in the first instance the General Receiver would not be cognizant of all the circumstances, the Government of the United States did not hesitate to express the opinion that, under present conditions, it would be equitable and proper that the German Receiver should be designated for the post at Monrovia. I may add that the propriety of such a course seemed to be accentuated by the fact that in approving at this time this slight preference to the representative of the German Government, in so far as the action of the General Receiver is concerned, the Government of the United States was availing of the only opportunity which had occurred for any special consideration of Germany, whereas other occasions had been offered and availed of in which this Government was able to manifest its consideration in matters more intimately concerning the Governments of France and Great Britain.
I am very sensible of the fact that, looked at apart from the history of the negotiations, the proposal of your excellency’s Government appears a peculiarly equitable one; and I think it quite possible that at some later date conditions may be so altered as to lead to another arrangement. Still, in the present circumstances, I must adhere to the view that it is not unfair that the German Receiver be assigned to the post at Monrovia.
As to another point which I had the honor to discuss with your excellency last Thursday, I take this opportunity to reiterate my concurrence in the view of your excellency’s Government that in objecting to the German Consul as a Receiver the Liberian Government should have the support of the other Governments concerned, and I might add that instructions in this sense have been sent to the Legation at Monrovia.
Having thus elaborated and supplemented what I sought to explain to your excellency in the course of our conversation, I permit myself in conclusion to express the confident hope that the Government of the United States, which has so much at heart the success of the Liberian plan, may count upon the collaboration of the French Government in meeting these really not very important questions and in certainly preventing them from affecting the success of a project upon which we have so successfully cooperated.
Accept [etc.]