File No. 300.115/1718
The Consul General at London ( Skinner ) to the Secretary of State
London , November 25, 1914.
[Received December 7.]
No. 153]
Sir: I have the honor to report that I have repeatedly called to the attention of the procurator general the circumstances that the [Page 359] implied promise made to the Department by the British Ambassador on September 4 last that American seized cargo should be disposed of expeditiously by an executive Committee without reference to the prize court, is not being carried out, and to my most recent communication on this subject he replied on November 21 in the following terms:
I may observe that it is of much general importance that the legal questions involved in the case (this was the case of Muir and Company) should be judicially determined, and it cannot, I venture to think, justly be made a matter complaint that a decision has been sought whether cargo belongs to neutral claimants or to the enemy.
I may add that the functions of the committee to which you refer are not generally to supersede the prize court, as your letter rather suggests, but have regard to the exercise of the dispensing powers or the bounty of the Crown.
I have [etc.]