File No. 841.731/131
The Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America to the Secretary of State
Sir: A degree of certainty in the treatment of cable messages sent abroad by American business men is of immediate importance to members of this chamber and to all business men who are endeavoring to maintain a normal course of business with regular customers in neutral countries.
Although difficulties of American business men are now somewhat mitigated by the action of England in permitting the use of several codes, very great embarrassment continues for the reason [Page 524] that when a message is interrupted by the British censorship neither the sender nor the addressee is afforded any opportunity to explain ambiguous terms, and in fact no notice whatever of the interruption is given.
We have before us copies of uncoded messages, in English and in French, addressed to firms in London, Sweden, Greece, Norway, Denmark, Italy, and Holland, which we are informed are now known to have been undelivered, although the American senders were not given information of any kind concerning the treatment these messages received.
Changes which have been made in the personnel of the staff enforcing the censorship on cablegrams may indicate some dissatisfaction on the part of British authorities themselves over the manner in which the censorship has been exercised. Nevertheless, so far as we can inform ourselves, we can learn of no definite arrangement for such regulation of the censorship as will permit American business men, endeavoring to carry on ordinary business negotiations with firms in neutral countries, to have reasonable knowledge about the disposal of their cable messages.
Under these circumstances we venture to suggest that the State Department, if consistent in other ways with the public interest, take up with the British Government some such proposal as that if the censors incline to interrupt a message proceeding from an American firm to a business house in a neutral country the censors afford the American business house in question an opportunity to make explanation, at their own cost for cabling, of ambiguous or suspicious terms, and that if a message is interrupted immediate notice by cable be sent to the sender or the addressee, as will better suit the purposes of the censorship, conveying only such insignificant information as will permit identification of the message which has been interrupted.
Very respectfully yours,
Secretary