File No. 763.72111/248
The Austro-Hungarian Ambassador (Dumba) to the Secretary of State
Manchester, Massachusetts, September 25, 1914.
[Received September 29.]
[Translation]
No. X–13/xiv]
Excellency: I have the honor to acknowledge your excellency’s note No. 104 of September 10,1 in which your excellency answered my telegram of the 9th about the collections of the Servian Sokols with headquarters at 1638 Diversey Parkway, Chicago, Illinois, for the Servian war fund.
It appears from a report of the Imperial and Royal Consulate General at Chicago that the United States District Attorney there has not yet received any instructions and therefore has taken no action in the matter. The aforesaid Consulate General is informed that the State authorities have no authority to interfere, and that in neutrality cases the United States District Attorney acts only upon instructions from Washington.
I beg leave to forward to you herewith the original, together with an English translation, of one of the appeals published in the various Slavic newspapers, by which the above-named headquarters of the Servian Sokols solicits contributions to the Servian War Fund.1 As your excellency will see, this appeal is directed not only to the Servians of the Kingdom but to Slays of all nationalities, that is to say, the same Servian agitation, which through its operation in the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy brought on the present war, is now being carried on here in the United States.
Renewing my request that these collections, which plainly constitute a breach of neutrality, be stopped and that the money already collected be attached, I avail myself of this opportunity to renew [etc.]