Press Release

Office of the Historian
Bureau of Public Affairs
United States Department of State
May 29, 2014

The Department of State released today the newly digitized Papers Relating to theForeign Relations of the United States, 1914, World War I, Supplement

This volume is part of a Foreign Relations subseries on the First World War that documents the most important decisions made by the Department of State relating to international law. The 1914 World War I Supplement, originally compiled in the 1920s, is the first of the World War I Supplement subseries to be digitized on the Office of the Historian website, providing for easier, more robust access to the publication.

The first section of the volume contains correspondence of a general political character relating to the outbreak and spread of the war (omitting documents dealing with military developments), and is arranged in chronological sequence. The remainder of the volume is organized topically into three main compilations: Neutral Rights, Neutral Duties, and Other Problems and Responsibilities. These documents cast light on U.S. Government interpretations of national and international conceptions of neutrality—conceptions central to the United States entering the Great War. It is available on the Office of the Historian website, history.state.gov, and may also be downloaded as an eBook.

This volume was compiled by Joseph V. Fuller, edited by Tyler Dennett, and published in 1928. This volume was digitized through a partnership with the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections (http://uwdc.library.wisc.edu/). The University graciously provided high quality scanned images of the printed book, which the Office of the Historian further digitized to create this full text searchable edition. The volume and this press release are available on the Office of the Historian website at http://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1914Supp. For further information, contact history@state.gov.