File No. No. 763.72113/700
The Secretary of State to the Alien Property Custodian ( Palmer)
Sir: The Department acknowledges the receipt of your letter of September 24, 1918,1 in which you state that among the properly of enemies reported to you under the provisions of the Trading with the Enemy Act, is certain property which is stated to belong to persons who it develops are the wives of persons who, while in this country, were consular representatives of an enemy government, and that where the wives are enemies you propose to require that such property shall be delivered to you under the provisions of the said act, unless there is some diplomatic reason to the contrary. You state that the property to which you refer will be divided into four classes as follows:
- (1)
- Household furniture.
- (2)
- Residences which were not used as consular offices.
- (3)
- Other real estate held as an investment and not used for consular purposes.
- (4)
- Stocks, bonds, mortgages, and other securities.
You further request me to advise you if there should be any diplomatic objection to the course of action which you propose.
In reply the Department informs you that it would appear that the property mentioned in classes (3) and (4) may properly be taken over by your office, since the private investments of diplomatic [Page 340] or consular officers in the United States, or their wives, whether real or personal which could not be regarded as pertaining to them in their diplomatic or consular capacity, should not be exempt from local jurisdiction and should not enjoy diplomatic immunity which attaches to the official property or personal effects of a diplomatic or consular officer which are regarded as a means or instrumentality for exercising his official functions.
The property mentioned in class (2), however, in so far as it might consist of the residence of the consul and his family when in the United States, and certainly the household goods mentioned in class (1), if used by the consul’s family when here, ought not to be taken over in view of the attitude expressed by the German Government in April last at the time of the reported seizure of Ambassador Gerard’s property in Germany, to the effect that the German Government was disposed to respect the property of American diplomatic and consular officers in Germany on the basis of reciprocity. It is the Department’s view that a similar attitude ought to be adopted with respect to the property of the wives of former Austro-Hungarian consuls in this country. To take over the property mentioned in classes (1) and (2) would probably result in retaliatory measures being adopted by the enemy governments.
I am [etc.]
Assistant Secretary
- Not printed.↩