Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, 1919, Volume I

[Enclosure]

The Secretary of the Treasury (Glass) to the Brazilian Minister of Finance³⁶

Washington, undated.

My Dear Mr. Minister: Your Excellency will, by this time, have received formal notice that the Second Pan American Financial Conference will meet in Washington, by the invitation of the President of the United States, on the morning of January 12, 1920. I venture at this time to call the attention of Your Excellency to certain matters concerning this Conference to which the Central Executive Council is now giving consideration. Subsequently, I shall take the liberty of requesting an expression of your views concerning related matters.

The Second Pan American Financial Conference will take place at a time when the entire world will be undergoing a process of substantial change and readjustment. The American continent, by reason of its great and as yet undeveloped resources, is destined to play a leading part in this work of economic reconstruction. The coming together of delegates from all sections of the continent will furnish the opportunity for an interchange of views as to the best means of meeting the new obligations which have been thrust upon us.

The First Pan American Financial Conference took place, as Your Excellency will no doubt recall, at Washington, in May 1915.³⁷ Upon the basis of its recommendation, the International High Commission was established and has sedulously labored to put into effect the resolutions of the Conference.³⁸ At the first general meeting of the Commission at Buenos Aires in April, 1916, concrete form was given to the problems at that time regarded as of a most practical and urgent character.³⁹ A report of the work accomplished by the commission since that time will be submitted in due course by the Central Executive Council. As Your Excellency will have realized, the Commission has at least brought matters to an advanced stage, even though it has not made effective all that it had hoped to carry out. I shall be grateful if Your Excellency would indicate to the Council any problems which it seems important to add to those hitherto studied by the International High Commission, with a view to their consideration by the Second Financial Conference.

The chief problem of the Second Pan American Financial Conference will be a clear and accurate presentation of the financial and commercial needs of each of the countries of the American continent and the formulation of plans by which those needs may be met. The specific form in which this problem should be expressed is indicated by the tentative program which I have the honor herewith to lay before Your Excellency. Some questions on this program can be considered in a satisfactory manner only if a detailed statement of what you believe to be the financial needs of Brazil at the present time and in the immediate future, is submitted for full and searching analysis. In order better to prepare not only for the Pan American Financial Conference, but also for the personal conference with Your Excellency, to which I look forward as one of the most helpful features of the meeting, I would be glad to begin, not later than the middle of October, a careful examination of such a complete enumeration and explanation of the financial requirements of Brazil.

It has seemed desirable to the Central Executive Council of the International High Commission that all the Sections of the Commission should consider the character and scope of the tentative program at an early date, and I, therefore, venture to request that Your Excellency be so good as to convene the members of the National Section of Brazil, in accordance with our now established rule of simultaneous meetings, on the morning of August 5 [25], 1919, transmitting at your earliest convenience the valuable conclusions arrived at by your Section.

Your Excellency’s kind cooperation in frankly setting forth your views concerning the considerations briefly presented in this communication and the tentative program now submitted will be deeply appreciated; and with cordial sentiments of esteem, we extend once more the assurances of our profound regard.

Carter Glass

Secretary of the Treasury of the United
States, and President of the Central Executive
Council of the International High Commission

L. S. Rowe
Secretary-General

[Subenclosure]

Tentative Program for the Second Pan American Financial Conference

Washington, January 12, 1920.

I. The effect of the war on the commerce and industry, manufacturing and mining, agriculture and public utilities, of the Republics of the American continent.

1. To what extent has the war stimulated the development of domestic resources, so as to create greater economic independence? To what extent has it delayed this development?

2. Urgent present public financial needs—

a. For the liquidation or funding of existing financial obligations;

b. For the further development of public enterprises.

3. Urgent present financial needs in commerce and industry.

II. How can required capital and credit facilities best be provided?

1. To what extent can these requirements be met by domestic capital?

2. To what extent is foreign capital required?

a. Improved banking facilities.

b. Acceptances.

c. The creation of a market for the distribution of foreign government and corporate securities. The establishment of investment companies.

d. The direct investment of capital in foreign enterprises, industrial and commercial, and in the construction of public works.

III. National credit, and the factors affecting it.

1. Extent and nature of the public debt.

2. The national fiscal system, with special reference to sources and adequacy of revenues.

3. The relation of the fiscal system to currency reform.

4. What guaranties and remedies are provided by law in the case of provincial and municipal loans?

IV. The effect of the war on transportation facilities. Requirements of the present and immediate future.

1. To what extent has the war affected transportation facilities on land and sea?

2. Laws and regulations to provide for the encouragement of shipping facilities between the American Republics.

3. The removal of obstacles in the way of transportation facilities, through adequate provision for lighthouses and other aids to navigation, and through agreement as to harbor and quarantine regulations, entrance and clearance, docking, lading and unlading facilities.

4. Freight rates.

5. Maritime insurance facilities.

V. Measures to facilitate commercial intercourse among the American Republics.

1. Commercial Travelers Treaty.⁴⁰

2. The International Gold Clearance Fund Treaty.⁴¹

3. Parcel post facilities and lower postal rates.

4. Cable facilities; wireless telegraphy.

5. Uniform customs regulations; the prevention of the undervaluation of merchandise in export and import declarations.

6. The establishment of free ports.

7. Improved warehouse facilities.

VI. The development of uniformity of legislation in relation to—

1. Bills of exchange and checks; bills of lading and warehouse receipts.

2. Contracts regarding the consignment of merchandise in foreign trade, and the conditions of acceptance or rejection of merchandise.

3. Commercial arbitration; agreements between the Chambers of Commerce of the American Republics, with special reference to the agreements between the Chambers of Commerce of Buenos Aires, Montevideo and Guayaquil and the Chamber of Commerce of the United States.

4. Patent and copyright law; the protection of trade marks, especially through the establishment of the International Trade Mark Bureaus at Havana and Rio de Janeiro.

5. Uniform admiralty law.

36. The same, mutatis mutandis, to Haiti. Spanish versions were sent to all the other countries concerned, the one to Mexico being somewhat different in tenor from the others.
37. See Proceedings of the First Pan American Financial Conference … Washington, May 24 to 29, 1915, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1915.
38. See Foreign Relations, 1915, pp. 20–24.
39. See ibid., 1916, pp. 18–29.
40. See pp. 45 ff.
41. See pp. 42 ff.