861b.6363/71

The Secretary of State to Mr. Francis B. Loomis of the Standard Oil Company of California

Sir: The Department has received your letter of May 22, 1923, in which reference is made to the Department’s letter of May 19, 1923, concerning the desire of the Standard Oil Company of California to obtain permission from the Government of Japan to send a party of geologists to Northern, or Russian, Sakhalin for the purpose of making a geological reconnaissance in certain areas in the eastern part of the island believed to contain structure favorable to the production of petroleum. You state that these areas are covered by patents lawfully obtained from, and executed by, the Government of the late Tsar of Russia, and ask that, in view of the facts set forth in your letter, the Department give further consideration to the company’s request for support in the proposed reconnaissance to the extent of instructing the American Embassy at Tokyo by cable to communicate the desire of the company to the Japanese Government.

In its letter to you of May 19, 1923, the Department stated that there was no objection on the part of this Government to the Standard Oil Company of California communicating directly with the Japanese authorities concerning the admission of the exploring party in question, but that the Department was not prepared at this time to make special representations on the subject to the Japanese Government.

In declining to accede to the suggestion that the Japanese Government be informed through the Embassy at Tokyo of the company’s desire to send a party of explorers into Northern Sakhalin, the Department acted only after the most careful consideration of all the questions involved, but the Department has no objection to receiving [Page 811] such additional information as you may consider necessary in support of the interests of the Standard Oil Company of California in this matter, including details of the grants and transfers upon which the company bases its claims to an interest in the rights in question.

I am [etc.]

Charles E. Hughes