893.5045/183: Telegram
The Ambassador in Great Britain (Houghton) to the Secretary of State
257. Your 254, August 10, 5 [4] p.m.15 was made the subject of an informal note to the Foreign Office to which the following reply has been received:
“As regards Colonel McEuen, as has already been pointed out by us to the Japanese Government, we still feel that acceptance of his resignation before the inquiry would be a mistake since if he is censured by the inquiry the Chinese, who are likely to criticise us whatever we do, may complain that justice has been defeated by allowing him to resign beforehand and thus escape dismissal. This objection is increased if consular or diplomatic representatives are concerned instead of its being a matter entirely between the Municipal Council and their servant. Suspension without prejudice therefore seems to us to be the proper course in fairness to all parties concerned and we think it must surely be precisely the course which the United States Government would themselves adopt if any similar inquiry were held in America. It seems, moreover, to be in accordance with the idea underlying the remarks of your Minister mentioned in (c) of your letter and to meet the view with which we agree that Colonel McEuen should not remain in active occupation of his office while the inquiry is being held.
[Page 697]You will also appreciate that His Majesty’s Government cannot insist on a matter which lies between the Municipal Council and their own servant. We now learn that Colonel McEuen’s offer to resign has lapsed and that he is not now prepared to resign. We cannot insist that his offer be renewed, as though he were an official in our own employ; and if the diplomatic body as a whole were to try to do so this would probably mean a conflict with the Municipal Council. Is the game worth the candle? And can the diplomatic body afford to risk a fresh breach with Shanghai at the present moment and on an issue in which they would be acting contrary to established ideas of justice? But we have already declared our readiness to recommend that McEuen be suspended by the Municipal Council. This will entail his disappearance from office pending the inquiry upon the result of which his ultimate fate will depend. This is fair and reasonable and we do not think the Municipal Council can refuse.
Of course we have no intention or wish whatever to screen McEuen but we do feel very strongly that the judicial inquiry which seems essential in order to reach a settlement of the Shanghai riots ought not to be made dependent on the minor question of McEuen’s fate which cannot affect the findings of the inquiry in any way. We are prepared to go very far to meet the views of other powers in order to expedite and facilitate this inquiry to which we attach great importance whereas the McEuen question seems to us here to be secondary matter. But if the United States and Japanese Governments insist on making McEuen’s resignation a condition to the judicial inquiry, they will be insisting on something which we (and they) cannot enforce; and they may well therefore be wrecking the judicial inquiry.
As regards (b) in our Ministr[y’s] reply to the Chinese note we stated that we agreed to negotiations commencing forthwith on those articles in the 13 demands which were extraneous to the immediate question of the Shanghai riots. In this connection we agree with you in principle as to the rendition of the Mixed Court and to Chinese representation on the Municipal Council; and we have instructed Peking that negotiations may begin forthwith.
As regards (c), the scope of the judicial inquiry, we submitted draft terms of reference to our representatives at Peking to serve as a basis for discussion and not as an unalterable document. These were as follows “to inquire into the origin and character of the disturbances which took place at Shanghai on or about the 30th day of May 1925; the reasons if any that existed for anticipating disorder; the precautions adopted or which might have been adopted to prevent the same; the measures taken to suppress it and the circumstances in which certain persons lost their lives and other persons suffered injuries; to report thereon (to diplomatic body) and to make such recommendations as they may think proper as to the action which is called for in the circumstances established by them and as to any steps which in their opinion should be taken by the authorities primarily or ultimately responsible for the administration of the International Settlement at Shanghai with a view to prevent a similar occurrence in future.”
These terms were duly intended to enlarge the scope of our original proposals which were shown in the last paragraph of our aide-mémoire [Page 698] of July 17th16 (See my despatch 230 [203,] July 2016) to agree that a public judicial inquiry should be held to establish the facts to fix responsibility and to satisfy public opinion in China and abroad that justice will be done and administrative reforms effected in any way that such an inquiry may show to be necessary.
It is the usual practice in order to get the full benefit from inquiries of this character to ask the court of inquiry to make recommendations. It remains for the Government[s] to act on those recommendations or not as they think fit. In the present instance we thought such a condition the more desirable as the police regulations are believed to be defective. We however only telegraphed terms of reference to our Legation at Peking to serve as a basis of discussions and in order to expedite action. Although for the reasons explained our first impression was that the court of inquiry ought to be asked to make recommendations on matters directly arising out of its ascertainment of the facts, the point of main importance is that the inquiry should not be further postponed and if your Minister and Government remain opposed to this feature of the terms of reference we are ready to fall in with their views. In any case I presume that your Government are ready to agree to rest of the terms of reference. Your Government suggests that the inquiry should be limited to “findings of fact as regards the resignation of McEuen” and on the other hand “to the determination of the facts in connection with the shooting.” I presume the latter is intended, but we do not see how the actual shooting (or shootings) can be separated from the other interconnected occurrences which in their entirety formed the sequence of events now generally known as the Shanghai riots.
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