893.5045/197: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Great Britain (Houghton)
282. Your 274 August 27, 1 p.m. Department has given careful consideration to views set forth in your telegram. It is willing to accept the British stand with regard to status of McEuen on the understanding that McEuen’s suspension should be arranged to take effect as soon as possible without awaiting the commencement of the judicial inquiry. British Foreign Office does not appear fully to appreciate the importance which attaches to McEuen’s status in the mind of the Chinese in the present situation. The Department is convinced that the Shanghai affair can never be really settled and the intense and widespread bitterness of the Chinese be allayed so long as McEuen is retained in his post. Rightly or wrongly McEuen represents in the minds of the Chinese that aspect of extraterritorial privileges which resulted on May 30 in the death of certain Chinese students. If the inquiry should find him at fault the matter will presumably be disposed of by his dismissal. But if, as is quite possible, the inquiry should find that his conduct was not culpable but involved question of the exercise of his administrative discretion which a judicial inquiry is not competent to review, the Chinese would undoubtedly resent what they would regard as a whitewash and there would be a fresh outburst of agitation against the British and other nationalities which they considered parties to repudiation of responsibility for shooting. To prevent any such unfortunate result it seems to the Department that it should be arranged that McEuen, if acquitted, will nevertheless retire from post in which his presence is a challenge and an incitement to anti-foreign feeling.
You may therefore inform the British Foreign Office that for sake of avoiding indefinite delay in settlement of the Shanghai affair we will not insist upon McEuen’s resignation before the inquiry; but that we feel so strongly that his retention in his post would perpetuate the Chinese rancor against the position of foreigners throughout China and render abortive any negotiations for the settlement of the Shanghai incident, that we feel that assurances should be given that he will ask to be retired in the event of his vindication by the inquiry.