Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, 1925, Volume II

811.512362 Shipping/8

The Ambassador in Germany ( Houghton ) to the Secretary of State

Berlin , January 22, 1924 .
[Received February 12.]

No. 526

Sir: Referring to my telegram No. 21 of January 21st last,⁸⁴ with regard to exemption from taxation of individual Americans engaged in shipping, who are non-resident in Germany, and of American shipping companies, I have the honor to transmit herewith a copy and translation of the note from the German Foreign Office, to which my telegram referred.

I have [etc.]

A. B. Houghton

[Enclosure—Translation⁸⁵]

The German Foreign Office to the American Embassy

No.V Steu 30/B 2556

Note Verbale

The Foreign Office has the honor to inform the Embassy of the United States of America, in reply to the latter’s note verbale of October 27, 1923 (No. 543),⁸⁶ and supplementing its own note verbale of September 5, 1923 (V Steu 1496),⁸⁷ that, by an ordinance dated January 5, 1924,⁸⁸ the Federal Minister of Finance has instructed the competent financial authorities that incomes derived from the operation of ships by citizens of the United States of America (individual persons) who have no residence in Germany are likewise to be exempted from the income tax, under the condition of reciprocity and the reservation of repeal at any time, as has already been ordered by a proclamation of August 10, 1923,⁸⁹ relating to American commercial companies as affected by the corporation tax.

Furthermore, according to the investigations undertaken by the German Government, citizens of the United States who have no residence in Germany, as well as American shipping companies which receive their incomes from the operation of ships, have not been subjected in Germany to either the income or corporation tax since January 1, 1921.

The Foreign Office would be grateful for a statement as to whether now the Government of the United States of America will grant to German shipping companies and individual persons engaged in shipping the same exemption from taxation of incomes derived from the operation of ships, and particularly so with retroactive effect from January 1, 1921.

Berlin , January 19, 1924 .

84. Not printed.
85. File translation revised.
86. Not found in Department files.
87. See telegram No. 137, Sept. 7, 1923, 9 a.m., from the Ambassador in Germany, p. 188.
88. Post, p. 194.
89. Ante, p. 189.