195/970
The Acting Secretary of State to Diplomatic and Consular Officers
G. I. Consular No. 1053
Sirs: In an opinion handed down on June 7, 1926, in the case of Berizzi Brothers Company, Appellant, vs. The Steamship “Pesaro”58 the Supreme Court of the United States held that a ship owned and possessed by a foreign government and operated by it in the carriage of merchandise for hire is immune from arrest under process based on a libel in rem by a private suitor in a Federal District Court exercising Admiralty jurisdiction. You are therefore directed to cancel the text under subtitle numbered one, Suits Against Shipping Board Vessels in Foreign Courts, of General Instruction, Consular, No. 871 of January 11, 1923,59 but you are not to cancel the title itself.
The Decision of the Supreme Court referred to above has not changed the general policy of the Department of refraining from claims of immunity in the courts of foreign countries for vessels owned by the United States Shipping Board, and you should not endeavor to obtain immunity for Shipping Board vessels unless you receive express instructions from the Department to take such action in a particular case.
You are instructed to make a marginal notation under the subtitle, Suits Against Shipping Board Vessels in Foreign Courts, of General Instruction, Consular, No. 871, referring to this instruction.
I am [etc.]
- 271 U. S. 562.↩
- Foreign Relations, 1923, vol. i, p. 267.↩