711.93/174
The Minister in China (MacMurray) to the Secretary of State
Peking, April 26,
1928.
[Received May 29.]
No. 1485
Sir: I have the honor to recall that, in the
course of consultation with the officers of the Department last autumn,
I was instructed by the Secretary to seek opportunity to negotiate
concurrently with the representatives of the several factions in China,
with a view to an agreement on the subject of tariff arrangements, along
the general lines indicated in a memorandum which I had submitted to the
Department on October 21st last.11
On my recent visit to the Yangtze Valley Region, I had various
conversations with General Hwang Fu, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the
so-called Nationalist government established at Nanking, and
[Page 409]
in one of the earlier of these
conversations which took place at Shanghai on February 26, he raised the
subject of negotiations for the revision of our treaties with China. A
memorandum summarizing this conversation is enclosed herewith. I
endeavored to make clear to General Hwang my readiness to negotiate on
tariff matters with a unified Chinese government (whether under Northern
or Southern control), or with a commission or other body simultaneously
representing North and South, or concurrently and along parallel lines
with the North and with the South; and I indicated that, while holding
no brief for the so-called Edwardes plan,12 I felt that something
along that line would afford the readiest means for such negotiations as
the American Government has in view. General Hwang, while speaking in
general terms of appreciation of the friendly disposition of the
American Government, made no concrete response with regard to any of the
alternatives suggested.
On my return to Shanghai after my trip up the Yangtze, I again saw
General Hwang in Shanghai on March 29, for the purpose of arranging with
him a settlement of the Nanking incident of March 24, 1927.13
The subject of treaty revision came up incidentally to the second
exchange of notes additional to the exchange actually covering the
settlement of the Nanking incident. In the discussion of my proposed
reply to his note requesting treaty revision, General Hwang queried the
necessity of my replying so guardedly as I proposed to do, saying
outright that we need not be afraid that the Nationalist government
would actually press us too hard by demands for radical revision of the
treaties. During the same phase of our discussions, it appeared that a
very strong objection which he had made to my inclusion of the phrase
“an administration so far representative of the Chinese people as a
whole” was based upon the apprehension that this phraseology might be
construed as implying the existence or the prospect of some
understanding between North and South—a possibility to which the
Political Council and the military authorities of the Nanking regime
were definitely opposed in view of the concentration of all their
efforts upon the prosecution of the military campaign against the North.
In this connection, he further stated that the Edwardes proposals had
failed largely because of this same feeling against any rapprochement with Peking. It was quite clear
that under existing circumstances he was not prepared to entertain in
behalf of the Nanking regime any offer to carry on negotiations with the
Nanking and Peking regimes, either jointly or concurrently.
[Page 410]
It may well be that the attitude thus indicated to me by the Minister for
Foreign Affairs was at least in part dictated by the fact that there
exists no coordination whatsoever between the Ministry for Foreign
Affairs and the Ministry of Finance of the Nanking regime…
I should add that, before leaving Peking on my recent visit to Central
China, I had taken occasion to discuss the tariff question with Mr. Wang
Yin-t’ai, then Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Peking regime, along
the same lines as those on which I later presented the matter to General
Hwang Fu. Probably because he was not in a position to commit himself
with regard to the Edwardes proposals which were still a matter of
debate among the interested authorities of the Peking regime, and
because of an unwillingness to entertain a proposal for concurrent
negotiations which would have implied a parity between the Northern and
the Southern administrations, Mr. Wang likewise made no concrete
response to my suggestions in this matter.
It is evident that, however desirable it would be to find as soon as
possible an adjustment of the tariff question which seems certain to
become acute by the close of the present calendar year, the time has not
yet come when either the Peking or the Nanking regime is prepared to
enter into such negotiations as we have contemplated to that end.
I have [etc.]
[Enclosure]
Memorandum by the Third Secretary of Legation in
China (Bucknell)
Shanghai, February 26,
1928.
At four p.m., Mr. MacMurray went to tea at the residence of Mr. Chang
Hsi-ao,14 and met there General Huang Fu with whom the
following conversation took place:
General Huang dilated upon the long continued friendship which had
existed between the two Governments without being marred by
misunderstandings and quarrels. He expressed his entire appreciation
of the consistently friendly attitude of the United States vis-a-vis China, and his realization that
America desired no spheres of influence or any other special
advantages. He explained that the Nationalist Government desired
America as a friend among the family of nations, and that that
Government’s sole ambition was
[Page 411]
to be able to assume an equal place among such
family of nations, and that General Huang would be glad to hear Mr.
MacMurray’s views upon the question of Treaty Revision.
Mr. MacMurray replied that it must of course be understood that many
of the so-called unequal provisions were embodied in the treaties
for the purpose of meeting definitely abnormal conditions, some of
which still existed, and that a change in such provisions could only
follow a change in the conditions in question.
General Huang said that he realized this was true, and that he did
not expect a sudden change in such provisions in the treaties, but
rather a gradual change as the unusual conditions became corrected.
He said, however, that there were some provisions that could be
changed without affecting the position of American citizens in
China, especially those relating to the tariff, and that he hoped
the American Government would take the lead in such change.
Mr. MacMurray explained that any treaty between the United States and
other countries had the force and effect of law, and could only be
altered by the negotiation of a new treaty. He said that at the
Tariff Conference in Peking, the American Delegation had definitely
set forth our Government’s position as to the revision of the treaty
restrictions upon the Chinese Tariff, but that that conference had
simply run down without accomplishing its purposes. Since then, we
had encountered conditions which had thus far made it impossible for
the American Government to proceed as it would have desired in the
matter: in the first place, there had been created conditions very
unfavorable for trade, which had made it at any rate difficult to
deal with tariff questions; in the second place, the attitude taken
by the Chinese (and more particularly by the Nationalists) in the
matter of taxation and other questions of treaty rights, had been
openly one of repudiation and defiance rather than of cooperation,
so that we had had no reason to expect either the good-will or
good-faith with which it would be necessary for them to meet us in
any negotiations for treaty revision; and in the third place, in the
present unsettled state of affairs in which there is no Governmental
Entity actually representative of China, we had been confronted with
the impossibility of finding anyone with whom to deal in such
matters.
General Huang asked if the American Government would agree to such a
procedure as outlined in the Edwardes proposal if accepted by the
Nanking Government, without any further negotiations. Mr. MacMurray
informed him that this could only be done through a new treaty, that
no doubt General Huang was familiar with the American attitude
toward tariff autonomy as shown at the Tariff Conference, but that
the difficulty lay in the fact that there was
[Page 412]
no one group in China with which such
a new treaty could be negotiated; that in the event that the
Nationalists should unify China, he would be ready at once to
discuss such an agreement with them; or that he would be equally
ready to discuss such a new treaty with the Northern Government in
the event that they should be able to bring the country under one
unified Government; or that in the event that both failed to unify
the country, he would be prepared to discuss the matter with any
such joint commission of both Governments as the American Government
might be convinced upon careful investigation, was not a purely
formal body, but one representing an actual agreement between the
Chinese factions on the subject-matter, and competent to bind the
entire country to any provisions agreed to. He said that in any such
negotiations the American Government was prepared to be as helpful
as possible, and would make for its part no demands beyond such
obvious conditions as the assurance of non-discriminatory treatment
for our nationals, and that meanwhile it was not a question of
unwillingness on the part of his Government to negotiate, but of
actual impossibility of finding actually representative and
responsible parties with whom such negotiations could be carried
on.
General Huang said that Mr. Frank Lee had reported that the State
Department held the same views as Mr. MacMurray had outlined, and
that he was sincerely grateful for the fair attitude of the American
Government in this regard.
Mr. MacMurray replied that he was extremely glad to hear the views
expressed by General Huang with regard to the gradual modification
of the so-called unequal provisions of the parties [treaties?] by means of friendly negotiation,
and that General Huang could rest assured that he would be glad to
institute discussions with regard to tariff as soon as the
requirements explained by him had been met.
