711.5227/5
The Spanish Ambassador ( Padilla ) to the Secretary of State
Mr. Secretary: With reference to Your Excellency’s kind note of June 12 last31 by which it was proposed that an agreement be reached on the ever increasingly important juridical and legal question of international aviation, submitting as a model therefor the agreement which the United States has concluded with Canada, I have the honor to inform Your Excellency that the Government of His Majesty, always deeply interested in the question, has already concluded broad conventions with Germany and France, and is negotiating upon similar bases with Italy, Holland, Denmark, England, etc., etc.
I transmit herewith a copy of the Convention between Germany and Spain32 which my Government wishes to submit for Your Excellency’s consideration, inasmuch as it would always be preferable for our country to have Air Navigation treaties which were basically the same, which would complement one another, thus reinforcing the union until, practically, a single convention is reached. In the accompanying text, air navigation is facilitated in almost all points, recognizing the laws which govern it, the use of wireless telegraphy from the air, limitation in the carriage of goods, regulations regarding passengers, freight, etc., etc., as well as mutual agreements concerning the use of airports and aerodromes.
For these reasons and in the greater interest of the regulated development of international air navigation, my Government would be happy if, as long as the United States is ready to study the matter in order to arrive at an agreement, it would follow the more general and broader bases which, in the opinion of the Madrid Cabinet, the texts agreed on by Spain with other Nations offer, and of which as I have already had the honor to say, the attached Spanish–German Pact is a model.
I avail myself [etc.]