611.5231/581: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Spain (Hammond)
26. Your despatch No. 1215, April 30, 1929. You are instructed to present to the Minister for Foreign Affairs a note in substance as follows:
“I have the honor to refer to Your Excellency’s note No. 93 [83] of April 26, 1929 concerning the commercial relations between Spain and the United States. I am instructed at the outset to express the most cordial reciprocation by the Government of the United States of the desire of His Majesty’s Government, so graciously expressed by Your Excellency, to pursue in the relations between our two countries a [Page 796] policy of cordial and close friendship, and to add that the Government of the United States is confident that, viewed in this light, there can be no issues which friendly examination and discussion cannot resolve.
Careful consideration is being given to the contents of Your Excellency’s note, to which the attention of the appropriate authorities at Washington has been drawn. At the present moment discussion of the proposed new tariff rates is continuing in the Congress and accordingly it is impossible for me at this time to make any definite response concerning difficulties which Your Excellency appears to anticipate. I venture to suggest, however, that informal discussion in the meantime of the other phases of Your Excellency’s note cannot fail to clarify the situation.”
[Paraphrase.] You should discuss alleged Spanish grievances on basis of Department’s instruction of May 3. If the opportunity arises, you may discreetly suggest that any drastic action by the Spanish Government might have unfavorable reaction on American interest in the current expositions in Spain.
At a suitable opportunity you are authorized to give statement to the press along lines of above note, making use of such material in Department’s instruction of May 3 as you deem advisable. [End paraphrase.]