There is also enclosed a copy of a proposed budget of the expenditures
which it is supposed will be necessary in connection with their work
during the remainder of the present year.87 You are authorized to make payments during this
time, and at the same rate for eighteen months thereafter, upon vouchers
approved by the chairman of the committee, consistent with such budget,
and to draw on the Secretary of State for the required amounts, citing
on the drafts the appropriation chargeable and rendering a separate
account therefor.
You are requested to render to these gentlemen such other assistance in
the performance of their duties as may be possible and proper.
In this connection your attention is especially called to the fifth,
sixth and seventh paragraphs of their instruction, from which you will
note that the Government to which you are accredited is not one of those
which have hitherto requested this Government’s cooperation in the
reconnaissance surveys and that they are, therefore, asked to refrain
from offering their services to that Government until they shall be
informed that this Government’s cooperation has been requested. You are
instructed to bring this matter as soon as possible to the attention of
the appropriate officials of the Government to which you are accredited,
assuring them that your Government is, however, both willing and ready
to make available its cooperation with their Government in these surveys
as soon as information shall reach the Secretary of State through the
Director General of the Pan American Union that such cooperation is
desired. You, also, will be promptly informed thereafter and will be
authorized to present the Engineers to the appropriate authorities of
the Panamánian Government so that they may properly offer their services
to it. If that Government’s failure to request this Government’s
cooperation should have been due merely to inadvertence and should it be
the desire of that Government that the cooperation should begin in the
near future, the necessary preliminary correspondence can of course be
attended to in a very few days by cable or by air mail.
[Enclosure]
The Secretary of
State to the Members of the
Technical Committee on the Inter-American Highway
Reconnaissance Surveys88
[Washington, July 1, 1930.]
Sirs: In a letter dated June 19, 1930,89 the Secretary of
Agriculture was requested to inform you that the President had
approved your designation as members of a technical committee to
make effective, in accordance with instructions which will from time
to time be issued by the Secretary of State, this Government’s
cooperation with several other Governments, members of the Pan
American Union, in reconnaissance surveys pertinent to the building
of an inter-American highway or highways. In the same communication
authorization was given for making the necessary expenditures in
connection with the work upon which you will be engaged. Since you
are proceeding first to Panamá and since the time intervening
between your appointment and your departure was insufficient for its
preparation, this instruction is being addressed to you in care of
the Legation of the United States at Panamá.
The following is the text of the pertinent portion of the Act of the
Congress of the United States (Deficiency Act for the fiscal year
ending June 30, 1930, approved by the President March 29, 1930)
which has enabled the Secretary of State to make available through
you, this Government’s cooperation with other interested Governments
in these reconnaissance surveys:
“To enable the Secretary of State to cooperate with the
several Governments, members of the Pan American Union, when
he shall find that any or all of such States having [have?]90
initiated a request or signified a desire to the Pan
American Union to cooperate, in the reconnaissance surveys
to develop the facts and to report to Congress as to the
feasibility of possible routes, the probable cost, the
economic service and such other information as will be
pertinent to the building of an inter-American highway or
highways, to be expended upon the order of the Secretary of
State, including the additional cost incident to the
assignment by the President of personnel in the Government
service, as now authorized, additional compensation of such
personnel for foreign service, compensation of employees and
rent in the District of Columbia and elsewhere, contingent
expenses, official cards, printing and binding, purchase of
necessary books and documents, transportation and
subsistence or per diem in lieu of subsistence
(notwithstanding the provisions of any other Act),
stenographic and other services by contract if deemed
necessary, without regard to section 3709 of the Revised
Statutes (U. S. C, title 41,
[Page 282]
sec. 5), and such other expenses as
may be deemed necessary by the Secretary of State in
furtherance of the projects described, fiscal year 1930, to
remain available until expended, $50,000.”91
The brief review, in this paragraph, of antecedent related events,
which you may already have in mind, is inserted merely for
convenience. The Sixth International Conference of American States,
by a Resolution adopted at Habana on February 7, 1928,92 entrusted the
Pan American Union with the preparation of projects for the
construction of an inter-American highway. The Governing Board of
the Pan American Union, acting through the Pan American Federation
for Highway Education, requested the cooperation of the several
Governments, members of the Union, in the formulation of such
projects. The Congress of the United States, by a Joint Resolution,
approved May 4, 1928,93 requested the President to direct the several
agencies of this Government to cooperate with the other interested
states in the preparation of such projects. In his annual message to
Congress on December 4, 1928, the President of the United States
said: “In my message last year I expressed the view that we should
lend our encouragement for more good roads to all the principal
points on this hemisphere south of the Rio Grande. My view has not
changed.”94 He
recommended that the necessary Congressional authorization for this
Government’s cooperation in the project should be given. The Senate
and the House of Representatives of the United States by Joint
Resolution No. 104, of the 70th Congress, approved by the President
on March 4, 1929,95
“authorized to be appropriated, out of any moneys in the Treasury
not otherwise appropriated, the sum of $50,000 to enable the
Secretary of State to cooperate with the several Governments”, etc.,
following almost verbatim the language of the Appropriation Act of a
year later which is quoted above. At the invitation of the
Government of Panamá, the delegation of the United States returning
from the Second Pan American Highway Congress, which had been held
at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from August 16 to August 28, 1929,
attended a conference at Panamá from October 7 to 12 with
representatives of the Canal Zone, Costa Rica, El Salvador,
Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panamá, for the purpose of
considering the measures to be taken to complete an international
highway from the United
[Page 283]
States to Panamá. After a full discussion the conference adopted
several resolutions. A copy of a document containing them is
enclosed for your convenience.96 It was the sentiment of the conference, you will
observe, that a highway should be opened between Panamá and the
United States within five years and that in order to expedite this
work, the Pan American Union should appoint an Inter-American
Highway Commission whose task it should be to make a field study of
the project; and all Governments interested were requested to
cooperate with the Union and the Commission in this task.
The enactment of the legislation, quoted in the second paragraph
above, appropriating funds to meet the expense of its participation
in the projected reconnaissance surveys, is one of the important
steps recently taken by this Government in the requested
cooperation. Another is your designation as the agency through which
the Secretary of State is to make effective this Government’s
cooperation in these surveys. In this connection it is appropriate
to allude to the fact that, on May 27, 1930, the President affixed
his approval to the Act passed by the Congress of the United States
(No. 269, 71st Congress)97 to authorize and provide for the construction and
operation of a ferry across the Panamá Canal and a highway across
the Canal Zone, which were also recommended by the Inter-American
Highway Conference at Panamá last October, as will be seen by
referring to the enclosed copy of the text of the Resolutions of
that conference. A copy of the legislation just referred to is also
enclosed.96
The Director General of the Pan American Union has informed the
Department of State that the Governments of Guatemala and Nicaragua
have expressed a desire to have reconnaissance surveys undertaken to
determine the most desirable route for the proposed inter-American
highway across their respective territories. The chiefs of the
diplomatic missions of this Government in those countries had
previously informed the Department that they had been apprised of
the fact that those Governments had taken the steps mentioned. The
steps taken by these two Governments appear to have complied fully
with the conditions which the Act appropriating the $50,000 and also
the Act approved March 4, 1929, authorizing such an appropriation
make a necessary prerequisite to the Secretary of State’s
cooperating with the other interested Governments in these
reconnaissance surveys. Referring to the resolution adopted by the
Inter-American Highway Conference at Panamá recommending the
creation of an Inter-American Highway
[Page 284]
Commission, the Director General also stated
that, in accordance with the terms of that resolution, the
Governments of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Panamá had
designated their representatives on that Commission. The actions
just mentioned appear to indicate that these four Governments also
expect to cooperate in the construction of the inter-American
highway; but the Director General has not yet informed the
Department that any Governments other than Guatemala and Nicaragua
have actually requested this Government’s cooperation in the
reconnaissance surveys.
In view of the fact that the Act approved March 29, 1930, quoted in
the second paragraph above, which makes available the appropriation
for the reconnaissance surveys, and also the Joint Resolution
approved on March 4, 1929, authorizing such an appropriation both
clearly contemplate that the cooperation of the Secretary of State
in the reconnaissance surveys shall be made available only when the
other interested Governments shall have “initiated a request or
signified a desire to the Pan American Union” for such cooperation,
and since this Government has of course no desire to participate in
the contemplated reconnaissance surveys in any country whose
Government has not unmistakably indicated a desire to have this
Government’s participation, you are instructed to offer your
services, for the present at least, only to the two Governments
mentioned above as having complied fully with the conditions made by
law a necessary prerequisite to the Secretary of State’s making
available this Government’s cooperation. As soon as the Director
General shall have informed the Secretary of State that the other
interested Governments, or any of them, have requested this
Government’s cooperation, you will be promptly informed and will be
instructed to offer your services also to them. The chief of this
Government’s diplomatic mission in each of the countries concerned
whose Governments have not hitherto requested this Government’s
cooperation is being instructed to embrace an early opportunity to
bring this matter to the attention of the appropriate authorities of
the Government to which he is accredited, assuring them that his
Government is both willing and ready to make available its
cooperation with their Government in these surveys as soon as
information shall reach the Secretary of State through the Director
General of the Pan American Union that such cooperation is desired.
To the Minister at Panamá it is being suggested that if that
Government’s failure to request this Government’s cooperation should
have been due merely to inadvertence and should it be the desire of
that Government that the cooperation should begin in the near future
the necessary preliminary correspondence can of course be attended
to in a very few days by cable or by air mail.
[Page 285]
Before offering your services to any interested Government, or any
official thereof, you are instructed to call upon the chief of the
diplomatic mission of the United States at the capital of the
country concerned in order that you may be properly introduced to
the appropriate officials of that Government. The chief of each such
diplomatic mission is being apprised of the fact that you have been
designated and instructed to make effective this Government’s
cooperation with the Government to which he is accredited, in case,
or as soon as, such cooperation shall have been requested. He is
also being informed that you will call upon him before establishing
any official relations with the Government to which he is
accredited; and he is being instructed to introduce you to the
proper authorities and to render to you such other assistance as may
be possible and proper.
You are instructed to submit written reports to the Secretary of
State from time to time, through the diplomatic mission of the
United States at the capital of the country where you may be at the
time each report is made, regarding your progress in the performance
of the task which has been entrusted to you. These progress reports
should be submitted not less frequently than once every three
months; and they may be made as much more frequently as you may deem
it desirable to make them. If, as it is understood you contemplate
doing, you establish and maintain an office for your headquarters at
or near the city of Panamá, the Legation of the United States at
that capital will of course be the medium through which you will
communicate with the Secretary of State, not only while cooperating
with the Government of that country, should you be informed that it
has requested your cooperation, but also while establishing your
headquarters, if they are to be in that country or the Canal Zone,
and, also, should there be such a time, whenever you shall not
actually be engaged in cooperation with the Government of any other
country.
A copy of this instruction is being attached to the instruction
which, as indicated above, is being addressed to the Minister at
Panamá. A copy of the budget which was enclosed with the letter
addressed to the Secretary of State on June 7, 1930, by the
Secretary of Agriculture, requesting your appointment, is also being
sent to the Legation at Panamá and the Minister is being authorized
to make payments, upon vouchers approved by the chairman of your
committee consistent with such budget, and to draw on the Secretary
of State for the required amounts.
Copies of this instruction to you are also being enclosed with the
instructions which are being sent to the chiefs of the diplomatic
missions of this country in Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala,
Honduras, Mexico, and Nicaragua.99 Copies of the same are also being
[Page 286]
furnished to the
Director General of the Pan American Union and to the Secretary of
Agriculture for the Chief of the Bureau of Public Roads.
Upon completion of your task and your return to the United States you
should reasonably promptly submit to the Secretary of State three
copies of a comprehensive report of your entire work, one for the
records of the Department and two for communication by the Secretary
of State to Congress in compliance with the provisions of the law,
quoted above, authorizing and making provision for the work.
Very truly yours,
For the Secretary of State:
Wilbur J. Carr
