893.12/29: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the Consul General at Shanghai (Cunningham)
Your July 26, 9 a.m.
1. The Department desires that in reply to the communication received from the director of the newly organized Chinese national quarantine service you inform him that under the treaties now in force between the United States and China jurisdiction over American merchant vessels visiting Chinese ports is vested in officials of the American Government. With a view to the general welfare, the officers of this Government in China have collaborated with officers appointed by the Chinese Government in measures designed to prevent the introduction into China of diseases from abroad. This collaboration has been carried out under agreements which have been revised as occasion demanded by mutual assent. While the procedure heretofore prevailing would appear to provide a basis for safeguarding the public health at Shanghai from importation of disease, this Government is prepared, in case the Chinese authorities so desire, to discuss the question of revising existing agreements by means of negotiations either between American consular officers and the local authorities or between its diplomatic representative and the higher Chinese authorities.
It may also be pointed out to the director that the only administrative officers of the Chinese Government authorized by the treaties to board American vessels in the performance of official functions are the officers of the Chinese Maritime Customs. If there has been any departure from this rule, it has been made with the assent of such American officials as exercise jurisdiction over American vessels in accordance with treaty stipulations.
You should assure the director of the Chinese quarantine service that this Government desires to continue to cooperate in every practicable manner with the Chinese authorities in the matters of public health and quarantine and will be glad to proceed at once to the consideration of the regulations forwarded by him.
[Page 530]Following for your information and guidance: In addition to the question of American jurisdiction over American vessels visiting Chinese ports, to which, in the Department’s opinion, American shipping interests are entitled under the treaties, there are to be found strong practical objections to the present Chinese proposal. At a time when the National Government in the very nature of things is able to enforce its own proposed regulations only “in the ports of China where the health services are under the control of the Ministry of Health”, that Government apparently proposes to dispense with international cooperation in the taking of quarantine precautions. This would tend to produce confusion and laxness. Before assenting to an alteration in the established procedure in the matter of quarantine regulations to be applied to American shipping in Chinese ports, the American Government would expect that proposed new arrangements take sufficiently into account existing treaty provisions and that the situation afford reasonable basis for expecting intelligent and uniform application of such quarantine measures throughout China generally.
2. The Legation reported under date July 28, 5 p.m.,32 that the Senior Minister had not yet received the new quarantine regulations.
3. For your confidential information, Surgeon General Public Health Service states that a serious epidemic of cholera exists in the Philippine Islands.
4. Department would like to be informed how the Chinese proposal is regarded by official representatives of other principal nations concerned.
5. Please repeat to Legation as Dept’s 256.
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