Papers relating to the foreign relations of the United States, 1930, Volume III

810.79611 Pan American Airways/890

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in France (Edge)

Washington, September 30, 1930.

No. 342

Sir: Reference is made to despatches Nos. 786 and 823 of August 13 and September 3, 1930, respectively, with regard to the French Government’s permission for the aircraft of American Companies to operate in and over the French territorial possessions in the Caribbean and South America.

The Department has now received a letter of September 24 from the Pan American Airways, Incorporated,⁵⁶ requesting that application for renewal of the present permission which expires on November 15, be made to the French Foreign Office. Therefore, as under the Department’s instruction No. 223, July 1, 1930, you are again requested to apply for a three months’ renewal of this permission on or before October 15 in accordance with the second paragraph of the note dated May 17 from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.⁵⁷ This application need only be made on behalf of the Pan American Airways, Incorporated, since this Company has now taken over all the assets of the New York, Rio, and Buenos Aires Line, Incorporated.

With regard to the French Government’s intimation that the renewal of this permission beyond November 15th will be contingent upon the conclusion of an agreement between the American Company and the Compagnie Générale Aéropostale, the Pan American Airways, Incorporated, states in its letter that conversations are proceeding between it and this French Company, and that while no definite undertaking has thus far been reached, it is hoped that the pending conversations will ultimately lead to the conclusion of an agreement or understanding between the two companies.

The position adopted by the Department on this question was clearly set forth in the second paragraph of the Department’s instruction to your Embassy, No. 4331 of December 14th last year,⁵⁸ and if necessary, you should again bring it to the attention of the French Government.

For your assistance and further information in these premises, I enclose herewith a copy of a self-explanatory note sent by the Department to the French Embassy on July 24th,⁵⁹ in connection with the resumption this past summer of the airplane service between the Steamship Ile de France and the coast of the United States. Herein are set forth the conditions upon which this Government grants permission for foreign commercial aircraft to operate over United States territory in the absence of the existence of a formal reciprocal arrangement between the two countries.

You may inform the French Government that this Government is still ready to negotiate an air agreement along the lines of the one with Canada, as was proposed in the Department’s note to the French Embassy of June 12, 1929.⁶⁰

In the course of recent discussions of air agreements with other countries, the text but not the substance of the Canadian arrangement as a model has been departed from somewhat. Therefore, a further instruction to you will follow, submitting, for your information, the latest revised draft of an air arrangement which the Department is using as a basis for similar negotiations with other Governments.

Very truly yours,

For the Secretary of State:

Francis White

56. Not printed.
57. Ante, p. 63.
58. Foreign Relations, 1929, vol. i, p. 534.
59. Ante, p. 64.
60. Foreign Relations, 1929, vol. i, p. 532.