793.003/665: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Nanking (Peck)
[Paraphrase]
Washington, May 12, 1931—5
p.m.
40. For the Minister: Your May 7, noon, and May 9, 11 a.m., from Nanking.
- (1)
- The Department would be willing to accept the Teichman-Hsu Mo draft of the article regarding personal status matters if this draft [Page 852] proves acceptable to the British and Chinese Governments and if the reciprocity clause be deleted. Also the Department would prefer retaining the clause regarding estates of transients. The Department will discuss this article’s redrafting when discussions are resumed with C. C. Wu, who returns this week after an absence from Washington.
- (2)
- The main difficulty in the way of American acceptance of the reciprocity clause is due to existence in several States of a law which prohibits marriages between persons of white and of Mongolian race. Should the Chinese demur from accepting a draft in which reciprocity is not granted, it will be pointed out to them that, though the United States is less liberal in this respect than Great Britain, the former is more liberal than the latter as regards reciprocity in matters such as military requisitions, forced loans, and arbitration of commercial controversies. (Your April 28, noon, from Nanking, paragraphs 6 and 7.)
Stimson