804.51W89 Great Britain/510
Memorandum by the Secretary of State
The British Ambassador and Sir Frederick Leith-Ross called both to pay their respects on arrival this morning in the city and also to inquire as to the procedure on tomorrow in connection with the intergovernmental [Page 843] debt conference, scheduled to be held primarily between Sir Frederick Leith-Ross, Chief Economic Adviser of the British Government, on the one hand, and Under Secretary of the Treasury Acheson and the Assistant Economic Adviser of the State Department, Mr. Livesey, on the other hand. I telephoned Mr. Acheson with the result that it was agreed between him and the British representative that the latter, accompanied by the British Ambassador and possibly one or two economic and financial experts, would call at the Treasury tomorrow morning at 10 o’clock, where they would be met at the outer door by Under Secretary Acheson and escorted to the rooms where the first preliminary conference would be held at that hour.
The remainder of my conversation was entirely general, relating as it did to our past association at the London Economic Conference, to some phases of that Conference,—past, present, and prospective,—and to certain other phases of economic conditions in various parts of the world. There was no attempt to solve any question or condition, or to enter into any sort of understandings relative to the same, either express or implied.