611.60F31/62: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Minister in Czechoslovakia ( Wright )
11. Your 12, March 4, noon, and Department’s 9, March 13, 5 p.m. The Czech Minister and Kabeláč, First Secretary of the Legation, came in today and discussed with officers of the Department the proposed exchange of notes. Draft copies of the proposed exchange were handed to him. The first paragraph of the proposed note provides for unconditional most-favored-nation treatment in respect of customs [Page 143] duties or charges imposed or in connection with importation or exportation, with respect to method of levying such duties or charges with respect to customs rules and formalities, and with respect to laws or regulations affecting the sale, taxation or use of imported goods within the country.
Paragraph 2 provides that if either government establish or maintain any form of control of foreign exchange, such control shall be administered so as to insure that the nationals and commerce of the other country will be granted a fair and equitable allotment of exchange.
Paragraph 3 provides that in the establishment and maintenance of any quantitative or quota restriction, each government will allot among exporting countries a share of the total quantity permitted entry equivalent to the proportion of the total importation of such article which such other country supplied during a previous representative period.
Paragraph 4 exempts from the agreement such treatment as we now accord or may hereafter accord the trade with Cuba, our territories and possessions, the Philippine Islands and the Panama Canal Zone.
Paragraph 5 states that nothing in the agreement shall be construed as a limitation on either country to impose prohibitions or restrictions relating to public security imposed on moral or humanitarian grounds, and similar well-recognized exceptions.
The Czech Legation will, I understand, telegraph the complete text of the proposed note. It is our wish to exchange these notes in Washington with the Czech Government at the earliest possible moment, in order that the removal of the discriminations now practiced by Czechoslovakia may be provided for, and in order that we may generalize to Czechoslovakia the concessions granted to Belgium as a result of the recent agreement.12 Unless some such exchange of notes can be made prior to the President’s proclamation proclaiming the Belgium agreement, it will be necessary to give notice of denunciation of the existing Czech-American commercial modus vivendi. Denunciation requires 30 days so that denunciation would become operative at the same time that the Belgian concessions become effective. Since it is expected that the Belgian agreement will be proclaimed in 10 days or 2 weeks, it will be necessary for the Czech Government to reach an early decision with regard to the proposed exchange of notes.
- For text of agreement with Belgo-Luxemburg Union, signed on February 27, 1935, see Executive Agreement Series No. 75 or 49 Stat. 3680.↩