600.628/14
Memorandum by the Secretary of State
The German Ambassador called, to use his expression, really to say goodbye before leaving for a holiday visit to Mexico.
In the course of the preliminary conversation, I inquired of him what he knew as to the amount that had been collected in Germany under the law which authorized business to impose a special tax upon itself to aid in facilitating German exports. He replied that he did not know. I stated that the press indicated the amount contemplated was from 350 to 450 million dollars. He said that he was sure nothing like that amount had been collected and in any event it was not a Government operation which would come under the inhibition of our dumping law, et cetera. I replied that the German Government had enacted a law prescribing such policy, provided, of course, business saw fit to adopt it. I requested the Ambassador to give me all the information that might come to him about the amount collected and the uses to which it was being applied. I then added that one reason why I was interested, in addition to my interest in the restoration of international trade in a broad way, was illustrated by the recent shipment of some $50,000 worth of German steel products to this country at a reported price of scarcely one-half of that for as nearly similar domestic steel as it was possible for us to furnish. I remarked [Page 473] that we were making efforts in this country to educate our people about the value of exports of iron and steel, for example, and in so doing we had called attention to the exportation of nearly a billion, two hundred million dollars worth of iron and steel products from the mills, and of automobiles, vehicles, machinery, et cetera, which American labor produced at good wages, and after doing so we suddenly found a shipment, even though small, of German steel which bore all the earmarks of a subsidy or a bounty, which in effect would badly break up and break down our educational campaign based on solid facts. I then requested the Ambassador to give me anything in the way of facts that might come to his attention about this sort of exports to this country, and again emphasized that this was the surest way to prevent the normal restoration of trade between the two countries.