811.00F/214
Memorandum by the Chief of the Division of Western European Affairs (Moffat)
The Italian Ambassador called this morning and referred to our previous conversations of February 28 and March 15 on the subject of the school teacher Vice Consuls against whose activities we had protested. The Ambassador had just received a telegram from his Foreign Office saying that they accepted our point of view that the activities complained of did not fall within normal consular functions; the school teachers had been attached to the Consulates for administrative [Page 551] reasons and not with a view to clothing them with any of the rights and privileges of Government agents.
The Italian Government would henceforth divorce any of its cultural activities from its official representation and would confine it to the local branches of the Dante Alighieri Society which of course was an unofficial body. The telegram added that it might take a little time to complete this transition but that it would none the less be effected.