611.5231/1162
Memorandum by the Secretary of State
The Spanish Ambassador called upon his own initiative and referred to his conversation of some days ago with Dr. Grady relative to the pending trade agreement between our two Governments. He offered the following figures as to trade between this country and Spain:
Value of exports of merchandise from the United States to Spain during the six months ending the 31st of December. 1934 and 1935:
| 1934 | 1935 |
| $18,663,000 | $21,808,000 |
Value of exports of merchandise from the United States to Spain during January and February, 1935 and 1936:
| 1935 | 1936 |
| $6,810,000 | $7,020,000 |
Value of imports into Spain during 1935:
| Pesetas gold | |
| From the United States | 147,637,747 |
| From Germany | 120,336,220 |
| From Great Britain | 91,548,369 |
| From France | 48,765,743 |
Value of exports from Spain during 1935:
| Pesetas gold | |
| From the United States | 127,447,788 |
| From Germany | 74,828,103 |
| From France | 68,987,916 |
| To the United States | 55,952,410 |
The Ambassador emphasized the strong favorable balance of trade involved. He said that Spain had an unfavorable trade balance against the world. His plea was that it would seriously disrupt the trade situation if we should terminate the modus vivendi existing between our two Governments. I inquired as to whether they had any plans to devalue and added that this was not any of my business, but [Page 795] that it did seem to offer possibilities that caused me to make the inquiry. The Ambassador replied that they were waiting on the course of the franc in France and that they would probably follow it in fairly short order, if and when the French devalued. He added a few additional statements to those he made to Dr. Grady, and we agreed that he might repeat them to Dr. Grady for his information. I stated that we could not permit the fundamentals of our trade agreements program to be discredited or impaired by making vital exceptions to each country calling for the same, even though each should make out a plausible case.
[No further discussions with the Spanish Government regarding a trade agreement took place before the outbreak of the Civil War in Spain in July 1936. With the beginning of that conflict all consideration of a trade agreement was apparently ended.]