Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, 1938, The American Republics, Volume V

710.H Peace/1

The Secretary of State to Diplomatic Officers in the American Republics

Washington, November 15, 1938.

Sirs: Experience has disclosed that the multiplicity of peace instruments to which the American countries are parties has often resulted in confusion and delay when specific occasions arose in which one or more pacts might have been or were invoked. Some of these peace instruments are complementary to one another but in many cases they have introduced duplication and overlapping.

In a belief that a combination and integration of these various peace instruments would be desirable, the Department has drafted a consolidated peace treaty, three copies of which are attached hereto.⁶⁷ It includes the substance of the principal provisions of every treaty combined and simplified in order to provide logical progression from one peace procedure to another.

You are requested to seek an immediate interview with the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the country to which you are accredited and hand him, for the study and consideration of his Government, a copy of the draft project. You should explain this Government’s regret that it has not been possible to give him this document for his consideration at an earlier date, and that your Government is of course aware that the brevity of time before the opening of the Conference in Lima will make impossible the very thorough and careful study which he undoubtedly would wish to give to a project of this importance. Nevertheless, your Government has believed that his Government might entertain a similar view to that of this Government concerning consolidation of the peace instruments and therefore that he would be interested in examining the results of the Department’s effort, so that should the idea of a consolidated peace treaty meet with the favor of his Government and of the other American countries, the draft submitted to him with any improvement that may seem desirable might then be employed as the basis for discussion at the forthcoming Conference.⁶⁸

Very truly yours,

For the Secretary of State:

Sumner Welles

67. Report of the Delegation, p. 193. See also “Proyecto de Tratado Sobre Consolidación de los Convenios Americanos de Paz,” Diario de Sesiones, p. 144, and index, p. xxxvi.
68. Favorable reactions were received from Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.