860D.51/390½
Memorandum by President Roosevelt to the Secretary of State
Washington
, January 2,
1940.
I fear we cannot make any large loan to Finland under the R. F. C. Act2 because, frankly, there is not enough security for its re-payment under the existing law.
Please speak to me, however, about the possibility of recommending to Congress3 Congressional authority for a loan based on an amount equal to what Finland has paid us on its debt since the other nations stopped paying.
F. D. R.
- Reconstruction Finance Corporation Act, approved January 22, 1932; 47 Stat. 5. See bracketed note regarding the press release of December 10, 1939, issued by Mr. Jesse H. Jones, Chairman of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, announcing a loan of $10,000,000, to the Finnish-American Trading Corporation, New York, N. Y., Foreign Relations, 1939, Vol. i, p. 1026.↩
- For information concerning the introduction of a bill in the Senate on January 8, 1940, to enable loans to be made to Finland, see ibid., p. 1030, footnote 27.↩