711.359 Sanitary/492: Telegram
The Chargé in Argentina ( Tuck ) to the Secretary of State
[Received 9:25 p.m.]
395. Dr. Leopoldo Melo attended as guest of honor a luncheon given by the American Chamber of Commerce today and included in his address certain statements attributed to President Roosevelt which may give rise to unfortunate repercussions in the United States. A free translation of the remarks follows.
“In addition the foregoing exchange of ideas with respect to the solution of the problem of the entry of our meat products I had the privilege of listening in the course of a friendly interview conceded to me at Hyde Park, to the convincing explanations of that great figure, President Roosevelt, in confirmation of statements made during his visit to Buenos Aires in 1935 regarding the sanitary convention, and I listened to his authoritative statement of the causes of the delay of the Senate vote and his desire that a solution be arrived at in harmony with existing cordial relations which take into consideration the reciprocal interests of the two nations. In discussing the technical governmental reasons that had delayed the approval of the convention, President Roosevelt mentioned that the Constitution of the United States requires the consent of two-thirds of the Senate for the approval of treaties, and that within the Federal Government a state such as Nevada with only approximately 100,000 inhabitants has two Senators just the same as New York with 14 million inhabitants, the cattle states of the west have equal representation with the eastern [Page 510] states with their great mass of consumers. He added that the present was an hour of political and electoral strife unpropitious for the discussion of this problem, since some western Senators might possibly feel inclined to listen to the desires of their constituents.
These words of the President, pronounced in his habitual tone, cordial sincerity, and other[s] already made known from outstanding government figures of the Democratic Party such as Hull and Welles lead to the conviction that once the hours of political agitation are past a propitious moment will arrive to deal with and solve the transcendental problem which preoccupies our cattle raisers.”
It is understood that the manager of the Chamber made strenuous efforts to have the section quoted omitted from the texts and reports telegraphed by the news correspondents on the ground that Dr. Melo had introduced this part of his discourse saying that it was “outside the 3-mile limit” which might be interpreted as “off the record”. Inasmuch however as the copies of the address released to the correspondents by Dr. Melo contained the sections referred to, it is believed to have been included in the text telegraphed by the newspaper correspondents.
Complete Spanish text follows.