800.515/818
Memorandum by the Assistant Secretary of State (Berle)
At the designation of the Secretary, Dr. Pasvolsky and I attended a meeting in Secretary Morgenthau’s office this morning. This was a meeting of the Committee on Financial and Monetary Affairs constituted by Secretary Morgenthau under authority given by the President more than a year ago.
There were present Secretary Morgenthau, Secretary Jesse Jones,61 Chairman Eccles, Federal Reserve Board, Mr. Leo Crowley, Alien Property Custodian, Mr. Daniel Bell, Under Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Harry White, Dr. Pasvolsky and myself.
Secretary Morgenthau said that the subcommittee (Mr. Harry White) had now reported that their preliminary conversations with the various united and associated nations in respect to monetary stabilization were concluded and that as a result a primary draft outline proposal for stabilization of currency had now been evolved and they wished to release this for publication tomorrow. It was pointed out that this draft had been already handed to the Congressmen and Senators interested. He asked whether there was any objection to its release.
[Page 1083]No one objected and it was determined, accordingly, to make the release.
Secretary Morgenthau then said that he wished now to initiate studies in connection with long-term investment policies. He had felt it necessary to delay these until the stabilization plans were concluded though he knew there was a desire, which he thought was justified, on behalf of the State Department, to get these studies started.
I observed that practically every Government in talking to us had indicated that their attitude toward monetary stabilization was contingent in some degree on the long-term credit situation so that the two were connected.
Secretary Morgenthau said that he knew this was so and agreed; but that he had felt it unwise to proceed until the stabilization matter was pretty well started, as he thought now it was.
It was thereupon agreed to authorize a technical committee under the chairmanship of Mr. White to go forward in the study of long-term international credit policies. It was indicated that these studies would probably have to be concluded prior to the middle of September, at which time it was expected that a British delegation would arrive here to discuss economic cooperation between Britain and the United States under Article VII of the Lend-Lease Agreement.
[On September 14, 1943, the Treasury Department sent to the Department of State 41 letters in sealed envelopes addressed to the Finance Ministers and enclosing a revised text of the Treasury Department’s stabilization proposal. These envelopes were transmitted to the Finance Ministers through Department of State facilities.]
- Secretary of Commerce.↩