740.00119 Council/7–1046: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the United States Delegation at the Council of Foreign Ministers at Paris
urgent
3347. Secdel 442. For Matthews from Hickerson.11 Monday afternoon after returning from the White House, Acheson signed a memorandum to me dated July 8 reading as follows:
“The President said that he talked with Mr. Byrnes on Friday,12 when Mr. Byrnes was under the impression that the invitations for the Peace Conference would go forward promptly. The President has not talked with him since, but gathers that the situation now looks much less favorable.
“He would like us to get word to Mr. Byrnes that he is backing him up completely in his stand on procedure and believes, as Mr. Byrnes does, that it should be a free and open conference with no Soviet veto, and with the right of the nations concerned to express their views freely about the treaties.”
The memorandum went by mistake in an envelope with some other papers to an officer in AC and did not reach me until the afternoon of July 10. Although the whole question has since been settled and in a way completely satisfactory to us, thanks to the vigorous stand which the Secretary took, we want him to have this message from the President even though it is two days late. [Hickerson.]