File No. 612.1123/67.
The Secretary of State to Special Agent Silliman.
Washington, March 10, 1915.
This Department will approve of an arrangement between American purchasers of sisal whereby the Carranza Government will receive an export duty on the sisal exported, the value of the sisal to be held in trust and subjected to the same rules that would be applied to the sisal if held in Yucatan. The contract between the Carranza Government and the purchasers of the sisal can also include a provision that the boats going to Yucatan for the sisal shall discharge no goods at blockaded ports, the Carranza Government in return to permit the export of the sisal on hand. We are very much gratified to learn that such arrangement is possible. It will greatly relieve our manufacturers of binding-twine as well as our great agricultural interests.