The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Great Britain (Page)
938. Your 1454, January 11. Please state to Foreign Office, Department regrets to seem insistent upon point that legitimate commercial firms should be notified immediately of stopped messages and should be given opportunity to change a word or words in message to make it clearer to censors. The argument that by notifying the senders of stopped messages an opportunity would be given to change the use of concealed codes seems to be foreign to the subject. The British Government have already designated exactly what codes should be used and have stated that, as far as practicable with trade phraseology, plain English words should be used.
The Department is informing all protestants and the larger cotton exchanges and commercial organizations throughout the country that plain English words must be used in cable messages.