723.2515/2268: Telegram
The Ambassador in Chile (Collier) to the Secretary of State
146. Yesterday I was reliably informed that in the debate in the Chamber of Deputies a great fight against good offices was being based largely upon assertions that the United States was trying to force Chile to accept plans of solution under good offices. This idea has been diligently and universally promulgated here not only by Alessandri but also by agents in the employment of the Plebiscitary Commission and by a great number of Congressmen and public orators and by all Chilean and many Argentine papers. … For months press and platform have meanly, bitterly, and falsely calumniated the Arbitrator, yourself, and all our delegation in Arica and have absolutely misrepresented your purposes and policies, using caricatures, as well as news and editorial columns. … For these reasons but especially in the hope that they might be brought by the Minister of Foreign Affairs to the attention of Congress before its night session, I drafted [Page 423] a new note dated yesterday79 expressing regret that the erroneous impression as to our motives had been allowed to permeate the masses and calling attention to the fact that Chile was the first to suggest and virtually invite good offices, and I incorporated that part of the memorandum of October 27, 1925, given to me by Barros Jarpa then Minister of Foreign Affairs and cabled to you on the following day.80 I then gave this new note of yesterday, May 8, to the press.
The Under Secretary called upon me at 8:30 last night and asked me to withhold publication of the note for two days until after the termination of the congressional debate and after your meeting tomorrow with the two Ambassadors when the Ambassador of Chile, unless his instructions are changed by a result of yesterday’s revelations, will notify you that Chile insists upon going on with the plebiscite. The Under Secretary said there was no objection to immediate publication my note in American papers, but they would like to keep it out of Argentine and Chilean papers for a couple of days. The more he laid stress upon this, the more I felt that the note should be published and published without delay. I declined to comply with his request that I write and telegraph to the papers withdrawing the note from publicity. I told him that, in view of the campaign of abuse against the United States which so far the Ministry had made little effort to stop, I thought the note should be published at once. I said there had been five memorandums including this one with regard to good offices; and that, without previously asking the consent of the Government of the United States, the Chilean Foreign Office on March 27 gave publicity to your memorandum of February 16 and to their answer, and you thereupon published the memorandums exchanged a month or so later and that therefore there was no violation of confidence or irregularity in publishing the Chilean memorandum of October 27th which virtually started the matter. On the contrary one memorandum having been published, ordinarily all relating to the same matter should be published. I also said that the note that I had given out could in no way embarrass the present Minister of Foreign Affairs nor the actual President. For your information I think it will help them to swing back to their original positions in favor of good offices from which they have both drifted with the popular tide. I understand that the Government got the local papers to hold off publication until it could try to persuade me to withdraw it. I refused to do so saying that it would be construed as cowardice or possibly a frustrated attempt at misrepresentation or a diplomatic irregularity and I would not make any such admissions. The article therefore appears in all [Page 424] Santiago papers this morning and I understand that the United Press cabled the full text to the United States and South America.
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[Paraphrase.] I sincerely trust you will not disapprove my action in publishing this note. I am aware how perilous a step it was, but I thought it necessary to take action before Chilean Congress met. As there was not a minute to spare I did not telegraph you, but had to assume responsibility, trusting you to approve the action for its results. … I shall cable you text of material part of my note. … [End paraphrase.]