711.933/159: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Minister in China (MacMurray)
354. Reference your 927, October 25, 5 p.m.
(1) Your telegram reached the Department at 2:50 p.m., October 25, and, before it was decoded, the Department was informed by a Secretary of the French Embassy, who called, that his Foreign Office had been informed regarding these discussions, including the explanation by you of my views and the offer by you to withhold until November 1 the note from the United States Government. The desirability of a simultaneous dispatch of the several notes, which should coincide in purport, was urged by the French Government.
It was explained to the French officer that the United States Government wished to cooperate as far as possible with the other governments; that the withholding by you of the American reply until November 1 is quite approved, as there is no desire to be precipitate; that the instructions sent you were based on the feeling that the formulae hitherto considered tentatively by you and your colleagues could not be regarded as applicable for adoption in the American reply, because, as is well known to all concerned, the United States Government’s willingness to negotiate was affirmed expressly in its note dated August 10. A further explanation followed along the lines of my 342, October 22, 5pm., paragraph 2. The view was also advanced that the Department’s readiness to delay sending the American note in reply is qualified because of the feeling that the sooner the powers reply the greater will be the advantage from having done so.
(2) Referring to your paragraph 2:
- (a)
- To the unanimous views of the Ministers I am not indifferent.
- (b)
- On this point my views remain as they were stated in the first two paragraphs of my 342.
- (c)
- Developments in the past few years and the Nationalist movement’s character and exigencies, I feel, make it inevitable for the present Chinese Government, or any other one, to insist upon abolition of extraterritorial jurisdiction. Therefore, an offer of negotiations, I feel, provides the sole possible means whereby denunciation of treaty provisions may be delayed and the period of transition may be protracted and ameliorated so as to safeguard, through a graduated process of relinquishment as agreed upon, the position of American citizens hereafter in China.
- (d)
- Though I do not desire to force the pace, yet I do not wish the Chinese to be able to contend that they were driven to take arbitrary [Page 615] unilateral action because of a refusal by the powers, the United States included, to face the issue with them. I believe, also, that an attempt to divert attention to the Provisional Court at Shanghai, a specific question, by sidetracking the general question of extraterritorial jurisdiction, would be difficult.
(3) Toward the views and the convenience of the other powers I wish to be altogether considerate. The manner of replying, the substance of the notes, and the time of their delivery I consider important. You may, as suggested, delay the American reply.
(4) The text which I have submitted in itself carries, I feel, a sufficiently concrete proposal, stating definitely, as it does, that the negotiations shall be directed to devise a method for relinquishing extraterritorial rights gradually, as to either designated territorial areas or particular kinds of jurisdiction, or both, provided, etc. It would be unwise technically, I feel, at this time to make a more restrictive proposal to the Chinese, enabling them thereby to contend that evidently there is no intention on the part of the United States to consider the entire problem, and this would afford the Chinese a specious pretext for a unilateral denunciation next January 1. What I have proposed offers, I believe, a sufficient safeguard against any Chinese expectation or representation of agreement by the United States Government to early and unconditional abolition of extraterritoriality, nor will it leave the Chinese with any possible excuse for declining an attempt to deal by agreement with the matter.
Finally, I feel that a demand of the Chinese first to make concrete proposals would, if responded to at all, which I do not expect it would be, enable them to proffer proposals not susceptible of acceptance. The makers of such a demand would thus be put in a very unfortunate position.
(5) Again, for what it may be worth, I invite attention to your 861, October 5, noon.