121.866A/¼a
The Under Secretary of State (Welles) to President Roosevelt2
My Dear Mr. President: Some weeks ago the Secretary and I were speaking of the advantage which might be gained by this Government if we had direct diplomatic relations with the Vatican. I think it is unquestionable that the Vatican has many sources of information, particularly with regard to what is actually going on in Germany, Italy, and Spain, which we do not possess, and it seemed to us that the question of whether it would be desirable for our Government to obtain access to this information was of considerable importance.
At Mr. Hull’s suggestion I wrote a personal letter to Bill Phillips3 asking his opinion. I have this morning received Bill’s reply under date of July 19 and I am sending you a copy of his letter4 for your information.
Believe me [etc.]
- Photostatic copy obtained from the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N. Y.↩
- Ambassador in Italy.↩
- Not printed. Ambassador Phillips’ conclusions were stated as follows: “To sum up, I believe that the resumption of diplomatic relations with the State Department would be a new source of political information of the highest importance. I believe, too, that by renewing our relations we would be supporting the Holy See in its well-known efforts to preserve peace in Europe at a moment of great tension.” (711.66A/23)↩