838.51/1051
The Acting Secretary of State to the French Ambassador ( Jusserand )
Excellency: I have the honor to acknowledge Your Excellency’s note of December 21, 1920,24 in reference to the payment of the coupons of the Haitian 5% loan of 1910, wherein you state that it appears from a report received from your Government, under date of November 28th last, that no notice was given of intention to pay those coupons on their maturity November 15th, and that the Haitian Government or its representatives took advantage of the fall caused by this failure to pay the coupons and bought in the stock market at Paris hundreds of bonds.
In this connection the Department of State has been advised by the Financial Adviser of the Republic of Haiti that no necessity exists for the Government of Haiti to give notice of its intention to pay the coupons of the loan of 1910, and therefore that Government was not at fault in not giving such notice. The Department of State also is informed by the Financial Adviser of the Republic of Haiti that in September 1920 he placed to his credit with the Farmers’ Loan and Trust Company in Paris the sum of thirty-two million and some odd thousand francs, and that in October last he advised the Farmers’ Loan and Trust Company to transfer one million, six hundred thousand odd francs of this amount to the Banque [de] l’Union Parisienne to the credit of A. J. Maumus, Receiver General of Customs in Haiti, for the purpose of meeting the interest coupons of the loan of 1910 due on November 15, 1920. Furthermore, having taken this step which was deemed entirely sufficient to comply with the service of the loan of 1910, the Financial Adviser of the Government of Haiti recently cabled the Farmers’ Loan and Trust Company in Paris to verify the payment of these coupons and was informed by it that the amount of one million, six hundred thousand odd francs had been transferred according to his request mentioned above to the Banque [de] l’Union Parisienne early in November and that the interest upon the 1910 coupons had been paid on November 15th, the date upon which they were due.
In view of these facts, it would appear that the information upon which the report received from your Government, under date of November 28th last, was based, was without foundation in fact, and that the Government of Haiti did not take advantage of any fall in the French bond market because of a failure to pay the 1910 coupons. [Page 208] The Government of the United States, being concerned over this unfortunate misunderstanding, would greatly appreciate it if Your Excellency would be good enough to request the Government of France to investigate into the origin thereof and would cause the results of such examination to be transmitted to the Department of State.
Accept [etc.]