893.102H/483
The Consul at Harbin (Hanson) to the Minister in China (MacMurray)63
Sir: I have the honor to refer to the Legation’s telegram dated February 5, 1927, stating that the Department had telegraphed the Legation authorizing action indicated in the last sentence of my despatch No. 1423 dated January 14th concerning the Harbin municipal question.
On February 14th I invited the American and Russian representatives of American firms located at Harbin to the Consulate and explained to them my idea of making voluntary contributions to the Harbin municipality. All present agreed that contributions equal to taxes paid by nationals enjoying extraterritorial rights, such as the British, should be made by American firms to help in the upkeep of the municipality. With the exception of the National City Bank of New York and the Standard Oil Company of New York, the firms desired to pay these contributions to the municipality through the Consulate in order to avoid any representatives of the municipality continually calling at their respective offices and interfering with their business.
Both the bank and the Standard Oil Company acquired land at Harbin under an agreement made with the Land Department of the Chinese Eastern Railway to pay taxes similar to those paid by the nationals whose governments had adhered to the Anglo-Russian Municipal Agreement of 1914. These American concerns have been paying taxes directly to the municipality and desired to continue so to do.
On February 25th I called upon the Commissioner for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Tsai Yun-sheng, and informed him that the American firms at Harbin had offered to make voluntary contributions equal in amount to the taxes paid by extraterritorial firms at Harbin. Mr. Tsai appeared to be favorably impressed with the offer, and promised to present me with a schedule of the municipal taxes now in force.
The Consulate is now engaged in working out with the various local American firms the amounts of the contributions that each firm should give.
All nationals, with the exception of the American, Italian and Japanese are paying municipal taxes at the present time. Mr. Amau, the Japanese Consul General, expressed his belief that the payment of contributions through a Consulate in lieu of paying taxes was a [Page 496] good idea, and that he might suggest to the Japanese that they adopt the same plan.
I have [etc.]
- Copy transmitted to the Department by the consul in despatch No. 4074, Mar. 1, 1927; received Apr. 2.↩