852.00/6315
Memorandum by the Secretary of State
During his call, the Spanish Ambassador took up the question of a sentence in Senator Pittman’s recent neutrality speech37 in which he says Senator Pittman stated that the Spanish Government had not objected to the position of this Government with respect to applying [Page 377] our Neutrality Act to Spain, whereas the Ambassador correctly stated that he had more than once objected to it to me here in the State Department. I stated to him that, of course, everybody understands that the senators are in a separate, independent branch of the Government and do not speak officially for the Government itself in foreign affairs. I said that doubtless any inadvertence in Senator Pittman’s speech was due to the fact that I had not had a conference with him on that point and furthermore the press had given no publicity to this attitude of the Spanish Government. I added that I would bring the matter to the attention of Senator Pittman’s secretary, who probably would be able to locate him in the West at a little later date.
- Radio speech, August 23.↩