393.1163/356
The Minister in China (MacMurray) to the Secretary of State
[Received October 25.]
Sir: I have the honor to enclose a copy of a despatch L. No. 800, of August 17, 1929, addressed to the Legation by the Consul General at Hankow,84 from which it will be seen that the Christian and Missionary Alliance is of the opinion that the question of making claims of the Chinese Government for indemnity for losses sustained by the mission should be left entirely to the discretion of the American Government on the ground that the mission’s work in China is carried on under existing Sino-American treaties.
While the Government has the right, in the enforcement of treaty provisions defining the rights and privileges of American citizens, to determine, irrespective of the desires of individual sufferers or claimants, whether or not to exact indemnity or compensation in any particular instance, I do not feel, as a general rule, that initiative in the matter of claims should rest exclusively with the Department or that American citizens can divest themselves of the responsibility of deciding themselves whether they wish to prepare and have filed claims for [Page 472] losses incurred by them. Before replying to Mr. Lockhart in that sense, however, I beg to request an expression of the Department’s views on the subject.85
I have [etc.]