Office of the Historian

810.154/565

The Chief of the Bureau of Public Roads (MacDonald) to the Assistant Secretary of State (Moore)

Washington, May 16, 1934.

My Dear Secretary Moore: Public Resolution No. 104, 70th Congress,4 authorized the Secretary of State to cooperate with the Governments of the Pan American Union in making a reconnaissance survey for an inter-American highway and an appropriation of $50,000 to pay necessary expenses.

In furtherance of the project the Secretary of State called upon the Secretary of Agriculture to assign personnel to the survey and other Governmental Departments cooperated. The very complete engineering and economic report, which has been filed with the Secretary of State, covering the proposed route of the inter-American highway between Panama and the Mexican Border was prepared through this cooperative effort and within the funds appropriated.

It would be desirable now to provide for a similar reconnaissance survey from Panama through the South American Republics in cooperation with and at the request of these Republics, and to carry on [Page 471] the detailed location surveys for the portion of the route (between Panama and Mexico) for which the reconnaissance survey and report have been made.

I am attaching a paragraph for the consideration of the State Department which would simply provide the authority for the Secretary of Agriculture to continue the surveys authorized under Public Resolution No. 104 at the request and under the direction of the Secretary of State, and to pay the cost from the administrative funds provided under the Federal aid highway legislation. These funds are adequate to absorb any additional costs without the necessity for an additional authorization. The Secretary of Agriculture is in sympathy with the project and agrees to this suggestion.

The paragraph attached would be germane to the subject matter of the highway legislation now pending in the Senate, known as H. R. 8781. Since it only provides authority to use funds now authorized, I think it might properly be carried in the Deficiency Appropriation Measure.

Sincerely yours,

Thos. H. MacDonald
[Enclosure]

To provide for the continuation of the cooperative reconnaissance surveys for a proposed inter-American Highway as provided in Public Resolution No. 104, approved March 4, 1929 (45 Stat. 1697) and for making location surveys, plans and estimates for such highway, the Secretary of Agriculture is hereby authorized to pay all costs hereafter incurred for such work from any moneys available from the administrative funds provided under the Act of July 11, 1916 (U. S. C. title 23, sec. 21) as amended, or as otherwise provided.

  1. 45 Stat. 1697.↩