Flutter

Secretary of State Kellogg, from his desk in the State Department, is supposed to speak with the voice of the U. S., whenever the U. S. wants to speak to foreign powers. He alone has the authority to say what the U. S. wants to say.

Last week, some U. S. citizen or citizens abroad said some thing or things which some high official or officials at Washington did not like. The dictum or dicta had to do with debts to the U. S. and was or were to the effect that the Administration's attempt to collect the debts need not be taken as seriously as it sounded. Was Otto H. Kahn the cause of offense ? He had made a speech, had tried to sweeten the bitter bills. Was George W. Wickersham the butt of official anonymous reproach? He had made several speeches on the general subject of peace, goodwill. Did Congressman W. R. Green misstep? He had conferred with Finance Minister Caillaux of France, had told newspapermen France could not pay quickly. Or was the offender some unnamed great one who was rumored to have gone to Europe to work out, unofficially, some debt-funding plan? Whoever and whatever it may have been, the Administration, through "one of President Coolidge's chief advisers," expressed its dislike of unofficial discussion of the debt situation, and urged prominent tourists to hold their peace. That part of the press which is friendly to the Administration echoed the sentiments and flayed the talking tourists as "meddlers," "muddlers," "hand-kissers," "knee-crookers," "ax-grinders," "sycophants." The result was that, a few days later, the unofficial spokesman, speaking "informally but authoritatively," declared that the U. S. meant just what it said when it invited foreign powers (TIME, May 25) to arrange to pay up their debts. He went on to say--lest foreigners take too much comfort from the kindly talk of U. S. citizens abroad-- that all the nations (possibly excepting Yugo-Slavia) which had borrowed money from the U. S. for relief and reconstruction after the War had broken their pledges. For they promised, when borrowing, to have no preferred creditors ahead of the U. S.-- yet most of them have settled other debts but done nothing to satisfy U. S. claims.