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Bankers and Diplomats: The Diplomacy of the Dollar in Mexico, 1921-1924*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2012

N. Stephen Kane
N. Stephen Kane
Affiliation:
Historical Office, Department of State
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Abstract

Intimate cooperation between American investment bankers and the diplomats of the Department of State occurred in the early 1920s because both groups shared similar goals and interests in Mexico. The resulting exercise in dollar diplomacy achieved some immediate ends but proved very short-sighted and self-defeating in the end.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 47 , Issue 3 , Autumn 1973 , pp. 335 - 352
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1973

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References

1 The efforts of the Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover administrations to secure the cooperation of the banking community in the program of loan control are most fully discussed in Feis, Herbert, The Diplomacy of the Dollar: First Era, 1919–1932 (Baltimore, 1950)Google Scholar; Brandes, Joseph, Herbert Hoover and Economic Diplomacy: Department of Commerce Policy, 1921–1928 (Pittsburgh, 1962), 151–213Google Scholar; Parrini, Carl P., Heir to Empire: United States Economic Diplomacy, 1916–1923 (Pittsburgh, 1969), Ch. VIIGoogle Scholar; Wilson, Joan Hoff, American Business and Foreign Policy, 1920–1933 (Lexington, Ky., 1971), Ch. 4Google Scholar; Tulchin, Joseph S., The Aftermath of War: World War 1 and U.S. Policy Toward Latin America (New York, 1971), Ch. V.Google Scholar Parrini, Wilson, and Tulchin mention the case of Mexico, but they do not examine it.

The activities of American bankers in Mexico are described in Smith's, Robert F. recently-published The United States and Revolutionary Nationalism in Mexico, 1916–1932 (Chicago, 1972)Google Scholar, but not within the context of general loan policy. Moreover, Smith distorts the role of the bankers by trying to demonstrate that the International Commitee of Bankers on Mexico acted “as an unofficial instrument of U.S. policy” (204), and by implying that Thomas W. Lamont, the chairman of the committee, was virtually responsible for the course of Mexican-American relations, particularly between 1922 and 1924.

2 For useful comments about Hughes' Mexican policy, see Scholes, Walter V., “Secretary of State Hughes' Mexican Policy,” in Konetzke, Richard and Kellenbenz, Herman, eds., Jahrbuch für Geschichte von Staat, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft Lateinamerikas (Cologne, 1970), 299–308Google Scholar.

3 The following works are instructive on the origin and impact of Article 27, as well as the broader implications of the controversy over property rights in Mexico: Roáix, Pastor, Génesis de los artículos 27 y 123 de la Constitutión Política de 1917 (México: Talleres Gráficos de la Nación, 1959)Google Scholar; Morineau, Oscar, Los derechos reales y el subsuelo en México (México: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1948), 197–245Google Scholar; Gordon, Wendell C., The Expropriation of Foreign Owned Property in Mexico (Washington, 1941)Google Scholar; Dunn, Frederick Sherwood, Diplomatic Protection of Americans in Mexico (New York, 1933), 326–335Google Scholar; and Bullington, John P., “Problems of International Law in the Mexican Constitution of 1917,” American Journal of International Law, XXI (October, 1927), 685–705CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 The Fall Committee in 1920 estimated the value of American property destroyed at $487,481,133 in U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, “Investigation of Mexican Affairs,” Senate Document No. 285, 2 vols., Series 7665–7666, 66th Congress, 2d Session, II, 3397–99.

5 Lists of Mexican bonds outstanding can be found in the Thomas W. Lamont Papers (Baker Library, Harvard University), boxes 192, 195, 205. In the postwar period, pesos converted into dollars at the rate of 2 to 1. The percentage of Mexico's debt floated (or held) in the United States is difficult to determine with precision. My figure is based on information supplied in Lamont to Hughes, April 18, 1924, Lamont Papers, Box 197.

6 Smith, Daniel M., Aftermath of War: Bainbridge Colby and Wilsonian Diplomacy, 1920–1921 (Philadelphia, 1970), 102–116Google Scholar.

7 A copy of the draft treaty is enclosed in George B. Christian, Jr. (President Harding's private secretary) to Hughes, May 21, 1921, National Archives, Record Group 59, General Records of the Department of State, File number 711.1211/45 (hereafter cited as NA with file number), and it has been reprinted in Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, 1921 2 vols. (Washington, 1936), II, 397–404Google Scholar (hereafter cited as FRUS with year and volume).

8 Considerable information about Mexico's economic and fiscal condition during the 1920s can be found in “Memorandum Regarding the Mexican Situation and the Method of Starting Its Rehabilitation,” undated, in the Papers of William Gibbs McAdoo, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Container 544; Sterrett, Joseph E. and Davis, Joseph S., The Fiscal and Economic Condition of Mexico: A Report Submitted to the International Committee of Bankers on Mexico (New York, 1928)Google Scholar; Secretaría de Hacienda y Credito Público, La deuda exterior de México (México; Editorial Cultura, 1926)Google Scholar; Bazant, Jan, Historia de la deuda exterior de México, 1823–1946 (México: El Colegio de México, 1968)Google Scholar. The relationship between politics, financial problems, and the process of economic development is perceptively analyzed in Vernon, Raymond, The Dilemma of Mexico's Development: The Roles of the Private and Public Sectors (Cambridge, Mass., 1965), 26–87Google Scholar, and Hansen, Roger D., The Politics of Mexican Development (Baltimore, 1971), 11–69Google Scholar.

9 A list of the original members is given in Turlington, Edgar, Mexico and Her Foreign Creditors (New York, 1930), 277Google Scholar. The American section included J. P. Morgan and Company, Illinois Trust and Savings Bank (Chicago), Ladenburg, Thalmann and Company (New York), Guaranty Trust Company (New York), Kuhn, Loeb and Company (New York), National City Bank (New York), Central Union Trust Company (New York), Chase National Bank (New York), and Kidder, Peabody and Company (Boston).

10 Thomas W. Lamont (Acting Chairman, International Committee of Bankers on Mexico) to Under Secretary Norman H. Davis, September 28, October 5, 1920, and Lamont to Hughes, March 29, 1921, NA812.51/619, 600, 724; “Chronological Memorandum As to [the] Formation of [the] International Committee of Bankers on Mexico,” December 7, 1923, and “Documents on [the] Formation of [the] ICBM,” Lamont Papers, boxes 193, 195; on the origin of the ICBM, see also Smith, Robert Freeman, “The Formation and Development of the International Bankers' Committee on Mexico,” Journal of Economic History, XXIII (December, 1963), 574–586CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Manuel C. Téllez (Mexican Charge, Washington, D.C.) to Lamont, February 7, Lamont to Davis, February 8, Lamont to Hughes, March 29, 1921, NA812.51/614, 724; “Memorandum,” March 23, 1921, unsigned, Lamont Papers, box 195.

12 Fletcher to Hughes, June 14, Lamont to Hughes, June 2, 9, Hughes to Lamont, June 2, 17, 1921, NA812.51/725, 767, 768; “Memorandum of an Interview Mr. Lamont had with Secretary Hughes at the Department of State,” August 15, 1921, unsigned, Lamont Papers, box 195.

13 Lamont to Hughes, June 27, 30, 1921, NA812.51/726, 728.

14 Hughes to Lamont, June 29, 1921, NA812.51/726.

15 Lamont to Teagle, August 17, 1921, Lamont Papers, box 197.

16 Lamont to Hughes, August 17, 1921, NA812.51/790; “Memorandum of [a] conversation with Mr. Teagle,” August 18, 1921, unsigned, Lamont Papers, box 195.

17 Hughes to Lamont, August 22, 1921, NA812.51/790.

18 Hughes to Teagle, August 20, 1921, FRUS, 1921, II, 456f. Fletcher made the same point even more strongly to Harold N. Branch, a representative of the oil companies, who frequently called at the State Department; see “Memorandum of an Interview with Under Secretary Fletcher,” August 24, 1921, initialed HNB, NA812.6363/1231.

19 Ira Patchin (for Lamont) to Hughes, September 12, 1921, enclosing press release, NA812.51/792; and New York Times, September 14, 1921.

20 Lamont to Hughes, September 13, 1921, NA812.51/793.

21 Lamont to Summerlin, quoting Hughes, October 10, 1921, NA812.51/663.

22 “Committee Understanding of Agreement: Clause Sixth (Bond-Purchase Clause),” in Oil Executives Committee to Adolfo de la Huerta, September 3, 1921, NA812.6363/1232, and Lamont to Hughes, September 23, 1921, with enclosures, NA812.51/794.

23 Lamont to Hughes, September 23, 1921, with enclosures, and Lamont to J. P. Morgan, October 20, 1921, enclosed in Summerlin to Hughes, October 21, 1921, NA812.51/794, 665; Lamont to Teagle September 19, 1921, and “Memorandum on the Mexican Government's Financial Position and Policy To-Day,” February 15, 1922, enclosed in Lamont to Judge Elbert H. Gary (President, United States Steel Company), February 15, 1922, Lamont Papers, boxes 197, 194.

24 “Principles Necessary for the Reestablishment of Mexican Government Credit in the Leading Investment Markets of the World,” Memorandum by Lamont, enclosed in Lamont to Summerlin, October 10, 1921, enclosed in Summerlin to Hughes, October 11, 1921, NA812.51/663.

25 Lamont to J. P. Morgan, October 20, 1921, enclosed in Summerlin to Hughes, October 21, 1921, NA812.51/665.

26 Precisely why Speyer was not include in the original group of bankers who made up the American section of the ICBM is not clear. The draft copy of a letter from Lamont to Teagle, Septemper 19, 1920, Lamont Papers, box 197, contains the comment, crossed out by someone, that “certain prejudices as to this house on the part of foreign section of the Committee existed because ot the war. This may be a plausible explanation, but had the American financiers truly wanted Speyer to participate, he would have been included. It is likely that either they objected to his tactics in Mexico, or that Speyer demanded some concessions as the price of cooperation.

27 James Speyer to de la Huerta, quoted in Lamont to Hughes, November 29, 1921, NA812.51/682; Lamont to Teagle, November 18, 1921, Lamont Papers, box 197; and announcement by Speyer in New York Times, December 1, 1921.

28 Summerlin to Hughes, December 27, 1921, Lamont to Hughes, January 13, with attachments, Patchin (for Lamont) to Hughes, January 18, and Lamont to Fletcher, February 21, 1922, NA812.51/693, 779, 719, 781; Diary of Chandler P. Anderson, June 12, 1922, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress.

29 Lamont to de la Huerta, February 18, 1922, enclosed in Lamont to Fletcher, February 21, 1922, NA812.51/719.

30 Lamont to Fletcher, February 24, 1922, quoting de la Huerta to Lamont, NA812.51/722.

31 The circular is reprinted in FRUS, 1922, I, 556–58. See also the New York Times, March 3, 1922.

32 New York Times, March 19, 23, 1922.

33 Summerlin to Hanna, May 15, 1922, NA812.51/747.

34 “Minutes of Meeting of International Committee of Bankers on Mexico with Mexican Minister of Finance,” June 2, 1922, Lamont Papers, box 205. De la Huerta repeated this statement several times during the first few days of the conferences.

35 Obregón, Alvaro, Documentos oficiales del Convenio de la Huerta-Lamont (Mexico City, 1924)Google Scholar, contains de la Huerta's dispatches from New York.

36 “Minutes of Meeting,” June 13, 1922, Lamont Papers, box 205.

37 Both of these issues had been floated during the Victoriano Huerta regime and were not recognized by successive governments. DeKay, John W. writes bitterly about the subject in his Mexico — The Problem and the Solution (Washington, 1927), 37–44Google Scholar.

38 “Final draft of Agreement Between Secretary of Hacienda (de la Huerta) and the International Committee of Bankers on Mexico,” June 16, 1922, with “Schedule of Obligations,” enclosed in Thomas Cochrane (for Lamont) to Hughes, July 7, 1922, NA812.51/775. Compare the debt schedule in La deuda exterior de México, 18–19.

39 “Minutes,” June 28, 1922, by Ira H. Patchin, Lamont Papers, box 205.

40 De la Huerta to Teagle, July 6, 1922, NA812.6363/1200.

41 “Memorandum of a Conference which Mr. H. N. Branch, representing a Committee of Petroleum Companies operating in Mexico, had with the Secretary on the matter of a loan to Mexico or an advance of money on Petroleum taxes to be paid to Mexico,” initialed by M. E. Hanna, July 11, 1922, NA812.6363/1228.

42 “Memorandum of a Conference Between the Secretary of State and the Mexican Secretary of Hacienda (de la Huerta),” July 18, 1922, by the Chief of the Division of Mexican Affairs (Hanna), NA711.12/526; New York Times, July 20, 1922.

43 Pani, Alberto J., Mi Contribución al nuevo régimen, 1910–1933 (México: Editorial Cultura, 1936)Google Scholar; Vasconcelos, José, A Mexican Ulysses: An Autobiography, translated and abridged by Crawford, W. Rex (Bloomington, Ind., 1963), 171, 173–74Google Scholar.

44 On the oil negotiations, consult Meyer, Lorenzo, México y Estados Unidos en el conflicto petrolero, 1917–1942 (México: El Colegio de México, 1968), Chapters 4–5Google Scholar; translations of the Supreme Court decisions are enclosed in Summerlin to Hughes, July 17, 1922, NA812.6363/1160, and the State Department's reaction can be studied in its press release dated August 10, 1922, in New York Times, August 11, 1922; for evidence that the Mexican authorities were making a special effort not to expropriate Americanowned agrarian properties, see Pani to Summerlin, March 31, 1923, enclosed in Summerlin to Hughes, April 5, 1923, NA711.1211/61.

45 “Memorandum… of conversation between Secretary Hughes and T. W. L., at the State Department,” September 26, 1921, dictated October 3, 1921, Lamont Papers, box 195; Hughes' speech in Boston, October 30, 1922, quoted in New York Times, October 31, 1922.

46 New York Times, June 17, 1922; “Mexico Ready to Pay Up,” Literary Digest, LXXIV (July 1, 1922), 16Google Scholar; “Mexico's Never-Ending Task” (editorial), The Nation, CXV (July 5, 1922), 5Google Scholar; letter by James G. McDonald (Chairman, Foreign Policy Association), June 28, 1922, ibid., (July 12, 1922), 44; McDonald to Lamont, June 19, 1922, Lamont Papers, box 195.

47 Hanna to Fletcher (in Belgium), June 21, 1922, Papers of Henry P. Fletcher, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, container 9.

48 Lamont to Hughes, October 2, 13, 1922, NA812.51/892, 880; “Memorandum,” September 13, 1922, by Ira H. Patchin, Lamont to Editor, New York Evening Post, April 3, and Lamont to William R. Hearst, April 23, 1923, Lamont Papers, boxes 195, 196, 194. See also Lamont, “The American Banker's Responsibility Today,” Address to American Bankers Association (extract), October 3, 1922, ibid., box 201.

49 Lamont to de la Huerta, September 29, 1922, enclosed in Lamont to Hughes, October 2, 1922, and Lamont to de la Huerta, October 19, 1922, enclosed in Lamont to Hughes, October 19, 1922, NA812.51/880, 893.

50 Hanna to Hughes, March 23, 1923, NA711.12/541.

51 The official record of the conferences is U.S. Department of State, Proceedings of the United States-Mexican Commission Convened in Mexico City, May 14, 1923 (Washington, 1925)Google Scholar. For general coverage of the conferences, see Pani, Alberto J., Los Conferencias de Bucareli (México: Editorial Jus, 1953)Google Scholar; Robles, Vito Alessio, Los tratados de Bucareli (México: A. del Bosque, 1937)Google Scholar; Dulles, John W. F., Yesterday in Mexico: A Chronicle of Revolution, 1919–1936 (Austin, Tex., 1961), Ch. 18Google Scholar.

52 The Bucareli Conferences, produced three instruments : (1) a general claims convention which authorized the creation of a general claims commission for the adjudication of mutual claims originating during the period since July 4, 1868; (2) a special claims convention establishing a commission to hear all American claims against Mexico for revolutionary damages suffered during the period from November 20, 1910 to May 31, 1920; and (3) a set of official minutes embodying certain “understandings” reached on the controversial agrarian and petroleum issues. Briefly stated, on the agrarian question, the United States surrendered its insistence on immediate cash payment to its nationals in Mexico for lands expropriated for ejidos (communal lands) and agreed to accept instead federal bonds as adequate compensation, while the Mexican government agreed that such payment would not constitute a precedent for future expropriations of any kind of property and agreed to limit the size of ejidos. On the matter of subsoil rights, the Mexican commissioners pledged that Mexico would respect the Supreme Court decisions declaring that Article 27 was inapplicable to American-owned oil properties acquired prior to May 1, 1917, on which some “positive act” of exploitation had been performed, and they broadly defined that phrase.

53 Lamont's attitude toward providing new funds to Mexico is clear in the following: dictated telephone call to Hughes, June 2, 1924, NA812.6363/1064; “Memorandum,” January 5, by Lamont, “Memorandum of Conversation between Mr. Lamont and Thomas J. Maloney, of the Lorillard Co.,” February 4, 1924, by Ira H. Patchin, and “Memorandum of Conversation… with [Mr.] Mascarenas, Financial Agent [of the] Mexican Government,” February 25, 1924, by Ira H. Patchin, Lamont Papers, boxes 195, 194.

54 New York Times, January 1, 1924. On the rebellion, see Robles, Miguel Alessio, Historia político de la Revolución (México: Ediciones Botas, 1946), 284–301Google Scholar, and Dulles, Yesterday in Mexico, 183–263.

55 Turlington, Creditors, 299–301. The financial complications caused by the upheaval are briefly described in Bazant, Historia de la deuda exterior de México, 193–94.