[Inclosure-Translation.] Count Lamsdorff to Mr. Peirce. MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS, SECOND DEPARTMENT, St. Petersburg, March 1, 1899. MONSIEUR LE CHARGÉ D'AFFAIRES: I have transmitted to the minister of finance your note of 1 (13) February, in regard to the subject of a proposed exposition of American products in St. Petersburg or Moscow. Mr. Witte has to-day advised me that, taking into consideration the fact that the proposed exposition will have a temporary character, he will in this case be able to accord the following customs privileges: The American products intended for display at this exposition may enter free upon the condition that the sum corresponding to the amount of the duties on the products be deposited as guarantee. This sum will be returned in case the products in question shall be exported within a certain time. If the committee of organization of the exposition accepts these conditions the minister of finance wishes to know what shall be the space of time during which it would be the intention to exhibit the American products in Russia. Accept, etc., COUNT LAMSDORFF. Mr. Peirce to Mr. Hay. No. 120.] EMBASSY OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: I have the honor to again call your attention to the proposition of an exposition of American industries to be held in Russia, which was referred to in Mr. Hitchcock's dispatch No. 238, of January 21, 1899. It is hardly possible to touch upon an article of American industrial progress which would not find a market in Russia if properly placed before this community. A few such are already meeting with considerable success as American typewriters, sewing machines, bicycles, tools, hardware, and a number of smaller articles. In the line of machinery the Worthington pump has had a most gratifying success; the Baldwin Locomotive Works have established a regular market in Russia for their engines, of which they have sold up to the present time some 400 engines to the Russian Government, and recently, after an exhaustive test, the Westinghouse air brake has received a very large contract from the Government for the equipment of trains upon the Government lines of railway. American agricultural machinery is also largely used throughout Russia, but its use could be extended by proper exhibition and representation. These are articles which it has been possible to exhibit to the consumers in the regular way, and they illustrate the fact that a profitable market exists in Russia for American specialties, if only the manufacturer is prepared to display here his wares. There are, however, almost innumerable lines in which the Russian public is wholly ignorant of what progress we in America have made, and in which there can be little doubt that we have only to make known what we have to offer in order to find an abundant consumption of our goods. Without at the present time attempting to specify with any sort of fullness what articles of American manufacture would be likely to find a sale in Russia, I will venture to give a few illustrations which may perhaps serve in a general way to indicate Russia's industrial condition in regard to those things which it lacks and which in America have become matters of course. Taking, for instance, conveniences of the household, although the majority of people in this community, including even the very rich, live in apartments or flats, the use of elevators is extremely limited. I do not know myself of more than twenty in all St. Petersburg, and these are of the most primitive and inconvenient character. I know of but two American pianos in St. Petersburg, one of which is my own. American stoves of any sort are unknown, heating and cooking being almost exclusively done by means of earthenware stoves, which, however satisfactory in certain respects, are costly in the beginning as well as in consumption of fuel. I may here remark that the fuel in common use is wood, which, however, has advanced within two years 50 per cent in price, and in consequence English, or rather Welsh, coal is beginning to take its place. I am confident that American furniture, if it were known here, would sell readily. * * There are many other minor articles of the household which could well be introduced from America, but the above are the most striking needs. * * * * * None of the large cities are provided with any system of street railways better than the old-fashion horse cars. "Automobiles," so called, are coming into somewhat extensive use in St. Petersburg; but I have not heard of any attempt to introduce those of American manufacture, nor are American carriages known to any extent in Russia. On the other hand, the Bell telephone is in general use in all the large cities, and, I believe, with satisfactory results to the stockholders of the company. St. Petersburg is almost wholly built of brick covered with stucco. These bricks are hand made, there being no machine brick-making industry in Russia. Bricks are quoted, delivered in St. Petersburg, at 27 rubles-about $13.50 a thousand-and this with extremely lowpriced labor. Perhaps one of the greatest opportunities for American machinery is in the line of lumber manufacturing, in which Russian methods are primitive in the extreme. It is probable that, should an American company be formed to come to Russia to erect mills for the manufacture of lumber with improved machinery, the Government would extend to it very valuable concessions. I may here remark that I have received the best assurances that Americans coming to Russia to erect factories, or to engage with capital and improved appliances in industrial enterprises, will receive the fullest governmental support. This may be taken to include protection in the way of tariff. Russian capital, both alone and in conjunction with capital from abroad, is investing largely in industrial enterprises, and this tendency is steadily increasing. In these undertakings American machinery ought to play a far larger part than it does at the present time, but it can only hope to do so by becoming known in Russia. I have not touched upon the subject of mining machinery, in which direction there is a very wide field for our countrymen in Russia. Gold, silver, platinum, copper, iron manganese, quicksilver, coal, salt, and the precious stones are already mined in large quantities, and increased activity in exploration is constantly developing new deposits. There is an active and a growing demand for all sorts of mining and metal-working machinery, and in the development of mining and metallurgical industries, as well as in other industrial enterprises, the Imperial Government is extending to capital special encouragement and support in which foreigners participate. The enormously productive oil lands of the district lying between the Black and Caspian seas are being rapidly and profitably exploited, largely by foreign and especially English capitalists, and here again crude methods, both in the production of the raw article and in its refinement, offer opportunities for the profitable introduction of American processes and apparatus. None of the products of petroleum produced in Russia are comparable to the American articles, American illuminating oil, for instance, finding some sale in St. Petersburg at double the price of the Russian oil. The manufacture of textile fabrics is probably more highly developed in Russia than most industries, but even in this direction it is worthy of note that such articles as crash, formerly one of the leading products of Russian commerce, is still made only by hand in the peasant villages, and, in consequence, its exportation is rapidly decreasing. That our commerce with Russia is growing is shown by the large sales which have been made of steel rails, bridges, locomotives, tools, ships, dredges, and other articles of development of public works within the last few years, not to mention articles of regular trade. Our published statistics regarding our commerce with Russia are misleading, the volume of our trade being much larger than it appears therefrom. Take, for instance, the item of cotton. Russia consumes of American raw cotton $40,000,000 annually, while the published statistics place it far less than this; I believe less than one-half. The reason of this disparity is that the greater part of American cotton consumed in Russia comes here by way of England and is accredited to English consumption. In the same way a great quantity of American agricultural machinery comes into Russia via Hamburg and other German ports and is not included in the statistics of our Russian trade. A line of Danish steamers is now plying directly between New York and St. Petersburg, as you have already been informed, and I am told that the results of this year's traffic have been satisfactory to the owners, although, in the absence of return freight from Russia to the United States, the return cargoes have been made up in Swedish and Danish ports. In this connection I would say that, believing that reciprocal trade is of very great importance in building up our commerce with Russia, I am now engaged in endeavoring to secure an exhibit of specimens of such Russian special products as seem likely to find a market in the United States to be sent to the Philadelphia Commercial Museum, which has at present an extremely meager Russian exhibit. Submitting the above for your consideration, I have, etc., HERBERT H. D. PEIRCE, APPLICATION OF M. W. PIPPING, A RUSSIAN SUBJECT, FOR PASSPORTS FOR HIS MINOR SONS BORN IN THE UNITED STATES. Mr. Tower to Mr. Hay. No. 30.] EMBASSY OF THE UNITED STATES, St. Petersburg, April 25, 1899. SIR: I have the honor to report to you for your information, the case of Mr. M. W. Pipping, of Helsingfors, a Russian subject who has applied for "a certificate to keep his two sons as American citizens in order to rescue them from military service." The facts relating to it are as follows: M.W. Pipping was born in Helsingfors, Finland, in 1851. He emigrated to the United States in December of 1883 and resided there, in Pennsylvania and Ohio, where he followed his vocation as a mechanical engineer until the month of March, 1896. He never was naturalized as a citizen of the United States, but returned to his native country and to his duty as a Russian subject in 1896. Whilst he resided in Altoona, Pa., two sons were born to him, to wit: Alfred, on the 24th of November, 1885, and Ingewald, on the 28th of December, 1887. Upon his return to Helsingfors he brought these two minor children with him, and they are now living with him there. It is for these boys, who are at present, according to his statement, 13 and 11 years of age, respectively, that he asks for the protection of the United States Government to exempt them from military service here because they were born in America. His first application, a copy of which is respectfully submitted herewith, together with copies of the whole correspondence relating to it, was made through Mr. Victor Ek, United States vice-consul at Helsingfors, in a letter dated the 16th of March, 1899, to the consulgeneral of the United States at St. Petersburg, which was in due course referred by the consul-general to this embassy. Before deciding whether these boys are entitled to receive the protection sought for them by their father, I wrote to the vice-consul at Helsingfors, saying that the only document which could be given them by way of identification would be an American passport, and I asked him for further information as to who Mr. Pipping is and where he was born; when he went to America; when he returned from there; whether he has any interest there; whether he ever declared his intention to become an American citizen; whether he intends to send his children to America to reside there; and, if so, when. I thought it possible that these inquiries might lead to the discovery of some reason for issuing a passport; otherwise it would appear that this was merely the application of a foreigner who seeks to shield his boys from the performance of such duties as they will properly become liable to if they continue to reside within Russian jurisdiction and remain hereafter Russian subjects in fact. But Mr. Pipping has written the reply which accompanied the vice-consul's letter addressed to me on the 10th of April, from which it appears that this man lived in the United States for more than twelve years without acquiring citizenship and without even declaring his intention to become an American citizen; that he is now engaged in business in Helsingfors and has no intention of returning to America to become a citizen of the United States; that he is raising and educating his sons in Finland and has no definite intention of sending them to the United States now or in the future. It is true these boys were born in the State of Pennsylvania, and I recognize the fact that they have a right under our statute to avail themselves of that accident to choose American citizenship if they decide to do so upon their coming of age. But, without discussing the abstract question of their right to citizenship, I am inclined to follow at present the ruling of the Department of State in a similar case, in which it was held that a minor child of a foreigner who was removed by his parents beyond the jurisdiction of the United States took the status of his father during his minority if he remained abroad. The Secretary of State having declared in regard to a certain minor born in the United States, but removed by his parents to Switzerland, that, "while it is true that the boy by virtue of his nativity may claim citizenship of the United States, yet his father being an alien and continuing to remain a Swiss citizen, and having removed the boy while a minor without the jurisdiction of the United States, his status, as well as his domicile, according to well-understood principles of international and municipal law, follows that of the father until the boy attains his majority. Should he, after reaching the age of 21 years, voluntarily return to the United States, and make it his permanent home, asserting the right of citizenship in virtue of his nativity, his political status would then be determined according to the law and circumstances of the case." (Mr. Seward to Mr. Fish, in re Joseph Speck, August 20, 1878.) The children of Mr. Pipping are in no proper sense Americans. They are not in contact with American influence or American thought, and they are not preparing themselves, in so far as I can discover, to perform the duties of American life. They live in a foreign country, and their father now seeks to use the protection of the American flag as a cloak under which to hide them from their legal obligations. Pending the instructions of the Department, I have refused to issue passports to them. I have, etc., CHARLEMAGNE TOWER. [Inclosure 1.] Mr. Ek to Mr. Holloway. CONSULATE OF THE UNITED STATES, SIR: Mr. M. W. Pipping has lived in America several years, and his two children, Alf and Ingewald (Aino is dead), are born in Altoona, Pa. Mr. Pipping is not American citizen, but he wishes to keep his two sons as American citizens in order to rescue them from military service. He wrote about this matter to his attorney at law in Altoona, and he writes: "Your favor of the 25th ultimo was received a few days ago. In reply I can only say that I do not see how any paper such as you speak of can be obtained here. I know of no officer of the law who can issue such a certificate. Only way to procure such a decision is to apply to the American consul in the country where your sons may be drafted with military service and there claim exemption from military service on the grounds that they are American citizens. It will then be the duty of that officer to furnish the necessary certificate." I inclose a certificate that the sons of Mr. Pipping are born in America, and beg to send me the necessary certificate for the questioned purpose. I am, etc., VICTOR EK, Vice and Acting Consul. |