August 3, 1942
 
 
Mr. Stephen Early
 
Dear Steve:
 
       I return herewith the drafts of proposed cablegrams to be sent by the President on August 14
to Prime Minister Churchill, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and Premier Joseph Stalin.
 
     Suppose I start with the proposed message to Chiang Kai-shek, as suggestions made
regarding it may have general application to the other two:
 
     The officers to whom this draft has been submitted offer the suggestion that the word
"compact", appearing at the beginning of the second paragraph, might well be changed to
"declaration of principles", the thought being that "compact" signifies the reaching of an
agreement, whereas the phrase "declaration of principles" could signify merely the announcement
of something in regard to which the declarers were already in agreement. It is further suggested
that the phrase "at sea" is inaccurate in that the declaration became known as the "Atlantic
Charter" not because it was signed on water, but because it was signed on a particular body of
water. Mr. Davis might wish to change this phrase to "on board ship in the Atlantic". He might
also wish to change the last sentence of paragraph 2 to read: "This charter has now been accepted
by the twenty-eight countries subscribing to the Declaration by United Nations of January l,
1942".
 
        Still another suggestion is that the phrase "and Coral Sea" in the second paragraph be
deleted on the ground that it is redundant, being included in the areas already named. The
accuracy of the phrase "to the fartherest corners of the globe", paragraph 3, has been questioned
on the ground that the horrors and tragedy of war are not known (for example) to some of the
countries of South America. It has also been suggested that a comma be inserted after the word
"victory" in the last sentence of paragraph 4.
                                                       There