-2-                             
 
 
 
clear and perhaps might have rendered some service to you and to our
Government, in which so many individuals seem to think they can get a
few fellows together and do what they want. I had the feeling that
one's duty might sometimes be even to give up an important position in
order to render assistance; and when I had luncheon with the Foreign
Relations Committee one day, two outstanding men who voted with the
minority crowd confessed their shame; and those two votes would have
made your recommendations successful.
 
 
 Later on, as it proved impossible to get any treaty relations here and
as one's work, strenuous as it was,almost invariably proved
unsuccessful, I felt that I ought not to stay much longer and therefore
offered my resignation last spring, and Judge Moore must have presented
it to you. I am not so sure that diplomats are worth anything like what
they cost our country. When I see how many Ambassadors we have and how
little they can actually do, it seems something of a waste to continue
them in service. The whole of Europe is almost immovable, the possible
exception being the little countries that can not do anything, or
possibly even England and yet we have very expensive services, very
expensive Ambassadors at many posts. I read Mr. Messersmith's famous
report on what was wasted in Paris, and I learned that nothing was ever
done. There seems to me to be a group of men in the Department who do
not undertake to listen to any advice that may come to them. Nothing
proves this better than the treatment of our urgent recommendations to
exchange the Blucher Palais for a suitable Embassy which the Germans
were ready to give, especially through the year 1936. We have lost
about $60,000 a year ever since I have been here