Citizens Report

To Washington one day last week journeyed the four U. S. members of the Reparations Commission--Owen D. Young, John Pierpont Morgan, Thomas William Lament, Thomas Nelson Perkins--to inform their government what, as private citizens, they had accomplished at Paris. First they drove up to the Department of State in a taxicab, went in to call upon Secretary Stimson. After a long wait their taxi-driver grew impatient, suspected his four fares of stealing away to escape the metre charge, went in and told a guard they were "dead beats." Emerging after two hours, the four Reparation Commissioners crossed the street to the White House to lunch with President Hoover. About the table were gathered officials from the State and Treasury Departments. Questions were asked and answered. The advisability of having a U. S. official join the International Bank of Settlements, set up under the Young Plan, was advanced and discussed. Emerging from the White House, the Messrs. Young and Morgan stepped into the first motor that drew up. Halfway down the drive they discovered it was the all-aluminum limousine of Secretary Mellon. Back under the portico stood Mr. Mellon, plunged in perplexity. The Messrs. Morgan & Young drove around to the portico again, got out. Mr. Morgan tapped Mr. Mellon amiably on the shoulder, assured him they had had no intention of making off with his unique machine. The next day Secretary of State Stimson reaffirmed the government's refusal to have any connection, official or otherwise, with the International Bank of Settlements. This was no direct rebuff to Messrs. Young & Morgan. In May, Statesman Stimson had publicly announced the same thing: that there would be no Hoover recognizance of any connection between war debts and reparations. Well knowing their government's attitude, the U. S. commissioners had inserted a provision in the Young Plan whereby private citizens could be selected for the Bank in the absence of official U. S. representatives.