Churchill v. Mellon

COMMONWEALTH (British Commonwealth of Nations)

Secretary Mellon of the U. S. Treasury and Chancellor Churchill of the British Exchequer came as near as statesmen ever do to calling one another "Liar!" last week. The Secretary was vacationing on the continent. The Chancellor was busy at London. Neither was within earshot of the other, but, through a series of suave but venomously couched official statements, they exchanged compliments with rough-and-tumble intent.

The U. S. Treasury set out to combat Franco-British propaganda against "U. S. debt Shylocking" by announcing over Mr. Mellon's signature: 1) that under the Mellon-Berenger agreement, if and when ratified, France will repay a sum roughly equivalent to only her post-War borrowings from the U. S., and may therefore be said to have been forgiven her War debt entire; 2) that "England borrowed a large proportion of its debt to us for purely commercial, as distinguished from War, purposes to save borrowing from its own people." (i. e. Britain deserves no cancellation of these "commercial" camouflaged "War loans.")

Rising irate in the House of Commons, fiery Chancellor Churchill cried: "The words Mr. Mellon is quoted as using indicate a complete misapprehension of the case so serious that one almost doubts the authenticity of the quotation. . . .

"During the period of American intervention (1917-20) over $7,000,000,000 was spent by Great Britain in the United States. Of that $7,000,000,000 we borrowed $4,000,000,000.and provided an additional $3,000,000,000 from our own independent resources. We spent on the two items of munitions and foodstuffs alone more than the $4,000,000,000 we borrowed from the United States" [i. e. the U. S. loans to Britain were shot up and eaten in the "Common Cause," and "ought" (in British eyes) to be canceled at least in part by the U. S.] Straightway the U. S. Treasury Department, through Assistant Secretary Garrard Winston, gave back the lie with delicate irony to Chancellor Churchill, pointed out that almost $2,000,000,000 of the "munitions and foodstuffs" alluded to were bought by Britain as purchasing agent for her Continental Allies with sums lent them by the U. S. (Thus Britain was declared to have purchased on her own account about half the "Common Cause" munitions and supplies stated by Mr. Churchill.) Pat came the British Exchequer's answer. The sums expended by Britain as agent for her Continental Allies were really more than counterbalanced by her own expenditures in their behalf. Ergo these sums cancel out of any discussion of the Anglo-U. S. debt. . .etc. . . . etc.. . . etc. . . . At this point the debate, though showing every sign of being continued ad infinitum, passed into the limbo where hairs are split--often by honest, well-intentioned men. The total result of last week's academic tilt was to rouse a majority of British editors to frenzied indignation at the U. S. Cartoons labeled "USury" were frequent in which " Uncle Sam" became "Uncte Shylock," and was adorned with unmistakably Semitic features. Late despatches reported that this orgy of futility seemed to have spent itself temporarily.