Woodrow Wilson to Robert Lansing

I have your letter of April twenty-eighth in which you suggest the allotment to the Department of State of $150,000 from the appropriation for National Defense at my disposal, in order to increase the emergency expenditures in the Diplomatic and Consular Services and enable the department to meet the extraordinary expenses incident to the war not only for the usual emergencies in the foreign service but also for personal services in the District of Columbia for Secret Service work and to relieve the pressure of the various bureaus of the department. I am quite willing in the circumstances to authorize this allotment and hope that you will transmit this authorization to the Secretary of the Treasury.