C.G. Pfeiffer to Woodrow Wilson

New York City,

The Hon. Woodrow Wilson, President
White House, 
Washington, DC

The plea that every American resource should now be made available and none be wasted, and your well known attitude,Mr. President, towards all problems arising out of the war, must be the justification for this direct appeal for prompt action to prevent needless and avoidable waste.
American importers dealing with Central European manufacturers inevitably suffered as a result of the European war, but the situation confronting them was met with characteristic resourcefulness – comparatively few failures resulted. The British Blockade Proclamation of March 1st, 1915 and its exacting enforcement materially increased the difficulties of our merchants by preventing shipment of their property unless paid for prior to a stated date. Through many years of normal business relations American importers had incurred obligations toward Central European factories for the acceptance of goods which could not suddenly be repudiated. There are consequently now lying, at their charge and risk, in neutral countries between ten and fifteen million dollars' worth of Central European non–contraband merchandise, American owned and destined for the United States. Shipping permits for these goods have so far been refused by Great Britain – a dead weight for the American merchants and their bankers to carry.
In a series of admirable notes and with relentless consistency the State Department has refused to accept the legality of the Blockade as affecting non–contraband. When the United States joined the Allies, therefore, it was confidently expected that this American property lying in neutral countries for many months would be immediately released. Four months have past since that momentous day, and the State Department is still urging release upon the British Government.
This merchandise should be released at once and the American capital involved made available for productive activity here instead of its remaining tied up abroad in goods that are exposed to the ever–increasing danger of deterioration, to loss of interest and an accumulation of carrying charges increasingly hard to bear.
Both as a matter of expediency and of simple justice it is to be hoped the principle will speedily be acted upon that all merchandise of Central European origin which became American property prior to the entry of the United States into the war, be released without delay. This will provide a clear–cut method of procedure, as Consular invoices (many of them withheld by the censor in Great Britain) are available for all such merchandise. Only such action will relieve some of our merchants from a strain on their resources which is rapidly approaching the danger point.
In writing as above the writer is actuated solely by the desire to protect American interests. He is an American citizen by birth and has been pro–Ally from the outbreak of the war.

Respectfully,
C.G. Pfeiffer


V. P. of GEO. BORGFELDT & CO., New York, N. Y.
And member of The American Industrial Commission to France
September – October, 1916