Secretary Gresham, Senator Lodge, and American Good Offices in China, 1894

Abstract

ON DECEMBER 3, 1894, Henry Cabot Lodge, the junior senator from Massachusetts, introduced a resolution asking that the state department send to the senate all the correspondence from American diplomats in China dealing with the protection of Japanese subjects. Specifically, the senator wanted to know whether, during the Sino-Japanese War, there was an understanding with the Chinese government as to the assistance that American officers might render to the Japanese who had elected to remain in China. He also wanted to know whether Chinese officials were ignoring American officers who sought to protect Japanese subjects and whether the American consul general at Shanghai had delivered two alleged Japanese spies to Chinese officials for execution.'