THE OTHER TREATY OF LAUSANNE: THE AMERICAN PUBLIC AND OFFICIAL DEBATE ON TURKISH-AMERICAN RELATIONS

Abstract

On August 6, 1923 Joseph Grew, the American representative at the Lausanne Conference, and İsmet Pasha, the Foreign Minister of the nationalist government of Ankara, signed a Treaty of Amity and Commerce in Lausanne, Switzerland. The "other" Treaty of Lausanne was meant to establish diplomatic and commercial relations between the United States and the new Turkish Government. Replacing agreements between America and the Ottoman Empire, which were severed when the United States entered World War I in 1917, this new treaty also signified the United States' recognition of the independence and sovereignty of the new Turkish state. In Turkey, the treaty with the United States was seen as an extension of the Lausanne Treaty, normalizing relations between the new Turkish Government and the European Powers. But in the United States, the treaty led to an official and public controversy which delayed its ratification, and resulted in its rejection in 1927 by the United States Senate. Stili, the debate surrounding the treaty continued, lasting seven year from its signing in 1923 until 1930 when the Senate finally accepted another, yet virtually identical, treaty with the Turkish Republic.