Consular officer

“ It is possible that the out-of-date view that diplomatic and consular officers are purely political agents may be excessively retained in some instances, and that the assistance rendered by Her Majesty's Consuls to British trade might advantageously receive more encouragement and departmental recognition. ”

“ In view of the growth of our interests in foreign countries and the encouraging prospects for a general expansion of our commerce, the question of an improvement in the consular service has increased in importance and urgency. Though there is no doubt that the great body of consular officers are rendering valuable services to the trade and industries of the country, the need of some plan of appointment and control which would tend to secure a higher average of efficiency can not be denied. ”

“ Warden in his treatise on 'The Origin and Nature of Consular Establishments,' that the consul was originally an officer of large judicial as well as commercial powers, exercising entire municipal authority over his countrymen in the country to which he was accredited. ”

“ Consuls shall exercise their functions only on receipt of an exequatur from the Government to which they are accredited. Consular authorities shall be bona fide officials. No merchants shall be permitted to exercise the duties of the office, nor shall Consular Officers be allowed to engage in trade. ”

“ Four of them were from citizens in various parts of the United States who seemed to regard the consul at Coralio as a cyclopædia of information. They asked long lists of questions, numerically arranged, about the climate, products, possibilities, laws, business chances, and statistics of the country in which the consul had the honour of representing his own government.
“Write ’em, please, Billy,” said that inert official, “just a line, referring them to the latest consular report. Tell ’em the State Department will be delighted to furnish the literary gems. Sign my name. ”

“ During my former Administration I took occasion to recommend a recast of the laws relating to the consular service, in order that it might become a more efficient agency in the promotion of the interests it was intended to subserve. The duties and powers of consuls have been expanded with the growing requirements of our foreign trade. Discharging important duties affecting our commerce and American citizens abroad, and in certain countries exercising judicial functions, these officers should be men of character, intelligence, and ability. ”

“ Under our present system of patronage appointments there is little security that the men appointed are qualified for their duties. In some places, notably in important positions, in Great Britain, Germany, and other European countries, we have been fortunate enough to secure men not only of the highest natural capacity, but admirably equipped, and their consular reports have been a credit to the service and of immense value to our commerce. ”

“ The public obligation to him will of course be much greater if he employs his official influence to the utmost, as I earnestly hope he will, toward accomplishing what the business community of the country has so long and so vainly been praying for—that is a system of examinations for Consular positions that will really rescue the Consular service from the deleterious touch of spoils politics, and bring to it the best attainable ability and character. ”

“ The promptitude with which the reports of the consuls are printed and distributed, the generous recognition which is being increasingly accorded by our business interests to the practical value of their efforts for enlarging trade, and the continued testimony of competent foreign authorities to the general superiority of their commercial work, have naturally had a stimulating effect upon its consular corps as a whole, and experience in the discharge of their duties adds greatly to their efficiency. ”

“ Crawford, ubi supra, it was said by Chief Justice TANEY that, 'in this country, as well as others, it often happens that the consular office is conferred by a foreign government on one of our own citizens.' It is because of this practice that the question has frequently arisen as to the extent to which citizens of a country, exercising the functions of foreign consuls, are exempt from the political and municipal duties which are imposed upon their fellow citizens. ”

“ If any one grudges us our pittance, and will inquire in Africa, Brazil, Damascus, or Trieste, they will find that at no time, of those or any other months, has a single detail of Consular work been omitted, or neglected, or performed by incompetent or ordinary subordinates, whilst every penny of public money was nervously accounted for. They will learn that we have ever given double of what we have received; that every one of our four Consulates has been a credit to the Government; that the English of our district have always been proud of their Consul and Consulate ”

“ King Theodahad to the Senate of the City of Rome.
The same subject.
'We do not think that the fact of a man's having received the Consulship early in life should shut him out from holding office of lower rank in his maturer years [649] . As the Tiber receives the water of smaller rivers which merge their names in his, so a man of Consular rank can serve the State in less conspicuous ways, yet still be Consular. ”

“ The first is that the consular service ought not to be filled with foreigners. The Consular Register of July, 1899, shows that out of 706 subordinate positions, including commercial agencies, 412 are filled by men born in the country where they are stationed. In fact, out of a total of 1,020 men in the consular service only 547 are of American birth or parentage. The reason for this is that so many of the positions don’t pay enough to induce Americans to undertake them. ”

“ The consuls and vice consuls, officers of the consulate, and in general, all persons attached to the consular functions, shall enjoy respectively a full and entire immunity for their persons, their papers, and their houses. ”

“ By no means, for the principal part of that reform, the introduction of the competitive merit system for the filling of consular offices, can be compassed without any legislation by Congress. It is simply in the hand of the President alone. He can say: “The Constitution confers upon me the power and the duty to nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, appoint consuls. The business of nominating—of selecting suitable persons for examination—rests with me. I consider it my duty to select for nomination the fittest persons I can find. ”

“ I am glad to say that of late years there have been many excellent exceptions to this rule; and one of my most earnest hopes, as a man loving my country and desirous of its high standing abroad, is that, more and more, the tendency, both as regards the consular and diplomatic service, may be in the direction of sending men carefully fitted for positions, and of retaining them without regard to changes in the home administration. ”

“ Each of the High Contracting Parties may appoint Consuls General, Consuls, Vice-Consuls, Pro-Consuls, and Consular Agents, in all the ports, cities, and places of the other, except in those where it may not be convenient to recognize such officers. ”

“ On the contrary, every person of experience in such things knows that with every change of administration consulates are among active politicians in greater demand than any other class of offices—in fact they seem to have a peculiar charm for people's imagination;—that almost every politician of any degree thinks himself fit to be a consul ”

“ The British consular system was made a service, its members being fairly remunerated and induced to make their occupation the profession of their lives; consequently the Government has at all times competent and reliable servants. ”

“ The United States has an ambassador or minister in 54 different countries of the world. There are 314 foreign commercial cities where the United States has a consul general, consul, vice consul, or consular agent, who, among other duties, help steamship lines and great business establishments to promote commerce with the United States. Our consuls protect and assist the hundreds of American missionaries whose stations are in remote foreign regions of the world. ”

“ Considering their initial qualifications, their social standing, and their great opportunities, it must be admitted that the men of distinction who have emerged from the consular service during the last fifty years seems disproportionately small. ”

“ For a place in the administrative part of the Government not the mere henchman of some party leader or committee, but he who proves himself better qualified for the duties of the office than his competitors; for the consular service, not a mere political drummer or a man who has put some member of Congress under political obligation, but he who proves himself especially well versed in commercial affairs and law, and in command of the other necessary equipments for the performance of consular duty ”

“ The present magnificently organized consular system of Germany is, then, one of the most remarkable outcomes of the establishment of the united empire. It was initiated by an act of the parliament of the North German Confederation (Nov. 8, 1867) , subsequently incorporated in the statutes of the Empire, which laid down the principle that the German consulates were to be under the immediate jurisdiction of the president of the Confederation (later the emperor) . The functions, duties and privileges of French and German consuls do not differ materially from those of British consuls ”

“ To Mr Alexander Spencer.
“Casa Capponi, Florence, Nov. 1,1858.
“Yesterday I had a civil note from Lord Malmesbury stating that the regulation for consular appointments required that no candidate should be above fifty, and all should submit to a rigid examination. He saw no better means of introducing me into ‘the line’ than by creating for me a vice-consulate at a place I am much attached to—Spezzia. The rule as to age and examination did not apply to vice-consular appointments nor to their promotion, so that once a V.-C. I can be advanced, if opportunity serve, to something worth having. ”

“ The interests of our country demand that our diplomatic and consular service should be fixed by a general law, subject of course to necessary changes, to be recommended by the department, and not undergo this annual tinkering, to which no other branch of the government and no other class of officials are subjected. ”

“ The Emperor shall have the supervision of all consular affairs of the German Empire, and he shall appoint consuls, after hearing the committee of the federal council on commerce and traffic. No new state consulates are to be established within the jurisdiction of the German consuls. ”

“ I find that after Americans, Germans make the best American consular agents, and Englishmen the best German consular agents, while French consular agents would be more useful to their countrymen if they could speak French as well as they do Spanish. ”

“ But in other positions, especially the smaller ones, the political removals and appointments which had been repeated every four years up to the time of the present administration, have made the term of the consul's service so short that, with the meagre pay allowed, first-class men cannot be secured. ”

“ The frequent wars of the succeeding century hindered the development of the consular system. Thus, though the system of consuls was regularly established in France by the ordinance of 1661, in 1760 France had consuls only in the Levant, Barbary, Italy, Spain and Portugal, while she discouraged the establishment of foreign consuls in her own ports as tending to infringe her own jurisdiction. It was not till the 19th century that the system developed universally. ”

“ And in response, the President in his recent message briefly refers to the subject in saying: “It is much to be desired that our consular system be established by law on a basis providing for appointment and promotion only in consequence of proved fitness.”
Attempts at legislation to reform the consular service have actually been made. There are now two bills pending in Congress, both of which have great merit—one introduced by Senator Lodge of the Senate, the other by Mr. ”

“ Very few of our consuls, either in South America or in the Orient, are acquainted with the language in which they are required to transact much of their business. In non-Christian countries, where consuls are charged with civil and criminal jurisdiction, and may not only try civil causes between Americans and foreigners but may sentence our citizens to fine, imprisonment, or even death, American consuls are not lawyers. ”

“ I found my position as the wife of the British Consul in Damascus very different from what it had been in Brazil. A consul in the East as envoye of a Great Power is a big man, and he ranks almost as high as a Minister would in Europe. Nearer home a consul is often hardly considered to be a gentleman, while in many countries he is not allowed to go to Court. ”

“ I claimed that the Consular and Diplomatic Services should be so co-ordinated that a good man in the Consular Service in Turkey might be promoted into the Diplomatic Service, and I instanced the case of Sir William White, one of the ablest Ambassadors we ever had in Constantinople, who had risen from being a consular clerk to the Embassy. ”