UNION. At the first international Conference of American States held at Washington, a recom mendation was approved on March 29, 1890, for the establish ment of an inter-American organization to be known as "the International Union of American republics" for the prompt collec tion and distribution of commercial data and information. This Union was to be represented at Washington, D.C. by a bureau called "the commercial bureau of the American republics," its organ of publicity to be a publication in English, Spanish, Portu guese and French—the four languages spoken in Latin America and the United States—entitled The Bulletin of the Commercial Bureau of the American Republics. It was also provided that this bureau was to be "at all times available as a medium of com munication and correspondence for persons applying for informa tion in regard to matters pertaining to the commerce of the American republics." To defray the expenses of maintaining the bureau the sum of $36,000 was set aside to be advanced by the U.S. Government, which was to be reimbursed by the other re publics by their respective quotas in proportion to their popula tion. Subsequently the Dominican republic joined the Union, as did later Cuba and Panama. The report of the committee adopted by the first conference is the original charter of the bureau.
At the second conference a resolution was adopted on Jan. 29, 1902, for the reorganization of the bureau. In Art. I. of this resolution it is provided that the international bureau of the American republics shall be under the management of a governing board, which shall consist of the secretary of State of the United States of America, who shall be its chairman, and of the diplo matic representatives of all the Governments represented in the bureau and accredited to the U.S. Government. The resolution contained 13 articles and provided in detail for the management of the bureau, and conferred upon the governing board full power over its affairs. The name of the bureau was changed from "the commercial bureau of the American republics" to "the interna tional bureau of the American republics." The third international conference, which met at Rio de Janeiro, adopted on Aug. 19, 1906, a resolution, signed by all of the delegates, for the reorganiza tion of the bureau. This resolution did not change in any particu lar the essentials of the resolution of Mexico City so far as the ad ministration of the bureau, its character as an international