William Phillips (diplomat)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

William Phillips (May 30, 1878February 23, 1968) was a career United States diplomat who served twice as an Undersecretary in the State Department.

Phillips was born in Beverly, Massachusetts. He attended Harvard College in 1900 and graduated from Harvard Law School in 1903. His first political job was working as a secretary in London to Joseph Hodges Choate, the United States Ambassador to the United Kingdom. Cholate was a friend of Phillips' family and also from Massachusetts.

Phillips subsequently went to work for the Ambassador to China in Beijing. In 1908, while in China, he was assigned to set up the State Department's Division of Far Eastern Affairs and was made its first chief. In 1909 however, he returned to work in London.

In 1917, he was appointed as Assistant Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson and remained in that position until 1920, when he was made the Minister Plenipotentiary to Netherlands and Luxembourg (in residence in the Netherlands).

From 1922 to 1929, he was made Under Secretary of State. In 1924, he was appointed as Ambassador to Belgium, where he remained until 1927, when he became the first Minister to Canada, until 1929.

In 1936, he was appointed as the Ambassador to Italy, under Benito Mussolini, to smooth over relations after that country's invasion of Ethiopia. He resigned on December 6, 1941, five days before Italy declared war on the United States. The following year, he was made chief of the United States Office of Strategic Services in London.

In October of 1942, Phillips was appointed as a personal Ambassador to Franklin D. Roosevelt, serving in India. (The United States would not have an official Mission there until the country's Independence in 1947.) Phillips was said to be extremely unpopular with the British due to his pro-Independence views. In 1943, he was made as a Special Advisor on European political matters to then-General Dwight D. Eisenhower, with the rank of Ambassador.

Phillips retired officially in 1944 but returned briefly to diplomatic life in 1945 when he was made a special assistant to Secretary of State Edward R. Stettinius. In 1946, he served on the Anglo-American Committee on Palestine, opposing the British plan for partitioning the country. In 1947, he was unsuccessful in mediating a border dispute between Siam and French Indo-China.

[edit] References

  • William Phillips, Former Ambassador, Dies at 89. New York Times. New York, N.Y.: Feb 24, 1968. pg. 27, 1 pgs
Diplomatic posts
Preceded by
John E. Osborne
United States Assistant Secretary of State
1917 – 1920
Succeeded by
Fred Morris Dearing
Preceded by
John W. Garrett
United States ambassador to Luxembourg
1920 – 1922
Succeeded by
Richard M. Tobin
Preceded by
John W. Garrett
U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands
1920 – 1922
Succeeded by
Richard M. Tobin
Preceded by
Henry P. Fletcher
Under Secretary of State
1922 – 1924
Succeeded by
Joseph C. Grew
Preceded by
Henry P. Fletcher
United States ambassador to Belgium
1924 – 1927
Succeeded by
Hugh S. Gibson
Preceded by
None
United States ambassador to Canada
1927 – 1929
Succeeded by
Hanford MacNider
Preceded by
William R. Castle, Jr.
Under Secretary of State
1933 – 1936
Succeeded by
Sumner Welles
Preceded by
Breckinridge Long
United States ambassador to Italy
1936 – 1941
Succeeded by
George Wadsworth
Chargé d'Affaires ad interim
Languages