OPENING REMARKS OF CHAIRMAN, SENATOR HOLLAND

Senator HOLLAND. Thank you very much, Mayor Hartsfield, Dean Narmore, and Dr. Richards.

Before beginning today's hearings I should like to express the gratitude of this subcommittee to Mayor Hartsfield, and the city of Atlanta for your kind invitation to hold this meeting here.

I also want to thank the Honorable Frank Hooper for making his chambers available for this meeting.

I particularly express our appreciation to Dean Phil Narmore, of Georgia Tech, chairman of the mayor's arrangements committee, and to the other members of that committee, Mr. Snodgrass, Mr. Magill, and Mr. Bell.

Of course, if you will allow a personal note, I am happy to be here. I think that most of you know I am a trustee at Emory and have great and continuing interest in everything that happens in Atlanta.

Incidentally, my father and his father both shed their blood in defense of Atlanta at the Battle of Powder Springs a good many years ago and my grandfather served here in the legislature so that when I come back to Atlanta it is almost like coming back on holy soil.

PURPOSE OF HEARINGS

This is the first time that a subcommittee of the Foreign Relations Committee has ever met in the State of Georgia. It is the seventh in a series of hearings being held in various parts of the country.

The subcommittee has undertaken these hearings outside Washington for one principal purpose: We want the ideas, we want the views of Americans on a matter of great importance to the United States. We are not taking a public-opinion poll. It is not the business of a committee of the Senate to conduct polls. But it is the business of the Senate to bring to bear on matters affecting the interests of the people of the several States, the wisdom and the intelligence of their citizens.

The issue before the subcommittee concerns the United Nations and all other international organizations in which the United States participates.

It is probable that next year or the year after an international conference will be held to review the Charter of the United Nations. The charter itself provides for automatic consideration of this question 10 years after the founding of the United Nations. If the conference is held, the Senate will have an important part to play, because under the Constitution the Senate has the function of advising the President and consenting to actions in basic matters of foreign relations, particularly where treaties are involved.

That is why this subcommittee on the United Nations Charter was established. Our job is to inform the Senate so that the Senate in turn will be better equipped to discharge its function of advice and consent on questions relating to the review of the United Nations Charter and the participation of the United States in international security organizations.

We expect help in our work from the witnesses who will appear today. We hope to enrich our understanding of the issues before us by listening to their ideas and suggestions.

TRIBUTE TO SENATOR GEORGE AND SENATOR RUSSELL

We expect, moreover, something special in the way of enlightenment from the State of Georgia, because Georgia has two of the country's greatest authorities on international matters in the Senate, Senator George and Senator Russell. Incidentally, Senator George is the first-ranking Senator and Senator Russell the third-ranking Senator in point of service of the 96 Members of the Senate.

MESSAGE FROM SENATOR GEORGE

Before proceeding to the first witness, I wish to read a letter which I received from Senator George who is chairman of this Subcommittee on the United Nations Charter as well as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.

DEAR SENATOR HOLLAND: As you know, the Subcommittee on the United Nations Charter of the Committee on Foreign Relations is scheduled to meet in Atlanta, Ga., and Miami, Fla., on March 17 and 18, respectively. As chairman of the subcommittee, I would like very much to be able to serve at these meetings, especially in my own State. I find, however, that it will be impossible for me to be away from the Senate on the scheduled days because of official duties here in Washington.

May I interpolate here to say that no Senator, no public servant of the United States, is carrying a heavier burden right now than is that carried by the senior Senator from Georgia as the distinguished chairman of the committee which is carrying our burden of international affairs at this time.

The letter continues:

May I prevail upon you, therefore, to act as chairman for these two meetings? I know there is considerable interest in the subject of the United Nations in the southeast region of the country and I believe that the subcommittee will find the views of informed citizens in Georgia and Florida of great value in our work. With every wish for successful and profitable hearings, I am,

Yours sincerely,

WALTER F. GEORGE, Chairman.

SUBCOMMITTEE MEMBERSHIP

Before I introduce my two distinguished colleagues for brief statements, may I say that the resolution under which this subcommittee functions calls for two members who are not members of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

I happen to be the Democratic member assigned under that provision, probably because of the fact that I have long served on the Agriculture Committee. And, as most of us know, the matter of the production of food and fiber has become our strongest asset in dealing with foreign nations because they cannot understand a nation of the size and power of this Nation, which besides producing enough for its own citizens who are maintaining the highest standards known, still has an abundance to share with others who are friendly to us.

Without further comment of my own, I call next upon my distinguished colleague, Senator Sparkman of Alabama, who, as you know, served with distinction as one of our delegates to the General Assembly of the United Nations several years ago and has rendered to our Nation distinguished service in many other fields.

Senator Sparkman.

OPENING REMARKS OF SENATOR SPARKMAN

Senator SPARKMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My comment will be very brief. I am happy to be here. Of course I do not have quite the claim to Georgia that Senator Holland has, but you would be surprised how often I remind people that Alabama was at one time a part of Georgia, so I can run my kinship back to Georgia in that

way.

But I am very much interested, as all of us are, in trying to find some formula that will help us to work out the dilemma that we so often find ourselves in with reference to the United Nations.

It happens to be my personal belief that we must solve this problem because I think the time is fast approaching, if it is not already here, when civilization as you and I know it simply cannot live through another world war.

I think that is something that we must keep in mind, and therefore, nations must learn to live together, and the responsibility becomes even greater upon us to try to find a method whereby that may be made possible. In brief, that is what we are seeking.

Senator HOLLAND. I next would appreciate comments, as I know you would, from the other distinguished member of this subcommittee, Senator Alexander Smith of New Jersey, who before his election to the Senate was a member of the faculty of Princeton University, and who is a recognized authority in international affairs.

Senator Smith.

OPENING REMARKS OF SENATOR SMITH

Senator SMITH. Mr. Chairman, I deeply appreciate the honor of meeting in Georgia because of my warm friendship for your two Senators who are both such outstanding leaders in the Senate and in the country, in the field of international affairs.

Now, the United Nations has been of profound interest to me for many years.

As far back as Woodrow Wilson's day, when he was thinking in terms of a League of Nations, I was one of those, and I was a much younger man then of course, who was very enthusiastic about any collective move among the nations of the world to establish some way to settle international disputes without recourse to war.

So right along, I have been a great supporter of that idea. Incidentally, I was a personal friend of Woodrow Wilson, whom I always admired enormously and whom I felt was a great prophet of what was to come if we were to have peace in the world.

So when the United Nations was set up it happened to be my first year in the Senate. I was elected in 1944 and in 1945 you will recall we had V-E Day and V-J Day and then the United Nations conference in San Francisco. One of my very close friends, the late Senator Vandenberg, was one of the leading delegates there. We had a great delegation that worked in the setting up of this United Nations Charter.

Everybody knew then that they could not foresee for all time what the provisions of this charter should be, but I think the drafters did a very constructive and an important job."

It is provided in the charter that automatically after 10 years the question of whether a charter review conference shall be held will come before the General Assembly.

That is why now 10 years later we are having these hearings. We are trying to see what the thinking of the people of our country is as to what revisions, if any, should be made.

Some people think that we had better try a little longer with our present charter as it is, without getting into some of these controversial questions.

Now the question that keeps coming to me at various times is: What good is the United Nations doing?

It has failed here and there. Well, I can assure you if any of you had the privilege of attending the United Nations like I did, especially when I was an official delegate of my country, you would get the feeling of the importance of people of different nationalities in different parts of the world meeting together and getting to know each other on a personal basis.

In the United Nations are representatives from practically all parts of the world from Europe, the Middle East, and all through the Far East. The Far East is the area to which I have given special attention.

I consider it a great privilege to meet people, the great leaders of the Far Eastern countries, at the United Nations, and have a chance to sit down and talk with them.

Whether or not we make much progress there with our resolutions, we do have the opportunity to exchange ideas. We do have a public forum where ideas are criticized, as you know, without much regard for anybody's feelings.

The question is sometimes raised whether Russia, which has been such a thorn in the flesh for us, should be left in the United Nations. I think it should. When I was there, I was abused by the Russian delegate in the committees on which we both served. I welcomed it. Let them go ahead and shoot words. It is better for them to talk than to shoot with guns and it may be that through the United Nations' continuing debates, and by trying to think through in a common way the ways to world peace, we can avoid the ultimate recourse to arms.

It is a terrific responsibility we have. Each one of you has responsibility. Every individual in every State of our Nation shares the responsibility, because today whether we like it or not we have emerged as the strongest country in the world and because of that strength we have the special responsibility, as I see it, to try to guide the world to the ways of peace through bringing together the thinking of all the world, and trying to devise means to save civilization, as Senator Sparkman has said.

In an atomic age another war is unthinkable. We must meet this responsibility and we must go ahead and we must use this instrument of the United Nations in an effort to bring about a different world than we have had in the past. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SUBCOMMITTEE PROCEDURE

Senator HOLLAND. Thank you, Senator Smith and Senator Spark

man.

We have with us two of the members of the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who are here to assist us, Dr. Wilcox, the chief of staff of that important committee, and himself a wellknown authority in the field of international relations, and Mr. Valeo.

Now I am told that we have a long agenda and that the witnesses have complied very cordially with the request that written statements be prepared and those written statements will, of course, be received and become a part of our record. The oral statements will be confined to 5 minutes each, and I am told by Dean Narmore that the witnesses are happy about that arrangement because they realize that we are trying to hear as many as possible.

With that statement, I think we will begin now the actual hearing. You have heard from us. Now we want to hear from you, and that is really the business of this meeting.

Dean Narmore has a copy of the list of witnesses. I don't happen to know many of them. I suggest that Dean Narmore call the witnesses in the order in which the list states their names, and we will proceed as rapidly as possible.

Dean NARMORE. Mrs. Fleming Law.

I would like to make this statement too: All of the witnesses should be seated in this chair and speak and address their remarks to the committee, and they will be notified if they exceed 4 minutes; they will be notified by Mr. Wynn that they have only 1 more minute, so please confine yourself to that.

Senator HOLLAND. This may sound like a peculiar situation in connection with Senators who are known for the length of their speaking and for the lack of limitation, but we are trying to hear as many of you as possible.

STATEMENT OF MRS. FLEMING LAW, OF ATLANTA, GA.

BACKGROUND FOR REVISION

Mrs. Law. In considering charter revision it is well to keep in mind that the United Nations is a voluntary association of sovereign states which depends entirely on the free cooperation of its members for the implementation of its decisions.

The charter as it now stands is a flexible instrument, adaptable to changing world conditions, broad in concept, and subject to interpretation.

Undertaking any revision of such a document will require the utmost skill and prudence and poses the question of whether a review conference will, in 1956, have the free cooperation of the member states to the end that any worthwhile accomplishments may be effected.

PROBLEMS FOR CONSIDERATION

The problems which seem to have caused the most dissatisfaction and which could be considered in revising the charter are as follows: Disarmament, concerning which the charter makes little provision; abolition of the veto in regard to membership; universal membership; some form of weighted representation in the General Assembly; the police force; domestic jurisdiction and certain organizational changes.