Do we have in our file a copy of the New York charter?

Jack Brinkley, would you obtain for our file a copy of the articles of incorporation or the certificate of incorporation from New York? I believe the lady also mentioned Virginia. If you can find it either place.

Mr. BRINKLEY. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. DANIELSON. In order to alleviate any big worries, Mrs. Chittick, that you may have, the annual statement that Mr. Kindness referred to is a very painless thing. It amounts to really, usually in legalistic terms, nothing more than a communication telling the Secretary of State of New York, for example, that we are still here. For a corporation not for profit, I doubt if there would even be a fee attached of any kind. I won't say there is none, but it would be minimal, if any at all.

But, you know, it is easy to set up a corporation. There must be thousands incorporated every year throughout the United States. Except for the fact that they can be purged every year if they cease to be in existence, the list of corporations would be unbelievably long.

So, most States require that a corporation face muster once a year, stand up and have their nose counted, yes, they are still here and they still want to stay in existence. It really is not burdensome. It would not cost you a lot of money or anything like that. But it is a way of maintaining a nose count that they are still around.

Beyond that, I would like to expand slightly. We have a reason for insisting that an organization be incorporated somewhere; namely, we are really not talking about anything here. There is no Federal corporation law.

Since the Constitution was adopted, it has always been left to the States to regulate corporations. In fact, I respectfully submit if we were to propose a Federal corporation law, and make corporations, for example, that deal in interstate or foreign commerce register with the Federal Government, to comply with some rules that we would promulgate, you would hear the loudest outcry of protest you ever heard in your life.

I don't think in my lifetime there will ever be Federal incorporation law. So, we don't really have one.

But for the fact that there are organizations like yourselves and like the Gold Star Mothers, and the Boy Scouts, and the Red Cross, we probably never would have had and never would have in the future any such thing as a Federal charter.

So what we try to do on this subcommittee is be very stingy with granting Federal charters because we are not really granting anything except a recognition. It is very difficult to grant that recognition to one organization and deny it to some other organization. If we were to give a charter to every boy's club, every lodge, every sorority, every lady's aid, every you name it, every rotary club, every organization in the country, we wouldn't be doing anything here except granting charters day in and day out, because there would be literally millions of them.

These are pretty exclusive and we have to be a little bit stingy about it.

Their officers, as far as I have been able to learn, so far have all been widows of retired-well, much more oriented toward the higher ranking officers. There are quite a few of our members who do hold membership in those.

Mr. DANIELSON. Except for those two-

Mrs. CHITTICK. Those are all we know about.

Mrs. SIMONFY. National Association for Military Widows.

Mr. DANIELSON. That is a third organization?

Mrs. SIMONFY. Yes, sir.

Mrs. CHITTICK. That may be the same.

Mr. DANIELSON. OK.

Last, another point that Mr. Kindness did touch upon-I have compared the language of H.R. 154 verbatim with the language of S. 1178. There is, as has been recognized, a difference in the names listed as the board of directors.

There are six persons listed as directors in S. 1179 who are not listed in H.R. 154. There are four additional persons listed in H.R. 154 who are not included in S. 1179.

Mrs. CHITTICK. And a month from now there will be some of those names that are in that because our convention every year, the terms of the board members expire.

Mr. DANIELSON. When will the convention for this year be held? Mrs. CHITTICK. Two weeks from now.

Mr. DANIELSON. Well, I don't know if we want to wait that long. Jack, I would like to make this suggestion. Would you please check and get your list up to date, correct as of now, and I surmise that with the forthcoming Republican Convention, which starts in about 3 weeks, it is possible that we couldn't get this bill to the floor, maybe not even to the full committee, until that time. Maybe by then these ladies will have held this year's convention and we can at least have a correct tabulation of the names.

Would you accept that additional burden, Jack?

Mr. BRINKLEY. Yes, Mr. Chairman. If my understanding is correct, the Senate list is correct, but I shall confirm that and submit that.

Mr. DANIELSON. The point is if we change names in the next two weeks, why not have the correct names, if we can. The language is all right. It names these people and says "or their successors." I believe it does, anyway.

Mr. BRINKLEY. I shall get the revised names, Mr. Chairman, for the committee.

Mr. DANIELSON. I have no further questions.

Mr. Glickman? Moorhead? Mr. Kindness?

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much. We will not mark up today because we have other things to do, but we will move ahead on this very shortly.

Thanks for coming.

[Whereupon, at 2:50 p.m. the subcommittee adjourned.]

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL

WHAT GOLD STAR WIVES OF AMERICA, MEANS

(By Nevolia O. Wright, president, Chattahoochee Valley Chapter, Gold Star Wives of America, Inc.)

First, it meant that I knew that I had met a group of people with whom I could identify with an at ease feeling. I no longer felt ostracized and completely ignored from the living world of human creatures. I no longer had to accept the rudeness of my married friends who felt that I was a plaque with some crude ailment that modern day scientist had not found a cure for.

Yes, in December 1968, many friends came immediately upon hearing of the death of my husband, Sfc. James G. Wright, Sr. They all seemed so very kind and were sympathetic with genuine sincerity at that time. Yet within a few short weeks they began to drift from me. I was soon to learn that I was no longer looked upon as a married woman. This hurt tremendously but when my best friend came over to my house one day and explained to me that I was no longer her caliber of a woman I truly felt as if I had been hit by a streak of lightning.

When I received an application to join Gold Star Wives in the mail, I received no explanation with it and so I merely filled it out to be helpful to this American organization. I soon received a call from one of my Cub Scout parents who belonged to Gold Star Wives of America, Inc., Chattahoochee Valley Chapter. She told me the night of the meetings and even came by and took me to my first meeting.

They truly gave me a big welcome and began to explain the purpose of Gold Star Wives, which No. 6: "To aid when necessary the widows and children of persons who died in the service of our Country.", was just what I needed at this point.

No. 5 was another good one for me “To promote activities and interests designed to foster among its members the proper mental attitude to face life's future with courage.'

So once each month I looked forward to attending the Chattahoochee Valley Chatper dinner meeting. We had a very sharp president who tried to make all of our meetings interesting by letting us know about various sources of helpful information. She had the people from the Red Cross to come and give us tips on how to become a Red Cross Volunteer for Martin Army Hospital. I accepted and did enjoy this work. She had people come from the Veterans Office to keep us informed of new or additional privileges that we were entitled to. Likewise the the Social Security Office. All of this was not done on the same night but to keep up our morale, she did have us awaiting to see just what she would do next.

Nearing election time the candidates were all invited to attend our dinner meetings and we would get an opportunity to meet them face to face but did not allow them to campaign other than with their brochures.

Gold Star Wives means a way of knowledge for me to understand all of the ideals of widowhood and that life can still be a very rich and rewarding experience to those who choose to stick with causes and purposes for which we stand.

No. 1 has become very significant to me also, now that I have with the help of Gold Star Wives to become involved with community services. "To assist in upholding the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America and to inculcate a sense of individual obligation to the community, State, and Nation."

This paragraph alone is the more reason for Gold Star Wives to be allowed the privilege to assist all widows through a Federal charter. There was one widow that I met just this year who said that she had heard about us but never had an opportunity to meet us until she met me in another organization that we belong. Through conversation we mentioned that we were widows and then I learned that her husband had been killed in Viet Nam, in 1969. She joined Gold Star Wives in 1980. She immediately began working with us already a much happier person.

Some of the Gold Star Wives who attended college under the educational plan that was provided for widows, met other widows and told them about Gold Star Wives and have been able to bring many of them into our organization.

Many programs have been provided for our children through Gold Star Wives. Special big brothers were provided to help our children to have some male image around especially for our boys. Picnics, Christmas parties where the big brothers