TREATIES AND EXECUTIVE AGREEMENTS

SATURDAY, APRIL 11, 1953

UNITED STATES SENATE,

SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Washington, D. C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to recess, at 10 a. m. in room 424, Senate Office Building, Senator William Langer (chairman) presiding.

Present: Senators Langer, Watkins, and Smith.

Present also: Senator Bricker; Wayne H. Smithey, subcommittee counsel.

The CHAIRMAN. The meeting will come to order.
You may proceed.

Mr. SMITHEY. Before Mr. Schweppe proceeds, I would like to pose a couple of questions to him that have been raised in the State Department brief on the authority of the United States to enter into compacts outlawing war as an instrument of national policy if these amendments are adopted.

The CHAIRMAN. We have to finish at 11 o'clock because Senator Bricker and Senator McCarran and I are having a meeting at 11 o'clock, and some judges. If we do not get through we will have to come back again this afternoon.

STATEMENT OF ALFRED J. SCHWEPPE, SEATTLE, WASH., CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON PEACE AND LAW, AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION

Mr. SMITHEY. Mr. Schweppe, will the American Bar Association's proposed constitutional amendment prevent the making of treaties by the United States like the Kellogg-Briand Pact outlawing war as an instrument of national policy?

Mr. SCHWEPPE. I would like to pass the answer to that question to my associate and colleague, Mr. Finch.

Mr. FINCH. My answer is "No."

Mr. SMITHEY. Then will the American Bar proposal prevent the making of a treaty for mutual or regional defense like NATO? Mr. SCHWEPPE. I also pass that to Mr. Finch.

Mr. FINCH. I give it the same answer.

Mr. SMITHEY. Do you wish to amplify your answer, Mr. Finch, at all?

Mr. FINCH. In my main testimony yesterday I think I covered that point in general terms. Specifically, the Kellogg Pact is a statement that signatories renounce war as an instrument of national policy.

apply even more forcibly to the so-called VATO agreement was made in direct reton known as the Vandenberg resolution, June 11, 1948, and I would like to read a ef that resolution.

ace reaffirm the policy of the United States to achieve city through the United Nations so that armed force n the common interest, and that the President be he Senate that this Government, by constitutional My pursue the following objectives within the United

ese objectives, paragraph 2 of that resolution reads: everent of regional and other collective arrangements for self-defense in accordance with the purposes, principles,

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A ne charter.

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The United States, by constitutional process, with such rechec colective arrangements as are based on continuous and ef

ed top pid mutual aid, and as affect its national security.

Caciải ng to the maintenance of peace by making clear its determi-
Arvose the right of individual or collective self-defense under article

show med attack occur affecting its national security.

The NATO agreement specifically states it under article 51:

Maxmen efforts to obtain agreements to provide the United Nations with mice forces as provided in the charter, and to obtain agreement among gus on universal regulation and reduction of armaments under aequa e and dependable guaranty against violation.

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▼w, evde 48 of the Charter of the United Nations says agreement to be provision of armed forces for the Security Council shall be in codece with our constitutional processes. So, Mr. Chairman, ece would not possibly be any conflict between this provision to erend the Constitution with reference to internal law or with referepeating the Constitution in agreements made by the NaCa Govezement, which has full authority to provide for our sa on define, and to provide for the raising of our Armed Forces. bere could be no possible conflict between the amendment proposed Americen Bar Association and the right of this Government to watever treaties it is deemed necessary to keep the Nation we, to achieve international peace through peaceful processes and to cooperate for collective security through such as the United Nations.

POLAMAN. You will be interested to know I voted against the Voeg resolution. If Mr. Bricker had been there, he would

B. What was that?

PS CRAIRMAN. I think if you had been in the Senate at that time wy: W Save voted against that, also.

Mr. FINCH. You would not have based your vote, Senator, on the ground it was unconstitutional.

Mr. SMITHEY. Mr. Chairman, we have received for inclusion in the record, the statement of Representative Sam Coon, of Oregon, in which he cites a resolution of the Oregon Legislature with respect to the American Bar Association proposal; the statement of Representative Gordon McDonough; a statement by Mr. W. R. Castle, who was for some years in the employ of the Department of State; statement of the Catholic Association for International Peace; a statement by the La Jolla unit of Pro-America concerning the Bricker amendment; a letter addressed to Senator John Butler of Maryland; a memo on Senate Joint Resolution 1 by Dr. Salo Engel of the University of Tennessee; and a resolution adopted by the National Cotton Congress and Cotton Warehouse Association.

The CHAIRMAN. They will all be filed. (The documents follow:)

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Washington, D. C., March 30, 1953.

Re Senate Joint Resolution 1.

Senator WILLIAM LANGER,

Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary,

Senate Office Building, Washington, D. C.

DEAR SENATOR LANGER: As chairman of the committee, which is holding hearings with respect to the above legislation concerning treaties, I would like to bring to your attention and that of the other members of your committee the fact that the House and Senate of the Oregon State Legislature have adopted Memorial No. 3 of the 47th Legislative Assembly asking an amendment to the Constitution of the United States with respect to treatymaking power. This memorial reads as follows:

"A provision of a treaty which conflicts with any provision of this Constitution shall not be of any force or effect. A treaty shall become effective as internal law in the United States only through legislation by Congress which it could enact under its delegated powers in the absence of such treaty."

On March 9, I presented on the floor of the House a copy of this memorial to the Congress. At that time I made a short statement in behalf of the principle of the memorial, and I now wish to make the same brief statement to this committee. I would also like to ask that this statement and letter be made a part of the record of hearings before this committee on this important resolution. "I wish to state that I myself support the basic purposes of this memorial, as I believe the question should be settled in clear and unquestionable language, for all time, that treaty power cannot be used for purposes in conflict with our Constitution. I feel that treaties must be prevented from cutting across the rights given our people by the constitutional Bill of Rights. I think we must not allow a loophole to remain in our Constitution which might make possible the change of our form of Government by permitting international agreements to come in and change and level out American rights, both State and individual. I do not think we can afford to lower our own standards of human liberty in order to compromise with godless and Socialist members of other nations, but rather we should endeavor to bring them up to our standards.

"As we know, much activity is going on today in this direction. In the past year alone, I am advised, the United States has been represented at more than 3,000 international meetings where agreements of all types have been discussed, and in some instances favored, by our own delegates to these meetings. Such international agreements may carry dangers, as they might well authorize what our Constitution forbids, and thus supersede our Constitution. It is my understanding that in no other country do treaties automatically become the supreme law of the land, and I concur with the Oregon State Legislature in the opinion that this Congress should take steps looking toward the amendment of our Constitution to prevent the danger of undermining our Constitution and Bill of Rights."

Sincerely yours,

SAM COON.

80572-53- -76

TRESSMAN GORDON L. MCDONOUGH

opportunity of submitting for your commitSowing statement on House Joint Resolution mmittee in writing the final text of the bill consideration on this important subject. in this subject for some time, having introthe 82d Congress and House Joint Resolutext of my House Joint Resolution 57 is as

ity of the United States and international President or by any other officer or agency of the the extent that they abridge, abrogate, nullify, and all of the rights and freedoms guaranStes by the Constitution of the United States."

submitted to your committee, the major Tales Harold Stassen, Mutual Security Adminthe executive branch of the Government is and the other resolutions before your committee making power of the President and would of the United States.

would present no such objection because it zdable terms that in the event that any phrase, e part of a treaty made between the United States ge, abrogate, nullify, subordinate, or interfere s guaranteed to the citizens of the United bat they shall be null and void.

of the United States, the Secretary of State, or ent may proceed without interference or comternational agreements with foreign nations, later be challenged by any citizen of the United s or freedoms guaranteed under the Constituarts of the United States are hereby notified that ational agreement is null and void, and it further e treaty shall be in full force and effect.

committee is seeking simple, direct, and underprotect the constitutional rights and freedoms States in connection with treaties with foreign at my resolution will do this far more effectively 1 or the other resolutions under consideration by

nition, approval, and endorsement of my House gress, and also of my House Joint Resolution 325 Congress. In my opinion, the majority of the in favor of this kind of constitutional amendment. Resolution 57 will be given serious consideration the final draft on the resolution you submit to the

...at of the committee to include the attached stateted for inclusion in the record of the hearings on and other resolutions.

NG VISILANCE IS THE PRICE OF LIBERTY

L. McDonough, of California, in the House atives, Tuesday, January 6, 1953

ker, eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. No etter describe the purpose and intention of my House I introduced on the 1st day of this Congress-83d oe title for a speech on the same subject during the when I introduced my House Joint Resolution 325 shed the same objective as House Joint Resolution 57

America is dedicated to the policy of defending the basic world and of restoring freedom wherever possible to enslaved behind the Iron Curtain.

The Republican Party platform adopted at Chicago in July 1952 contained the following plank :

"We shall see to it that no treaty or agreement with other countries deprives our citizens of the rights granted them by the Federal Constitution."

We as the majority party have, therefore, pledged and obligated ourselves to protect and uphold the constitutional rights of the people of the United States. President-elect Eisenhower stated during his campaign for office that we must not rest until freedom is restored throughout the world, and his election by an overwhelming majority of the American voters is proof that this policy has the support of our whole Nation.

But in spite of all our efforts freedom is still denied to people in many parts of the world, and nowhere else does the individual citizen enjoy the rights and privileges that we do here in America. In the United States the individual citizen has an importance that no other government in the world recognizes to the same extent. And only in the United States are the rights and privileges of the individual protected by law and guaranteed within the Constitution itself.

The United States is the last fortress of freedom in the world today. And if we should permit any encroachment upon the basic liberties guaranteed to the American citizen by our Constitution, if we should lose freedom in the United States, then the torch of liberty would have burned out, and there would be no light of freedom ablaze anywhere in the world and no hope for humanity.

We have, therefore, a very sacred trust to defend liberty wherever we can in the world, and even more important, to preserve and protect it here in our own United States.

I have fully realized the paramount importance of preserving our civil rights under the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. I want to be sure that these rights will never be nullified so long as the Constitution itself shall stand as the foundation of our Government. And I have, therefore, introduced House Joint Resolution 57 proposing an amendment to the Constitution which reads as follows:

"Treaties made under the authority of the United States and international agreements entered into by the President or by any other officer or agency of the United States shall be void to the extent that they abridge, abrograte, nullify, subordinate, or interfere with any and all of the rights and freedoms guaranteed to citizens of the United States by the Constitution of the United States."

Ratification of this amendment to the Constitution would protect all of the rights of citizens of the United States guaranteed by the Constitution from nullification by any treaty or international agreement.

The first line of defense for the United States in the struggle in which we are now engaged, to meet the aggression of Soviet communism, is not only the military might of our weapons of destruction. Our first line of defense is the basic concept of freedom upon which our Nation was established, the protection of individual liberty which insures the personal freedom of every American as guaranteed under the Constitution.

Too many of us live under the false and erroneous belief that the Constitution is self-executing. This is the dangerous belief that our Communist enemies

would like us to fall into.

Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. This means that we must always be alert and alive to any attempts to abolish, abrogate, or interfere with the freedoms or liberties, rights, or privileges, guaranteed to us under the United States Constitution, whether these attempts originate inside or outside our Government. Do you, as a citizen vitally interested in these rights and privileges which you now enjoy and in any executive or legislative act which affects these rights and privileges, know that the terms of a treaty between the United States and any foreign nation "shall be the supreme law of the land: and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding"?

If you did not know this, let me inform you that I have just quoted to you from the contents of article VI, paragraph 2, of the Constitution of the United States.

It is important to realize just what this provision within the Constitution means to each of us as citizens of this Nation, and to know and understand to what extent our basic rights and freedoms can be imperiled through treaties which when ratified become the supreme law of our land.

Let me give you a few examples, based upon decisions of our American courts in cases involving treaties as the supreme law of our land.