centrate our discussions on a more limited number of topics which could be examined in depth. They might include, first, a review of the progress made in accordance with our own specific program of action, and then a thorough examination of a few issues of highest urgency. To this end, it might be well for the CIAP, at a time 2 or 3 months in advance of the next annual meeting to recommend such fields for examination, so that the proper documentation could be prepared and studied by all of us with a view toward thorough analysis and appropriate decision for action on our part. Mr. President, as economic ministers we are concerned in our daily tasks with the dry materials of economic policymaking-with budget and credit and balanceof-payments statistics, with production and trade and wages and prices, with laws and decrees and the texts of international agreements. We should never forget, however, that what is at stake is the lives and welfare of human beingstheir opportunities, their liberties, and their dignity. Even in these early years of the Alliance, some of us have had the privilege of seeing electricity and access roads brought to hitherto isolated communities, of seeing healthy children where polluted water supplies had previously brought early death to one newborn infant out of two, of seeing the pride of parents and the hopes of children attending schools where for centuries the fate of each new generation was merely to plod through life in the weary patterns of its forebears. Our task, however, is not to help change these conditions for the people; it is to change these conditions with the people. It is their participation, their full integration into the active life of modern society, which gives the Alliance for Progress its moral basis. This is what has enlisted the enthusiasm of our own Peace Corps and is increasingly enlisting the enthusiasm of national youth corps in many other member countries. This is also the spirit that infuses the concept which President Johnson has called the Great Society. The goals of that society are material in part-to cope with problems of urban congestion, river pollution, medical care for the aged, and the continuous upgrading of working skills. But their essential purpose is more than material. It is to eliminate the last vestiges of discrimination and inequality of opportunity which have become intolerable to the national conscience of a free and democratic society. We in the United States, therefore, are also a Nation in continuing development, guided by the same spirit as the Alliance for Progress. Nor can we lose sight of the fact that the end of our efforts is not only economic and social progress. It is in equal measure respect for human rights and the constantly improved functioning of representative democracy. We see the objectives of development and democracy as indivisible. Without advance in the material condition of our peoples, democracy cannot survive. But freedom of expression, initiative in experimentation, and the capacity for responsible selfgovernment are also stimuli to economic development as well as most precious ends in themselves. We also believe that nations developing in this spirit will inevitably strengthen their bonds of solidarity and mutual cooperation in a nexus of ever-growing interdependence. In the wider context beyond this hemisphere, we foresee the role of a free and increasingly prosperous Latin America as a vital force in the cause of peace and freedom and human dignity throughout the world. Chairman MORGAN. Mr. Frelinghuysen. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Secretary, I would like to follow up the questions that the chairman put to you with respect to the nature of the commitments that some of the Latin American countries want from us. I saw a press release that they wanted actually incorporated into a formal treaty what we would be willing to put up. I wonder if you would give us some details on specifically what they desire? I don't mean to have you give me an immediate answer, but it would be helpful to know just how definite they mean these commitments to be? Mr. GORDON. Yes, Mr. Congressman. I would like to read to you, if I might, one paragraph out of the Economic and Social Act of Rio de Janeiro which deals with the question of mutual assistance in order to indicate the kind of thing involved. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Mr. Secretary, I hate you to take the time, and if you do I will lose the time to ask you other questions. Mr. GORDON. We will be glad to submit it in writing. (The information follows:) ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL ACT OF RIO-ARTICLE 13 The member states accept the obligation, with the framework of their corstitutional processes and to the extent their resources permit, to help one another and to provide assistance, in the order of need to the less-developed countries of the system, with a view to achieving, on a national and regional level, the social and economic objectives set forth in this act, for the purpose of putting the countries of the hemisphere in a situation of development as soon as possible. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. This lack of time is far from an ideal arrangement. I apologize for not giving you the time to answer the question. As far as I have heard and I have been listening quite hard, we have had no adequate rationalization of just why this long-term authorization is being requested. I have a couple of questions. One is to suggest what you think might be accomplished better if you had a 5-year authorization? To what extent do you think the same aims may be achieved, for example, with a 2-year authorization? I know nobody who thinks you are going to get a 5-year authorization. Nobody even thinks that you are advancing it seriously. I am talking about the administration, not you individually. Would there be any basic improvement either in your position in discharging your responsibilities to the Latin American countries or in the recipient countries' confidence in our ability to continue? In your prepared statement on page 10 you referred to the President's assurance through Secretary Rusk that the Alliance for Progress would be extended on the basis of continued effective self-help action. We had a quotation earlier to the effect that our support would continue beyond 1971. Thus, as far as the Executive is concerned, he can give such assurances whether Congress agrees with him or not. There is no need to write in a long-term authorization in order for him to take such steps. You say also that the long-term authorization "would give encouragement"-I quote on the bottom of page 29-"would give encouragement to the developing countries in initiating and carrying out their own sustained multiyear efforts." To what extent is the form of commitment that an authorization would represent any encouragement? If it doesn't provide an appropriation, I don't see how they get any more assurance one way or another beyond that which the Executive might feel willing to give. Would you care to expand on that? Mr. GORDON. Mr. Congressman, as you know in the case of the Alliance for Progress this policy was adopted by the Congress 4 years ago, 1962. We have had a long-term authorization which runs out in this fiscal year and in respect to the Alliance for Progress the request is for a second long-term, a renewal of that. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. On that point-and again, we don't have time to discuss these big questions in the short time we have on that point has the Alliance for Progress been crippled because there is a specific termination date almost upon us? In other words, there hasn't so far been an automatic extension for a 5-year period of that program. If there was any validity in this argument that there must be a long-term authorization, presumably we have muddled our own efforts because of this specific termination date which hasn't been extended. Mr. GORDON. I would say it is not indispensable but it is helpful. The Executive can indicate an intent but the Latin Americans are aware that ours is a constitution system of divided and coequal powers, and the indication that the legislative branch expects to be in this business for a substantial period ahead, and is in fact backing as it has consistently backed the Executive position on the Alliance for Progress does give a sense of psychological reassurance. It doesn't mean we couldn't operate without it. It is helpful. In this case I would feel that it having been done 5 years ago, that if it were now to be undone, that is to say if it were not to be renewed, this might cause some preoccupation. There might be a feeling, that, now the Congress seems to be turning its back on the Alliance for Progress. This would be a matter of real concern to me, so that the continuation of something on which there has been a precedent, which has been the working base for several years, does seem to me of considerable importance. As to the precise period, whether it is 5 years or 3 years, I don't think this is a matter of life or death. Since the effect is mainly psychological, since the appropriations have to be made annually anyway, the longer the term, the greater the effect. Mr. FRELINGHUYSEN. Are you saying there would not be any particular beneficial effect if it were only extended for 2 years? Mr. GORDON. I think 2 years is better than 1; 3, better than 2; and 5 better than 3. Chairman MORGAN. Mrs. Kelly. Mrs. KELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Secretary, will you turn to page 19, please, the last paragraph on that page. Do the guidelines which you refer to on this page, in the last sentence, apply equally to all four purposes that you refer to; namely, free labor, et cetera ? Have outlays for these purposes been held up as much as the outlays for the housing program? Mr. GORDON. I wonder if I could ask Mr. Bronheim to respond to this. Mrs. KELLY. I am worried about the fact that you have neglected to live up to the mandatory aspects of the Kelly-Fascell amendment on Latin American housing. Did you increase the outlay for other pilot programs at the expense of this? Mr. GORDON. As I understand it, the limitation on the authority for the pilot programs does not have an adverse effect on the new programs, but I would like to verify whether this is so or not. STATEMENT OF DAVID BRONHEIM, DEPUTY U.S. COORDINATOR, ALLIANCE FOR PROGRESS, AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT Mr. BRONHEIM. That is right. Mrs. KELLY. What have you done with the housing program? You haven't picked up one new application as a result of the Kelly-Fascell amendment last year; is that correct? Mr. BRONHEIM. That is correct. Mr. HAYS. That is because they know better than Congress. The thing to do is to knock off their money. Mrs. KELLY. This is what I am coming to. You mentioned our turning our back on the 5-year authorization. This is why I am not going to vote even for a 2-year program. You already neglected to do what we in Congress specified just last year. Mr. HAYS. They didn't neglect to do it. They deliberately didn't do it. It was not neglect. It was deliberate. Mrs. KELLY. Will you tell me how many applications you picked up under the new money authorized last year, if any? You said "None." Mr. BRONHEIM. That is right. Mrs. KELLY. How many applications were on file before we authorized this money? Mr. BRONHEIM. I don't have the exact answer, which we could submit for the record. As you know, we have been processing— Mrs. KELLY. You had almost 5,000 when we gave you this money last year the money which you neglected to pick up. Chairman MORGAN. Do you mean 5,000 applications? Mrs. KELLY. Applications. Chairman MORGAN. 5,000 applications? Mrs. KELLY. That is what I was told. This may include inquiries as well as formal applications. But I don't care how many you take off or add. The fact remains that of the carryover applications filed in prior years, you didn't even pick up one, did you? Mr. BRONHEIM. I am not sure I know exactly how you define the applications. Mrs. KELLY. I will start all over again. Last year in the program we increased the authorization for the housing guarantee program. At that point you had a carryover of unapproved applications. How many of those did you pick up? Mr. BRONHEIM. We haven't picked up any. We have been processing 15 applications that are not yet under contract under the old authorization and an additional 19 which have not yet been authorized, for a total of 34, which have been under process and which have not been signed. That is the point I was trying to make. Mrs. KELLY. How many years have you been processing all of those old applications? Your former backlog, not applications filed against the new money. Mr. BRONHEIM. I would guess many of them have been worked on for about 212 years. Mrs. KELLY. Then I want submitted for the record, how many applications received from the start when the Alliance for Progress came into being, how many you had acted upon and so on right up to date. Mr. BRONHEIM. We can submit that. (The information follows:) NUMBER OF HOUSING GUARANTEE APPLICATIONS AID HAS RECEIVED SINCE ALLIANCE BEGAN On May 15, 1964, AID had received 164 applications for housing guarantees. No applications have been taken since then. Fifty of these applications, for a total dollar value of $240 million, are now being processed. Of this 50, 16 with a dollar value of $89.7 million are under contract, 15 with a dollar value of $74.7 million are in contract negotiations, and 19 with a dollar value of $75.6 million are in earlier stages of processing. Mrs. KELLY. That is all. Chairman MORGAN. Mr. Whalley. Mr. WHALLEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, Mr. Secretary. I want to compliment Secretary Gordon on his work at the annual Alliance for Progress meeting just held, especially when you realize he is a new man on the job. He put in countless hours, including a session that lasted to 4 a.m. in preparation. He explained clearly the U.S. position. His special talk to the Latin American businessmen signified that the Alliance for Progress program was a two-way street. I would like to say that Mr. Gordon continually stressed the necessity for Latin American self-help and their responsibility in the Alliance for Progress program. Mr. GORDON. Thank you, Mr. Congressman. Chairman MORGAN. Mr. Hays. Mr. HAYS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You are formerly a professor of economics, Mr. Secretary? Mr. GORDON. Yes. Mr. HAYS. Harvard? Mr. GORDON. Yes, sir. Mr. HAYS. You have heard my story about the economics professor, haven't you? Mr. GORDON. No, sir. Mr. HAYS. After 25 years I went back to my university and I found out he was there and still giving the same 10 questions in the final exam. I asked if the kids were stupid, and he said no, he changes the answers every year. Mr. GORDON. We like to believe that this is a field of study in which we learn something from year to year, Mr. Congressman. Mr. HAYS. I would like to believe that, too, but I don't know whether I can apply that to the aid program or not. I don't know if they have learned anything. My guess is they haven't. I detect from your presentation-I don't want to get too rough on you the first time you are here-that it fits a pattern this year that you are going to try to wear us down by putting us all to sleep. Mr. GORDON. I am sorry, sir. Mr. HAYS. I want to tell you as far as I am concerned that is not going to work because it will make me vote against the program. Mr. GORDON. That was not the objective, Mr. Congressman. I am sorry if it had that effect. Mr. HAYS. It was entirely too long and it precludes a good many members of the committee having a chance to ask any questions. I go around my district making speeches and I try to keep the speech down to 15 minutes and let them ask questions. I find it is good for me, and good for them. Mr. Bronheim, you are the Deputy U.S. Coordinator for the Alliance for Progress. What is a Deputy U.S. Coordinator, could you tell me briefly? Mr. BRONHEIM. I try to assist Mr. Gordon in the aid program. |