WARNING: Do not break the law before, during, or after reading anything I mention.
An excerpt of my article on the History of the Reception Clause of the U.S. Constitution
In September 1792, Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson, wrote a lengthy letter to President George Washington explaining that the Secretary of Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, entertained dangerous designs to subvert the very essence of Republican government. This letter highlighted the political dissention plaguing Washington's cabinet and the nation. Hamilton's "system flowed from principles adverse to liberty," Jefferson exclaimed to the President, "and was calculated to undermine and demolish the Republic, by creating an influence of his department over the members of the Legislature."19 Jefferson further claimed, with regard to French and English commercial policies, that
my system was to give some satisfactory distinctions to the former, of little cost to us, in return for the solid advantages yielded us by them; and to have met the English with some restrictions which might induce them to abate their severities against our commerce.20
Jefferson adamantly despised Great Britain's commercial depredations of American trade, which Hamilton seemingly favored. Hamilton "has forced down his own system," the secretary passionately noted, which was "inconsistent with the honor and interest of our country."21 In Jefferson's view, Hamilton was too involved with the policies under the State Department's purview, and "stepped farthest into the control of the department of the other."22 The dispute was centered on the seperation of power doctrine, and the sphere of influence of departments over certain federal operations and policies.
Washington's administration faced significant problems in April 1793, commercial trade, especially involving the West Indies, the revolutionary debt the United States owed France, internal political dissention, coupled with the murderous turmoil associated with France's Reign of Terror. In a letter to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Jay, Hamilton clearly delineated the major foreign policy dilemmas confronting the United States in regard to the French Question. On April 9, 1793, one day after Edmond Charles Genet, newly appointed French Minster to the United States, arrived in South Carolina, Hamilton addressed the issue of whether the Minister should be received by the United States. The Treasury Secretary asked Jay
[i]f we receive a Minister from the Republic, shall we be afterwards at liberty to say - We will not decide whether there is a Government in France competent to demand from us the performance of the existing treaties. What the Government in France shall be is the very point in dispute. 'Till that is decided the applicability of the Treaties is suspended. When that Government is established we shall consider whether such changes have been made as to render their continuance incompatible with the interest of the U States.23
Hamilton suggested that the instability of France's government should induce the United States to change its foreign policy posture. "I am of the opinion," Hamilton confidently remarked, "that we have at least a right to hold the thing suspended till the point in dispute is decided."24 The revolutionary war debt the United States...
19 Andrew A. Lipscomb, The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Washington, D.C., 1903) vVIII.,397.
20 Ibid., 398.
21 Ibid., 399.
22 Ibid.
23 Harold C. Syrett, The Papers of Alexander Hamilton (New York, 1969), vXIV, 297.
24 Ibid.
Monday, February 15, 2010
President Truman's Palestine Policy - 1945 Part II
WARNING: Do not break the law before, during, or after reading anything I mention.
Another excerpt from my article on the Recognition of Israel.
On the same day that Truman announced the creation of the Palestine Committee, the White House made public a letter to British Prime Minister Attlee. In it, Truman stressed his contention that "granting of an additional one hundred thousand of such certificates would contribute greatly to a sound solution for the future of Jews still in Germany and Austria."40 Truman vigorously pressured the British to let Jews migrate to Palestine. "[N]o other single matter is so important," Truman fervently professed, then "for those who have known the horrors of concentration camps" to "be permitted to resettle" in Palestine.41 The letter was filled with dreary reminders of German atrocities - as if the Prime Minister was not aware of the horrific atrocities committed. "No claim is more meritorious," the President ardently proposed, "than that of the groups who for so many years have known persecution and enslavement."42 The Chief Diplomat was a strong and sympathetic advocate for minority rights and the future of Jewish resettlement in Palestine. The president's Wilsonian character was stern. It was not purely political, but politics were certainly intertwined with policy, as it usually is. Truman's policy on Palestine was formed and expressed well before any election. The president was either idealistically sincere, or cynically crafting a political issue to use in the elections of 1946 and 1948; the former should be given more weight than dissimulation on Truman's account.
At the beginning of a press conference on November 20, 1945, the president announced a change in the Army command. During the conference, a reporter made the observation that there was peace "but it is still not peace."43 Truman had a lengthy answer for the reporter who then postulated, "[h]ave something for the people to shoot at?"44 "Well, it isn't a matter of being something for the people to shoot at," Truman pedantically replied, "[i]t is for the establishment of world peace."45 The prior week, Truman poignantly reminded the reporters, the conference took a momentous "first step toward implementing the United Nations Organization." This "will be the fundamental organization," Truman assured them, "through which we can get peace in the world."46 That democratic institution was a remaking of Wilson's initial League of Nations vision, which could be a proper venue for the Palestine question, and similar international disputes, to be peacefully resolved. On that same November day, former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt wrote a letter to the president. In it, she astutely analyzed the Palestine situation and Jewish plight in general. Eleanor told Harry that she was "distressed that Great Britain has made us take a share in another investigation of the few Jews remaining in Europe."47 If only other nations had taken some refugees, Roosevelt paternalistically noted, "we would not have to continue to have on our consciences the deaths of at least fifty of those poor creatures daily."48 Mrs. Roosevelt's disdain for the British was clear. She shrewdly remarked, "I object very much to being used by them."49 Mrs. Roosevelt did make the crucial observation, though, that "[t]he question between Palestine and the Arabs, of course, has always been complicated by oil deposits, and I suppose it always will."50 Truman addressed Mrs. Roosevelt's concerns in a letter a few days later. Truman was "very hopeful" that something peaceful work out in Palestine that would "be of lasting benefit."51 He optimistically maintained "we expect to continue to do what we can to get as many Jews as possible into Palestine as quickly as possible, pending any final settlement."52 Mrs. Roosevelt and President Truman's sentiments were aligned, and both were deeply concerned about the future of displaced Jews, fully conscious of the intricate complexities surrounding, what Dean Acheson called, an "international puzzle."
40 Reid, Public Papers of the Presidents, 470.
41 Ibid.
42 Ibid.
43 Ibid., 494.
44 Ibid.
45 Ibid.
46 Ibid.
47 Steve Neal, Eleanor and Harry (New York, 2002), 46.
48 Ibid.
49 Ibid.
50 Ibid.
51 Ibid., 48.
52 Ibid.
Another excerpt from my article on the Recognition of Israel.
On the same day that Truman announced the creation of the Palestine Committee, the White House made public a letter to British Prime Minister Attlee. In it, Truman stressed his contention that "granting of an additional one hundred thousand of such certificates would contribute greatly to a sound solution for the future of Jews still in Germany and Austria."40 Truman vigorously pressured the British to let Jews migrate to Palestine. "[N]o other single matter is so important," Truman fervently professed, then "for those who have known the horrors of concentration camps" to "be permitted to resettle" in Palestine.41 The letter was filled with dreary reminders of German atrocities - as if the Prime Minister was not aware of the horrific atrocities committed. "No claim is more meritorious," the President ardently proposed, "than that of the groups who for so many years have known persecution and enslavement."42 The Chief Diplomat was a strong and sympathetic advocate for minority rights and the future of Jewish resettlement in Palestine. The president's Wilsonian character was stern. It was not purely political, but politics were certainly intertwined with policy, as it usually is. Truman's policy on Palestine was formed and expressed well before any election. The president was either idealistically sincere, or cynically crafting a political issue to use in the elections of 1946 and 1948; the former should be given more weight than dissimulation on Truman's account.
At the beginning of a press conference on November 20, 1945, the president announced a change in the Army command. During the conference, a reporter made the observation that there was peace "but it is still not peace."43 Truman had a lengthy answer for the reporter who then postulated, "[h]ave something for the people to shoot at?"44 "Well, it isn't a matter of being something for the people to shoot at," Truman pedantically replied, "[i]t is for the establishment of world peace."45 The prior week, Truman poignantly reminded the reporters, the conference took a momentous "first step toward implementing the United Nations Organization." This "will be the fundamental organization," Truman assured them, "through which we can get peace in the world."46 That democratic institution was a remaking of Wilson's initial League of Nations vision, which could be a proper venue for the Palestine question, and similar international disputes, to be peacefully resolved. On that same November day, former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt wrote a letter to the president. In it, she astutely analyzed the Palestine situation and Jewish plight in general. Eleanor told Harry that she was "distressed that Great Britain has made us take a share in another investigation of the few Jews remaining in Europe."47 If only other nations had taken some refugees, Roosevelt paternalistically noted, "we would not have to continue to have on our consciences the deaths of at least fifty of those poor creatures daily."48 Mrs. Roosevelt's disdain for the British was clear. She shrewdly remarked, "I object very much to being used by them."49 Mrs. Roosevelt did make the crucial observation, though, that "[t]he question between Palestine and the Arabs, of course, has always been complicated by oil deposits, and I suppose it always will."50 Truman addressed Mrs. Roosevelt's concerns in a letter a few days later. Truman was "very hopeful" that something peaceful work out in Palestine that would "be of lasting benefit."51 He optimistically maintained "we expect to continue to do what we can to get as many Jews as possible into Palestine as quickly as possible, pending any final settlement."52 Mrs. Roosevelt and President Truman's sentiments were aligned, and both were deeply concerned about the future of displaced Jews, fully conscious of the intricate complexities surrounding, what Dean Acheson called, an "international puzzle."
40 Reid, Public Papers of the Presidents, 470.
41 Ibid.
42 Ibid.
43 Ibid., 494.
44 Ibid.
45 Ibid.
46 Ibid.
47 Steve Neal, Eleanor and Harry (New York, 2002), 46.
48 Ibid.
49 Ibid.
50 Ibid.
51 Ibid., 48.
52 Ibid.
President Truman's Palestine Policy - 1945
WARNING: Do not break the law before, during, or after reading anything I mention.
An excerpt from my article on the Recognition of Israel.
On Thursday, August 16, 1945, shortly after returning from Potsdam, Germany, United States President Harry Truman gathered the White House press corps in his office for a mid-morning news conference. The president was in a chipper mood. He jokingly told the eager reporters "you hadn't all had a chance to look me in the face or ask me any impertinent questions." Laughter from the news corps broke out, as the president wryly smiled, then further aroused his attentive audience's humor by adding that there was nothing "that you would break your arms to get out of the door for this morning." As the festive greeting and hardy laughs eased down, more serious business began. After a few questions concerning the future of the Manhattan project, V-J Day, and General Douglas MacArthur's surrender terms with the Japanese, a reporter asked if there was "[a]nything about the Jewish national state discussed at Potsdam?" Truman candidly disclosed that he "discussed the matter with Mr. Churchill and Mr. Attlee, and [was] still discussing it." A follow-up question beckoned from another Washington scribbler, "not with Stalin?" The president casually replied, "No, there was nothing he could do about it." Truman isolated Stalin and the Soviet Union by downplaying their significance as an important influence in the Near East. Great Britain was the nation necessary to secure a peaceful path in a strategic region. President Truman adeptly handled a variety of other questions peppered to him by the ravenous press corps.
Toward the end of the press conference, an inquisitive reporter could not leave until the president could at least elaborate a bit more about a Jewish national state. The correspondent wanted to pin the president down on a direct policy position, and further asked "[w]hat was the American view on Palestine at Berlin?" Truman realistically asserted that American foreign policy toward Palestine was primarily concerned with letting "as many Jews into Palestine as it is possible to let into that country." President Truman, and several other administration officials, were seriously concerned about exacerbating the humanitarian situation with uninhibited mass migration into Palestine. The President also announced that the situation would "have to be worked out diplomatically with the British and the Arabs." "[I]f a state can be set up there," the president cautiously advanced, "they may be able to set it up on a peaceful basis." Optimism about a peaceful settlement of a Jewish state in Palestine was sincere and pragmatic. Truman recognized and appreciated the innumerable unforeseen ramifications surrounding such a noble endeavor, while delicately maneuvering through the seemingly innocuous and "impertinent" questions. President Truman's diplomatic willingness to publically back the possibility of a Jewish national state, with certain conditions, was an act of national clarity on policy, and, given cold war constructs, security. The Chief Diplomat maintained that the United States had "no desire to send 500,000 American soldiers there to make peace in Palestine." Truman, acting in his constitutional authority as Chief Diplomat, altered U.S. policy toward Palestine during that seemingly innocuous media session. The President utilized an informal press conference to delineate policy parameters regarding Palestine. From the earliest stages of the Truman administration, Jewish immigration, a future Jewish state, and cold war intrigues were important issues driving the president's policy considerations, not political expediency.
Warren R. Reid, Public Papers of the Presidents: Harry S. Truman 1945 (Washington, D.C., 1961), 224-26, 228.
An excerpt from my article on the Recognition of Israel.
On Thursday, August 16, 1945, shortly after returning from Potsdam, Germany, United States President Harry Truman gathered the White House press corps in his office for a mid-morning news conference. The president was in a chipper mood. He jokingly told the eager reporters "you hadn't all had a chance to look me in the face or ask me any impertinent questions." Laughter from the news corps broke out, as the president wryly smiled, then further aroused his attentive audience's humor by adding that there was nothing "that you would break your arms to get out of the door for this morning." As the festive greeting and hardy laughs eased down, more serious business began. After a few questions concerning the future of the Manhattan project, V-J Day, and General Douglas MacArthur's surrender terms with the Japanese, a reporter asked if there was "[a]nything about the Jewish national state discussed at Potsdam?" Truman candidly disclosed that he "discussed the matter with Mr. Churchill and Mr. Attlee, and [was] still discussing it." A follow-up question beckoned from another Washington scribbler, "not with Stalin?" The president casually replied, "No, there was nothing he could do about it." Truman isolated Stalin and the Soviet Union by downplaying their significance as an important influence in the Near East. Great Britain was the nation necessary to secure a peaceful path in a strategic region. President Truman adeptly handled a variety of other questions peppered to him by the ravenous press corps.
Toward the end of the press conference, an inquisitive reporter could not leave until the president could at least elaborate a bit more about a Jewish national state. The correspondent wanted to pin the president down on a direct policy position, and further asked "[w]hat was the American view on Palestine at Berlin?" Truman realistically asserted that American foreign policy toward Palestine was primarily concerned with letting "as many Jews into Palestine as it is possible to let into that country." President Truman, and several other administration officials, were seriously concerned about exacerbating the humanitarian situation with uninhibited mass migration into Palestine. The President also announced that the situation would "have to be worked out diplomatically with the British and the Arabs." "[I]f a state can be set up there," the president cautiously advanced, "they may be able to set it up on a peaceful basis." Optimism about a peaceful settlement of a Jewish state in Palestine was sincere and pragmatic. Truman recognized and appreciated the innumerable unforeseen ramifications surrounding such a noble endeavor, while delicately maneuvering through the seemingly innocuous and "impertinent" questions. President Truman's diplomatic willingness to publically back the possibility of a Jewish national state, with certain conditions, was an act of national clarity on policy, and, given cold war constructs, security. The Chief Diplomat maintained that the United States had "no desire to send 500,000 American soldiers there to make peace in Palestine." Truman, acting in his constitutional authority as Chief Diplomat, altered U.S. policy toward Palestine during that seemingly innocuous media session. The President utilized an informal press conference to delineate policy parameters regarding Palestine. From the earliest stages of the Truman administration, Jewish immigration, a future Jewish state, and cold war intrigues were important issues driving the president's policy considerations, not political expediency.
Warren R. Reid, Public Papers of the Presidents: Harry S. Truman 1945 (Washington, D.C., 1961), 224-26, 228.
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