courage and the faith of those who came to California before us across a wilderness to the shores of this great ocean named for peace.

We approach our task humbly, but with united resolution. The prayers of the people of the world are with us. They are spoken in many tongues, and in the words of many creeds. But they are as one voice, rising from the tragedy and the suffering of war, in prayer for lasting peace.

Thus fortified, and with the guidance of Almighty God, we must, and we shall fulfill the purpose for which we have come together. Thank you.

MR. STETTINIUS: Ladies and Gentlemen, I wish to present to you Mr. Alger Hiss, the temporary Secretary General of the Conference, who has two announcements to make concerning our procedure for tomorrow, Mr. Alger Hiss.

MR. HISS: Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen, there will be a meeting of the chairmen of all delegations tomorrow morning at 10:30 in the Veterans Building, and tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 the first official plenary session of the Conference will be held here in this place.

MR. STETTINIUS: Ladies and Gentlemen, the opening session of the United Nations Conference on International Organization is now adjourned.

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MR. STETTINIUS: Ladies and Gentlemen, the First Plenary Session of the United Nations Conference on International Organization is hereby convened. The chairman of the delegation of Chile has asked permission to speak for a moment on a very special purpose.

His Excellency, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Chile:

SR. FERNANDEZ Y FERNANDEZ (through translator): The delegation of Chile has received the highest honor— that of representing the sister republics of Latin America -to request of this assembly an homage in memory of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

The life of a great man is like the seed of an unknown tree. During his days on this earth we see its branches and flowers that may be splendid and modestly fragrant. The waters of death sometimes enhance this splendor into glory and season its fruits with intense flavor and beauty. Roosevelt has been a powerful tree of magnanimous and firm fruits and flowers, strong within the heart of this great people, and his foliage extends over the entire world. His death has been only a streak of lightning that has destroyed the mere form, the mortal form. Although sorrow weighs upon us for his apparent disappearance, we affirm that Roosevelt goes on in all parts of the earth. His death is as a strong light that sheds its

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light always with greater clarity-the light of a great statesman and a great leader of peoples.

His spiritual work begins to grow and to spread throughout the earth. It is we, the United Nations, who have the solemn duty to be faithful to this noble heritage. Roosevelt, the humanitarian, asks us to give humanity peace. It is we, the countries of this continent, who are his spiritual sons directly, must carry this heritage, maintaining firmly his creed of good neighborliness in this continent, as well as through the concert of nations.

It is therefore fitting that the American republics present at this occasion to the Conference the following declaration:

"The Latin American republics invite all the other United Nations represented at this Conference, in homage to the memory of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, to express the aim of bringing to a fitting and perfect consummation his work as a leader of democracy, as the initiator of the Good Neighbor policy, and as the inspirer of a world organization for the maintenance of peace through the rule of justice."

I beg the assembly to express its approval by standing and remaining silent for one moment. (Standing; silent meditation)

MR. STETTINIUS: May I, on behalf of the Government and the people of the United States, express to you our very deep appreciation and our profound gratitude for this tribute to President Roosevelt.

I know that the spirit of this great man will always be an inspiration to our united efforts now and in the days to come, to establish and maintain lasting peace.

The heads of the delegations met this morning for the purpose of recommending the organization of the Conference. The meeting has not yet completed its work and will convene again tomorrow morning at 10:30. Tomorrow's plenary session that was scheduled will therefore be postponed until the afternoon. At this afternoon's session the heads of delegations, beginning with the sponsoring countries, will address the Conference.

At this time I should like to make a brief statement in behalf of the United States delegation.

Three years ago the forces of tyranny and aggression seemed on the very point of conquering the world. Today, on every front, they are face to face with defeat-utter and complete defeat. It has taken years of toil and sacrifice to bring us to this moment. But the doom of the aggressor nations was sealed long ago. It was sealed in Washington on January the first, 1942, when the United Nations Declaration was signed.

Our enemies could conquer only by keeping us divided. Instead, we confronted them with a free and a voluntary association of nations united in purpose and without equal in human and material resources. This unity neither force nor subterfuge has broken. Against the common will and the common strength of the United Nations our

enemies have hurled their propaganda and their armed might in vain.

For centuries to come men will point to the United Nations as history's most convincing proof of what miracles can be accomplished by nations joined together in a righteous cause. It is a unity achieved in spite of differences of language and custom, of cultural tradition, and of economic structure. It is a unity which proves that no differences of race or color or creed or history or geography can divide the peoples united in a higher community of interest and purpose.

Our first objective has been the defeat of our enemies. But from the beginning the United Nations have pursued another objective, one which is equally necessary to each one of us. It is the objective which gives ultimate meaning to all the sacrifice and the suffering of these tragic years.

We are united not only for survival, not only for military victory. We are united above all in the necessity to assure a just and an enduring peace in which the peoples of the world can work together to achieve at last freedom from fear and from want.

We have made a better beginning for the fulfillment of this purpose than nations have ever made before. For this purpose the responsible leaders of our nations and their representatives have met in Moscow and in Teheran, in Cairo, in Quebec, at Dumbarton Oaks, and in the Crimea.

Because of our common understanding that economic security goes hand in hand with security from war, United Nations conferences were held in Atlantic City,

Hot Springs, and Bretton Woods on co-operative measures for relief, to meet common problems of food and agriculture and to prepare the financial basis for economic reconstruction and an expanding world economy in the postwar world.

ples of all the United Nations. Since then many constructive suggestions have been made toward their improvement. Some of these suggestions, and others which may emerge from our discussions here, will undoubtedly be reflected in the final draft of the Charter, and the Charter itself should be open to whatever later amendment experience may dictate as wise.

At Mexico City the Inter-American Conference on Problems of War and Peace strengthened the ties between the republics of the Western Hemisphere and prepared the way for a close integration of the inter-American system with the world Organization.

Yes, the United Nations have long been at work together on many preparations required in building the structure of a lasting peace. Here at San Francisco we have come to the decisive point in these preparations. The purpose of this Conference is to prepare the Charter of an International Organization to maintain peace with justice in a free world of free men.

I believe that it was wise, and indeed a necessary decision, to limit the work of this Conference to that great task. It was a wise decision because writing the constitution of a world organization for the maintenance of peace in the future is a task wholly separate from the punishment of the international gangsters who started this war. It was a necessary decision because the establishment of the world Organization must be kept above and apart from the peace settlements if the Organization is to be able to deal freely and justly with future threats to the peace that may arise from any cause, including these settlements.

The preparation of the Charter of the world Organization should not, therefore, be entangled with the many and the complex political and economic issues involved in the defeat of Germany and Japan. And the imminent collapse of organized German resistance makes it all the more important that the world Organization be established at the earliest possible moment.

To deal with these and other issues there will have to be many other conferences and many other decisions, both national and international. We have no time to lose.

Success at this Conference will not in itself assure enduring peace. The whole structure will take years to build. But without agreement on a Charter of world Organization, the structure of peace cannot be built at all. A house cannot be built without a plan or without a foundation; and here at San Francisco the United Nations must draw the plan and lay the foundation.

Upon this foundation and in accordance with this plan, the framework of the structure will be erected when the United Nations have ratified the Charter by their respective constitutional processes and brought the world Organization into being. It is only around this framework that we can complete the structure of peace with all the other agreements on political, economic, and social problems which we must reach together. At this Conference we have therefore undertaken a responsibility on which all else depends. We have undertaken to draw up a Charter of an International Organization strong enough to prevent war but flexible enough to allow for peaceful development and change.

The outlines of such a Charter are contained in the Proposals formulated at Dumbarton Oaks last fall by the representatives of the Republic of China, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

These Proposals were formulated after years of preliminary study. They represent in their essentials the highest common denominator of thought among the four sponsoring nations. They are being presented to this Conference as affording the basis of the Charter of an International Organization.

The Proposals were submitted months ago to the most searching examination by the governments and the peo

We must always bear in mind, however, that there are at least two conditions essential to the establishment of a world organization which can successfully maintain peace. One of these conditions is that those peace-loving nations which have the military and the industrial strength required to prevent or suppress aggression must agree and act together against aggression. If they do not agree and act together, aggression cannot be prevented or suppressed without a major war. This fact has certainly been spelled out by our experience in this war. That is why the first step toward the establishment of the world Organization was to prepare proposals on which the nations sponsoring this Conference could agree, and this is why in the structure and the powers of the Security Council of the world Organization proposed in the Dumbarton Oaks plan, provision was made for this essential agreement and unity of action by the major nations. Without this we cannot hope to build a world organization which will provide security to all nations, large and small. Without this we cannot hope to develop enduring institutions in which all free nations may participate on a basis of sovereign equality and in which justice and respect for law will apply to the powerful as well as to the weak.

The second essential condition of success in our endeavor is the voluntary co-operation of all peaceful nations, large and small, acting with full respect for the equal sovereignty of each to promote justice among nations, to foster respect for basic human rights, and to solve these common problems upon which the security and the economic and the social advancement of their peoples so largely depends. There can be no end to the tyranny of fear and want unless the proposed world organization commands the allegiance of both the mind and the conscience of mankind.

The International Court, the Assembly, and the Economic and Social Council and its related agencies are the institutions proposed at Dumbarton Oaks which would have the major responsibility in these fields. They are of the utmost importance. Widespread economic insecurity and poverty, ignorance and oppression breed conflict and give aggressors their chance.

Measures for security against aggression, no matter how effectively contrived, will not alone provide the assurance of lasting peace. We have also to work effectively in close co-operation together toward rising standards of living and greater freedom and greater opportunity for all peoples of every race and creed and color.

In the preparations for this Conference we have sought from the beginning to build with vision and with justice, but to build always upon the realities and upon hard-won experience. To build upon a millenial idealism, however fine in theory, would be to build upon quicksand. To build only on the collaboration and interests of the major nations would be to deny the community of interest of all nations. We have sought instead to insure that the strength of the major nations will be used both justly and effectively for the common welfare-under the law of a world charter in which all peaceful nations are joined together.

We began by seeking a common understanding among the sponsoring nations on basic objectives and on the essential machinery for action. These are the nations which have united their strength against the aggressors so successfully in this war. We proceed now in seeking agree

ment among all the nations, large and small, which have been united against the common enemy.

This is a conference of the United Nations, the nations that love peace and freedom enough to fight for them. The International Organization we seek to build is one that is based upon this inescapable fact of our time, that peace and security will be the right of those nations which are willing to share in the responsibility for keeping them. Tyranny and barbarism have never recognized neutrality and they never will.

We do not intend to build a world Organization that will overlook this cardinal fact. We do propose that after it is established the Organization be opened to membership of all other nations which have demonstrated their willingness and their ability to fulfill their obligations under the charter.

I have reviewed briefly the preparations for this Conference and our thinking on some of the major problems that we must here meet together. We cannot expect at this Conference to produce a charter which will answer all the questions and resolve all the problems. No charter and no constitution, no basic document was ever drafted that was not open to improvement.

We Americans have a convincing proof of that in our own history. Our Constitution, under which this republic has grown and prospered for a hundred and fifty years, was by no means satisfactory to all the citizens when it was issued from the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787, or even satisfactory to all the delegates to that Convention. It lacked many provisions which numerous Americans of that day believed to be essential; yet it was adopted by the requisite number of States in 1789. Only four years after the Constitution was written, the first ten amendments went into effect, and eleven other amendments have been made since then. What was true of the thirteen States which joined to form the United States of America is true also of the nations which have met at this Conference to consider the proposed organization of the world for peace and security.

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Let us construct a Charter of the world Organization as soundly as we can, but let us not sacrifice approval to perfection. Let us act now in the sure knowledge that our work can be improved upon with time, but that if we fail to act, we are likely to lose altogether the opportunity which has been given to us to prevent another world war.

Fellow Delegates, as we enter upon our great task we cannot forget the millions of men of our armed forces who have given their lives in this cause, nor the other millions of men, women, and children who have suffered the cruel agonies of starvation, of torture, and of death. We cannot forget the untold destruction that has been wrought, nor can we forget how close our whole civilization has come to utter ruin. It is our supreme responsibility at this Conference, and afterwards, to see to it that this calamity never again falls upon the world.

Vision we must have to see clearly that without peace and security for all nations there will be no peace and security for any one of us. Courage we must have to carry us through trying delays and temporary misunderstandings and lesser differences to the fulfillment of our common purpose. Faith we must have in the ability of mankind to make peace with the same resolute devotion that the United Nations peoples have given to fighting this

war.

That vision and that courage and that faith inspired the great American leader whose life was given for the cause for which we have met, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. It is only with such vision and courage and faith, expressed in a thousand different ways, that the United Nations have been able to travel so far along the hard road to final victory. It is only with this vision and this courage and this faith that we shall make peace secure for ourselves and for succeeding generations.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I now recognize His Excellency, the Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China and chairman of the delegation of the Republic of China, Dr. T. V. Soong.

MR. SOONG: Mr. Chairman, Fellow Delegates: I wish first of all to speak of China's regard for the memory of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and I do this with deep emotion. To us he was not only the first citizen of the United States but also an inspired leader of the world, passionately devoted to the cause of peace and justice among nations. His vision and faith, his statesmanship and courage have brought the victory of the United Nations within sight. He embodied the ideals and hopes of the peoples everywhere. He was rightly regarded as the leading proponent and architect of a durable system of peace which was to crown our joint efforts in the present struggle. Only a fortnight ago he was still actively guiding the work of preparation for this great Conference. Although he has left us, his work will continue to guide us. In tribute to his memory and in recognition of all that he has done for us, let us concert our efforts and complete that important task ahead in the fullest

measure.

China, perhaps more than any other nation, understands the necessity for the success of this Conference; for it is now universally recognized that a second world war had started when the Japanese invaded Manchuria in 1931, thus depriving China of 30,000,000 of her people

and of the rich natural resources so essential to her national existence.

Twice in our generation it has been necessary to mobilize the world's resources of men and material to arrest tyranny and preserve freedom. Twice in our generation we have had to learn by bitter experience that in an interdependent world, war cannot be localized or peace isolated. Twice in our generation we have lost lives in tragic numbers and treasure in prodigious volume that could have been saved if peace-loving nations had united when peace was first threatened, instead of waiting until aggression had engulfed half the world in flames.

In the fourteen years of savage warfare since 1931, China has endured every misery that the aggression of a major predatory power can impose. We sought by all means which were then available, in the existing state of international organization, to obtain redress. Inescapably we learned that there was no hope of ultimate safety for any nation without a really effective system of collective security. Therefore, at the very inception of the idea of the United Nations, President Chiang Kai-shek advocated the early setting up of an executive council of the United Nations, since without such an authority a world order cannot function.