Statement to the Press by President Roosevelt91
Post-War Security Organization Program
The conference today with officials of the Department of State on the post-war security organization program is a continuation of conferences which have been held from time to time during the past 18 months. These conferences have enabled me to give personal attention to the development and progress of the post-war work the Department of State is doing.
All plans and suggestions from groups, organizations, and individuals have been carefully discussed and considered. I wish to emphasize the entirely non-partisan nature of these consultations. All aspects of the post-war program have been debated in a cooperative spirit. This is a tribute to the political leaders who realize that the national interest demands a national program now. Such teamwork has met the overwhelming approval of the American people.
The maintenance of peace and security must be the joint task of all peace-loving nations. We have, therefore, sought to develop plans for an international organization comprising all such nations. The purpose of the organization would be to maintain peace and security and to assist the creation, through international cooperation, of conditions [Page 643] of stability and well-being necessary for peaceful and friendly relations among nations.
Accordingly, it is our thought that the organization would be a fully representative body with broad responsibilities for promoting and facilitating international cooperation, through such agencies as may be found necessary, to consider and deal with the problems of world relations. It is our further thought that the organization would provide for a council, elected annually by the fully representative body of all nations, which would include the four major nations and a suitable number of other nations. The council would concern itself with peaceful settlement of international disputes and with the prevention of threats to the peace or breaches of the peace.
There would also be an international court of justice to deal primarily with justiciable disputes.
We are not thinking of a superstate with its own police forces and other paraphernalia of coercive power. We are seeking effective agreement and arrangements through which the nations would maintain, according to their capacities, adequate forces to meet the needs of preventing war and of making impossible deliberate preparation for war and to have such forces available for joint action when necessary.
All this, of course, will become possible once our present enemies are defeated and effective arrangements are made to prevent them from making war again.
Beyond that, the hope of a peaceful and advancing world will rest upon the willingness and ability of the peace-loving nations, large and small, bearing responsibility commensurate with their individual capacities, to work together for the maintenance of peace and security.
- Released to the press by the White House, June 15, 1944; reprinted from Department of State Bulletin, June 17, 1944, p. 552.↩