Office of the Historian

Hopkins Papers

Memorandum by the President’s Special Assistant (Hopkins)

Washington, December 27, 1941.

Memorandum for the President:

I think, if possible, you should make every effort to get religious freedom in this document.1 I believe it will be necessary for you to talk to Litvinoff this noon about this.2

I think the wording in “1” on page 2 is a very difficult one for the U.S.S.R. to subscribe to. Paragraph 1 might read

“Each government pledges itself to employ its full resources against those Axis forces of conquest with which it is at war. Each government pledges itself to continue such employment until these forces have been finally defeated.”

As long as this list in paragraph 1 must include a great many names, I think we should include them all, including the South American Republics. I think there are distinct advantages having a long list of little countries joining with us.

I would lift the countries like China and the U.S.S.R. out of their alphabetical listing and place them with our own and the U.K., the distinction being those actively engaged in war in their own countries and those that have been overrun by the Axis.

I think this listing is extremely important and should be gone over with great care by the State Department.

I think it is up to the British to decide whether or not India should be included, although for the life of me I don’t understand why they don’t include it.

My own feeling is that at the moment the Free French should not be included.

At the end of the second paragraph of the Joint Declaration, another sentence should be added including a restatement of our aims for human freedom, justice, security, not only for the people in our own lands but for all people in the world. I think a good deal of care should be given to the exact words of this and I do not think the reference to the Atlantic Charter is adequate.3

Harry L. Hopkins
  1. The draft under reference is the one of December 19, 6 p.m., ante, p. 39.↩
  2. For the conversation with Litvinov, see ante, p. 112.↩

  3. A small memorandum of December 27 by Hopkins attached to this file reads:

    “I showed this memorandum to the President this morning and he agreed with these ideas.

    “I drafted the attached letter for him to sign to Hull to get this really off the ground.”

    The memorandum to Hull is printed infra.

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