867N.01/12–1745
Memorandum Prepared in the Department of State
Concurrent Resolution on Palestine, 79th Congress, 1st Session, December 17 and 19, 1945
[This resolution, adopted by the United States Senate and the House of Representatives on December 17 and 19, was a composite of three previous resolutions which had been pending since October 1945, and was based as well on resolutions offered in 1944 (see especially S.J. Res. 112, H.J. Res. 264, S.J. Res. 247, H.J. Res. 418 and 419). It may be noted that the resolution of December 17–19, 1945, differs from the [Page 842] previous resolutions, especially in that it does not call specifically for a “free and democratic Jewish commonwealth” in Palestine but for a I “democratic commonwealth in which all men, regardless of race or creed, shall have equal rights.” The resolution also differs from the Zionist demands as expressed in the resolution of the World Zionist Conference which met in London during August 1945.]65
Whereas the Sixty-Seventh Congress of the United States on June 30, 1922, unanimously resolved: “That the United States of America favors the establishment in. Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of Christian and all other non-Jewish communities in Palestine, and that the holy places and religious buildings and sites in Palestine shall be adequately protected”; and
Whereas the ruthless persecution of the Jewish people in Europe has clearly demonstrated the need for a Jewish Homeland as a haven for the large numbers who have become homeless as a result of this persecution; and
Whereas these urgent necessities are evidenced by the President’s request for the immediate right of entry into Palestine of one-hundred thousand additional Jewish refugees; and
Whereas the influx of Jewish immigration into Palestine is resulting in its improvement in agricultural, financial, hygienic and general economic conditions; and
Whereas the President and the British Prime Minister have agreed upon the appointment of a Joint Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry to examine conditions in Palestine as they bear upon the problem of Jewish immigration and the Jewish situation in Europe and have requested a report within 120 days: Therefore be it
Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring) that the interest shown by the President in the solution of the problem is hereby commended, and that the United States shall use its good offices with the Mandatory Power to the end that Palestine shall be opened for free entry of Jews into that country to the maximum of its agricultural and economic potentialities, and that there shall be full opportunity for colonization and development, so that they may freely proceed with the upbuilding of Palestine as the Jewish National Home, and, in association with all elements of the population, establish Palestine as a democratic commonwealth in which all men, regardless of race or creed, shall have equal rights.
- Brackets appear in the original.↩