Editorial Note
On June 21, 1946 at the end of its Second Session the Economic and Social Council, in pursuance of the General Assembly’s resolution of February 14, agreed upon principles and procedures for the admission of non-governmental organizations to a relationship with ECOSOC, established three categories of eligible organizations, defined their privileges, and set up a standing committee to constitute a channel for establishing effective consultation between the organizations and the Council. The World Federation of Trade Unions, the International Co-operative Alliance and the American Federation of Labor were placed in the first category, designated as “category (a)”; this was defined as including “organizations which have a basic interest in most of the activities of the Council and are closely linked with the economic or social life of the areas which they represent”. The June 21 decisions of ECOSOC were based on the report of a special committee that had been appointed by ECOSOC on February 18 to implement the General Assembly’s resolution of February 14. In turn the report leaned heavily on a memorandum of May 17, 1946 submitted by the United States Representative on the Economic and Social Council (Winant) and a working paper forwarded to the Council by the United Nations Secretariat. Before the Council took final action on the report the Soviet Union offered amendments that would have given the WFTU the right to participate without vote in the meetings of the Council and those of its commissions and committees. In the discussion that followed, concluding with the defeat of the Soviet proposals, the United States Representative (Winant) stated the position of the United States Government that no nongovernmental organization should be given rights not accorded to a Member State of the United Nations not on the Council. For the June 21 proceedings of the Council see United Nations, Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, First Tear, Second Session, pages 108 ff. (hereafter cited as ESC (II) [ECOSOC records are denoted by session rather than by year]). For the report of the special committee on which the Council’s decisions of June 21 were based, see ibid., page 318 ff., annex 8a; for Part IV of this report, printed in this compilation, see annex I to United States Delegation Working Paper of November 21, 1946, p. 516. Mr. Winant’s statement of June 21 is found in ESC (II), page 309. For the United States memorandum of May 17 and the United Nations Secretariat working paper alluded to above, see IO files, black binder entitled “Annotated Provisional Agenda”, dated May 25, 1946, a briefing book prepared for the United States Representative (Winant) on the impending second session of ECOSOC, item II–5.