501.BB International Law/10–1146
Memorandum by Elwood N. Thompson, Special Assistant to the Director of the Office of Special Political Affairs (Hiss), to the Director
Attached are memoranda and documents by Mr. Liang, Mr. Maktos, and Miss Whiteman,16 on the subject of the General Assembly agenda item on codification of international law. Mr. Liang’s proposed resolution suggests that the Assembly request the Secretary General to prepare a survey of multipartite international conventions, establish contacts with official and non-official bodies engaged in the development of international law and prepare a report on methods and procedures for the General Assembly.
I should think the best features of Mr. Liang’s resolution could be retained, and the doubts of Miss Whiteman and Mr. Maktos resolved, by suggesting that the resolution for the General Assembly create a committee on the codification of international law, and in the same resolution request the Secretary General to do the things indicated in Mr. Liang’s draft, with a further provision that the Secretariat submit its results to the Assembly’s committee. The committee would not thereby be bound by the Secretariat’s work but should find it useful, nor would the committee be precluded from suggesting to the Secretariat other lines of inquiry and also from following other lines of inquiry through other facilities that the committee may want to use.17