Editorial Note
Throughout 1954 and into 1955, looking towards the tenth regular session of the General Assembly when Charter review would become a mandatory item on the General Assembly agenda, the position of the United States Government on this matter remained fixed on the Dulles statement of January 18, 1954. The Department of State, whether counselling the United States Senate subcommittee, encouraging research and discussion by private American organizations, or consulting informally with other governments, invariably referred back to the terms set forth therein, as terms which identified not only what might be desirable in the way of Charter revision (change) but also as to what was undesirable in the way of proposed change. A recurring theme of United States Government spokesmen was the demonstrated flexibility of the United Nations in the past and the urgent need not to lose the good already in the Charter in the process of Charter review.
Certain statements, articles, and speeches by governmental officials were recorded in the Department of State Bulletin on this subject in 1954:
- (1)
- Text of Statement by the United States Representative at the United Nations (Lodge), to the Charter Review Subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, March 3, 1954 (Department of State Bulletin, March 22, 1954, page 451).
- (2)
- “The United States and Charter Review”: address by David W. Wainhouse, Director of the Office of United Nations Political and Security Affairs at the University of Minnesota, April 10, 1954 (ibid., April 26, 1954, page 642).
- (3)
- “Charter Review as a Means of Strengthening the U.N.”: Address by Wainhouse before the American Bar Association, Chicago, Illinois, August 17, 1954 (ibid., August 30, 1954, page 296).
- (4)
- “Charter Review—Some Pertinent Questions”: Address by Lincoln P. Bloomfield, Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs, made before the American Political Science Association at Chicago, Illinois, September 10, 1954 (ibid., September 27, 1954, page 446).
- (5)
- “Some Problems of Charter Review”: Address by Wainhouse before the Bay Area Citizens Committee for United Nations Charter Review, San Francisco, California, October 23, 1954 (Department of State Bulletin, November 15, 1954, page 737).