Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, United Nations Affairs, Volume III

IO files, SD/A/AC.57/1

Position Paper Prepared in the Department of State for the United States Delegation to the General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions ¹

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[ Washington ,] September 22, 1952.

General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions

the problem

The problem is to formulate the position of the United States Delegation in the General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions with regard to the Special Report on Administrative Unions (T/1026, T/1026/Corr.1, T/1026/Add.1) adopted by the Trusteeship Council at its Eleventh Session on July 23, 1952. The General Assembly Committee is to meet on September 23, 1952.

recommendations

1. The Delegation should support the special report adopted by the Trusteeship Council as a carefully prepared and detailed analysis of the problem of administrative unions.

2. The Delegation, in supporting the special report, should make a statement in the Committee recalling the particular importance which the United States has consistently attached to the problem of administrative unions, recalling the extensive Trusteeship Council documentation on the subject which shows that the Council has thoroughly studied and restudied the problem, recalling the substantive achievements of the Council, and recalling that the Council established in 1950 a Standing Committee on Administrative Unions which regularly examines the operation of administrative unions and reports to the Council at each session on any Union in which a Trust Territory under review participates.

3. The Delegation should introduce in the Committee, if appropriate, a draft resolution along the lines of Annex A for the Committee to recommend for adoption by the Assembly.

4. If a proposal is made in the Committee that the General Assembly should re-establish the Committee for another year, the Delegation should take the position that this would be undesirable because it would result in the unnecessary duplication of United Nations activities, which the General Assembly is trying to avoid.

5. If the other three members of the Committee wish to have the General Assembly request an advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice as to whether existing administrative unions are within the scope of and compatible with stipulations of the Charter and the terms of the Trusteeship Agreements, the Delegation should support such a request. If the Committee is divided on such a proposal, the Delegation should consult the Department.

6. The Delegation should hold individual consultations with the other three delegations on the Committee (Belgium, Brazil, and India) before the opening of the Committee in order to explain United States objectives, and to establish such harmonious working relationships as may enable the Delegation to achieve these objectives.

discussion

A. Background of the Problem

The problem of administrative unions between Trust Territories and adjacent territories under the sovereignty of the Administering Authorities concerned has been one of the major problems before the Trusteeship Council and the Fourth Committee for more than four years. It should be noted that the Trusteeship Agreements for all the Trust Territories except Nauru and Western Samoa authorize the Administering Authorities concerned to constitute customs, fiscal or administrative unions or federations, and to establish common services between the Trust Territory and adjacent territories under the sovereignty or control of the Administering Authority where such measures are not inconsistent with the basic objectives of the International Trusteeship System and the terms of the trusteeship agreements. It should also be recalled that the General Assembly approved these agreements upon the assurance of the Administering Authorities that they did not consider the relevant terms of the agreements as giving them powers to establish any form of political association between the Trust Territories and adjacent territories which would involve annexation of the Trust Territories in any sense or would have the effect of extinguishing their status as Trust Territories.

The most recent action of the General Assembly on this subject was the adoption of Resolution 563 (VI) of January 18, 1952, which asked the Council to submit a special report containing a complete analysis of each of the administrative unions to which a Trust Territory was a party, and of the status of the Cameroons and Togoland under French administration arising out of their membership in the French Union. The Council was asked to give special attention in this analysis to

(a) The five considerations enumerated in paragraph 1 of Resolution 326 (IV) of the General Assembly, and

(b) The compatibility of the arrangements already made with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations and the Trusteeship Agreements.

The report to be examined by the General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions, which is to meet three weeks before the Assembly’s Seventh Session, is the special report adopted by the Trusteeship Council on July 23, 1952 in compliance with General Assembly Resolution 563 (VI).

It is important to note, however, that this special report is only the latest of numerous studies of administrative unions made by the Trusteeship Council. In order to make this point clear, it is necessary to summarize the action taken by the Trusteeship Council and the General Assembly on the problem of administrative unions since the Second Session of the Trusteeship Council (1947–1948).

1. Trusteeship Council, Second and Third Sessions.

At its Second Session the Trusteeship Council undertook a preliminary examination of the Annual Report by the Government of Australia on the Trust Territory of New Guinea, and at its Third Session, in the summer of 1948, the Council adopted certain observations, conclusions, and recommendations concerning the administrative unions affecting New Guinea, Ruanda-Urundi, and Tanganyika. (See A/603, Report of the Trusteeship Council Covering its Second and Third Sessions.) Since the Annual Reports on British Cameroons, British Togoland, French Cameroons, and French Togoland were not received in time for examinations at the Third Session, they were postponed until the Fourth Session.

2. General Assembly, 1948.

At its Third Session in 1948 the General Assembly considered the observations made by the Trusteeship Council on administrative unions and endorsed the observations of the Council that such administrative unions must remain strictly administrative in nature and scope and must not have the effect of creating any conditions which will obstruct the separate political, economic, social, and educational development of the Trust Territory. The Assembly recommended that the Council investigate the question in all its aspects and report to the Fourth Session of the Assembly. The Council was also asked to recommend any safeguards considered necessary to preserve the distinct political status of the Trust Territories and to enable the Council effectively to exercise its supervisory functions; to invite the Administering Authorities concerned to furnish additional information; and to seek, where appropriate, an advisory opinion of the International Court on whether such unions are within the scope of and are compatible with the Charter and the Trusteeship Agreements.

3. (Ad Hoc) Committee on Administrative Unions, 1949–1950.

In accordance with General Assembly Resolution 224(III) the Trusteeship Council at its Fourth Session adopted Resolution 81 (IV) establishing a six-member Committee on Administrative Unions (China, France, Mexico, New Zealand, USSR, and United States) to undertake preparatory work in connection with the investigation requested by the Assembly. The Committee was to draw up an outline, collect information, and report to the Council on the various administrative unions. In addition, the Council adopted Resolution 82 (IV) instructing the Committee to make a study of the relations between France and the Trust Territories administered by France. This Committee after ten meetings submitted an Interim Report (T/263) to the Council on March 1, 1949 and after seven additional meetings submitted its report (T/338) to the Council on June 6, 1949. At its Fifth Session, in Resolution 109 (V) the Council decided that it would continue to study and examine the operation of existing or future administrative unions in order to safeguard the identity and status of the Trust Territories. The Administering Authorities concerned were requested to furnish in their annual reports separate records and statistics on each Trust Territory. The Council transmitted to the Assembly the reports of its Committee on Administrative Unions and the information furnished by the Administering Authorities. At its Sixth Session the Council adopted Resolution 129 (VI) requesting its Committee on Administrative Unions to continue its study and report to the Council July 1950. Argentina was appointed to take the place of Mexico on the Committee and the Philippines was designated to serve in the absence of the USSR. After fifteen additional meetings the Committee transmitted its report to the Council. This report, which was unanimously approved by the Council, is an important study of the problem of administrative unions, and it was printed as an Annex to A/1306: Report of the Trusteeship Council Covering its First Special Session, its Second Special Session, and its Sixth and Seventh Sessions. In preparing the above-mentioned reports the Ad Hoc Committee on Administrative Unions examined a large number of Conference Room Papers and more than thirty valuable memoranda prepared for the Committee by the Secretariat. The latter documents were circulated as official documents of the Trusteeship Council in the T/AC.14 series; this series of documents, it should be noted, is no longer available except in the archives of the United Nations and in the files of individual delegations.

4. General Assembly, 1949.

At its Fourth Session the General Assembly adopted Resolution 326 (IV) which recommended that the Council complete its investigation and present a report to the Fifth Session of the General Assembly with special reference to any safeguards the Council may consider necessary. The Assembly further recommended that in completing its investigation the Council pay particular attention to the following:

(a) the desirability of having the Administering Authorities inform the Trusteeship Council beforehand when they propose to create new administrative unions of Trust Territories with adjacent territories, or extend the scope of any existing union or federation;

(b) the desirability, should it be impossible as a consequence of the establishment of an administrative union to furnish clear and precise separate financial, statistical, and other data relating to a Trust Territory, of the Administering Authority concerned accepting such supervision by the Trusteeship Council over the unified administration as the Council may consider necessary for the effective discharge of its high responsibilities under the Charter;

(c) the desirability of establishing a separate judicial organization in each Trust Territory;

(d) the desirability of establishing in each Trust Territory a separate legislative body with increasing powers and with headquarters within the Trust Territory, and of eliminating any type of legislative action originating in any other legislative body with headquarters in a Non-Self-Governing Territory;

(e) the desirability of taking into account, before any administrative, customs, or fiscal union is established or extended in its nature or scope, the freely expressed wishes of the inhabitants of the Trust Territories concerned.

It should be noted that the words “the desirability of” in these five considerations were the subject of considerable discussion in the Fourth Committee, and that the United States and other Administering Authorities interpret them to mean “the question of whether it is desirable”.

5. Trusteeship Council, 1950.

The Trusteeship Council at its Seventh Session in the summer of 1950 adopted Resolution 293 (VII). This important resolution was based upon the report submitted to the Council on July 11, 1950 by the Ad Hoc Committee on Administrative Unions referred to in paragraph 3 above. In this resolution the Council addressed itself to the five considerations of General Assembly Resolution 326 (IV) in so far as they applied to the administrative unions affecting the Trust Territories of the Cameroons under British administration, New Guinea, Ruanda-Urundi, and Tanganyika. With regard to Togoland under British administration the Council expressed the opinion that in view of the fact that various proposals concerning the administrative arrangements affecting the Trust Territory of Togoland under British administration are under consideration, further examination of the administrative union of Togoland under British administration and the Gold Coast could not usefully be undertaken at this time. Furthermore, Resolution 293 (VII), in compliance with the request in General Assembly Resolution 326 (IV) established and drew to the attention of the administering authorities concerned four safeguards which the Council considered necessary in order to assist it in the discharge of its functions and to avoid the possibility of any administrative union operating in such a manner as to prejudice the outcome of the objectives of the Trusteeship System. These safeguards are:

(a) That the Administering Authorities furnish clear and concise financial, statistical, and other data relating to Trust Territories participating in administrative unions;

(b) That the Administering Authority facilitate the access of Visiting Missions to such information on an administrative union as may be necessary to enable the Mission to report fully on the Trust Territory concerned;

(c) That the Administering Authorities continue to maintain the boundaries, separate status, and identity of Trust Territories participating in administrative unions;

(d) That the Administering Authorities ensure, with regard to Trust Territories participating in administrative unions, that expenditures on the administration, welfare, and development of any such Trust Territory for a given year be not less than the total amount of public revenue derived from the Territory in that year.

Finally, in Resolution 293 (VII) the Council decided to establish a Standing Committee on Administrative Unions which shall regularly examine the operation of administrative unions and report to the Council at each session on any union in which a Trust Territory under review participates.

6. Standing Committee on Administrative Unions, 1951.

In accordance with Resolution 293 (VII) the Council appointed Argentina, the Philippines, New Zealand, and the United States to the Standing Committee on Administrative Unions. This Committee held two organization meetings in 1950, and six meetings in 1951 during which it adopted reports on Tanganyika (T/915), New Guinea (T/916), British Togoland (T/917), British Cameroons (T/918), and Ruanda-Urundi (T/919). In 1951 China and Thailand were appointed to replace Argentina and the Philippines on the Standing Committee.

7. General Assembly, 1951–1952.

At its Fifth Session the General Assembly adopted Resolution 443 (V) which postponed the item on administrative unions until its Sixth Session.

At its Sixth Session the Assembly, despite the work already done on the subject as described above, adopted Resolution 563 (VI) requesting the Trusteeship Council to submit to the Seventh Session of the Assembly a special report containing a complete analysis of each of the administrative unions to which a Trust Territory is a party, and of the status of the Cameroons and Togoland under French administration arising out of their membership in the French Union with special reference to

(a) the five above-mentioned considerations in Resolution 326(IV) of the General Assembly, and

(b) the compatibility of the arrangements already made with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations and the Trusteeship Agreement.

Furthermore, in Resolution 563 (VI) the General Assembly established its own Committee on Administrative Unions, composed of Belgium, Brazil, India and the United States, to meet three weeks before the Seventh Session of the Assembly, to make a preliminary examination of the special report prepared by the Trusteeship Council, and to present its observations thereon to the Assembly at its Seventh Session. The operative paragraph establishing the Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions was an amendment proposed by Brazil, and opposed by the United States and other delegations on the grounds that it would result in a costly and unnecessary duplication of work. The Brazilian amendment was adopted in the Fourth Committee by 29 votes to 10 with 8 abstentions, and in the Plenary by 30 votes to 14 with 11 abstentions.

8. Standing Committee on Administrative unions, 1952.

In 1952 the Standing Committee on Administrative Unions not only had its regular reports on each administrative union to prepare, but the Council adopted Resolution 420 (X) requesting the Standing Committee to draft also the special report for the Assembly. In 1952, therefore, the Standing Committee held 34 meetings during which it adopted its regular reports on New Guinea (T/969), Ruanda-Urundi (T/1011), Tanganyika (T/1017), British Togoland (T/1020), British Cameroons (T/1022) and its special report (T/1026 and T/1026/Add.1). The Committee had before it in preparing these reports many new Conference Room Papers, and 26 new working papers prepared by the Secretariat in the T/C.1/L series.

B. Discussion of Recommendations

Recommendation 1.

The special report on administrative unions (T/1026) and (T/1026/Add.1) is a carefully prepared and detailed analysis in eight chapters totaling 162 pages, which was adopted by the Trusteeship Council on July 23, 1952, by 7 votes to 1 (USSR), with three abstentions (Australia, Belgium, United Kingdom), and Iraq not voting. The report had been prepared and adopted unanimously by the Standing Committee on Administrative Unions (China, New Zealand, Thailand, and United States) under the chairmanship of the United States. The report would have been considerably longer except for a decision of the Committee to delete from the report whenever practicable such subject matter as was readily available in other official documents of the United Nations. This practice gives parts of the special report a skeleton appearance which caused the Committee some concern. The Committee made this decision, however, after a Secretariat called to its attention General Assembly Resolution 593 (VI) on the control and limitation of documentation, one paragraph of which invites the Governments of Member States to refrain “from requesting the repetition or reissuing of material readily available in other United Nations documents.”

The problem of organization of the special report was a complicated one. Chapter I reviews the resolutions adopted by the General Assembly and the Trusteeship Council on the general question of administrative unions, but not with regard to specific territories. Chapter II summarizes the provisions of the trusteeship agreements concerning administrative unions and the interpretations of these agreements which the various administering authorities have given. The remaining six chapters deal with particular territories and are subdivided, with one exception, into four parts as follows: Part A summarizes the historical events preceding the present administrative unions; Part B summarizes the laws establishing the various administrative arrangements; Part C reviews the recommendations and observations made by the General Assembly and the Trusteeship Council and its subsidiary organs on the territories concerned and, wherever appropriate, the observations of the administering authorities concerned; Part D gives the Council’s observations and conclusions on the two matters to which the General Assembly in Resolution 563 (VI) asked the Council to give special attention, namely, (a) the five considerations enumerated in paragraph 1 of Resolution 326 (IV) of the General Assembly, and (b) the compatibility of the arrangements already made with the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations and the Trusteeship Agreements. It is this Part D, and particular Section (b) of Part D, which is of special importance because it contains the Council’s observations and conclusions.

The conclusions adopted by the Council in Section (b) of Part D differ in the case of the various territories even though the provisions of the various trusteeship agreements authorizing the establishment of administrative unions are generally similar. The Standing Committee on Administrative Unions was well aware of this fact, but it was of the opinion that it could not reach any realistic and satisfactory conclusions concerning the questions raised in General Assembly Resolution 563 (VI) without paying in its analysis due regard to several other factors. These other factors were the differing ethnic, geographical and historical factors in the territories concerned, the differing degree of political advancement in these territories, the practical operation of the administrative arrangements, and the individual laws establishing these administrative arrangements. In those cases where the conclusions of the Committee differ for various territories, the Committee believed that such differences resulted not from any inconsistency on the part of the Committee but rather from these differing factors.

In view of the thorough quality of the special report, and in view of the fact that only the USSR voted against it in the Council, it is recommended that the Delegation give its full support to the report in the General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions.

Recommendation 2.

Despite the effort and care of the Trusteeship Council in dealing with the problem of administrative unions, certain non-administering Members of the United Nations continue to be concerned with the possibility that administrative unions may become disguised forms of annexation resulting in the extinguishment of the political identity of the trust territories and accordingly to believe that intense and continuous review of the administrative unions is essential. These Members of the United Nations have been generally unwilling to launch direct attacks on the various administrative unions in the General Assembly, but at the same time they have seemed unwilling to acknowledge that the Trusteeship Council has done as thorough a job as possible in its study of the problem. It seems likely that Brazil and India, the two non-administering members of the General Assembly Committee may hold this view. Possibly they are not fully aware of the extensive Trusteeship Council documentation on the subject, which shows that the Council has studied and restudied the problem. The United States, as a member of the Council’s Committee on Administrative Unions from the beginning, is in a position to point out the extensive work which the Council has done. It is therefore recommended that the Delegation should make a detailed statement at the opening of the Committee along the lines suggested. Such a statement should, among other things, recall the particular importance which the United States has consistently attached to the problem of Administrative Unions, recall that the extensive Trusteeship Council documentation on the subject shows that the Council has thoroughly studied and restudied the problem, recall the substantive achievements of this study, and recall that the Council has established a Standing Committee on Administrative Unions to regularly examine the operations of the administrative unions and report to the Council at each session on any union in which a trust territory under review participates.

Recommendation 3.

If the tactical situation in the Committee seems appropriate, it might be advantageous for the Delegation to introduce in the Committee a draft resolution for the Committee to recommend for adoption by the Assembly. Such a resolution should be a balanced resolution which would commend itself to both administering and non-administering members of the Committee and the General Assembly. A draft resolution along these lines is attached as Annex A which the Delegation should use if it seems appropriate.

Recommendation 4.

It is possible that Brazil or India may suggest in the Committee that the General Assembly should reconstitute the Committee for another year. Such a suggestion would be in line with a noticeable trend on the part of certain non-administering members to consider Trusteeship Council problems in the Fourth Committee where the non-administering members outnumber the administering members by 52 to 8 rather than to rely on the Council which has a balanced membership of six administering and six non-administering members. At the Sixth Session of the General Assembly the United States opposed the Brazilian amendment providing for the General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions and tried unsuccessfully to muster enough votes to defeat it in plenary, where it was adopted by 30 votes to 14 with 11 abstentions. The Delegation should oppose such a proposal because the reconstitution of the Committee would inevitably result in the repetitious, unnecessary, and costly type of work which the General Assembly in other resolutions is trying to prevent (See Annex B covering the four General Assembly resolutions which are pertinent in this regard).³

Recommendation 5.

The General Assembly on November 18, 1948, adopted Resolution 224(III) which, inter alia, requested the Trusteeship Council to request, whenever appropriate, an advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice as to whether such unions are within the scope of and compatible with the stipulations of the Charter and with the terms of the trusteeship agreements. It is possible that one of the members of the Committee may suggest that the problem of whether such unions are compatible with the Charter and with the trusteeship agreements is a legal problem with which the Trusteeship Council is not qualified to deal, and which, therefore, should be referred to the International Court of Justice. If the other three members of the Committee favor such a proposal the United States Delegation should also support it. If the Committee is divided regarding such a proposal the Delegation should consult the Department for further instructions.

Recommendation 6.

It seems likely that the United States objectives set forth in the preceding recommendations are more likely to be achieved if the Delegation holds individual consultations with the other three Delegations on the Committee before the Committee’s first meeting. It is therefore recommended that the Delegation hold such consultations with the other three Delegations in the attempt to establish harmonious working relationships. The Delegation should seek to dissuade any of the other three Delegations from advancing extreme proposals which would be likely to precipitate extreme counterproposals and thereby jeopardize the attainment of the objectives of the United States Delegation.

Annex A

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Draft Resolution on Administrative Unions for Possible Introduction by the United States Delegation in the General Assembly Committee on Administrative Unions

The General Assembly,

Recalling that by its Resolution 224 (III) of 18 November 1948 the General Assembly recommended that the Trusteeship Council should investigate the question of administrative unions in all its aspects, and that by its Resolution 326 (IV) of 15 November 1949 it recommended that the Trusteeship Council should complete its investigation,

Recalling that by Resolution 326 (IV) the General Assembly noted that the trusteeship agreements do not authorise any form of political association which would involve annexation of the trust territories in any sense, or would have the effect of extinguishing their status as trust territories, and affirmed the view that measures of customs, fiscal or administrative union must not in any way hamper the free evolution of each trust territory towards self-government or independence,

Recalling that by its Resolution 563 (VI) of 18 January 1952 the General Assembly requested the Trusteeship Council to submit to the General Assembly at its Seventh Regular Session, a special report containing a complete analysis of each of the administrative unions to which a trust territory is a party, and of the status of the Cameroons and Togoland under French administration arising out of their membership in the French Union,

Recalling the studies of administrative unions undertaken by the Trusteeship Council’s Ad Hoc Committee on Administrative Unions in 1949 and 1950, and by its Standing Committee on Administrative Unions in 1951 and 1952,

Expresses its appreciation to the Trusteeship Council for the Special Report submitted by the Council in compliance with General Assembly Resolution 563 (VI), and endorses the observations and conclusions contained in the Special Report,

Notes that the Trusteeship Council’s Standing Committee on Administrative Unions will continue its regular examination of each administrative union affecting a trust territory, and requests the Council to instruct the Standing Committee to study these administrative unions not only with regard to the four safeguards enumerated in Trusteeship Council Resolution 293 (VII) but also with regard to any other matters which the Standing Committee deems appropriate,

Calls to the attention of the Administering Authorities the observations and conclusions contained in the Special Report to the Trusteeship Council and the observations thereon made by the General Assembly’s Committee on Administrative Unions,

Requests the Administering Authorities to furnish promptly to the Trusteeship Council as complete information as possible concerning the operation of the administrative unions affecting trust territories under their administration,

Expresses the hope that the Administering Authorities concerned will notify the Trusteeship Council promptly of any change in or extension of existing administrative unions, or of any proposal to establish new administrative unions.

1. The Committee on Administrative Unions met at New York from Sept. 23 to Oct. 7, 1952. The U.S. Delegation consisted of William I. Cargo, U.S. Representative, and D. Vernon McKay, Deputy U.S. Representative.
3. Not printed.