Editorial Note
Throughout the spring of 1954 House and Senate committees conducted hearings on a proposed new mutual security act. The so-called “Richards amendment” which had been passed in 1953 as part of H.R. 5710 and which had stipulated withholding a portion of the aid funds destined for those countries that had not yet ratified the EDC Treaty, again received prominent attention from both Representatives and such Administration spokesmen as Foreign Operations Administrator Harold Stassen and Assistant Secretary of State Livingston T. Merchant. As indicated in telegrams Edcol 102 to Paris, April 5 (page 926), and Edcol 103 to Paris, April 7 (see footnote 3, page 927), Administration spokesmen originally did not favor reenactment of the Richards amendment. But sentiment in favor of reenactment was strong in Congress. As Representative Vorys noted in floor discussion of the Mutual Security Act of 1954 on June 29, the Richards amendment was brought out of the House Foreign Affairs Committee by unanimous vote. Discussing the Richards amendment the previous day, Representative Bentley stated that the Administration then softened its opposition and agreed to a compromise version of the amendment which would prevent delivery of arms to France and Italy, the two nonsignatories, while permitting full delivery to the four countries which had ratified, including the Federal Republic of Germany. Discussion of the Richards amendment on the floor of the House is in the Congressional Record, volume 100, part 7, pages 9110, 9193, 9200–01, 9205. The testimony of various Administration spokesmen on the Mutual Security Act of 1954, including the Richards amendment, is in Hearings Before the Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, on the Mutual Security Act of 1954, 83d Cong., 2d Sess. [Page 974] Regarding the origins of the Richards amendment in 1953, see footnote 3, page 793. Further documentation on the Mutual Security Act of 1954 is presented in volume I.