33. Memorandum From the President’s Assistant Special Counsel (Goodwin) to President Kennedy1
If the world emerges relatively unscathed from the current series of crises, then one of the most important long-range activities of your Administration will be to place the Alliance for Progress on a sound footing. We have already discussed the desirability of establishing a special fund for Latin America sometime early next year. It is clear that current appropriations will not be adequate to do the job which has to be done. Thus, it is absolutely essential that the next three or four months see this program get off to a good start. We cannot raise living standards in a few months, but we can begin on soundly conceived plans and projects; we can work to ensure that some of the Latin American nations show signs of significant self-help and social reform activity; and we can re-shape the procedures and thinking of our Latin American aid personnel.
All these things—and especially signs of activity on the part of the Latins themselves—are vital if we are to get anywhere with an Alianza fund. This means good people to run the program—especially the regional director in the Aid Agency. This regional director should be more than an area chief for A.I.D. He should be the “Coordinator of the Alliance for Progress”—with authority to direct the U.S. representatives on the Inter-American Bank, to be consulted on ExIm Bank activity, and to run, as far as possible, all the varied aspects of Latin American economic development programs.
It is, as we well know, very difficult to get capable enough people to do this. Nothing is more discouraging than to compare the caliber of people who were drafted into the Marshall Plan effort with those who now run our Latin American Aid program—a program which you have said is comparable in “scope and magnitude” to the Marshall Plan. However, there is one fellow now in the government—John Leddy of Treasury—who could probably do this job. Except for Linc Gordon he is the one person I know of who I would be confident could handle the Alianza in its early stages. It is very possible that there are people on the outside who might even be better, but appointing someone from outside would be an act of faith. In addition, if this program is to get off the ground immediately, Leddy’s knowledge of the intricacies of our government (he also worked for Dillon in State), and the vagaries of Latin American economics (he worked on the Act of Bogota as well as the Charter of [Page 65] Punta del Este) would be invaluable. This is by far the best fellow I, or anyone else, knows of for the job.
Doug Dillon would not want him to leave Treasury. He regards him as an invaluable assistant. I am convinced Leddy would take the job if pressed, although his loyalty to Dillon as well as the importance of his present post as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury would make him reluctant. You would have to draft him and that depends on the priority you give to this task.
2. As you know, I am very deeply involved in the day-to-day conduct of Latin American affairs. This involvement is inevitable as long as I am acting as an agent of yours in your effort to re-energize a long dormant and ineffective area of our policy. But such involvement is bound to create some difficulties. My relationship with Woodward is, I strongly believe, of the best; and there remains little, if any, resentment in the Bureau of Inter-American Affairs. He regards me as an aid to his policy, not an obstacle.
However, as long as I deal with Cuban exiles and with other Latins I am bound to be the object of some criticism and even personal abuse. I do not mind this in the slightest. It does not bother me or affect my work. I only point it out as a possible potential source of some embarrassment to you. I attach, as an example, a column which appeared in the Northern Virginia Sun.2 The story itself is a complete fabrication. I never saw this fellow. In fact, I never heard of him until this story appeared. The quote from an “aide of Woodward” is also mythical. I also get word that the Tom Dodd-HUAC-Human Events crowd has been “looking into my background.” Fortunately I was born too late to join anything incriminating.