We urge the Congress to set an example by taking affirmative action on the i proposal for financing the aid program over a 5-year period. The United States can encourage the effective growth of underdeveloped countries by allowing program planning within a relatively flexible framework of time. Essential to the life of such programs is the need to commit financing beyond the arbitrary restrictions of a single fiscal year. Those whom we help must be in a position to initiate long-range plans requiring long-term budget and investment commitments. If our aid programs are to generate a maximum impetus for "self-aid" in recipient countries, we should encourage the formulation of long-range policies. These policies should bring to bear all national resources toward achievement of national goals, synonomous with the integrity of each country.

We further urge the Congress to approve the request for authority to borrow directly from Treasury funds according to a specified schedule rather than through the annual appropriations process. In so doing, the advantages of long› range programing would be made meaningful. The Congress will not have given up its proper constitutional prerogative to investigate, to reduce, or even to abolish the entire program. By endorsing direct Treasury financing for the duration of this program, the Congress will allow the administration to draw up agreements over a 5-year period that will have the force of a moral commitment and permit recipient countries to concentrate on the problem at hand rather than the nature of American political and congressional processes on a yearly basis.

The Jewish War Veterans is hopeful that the actual programs developed as a result of this proposed legislation will bring aid directly to the people of recipient countries. We should encourage social as well as economic reform. In this manner, U.S. citizens can have a direct salutary impact in bringing the advantages of our free society directly to those in whom rests our greatest stake-the poor, the sick, and the ignorant who provide fair game for the likes of Castro and his patrons in the Kremlin. Hospitals, schools, sanitation systems, land reforms, and equitable taxation are not merely benchmarks of our society; they are the weapons we can provide these emerging countries to fend off the enemies of their freedom and ours. The narrowing of the gap between the extremely wealthy and those who live in abject poverty is in many of these countries the true war of liberation. This is the war we are asked to underwrite.

We are not asked to pay with our lives. As veterans who know the nature of sacrifice and the essence of what is most destructive, we are willing to dig deep down and to pay to make the cause of all who would be independent peoples our canse. We find it difficult to believe that, in this country where we have generated the greatest economic might in history and where our potential is infinite, the cost of material sacrifice is the measure of our national security.

While Soviet military power is the core of the Communist threat, the desperate needs of the millions in the underdeveloped and new countries represents the nourishment on which Communist expansion hopes to thrive. President Kennedy in his profound and moving inaugural address directed our attention to an everlasting truth applicable to the entire international situation, as well as to our domestic problems. He said, "If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich." The Jewish War Veterans of the United States of America considers it in the highest national self-interest to provide aid as, indeed, the rich neighbor, to those struggling toward freedom and security. In our best judgment, the President's proposal is practicable, feasible, and in the best interest of our national security.

RESOLUTION ON THE U.S. FOREIGN AID PROGRAM ADOPTED BY THE NATIONAL BOARD OF HADASSAH, JUNE 22, 1961

Convinced that the foreign aid program as outlined and recommended by the President is an essential aspect of U.S. foreign policy; and

That this program, known as the act for international development reflects the highest level of democratic statesmanship and generosity, in consonance with America's objective of convincing the world that a free society can volunarily undertake a program designed to raise the standard of living of the eoples of underdeveloped and impoverished countries on a long-term basis; Hadassah, the women's Zionist organization of America, representing 318,000 American Jewish women throughout the United States, records its wholehearted support of the administration's foreign aid program now before it, and

respectfully urges the Congress of the United States to vote positively on this program as an indispensable step in the path to world peace, under conditions of political, economic, and individual freedom.

STATEMENT OF H. VANCE AUSTIN, MANAGING DIRECTOR, CREDIT UNION NATIONAL ASSOCIATION, ON S. 1983

Millions of Americans belonging to the more than 20,000 credit unions comprising the Credit Union National Association believe that credit unions can make a valuable and enduring contribution to the economic betterment of developing lands. They base this conviction on more than 50 years of successful missionary endeavor in introducing the credit union idea to scores of countries throughout the world.

WHAT IS A CREDIT UNION?

A credit union is a cooperative self-help thrift and credit association. It is organized by members of a particular group-for instance, people working for the same employer; people who belong to the same fraternal order, church, or labor union; or, people who live in the same community. Membership is open to all in the group regardless of race, color, or creed.

Credit unions are democratic: the members elect their own officers and committeemen and set policy for the credit union at the annual meeting. Members are encouraged to save regularly. From the accumulated savings, loans are made to members for any good purpose at low interest. Through their service credit unions raise the standard of living of their members and teach them how to use and control their own money. Education in democratic principles and procedures is one of the important contributions of credit unions.

CREDIT UNION NATIONAL ASSOCIATION

The Credit Union National Association (CUNA) was organized in 1934 as a dues-supported association of credit unions in the United States. In 1940 it became an international organization when the credit unions of Canada and the United States joined together. In 1946, membership was expanded to include credit unions throughout the Western Hemisphere, and from 1950 on, credit unions from anywhere in the world have been eligible for membership in CUNA. Ever since CUNA was formed 26 years ago, appeals have flowed to it for advice and assistance in the establishment of credit unions overseas. In 1954, our World Extension Department was set up with the specific goal of encouraging the formation of independent sound credit unions in all countries, and thus helping to contribute to the economic growth and general well-being of people

overseas.

In the past 7 years, approximately 3,000 credit unions have been organized either directly or indirectly through the efforts of our World Extension Department. Credit unions now flourish in the Far East, Africa, the Caribbean, Central and South America, as well as New South Wales in Australia.

LATIN AMERICAN SITUATION

Particular emphasis is now being placed on the formation of credit unions in Latin America, with concrete programs projected or underway in Venezuela, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Panama, Ecuador, Bolivia, Argentina, Chile, and Peru. Aside from the traditional pawnshops, legal credit for personal use is practically nonexistent in most Latin American countries. Bank credit is not available to workers. Under these circumstances, a good portion of the personal loans come from illegal moneylenders who charge fantastic rates of interest. Rates of 20 percent per week or 1,040 percent per year are very common.

On the savings side, there are some thrift organizations, principally in large cities. These banks, however, do not carry out an active program for promoting savings among the small farmer or employee. Moreover, most small towns do not have banking services of any kind. Obviously, credit unions have a great opportunity before them. Some 800 credit unions are already functioning in Latin America.

To many it may seem a mystery how a credit union can exist and serve people in developing countries with an average annual income of under $100, for example. The answer is very simple:

Where people can save maybe a penny a week, even a penny every 2 weeks, the capital will, of course, be proportionately low. However, so will the size of the early loans made. A loan might be given for the equivalent of a couple of dollars to buy an iron hoe, to purchase a fish net, or a large loan of some $15 to $20 might be granted to buy a share in a cow or an ox cooperatively with other members.

HOW CREDIT UNIONS AID PERUVIAN VILLAGE

An excellent illustration of the operation of a credit union in a less-privileged land is the Cooperativa de Ahorro y Credito Parroquia San Juan Limitada, located in Puno, Peru, and which was brought into being through the CUNA world extension program.

The per capita annual income in Puno is estimated to be about $100 a year. Before the credit union was organized in April 1955 very little saving took place in Puno. The few productive loans that were granted came from usurious moneylenders charging extremely high interest which made it almost impossible for the small businesses to make a go of their enterprises.

Just 4 years later, a financial statement from this credit union indicated assets of 8 million soles ($350,000 U.S.). Five thousand loans for over $1 million (U.S.) had been granted with a loss of less than one-tenth of 1 percent of total loan volume. This growth took place during 2 years of serious drought and in spite of inflation that caused the Peruvian sol to go from 16 soles to the dollar in 1955 to about 28 to the dollar in 1959.

Loans ranged in character from 75,000 soles to develop a mine to 1,500 soles to buy a bull for plowing or 300 soles to bury a parent. Credit union financing made it possible for Puno to retain permanently the only X-ray machine in the city and the second in the state, and also to obtain an electrocardiogram machine.

It has extended credit to the owners of more than 500 dwellings in Puno, and is completely financing 72 families who have joined together in a model housing development. In 1955 there was only one taxicab in the town. Today there are 20 taxicabs, all financed by the credit union. In 1955 there was no bus service in Juno, today four buses, all financed by the credit union, operate on a regular schedule.

An Indian member had an idea for making sandals out of old automobile tires. The credit union loaned him enough money to get started and now Puno has a new industry. The credit union's largest individual loan so far for approximately $7,000 (U.S.) recently helped set up another industry in Puno for the development of animal serums and vaccines. Another member asked for a loan of 30,000 soles to invest in coffee. He got the loan because the previous year he had borrowed 8,000 soles for the same purpose, paid according to schedule, and now wanted to expand.

It should be emphasized that all of the capital of this credit union came from the savings of the members. The rapid accumulation of capital demonstrated that, not only was it possible for people with an income of less than $100 a year to save regularly in small amounts, but also that hoarded and hidden capital was brought to the credit union by people who, through the educational program of the credit union, learned to have confidence in it.

One can multiply many times over in other villages, in other lands, what the Puno credit union has managed to do in 5 short years by way of transforming the life of that little community and creating an atmosphere for further growth and development, uncongenial to the threat of communism. Everywhere that credit unions have been introduced, desperate and confused people are discovering that there is no limit to what they, no matter how poor, can achieve by working together.

CUNA'S ORGANIZATIONAL TECHNIQUE

With a staff of about five persons (two based at headquarters in Madison, Wis., and three field representatives based in Mexico City. Manila, and the Caribbean) and an annual budget of about $80,000, the Credit Union National Association's World Extension Department must depend principally on volunteer workers in various countries.

Throughout the years, our staff has developed an effective method of organization by the use of study clubs to provide a solid educational basis. Staff personnel and volunteer workers trained by the staff conduct seminars giving specific emphasis to the mechanical operation of a credit union and to the understanding of the role of the credit union in the development of the community.

Many groups where illiteracy is high, particularly in Latin America, have been successfully dealt with.

In educating these people a pyramid technique is used whereby the staff member or the volunteer specialist throughly instructs a group of 5 to 10 good leaders who, in turn, teach similar groups until the whole membership and potential membership thoroughly understand what will take place when the credit union is organized.

Our program has stressed the training of volunteer leaders. In addition to numerous week-long conferences and weekend seminars, the department has sponsored, with other agencies interested in self-help programs, international and regional conferences on credit union operations. Two permanent credit union training centers located in Peru and the Fiji Islands have also begun to function. These training centers should have great influence on the development of credit unions in South America and the Pacific. Visual aid materials, pamphlets, and study outlines easily adaptable to any country or any economic level have been created in a number of languages.

The demand for CUNA's technical assistance overseas is literally inexhaustible. We are hopeful that the means will be found to accelerate and expand this program so that many thousands more may become skilled in the techniques of credit union leadership. To this end, we constantly seek to cooperate with voluntary and government agencies having like objectives and parallel programs.

CONCLUSION

We believe our success in extending the credit union idea to so many lands in so short a span provides interesting proof of what can be done with limited resources to plant the seed of economic self-help among the needy and dispossessed. It is not our contention that ours is the only answer to the problems of human misery and social injustice. But we do suggest that in the credit union there exists a proven and practical instrument of economic betterment generally adaptable to any people or place.

Moreover, we hold that when less fortunate men understand that by pooling their meager resources they can pull themselves up, so to speak, by the bootstraps, then the credit union idea has accomplished something much more than providing a convenient place to save and borrow. It has proven to these people that they can make decisions for themselves and run their own democratic institutions without help from the outside. Confidently, they can take pride in their credit union because it belongs to them and because through its simple workings they earn the promise of a brighter and more secure tomorrow.

STATEMENT OF THE AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE ON S. 1983

The American Jewish Committee, founded in 1906, is the pioneer human relations agency in this country, combating bigotry, protecting the civil and religious rights of Jews here and abroad, and advancing the cause of human relations everywhere.

The Government of the United States has always regarded the protection of the essential rights and liberties of its citizens as its prime responsibility. Until recently, the conduct of America's foreign relations reflected firm commitment to this position; it was known throughout the world that actions impairing the dignity and equal rights of Americans, for whatever reason and in whatever land, would not be tolerated by the United States.

Of late, however, alarming departures have been noted. Most of the countries affiliated with the Arab League' have been permitted to impose discriminatory measures which interfere with the rights of Americans.

The purpose of these measures, which are part of a boycott against Israel, is not germane to the present discussion. Regardless of intent, it is in effect a boycott against Americans. This is the overriding fact.

To weigh the impact in terms of inconvenience would miss the crux of the matter. For even if the disadvantage suffered by Americans were negligible, there would still remain a loss which no self-respecting nation can affordthe loss of integrity and prestige incurred by submissiveness to affronts.

1 The Arab League consists of 10 countries: Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, the Sudan, Tunisia, United Arab Republic, and Yemen.

That our Government is pursuing a course degrading to the dignity of the United States transcends all other issues and requires close scrutiny by the American people.

Study of the situation reveals four main findings:

1. The Arab League nations have invaded American rights. They have blacklisted American citizens whose travel routes, religious beliefs, or personal opinions do not conform with Arab League dictates. Agents of Arab governments operating on American soil have promoted discriminatory practices which are unlawful in many of our States. Americans subjected to these indignities include citizens of all faiths.

2. Our Government has accommodated itself to these and similar measures, even to the extent of yielding to Arab bias in contracts for foreign-aid shipments and in personnel assignments to Arab territory.

3. The accommodation of our Government to intrustions upon its sovereignty and discriminatory abuses visited upon its citizens is without justification in American law or tradition.

4. Protests and other critical pronouncements of representative bodies-the Congress of the United States, the legislatures of several States, the Republican and Democratic Parties-have not resulted in remedial action by our Federal Government.

These, in brief, are the facts. They point to the urgent need for informed public discussion and firm public insistence that our Government immediately reassert the principles of morality and law that have guided American foreign policy and protected American rights in the past.

At its initiation in 1951, the Arab League boycott was applied to companies with branches in Israel or otherwise doing business there, and firms and individuals engaging in trade or commerce with that country. Since then, the scope of the boycott has been vastly extended. Specific terms of the regulations, made known piecemeal for several years, were not officially published until 1958. Today, procedures of intimidation and discrimination directed from offices in Damascus, Syria (United Arab Republic), and the Sheikdom of Kuwait, and applied in varying degree by Arab League governments, include:

1. Blacklisting many American companies having Americans of the Jewish faith among their officers, owners, directors, or even personnel.

2. Refusing visas to American citizens of the Jewish faith and forbidding them to disembark in some Arab League countries.

3. Preventing American servicemen and civilian employees of the Jewish faith from serving at an airbase built in an Arab country with American funds and maintained by the United States.

Our Government, like many others, asserts that it opposes these acts. We have also committed ourselves to aid the economic development of all countries of the Middle East, including Israel.1

Thus, American citizens find themselves subjected to measures instituted by foreign powers in contravention of U.S. policy. Moreover, since the boycott is partially prosecuted in this country, we are confronted with a situation in which American principles are flouted by representatives of foreign governments on American soil.

In some cases, companies doing no business in Israel are nevertheless subject to the boycott if their management personnel includes Jews. This policy has been in effect since 1956. On March 5 of that year Foreign Commerce Weekly, published by the U.S. Department of Commerce, contained the following report: "Saudi Arabia intends to boycott all Jewish or Jewish-directed firms from trading with that country, according to information received by the Bureau of Foreign Commerce.

"This new policy greatly extends the provisions of the existing boycott against firms having branches, assembly plants, or general agents in Israel, as well as firms having shares in Israeli companies.

"Implementation of the new policy normally will be accomplished by Saudi Arabian consulates, who are responsible for legalization of commercial invoices and certificates of origin."

1 Sec. 142 of the Mutual Security Act of 1954, as amended, provides that assistance shall not be furnished to any nation unless such nation has agreed to "join in promoting international understanding and good will, and maintaining world peace: take such action as may be mutually agreed upon to eliminate causes of international tension. *

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