Speech #800189047

Austria. and Italy by the Axis countries for their war purposes. Presumably the committee had in mind that we should feel a responsibility only for those who were brought in by force by the Axis countries. to work for them during the war. Apparently the framers of the pending bill felt there should be a distinction between those forcibly brought in and those refugees who came in voluntarily because of persecution or fear of persecution. Even if such a distinction were defensible. which I submit it is not. in light of the way the whole situation has developed. it would not be achieved by the earlier datethat is. by December 22. 1945. This is because of the fact that a great number of persons now present in the camps came in voluntarily prior to December 22. 1945. as refugees fleeing before the advance of the Russian armies. If we try to decide between those who were forcibly brought in and those who came in because of fear. we do not arrive at a clear distinction. because prior to December 1945 there were many who fled because of the Russian armies. Since there was no registration as of December 22. 1945and a moment ago I pointed out that the registration has been made as of the later date 6f April 22. 1947it is now impossible to distinguish between those voluntary refugees and those who were forcibly brought into Germany for warproduction purposes. But beyond this point. the earlier date of December 1945 would exclude other refugees who. for the same reasons. fled into the same areas between December 1945 and the critical date of April 1947 from Yugoslavia. Hungary. Rumania. and Poland. all of whom were accepted and treated by our armies on the same basis as those who had been taken care of prior to December 1945. The people who came into our zones because they would not accept the control of their countries by foreign dictators. were accepted by our camps until April 21. 1947. and I can see no logical reason for treating them differently from those who came in prior to December 22. . I submit. therefore. the date of December 22. 1945. contained in the bill has no official standing. but does not accomplish what apparently was its purpose of distinguishing between classes of displaced personsthat is. those forcibly brought in and the refugees who fled for fear of. persecutionand leads to unnecessary difficulties and confusion in administration. It would be very difficult to make such a distinction in light of the fact that our cataloging brings us down to April 21. 1947. and I refer to both our own catalog and the IRO catalog. Those persons have been very carefully screened and cataloged for whatever disposition is made by means of our legislation or any other legislation for dealing with this problem.