Speech #830100560

Mr. Chairman. as the Members will recall. in the 80th Congress I was chairman of a special subcommittee of the Foreign Affairs Committee for displaced persons which made an intensive study of displaced persons camps and refugee problems in Europe. I had with me various Members of Congress. including one frcm the Judiciary Committee. the gentleman from Kentucky . also the gentleman from New York . and Dr. Pfeiffer. of New York. of the Foreign Affairs Committee. also that fine administrative assistant of the Judiciary Committee. immigration and naturalization subcommittee. Mr. Walter Besterman. We went to more than 150 displaced persons camps and made a thorough study of the problem. This year I again went to Europe with the gentleman from Pennsylvania and the gentleman from Oregon . I spent almost 5 weeks. much of that time in checking the refugee camps in West Berlin and Western Germany. so that I have seen personally the fine kind of people in the camps in March and April of this year. I have also seen the screening that is being done to make sure that these are not Communists that are coming over. We Americans do have a responsibility if we wish to aid many freedomloving people escaping from oppression. For example. I talked to two young refugees from Prague. who were in their late teens. They were former normal school or high school students and they had been out one day on a picnic. when down came a large balloon with pamphlets on it sent out by Radio Free Europe. These high school studerts thought the messages were fine. they told them of the benefits of freedom.