Speech #930160904

I believe that we should act upon that section and the entire bill this week. Critics of title IV have properly expressed their concern with the relationship between this section and the numerous disconcerting policies of its chief beneficiarythe Soviet Union. However. by relating any trade concessions for the Soviets to freedom of emigration. it is possible to strongly encourage the liberalization within Russian society that we all desire. In this manner the choice is clearly left up to the Kremlin leaders whether they want nondiscriminatory trade treatmentmostfavored nation statusmore than they need the continued confinement of their people. By virtue of placing a progressive head tax this past year on each individual leaving their country. the Soviets explicitly sought to use people as an exportable commodity. Though suspended after extreme pressure from the rest of the world. the law remains on the books ready for reimplementation. If such laws are to be permanently abolished and other restraints upon the people are to be removed. then we must vigorously encourage the Soviet leaders to move in this direction. Thus if we are to allow material goods to pass freely across international boundaries. then we should certainly require that human beings be allowed at least an equal opportunity in their ability to move. The Soviet Union does not currently enjoy mostfavorednation status and might decide that lifting their embargo on people represents too great a threat to their closed society to warrant the benefits accruing from freer trade. Under the bill before us only the extension of mostfavorednation status is dependent upon a prior acknowledgement of the right of emigration. Consequently. we must also prohibit the extension of credits to the Soviet Union unless there is a similar guarantee of freedom of emigration. The Soviet Union needs access to our sources of credit far more than access to our markets. In fact. if the Soviet Union continues to restrict emigration and their products are denied access to American markets. then the demand for credit may rise even higher than it might have otherwise. Even with their limited trade with the Western nations. the Soviet Union amassed a $1.3 billion trade deficit in 1972 and a cumulative foreign debt of $8.5 billion. Both figures are expected to rise substantially by the end of this year.