Speech #940116833

But in another sense. the closerelative criterion provides a selfenforcing mechanism. We cannot police what happens all over the world. but close relatives living in the United States can easily monitor what is happening to their families in nonmarket countries. They have the strong motivation to do so. and they can set in motion the necessary pressures to allow the person involved to emigrate. But its implementation really depends upon the amount of moral force that we apply. We cannot sidestep the issue every time commercial interests see a chance to make a few dollars at the expense of freedom. or when ideologues who demand detente at the expense of freedom see a chance to make major concessions for political reasons. That is why it is very disturbing to see that the very first time the trade act is used for a nonmarket country. the President of the United States chose to exercise his power to waive sections 402 and 409. The waiver. as my colleagues will recall. was written in as a socalled compromise so that the President could implement trade agreements if he determined that progress was being made to the goal of free emigration. even though free emigration had not yet been achieved in actuality. It was because of the waiver on section 402 that I offered section 409 as a minimum position. If we could not get the whole pie without a waiver. then we should at least get privileges for close relatives of Americans without a waiver. In other words. we could accept promises and hopes for the larger group consisting of all who wished to emigrate. but we should demand hard concessions for close relatives of Americans. Unfortunately. in a parliamentary maneuver taken without informing me. section 409 was brought under the waiver also. contrary to the intention of the Senate in passing 409. and as a consequence a major step forward was lost. It is very discouraging that the President saw fit to use the waiver on the very first time that our determination was tested. As the Members of this body are aware. the Presidential determination that a waiver was in the best interests of the Nation was sent down without any significant performance at all on the part of the Socialist Republic of Romania to remove harassment from those wishing to emigrate. This happened when it appeared that the treaty might fail because many Senators objected to Romanias emigration performance. When the future of the agreement came into doubt. the administration postponed its testimony before the Finance Committee for a month. while Romania hurriedly granted a great number of exit permits. Mr.