Memorandum Concerning the Recommendations of the White House Conference on International Cooperation

Memorandum for the Heads of Departments and Agencies

SUBJECT: Follow-up on the work of the White House Conference on International Cooperation

We in the United States set aside the year 1965 as International Cooperation Year (ICY) to be spent in search of new ways of cooperation among nations. To encourage that search, I called the White House Conference on International Cooperation, which met in Washington November 28 to December 1. That Conference was built on months of preparatory work by the ICY Cabinet Committee, which I had earlier formed, and the National Citizens' Commission. At the Conference itself some 5,000 Americans took part in discussing the reports of 30 panels of the National Citizens' Commission.

Now we in the Government are wall advanced in following up many of these recommendations. In fact, a number of them are already before the Congress. Others are headed that way or are under review for other forms of implementation. A few we have found unworkable now. But all must enjoy the constructive review which the Secretary of State, the Vice President and I promised.

To finish that review, I am appointing a White House committee this summer to oversee the final analysis in the context of preparing the FY 1968 Budget and legislative program. The Director, Bureau of the Budget, will serve as Chairman. He will be assisted by my Special Assistants, Mr. Rostow and Mr. Califano, and a private individual who was active in the work of the Conference. I ask you all to cooperate fully with them.

When the committee has finished its review, the Director, Bureau of the Budget, will give me a final report. Meanwhile, I have asked it to send to the National Citizens' Commission and each Chairman of a Citizens' Panel an appropriate letter outlining its plans for the review.

Equally important products of the Conference were the new channels of cooperation opened between experts in and out of government. I am determined that our government in its normal course of business continue to take advantage of the best thinking among our citizens. Therefore, I request each of you to encourage each Government Committee Chairman in your department or agency to carry on whatever contact with his citizen counterpart helpfully enlarges the scope of our own thinking. I am also asking the White House committee to report on the degree to which it has been possible to make this sort of contact a continuing and useful part of your regular business.

LYNDON B. JOHNSON